The Secret History - Donna Tartt [212]
“I don’t need a paramedic,” I said. Francis was repeating my name frantically at the other end.
“Here I am,” I said.
“Richard?” His voice was weak and breathy. “Who are you talking to? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Now listen to me—”
“Who said something about paramedic?”
“Nobody. Now listen. Listen,” I said, as he tried to talk over me. “Calm down. Tell me what’s wrong.”
“I want you to come over. I feel really bad. I think my heart just stopped beating for a moment. I—”
“Are drugs involved?” said Veronica in a confidential tone.
“Look,” I said to her, “I wish you’d be quiet and let me hear what this person is trying to say.”
“Richard?” said Francis. “Will you just come get me? Please?”
There was a brief silence.
“All right,” I said, “give me a few minutes,” and I hung up the phone.
At Francis’s apartment I found him dressed except for his shoes, lying on his bed. “Feel my pulse,” he said.
I did, to humor him. It was quick and strong. He lay there limply, eyelids fluttering. “What do you think is wrong with me?” he said.
“I don’t know,” I said. He was a bit flushed but he really didn’t look that bad. Still—though it would be insane, I knew, to mention it at that moment—it was possible that he had food poisoning or appendicitis or something.
“Do you think I should go into the hospital?”
“You tell me.”
He lay there a moment. “I don’t know. I really think I should,” he said.
“All right, then. If it’ll make you feel better. Come on. Sit up.”
He was not too ill to smoke in the car all the way to the hospital.
We circled around the drive and pulled up by the wide floodlit entrance marked Emergency. I stopped the car. We sat there for a moment.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” I said.
He looked at me with astonishment and contempt.
“You think I’m faking,” he said.
“No I don’t,” I said, surprised; and, to be honest, the thought hadn’t occurred to me. “I just asked you a question.”
He got out of the car and slammed the door. We had to wait about half an hour. Francis filled out his chart and sat sullenly reading back issues of Smithsonian magazine. But when the nurse finally called his name, he didn’t stand up.
“That’s you,” I said.
He still didn’t move.
“Well, go on,” I said.
He didn’t answer. He had a sort of wild look in his eye. “Look here,” he finally said. “I’ve changed my mind.”
“What?”
“I’ve said I’ve changed my mind. I want to go home.”
The nurse was standing in the doorway, listening to this exchange with interest.
“That’s stupid,” I said to him, irritated. “You’ve waited this long.”
“I changed my mind.”
“You were the one who wanted to come.”
I knew this would shame him. Annoyed, avoiding my gaze, he slammed down his magazine and stalked through the double doors without looking back.
About ten minutes later an exhausted-looking doctor in a scrub shirt poked his head into the waiting room. I was the only person there.
“Hi,” he said curtly. “You with Mr. Abernathy?”
“Yes.”
“Would you step back with me for a moment, please?”
I got up and followed him. Francis was sitting on the edge of an examining table, fully clad, bent almost double and looking miserable.
“Mr. Abernathy will not put on a gown,” said the doctor. “And he won’t let the nurse take any blood. I don’t know how he expects us to examine him if he won’t cooperate.”
There was a silence. The lights in the examining room were very bright. I was horribly embarrassed.
The doctor walked over to a sink and began to wash his hands. “You guys been doing any drugs tonight?” he said casually.
I felt my face getting red. “No,” I said.
“A little cocaine? Some speed, maybe?”
“No.”
“If your friend here took something, it would help a lot if we knew what it was.”
“Francis,” I said weakly, and was silenced by a glare of hatred: et tu, Brute.
“How dare you,” he snapped. “I didn’t take anything. You know very well I didn’t.”
“Calm down,” said the doctor. “Nobody