400: When her cancer ...
Herb ’n’ Lorna, Chapter 20 continues
When her cancer was diagnosed, Lorna told no one, but something about her manner, a finality in the way she began to handle her affairs, in her visits to old friends, convinced Ella that something was fatally wrong, and because cancer was what Ella feared most, she guessed, correctly, that that was it.
Mark and Margot and Martha visited Lorna. Ella had told them what she feared and made them promise not to betray to Lorna in any way what she had told them. They found themselves, against their wills, looking for and finding signs that Lorna was weakening. Was she thinner? Was she fragile? Was she too tired? Was she having trouble breathing? Yes, she was. She was eager to hear their news, but it seemed that they didn’t have enough news to fill the time they spent with her, certainly not enough to fill the hollow in the house. The news they had brought was gone too soon, like firewood that’s too dry. After an hour or so, Lorna began to drift into reminiscence. The three M’s loved hearing her stories, and they would have listened contentedly for hours, would have asked for more, would have asked the questions they were curious about, if they hadn’t worried that the reminiscences were painful for her, that perhaps it hurt her to have Herb come to mind. The truth was that Herb was always on her mind, and that reminiscing about him was more pleasant than painful. Not having him with her was what hurt her; remembering him didn’t hurt her at all.
Mark drove to the Gilded Peacock and brought back cartons of chicken chow mein. While they ate, Lorna recalled their visit to Punta Cachazuda, and the fricasseed-chicken dinner at which Margot had announced their engagement. When Lorna began talking about that dinner she sat up straighter, and her spirit seemed to return to her. Soon she was even laughing. This wasn’t just the feeble laughter she’d managed earlier in the evening, but real laughter, laughter that betrayed her illness when it made her breathless, but a joy to hear despite that.
“Poor Herb,” she said. “I remember the way he tried to go on with the speech he’d practiced and give you the gift we’d made.” She laughed again, and ran out of breath again. “You can’t imagine what we went through to make that.”
Her expression became serious. She put down her fork. She put her elbows on the table and laced her fingers together. “Tell me something,” she said. “Tell me how it’s working out. Are you happy?”
“Are we happy?” Mark asked.
“Are — all three of you happy? Martha, you haven’t married. I wonder — I wonder if I know why. What — how — how do the three of you — get along?”
“Oh, very well,” said Martha. “We get along beautifully together.”
“But — how?” asked Lorna. “I want to hear all about it.”
“Well — ” said Mark, sheepishly, looking into his plate.
“You remember the night when you told Herb and me that you three were in love, don’t you?”
“Of course,” said Mark.
“You told us everything then.”
“I was a little drunk.”
“You’re a little drunk now, aren’t you?”
“Just a little.”
“I’ll tell,” said Margot.
“Me too,” said Martha.
Together, the three of them managed to tell Lorna what sort of life had evolved for them. Shyness, coupled with the youthful assumption that the experiences of the old have been too limited for them to understand young lust, kept them from telling her quite everything, but they told her most of it.
[to be continued on Monday, December 12, 2022]
In Topical Guide 400, Mark Dorset considers Food: International Cuisines in Translation: Chinese: Chow Mein from this episode.
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