John Irving - The Cider House Rules

Poor Mr. Hood, attempting to reveal the secrets of the uterus upon the chalky blackboard, confused his duplex with his bicornis; he called a sheep a rabbit (and vice versa). It was a smaller error than if he'd imagined the human female had two complete uteri and had spread this misinformation to the class, but it was an error; Homer Wells caught it. It was the first time he had been {416} put in a position of correcting an authority. 'An orphan is especially uncomfortable and insecure in such a position,' wrote Dr. Wilbur Larch.

'Excuse me, sir?'said Homer Wells.

'Yes, Homer?' said Mr. Hood. His gauntness, in a certain light, made him appear as exposed as the many rabbit cadavers lying open on the students' laboratory tables. He looked skinned, almost ready for labeling. A kind but weary patience was in his eyes; they were the man's only alert features.

'It's the other way around, sir,' said Homer Wells.

'Pardon me?' said Mr. Hood.

'The rabbit has two complete uteri, the rabbit is uterus duplex -not the sheep, sir,' Homer said. 'The sheep's uterus is partially fused together, it's almost one-the sheep is uterus bicornis.'

The class waited. Mr. Hood blinked; for a moment, he looked like a lizard regarding a fly, but he suddenly retreated. 'Isn't that what I said?' he asked, smiling.

'No,' the class murmured, 'you said it the other way around.'

'Well, it's my mistake, then,' Mr. Hood said almost cheerfully. 'I meant it just the way you said it, Homer,' he said.

'Maybe I misunderstood you, sir,' Homer said, but the class murmured, 'No, you got it right.'

The short boy named Bucky, with whom Homer had to share his rabbit cadaver, nudged Homer in the ribs. 'How come you know all about cunts?' he asked Homer.

'Search me,' said Homer Wells. He had learned that phrase from Debra Pettigrew. It was the one game they played. He would ask her something she couldn't answer. She would say 'Search me.' And Homer Wells, saying 'Okay,' would begin to search her. 'Not therel' Debra would cry, pushing his hand away, but laughing. Always laughing, but always pushing his hand away. There was no way Homer Wells would gain admittance to the uterus simplex of Debra Pettigrew. {417}

'Not unless I ask her to marry me,' he told Wally, when they were back together in W ally's bedroom, Thanksgiving night.

'I wouldn't go that far, old boy,' Wally said.

Homer didn't tell Wally about embarrassing Mr. Hood, or how the man seemed changed by the incident. If Mr. Hood had always been cadaverous, now there was an insomnia about his presence, too-as if he were not only dead but also working too hard; staying up late; boning up on his rabbit anatomy; trying to keep all the uteri straight. His tiredness made him slightly less cadaverous, but only because exhaustion is a life-sign; it is at least a form of being human. Mr. Hood began to look as if he were waiting for his retirement, hoping that he could get there.

Where have I seen that look before? wondered Homer Wells.

Nurse Angela or Nurse Edna, or even Mrs. Grogan, could have reminded him; they were all familiar with that look-that strained combination of exhaustion and expectation, that fierce contradiction between grim anxiety and childlike faith. For years that look had penetrated even the most innocent expressions of Wilbur Larch; lately, Nurse Angela and Nurse Edna, and even Mrs. Grogan, had recognized the look in their own expressions.

'What are we waiting for?' Nurse Edna asked Nurse Angela one morning. There was an aura of something pending, some form of inevitable change. These good women were as insulted by the now-famous Goodhall-Gingrich questionnaire as they felt sure Dr. Larch had been; Larch did seem unusually cheered by the remarks of the former Snowy Meadows; the board had thought Snowy's response was so praiseworthy that they'd sent it along for Dr. Larch to see.

To the question of being 'properly supervised,' Snowy said that: Dr. Larch and the nurses never let him; out of their sight. To the question regarding whether or not the {418} medical attention was 'adequate,' Snowy Meadows advised the board to 'just ask Fuzzy Stone.' In Snowy's opinion, Dr. Larch had breathed for Fuzzy. 'You never heard a worse set of lungs,' said Snowy Meadows, 'but old Larch just hooked the kid up to a real life-saver.' And to the question of whether or not the foster home was 'carefully and correctly chosen,' Snowy Meadows claimed that Dr. Larch was a genius at this delicate guesswork. 'How could the guy have known that I was going to fit right in with a furniture family? Well, I'm telling you, he did know,' Snowy Meadows (now Robert Marsh) wrote to the board. 'You know, private property, the world of personal possessions-that doesn't mean the world to everybody. But let me tell you,' Snowy Meadows said, 'furniture means the world to an orphan.'

'One of you must have dropped that boy on his head,' Wilbur Larch said to Nurse Edna and to Nurse Angela, although they could tell he was very pleased by Snowy's remarks.

But just to be fair, the board sent Larch Curly Day's slightly less enthusiastic response to the questionnaire. Roy Rinfret of Boothbay was seething with resentment. 'I was no more prepared to be adopted by druggists than was prepared to have my belly-cord cut,' wrote Roy 'Curly' Rinfret. 'The most beautiful couple in the world walked off with someone who didn't even need or want to be adopted, and I got nabbed by druggists!' Curly complained. 'You call it being supervised when little children are stumbling over dead bodies?' Curly Day asked the board. 'Imagine this: on the day I find a dead man in the grass, the couple of my dreams adopts someone else, Dr. Larch tells me that an orphanage is not a pet store, and shortly thereafter, two druggists hire me to work in their drugstore for free-and you call that being adopted!'

'Why, that ungrateful little snot!' said Nurse Angela. 'Why, Curly Day, aren't you ashamed?' Nurse Edna asked the indifferent air. {419}

'If that boy were here,' Nurse Angela said, 'I'd take him over my knee, I would!'

And why hasn't our Homer Wells filled out the questionnaire? the women wondered.

Speaking of 'ungrateful,' thought Wilbur Larch, although he held his tongue.

Nurse Angela did not hold hers. She wrote directly to Homer Wells, which would have irritated Dr. Larch if he'd known. Nurse Angela came right to the point. 'That questionnaire is the least you can do,' she wrote Homer. 'We all could use a little support. Just because you're having the time of your life (I suppose), don't you dare forget how to be of use-don't you forget where you belong. And if you happen to run into any young doctors or nurses who would be sympathetic to our situation, think you know that you'd better recommend us to them-and them to us. We're not getting any younger, you know.'

My dear Homer [wrote Dr. Larch, in the next day's mail], It's come to my attention that the board of trustees is attempting to communicate with several former residents of St. Cloud's in the form of a ridiculous questionnaire. Answer it as you see fit, but please do answer it. And you must be prepared for some other, more troubling correspondence from them. It was necessary for me to be frank with them regarding the health of the orphans. Although I saw no reason to tell them I had 'lost' Fuzzy Stone to a respiratory ailment -what good would that admission do Fuzzy? -I did tell the board about your heart. I felt that if anything ever happened to me, there should be someone who knew. I do apologize for not telling you about your condition. I am telling you now because, reconsidering the matter, I would never want you to hear about your heart from someone else first. Now, DON'I BE: ALARMED! I would not even describe your heart as a condition, the condition is so slight; {420} you had a fairly substantial heart murmur as a small child, but this had almost entirely disappeared when I last checked you-in your sleep; you wouldn't remember-and I have delayed even mentioning your heart to you for fear of worrying you needlessly. (Such worrying might aggravate the condition.) You have (or had) a pulmonary valve stenosis, but PLEASE DON'I WORRY! It is nothing, or next to nothing. If you're interested in more details, I can provide them. For now, I just didn't want you being upset by some fool thing you might hear from that fool board of trustees. Aside from avoiding any situation of extreme stress or extreme exertion, I want you to know that you can almost certainly lead a normal life.