Paul Theroux - Murder in Mount Holly

“I have one for my radio, my juicer and everything else.” Miss Ball laughed helplessly, hollowly, for no reason at all. “I was foolish to have the operation without getting it warranteed.”

“You want it warranteed, is that it? That’s why you came here today — so I could swear out a warranty?”

“You could have been taking me for a ride.”

“A ride ?” The doctor aimed the top of his head at Miss Ball. “Do you know what you’re saying, Miss Ball? Now you’re talking about ethics. Yes you are. You’re talking about my ethics!”

“How’s a body supposed to know what’s going on? You come into the room and stab me with a needle. I fall flat and then you fiddle around for three hours. .”

“Fiddle around? I take you for a ride to fiddle around, and for this you want a warranty?”

“You know what I mean.”

“I’m a very busy man.”

“I lived on a farm, don’t worry.”

“Why should I worry about you living on a farm?”

“Sure,” was all Miss Ball said.

“I want to assure you that I operated on you. I did my level best, as I do with each and every patient. I have not hounded you for the money.”

“You can whistle and wait, for all I care.”

“I have nothing but your health in mind.”

“Don’t worry, I’ve seen things grow back — grass, eyebrows, adenoids. I’ve seen things go wrong — my toaster, my dryer, my mixer. .”

“That’s a doctor’s business — health. We don’t try to frighten patients. We are very busy men.”

“Busy my foot. You think you’re special, you doctors. That’s the trouble with you — you think you’re better than other people that have to work for a living. You wouldn’t know about that, would you? Hard work! Hah! Ever get your hands dirty, real dirty and filthy with hard work?”

“Not that I remember, Miss Ball. I couldn’t call myself a doctor if I went around getting. .”

“And you call yourself a man! Ever wheel a whole barrow of cow manure up a plank? Bet you think it’s easy!”

“I never said that wheeling cow manure was easy. It’s probably very hard work.”

“Probably,” said Miss Ball in the same tone of voice.

The doctor asked Miss Ball if she thought he was a quack. “You think I’m a quack, don’t you?” he asked.

“Who cares what I think. No one cares.”

“I care, Miss Ball. I care a great deal what you think,” the doctor said softly.

“All right, I think you’re a quack,” said Miss Ball.

The doctor bit his lip. He said he had been a doctor a long time. He had healed a lot of wounds, not all of them physical. He had seen a lot of people come and go.

Things grow, Miss Ball thought. Things kept growing and there was little or nothing you could do to stop them. It was Mother Nature’s way of getting even with the human race. Everyone suffered. Nature liked ugliness and suffering. Nature wanted fat people and failed crops. Nature wouldn’t make you lovely and light. She would keep you fat and fertile. Fertile.

Miss Ball leaned toward the doctor. She almost did not have to act scared. She was scared. But she acted scared just the same, and she shook her head from side to side and up and down, and she said very plainly, “Doctor, I want you to know I’m a very frightened person. I never get a wink of sleep any more.”

The doctor reflected and was about to speak. But it was Miss Ball that spoke.

“I think they’re growing back, and I want a warranty so they don’t.”

When all the words reached the doctor he still did not seem to understand what Miss Ball was saying.

“You think what are growing back?”

“My things.”

“You mean your fallopian tubes?”

“Yes,” Miss Ball bit her lip, “those. And the other things you said you took out.”

The doctor started to giggle.

“You think it’s funny!”

The doctor could not answer.

“You think human suffering and worry is a big laugh!” Miss Ball began to cry, loudly at first, then worked it down to a whimper. Miss Ball sniffed and dabbed at her cheek with a lace hanky. “Cruel. You’re a cruel, cruel man.”

The doctor apologized. He asked Miss Ball to explain what she meant by the warranty.

After a little hesitation Miss Ball told the whole story. She talked about Mother Nature, about weeds that grew all night and were tall in the morning, about lungs and tonsils, about how she had seen Mother Nature kill her father, about her things — how they would be back as sure as shooting. The least the doctor could do was give her a warranty so they wouldn’t grow back. She finished with, “. . I haven’t had a good night’s sleep for ages.”

The doctor said nothing. He played with his lips for a few moments and stared at the far wall. When Miss Ball thought he was going to laugh once again she started to unfold her hanky. The doctor swiveled his chair back at her and said in a low voice, “I think I understand.”

“What about it?”

“I’ll do anything you say.”

“I want you to warranty the operation.”

“I’ll do it,” said the doctor. He took out a piece of paper and wrote on it.

“Make it a five-year warranty, like my juicer. Five years is good enough. I’ll be satisfied.”

“No, I won’t hear of it, Miss Ball. I’ll give you a lifetime warranty for that operation of yours.”

“ A lifetime warranty! Good God,” said Miss Ball. Her mouth hung open. She could not find the words to express her thanks. Just when he seemed about the biggest quack she had ever seen he reached into his skinny heart and came up with a lifetime warranty. It was almost too much to ask. “Golly,” she finally said, “that’s the nicest thing anyone ever did for me.”

The doctor handed Miss Ball the piece of paper. He said he had done nothing. Miss Ball protested, and felt like throwing herself at his feet.

On the way out of the office Miss Ball’s heart was full of love and life. It pulsed. She felt it thumping there under her brooch and lace like a giant Snooz-Alarm. She was a new woman. Mother Nature could do her worst, could twist nice little tissues into ugly old organs. What did it matter? The wonderful warranty was right there in her handbag.

“When God closes a door he opens a window,” Miss Ball murmured over and over again as she walked home to find out what success Mr. Gibbon and Mrs. Gneiss had had with their looking around the Mount Holly Trust Company. Personally, Miss Ball felt she could rob a thousand banks single-handed.

“It’s all set,” Mr. Gibbon said. He and Mrs. Gneiss had found out many valuable things. They knew exactly where the vault was (it was, as a matter of fact, in full view of all the bank customers, as most vaults are) and they had plotted what movements they would make. It would be an elaborate “quarterback sneak:” the women would be standing by, Mr. Gibbon would sneak in with his gun drawn, wearing a disguise. The women would be dressed in very ordinary clothes (“Oh, gee!” Miss Ball said, and slapped the table), and would arrive early at the bank. Everyone agreed that it was a nifty little plan.

The suitcases were next on the agenda. The bodies — or the parts of the bodies — had started making a terrific reek. It was an ungodly odor, Mr. Gibbon said, and then he began telling the two ladies about how trenches smelled exactly like that — and you had to sleep, eat, load your gun and shine your brass right in the thick of it. You could cut it with a knife, in case anyone was interested.

Miss Ball said that, for goodness sake, it must have been just like what Herbie was putting up with at that very moment! The thought of the decaying limbs and trunks of the two communists in the suitcases upstairs made them all feel quite close to Herbie.