Turning Back the Sun(10)

Only Miriam was not there. Again and again he scrutinized the platform for her. The doors were clunking shut all along the train. The men clasped his hands. Then, at last, he realized that she would not come, and understood. Among this crowd of friends, the gap that she created—her inability to endure this last farewell—was more eloquent than any words she might have spoken. None of the others mentioned her. It was as if they conspired in the knowledge that her presence would be unbearable.

For months afterwards he imagined her face as an oval gap in that platform crowd. He could not bear to write, and nor did she. After a year she had retreated to a cell somewhere in the back of his memory, and he slipped into the arms of the girl who sold cheap scarves on the town”s mall.





CHAPTER

5

The partition wall in Rayner”s clinic gave out a relentless thudding, as if someone were beating it with his fist. From the far side he heard the voice of his colleague Leszek, raised in anxiety. But the thudding went on like a threatened heartbeat, and beneath it the voice of a man: “I want to know. I have the right to know.”

Rayner tried to concentrate on his own patient, a four-month-old baby who had spewed up all night, his mother said. The woman”s voice was gravelly, suspicious. The baby had not been registered. The thudding next door continued, but the talking had died. His examination cleared the baby, but disclosed quinsy in the mother. The thudding rose to a crescendo. There was a noise of splintered glass.

When he flung open his door onto the reception area he saw the usual listless quadrangle of patients, sitting on quilts against the walls, waiting. But in his partner”s room a coarse, heavy-built man hovered tempestuously above the examination couch, where a broken glass had fallen or been dashed from somebody”s hand. His fist still belabored the wall, but it was impossible to tell if he were threatening or protecting the woman who lay there. She stared at the ceiling with a face of abject tiredness.

Leszek looked at Rayner with open relief, and turned to the man. “This is my partner. He will give you a second opinion.” His voice trembled. “Really, I can”t say anything more, because I simply don”t know. We will have to carry out tests.”

“Tests?” The man looked as if he were being cheated. “What in hell can they tell you that you don”t know already?”

Leszek took off his glasses as if he no longer wanted to see. He touched Rayner”s shoulder. “The patient complains of intermittent fever and lassitude. I”ve carried out my examination, and taken a blood sample. There”s nothing obviously wrong. The patient has a skin discoloration, which is causing her husband concern. She”s noticed it for six weeks …”

Rayner leaned over to examine her. The husband”s stare dug into the back of his neck. She was one of those townswomen whose faces had outrun their bodies, leaving her features lined and sallow above a still young figure. Her arms were crossed over her breasts in embarrassment. She whispered, “It”s disgusting.”

Rayner eased her hands to her sides, then stifled his surprise. Between her breasts and out from her armpits spread a dark pigmentation which he”d never seen before. It looked like liquid chocolate. Its edges ended abruptly, leaving nothing between itself and the whiteness of the normal skin.

He did not know what to say. It did not look like a fungal disease, but he asked, “Have you felt any irritation?” The woman was silent. “Does it itch?”

The husband said, “Of course it itches.”

“Let her answer.” Rayner excluded him with his back.

But the woman only echoed wanly, “Of course it itches.”

No wonder, Rayner thought. Either she or her husband had lacerated its whole surface, as if with sandpaper. “You should have left this alone.”

“How could I?” The husband barged in beside him. “Look at it. Look at it!”

Rayner was growing angry. “Did you think it would come off, or what? Now will you let me complete my examination?”

But there was nothing left to examine. Leszek had smeared the rash with gentian violet, but Rayner felt sure now that it was not fungal. He did not know what it was. He imagined it must spring from some hormonal imbalance, or be the benign result of nerve-cell tumors. But it did not resemble anything in his experience.

The man said, “Well?”

“I”ve got nothing to add,” Rayner said. “We”ll await tests.” The woman sat up shakily, pulling on her dress. “Once we”ve established the cause, your skin will return to normal with treatment.”

“Who the fuck are you telling?” The man”s fists were flailing at his sides. “That disease isn”t curable, is it? Are you saying you can change it back to white? You come clean with me, doctor, that”s the savage disease, isn”t it?” He rammed his kepi back on his head and glared at the woman. “That”s one fucking low disease.”

Rayner turned on him. “Who says it”s a savage”s disease? Where did you hear that?”

The man said, “It”s around town. It”s spreading.”

What was spreading, Rayner wondered, the disease or the fallacy of its origin? He said, “This is the first case I”ve seen.”

“Well I”ve heard of others.” The man pushed his wife away from him. “Another woman … two other women. And d”you know why they don”t report it? Because they”ve been going with them, that”s why.”