Implosion, p.17
Implosion, page 17
A MOH directive forbade the movement of any pregnant woman in her last two months.
“No! Of course you must go.” Bart tried to analyze his feelings, disappointment—relief? Both?
“Young Prue’s going—you know the girl in the next bed, she had lunch with us at Christmas.”
Bart tried to remember. He could hardly recall Christmas. He noted there was no mention of their daughter, and did not know if he was pleased or sorry. He tried to sound enthusiastic, “Well, you have a jolly good time, dear. Who knows, I might see you up there.”
“That would be simply marvelous!” To Bart’s guilty ear, anxious for excuses, Julia did not sound pleased, but then she was so excited at the prospect of the visit. “It’ll be super. That terribly nice old girl, she must be nearly forty-six, Margie—that’s what we call her, but her real name’s Marleen! Well, really, Marleen! She’s such a character; d’you know, the other day …”
There was much more. Even allowing for her very natural desire to talk, Bart had no need for close analysis of his feelings when he rang off. The relief was overwhelming.
At six forty he finished signing letters. It had not been an unduly hard day, but he wanted to go home. He told a surprised Miss Parkins he was off, resisted the temptation to phone, and left. His heart thumped as he fumbled with his door key. The flat was silent, and standing listening in the small hall, his spirits sagged. He slammed the front door and again listened, but there was no reaction. Hope sagged to vanishing point as he made the effort, and it was a conscious effort, to open the living room door, and found the room in darkness. He switched on the light and looked wearily around. Then he saw that his supper place was laid, but there was no covered plate, and a second place was laid. Hope flooded back like an electric shock, he felt his arms and legs tingle with it …
Mary was lying half hidden on the sofa. At once he knew she had done this deliberately. He must recognize his need …
She looked up. “Yes, very wicked, I know, but necessary. I won’t do it again—ever.”
Part Two
1
An expanse of undulating white, three glaring orbs moving unsteadily yet rhythmically, a sense of floating, floating. Julia shut her eyes again, but remained conscious of the light. For some minutes she lay still, listening to the beat of her heart. There was a sickly taste in her mouth, and a growing awareness of dull bodily pain.
Slowly her mind began to work, seeking orientation. She lifted her eyelids fractionally. The three lights were still there, but now they were closer together. Even that effort was exhausting, and once more she shut her eyes: the floating sensation was less, and she was more conscious of her body. She was hot, her legs ached, there was a trickle of sweat between her breasts and the pain in her body made thought difficult.
There was something in her mouth, soft and resilient yet hard. Her mind grappled with the problem, helped by dim memory. A gag? Yes, she thought triumphantly, a gag. A phrase from a textbook drifted with maddening slowness across her mind, “If the tongue is allowed to fall back, the patient may asphyxiate …” That was it; she was a patient. Where? Why? She opened her eyes again, more easily and with purpose. Slowly the three lights merged into one, and the expanse of white became a ceiling. And she remembered.
Her eyes searched the ceiling; yes, there it was. A discolored patch where drifting snow had got in, two—three?—years ago. In the early days that would have been seen to at once, but not now. The familiar sight quelled the first faint surge of panic. She could relax, she was an old hand and knew this room well. This was the post-labor recovery room. The knowledge reassured her, and her discomforts assumed a lesser importance. She had only to make a noise, and help would be forthcoming, but for now she preferred to remain still, half enjoying her drowsy detachment. She shut her eyes again.
With slow, almost tipsy deliberation, she thought about her latest confinement. How had it gone? She concentrated very hard, how many times had this happened? At first she could not recall, but she was pretty certain this was May 1978. Regular as clockwork, she thought, with a tinge of pride, regular … Every May, but for how long? 1977, 76, 75 … her mind was confused, lost. She started again. Married in ’72, Diana was born in ’73 … funny that she should remember the child’s name. Odder still that she could remember her with the greatest clarity. Perhaps not so odd; a real child that, begot by a real man—Julia stopped short, shocked at her own disloyalty to the concept of state motherhood, but the idea crept back. She excused it to herself; those days were so infinitely remote, it had all been so different …
John. Funny that. Diana’s puckered face was clear, but all she could conjure up of John was the remembrance of the photograph of him on her desk in her chalet, eternally frozen in three-quarter face, faintly smiling. It seemed important to her to try and recall him in movement, but she could not do it. It was so long ago. There were tears in her eyes, blurring the image of the ceiling, and no one to wipe them away. Weakness, pure weakness retorted her well-trained mind. Concentrate; how long have you been here? She resumed her solitary dialogue.
So that had been 1973. A lovely summer. She could never squeeze herself into that swimsuit now, not for a couple of years past. In ’74 she had her first set, triplets. The same in 1975, and then quads in 1976 and the same again in ’77—and how many this time? The doctors had told her to expect triplets, and the doctors were seldom wrong. That would be three and three—six—and four and four—eight—and if she had had three this time, that would be … fourteen, plus three—seventeen, and Diana. Never mind Diana, even if she was five years old, and God knows where, never mind. That was eighteen all told. Only two more and she would get her Silver Star, and a Silver Star in five—or was it six—years was not bad going. Usually they were presented by the Minister himself, would John give her hers?
She speculated about that. Surely he would not avoid that, he must be proud of her …
Julia had been distantly aware of sounds coming from the other side of the thin partition separating her from the labor room. Moans, groans and strained breathing were part of everyday Home life, and since it was an experience common to all Mums, regarded by them with sympathetic indifference. To Julia’s trained ear, these sounds were not quite so normal. There was too much shuffling of feet, too much clinking of metal and too much soft plopping as the sterilizer was opened and shut. She listened, analyzing the sounds.
That’s a Cesarean, she thought. Rough. Mentally she ran over the list of women it might be. There was young Prue, that bitch Deborah, Kate, and old Margie. Mums tended to be friends with other women in the same cycle as themselves. Not that that bitch Deborah was anyone’s friend. One set of quints and she thought she was the Queen of the May. Anyway, it couldn’t be her; always had hers with no trouble at all. She would.
Young Prue? Might be, hope not. Julia was on the point of giving it up as too difficult and sinking back into the cosy security of her mind when she heard rapid footsteps in the corridor. She managed to catch a glimpse of the slim figure of Doctor Parsons as he hurried past her into the labor room. That jerked her to full consciousness; if he was wanted, it must be serious. Standing Orders laid down that two doctors plus a staff nurse were to attend each delivery, and Julia knew that they had been in the room for her. That nice Doctor Sanders, a newish woman doctor, and old Lily, the nurse. These days they were rather detached, impersonal, not like the old days, but no one doubted their ability, and if they wanted Parsons—
She liked Parsons. Like her, he was one of the originals, and they were getting less. Home life had hardened a lot since the old Matron left for a senior job in the Ministry. She had been a poppet, had a marvelous way, but this one … Mind you, Julia told herself, things were different these days. Really started with that big ’flu epidemic of ’74 and the total ban on visitors. For three months they had been quite cut off, and afterwards, a good many men, who had been regular visitors before, did not come back. And those that did, mostly came less and less often.
Julia could not blame them, not even John, who came so seldom now. As the supply of men grew less, some of the Mums became man-hungry. Really hungry; they’d do anything to get one. Women can’t commit rape, but it was not for want of trying.
That, of course, was one of the main reasons why John did not come; it must be a year now …
Quickly Julia’s mind reverted. These sex-crazy women were also responsible for a good many of the changes in the Home, and staff. A lot of male doctors just had to go. Even the provision of a female escort did not save them from embarrassment, even violence. Julia was thankful that it never took her that way; how a woman six months gone could try to inveigle a doctor— Even when it was made a punishable offense to molest a man, it did not stop. Exhibitionism, Lesbianism had grown, creating new strains, jealousies.
No, Julia did not complain at the stricter discipline, and accepted that occasionally there was harsh injustice. No one was perfect, but she did not like the harder attitude of many of the newer staff members. No, discipline was essential, and as a member of the Home Harmony Committee, she was part of the machine. Neither she, nor, as far as she knew, any of her fellow-member Mums enjoyed their power to punish, but there were some things that had to be stopped for the good of all. That sex-starved girl who broke out of the Home in search of a man during her rest period, for instance. The HHC authorized a dozen lashes, not so much as punishment as to discourage others. Unfortunately, another girl followed the next night before the first had been recovered. She was not so lucky, a bunch of steriles caught her importuning. When they had finished with her they had flung the broken body into the floodlit entrance of the Home. There were no more escapes after that, the MOHS guard was more concerned keeping the odd fanatical sterile out than the Mums in …
The swing doors to the labor room were fastened back, and the nurse came out pushing a trolley. Julia did not need to open her eyes; that was the mobile incubator taking the latest batch to the primary nursery. The nurse, in a hurry, left the door ajar. Now Julia could hear perfectly.
For a time there was only the scrape of feet and vague, anonymous sounds, then she recognized the voice of the young woman doctor.
“Well, that’s that.” There was tired finality in her tone.
“Yes, I’m afraid so.” Couldn’t miss Parsons’ fluty voice.
Sanders spoke. “Perhaps they’ll listen now.” He was very angry. “Bloody stupid, criminal idea, this extended ovulation! It might be all right on its own, but to go on with hormone treatment as well—! Look at this poor old cow. Fifty-one, coming up to fifty-two—and triplets!”
To Julia the shock was physical. It must be poor Margie, poor gay, feckless Margie!
“We’ve saved the children,” said the woman, “and that, after all, is the main thing.”
“Yes! I know the Standing Orders!” Sanders was almost shouting. “But she’s dead—all because of our clever trickery! That’s two we’ve lost here, and the last confidential memo listed nine cases in other Homes!”
“Yes, I know,” said the woman evenly. “And I know it sounds terribly hardhearted, but it’s no good blinding ourselves to the fact that in the process we got eleven batches, thirty-four babies all told, and that’s worth having.”
“And eleven dead women—how worthwhile would you regard that?”
Someone coughed. Julia thought it was Parsons, never at his best in a row.
“Eleven women dead,” agreed the woman calmly, “I just cannot understand you men, especially a trained man like you, you let your emotions well up and pour all over the floor, like a child. So we lose eleven women. Sad? I suppose so—”
“You suppose so!”
“Let me finish. No one imagines these women could be bred from again. Extended ovulation is intended, so far at any rate, to produce one extra batch, and the figures show that the death rate for women in this category is below thirty percent—no, wait! Answer this; what d’you imagine happens to any of these women when they retire?”
“Well, they go back outside, they get a generous pension and any possible assistance needed to resettle them. I don’t say it’s perfect, but Bart’s lot do all that is humanly possible for them.”
“Being a man, I suppose, you just can’t see straight. I’m a sterile, psychologically tested and passed fit to work with fertiles, and there’s a very high failure rate in that test! So don’t get any false ideas about me. I have real sympathy for these poor creatures, not just sloppy sentimentality. So what happens to them outside? They leave here, full of indoctrination, with their pathetic little medals, expecting at least some sort of welcome, and it’s for sure they don’t get it from the women! And what about the welcome they get from men? You take a long, hard, objective look at a Mum after only five years here—and remember, it’s going to get worse—try to see them as a man, not a doctor. Prematurely aged, fat, pendulous breasts, hemorrhoids, thick blotchy legs, they’re not women any more, just worn out sacks of fat with atrophied minds, full of Bart’s mental syrup and memories of a life which outsiders can neither understand, nor want to understand. They’re not women any more, even in here. Psychologically they’re torn to ribbons, producing children they never feed, never know, and worst of all, never really want to know. The Mum, God help her, is not a mother or a woman. She’s breed-stock, and when her breeding days are ended, she’s finished! No, that poor devil there has more sympathy from me than you’ll ever guess. But for a biological quirk, I might have been in here, breeding. She’s better off dead. At least she died doing something vital, and she was never disillusioned.”
When Sanders spoke he was clearly on the defensive. “You can’t be right! Parsons, you’re a reasonable man.”
“I only wish things were not as they are, but I’m very much afraid she’s right; there is no future for these poor women. The Ministry now recognizes it, there is talk of an experimental Home for retired Mums. I do not, however, agree that they are in any way less than real women, although I regret to see this view growing among some of the staff. They are still women, humans caught up in circumstance.”
“Don’t take it too much to heart.” It was the woman doctor again. “The majority are quite happy, happier in many ways than the steriles outside, and their indoctrination helps—”
The conversation was cut short by the return of the nurse, but Julia had heard enough. More than enough.
Julia had never been a particularly deep-thinking woman; she had always lived for the day. She had accepted the Home life bravely, if not cheerfully, and as time passed, with growing dedication, for three main reasons. She felt she owed it to John to set an example, there was the undoubted need of the nation, and there was no option.
The sanctity of the printed word—still strong—had long ago yielded pride of place to the more powerful visual images of the cinema and TV. All the dictators of the twentieth century, and the admen, knew this, and the techniques of both were utilized to hammer home in the Mums’ minds that “Mums are special.” It was pressed with unrelenting efficiency by TV and cinema film shows, news bulletins. Backed up by priority for all the good things—that were good for Mums, that is—and decorations for the particularly prolific, watched over carefully, with the best possible medical attention, it was hardly surprising if even the strongest mind did not accept the basic proposition that Mums were indeed special.
To Julia, and as far as she knew, other Mums, the idea that they were just breeding stock, did not occur. She could not know that those very few who showed restive signs were quickly removed to a small retraining establishment. Such moves did not cause comment, for there was constant movement in the Homes, due to exchange visits, sickness and with the gradual regrouping of the population beginning, the transfer to other, more conveniently placed Homes for the visiting relatives, if any.
Released to her chalet, Julia tried to do some hard thinking. What she had heard had terrified and shocked her beyond measure. She tried to see the situation objectively. She was a Mum, vital to the nation. Soon she would get the Silver Star, and the day was not so very far off when she might be a National Heroine, honored by the sovereign in Buckingham Palace … All that could not be a mere nothing, and yet she saw that so much the woman doctor had said could well be true. It was all a matter of how you looked at it. What a puritan might regard as beastly fornication might be seen by others as a charming love affair. And both, in their ways, might be right.
But the staff view could not be right. It was ridiculous to think the Mums were mere breeding sows. John would never countenance such an attitude, if he knew. But still the memory of the woman doctor’s words lingered, especially the part about the retired Mums—and what had Parsons said about retirement Homes? And Parsons, he did not agree with the breed-stock attitude, but what he said had obviously impressed Sanders, and unwittingly he had impressed Julia too. Julia was left, fighting hard not to recognize that her view of herself and the other Mums could be wrong, struggling not to recognize that the ground had opened at her feet …
It was June, and the best part of the first month of rest was over. Julia no longer worked as a nurse, for she was on two or three committees, and for a Mum, a person of consequence in Home life. One of her lesser duties was to welcome and mother some of the pitiful trickle of new Mums, mere fifteen-year-olds, as they came in straight from their National Schools.
Most of them, still children, were scared, despite the special preentry indoctrination given them at school. True, they all received a congratulatory telegram on joining from the Prime Minister, and there was the regulation bunch of flowers in their chalets, but all the same, they were frightened. Julia’s job was to calm these fears, and see them through those first days. But one who arrived at this time, a bright-eyed, auburn-haired girl, so far from being frightened, seemed quite unable to regard her new life as anything more than a “lark.” She was full of mischief and a zest for life. Although she was a frightful headache, Julia liked her. The child’s saucy, even disrespectful, attitude to authority was not rooted in hatred. She was tomboyish, full of the love of life. Looking somewhat wistfully at her young figure, Julia decided that a lot of young men had had a narrow escape when the girl was sent to a Home.
