Act of God

cut, and things to drink and eat, but not at restaurant like Grgo’s.”
    “Many people from Value Furniture lose their jobs?” Smoke wended out his nostrils in two wispy strands. “Enough.”
    “Any of them angry at Mr. Rivkind?”
    “I don’t think so. Nobody can be angry at him. He was good man, good to all.”
    “Somebody didn’t think so.”
    “Then it is somebody don’t know him. At his funeral, I think of all the things I learn Catholic in Croatia , good things to say about dead person. But it is Jewish funeral, so I don’t think it is right to say them. In Zagreb , a friend of mine from school, he was Greek, and I go to his father’s funeral when he die. I am nine, ten years, but I remember my friend tell me what the people say. When it is time to put coffin into ground, they say, ‘The earth that fed you now will eat you.’ ”
    Christ. “Did you say that?”
    “No. But I think this.” Grgo Radja stubbed out the cigar. “Funny thing to think for man who own restaurant, I tell you.”

15

    Like Radiology, the department I wanted was below the lobby. One wing of the basement had painters doing touch-up work, the sign MAGNETIC RESONANCE IMAGING/AMBULATORY PATIENTS temporarily propped against a pillar.
    Inside the doorway was a waiting area with a receptionist sitting behind a desk. Putting down the Lawrence Block paperback I’d been carrying since the last visit, I gave my plastic hospital card to her, and she used a machine to stamp it through several self-carboned forms. With a pencil she handed me, I filled out a “yes/no” information sheet that seemed interested mainly in whether I had any shrapnel or other metal parts in my body.
    An attendant who introduced herself as Maureen came through a set of doors and led me into a locker room with a wooden bench flanked by classy new lockers and dented old ones. Looking at the new ones, Maureen said, “These are from Italy . Paid a fortune for them, but guess what?”
    She had an accent like a friend of mine in the army who’d grown up near Milwaukee . “What?”
    “The company over there shipped the things without keys.”
    “You’re kidding?”
    “ Uh-unh. That’s why we have to use these old ones.” She pointed me toward the dented lockers, which looked like they’d been salvaged from a high school gym just before demolition.
    Removing the key for Number 16, I said, “Are you from Wisconsin by any chance?”
    “No, upstate New York , outside Buffalo .”
    “Sorry, it’s just—”
    “I know. We sound like Wisconsin , and we never lose our accent no matter where we move to.”
    I got the feeling she thought I was nervous and was trying to make me feel better, so I just nodded.
    “Okay, Mr. Cuddy, please take off all your clothes except briefs and socks. Put on one of these outfits back to front and step through that door when you’re done.”
    “Thanks.”
    I stripped and put on the johnny coat and, a new one on me, johnny pants. There were also plastic envelopes that folded inside out to form something like slippers for your feet. When I was finished, I picked up my book and key and went through the door.
    Maureen was waiting on the other side. “Let me take those from you. You won’t be able to read, and the key doesn’t work so well inside the chamber.”
    Chamber.
    We went into a large room. There was very little in the way of furnishings beyond a big metal cylinder like an iron lung from the fifties and a fancy gurney table in front of it. “Please sit on the end of the table.”
    When I did, Maureen used a strip of cloth maybe six feet long to bind my shoulders back. I suddenly had a vision from Saigon during the Tet Offensive, suspected Vietcong, on their knees in the street, their arms bound behind them at the elbow, causing them to arch forward, like—
    “Am I hurting you?” said Maureen.
    “No.”
    “You just grimaced, and I was afraid—”
    “No, thanks. I’m okay.”
    “Good. Now, please scoot back so you’re able to be flat on the table facing the ceiling. A little more... good. Now just lie still, please.”
    I did. Maureen padded my left elbow and taped a circular ring like a juggler might use on my left shoulder, as though my shoulder were my head and the ring a straw hat. Then a triangular foam support was wedged under my calves and restraints strapped across my waist.
    She said, “I’m going to slide you in now.”
    “Be sure to notice whether it’s a boy or a girl.”
    A nice smile.