Hidden Jewel Read online

  Our tragedy was just getting under way.

  To see Pierre without Jean at his side was like looking at someone who’d had a limb removed. He always looked incomplete; so it was understandable that he would fall into a state of shock, perhaps even deeper and more intense than the shock Mommy was feeling. The doctors examined him. They thought he would snap out of it after a while. They advised us to take him home and pay him as much attention as possible. Daddy had carried his one twin son into the hospital, and he had to carry the other out. We drove back to the château as if we were already in Jean’s funeral procession. Mommy lay back, her head against the side of the car. I sat with my arm around Pierre, holding him beside me and whispering words of comfort in his ear. Daddy was mechanical, going through the motions of what had to be done. He carried Pierre into the château, and I helped Mommy. Daddy put Pierre to bed, but we weren’t going to stay there. Daddy had the servants get our things together quickly, and he called ahead and had our doctor waiting at the New Orleans house. Then he made the arrangements for the transfer of Jean’s body to the funeral parlor. I was at his side, ready to help him with anything, but he wanted me to concentrate on Pierre, who still hadn’t snapped out of his semiconscious state. When it was time to leave, he had to be carried to the car, where he lay limp against me all the way to New Orleans. Mommy was collapsed in the front seat, her eyes shut to keep out the reality.

  Nothing travels as fast as bad news. We weren’t home an hour before the phones began to ring. Daddy had to call Europe to tell Grandpa and Grandma Andreas what had happened. As usual, they had gone to the Riviera for the summer. Grandma Andreas told Daddy that Grandpa was too sick to travel home for the funeral. He had suffered a stroke the year before.

  The doctor had given Mommy a sedative. He examined Pierre and thought he would snap out of his shock soon. Following the doctor’s orders, I tried to get him to eat something, drink something; but he wouldn’t open his mouth. I began to fear that the doctors at the hospital and our doctor might have underestimated the intensity of his emotional trauma.

  The air of gloom that had permeated our house before we went to the country was nothing compared to what followed. Death had made a camp in our dark corners; it moved proudly and freely through the corridors, dimming every light, fading every color, making every flower droop, and painting our windows with a gray tint so that no matter how much sunshine fell from the blue sky above, it looked like rain to us. People spoke only in whispers and lifted their feet so their footsteps were barely audible. The servants glided in and out of rooms to do their work and then hovered together in the kitchen or the pantry to console each other. The ticking of clocks began to sound like thunder.

  Later in the day Daddy gathered all his inner strength to greet people in his study and finalize the arrangements for Jean’s funeral. In the dim lamplight, he looked ashen and gray, like a man who had aged decades in minutes. Early in the evening, just after one of his business associates left, I entered his study. He was sitting back in his desk chair, staring blankly at the opposite wall. He didn’t seem to notice me.

  “Daddy,” I said.

  He turned to me as in a dream. His dark eyes shone, full of tears. “Yes, Pearl.”

  “It’s about Pierre, Daddy. He’s not improving. He hasn’t eaten anything since … since the hospital. He won’t even sip water.”

  “He’s blaming himself,” Daddy said, shaking his head. Then he pounded his chest with his closed fist so hard that I winced. “I am the one to blame,” he declared.

  I hurried to his side and put my hand on his shoulder. “Of course you’re not, Daddy. No one’s to blame.”

  “I wanted us to go there. I pushed for it,” he moaned, his voice cracking.

  “But, Daddy, sooner or later we would have gone there anyway. You can’t blame yourself. It was a horrible, horrible accident.”

  “Accident,” he said bitterly. His chin quivered. “I warned them; I told them not to wander off, didn’t I?”

  “Yes, Daddy. Stop blaming yourself. Mommy’s upstairs wrenching her heart with blame, and Pierre has fallen into a serious coma because he blames himself. Jean simply shouldn’t have gone into the water.”

  “He was just a young boy, still a child,” Daddy protested. “It was my job to take care of him, watch over him, protect him. I failed. I failed miserably,” he said and closed his eyes. He looked as if he might keep them shut forever.

  “Daddy, I’m afraid for Pierre. We’ve got to do something. Call the doctor back.”

  Daddy opened his eyes slowly and stared at me as if my words were taking hours to enter his brain. “You think it’s that serious?”

  “He’ll be dehydrated. I think he’s even running a fever.”

  “Oh, no. I’ll lose both of them,” he said and stood up. He nodded after his own thoughts. “I’d better pay some attention to him and stop wallowing in my own tragedy,” he added and started out. I followed him up the stairs to Pierre’s room.

  Pierre hadn’t moved a muscle since I had last been beside him. His eyes were open, but so empty it was as if I could see through them, down the long corridor, into the blackness of his closed-down mind. Daddy went to the bed and sat beside Pierre, taking his hand into his.

  “Pierre, you’ve got to snap out of this and help us, help Mommy. You must eat and drink something. It wasn’t your fault. You tried to keep Jean from going into the water. Come on, Pierre,” Daddy pleaded. Pierre didn’t even blink. “Pierre.” Daddy touched his cheek. “Come on, son. Please,” he begged. Pierre’s eyes remained turned inward. Suddenly he grimaced as if in great pain. And then he made a horrible guttural noise that frightened Daddy and me. Daddy retreated with surprise and stood up. “What’s wrong with him? Why is he doing that?”

  “I think he’s reliving the tragedy,” I guessed.

  “Pierre, stop it. Stop it,” Daddy ordered. He shook him by the shoulders. Pierre’s expression didn’t change, but the horrible sound ended. Daddy released him and turned to me. “I’d better call the doctor, as you say, Pearl.”

  “Go on, Daddy. I’ll stay with him,” I said.

  Daddy left the room.

  I sat on the bed and took Pierre’s hand in mine, stroking it gently.

  “Poor Pierre,” I said. “You had to see such a terrible thing, but you can’t blame yourself. It wasn’t your fault.”

  I lifted my eyes to his face and saw the beginning of a single tear as it crawled over his eyelid and made its slow zigzag journey down his cheek to his chin. Incredibly, that was it, only one tear; as if he had cried all the others inside and had nothing more left to show. I leaned over and wiped the solitary tear away.

  “Won’t you try to drink some water, Pierre? Please. For me. Please,” I begged. His lips didn’t move, and his eyes remained as cold and hard as chips of turquoise. I sighed and held his hand and spoke to him softly until I was exhausted with the effort. Then I heard the door open and saw Mommy standing there, her hair down, her face streaked with her own dried tears, her skin waxen. She was in her nightgown, but wore no slippers.

  “What’s wrong with him?” she asked in a voice stripped of emotion. She sounded like someone who had been mesmerized and was speaking under a spell, but she seemed finally to realize there was something the matter with Pierre.

  “He won’t drink or eat anything. His expression hasn’t changed since we returned, nor has he moved. He’s in a catatonic state, Mommy. I told Daddy to call the doctor.”

  “Mon Dieu,” she said. “What have I done?”

  “Mommy, please. It doesn’t do anyone any good if you blame yourself. Look what it’s doing to Pierre.” I turned to him. “I’m sure he’s blaming himself.”

  “My baby,” she said and moved forward to embrace him. She sat on the bed and took him in her arms, but he was like a rag doll, his head wagging, his eyes frozen, his limbs lifeless. She rocked with him and tried to soothe him, but he didn’t respond. The realization struck her, and she lowered him to
the pillow, an expression of shock and fear in her face.

  “What can we do, Pearl?” she cried.

  “The doctor will be here any minute, Mommy, but I think Pierre’s going to have to go to the hospital. They’ll have to put him on an I.V. until he returns.”

  “Returns?” she asked. “From where?”

  “From his own sanctuary, his place of escape, a place where what’s happened is not a reality.”

  “How long could this last?” she asked, looking at him. I was afraid to tell her what I knew. I had read of people who had gone into a catatonic state for years because of some emotional trauma. Some of them never emerged, and some, when they emerged, were dramatically different because they had regressed into childhood.

  “He’ll snap out of it soon, Mommy, but he needs medical attention,” I replied.

  “Yes, of course, you’re right.” She put her hand on my cheek gently and smiled. “You’re my big girl. I’m going to depend on you for so much now, Pearl. It’s not fair, I know. You should be able to enjoy these years and not be weighed down by so much hardship and misery. I had hoped your life would be different from mine. I had hoped …” She paused, her lips quivering.

  “I’ll be all right, Mommy.”

  She looked at Pierre again. “The twins were so close. Even as babies when one would cry, the other would, too, and when one woke up, the other was soon to wake up as well. Jean started to walk before Pierre did, you know.”

  “I remember, Mommy.”

  “But even though he could, he still crawled because Pierre crawled. One never wanted to leave the other too far behind. Now …” She closed her eyes. I put my arm around her, and we cried and comforted each other for a few moments. Finally the doctor arrived, and Daddy brought him up to Pierre. We all stood back and watched him examine my brother, noting the way his pupils dilated, checking his pulse, listening to his heart and lungs.

  “We should put him into the hospital, monsieur,” he told Daddy. “I’d like him to be under the care of a psychiatrist too.”

  Daddy swallowed hard. Mommy started to sob softly.

  “I’ll make the arrangements,” the doctor said. “If I may use the phone.”

  “Come down to my study,” Daddy said.

  “I’ll get him ready,” I offered quickly.

  “He’ll be so frightened,” Mommy moaned.

  I dressed Pierre in his bathrobe and slippers and put together some of the things I knew he would need, things I prayed he would soon need. Mommy went to get dressed. Soon afterward Daddy carried poor Pierre to the car again and we were off to put him in the hospital.

  He looked so much smaller when he was dressed in a hospital gown and put in a hospital bed; and when they inserted the I.V. in his arm, the seriousness of what was happening to him struck both Mommy and Daddy at the center of their hearts. Daddy embraced her, and they stood together watching as the nurse and the doctor attended to him.

  Because the nurses knew me, they were more concerned and sympathetic. The psychiatrist who was called in was a Dr. LeFevre. She was in her early sixties with fading light brown hair. I knew of her, but I had rarely seen her and never talked to her before. She interviewed Daddy first to learn about the circumstances and then went in to examine Pierre. After her initial examination, she spoke to Daddy, Mommy, and me in the hallway. She was a soft-spoken woman, but her demeanor was authoritative and confident.

  “Your son is suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder,” she began. “After the experience you’ve described,” she said to Daddy, “it’s quite understandable. It’s not unlike what some combat veterans experience. In the profession we sometimes refer to this as emotional anesthesia. He’s turning himself off, in a sense, to keep from suffering.”

  “How long …”

  “I think we’ll bring him out of it soon, but I must warn you, he’ll need serious therapy, maybe for some time. Something like this could leave him with severe depression and anxiety. We could find he experiences chronic headaches, has difficulty with his concentration … Of course, we have to wait and see. In the meantime, we’ll see that he’s well looked after.” She turned to me. “Why do you look so familiar to me?”

  “I work here,” I said. “I’m a nurse’s aide.”

  “Oh, yes. I’ve heard good things about you. Well, I’ll examine Pierre again tomorrow. Call me in the late afternoon.”

  “Thank you, Doctor,” Daddy said.

  Mommy wanted to stay with Pierre a while longer. Some of the friends I had made working at the hospital came over to speak to me and offer condolences when they heard what had happened. Jack Weller wasn’t on duty. I was happy that I didn’t have to confront him at this terribly emotional moment. Mommy just sat in a chair staring at Pierre. Finally Daddy forced her to get up to go home. We had hard days waiting for us. He knew she needed some rest.

  “I’ll be here with him every possible moment, Mommy,” I promised. She smiled, looked back at Pierre’s pathetic face, still frozen in a bland expression, and then she permitted Daddy to lead her out and to the car.

  The house was too quiet that night. I slept in short cycles, waking with a start and listening, hoping for the sound of my brothers doing some mischief, hoping that all that had happened had been only a nightmare. But there was nothing but the ticking of my clock and the gong of the grandfather clock downstairs. It echoed through the hallways, telling me we were that much closer to Jean’s funeral. I buried my face in my pillow to smother the tears, but every time I closed my eyes, I saw Jean’s face, mischievous, happy, full of life and promise.

  At the break of day, unable to sleep, I rose, dressed, and went downstairs to discover that Daddy had risen during the night. He had his head down on his desk and was asleep from emotional exhaustion. Beside him on his right was a recent picture of the twins, and on his left was a nearly empty bottle of bourbon. I didn’t have the heart to wake him. I simply slipped out quietly and closed the door. Then I went to see about some breakfast for Mommy and the start of what I knew would be the worst week of our lives.

  So many people attended Jean’s funeral that the crowd of mourners spilled out of the church door and down the steps onto the sidewalk. A few of my school friends were there, but I didn’t see Claude. I knew Catherine had gone on a holiday with her family and wouldn’t find out about Jean until she returned. Mommy, somewhat sedated, moved in a dreamlike state, her face sculptured in a tight grimace that sometimes appeared like an angelic smile but told me of the deep pain she was feeling from her toes to her head and into the very essence of her soul. By now everyone knew how Pierre’s condition compounded our tragedy. He was still hooked to an I.V., still catatonic.

  After the church service, the procession wound its way to the cemetery. I recalled Jean’s and Pierre’s questions about the vaults—what we in New Orleans call the burial ovens—built above ground because of the water table. What had once been a place of intrigue and curiosity to Jean would now serve as his home and resting place.

  Daddy and Mommy clung tightly to each other. Most of the time, Daddy was holding Mommy up, her legs moving like the legs of a marionette on a string. I remained as close to her as I could, ready to embrace her myself if she started to topple. At the gravesite, the three of us embraced. I don’t think any of us actually heard the priest’s words. There was just the morbid rhythm of his voice reciting the prayers. He showered the holy water on Jean’s casket and finally said “Amen.”

  I barely had raised my eyes higher than Mommy’s and Daddy’s faces all day, so I wasn’t aware of the blue sky. To me it was a totally overcast day with only a slight breeze.

  As we turned to walk back to our limousine, I saw Sophie standing under a tree. She was grinding the tears out of her eyes with her small fist, but the sight of her gave me a boost and helped me manage the journey home.

  Mommy went right to bed. Daddy sat on the sofa in the sitting room greeting people and sipping from a tumbler of bourbon. As soon as I had the opportunity,
I called the hospital, hoping Pierre had begun his recovery. We so desperately needed a morsel of good news, but his condition remained unchanged.

  I decided I had to go to him, that a full day without any of us at his side was unacceptable, even though it was Jean’s funeral day. I whispered my intentions to Daddy, who just nodded. He was numb with grief and unaware of what was happening around him.

  At the hospital I met Dr. LeFevre in the hallway. She had just been in to see Pierre. “I’m going to move Pierre to the psychiatric unit,” she said. “His recovery is going to take longer than I first anticipated. The emotional wound goes deep. I gather he and Jean were very close.”

  “Inseparable,” I said, “and very protective of each other.”

  “Well, I know it’s a difficult time for you and your parents, but try to give him as much time as you can. Just hearing your voice, feeling you beside him, will help reassure him and make his recovery that much more likely,” she added. I didn’t like the way her eyes shifted away from me.

  “Do you think he will recover? I mean, will he be all right?”

  “We’ll see,” she said in a noncommittal tone and walked off.

  I put my chair as close to Pierre’s bed as I could and sat holding his free hand. He stared ahead, blinking, his lips slightly open. I stroked his hand and spoke softly to him.

  “You’ve got to try to get better, Pierre. Mommy and Daddy desperately need you to get better. I need you. Jean wouldn’t want you to be like this. He would want you to help Mommy and Daddy. Please try, Pierre.”

  I sat there, waiting, watching. Except for the reflexive movement of his eyelids, he was like a statue made of human skin and bones. His ears and his eyes had brought him shocking, horrible information, and he had shut them down as a result, locking out any further details. Somewhere inside himself he was safe; he was playing with Jean; he could hear Jean’s voice and see him. He didn’t want to hear my voice, for my voice would shatter the illusion like thin china, and the shards would stab him in his heart forever and ever.