J. Powers - Morte D'Urban

“You’ve lost some weight,” said Mr O’Hara, who owned the barber shop in the General Diggles Hotel. Mr O’Hara was a good barber, good enough to hold a chair in the Palmer House, but he wouldn’t leave it at that. His real love was medicine, and if you were ignorant of his profession’s history, in this respect, he told you about it. He had prescribed “Restorine” for Father Urban’s gray hair, and a girdle for Father Urban’s pot, “not that you really need one.” (Father Urban hadn’t done anything about these vital matters.) Mr O’Hara also prescribed for the world’s ills. Give Arizona more water, and you wouldn’t know it from Wisconsin. Heat the Yukon — or even the South Pole, which, unlike the North Pole, had land under it — and evaporate any surplus water atomically, or pipe it up to Arizona in light plastic pipes. Regulate the Gulf Stream. Give the world what it needed, and it would be all right, and do the same for people. Very few of the world’s leaders were properly mated, and Great Plains was no different. Ray Bean wasn’t good for Sylvia, and Marge, the wife of George, Father Urban’s friend in the bank, was bad for him. Mr O’Hara’s new shoeshine boy was another who needed help. “Much as I’d like to tell him what to do, I can’t. He’s a strict Lutheran.” For an Irish Catholic, Mr O’Hara was an odd duck. He got a lot out of Life , and was so sincerely interested in the physiology of the world and its people, and was so humorless, that Father Urban, when he felt that some objection, or modification, was in order, didn’t know how to put it. So he said nothing. Every time he went to Mr O’Hara he thought of going elsewhere for his next haircut, but he always returned to Mr O’Hara — he was such a good barber. Others went to him as they would to a physician. You couldn’t quite hear what was being said at Mr O’Hara’s chair, which was at the rear of the shop, but you could see Mr O’Hara listening to the patient describe his ailment in his own words. You could see Mr O’Hara nodding and gravely inquiring. Sometimes Mr O’Hara’s razor would fall silent on the strop, while he listened, or his scissors would hang open, poised between snips. But then would come the diagnosis, shnip, snip, snip, prognosis, shnip, snip, snip, and cure, if any, and, finally, as the patient left the chair, “Feel free to call me at the house, Bill. Next.”

So Mr O’Hara wasn’t making idle conversation when he commented on Father Urban’s loss of weight, nor when he asked whether Father Urban’s head was still troubling him. At their last consultation, Mr O’Hara had told him to try standing on it for fifteen minutes just before retiring. “Did you do what I told you?”

“I haven’t felt up to that. I did try letting it hang down over the edge of the bed.”

“That’s better than nothing, but I wish you’d give the other a try when you feel up to it. Of course, you know what you should do.”

“Yes. I’ve been thinking of that.”

“You really should. Would you like me to make the arrangements? I could give him a ring tonight.”

Father Urban thought this over, and then he said: “Would you?”

“Sure. I won’t say it won’t cost you something, but I’ll ask him to make it easy on you. I’m taking a little more off the top than usual.”

“Well, I hope it won’t come to that,” said Father Urban.

Thus his case was referred to Mr O’Hara’s son, a big head specialist in Rochester.

Father Urban went down by train. He stayed a week, and was given a thorough physical examination. Special attention, of course, was given to his head, X rays, electroencephalograms, and so on — the works. The results were negative.

“Doesn’t show a thing,” said young Dr O’Hara, holding one of the X rays up to the light.

“How do you mean that?” said Father Urban.

Young Dr O’Hara sat down on the desk in Father Urban’s room at the hospital and put his feet on the chair. He didn’t inspire confidence somehow. “Perfectly normal,” he said.

Father Urban still felt that something was wrong with his head. “You’d tell me, wouldn’t you?”

“Oh, but of course,” said young Dr O’Hara, with a big smile. “That’s one thing I believe in. Now let’s get this straight. There could be plenty wrong. It just wouldn’t show up. You can understand that, can’t you?”

“Oh yes.”

“When you get a little older, you know, the old machine develops a few knocks. You have to expect these things.”

“I suppose you do. I just never had anything like it before.”

“First time for everything, you know. Have you tried aspirin?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Didn’t help?”

“Some. The trouble is I don’t know when these attacks are coming, and then it’s too late.”

“You might try Anacin for faster relief. It won’t upset your stomach either.”

“That’s what you recommend then?”

“Yes, in a case like yours.”

“I see.”

“Of course, no two cases are alike.”

“No, I suppose not. Well, thanks.”

“Say hello to Dad,” said young Dr O’Hara, after making sure he had Father Urban’s correct address.

POWWOW

Present were the Rev. Fathers Wilfrid (Bestudik), John (Kelleher), and Urban (Roche), with Brother Harold (Peters) recording. The Rector called upon Father Urban for a prayer .

RECTOR: Thank you, Father. Once again, I choose this day to meet with you — this day because it marks the Order’s second anniversary here. I’m happy to say that the past year was in every way better than the first one, and I thank you for making it so. You, Father Urban, and you, Father John, and you, too, Brother Harold. Without you, well…

FR JOHN: Our thanks to you, Father.

RECTOR: Thank you, Father.

Financially, St Clement’s Hill was doing better than ever before, even though expenses were at an all-time high. What had been realized from retreats and weekend work in the past year was no little sum, but was nothing compared with the satisfaction there was in a job well done. Only last week, the Bishop was said to have said, “Those men have become an asset to the diocese.” Wasn’t that nice? That was how they wanted to keep it, and so they would continue their weekend work as long as it didn’t conflict with their obligations at the Hill. In any case, now that they weren’t going to St Monica’s, there would always be a man on duty at the Hill (Brother Harold would be there, too, of course), and the two men who did go out weren’t away as long as in the past, thanks to the station wagon. Nevertheless, there were problems. Several retreatants had complained about the coldness of their rooms. Perhaps more would have done so if they’d spoken their minds freely. Therefore, in the next few days, the Rector would install a blower in the furnace — rather, although this would cost money, would have one installed by local labor. (The blower itself was coming from the discount house in Minneapolis.) Thus the Rector was acting before the Hill got the reputation of being uncomfortable in the winter time. This was what the Rector called staying on top of a situation. He was also doing something about that bad place in the northwest corner of the roof. He had received a number of estimates, and had got the best possible deal, but the job was going to cost $92.50, not counting the cost of materials. It would begin as soon as these arrived from Minneapolis. After that, the attic would be insulated by the same contractor — an experienced man, presently unemployed, and his son — who would use insulation (Woolite) also on order from Minneapolis. Nobody at the Hill would have anything to do with these jobs, not even Brother Harold .

RECTOR: Now, as for the holes in the eaves, have you noticed something? The squirrels have disappeared. It’s the same all around here. That last frost we had in the spring played hob with the nuts. Hard on the squirrels, of course, but a break for us.