Dark Benediction

“Hey, Slade,” a voice called. “They’re coming after Mary.” Norris stood aside to let John hurry toward his wife. Most of the crowd stopped milling about to watch Dr. Georges, a nurse, and an attendant coming from a rear door to take charge of Mary.

“Stop! Stop right there!”

The voice came from near the front entrance. It was a choked and hoarse gasp of sound, not loud, but somehow penetrating enough to command the room. Norris glanced aside during the sudden lull to see the thin-lipped woman threading her way through the crowd, and the crowd folded back to clear a way. The farther she walked, the quieter the room, and Norris suddenly realized that somehow the center of the room was almost clear of people so that he could see Mary and John and the medics standing near the delivery room door. They had turned to stare at the intruder. Georges’ mouth fell open slightly. He spoke in a low voice, but the room was suddenly silent enough so that Norris could hear.

“Why, Sarah—what’re you doing here?”

The woman stopped six feet away from him. She pulled out a small parcel and reached it toward him. “This is for you,” she croaked.

When Georges did not advance to take it, she threw it at his feet. “Open it!” she commanded.

Norris expected him to snort and tell the attendants to toss the nutty old dame out. Instead, he stooped, very slowly, keeping his eyes on the woman, and picked up the bundle.

“Unwrap it!” she hissed when he paused.

His hands fumbled with it, but his eyes never left her face. The package came open. Georges glanced down. He dropped it quickly to the floor.

“An amputated—”

Chubby mouth gaping, he stared at the gaunt woman. “My Primrose had a black cowlick in her tail!”

The doctor swallowed and continued to stare.

“Where is my Primrose?”

The woman had her hand in her purse. The doctor retreated a step.

“Where is my baby?”

“Really, Sarah, there was nothing to do but—”

Her hand brought a heavy automatic out of the purse. It wavered and moved uncertainly, too weighty for her scrawny wrist and arm. The room was suddenly a scramble and a babble.

“You killed my baby!”

“The first shot ricocheted from the ceiling and shattered a window,” said the television announcer. “The second shot went into the wall. The third shot struck Doctor Georges in the back of the head as he ran toward the delivery room door. He died instantly. Mrs. Glubbes fled from the room before any of the guests could stop her, and a dragnet is now combing…”

Norris shuddered and looked away from the television screen that revealed the present state of the reception room where they had been not more than two hours ago. He turned off the set, nervously lit a cigaret, and glanced at Anne who sat staring at nothing on the other end of the sofa.

“How do you feel?” he murmured.

She looked at him dumbly, shook her head. Norris got up, paced to the magazine rack, thumbed idly through its contents, glanced back at her nervously, walked to the window, stood smoking and staring toward the street for a time, moved to the piano, glanced back at her nervously again, tried to play a few bars of Beethoven’s Fifth with one finger, hit a foul note after the opening ta-ta-ta-taaaahh, grunted a curse, banged a crashing discord with his fist, and leaned forward with a sigh to press his forehead against the music rack and close his eyes.

“Don’t blame yourself, Terry,” she said softly.

“If I hadn’t let him have that impounded newt, it wouldn’t have happened.”

She thought that over briefly. “And if my maternal grandfather hadn’t lied to his wife back in 2013, I would never have been born.”

“Why not?”

“Because if he’d told her the truth, she’d have up and left him, and Mother wouldn’t have been born.”

“Oh. Nevertheless—”

“Nevertheless nothing!” She shook herself out of the blue mood. “You come here, Terry Norris!”

He came, and there was comfort in holding her. She was prepared to blame the world all right, but he was in the world, and a part of it, and so was she. And there was no sharing of guilt, but only the whole weight of it on the shoulders of each of them. He thought of the Delmont case, and the way Franklin talked casually of slaughtering five hundred K-99s just to be sure, and how he continued to hate Franklin’s guts for no apparent reason. Franklin was not a pleasant fellow, to be sure, but he had done nothing to Norris personally. He wondered if he hated what Franklin represented, but directed the hate at Franklin’s person because he, Norris, represented it too. Franklin, however, liked the world as he found it, and was glad to help keep it that way.

If I think something’s wrong with the set-up, but keep on being a part of it, then the wrongness is not part mine, he thought, it’s all mine, because I bought it.

“It’s hard to decide,” he murmured.

“What’s that, Terry?”

“Whether it’s all wrong, dead wrong—or whether it’s the best that can be done under the circumstances.”