Half a dozen runners immediately came to his aid, and a woman called 911 on her pink cell phone. Someone took off a nylon jacket, folded it, and put it under Jules’ head after two other people had rolled him onto his back. “Is he dead?” another person asked, as someone else began to push Jules’ chest with the heels of his hands, singing, as he was taught in his CPR class, the song “Stayin’ Alive,” to time the pushes. The sound of an ambulance could be heard not even half a mile distant, near St. Luke’s. All the while, Jules’ heart was functioning perfectly well even as it was suffering violent and unnecessary ministrations. And all the while he was dreaming, although the dream was so real he would think upon remembering it that it was not a dream but a visit to another world.
In his dream, fur-clad, pre-medieval warriors met on a frozen strait, far from land. The battlefield was perfectly white and flat, with no horizon but only three hundred and sixty degrees of mist. And there they fought to the death. Hours passed, combinations formed and dissolved, but the battle continued to the last man on both sides, and the two who remained killed one another. Scattered over the reddened ice and its snow were whitened bodies. The corpses, and weapons of bone, wood, and iron were laid out as if by a receding flood, stacked and crosswise, hunched over, the men’s faces a gallery of frightened and agonized expressions. Nothing moved or changed. Neither crows nor jackals interrupted the quiet. Silence reigned until spring, when the ice melted and gave way, and in half an hour every evidence of life and struggle disappeared as if it had never existed, all the vanquished sinking into oblivion, their weapons, plans, hopes, and passions easily subsumed in the smooth, unconscious sea.
WHEN JULES AWOKE he had an extraordinarily strong, almost sensual feeling of delicacy and impermanence. Aware that he might die at any moment, he was like a traveler who, before taking a single step, has in spirit left his home, his city, and his country. He was reconciled and unafraid, sorrowful only because important matters remained unaddressed. Little things ballooned in his perception as if he were once again an infant. The painfully white, waffled, cotton blanket that covered him up to his chest, the almost smooth, slightly threadbare sheets, the top of a copper-clad steeple he saw through the window, murmurs from the hospital corridor, and the cooing of pigeons nearby and out of sight were as comforting as if he were embraced, held, and loved.
He had no pain, and breathed easily. Something had happened, he didn’t know what, but evidently he was not yet over the edge. A nurse came in and saw that the patient was conscious, his eyes open. She had strawberry-blonde hair, a big face, and prominent upper front teeth.
“I enjoy this hospital room,” Jules declared. It stopped her cold.
“I’ve never heard that before,” she said, “ever.”
“Oh yes I do,” Jules said.
“Sit tight,” she told him, an idiom with which he was not familiar. “I’ll get the attending.” She went out.
It took fifteen minutes for the attending to arrive, and when he did he announced himself as Doctor Beckerman. “How do you feel?”
“I don’t know what happened.”
“You were running. You experienced what appears to have been a transient neurological event, and you fell. Before anyone could stop it, you were given unnecessary CPR, which, surprisingly, didn’t break your sternum. It easily could have. You went down on Heartbreak Hill. An ambulance was near and got to you very fast. You were brought here in four minutes, which must be some sort of record. You’re not in acute danger.”
“What kind of danger am I in?”
The doctor was consummately professional but warm by nature. He could have been a rabbi or a priest. Some people are simply born that way. “You know what an aneurysm is?”
“Yes.”
“You have a basilar aneurysm. The basilar artery is located near the brainstem, and your aneurysm is unusually large. They tend to burst before they enlarge to the extent that yours has. Did you ever have a serious head injury? That’s a medical question, not a taunt.”
“Yes, I did.”
“When?”
“When I was four.”
“Did you suffer the impact in the back of your head?”
“Yes.”
“And did you lose consciousness?”
“I believe so.”
“I realize that it was a long time ago, but can you recollect what happened? How old are you?”
“Seventy-four. I was told it was a rifle butt.”
For a moment the doctor was shocked into silence, but then he calculated. “In nineteen forty-four,” he said, as if vaulted back to the war that was over before he himself was born. “Was whoever did this punished?”
“His nation was punished.”
“I think I understand. We don’t have the best news for you. We did an MRI ….”
“An NMRI?” Jules asked. “I know there’s no radiation in it.”
“That’s correct. Most people don’t know that, and there’s no point in scaring them. Unfortunately, the aneurysm has formed and expanded in such a way that it’s partially wrapped around the brainstem. Blood pressure to the brain is consistent and well-regulated, but, still, with the exertion of running up the hill, at your age, perhaps a change in position, the pressure of the aneurysm itself – without leakage, as far as we can tell – mimicked the effects of a hemorrhage.
“It would be very dangerous were you to strain. The aneurysm may not be operable, being so unusually large and because of the way it embraces the brainstem. We’re affiliated with Columbia P and S, and later this afternoon our team will consult. The surgeons can do extraordinary things. Meanwhile, you should know that your blood values are truly amazing, unheard of in someone your age. I’ve never seen every single measure of blood chemistry right where it should be. Do you know that you may have Gilbert’s disease? Actually, it’s a syndrome.”
“I do have it,” Jules told him. “Whenever my blood is taken, they tell me that.”
“So the bilirubin ….”
“Is always elevated. But in my case never to the extent of a negative effect.”
“That’s it,” the doctor said. “There’s a strong correlation between Gilbert’s syndrome and living past a hundred.”
“Does it cover aneurysms?” Jules asked.
“Not to my knowledge.” He looked at his watch. “I’ll come back early in the evening after studying your imagery. We’ll know more then. All you need do is rest and be calm.”
“In regard to a possible operation,” Jules asked, “could there be side effects?”
“Of course.”
“Grave side effects?”
“Yes.”
“Such as?”
“Death.”
“And with no operation?”
“You could die tomorrow or you could live to a hundred. We can’t even guess about the probabilities until we have observations over time, to see if there’s degeneration and/or expansion. That is, the thinning of the artery wall, and/or the expansion of the aneurysm. Unfortunately, they usually go together. It’s a difficult decision. You don’t have to make it now.”
“It’s been made for me.”
“By whom, or what?”
“By my plants.”
“Again?”
“My plants. Every Fall I have to decide whether or not to bring in some of the annuals or leave them out on the terrace. If I bring them in and put them under lights, they weaken, grow pale, and stay deathly still. If I leave them out, they get full sun, full air, and they move in the wind. Sometimes they last even to December, but in the dangerous time of frosts and rain, and what you call Indian Summer, even though they die they may be better off than if they spend the winter paralyzed under lamps.”
“What I call Indian Summer?”
“English is not my native language.”
“Yes, of course. You’re French?”