White Wind Blew (23 page)

Wind blew snow against the solarium screens, scattering pages of concert notes from Wolfgang’s podium. The choir barely broke stride, pausing only for a second when their choirmaster squatted to grab the first sheet from the floor. Wolfgang continued to conduct with his free hand, hopping and conducting like some deranged frog, all while keeping his eyes on the choir. Ever since Dr. Barker’s reluctant approval, they had been practicing with great enthusiasm.

He moved back to the podium, his face red, and his hair dotted with snowflakes. He mentioned canceling the rehearsal due to the inclement weather, but the choir wanted to hear nothing of the sort. They demanded to sing, and the musicians never once stopped performing, despite the numbness in their hands. Rufus must have heard them playing, because after only a few minutes into their first piece, he’d joined in, blowing his flute from down the hillside, practicing from afar as he’d been doing for weeks now.

Wolfgang conducted like an orator, his vision roaming the choir from side to side, leaving no one out. On each pass he made sure Susannah was in view. For two days he’d wanted to ask her about her clandestine visit to Dr. Barker’s house, but he feared upsetting her. Other than leaving him to walk the hillside alone that night, she’d acted no different around Wolfgang. She’d knocked on his door the very next morning as usual—her eyes a bit heavier than normal—and apologized for leaving without him the night before, although he’d noticed that she’d conveniently not offered any explanation. It was none of his business. That was her attitude, and that was how he’d left it—an irksome mystery.

Halfway through the rehearsal Wolfgang spotted Dr. Barker standing in the shadows at the end of the solarium porch. He stood there listening, watching. Spying. And then he was gone. After they finished a Haydn piece, Susannah stepped away from the choir, eyeing the spot where Dr. Barker had stood. “Did you see him watching?”

“I think he’s up to something.” Wolfgang watched Susannah carefully, wondering if she knew something more.

Susannah folded her arms. “He pulled the case files on all the musicians and choir members today.”

“What for?”

“I don’t know.” Susannah looked upward as a voice soared over the weather.

“My cakes… My cakes…”

“How long has he been carrying on?” asked Wolfgang.

Nurse Cleary came running across the solarium, panting and calling for Susannah. She’d taken on Rita’s hours in the mental ward and had been none too pleased about it. “It’s Herman,” she cried. “He’s going mad. I can’t take it anymore.”

Susannah brushed quickly beside Wolfgang. “You don’t have to come.”

“I don’t trust him.”

Susannah hurried to the stairwell, her feet pounding the steps in rapid motion, her hand gliding up the rail. Wolfgang had to hustle to keep up. When she reached the rooftop, she held on to her hat and never broke stride as she lowered her shoulders into the wall of wind that threatened to push them back down the steps.

“Susannah,” Herman shouted. “I want my cake! Bring me my cake! Susannah!”

Wolfgang could have strangled him. Susannah opened the door to the nurses’ station and stormed inside, fumbling for her keys. She quickly unlocked Room 502. “My Lord, Herman. What is wrong with you?”

Herman sat cross-legged on the floor beneath his window, yelling through the screen. He looked up when Susannah entered. He was fully clothed this time. Benson’s bulk was concealed on the bed but unmoving beneath the covers. Wolfgang wondered how he could even breathe under there. No wonder Benson had been at Waverly for five years. He breathed his own diseased air all the time.

Herman unfolded his long legs and braced his hands on the wall to stand. He faced Susannah, his voice under control. “Nobody listens.” Tears welled in his eyes. “Nobody hears me.” He stepped closer to the doorway. “Nobody ever listens to me.”

“Stay back,” Wolfgang told him.

Susannah stepped in front. “He’s not a criminal, Wolf.”

Benson poked his head out from beneath the covers. “I can hear him. I can most certainly hear him. I ate my dog. They let him out, but I ate him. Rita’s feet…they dangled…” Benson ducked his head back beneath his turtle shell of blankets and stopped talking.

“I’m better than all of them,” Herman said. “Don’t you see?”

“Better at what?” Susannah asked.

Herman sat on his bed, defeated and tired. “I want my cake.”

Susannah sat bravely beside him. “What is it, Herman?” She lifted his hand and looked into his dark eyes. “Better at what?” Herman stared past Susannah at Wolfgang and then whispered something into her left ear. Susannah’s eyes widened and she spoke to Nurse Cleary, who stood behind Wolfgang in the doorway, panting. “Go to the kitchen and get me a cake. Any kind of cake.”

“But—”

“Just do it,” Susannah yelled. Nurse Cleary turned away, and seconds later the door to the nurses’ station flew open and slammed against the outside wall. Wolfgang closed it, but not before the wind had scattered the papers atop the desk in the center of the room. He left them where they landed and returned to Room 502, where Susannah continued to comfort Herman. Wolfgang couldn’t believe how she’d tamed the man. Well, yes, he did believe it. She had a way of controlling any man. And what had he whispered in her ear? How dare he get that close to her? And what was he talking about, “no one listens”? How could they not, as loud as he was?

“No one listens,” Herman said softly.

Susannah touched his shoulder. “We’ll listen, Herman.” Wolfgang saw a look of determination in Susannah’s eyes that wouldn’t be squashed by his fear and distrust of Herman. She stood from the bed and tugged on Herman’s elbow. Herman stood beside her, dwarfing her by at least a foot, the top of her head barely reaching his shoulders. She walked Herman out of Room 502 and into the body of the nurses’ station. She left him standing in the middle of the room while she hustled around to the back of the desk for a folding chair.

“Susannah,” Wolfgang said. “What on earth are you doing?” It was the same chair Rita had used to hang herself. Seeing it in her grip made him uneasy.

Susannah placed the chair behind Herman and told him to sit. He did, lowering his body slowly down to the small seat that creaked under his massive bulk. Susannah tied a towel around his neck. Not once did he ask what she was about to do to him, not even when she reached across the desk for a pair of scissors.

“Susannah?” Wolfgang said.

She gave him an annoyed look. “Relax, Wolf. I’m just going to cut his hair.”

“Cut his hair?” Wolfgang stared at the top of Herman’s head, where strands of hair stuck out at odd tangents like plant growth. “That could take days.”

Susannah rolled her eyes and worked like the barber she wasn’t. “He’s been ignored his entire life, I bet.” She lifted a tangled patch of Herman’s dirty brown and gray hair. Snip—the clump fell to the floor with a slight bounce. “But not anymore.” Herman stared straight ahead into Room 502 as if they weren’t discussing the man right in front of him. Susannah clipped another patch of hair.

Lincoln opened the door to the nurses’ station and stuck his head in. “Wolf, you better come down. It’s Frederick.”

Wolfgang looked at Susannah and then specifically to the scissors in her right hand. Herman was calm now, but Wolfgang didn’t trust him. The big man had bruised her before.

“Go, Wolf,” said Susannah. “I’ll be fine.”

Wolfgang turned and left. He trusted her.

***

Wolfgang found Frederick Helman in the middle of the fourth-floor hallway, on his stomach, his left cheek against the floor, his eyes facing the wall. Wolfgang knelt down and felt for a pulse at Frederick’s neck. He found one.

“You left him like this?” he asked Lincoln.

Lincoln squatted next to him. “Of course not. He was in his room, but he was crying hysterically.” Lincoln fingered the rim of his fedora. “He’s getting stronger. He was letting it out pretty good for just one lung.”

“What was it about?”

“Wouldn’t talk to me,” said Lincoln. “That’s why I came and got you.”

Wolfgang looked down the hallway toward Frederick’s room on the right. “Apparently in the time it took you to find me he’d made it this far on his own.” Wolfgang snaked his arms underneath Frederick’s torso. The poor young man was so slight compared to what he had weighed upon his arrival at Waverly. Lincoln helped Wolfgang by grabbing Frederick’s feet, and together they carried him back to his bed.

“What do you think he was trying to do?” asked Lincoln.

“See Mary Sue and the baby, no doubt.” Wolfgang propped a pillow on Frederick’s bed and gently settled his head down on it. He leaned down and listened to Frederick’s breathing with his stethoscope. “He is getting stronger.”

Frederick’s eyes opened. He looked up at Wolfgang and Lincoln and then, on his own, turned away from them and faced the wall.

Wolfgang touched Frederick’s head with an open hand, silently blessing him. “Rest now, my friend. I’ll come back and play for you later.”

Frederick didn’t respond.

In the hallway, Lincoln said, “He looked sad.”

“He must have learned the news.”

“What news?”

“Mary Sue and the baby are being released,” said Wolfgang. “She’s due to Make the Walk in the next few days.”

***

Wolfgang and Lincoln ran into Nurse Cleary on the stairs leading to the rooftop.

“Dr. Pike,” she shouted. “Come quickly.”

“What is it now?”

“Susannah, she—”

Wolfgang didn’t even hear her finish. All he could think about was the scissors slicing Susannah’s throat or the sharp blades piercing her chest. His heart raced so quickly he feared it would jump from his rib cage. He sprinted to the stairwell and took the steps two and three at a time, ignoring the pain that shot down his right leg with every step, unable to block out the horrible visions that assaulted his mind. He could see her now, lying on the floor in a pool of blood, the scissors sticking from her slender neck. He hated himself for trusting her, for leaving her alone with Herman. He hit the rooftop with a wild burst of speed, lunging with his left foot while dragging his right. A pig snorted near the doorway to the nurses’ station. Wolfgang gave it only a second’s glance—why the hell was it up on the rooftop?—before he rushed inside.

“Susannah!”

“What is it, Wolf?” Susannah smiled at him. She stood with her arms folded, leaning against the desk. A man sat in the chair, young and handsome, with trimmed hair and neat beard; Wolfgang blinked. It took him a moment to realize…

“Doesn’t he look great?” she said.

Wolfgang nodded like an idiot. Herman’s face was long, his jaw sculpted, his cheekbones high beneath dark eyes. Wolfgang touched his own beard and wondered, given the choice and a razor, if Susannah would have shaved his as well? Herman looked at Wolfgang and grinned. In his right hand he tightly clutched a fork. Before him, resting on a small rounded table, was an entire chocolate cake Nurse Cleary must have retrieved from the kitchen. A good chunk of it had already been eaten. A tall glass of milk stood next to it. Herman took another bite of cake and washed it down with a loud gulp of milk.

Nurse Cleary stepped inside. “Well, what do you think?”

“I think you should have told me that everything was okay.”

“Relax,” said Susannah.

“You ran before I had the chance,” said Nurse Cleary.

Wolfgang stepped closer to Herman. “He looks like a new man.”

“No, about the surprise,” Nurse Cleary said.

Wolfgang looked at Susannah. “What surprise?”

Susannah laughed. “Herman. Show Dr. Pike what you’re better at than the others.”

Herman scooted his chair back from the table and stood, slowly, dramatically. It seemed to take forever for his long frame to unfold from the chair and straighten, but he faced Wolfgang with a military alertness.

Then he cleared his throat and began to sing.

Wolfgang’s knees buckled. Susannah hurried over to him. He couldn’t believe his ears. This giant lunatic sang an aria from Mozart’s
Magic
Flute
with one of the strongest, deepest voices Wolfgang had ever heard, the sound resonating from the unseen cavern inside the man’s massive chest.

Wolfgang’s choir had been missing its bass for weeks.

Now God had sent him.

***

They wasted no time hurrying Herman down to the fourth floor, where McVain was in bed, eyes closed. Susannah skipped her way down the solarium, stopping at the piano with a playful hop. Herman waited patiently with a fork clutched in his right hand. Wolfgang struck one of the piano keys and McVain’s eyes snapped open. He sat up in bed, staring at Herman’s towering figure. McVain’s jaw dropped when Herman began an aria from
Don
Giovanni
. He easily had the best voice of the entire chorus, barely hampered by the tuberculosis. McVain nearly broke into a grin.

Susannah rubbed her hands together joyfully. Herman stopped abruptly and stood as stiff as a board, staring over McVain’s piano toward the bed, fork in hand.

Wolfgang, too, looked to McVain for a verdict. They all did.

McVain craned his head for a better look. “What’s with the fork?”

***

Wolfgang walked Susannah home that night, wondering every step if she would veer off in the direction of his cottage and decide to sleep on his couch again. Or would she venture up to Dr. Barker’s residence after he dropped her off? They continued toward the nurses’ dormitory.
As
it
should
be,
he thought, relieved and disappointed at the same time.

“I knew there was something hiding inside of him,” Susannah said.

“And the fork?” Wolfgang asked.

“Herman spent ten years singing opera in Italy.” Susannah was in a playful mood, stepping carefully over twigs that had fallen on the footpath, maneuvering in a way that reminded Wolfgang of how he used to avoid the cracks on the sidewalk on his way through Central Park as a kid. “After his girlfriend left him for a baker, he stabbed the baker with a fork, half a dozen times, claiming, get this”—she slapped Wolfgang on the shoulder—“claiming that he’d stolen his cake.”