The Light of Luna Park Read online

  “Don’t worry.” She grins as I turn. “They’re all gone, done with us and ready to move on to the burlesque dancers.” I cannot tell if this bothers her or not, to be likened to such an act. “Anyway, this little one’s too new yet. No ring tricks for her.”

  I nod, embarrassed that Louise so easily sensed my apprehension. I cannot afford to be so transparent, not when my career revolves around offering comfort to patients and their loved ones. Not when my presence here is a lie.

  Louise smiles. “Do you want to hold her?”

  Though shocked, I manage to control my expression. Surely, Louise cannot intend to take Margaret out of the incubator. But she does. The woman reaches past me to unlatch the doors. Gently, she pulls the sleeping Margaret from her cocoon of pumped heat and air.

  “Is it time to feed her?” My voice is steady.

  “Oh, no,” Louise chuckles. “Not now. But we try to give them a human touch once in a while, bring some color to their cheeks.”

  The image of Margaret, alone and anonymous inside her incubator, makes a convincing case for Louise’s point. But my years of schooling suggest the opposite. What if Louise passes a disease to little Margaret? The girl is already so weak that exposure to the air-conditioned room or separation from the otherworldly tubes of oxygen may be enough to kill her.

  I open my mouth to respond, but a cry from the other room catches my attention. A curly-haired infant bawls with a vigor that penetrates the glass window, and I look over. The nurse changing the girl’s diaper meets my eye briefly and shrugs. Her gaze returns with a patient smile to the infant.

  I look back to Louise and sigh. “I suppose you know what you’re doing.” Is it the image of the healthy baby that convinces me, or merely my desire to hold Margaret? I don’t know. I am on the sidelines as so many babies enter into this world, but while I clean and weigh them, I don’t ever hold them beyond those first precious moments. Like the umbilical cord, I am clipped away from them at birth. And so, getting the chance to hold baby Margaret now is something special.

  I adjust her carefully, cradling her entire sleeping body. Lifelines, I think again, gazing down at Margaret’s veins. I fight the senseless urge to unfurl her tiny fists, inquire where the pathways on her palms will lead her.

  Afraid to transfer any germs that may endanger Margaret or her lungs, I lighten my own breath and exhale only softly through my nose. Is this what it is to have a daughter? I wonder. To suppress your own breath of life for hers?

  My body quivers as I pass Margaret back over to Louise at the nurse’s request, and my hands search for something else to occupy them in Margaret’s absence. “She seems to be doing well,” I tell the nurse, peeling back a hangnail on my left thumb. “I should be going, but”—the nail gives way, ripping off the skin beneath it—“I will certainly keep her mother apprised of her progress.”

  I clamp my thumb beneath the other fingers on my hand to stem the flow of blood. “Good-bye, Louise.” I turn to go. “Good-bye, sweet Margaret.”

  * * *

  —

  Nights at Bellevue become my routine. Stitches and syringes and bandages, any number of minor emergencies that seem far less pressing than those faced by an infant. But when I enter the Nurses’ Residence each morning, my thoughts turn again and again to Margaret. Sometimes, she is a comfort; I envision her eyes like a fighter’s. Sometimes, she is fear, and I must focus on my work to avoid the image of Margaret’s body turning as pale and lifeless as Cybil’s had.

  Then there is the other kind of fear. The fear of being discovered. What would happen to me, for stealing a child even temporarily from her parents and her doctor? I’d never work again. Never whisper comforts into an old woman’s ear, never hold a baby kicking for the first time, never send a child back to carefree youth with a bandage and some tape. I wouldn’t have a purpose, a reason for being.

  I wouldn’t have a way to make up for killing my mother, just by being born. My net balance in the world, my overall impact—it would be negative.

  I shudder. Maybe sacrificing my work would be the end of my losses. Perhaps my timid femininity would save me, and I would be pardoned from any more serious consequence. Deemed insane or incompetent. The doctors consider us female nurses the latter already, do they not?

  But that may not be enough. And I, Althea Anderson, exceptional student and well-mannered young lady, could end up on trial. I could stare into the hard eyes of a judge as he sentences me to waste away in dissolution the rest of my lonely life. Welfare Island’s white stone penitentiary rears ugly and jagged in my mind. Other women have been sent there for less: Emma Goldman for distributing information on birth control, Becky Edelsohn for calling John D. Rockefeller a murderer. “Disturbing the peace,” they called it for Edelsohn. What would they call my crime? Kidnapping?

  I shudder. Boarding school had been bad enough, with its restrictions on my every movement and word and thought. But there, at least, I had hot meals to eat and a soft, warm bed to curl into at night. How would I survive in prison? With whom might I share a room? A thief? A murderer?

  These thoughts terrorize me each time I turn a corner at Bellevue. Will someone question the circles under my eyes, the tremor in my hands, the blisters on my heels? Will someone recognize me from Coney’s stifling crowds?

  My fear comes to a head when Ida Berry, who has replaced me in obstetrics, stops me in the hallway at the end of her shift and the beginning of mine.

  “Althea,” she calls. “Are you in a hurry?”

  I shake my head. I’m early as usual; I can’t risk the doctors finding even the tiniest fault in my service.

  “I wanted to let you know I filled out Margaret Perkins’s death certificate.”

  My knees buckle beneath my apron, and I reach to the wall behind me to steady myself. “Margaret Perkins? Death certificate?” I’m too afraid to say anything more intelligent.

  “Yes.” Ida looks at me quizzically. “The newborn who died when you were still in obstetrics? You forgot to file the death certificate. I only realized because Dr. Bricknell was trying to get me out of his hair and made me organize all the records. As if anyone ever looks at them.”

  It’s true. Bellevue is not known for its meticulous record keeping.

  Ida looks around the hallway and lowers her voice. “Anyway, I found the birth certificate you’d signed, but no death certificate. I didn’t want you to get in trouble, so I went ahead and signed it for you.” She shrugs, as if her words haven’t altered the very foundation of my existence. “I can’t blame you for forgetting. Everything gets chaotic when an infant dies.” Her face sobers for the first time. “It’s not something anyone should ever have to see.”

  I agree with her, stammer out a thank-you. But I retreat to the restroom to think as she whistles away. Now there is a death certificate for Margaret Perkins, who is not dead at all. What will happen when I bring her back to her parents? The danger is intensifying—not only for me, but for Ida, too. I never meant to implicate her in my wrongs.

  But are they wrongs? Was I wrong to save a baby girl who could not save herself? We learned of Niccolò Machiavelli in school. Do my ends justify my means?

  The thought is not a comforting one. Not when Machiavelli is a synonym for deceit and manipulation.

  But, but, but. A line from The Prince bubbles to the surface of my murky mind, something we learned in school about nothing great being achieved without danger.

  I am terrified. I am a liar and a crook. But I have done something great.

  I have done the right thing, saving the girl for her parents.

  And so it is that I return to Luna Park the next day, despite my twelve-hour shift overnight. It is Saturday, and revelers are out in full swing. Children scream with joy and exhaustion; mothers clutch wailing babies to their chests. Each step I take meets resistance, the sudden stop of a body before me or a syrupy puddle of
beer around which I must step. My father used to ask me how I, so quiet and steady, could thrive in the chaos of the hospital, but what he never understood is that neither speed nor urgency translates into chaos. Medicine is an antidote to disorder, every procedure delineated with numbers and rules. Here at the carnival is the mayhem I have always sought to avoid. This wild world of Luna Park, Steeplechase’s competing tower leering above, is an utter departure for me. Here, I’ve deviated not only from the steadfast rules of my profession but from its orderly realm.

  But I will return to that other world once Margaret is healthy enough to go home to her mother. When she is part of a family like the ones jostling about: mothers, their own food abandoned as they feed their children bite by bite; fathers, oblivious as they shout across the masses to wives focused only on their children’s erratic movements through the crowd.

  I close my eyes. My own father was never one for such chatter, though perhaps he was different when my mother was alive. I’ll never know.

  I remind my feet to move, bump my way through the throng to reach the incubator facility. The barkers are familiar with me now and I slip in without paying the dime required for amusement’s entry. With Hattie still in confinement, or so the nurses here believe, I am afforded the privileges of a mother.

  The privilege and the pain. The sight of Margaret’s pinprick body seizes me each time; always, I fixate on something different and excruciating. Today I am all too aware of the stubs of her tiny fingers, pale flesh where there should be brittle nail. I imagine that her toes are the same way, though they are wrapped securely in a fleece blanket and pink satin bow. This girl is still forming, still—for all intents and purposes—in the womb.

  Even I, who never knew my mother, was granted the connection of being formed in her body. Poor Margaret is alone, half-formed. The tragedy of it makes me bold, and I search for Maye or Louise. Instead, I catch the good doctor himself as he emerges from the office area, and he greets me with a grin. “Nurse Anderson,” he cries out, “how lovely of you to stop by.”

  I duck my head. “I must keep the mother apprised of Margaret’s health.”

  “Of course, of course.” Dr. Couney waves his hand as if we are discussing a game of checkers rather than a baby’s life. Perhaps I should find his nonchalance off-putting, but his confidence in Margaret’s survival sets me at ease. He and I see the same fighting spirit in the girl.

  “I was wondering”—I breathe in—“whether I could hold her?” I am prepared with my defense—that Louise had let me just days ago—but it does not prove necessary.

  “Absolutely.” Dr. Couney grins. “You sanitized?”

  “Of course.” As is required, I had washed my hands with the provided soap and water upon entering the building. I smile slightly. “Twice.”

  “Good, good.” Dr. Couney pats my back. The gesture is condescending, but I appreciate the words that accompany them. “I’ve fired a nurse or two for not washing her hands.”

  I watch Dr. Couney as he lifts Margaret gently into his arms. He’s a strange man, this doctor. He’s so against the fold in running this practice that doctors deem exploitative and dehumanizing, but he’s also so rigid with the rules he does follow. All visitors must wash hands. No gawkers can touch the babies. Blankets must be wrapped just so. He cares about the babies in his facilities, that much is obvious. Does that make up for his methods?

  Dr. Couney smiles as he surveys Margaret. “She’s strong, this one,” he whistles. “Two and a half pounds when she came in, was she not?”

  I nod slightly, afraid to make any movement that might disrupt the girl.

  Dr. Couney whistles again. “Our minimum,” he tells me, “is two pounds.”

  I cringe. Cybil had been two pounds and two ounces. We could have brought her here. But we didn’t.

  I push the guilt away and focus on the doctor’s words. “Any less than that and we won’t be able to save them. Even two pounds”—he shakes his head—“even that is tempting fate.”

  But Margaret’s a fighter, I remind myself. He said it himself: strong, this one. I carry the words with me as the doors release me back into the sticky July heat. The crowd moves en masse, thicker than usual and more unified. Where are they going? The flood of people pushes me in the direction of a banner stretched from one building to another: Better Babies Contest July 10, 1926.

  Curiosity piqued, I let the crowd carry me closer. Is this something Dr. Couney has manufactured? How glorious, were he to show the world how babies like Margaret could survive.

  But the babies I make out as I approach are not premature. They drip with rolls, their pudgy thighs visible in their nudity. But why are the babies naked before a crowd? And in this sun? Already, their pale skin—for they are all creamy white—is reddening like salmon. Behind each infant stands its mother, trying her hardest not to sweat: curls set, cloches jaunty, dresses sticking to thighs. Ring-studded fingers keep their babies balanced on the long bench serving as a stage. Many of the babies struggle to escape their mothers’ clutches as a row of women in aprons and men in hats and ties poke and prod them, clipboards in hand. A baby on the far left wails as a woman wraps a measuring tape around his forehead, neck, torso, wrists, and ankles. Closer to where I stand in the opposite back corner of the crowd, a little girl stares unblinking at a man who pries open her lips and taps her teeth with his knuckles. Beside her, judges fan a collection of toys before a boy and take notes as he reaches and grasps. I recognize the gross motor skills evaluation, but why is it taking place here?

  I squirm between the other spectators to get closer. A poster leaning against the wooden stand carries a catchphrase: You are raising better cattle, better horses, and better hogs, why don’t you raise better babies?

  The glint of a silver trophy turns my head. Best baby, 1926.

  Tears pool in the corners of my eyes. I’d like to blame the painful reflection of the trophy in the sunlight, but I am picturing Margaret. Her purple gums. Her shrunken arms and legs. She would never win a better baby contest, no matter how much of a fighter she is. Nor would have Cybil, and perhaps that is part of the reason the world let her die. At a place like this, she’d be viewed as defective. Her parents would be suspected of illness or sin. The fitter family contests across the countries would eschew their participation as well as hers.

  I turn to survey the crowd. German speakers, Italian speakers, snatches of English with that familiar Irish lilt. Even a few Black families dot the midway, and I clench my toes to keep from crying openly. So many children excluded from this inane, dehumanizing contest. So many men and women told they are less than. So many babies unvalued and abandoned.

  And the contest itself. I am a nurse. I know the value of dental health, infant size, and physical coordination. But proclaiming the need for more babies like “this” means reducing the number of babies like “that.” I’ve seen the flashing-light exhibits in the Hall of Science. “We need more normal people to be born,” they say, “and fewer criminals.” Fewer illiterate parents, they mean, fewer immigrant parents, fewer Black parents.

  Yes, this is a movement for the babies’ health. But only for certain babies.

  It is a movement that would tear Margaret from her family and this world.

  Disgusted, I turn away. Angling my narrow body so my right shoulder leads me through the crowd, I push away and toward the exit. Dr. Couney and his incubators are the only spot of light at this godforsaken fairground.

  Today, only a small trickle files into the popular World Circus Sideshow as I pass. I suppose I ought not be surprised. After all, the freak show performers are no prizewinners like the chubby, healthy babies on display outside.

  I pause. I typically stay far from the circus sideshow and its “freaks.” My toes twitch at the very thought of going inside and taking advantage of these men, women, and even children who make a living off defections and deformities.

&
nbsp; Like Margaret does? Tourists pay a dime to see my baby girl, too. Those hawk-eyed, gaping gawkers keep Margaret alive. They pay for her air and her warmth and her clothes and her food and her care.

  I look again at the sign: World Circus Sideshow. Inhaling, I pay the fee and step inside. Dampness permeates, and darkness surrounds me. The place is a far cry from Dr. Couney’s bright, clean incubator ward. I pause for a moment as my pupils dilate, and then I continue. The first exhibit consists of a pair of twins. Pinheads Flip and Pip, a banner reads above them. Both women are about my age, and their small, microcephalic heads are shaved smooth aside from a tuft of hair like a sprout at the top. Both girls wear large, childish bows and matching checkered dresses.

  “Not half as good as Zip,” a man mutters beside me. “Even though there are two of them! Should be twice as good.” He laughs at his own weak joke.

  “Excuse me?”

  “Zip, the African Pinhead? Died earlier this year. Looked like a monkey. They billed him as the missing link. He did shows and all—much funnier than these girls.”

  The two girls giggle uncertainly, but my shoulders tense in horror. “I regret to inform you he was not the ‘missing link.’ ” I lift my chin. “I am a nurse. That man and these girls are microcephalic. It’s a neurodevelopmental disorder. It could very well have been you born like that.” I am only momentarily mortified by my words, for the man’s response assures me he deserved it.

  “Yeah, right. My parents were good ol’ Americans. Thank God these girls are locked up in here, huh?”

  I close my eyes and take a deep breath. That’s not how it works, I want to tell him. Microcephaly is not always a genetic disease. It can be caused by anoxia at birth, infections during pregnancy . . . countless other curses of circumstance alone. But the man is rolling his eyes, whites eerie in the darkness, and he moves away from me. I should call out and stop him, but the words clot like blood in my throat. The man wouldn’t believe me, anyway. Wouldn’t care if he did. Instead of pursuing the man, I pick up one of the pamphlets Flip offers me. Twins from the Yucatan, it proclaims. Twins? I look back to the girls. Impossible. And the claim that the girls are from the Yucatan is equally impossible. Chances are they come from Alabama or Georgia, states with economies still sagging decades after the War between the States. Wagner, Coney’s circus director, has been known to make a pretty penny off children from down South. He buys them from their desperate mothers for pocket change, then turns around and makes a fortune off them. I doubt their families see a penny. Yes, Dr. Couney also makes money for what he does—but he saves people’s babies in the process. Wagner takes the money and then the babies, too.