Sophie's Choice - William Styron [125]
“He telephoned me this morning at work,” she explained, “at Dr. Blackstock’s, and said he wanted to have lunch with me. He wanted to tell me something. His voice sounded so excited, I just couldn’t imagine what it was. He was calling from his laboratory, and it was so unusual, you see, Stingo, because we almost never have lunch together. We are working so far away from each other. Besides, Nathan says we see so much of each other that having lunch together is maybe a little... de trop. Anyway, he called this morning and insisted in this very excited voice, and so we met in this Italian restaurant near Lafayette Square, where we had been together last year when we first met. Oh, Nathan was just wild with excitement! I thought he had a fever. And when we ate lunch he started to tell me what had happened. Listen to this, Stingo. He said that this morning he and his team—this research team—have make the final breakthrough they were hoping for. He said they were right upon the edge of the final discovery. Oh, Nathan could not eat he was so full of joy! And you know, Stingo, while Nathan was telling me these things I remember that it was right at this same table a year ago that he first told me about his work. He said what he was doing was a secret. What it was precisely he could not reveal, even to me. But I remember this—I remember him telling me that if it was successful it would end up being one of the greatest medical advances of all time. Those were his exact words, Stingo. He said that it wasn’t his work alone, there were others. But he was very proud of his own contribution. And then he said it again: one of the greatest medical advances of all time! He said it would win the Nobel Prize!”
She paused and I saw that her own face was rosy with excitement. “God, Sophie,” I said, “that’s just wonderful. What do you think it is? Didn’t he give you any hint at all?”
“No, he said he would have to wait until tonight. He could not tell me the secret at lunch, just that they had make the breakthrough. There is this great secrecy in the companies that make drugs like Pfizer, that is why Nathan is sometimes so mysterious. But I understand.”
“You’d think a few hours wouldn’t make any difference,” I said. I felt a frustrating impatience.
“Yes, but he said that it does. Anyway, Stingo, we’ll know what it is very soon. Isn’t it incredible, isn’t it formidable?” She squeezed my hand until my fingertips went numb.
It’s cancer, I thought all during Sophie’s little soliloquy. I had really begun to burst with happiness and pride, sharing Sophie’s own radiant exuberance. It’s a cure for cancer, I kept thinking; that unbelievable son of a bitch, that scientific genius whom I am privileged to call a friend has discovered a cure for cancer. I signaled to the bartender for more beer. A fucking cure for cancer!
But just at this instant, it seemed to me, Sophie’s mood underwent a subtly disturbing change. The excitement, the high spirits fled her and a note of concern—of apprehension—stole into her voice. It was as if she were affixing a gloomy and unpleasant afterthought to a letter which had been all the more factitiously