Coma

During lunch Bellows found the opportunity to corner Chandler. The chief resident had reiterated what Bellows already knew—namely, that Stark was really uptight about the drugs.

“The whole Goddamned thing is ridiculous,” said Bellows. “Has Stark talked with Walters yet to get me off the hook?”

“I haven’t even talked with Walters,” said Chandler. “I went into the OR

area to talk with him but he hasn’t shown up today. Nobody has seen him all day.”

“Walters?” Bellows was greatly surprised. “He hasn’t missed a day here in a quarter of a century.”

“What can I tell you? He’s not here.”

Bellows responded to this information by going up to the personnel office to get Walters’s home phone number. It turned out that Walters did not have a telephone. Bellows had to be satisfied with an address: 1833 Stewart Street, Roxbury.

By one-thirty Bellows was very much on edge. Another call to the OR

desk confirmed the fact that Walters still had not appeared, and Bellows made a decision. He decided that he would take the time and make the effort to go and visit Walters. It was the only way that he could think of to extricate himself immediately from the drug affair. It wasn’t all that difficult a decision,- although it was very irregular for Bellows to leave the hospital in the middle of the day. But Bellows had the distressing feeling that over the last forty-eight hours his comfortable and promising position at the Memorial had been put in jeopardy. As he saw it, he had two problems: the first, the drug problem, was simple, because he knew that he was not involved and that all he had to do was to establish that fact; the second problem, Susan and her so-called project, was something else.

Bellows managed to foist his medical students off on Dr. Larry Beard, a grandson of the Beard wing benefactor. Then, with his beeper on his belt, the operators notified, and a fellow resident by the name of Norris willing to cover for an hour, Bellows slipped out of the hospital at one-thirty-seven, and flagged a cab.

“Stewart Street, Roxbury? You sure about that?” The taxi driver’s face contorted into a questioning, disdainful expression when Bellows gave his destination.

“Number 1833,” added Bellows.

“It’s your money!”

With dirty steaming piles of snow pushed aside here and there, the city looked particularly depressing. It was raining almost as hard as it had been when Bellows had walked to work in the morning. Very few people were visible along the route the driver took. The peculiar, uninhabited look of the city recalled the deserted cities of the Mayans. It was as if things had gotten so bad that everyone decided to just close their doors and leave.

As the cab penetrated Roxbury deeper and deeper, the city got worse.

Their route took them down through a disintegrating warehouse area, then through decaying slums. The mid-thirties temperature, the relentless rain, and the rotting snow made it that much more depressing.

Finally the cab pulled to the right and Bellows leaned forward, catching sight of the street sign for Stewart Street. At the same time the right front wheel descended into a pothole filled with rain water and the bottom of the front part of the cab crashed against the pavement. The driver swore and threw the steering wheel to the right to avoid the same hole with the rear tire. But the rear of the car slammed down and then lurched upward with a shudder. Bellows’s head hit the ceiling hard enough to hurt.

“Sorry, but you wanted Stewart Street!”

Rubbing his head, Bellows looked out at the numbers: 1831, and then 1833. After paying the fare, he stepped out and closed the door. The cab raced off, weaving its way between the potholes and turning off as soon as possible. Bellows watched it disappear from sight, wishing that he had told the driver to wait. Then he looked around, thankful that the rain had stopped. There were several gutted hulks of automobiles with everything of even questionable value removed. There were no other cars parked on the grim street, or moving, for that matter. There were no people in sight either. When Bellows looked up at the row house in front of him, he realized it was deserted, most of the windows boarded up.

Then he looked at the surrounding houses. All were the same. Most were boarded up; any windows exposed were smashed.

A torn sign nailed to the front door said that the building was condemned and owned by the BHA, the Boston Housing Authority. The date on the sign was 1971. It was another Boston project that had got completely fouled up.

Bellows was perplexed. Walters had no phone, and this seemed a phony address. Remembering Walters’s appearance, it didn’t seem so surprising.

Curiosity made Bellows mount the stairs to read the BHA sign. There was another smaller sign saying “No Trespassing” and that the police had the premises under surveillance.