Bel Canto(15)

No one on the floor raised a hand and the conclusion was that no doctors were present. But that wasn’t true. Dr. Gomez was lying in the back, almost to the dining room, and his wife was stabbing him sharply in the ribs with two red lacquered fingernails. He had given up his practice years ago to become a hospital administrator. When was the last time he had sewn a man up? In his days of practice he had been a pulmonologist. Certainly he had not run a needle through skin since his residency. He was probably no more qualified to do a decent job than his wife, who at least kept a canvas of petit point going all the time. Without taking a single stitch he saw how the whole thing would unravel: there would be an infection, certainly; they would not bring in the necessary antibiotics; later the wound would have to be opened, drained, resewn. Right there on the Vice President’s face. He shuddered at the thought of it. It would not go well. People would blame him. There would be publicity later. A doctor, the head of the hospital, killing a man perhaps, even though no one could say it was his fault. He felt his hands shaking. He was only lying there and still his hands trembled against his chest. What hands were these to sew a man’s face, to leave a scar for which they would both become known? And then there was this girl descending the staircase with her basket, looking so much like hope itself. She was an angel! He had never been able to find such intelligent-looking girls to work on the hospital floors, such pretty girls who could keep their uniforms so clean.

“Get up there!” his wife hissed. “Or I’ll raise your arm for you.”

The doctor closed his eyes and gently wagged his head from side to side in a way that would attract no attention to himself. Whatever would happen would happen. The stitches would neither save the man nor kill him. That card was already played and there was nothing to do but wait and see the outcome.

Esmeralda handed the basket to Joachim Messner but she did not step away. Instead, she lifted the lid, which was lined in a padded rose-covered print, took a needle from the tomato-shaped cushion and a spool of black thread, and threaded the needle. She bit off the thread with a delicate snap and made a neat little knot at the end. All of the men, even the Generals, watched her as if she was doing something quite miraculous, something far beyond needles and thread that they could never have managed themselves. Then she reached into her skirt pocket and took out a bottle of rubbing alcohol into which she lowered the needle and bounced it up and down several times. Sterilization. And here she was a simple country girl. Nothing could have been as thoughtful. She pulled the needle up holding only the knot on the thread and extended it to Joachim Messner.

“Ah,” he said, taking the knot between his forefinger and thumb.

There was some discussion. First it was thought that they could both stand and then it seemed better for the Vice President to sit down and then best of all for him to lie down near a table lamp where the light was best. The two men were stalling, each dreading it more than the other. Messner rubbed his hands in alcohol three times. Iglesias was thinking he would rather be hit by the gun again. He lay down on the carpet away from his wife and children and Messner bent over him, leaning in and then blocking his own light, leaning back and turning the Vice President’s head one way and then the other. The Vice President tried to make himself think of something pleasant and so he thought of Esmeralda. It was really quite remarkable how she managed things. Perhaps his wife had taught her that, the concept of bacteria, the need to keep things clean. How lucky he was to have such a girl looking after his children. The blood no longer pulsed but it continued to seep, and Messner stopped to blot it away with a napkin. Considering the circumstances, the blaring messages pouring in through the windows, the constant on and off of sirens, the hostages stretched across the floor, the terrorists sleepy with their guns and knives, you would have thought that no one would care what became of Ruben Iglesias’s cheek, and yet the people craned their necks up like turtles to see what would happen next, to see the needle go down for that first stick.

“Five minutes is what you have left,” General Alfredo said.

Joachim Messner pinched the skin closed with his left hand and with his right put the needle in. Thinking that a quick movement would be kinder, he misjudged the thickness of the material at hand and drove the needle hard into the bone. Both men made a noise that was less than a scream, sharp but small, and Messner jerked the needle out again with some effort, leaving them exactly where they had started. Except that now the little hole was working up a drop of blood itself.

No one had asked for her but there was Esmeralda cleaning her hands. She had a look on her face the Vice President had seen her use with his children. They had tried at something and failed and she had let things go far enough. She took the needle and thread from Joachim Messner and bobbed it again in the alcohol. It was with great relief that he moved aside. He did not care about her intentions or qualifications, he only watched her as she bent beside the light.

Ruben Iglesias thought her face was kind in the beatific manner of saints, even though she was not exactly smiling. He was grateful for her serious brown eyes, which were now just inches from his own. He would not close his eyes, no matter how great the temptation. He knew that he would never again see such concentration and compassion focused on his face even if he were to survive this ordeal and live to be a hundred. When the needle came towards him he held still and breathed in the grassy smell of her hair. He did feel like a button that had come undone, a pair of child’s trousers spread across her warm lap that she sewed in the evening. It was not so bad. He was simply one more thing for Esmeralda to put together again, something else in need of repair. It hurt, the little needle. He did not like to see it pass before his eye. He did not like the small tug at the end of every stitch that made him feel like a trout, caught. But he was grateful to be so close to this girl he saw every day. There she was on the lawn with his children, sitting on a sheet beneath a tree, pouring them tea in chipped cups, Marco on her lap, his daughters, Rosa and Imelda, holding dolls. There she was backing into the hallway, good night, good night, she says, no more water, go to sleep, close your eyes, good night. She was silent in her concentration and still the very thought of her voice made him relax, and though it hurt he knew he would be sorry when it was over, when her hip was no longer pressed against his waist. Then she was finished and she made another knot. Like a kiss she leaned down to him and bit the thread, her lips having no choice but to brush the seam her hands had made. He could hear the quick cutting of her teeth, the disconnection of what bound them, and then she sat up again. She ran her hand across the top of his head, a gift for what he had suffered. Pretty Esmeralda.