Frank De Felitta - For Love of Audrey Rose

Henderson, no name. Father: James McAlister Henderson. Mother: Marcia Elise Hinton Henderson. Hospital: Columbia University Medical. Time: 10:43 AM. February 3, 1975. Signature of presiding doctor, James E. Kindermann.

Where there were spaces for more information, Dr. Kindermann had scrawled in: surgical delivery — malformed central nervous system: medulla. Time of death: February 10, 1975. See City of New York Certificate #348689682.

“Poor thing,” Cathy said softly.

“That leaves only one other possibility.”

“I’ll get it for you now.”

Janice watched the microfilm blur in the bright rectangle of the machine’s projection frame. Cathy whipped the microfilm into a roll, clipped it, and replaced it. In a few seconds, she returned with a second clip. Transfixed, Janice leaned forward as the birth certificates in negative tones raced by, streaks of white jumping through the viewing rectangle, and then Cathy slowed and the columns began to be discernible, moving slower and slower into the oblivion of the cutoff. At last Cathy stopped.

“There she is.”

Janice bent forward even farther.

Hernandez, Juanita Flores Ynez. Father: Patrizio Gomez y Ruiz Hernandez. Mother: Rosa Hernandez. Hospital: Bronx General. Time: 10:43 AM. February 3, 1975. Signature of presiding doctor, Herbert M. Weissberg. Weight: 5 lbs. 11 oz. Slight jaundice. Religion: Roman Catholic. 385 118th Street, New York City, New York. Stamped: Office of the clerk of the City of New York. There was more, the mother’s maiden name, and so forth, but Janice only saw the infant’s name. And the address. There was even a reproduction of a scrollwork over the certificate, an imitation banner with furled ends, an obsolete vestige of generations of custom that somehow the city had not exterminated.

As she scrawled the information, Janice realized that the little girl already had two connections to her. The instant of birth and her religion. Janice smiled. Apart from that, it was all part of permutations and probabilities.

“Tell me honestly,” Cathy demanded, smiling, “what are you going to do with that?”

“This address? I’ll tell you, Cathy, I don’t know.”

Puzzled, Cathy could not help but laugh.

Janice turned to go, but Cathy objected.

“You have to sign the register,” she said, smiling.

“Sorry.”

Janice initialed the last column after her name, where Cathy had written in the time.

“You have good security here,” Janice observed.

“That’s right. Nobody comes in or goes out without signing. In person. City rules.”

With profuse thanks, Janice left the department and returned to Des Artistes. She entered the restaurant bar, sat down, and ordered a split of Mouton Cadet. Then, hungry, she added a sandwich. Outside, the storm threatened but never came. Dense clouds swirled over the buildings, lit up from below by floodlights or red neon, like an angry, cosmic storm.

It was in this restaurant bar, she thought, that they had first met Hoover over a year ago. He had expounded his theory of rebirth, and Bill had practically landed him a punch across the table. Now Bill was in an asylum and Hoover was gone into some distant countryside where the water stank and white cows with long horns were sacred.

She ordered a second wine. She thought about the birth certificate. Juanita — Juanita Hernandez. It evoked an image of a tiny, tan-skinned infant, with black curly hair, eyes shut with crying. The one infant in all of New York born at precisely the wrong moment. Mercifully, she began to feel the effect of the second glass.

As Janice wearily entered the apartment, the telephone was ringing.

“No, not at this hour,” she pleaded to the dark rooms. “Please, Bill…”

Turning on a lamp, she picked up the receiver.

“Glad I caught you,” Bill said. “What did you find?”

“Nothing, Bill.”

“Nothing? What the hell do you mean, nothing?”

“It’s a manual system, Bill. And there was nobody to help.”

“God damn all hell, anyway.” Bill threw something across his room that shattered. “Look,” he said, barely controlling himself. “When can you go back there?”

“Not for a while, Bill. We’re swamped at the studio.”

“Janice, I need you to go tomorrow.”

“Not tomorrow, Bill.”

“Well, then by Wednesday. Okay?”

“I’ll try, darling.”

“Try? You’ve got to do more than just try! I’m sorry— please, honey, how long is this going to take?”

Janice wondered how long she could string him along.

“Perhaps a few weeks,” she said. “Maybe longer.”

Bill groaned.

“I’m doing what I can, Bill, but it’s going to take time.”

“Right. Christ, I’m glad I’ve got you out there. You don’t know what it’s like in this chamber of horrors. By the way, I forgot to write down what the Master said. About the signs.”

Janice explained, reading from her notes, what the Master had said about the signs: Physical, Psychological, and Religious.

“Well, screw the psychological,” Bill said in disgust. “Any kid born in February, 1975 is less than a year old. What about the physical signs? I don’t remember a damned thing wrong with Ivy, do you? I mean, did she have a rash or something when she was born? It was all normal, wasn’t it?”

“She was a perfect little child, Bill,” Janice lied, remembering a tiny scar just below the nape of Ivy’s smooth, white neck.

“Think, God damn it!”

Janice held the receiver a foot from her ear.

“Sorry,” he mumbled. “But there’s got to be a sign. Did she have any marks at all?”

“None that I can remember.”

“All right, all right,” he said angrily. “Let me work on it. Meanwhile, you get on back to the Hall of Records.”

“When I can, Bill.”

Janice stalled a week.

The next time she visited Bill, he folded his arms, listening patiently to her explanations as to why the Hall of Records took so long to yield up its secrets. He studied her eyes intensely, examining them for the slightest flicker, the smallest indication of a lie. While in her mind she heard: Juanita Hernandez. 118th Street. Birth: normal. 10:43. February 3, 1975.

“When you went to Westport,” Bill asked, “did Ivy look any different?”

Confused, Janice said nothing.

“The night you ran away from New York,” he said calmly, “you ran off to the beach with Ivy. Did she look any different?”

“No, I don’t think so — I don’t remember.”

“Was she in pain?”

“No. I’m sure she felt fine. She loved the beach.”

“Were her eyes clouded?”

“Of course not.”

“Were her senses unclear?”

“Bill, I don’t understand what you’re asking!”

Bill, flustered, referred back to The Tibetan Book of the Dead, which now lay permanently open on his desk, like a small altar.

“Those are the signs of deliverance to the Lord of

Death,” Bill said somberly. “You say you saw none of them?”

“None, Bill. I’m quite sure.”

“What about fear of holy persons? That’s a very strong sign.”

“No. In fact, we saw some nuns and the children of the girls’ school, and Ivy became very happy.”

Bill looked at her carefully, a strange mixture of triumph and fear in his eyes.

“Then the death was untimely, Janice.”

Bill looked pale. He looked exhausted. Janice realized now that there was utterly no chance that stringing out the Hall of Records ordeal would lessen his passion one iota. His finger jabbed at The Book of the Dead.

“If you had known in Westport,” he said. “If you had had some inkling…”