Touched

Deep South v.3 n.3 (Spring 1997)

I woke. I think. Yes, I must have been awake because my stump was hurting and you don't feel pain in dreams but there was a strange dreamlike quality about the scene. The long room was lit by distant flickering lightning and two candles that Andy Svenson had propped on his pack. There was a quiet rumble of thunder mingling with the soft snores of the sleepers.

A severe summer storm had created a crisis at the Mountain Lodge as soaked and weary trampers sought refuge for the night. The long games room and one of the lounges had been cleared and mattresses laid out on the floor but one young woman had been severely hurt by a falling branch and needed special attention. It wasn't possible to get her to hospital so I gave her my room and made her as comfortable as I could. Then I joined the men in the games room. I didn't have to sleep on the floor -- in deference to my age and disability a bed was brought in for me. I didn't mind, I'd done a lot of tramping and back-packing in my time and I enjoyed the camaraderie.

We'd lolled around and yarned by the light of a few candles for an hour or so before turning in and I came to know my companions quite well. Except for MacGregor and Boden who were in their fifties, they were all strong young outdoor types but apart from their common love of nature, they were as diverse a lot as you could meet.

My stump was troubling me but I didn't want to take a pain killer if I could avoid it so I lay looking at the flickering ceiling and tried to induce sleep by remembering the names, faces and occupations of my companions. Opposite me and nearest to the door was Andy Svenson, a young Swedish geologist who had recently "got religion" as they say and who had kept the two candles going so that he could read his bible. I lifted my head a little to see whether he was still reading or had fallen asleep and was surprised to see a young woman standing by his bed.

She was dressed in a one piece garment, a jump suit or coverall, made of some shiny white fabric. She had her back to me but I judged her to be young because she was slim and upright. She had shoulder length curly dark hair and was leading a child by the hand -- a fair haired boy of three or maybe four.

She asked Andy what he was reading and he told her the bible.

"And what are you searching for so assiduously, so late at night?"

"For God," he said, and with that she burst out laughing so that practically everybody woke up and stirred in their sleeping bags.

"What's so funny about that?" asked Andy.

She suppressed her mirth. "That's a very interesting book. It's full of wise sayings, good ideas and beautiful poetry, not to mention all that probably slanted Jewish history. But if you think you'll find God in a book, you wouldn't recognise him if you knocked Him down on a street corner, picked Him up and dusted Him down."

Now I'm not a religious man in the sense that I have sympathy with any of the organised religions and if anything I'd be inclined to go along with what she said but I felt outraged that she should wander in here and mock poor Andy who was so happy with his beliefs. I was about to remonstrate, then I saw that that gentleman, far from being offended, was smiling happily. He had laid down the book and taken her hand and seemed to want to pull her down to him. She let go the boy and bent over the man, released his grasp, laid down his arm and gently pressed it. He lay still and looked up at her adoringly. The little lad looked up at her too, his head cocked as if in inquiry. She nodded and he gave a little hop and clapped his hands. I couldn't see her face but I imagine she smiled and perhaps whispered goodnight.

She moved on to the next sleeper, Fuchs, the arts student. She untucked a hand from his bag and lifted it towards her. She laid the arm down and pressed it gently. No words were spoken but again I saw the little boy raise his face to her and again she nodded and he clapped his hands with pleasure.

And so it went round the room -- the raised arms, the hands held and laid down and the arms pressed affectionately, the mute enquiry and the nod. And the little display of delight. Bucknall the truck driver. Goldsmith doing his honours in physics and maths. Philby and Korski the computer whizzes. Even Robertson, a rather surly mechanic. But no arm appeared from Boden's bag and the little fellow shook his head sadly. His mother looked at Boden for perhaps half a minute while that worthy just stared back with a'who are you and what the hell do you think you are up to' kind of expression. Then she passed on to MacGregor and the same pattern repeated -- a shake of the little fair head and a shake of agreement from the dark curly one. I didn't blame the two builders for their attitude, I'd felt much the same way myself at the beginning but now I didn't want to get the thumbs down. So when lawyer Lederman who was alongside me got the thumbs up, I determined to be civil.

I thought they were going to walk straight past me and through the door but they stopped at the side of my bed. The boy was intrigued by my prosthesis which was hanging from the back of the chair beside me. I opened the conversation.

"Isn't it a bit late to be wandering about with the little lad?"

"The storm upset him so we're exploring a bit until he's ready for sleep again. He's very interested in people."

"You seem very interested yourself."

"Yes, but in a different way. He's interested in each individual but I've had too many let downs to care about them. But humanity as a whole, that's different."

"It didn't look like that to me -- I thought you were looking for a friend, or rather for friends."

"Did you?" she said and before I could reply or think of a reply the boy spoke in a high childish voice.

"Is this Doctor Philpott?"

"No dear, this is Doctor Whatmore."

"Doctor Whatmore's got a sore leg." She picked up the artificial limb and examined it.

"What happened?" asked the boy.

"It got sick and had to be chopped off," I told him.

"What made it sick?" Children -- really!

Now I'm not one of those adults who fob off awkward questions with 'just something' or 'mind your own business' but before I could think up a reply his mother came to my rescue.

"Dr. Whatmore is a nuclear scientist. He found himself in a situation where there was a serious radiation leak that would endanger a lot of people if not stopped quickly. He knew how to stop it and he did just that. He should have put on special clothes but there weren't any near by so he suffered an overdose."

"Is that what made his leg sick?"

"Yes," I said.

"Dr. Whatmore," said the woman, taught radiation medicine at the university so he knew what would happen to him if he went into that place. That makes him a very brave man."

"I like Dr. Whatmore," said the boy. He looked up to his mother with the inquiring look I had seen before but she shook her head.

"No," I said, not actually knowing what I was talking about, "I wouldn't be any use. The cancer in my leg is only the start of it -- it will keep eating me up, bit by bit."

I know I shouldn't have said that but my stump was hurting. It had never really healed properly and had been aggravated by the days unwonted activities. And I was annoyed with the woman for telling my tale. I wasn't particularly surprised that she knew all about it, it had been in the papers of course and if she were local she'd remember it. But in front of all these people? Wasn't a man entitled to some privacy?

The child was staring at me with wide eyes. "Poor Dr. Whatmore," he said, and then with a sudden switch, "can I see it?"

"See what?"

"Your leg." I reached for the metal leg

"Not that thing -- your sore leg." I looked at the mother. "It's not very nice. My prosthesis has been chafing it and it's inflamed."

"Never mind. He's interested in sores -- let him see it." I folded back the blanket and rolled up my pajama leg so that the stump showed red and fiery. He gazed at it earnestly then turning to the woman, said "Kiss it better." She looked at me, "May I?" He stamped his little foot. "Kiss it better! Kiss it better!" Without more ado she stooped and planted a soft kiss on the offending member.

"There," she smiled, "all better now, no more troubles."

"Thank you," I said and the boy laughed and clapped his hands. "All better now. Dr. Whatmore is all better now." She scooped him up and stepped out of the room. The draught as she shut the door blew the candles out.

In the sudden silence I heard her footsteps move along the corridor and the little fellow asking some question. I wondered if they were going to repeat the performance in the other big room where the women were bedded down.

"What the hell was all that about?" asked Boden

"God alone knows," I said, "don't ask me."

The morning came quickly -- so quickly that I realised I must have slept solidly from the moment the strange visitors left. Bucknall came in dressed in the vest and shorts he'd slept in, a towel over his shoulder. His hair was wet and tousled and his face polished. He'd made sure of getting a shower before the rush started. He looked a picture of glowing health but when he saw that I was awake he came over and showed me a red patch on his upper arm.

"What do you make of that, Doc?" I didn't know what to make of it. It looked like a patch of sunburn or a slight scald but that wasn't possible. I could see no sign of an insect bite.

"Is it painful to the touch?" He put his fingers to it lightly. "Not really. It stung a bit when the warm water struck it. I mightn;t have noticed it otherwise."

"I don't know what it is. It's not a burn and I can't see an insect bite. Must be a slight allergy." If we doctors can't figure the cause of a skin rash we plump for an allergy. "I shouldn't worry about it but if it irritates or itches you could try some calamine lotion or some anti-allergy cream. I think Mac, the proprietor, has some."

Then the law student, Lederman, came back from the shower -- strange coincidence -- displaying the same complaint. The late risers sat up and began fingering their arms. All except MacGregor and Boden and me had the red patch. They looked at each other puzzled then Robertson blurted out "My God -- that bitch last night -- she's given us all the pox!"

There was a stunned silence then Jessop -- he had something to do with publishing -- voiced what I think was the opinion of them all. "No. If she gave us anything it wasn't that. She was too near perfect for that. And don't you go calling her a bitch!" He turned on Robertson with clenched fist raised. That worthy looked around and sensed that the others were against him. "You're right," he said, backing down, "she certainly was some dame."

The big Swede, the happy Christian, came whistling in from the shower, clad only in a towel. There was no rash on his arm.

"Hey Andy," said Goldsmith, "she touched you too - how come you haven't got a red patch?"

"Red patch?"

"Like this. We've all got one." Andy looked at his arm. "I had a mark like that -- I thought I must have slept on a lump in the mattress or something. It went away."

"Mine's gone too," said Bucknall. And it had -- not a trace of it left.

Before long all the rashes had gone. It had me baffled and no mistake. Rashes come and go of course, but eleven men all with an odd rash in the same place at the same time?

There's something strange here," I said. "I'd be surprised if those red marks ever recurred, but if they do or if you notice any after effects, please let me know. And in case I find out anything, will you please give me your names and addresses so that I can contact you?"

I'm a slow mover in the morning at the best of times and this morning I let the bustle around me subside before I embarked on the daily adventure of getting out of bed, showering and shaving, getting dressed and fitting on my leg. By the time I got down to the lobby they had all loaded their packs, collected their girlfriends and checked out into a brilliant day. All except Kurt Spiegler, the Swiss guide, who was paying his bill. He was a big confident fellow and I could imagine him striding along an Alpine path and yodelling to his girl across the valley. He was wearing one of those Swiss hats -- you know -- greeny tweedy things with narrow brims and a feather in the band.

"I like your hat," I said.

"It is good, no? A little bit of Switzerland. Come and meet Gretchen."

His fianc e was a big fair girl with her back-pack already settled on her shoulders.

"I'm glad I met you," I said after introductions, "I wanted to ask one of the young ladies whether you'd had a strange visitor in the night - a young woman with a little boy?" She didn't think so. The woman might have come and gone without her knowing because she was a sound sleeper but none of the others had spoken of it in the morning.

"Tell the Doctor about your dream," said Kurt.

"Oh Kurtie I couldn't, not to a doctor. He'd read all sorts of things into it!"

"Nonsense, he's an ordinary doctor, not a psychoanalyst. I think you should tell him, there could be some connection with the strange things I told you about."

So she told me. She dreamed a man had come into the room and gone from mattress to mattress, turning the women over and putting his hands on their hips. He had a little black girl with him who would give him an inquiring look and if he nodded she would do a little dance of pleasure. If he shook his head she looked sad.

I asked her if she was sure it was a dream and she said of course it was because when it came to her turn, instead of screaming she had giggled and smiled at the man. He was of no particular age, good looking with a nice smile and kind eyes. He was dressed in a gold coloured coverall with a fancy "M" embroidered on the pocket. And it must have been a dream because she could see it so clearly -- the room was brightly lit -- whereas in fact there was no light at all, not even a candle as we had had.

"Did you pass the test?" I joked.

"Yes, I got the nod. Most of us did. Only three very slim girls got the thumbs down."

"Your Mr.M knew a good thing when he saw it." Kurt patted her bottom affectionately and they set off laughing up the track while I went in search of breakfast.

I needed to think and I think best while walking -- which is awkward when I walk with such difficulty -- but I knew there was something that had happened or been said that was important and I couldn't bring it to mind. I got up from the chair on the veranda and went up to the room to get my crutch-stick. The staff hadn't started cleaning up yet and I noticed with amusement that Andy had left his bible behind. I handed it in at the office and set off along the track, my stick over my shoulder.

I went over the whole scene again in my mind from the time I heard voices and saw her talking to Andy and it was all quite clear until they came to me and then it got a bit fogged. A tree had come down in the storm and fallen across the path. I sat on the trunk to take the weight off my stump. I tried to recall the exact words of our conversation. I'd been trying to find out what she was up to but the child had interrupted and we never got back to the point. What was it he'd said? Dr. Whatmore's got a sore leg -- no, there was something before that. Got it. He suddenly asked 'is this Dr. Philpott' and his mother said no dear, this is Dr Whatmore and from then on the talk went right off beam and was focussed on me, culminating with the kiss and the sudden departure. Dr.Philpott -- where did he fit in? Was he the key? Was there a lock? The whole thing seemed unreal

I put my weight on my stump - kiss it better -- there was no discomfort at all and I'd been walking for twenty minutes. I felt strange. I found myself looking up into the sky the way early man must have done when puzzled or seeking help. Had my stump really healed just like that? Why not? All around me were signs of the universal healing force at work -- new shoots growing where branches had been broken, new plants growing where earth had been scarred.

I put my stick over my shoulder and hurried back to the Lodge. I made inquiries about Dr. Philpott and about the strange night visitors. Nobody came up with anything and I began to wonder if it had all been a dream after all. But the red marks and the reaction to Robertson's unpopular remark? Could I have slept sounder and longer than I thought and dreamt that too? I took my notebook from my pocket and saw the eleven names and addresses written there.

I had come here for a rest but I couldn't rest. I settled my account and drove home.

Home is a comfortable house in a small country town where I practice medicine on a small comfortable scale. I had started out in life to be a doctor but after I had my degree I became fascinated with nuclear physics. I found that besides being endowed with the good memory so essential for medicine, I had the good mathematical brain necessary to the physicist. In the end I combined the two disciplines and made the effect of radiation on living tissue my primary interest.

That is until the accident that cost me my leg and my confidence. Then I began to wonder. I saw men of science not only as innovators and discoverers but also as inadvertant destroyers. Possibly of all life on this planet.

I needed space to think. I left my chair at the university and retired to a little country practice where I could live out my few remaining years making sure that Mrs. Selznik's baby is delivered safely and old Mr. Prescott is as comfortable as his arthritis will permit. But I am a scientist at heart and the quest for knowledge is innate in me. I installed a good computer and tuned into the scientific world.

Right now I had it searching the medical register for Dr. Philpotts. There were dozens of them - G.P's, surgeons, specialists -- it meant nothing. But there are many doctors not on the medical list. Doctors of all sorts of things. I started programming it to list all the Philpotts with Ph.D. degrees but before I pressed the last key, my small computer, the one I keep between my ears, came up with the answer. I'd read of Dr. Philpotts some weeks previously. A biologist whose interest was evolution. He was one of a select band who put forward the theory of 'punctuated evolution', I think they called it. This covered, they said, certain weaknesses in Darwin's theory of natural selection by postulating the idea of sudden jumps in evolution in place of or as well as the painfully slow natural selection process. For example from Australo-pithecus to Homo habilis to Homo erectus to Homo sapiens without intervening steps.

I rather liked the idea. I don't imagine Philpott and Co meant really big changes in the offspring of the prevailing species but rather a succession of small changes in closely following generations that would appear as a giant leap forward when seen against a geologic time scale. In any case it isn't my subject and though most of the sciences interest me I can't really get involved in theories about what happened in the distant past when we have so many pressing problems in the present. I can't imagine why creationists and Darwinists get so hot under their collars. But I digress.

The big computer located Dr. Philpott without much difficulty and before long I was talking to him at his home in Washington. I told him my story and waited for him to laugh me down. Instead, after a pause, he asked me if I'd thought to measure the mens' skulls. I told him no such an idea had come to me and asked him what the point of such a measurement would be. If what I'd seen, he said, heralded an evolutionary jump, that jump would almost certainly be a bigger brain. And a bigger brain would require a bigger brain box. I rather gagged on that one. I told him I imagined the change would be in the offspring, not in the parents. "Changes take place in the genes of the sex cells of the parents and mutations show up in the offspring. Isn't that the theory?"

"That's the general idea," he said. There was a long pause.

"But....?" I queried.

"But supposing..." he spoke slowly with long pauses between phrases so that I could almost hear him thinking, "but supposing Darwin's theory has its limitations -- just as Newton's maths holds true for most circumstances but fails when certain limits are exceeded. Suppose natural selection works just fine until some condition arises that calls for urgency. Say, just for example, a sudden climatic change requires an animal to grow a longer coat in order to survive. Does it have to wait around shivering until some cosmic ray tampers with the gene that controls the length of its fur? And then only its child's fur? what would happen in the meantime?"

"I guess," I said, "that species would die out -- if the long fur were really a matter of life and death. Millions of species have become extinct, haven't they? It didn't matter, did it?"

"No, maybe it didn't but the 'urgency clause' that I'm postulating presupposes that it does matter. Please don't ask me why it should because I don't know the answer. I wish I did. But it could matter, couldn't it?"

It was my turn to weigh my words carefully. I felt my stump comfortable in its socket and the hair on the nape of my neck began to prickle. "Yes," I said, "yes, it could well matter. And random chance would not be the solution. Neither would non random chance, whatever that is. The winter is going to be cold and it is no use providing fur coats for the next generation if this one is not going to survive to produce it. So?"

"So the Architect," (I could distinctly hear the capital A) "so the Architect contacts the clerk of works and instructs him to alter the blueprint. The animal's DNA is modified and it grows longer fur."

"Nice theory. What is the Architect and what the clerk of works?"

"The Architect has many names. Use the one that sits most comfortably. The clerk of works is what he puts in each building to guard the plans and see that thay are carried our exactly to specification."

"Or as modified by urgent necessity." Philpott laughed, "I like you Dr.Whatmore - but don't quote me in any scientific paper you may write!"

"I wouldn't dare. And I don't know what to think at the moment. I agree with you that we do desperately need wise men if this planet is to survive our advances in technology backed as they are by such a limited understanding of the true nature of things but is any of this remotely possible? You can't alter a building once it's finished, can you?"

"I wouldn't say that. Many a house has had a bow window added years after completion. Or an extra room. Even a complete storey!"

"True. But aren't we taking the metaphor too far?" There was along pause such as you get when so many wild thoughts are chasing each other round your skull. Eventually he spoke. "I just don't know. Any more than you do. We can only wait and see."

And that's what we are doing. I don't cease to wonder at the healing of my stump. I can, and do, walk for miles and I'm sure there's not an atom of incipient cancer in my body. I wish I could kiss old Prescott's arthritis better but, to be honest, I haven't the courage to try, just as I haven't the courage to contact my tramping friends and ask them to measure their heads. I know I'm a scientist trapped by my science. I don't want to believe the evidence if it's contrary to my habit of thought so I have dismissed the whole thing as a dream even though there are names and addresses in my notebook. I have convinced myself that I jotted them down while we were yarning the evening away. I don't have the addresses of MacGregor or Boden, but then they were old and established and didn't hold the same interest for me. And as for the red patches and my conversation with the flamboyant Swiss and his girl friend -- I know I have a vivid imagination and, especially since my accident, am quite capable of becoming confused by it. Then there's my talk with Dr. Philpott. I think now he was pulling my leg -- he must have been splitting his sides at the deranged country G.P.'s weird ravings. On the other hand perhaps he is also trapped. He is preaching a rather unpopular theory and he could have been clutching at straws. We haven't contacted each other again.

My stump is another matter. It has been a mystery right from the beginning. According to all I knew about the effects of radiation, the cancer should have started in my thyroid. But did I write a paper acknowledging that my previous papers were probably wrong? No, I wrote one suggesting that the anomaly was due to some weakness in the bones that had been fractured in a skiing accident some twenty years ago. Shall I now write a paper detailing the apparent miracle cure? No I won't do that. They would argue that the cancer infected section of my leg had been removed and it was only a matter of time before the scar tissue hardened. So the immense gratitude I feel to my (dream?) lady of the night I keep to myself and say little prayers of thanks. For all our mighty intellects we are never very far from our remote ancestors. And I'm not going to push my luck!

So I keep busy and try not to dwell too much on that eerie night but my dreams are full of people with noble foreheads and women with wide hips to accomodate their infants' craniums. And I dream of a pleasant world, clean and unpolluted, united and free of tensions. But when I'm awake I find it hard to imagine any of my young friends as world leaders -- though to be fair, I haven't met any of them since they grew their extra layer of cortex!

Three weeks after the the incident I was back at the Lodge. It was very quiet and I was reading a whodunnit in the garden when I heard yodelling in the distance. I ran out and saw Kurt and Gretchen emerging from the forest track. It was obvious that they were very happy and their 'trial honeymoon' had been a great success. They greeted me warmly.

"No more red patches," said Kurt.

"Where's your smart hat?" I asked.

"The rain must have given it the shrinking sickness - it sat on the top of my head and then blew off and went over a cliff."

"If you ask me," laughed Gretchen, "his head swelled."

"What did it have to swell about?"

"Oh,Doctor, you do ask the most embarrassing questions! But I'll let you into a secret. We're going to be married as soon as we get home."

We laughed and chatted for a while, and then as they moved on, I noticed that the zip on the side of Gretchens's skirt was undone and the button was fixed to the buttonhole with a large safety pin.