The Studs Lonigan Trilogy - James T. Farrell [408]
“He’s not as restless as he was when I telephoned you, Doctor.”
“In a case like this, there is not much to do. We must let Nature take its course and hope for the best.”
He again looked at the patient and saw the blueness around the mouth, heard the grunting breathing, and Studs mumbled inarticulately.
“You gave him digitalis?” the doctor asked.
The nurse shook her head.
“He has rales, and a great deal of congestion. What we must watch for is cardiac failure. I’m afraid the heart is going to give us trouble, and I’ll leave a prescription for strychnine. It had better be administered at once.”
“Yes, Doctor.”
“If he survives, I’ll be greatly surprised.”
“He seems to have been losing steadily all day.”
“Well, we might as well do what we can and make him more comfortable,” the doctor said.
He and the nurse bathed the patient’s limp, thin body by giving him an alcohol rub. The patient was set face down-ward again. He drew irregular breaths with a small clicking noise, and uttered feeble moans, and then a wailing, sad cry. The doctor looked meditatively at Studs, closed his case, left the room, meeting the shaken mother in the parlor.
“Doctor, how is he?”
“In such cases, Mary, it’s difficult to say. Nature must take its course. All we can do is hope for the best and trust to the will of God. We’ll do all we can and the rest is not in our hands.”
“Oh, Doctor, I know it. I know it. He’s going to die. I was told it last night in a vision.”
“Now, Mary,” Dr. O’Donnell said gently, patting Mrs. Lonigan’s shoulders, “you must wait and be prepared. There is no use jumping to conclusions.”
“Doctor, I’m his mother. Tell me the truth.”
“There’s a great deal of congestion, and naturally the pneumonia infection has sapped his strength. The pulse is bad, and the heart action is unsatisfactory. The greatest danger in a case like this is heart failure with complications, so I’m leaving a prescription to be filled.”
“I knew it, Doctor. Oh, my son, my son,” Mrs. Lonigan said, looking confused while Or. O’Donnell wrote out and handed her a prescription blank.
“Now, Mary, you must bear up. It’s not lost yet,” Dr. O’Donnell said, patting her shoulders.
“Doctor, isn’t there anything else we can do?”
“Well, I could put him in an oxygen tent which would make his breathing easier and help clear up the blueness of his lips and face. But that would be very expensive. If you can afford it, it would be good.”
“I’ll talk to Patrick, and he will telephone you. Patrick has just taken a bad blow, you know, Doctor, the day my son came home to me sick, and cried like a little boy, `Mom, put me to bed,’ that very day Patrick’s bank closed and he’s lost a lot of money, the money he had for the next mortgage payment on our building. Oh, Doctor, it’s hard times indeed. That such misfortunes should be visited upon us in our last years!”
“It’s sometimes for the best, Mary, so you must buck up! Tell Paddy to telephone me at six o’clock and we’ll talk about that oxygen tent.”
“Doctor, I have called the priest.”
“That was wise, Mary. In cases like these, it is best not to wait too long, particularly since you know the patient’s heart is weak and his illness is putting a severe strain upon it. Yes, that was wise, and it might be helpful. The hand of God in a case like this is likely to be of more help than us doctors.”
“Yes, Doctor,” she said, sighing, then facing him speechless.
“The nurse will keep me informed by telephone of Bill’s condition, and you’ll have Paddy telephone me at six so I can talk to him about an oxygen tent. Now, Mary, you’re a brave mother, and I can vouch for it because I tended you when you brought your children into the world. I know you are going to keep up your spirits. You look tired yourself, and I’d advise you to take a rest.”
“Oh, Doctor, I can’t. I can’t!”
“Mary, don’t say you can’t. You just go lie down and take a rest.”
The doctor returned to the sick room, spoke to the nurse, and took his hat from the hall tree.
“Now, Mary, don’t forget. No worrying from you,” he said.
Puffing, he walked downstairs.
V