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CHAPTER 43

Uncle Bob

      MRS. PANADERO met them on the porch. "I don't know. Maybe I should not have called you."

      Lucy said, "Is he all right now?"

      "Yes, but all evening, Lucia, he's been very restless, as if he was listening for something. And it began to make me uneasy." The woman still seemed very uneasy as she continued, "And when I heard him call — at first I thought it was for you. But then, very clearly, the name he called was something like Mae-bate. Is that someone you know? A relative?"

      "He did that once before, saying Maybeth," Lucy answered. "I don't know who she was, though." She glanced at Tagg. "Stay here; I'm going in to see him."

      Tagg shook his head. "I'm going in there with you."

      "It's all right," she told him. But Tagg only shook his head and repeated, "I'm going with you." So they went into Uncle Bob's room together.

      The room was shadowy and a little too warm. Both lamps were lit, and Uncle Bob lay there on the bed pretty much as usual, looking at the ceiling. But the bedcovers were untidy, and it seemed to Lucy that he was a little pale.

      Automatically, she went to rearrange the covers. "Honey, did you want to talk to me?" She spoke as naturally as if she'd been in the kitchen all the time.

      "Maybeth? Is that you?" Uncle Bob's words were perfectly very clear, but his voice seemed to be coming from a long way off.

      Lucy hesitated, taking a moment to decide how to answer him. Should she let him think — then she decided no, choose the truth. "Not Maybeth, honey. Just Lucy, your own niece, who loves you."

      She finished smoothing out the covers, then sat down on the bed and took his unresisting hand. "Maybeth's gone, but I'm right here to see to you, just like I promised."

      He didn't look at her, but he answered very plainly, "I know she's here — and not just tonight. She's been calling me. And it was Maybeth; I'd know her voice anywhere."

      "Well, maybe she was," Lucy agreed neutrally.

      For several minutes, she sat watching him and holding his hand. He wasn't looking at the wall any more, but his eyes had an odd, out-of-focus look. And yet, she thought his fingers closed around hers as if he was aware of her and knew she was there.

      Tagg said quietly, from the foot of the bed, "I'll go call the doctor."

      "You think we should?"

      "Yes."

      She looked around the dim room. "All right, Tom. But call Bobby, first."

      A few minutes later, Bobby came in. He glanced at Tagg, then at Lucy as he came to sit on the other side of the bed. He took Uncle Bob's other hand and said, "You feeling poorly tonight, Uncle Bob?"

      When Uncle Bob didn't say anything, he repeated, "Uncle Bob?"

      After a little silence, Lucy answered for him, very softly, "When I first came in, he thought I was somebody else — and when I said, 'no,' he told me she'd been calling to him. I think now he's listening for her to call him again."

      Bobby's voice sounded choked-up. "Maybe so."

      A few minutes later, Uncle Bob closed his eyes and began to snore lightly. But nobody offered to leave the room. Bobby only leaned toward Tagg and whispered, "You said you'd called the doctor?"

      "He's out delivering a baby, but his wife said he'd come as soon as he could."

      About midnight, Mrs. Panadero brought in coffee and they drank it, Lucy and Bobby and Tom Tagg. They didn't talk at all; they just sat together with Uncle Bob in the half-dark room, waiting and not talking.

      A long while later, he began to stir. Without entirely rousing, he moved around on the bed a little. Then he began coughing.

      The cough kept up intermittently, getting more and more rusty-sounding, so they sat him up to help him get his breath — whispering to each other, "Easy — hold on. Let me get my arm under him . . ." not saying more than was needed.

      After the coughing subsided, they laid him down again on the pillow. As they settled down again, he gave a little shudder, and his hand clenched on Lucy's hand. Perhaps on Bobby's hand too . . . as if he were trying to sit up again. But then he relaxed a little and lay still, looking at the ceiling.

      After that, nothing else happened.

      Until, very suddenly, Lucy began to tug at his hand. And then she began cry out loud, sobbing, "Uncle Bob. Uncle Bob — oh. Oh!"

      Tagg came forward at once and put a hand on her shoulder, but even then she didn't try to keep her voice down. Because — the sound of her voice was not going to disturb Uncle Bob now. Nothing was going to bother him again.

      Bobby sat there on the other side of the bed, hardly noticing Lucy's crying. He looked as if he was thinking of something. Finally he leaned over and kissed Uncle Bob on the cheek. "Well, Sir, you go easy now," he said. "And when you get to Mama, you give her our love from us . . ." Then he let go Uncle Bob's hand and laid it down, very gently, beside him. He smoothed up the covers. Then he reached over and shut Uncle Bob's eyes.

      Swan came in from the front room, and it seemed natural for her to be there. After standing beside Bobby a while, saying nothing, she took his hand and began to urge him away from the bed. Tagg got Lucy on her feet and put his arms around her, but it didn't seem to help her any.

      Still later, in the front room, they found Gene and Melida, waiting with Mrs. Panadero and Melida's mother.

      It hardly mattered to Lucy though. Because she couldn't catch hold of anything just now, or notice people.

      They put her to bed, finally. Although that didn't make any difference either. She lay there without noticing when or if she fell asleep. Maybe she'd only dreamed it all.

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