Ordinary Decent Criminals by Lionel Shriver

Author:Lionel Shriver
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780008134785
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2015-08-11T16:00:00+00:00

chapter sixteen

The House in Castlecaulfield

Had Farrell been a product, Estrin would have returned him.

“I’ve never seen you turn down a glass of wine,” she observed dolefully. He reached constantly for his inhaler, but it wasn’t helping; the cough was worse than ever, his handkerchief heavy and yellow. His forehead trickled like the windowpanes outside, and it was pouring.

Reading him as a man who would balk at hospitals, she was alarmed when he didn’t put up a fight. At a glance he looked seventy-five. With no raincoat, Estrin draped the old man in a tarp; clutching the streaked sheet to his middle and cowling his damp gray hair, Farrell looked biblical, but out of those new-fangled churches with banners and teak—a modern-day Jesus in plastic and slapdash slashes of paint. Only the face was Middle Ages—flat, white, and harrowing. The eyes were empty. When she moved him outside he went soft and obedient in her hands; it was gross.

When he whimpered where were they going and Estrin said the Royal, just around the corner, she could as well have said plague hospital. “City!” Farrell gasped, and though City was a longer ride, she wouldn’t argue. She propped him on the bike and said hold on, but hadn’t meant like that; Farrell squeezed her chest until they both couldn’t breathe.

“O’Phelan!”

Nurses scurried. Estrin had prepared herself for the six-hour wait of U.S. emergency rooms, but they took care of everyone in short order and Farrell right away. Estrin stood trailing the tarp, feeling that hopeful uselessness particular to waiting rooms. She importuned to stick with him; surprisingly they said yes.

His temperature was 104. A nurse said she was sorry but they’d have to take a blood gas, and Estrin didn’t understand why the woman apologized until the needle went in his wrist and for the first time in hours Farrell returned to his eyes. They shot black. He inhaled quickly and clogged. That was all. The nurse stood back with her syringe full, nodding at Farrell appreciatively. “Haven’t I seen stagers bawl like babies. He’s a hard one, your man.”

Estrin was grateful for “your man,” even if it was only an expression.

Farrell was careened into X-ray in an oxygen mask. Presently a doctor called Estrin in to view the film—both lobes were overcast. The lungs looked so small, translucent wings darkened by storm cloud. Oddly, she recognized him. Farrell was so thin that even under radiation he didn’t look much different. And she’d know those close, sharp shoulders anywhere. There was something about his sheer narrowness that melted her, a boy hunched in the back of a classroom, hoping not to be called on.

“Overdoing it as usual?”

Farrell rasped, sucking a last sip through a straw.

“There’s no doubt you should have kicked it, old boy.” The doctor slapped Farrell’s shoulder like the withers of a sturdy horse. “But sure we’ll prop you up one more time. Pneumonia again.”

When Farrell heard the word pneumonia, he nestled his wiry head of hair into the pillow with the finality of So.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.