Empty Mansions

where?
    Her first rule: no nursing homes. She told Dr. Newman that she didn’t want to go downtown to Beth Israel’s main hospital. She preferred to remain close to Madame Pierre on the Upper East Side. She sent her attorney and accountant to scour the city for other hospitals. Beth Israel officials did as Huguette asked, reaching out to those other hospitals to try to arrange a room for her. Huguette considered Mount Sinai, where her mother had died, up Fifth Avenue from her apartments. If she moved there, however, she would have to switch caregivers. Dr. Singman told her he “would have to discontinue my care for her” if she moved to Mount Sinai—it was too far from his home, he said. In fact, Mount Sinai is on the Upper East Side, the same as Doctors Hospital, and was only five minutes farther from his home in SoHo.
    Hadassah told her the same: If she went to Mount Sinai, she’d have to get a new team.
    The next day, she relented, agreeing to move down to the main Beth Israel hospital. She moved in July, just before Doctors Hospital closed. The next year, it was torn down to make way for multiple-story condo buildings.
    The medical records show that Huguette was anxious leading up to the move, but Hadassah talked her through it.
A MORNING OUTDOORS

 
    N OT ONCE in twenty years did Huguette take a walk or a ride in a wheelchair out to the parks near her hospital rooms. “We told her,” Hadassah said, “we can have some fresh air outside.… We have a wheelchair for you. Refused.” Her friend Madame Pierre said she urged Huguette to go out, but Huguette always changed the subject.
    Huguette went outside the hospital a few times to see doctors and dentists, especially in the early years. But she was mostly in excellent health and was able to get her teeth cleaned inside the hospital.
    Her last time outdoors was the day she transferred from the closing Doctors Hospital down to the main Beth Israel. It was a Tuesday morning, July 27, 2004, whenChris Sattler helped her into the ambulance for the five-mile trip from the Upper East Side. She didn’t take a long look at the old site of the Clark mansion or her apartments on Fifth Avenue or the Spence School. She didn’t see the Empire State Building or Central Park. She didn’t see a single bit of New York City on the fifteen-minute ride. The entire time, her eyes were covered, Chris said, by those big patches that patients wear after eye surgery.
    • • •
    In her chart on the day of the transfer, Dr. Singman summarized her for the staff at Beth Israel: “She is terribly insecure, and a hospital room is her home from whence she rarely leaves.” He added one more note: “At present patient not pleased with her new surroundings, and is considering leaving.”
    She didn’t leave, and now she had six nurses to watch over her. Hadassah cut back to an eight-hour shift, so more nurses were added. But because Huguette didn’t do well with new people—“She have to know you first,” Hadassah said—the nurses started doubling up, two per shift, so she would always see a familiar face if someone needed to leave early or take a day off.
    Huguette’s room no longer had a view of the river. Her new roomlooked out on apartment buildings. She talked about how much nicer Doctors Hospital had been, though her shades were drawn most of the time anyway. Her new room was larger, a double room, though occupied by one patient. It was on the tenth floor of the hospital’s main circular building, called Linsky.Room 10L04 was decorated in standard late-century hospital tans and browns: wood closet of cheap laminate, tile floor, sink, bathroom, standard hospital bed with curtain for privacy, schoolhouse wall clock, modern armchair, nightstand with three drawers, fluorescent lighting.
    Huguette had fewer visitors at Beth Israel than at Doctors. It was much farther from the apartment of Madame Pierre, who now visited only about every four to eight weeks. Though they still spoke on the phone every day, by 2005 Madame Pierre was showing the beginnings of Alzheimer’s, so their conversations became shorter.
    Despite having fewer visitors, over these years Huguette became more open with strangers, more conversant. As she passed her hundredth birthday, in 2006, she began to leave her door open more often. She allowed her attorney Bock to visit, as Don Wallace never could. She shared French pastries and childhood stories with the nurses and other staff.
    “She started