Page 120 of The Book of Summer

Well, my friend, I write to you from the Hay-Adams hotel in good old Washington town. The city’s a swampy pit just as promised, and the hotel (and the restaurants and people) a tad stuffy for my tastes. But there’s a sense here, knowledge that, nearby, decisions are being made that will change the world.

Speaking of changing worlds, tomorrow I will venture down to the naval hospital in Portsmouth, Virginia, where Sam is recuperating, another victim of war, though compared to others he is in decent shape. That’s what I tell myself. As I mentioned the other day, his injuries aren’t life-threatening. Whether they are naval career–threatening I cannot begin to speculate. Mary was no help there, surprise, surprise. It’s up to me to find out for myself.

Golly I’d love to see you on the ride back to Boston. Might you have a free night to step out and do the town? It’s been a long time since I’ve had a bit of fun. Send a telegram to my attention at the Hay-Adams and let me know what you think.

Well, my friend, time to hit the percales and get some shut-eye. I trust you are well. I think of you often, always with great fondness, particularly in these dark times.

Your friend,

Ruby Packard

***

Ruby woke up the next morning a stitch before dawn.

It took several minutes to make out where she was. The Hay-Adams, a reservation made by Daddy so that Ruby could bypass some dreadful women’s hotel like the Grace Dodge or, God forbid, the YWCA. She ran darn Cliff House without a man involved. Ruby could certainly manage an average-size bedsit.

Ruby surveyed the clothes she brought, a couple of one-piecers, and some two-piecers, before settling on a lilac rayon and wool jersey dress with sash. After securing her hair into an omelet fold, Ruby applied a light dusting of makeup and then put on a small, trim hat. She swooped up her fingertip coat and hoofed it out onto Sixteenth Street, but not before posting a letter to Hattie to be mailed out that day.

The journey used up the entire morning and a good chunk of afternoon, too. Ruby brought a book to keep her occupied—Mrs. Parkington—plus some magazines recommended by Hattie. In the end she only read a sentence or two in favor of staring out at Virginia’s green countryside.

They rumbled up to the Norfolk station at 2:05 p.m. Ruby hailed a taxi and rode the short distance to the hospital. She read they’d doubled, or even tripled, the facility in the past eighteen months, but did not expect the sprawling, white hospital before her. Everything suddenly felt more serious.

A convoluted pathway of interlocking buildings and corridors led Ruby to Sam’s ward. The place was crowded, busy, teeming with staff knocking this way and that. She didn’t encounter many patients, thank God, when winding her way to the guy in charge, of Sam’s health at least.

“Hello there,” Ruby said brightly to a young nurse manning a desk.

She was a doll, this one, and so were the others. Mary was going to fit into this nursing gig about as well as a rotten tooth in a gleaming set of chompers.

“My name is Ruby Packard,” she said as the girl smiled prettily. “I’m here to visit my husband, who’s recuperating on this ward. His name is Sam Packard.Lieutenant Packard,that is.”

Ruby didn’t know if wives showed up at that hospital, as a rule. Daddy had pulled a few strings, turned a few levers, promised a few golf balls, to get Ruby so quickly on the books. Was she a common sight? Or would they be a-twitter about her presence the second she turned her back? Ruby found she didn’t expressly care.

“Right-o!” the girl said, and stood with a burst. “The doctor is expecting you. Let me see if he’s ready.”

The nurse rapped on the door behind her, then poked her head inside, looking quite like the back end of an ostrich. Ruby tried to avoid staring directly into her tail, but the room was dang small.

“Yes, ma’am,” the nurse said, her whole person returned to the room. “He can see you now.” She cocked her head to the left. “Good luck, honey. Just so ya know, a lot of them recover. And you might be the perfect cure.”

***

Ruby sat blinking at the man, trying not to seem befuddled by his words. She went to Smith for cripe’s sake, even took a biology class or two. A far cry from medical school but she was no dope even though she felt like one then.

“Do you understand what I’m saying?” the man asked again, this doctor with the round spectacles and thinning hair.

“The psychoneurosis…” Ruby started, concentrating as she tried to decipher the word, the first she’d heard it. “The war caused it?”

“It’s possible,” the doctor replied. “However, often we find it’s been there all along.”

“All along?” Ruby said with the hint of a scoff. “Doctor, I’m sure you’re a very smart man, and the folks at this facility quite well trained, but I’ve known Sam my entire life. We’re married. I’d know if that sort of thing was… lurking around.”

“You’d be surprised. In general, the psychoneurosis is a by-product of the underlying condition. In the unique environment of the armed forces, men with such predilections will sometimes develop psychosomatic disorders and work themselves into states of acute anxiety. This causes the psychoneurosis, and the resultant behaviors.”

“So then how do these people—”

These people. Other people. But not Sam. That was not her husband. It was, as the good doctor said, a “by-product.” Something to be fixed.

“How do these people get accepted?” Ruby asked. “Into the service? The exam sounded quite thorough.”