Requiem for the Bone Man Read online

  He buried his face in Anna’s chest. He could not let her see the tears.

  Then he felt the touch of her calloused hands on the roughness of his furnace-burnt face and his bitterness dissolved. He could refuse her nothing.

  “Si, if it is your wish, cara mia.”

  Once more the drums of war resonated across Europe

  A voice on the radio announced the news from the Old World that Hitler had annexed the Sudetenland. Austria fell to the charismatic beast without a shot. Soon the world would learn the meaning of the word Blitzkrieg.

  She could hardly believe it, but she felt it again, that familiar stirring. She went to the free clinic run by Dr. Agnelli.

  “Yes, Anna, you are right, but you are thirty-nine years old. We must watch you very carefully.”

  She nodded, dressed, and walked out of the clinic.

  A newsboy in knickers shouted, “Peace in our time, Chamberlain says. Peace in our time!”

  “Big breaths, Signora Galen. Steady, steady. Nurse, low forceps. Ah, good, the baby’s verted.”

  He spoke the magic doctor words to the nurse. The baby had shifted position inside the womb. It would enter the world headfirst.

  “Anna, I need one big breath and push—PUSH!”

  He didn’t need the forceps. The baby’s head was presenting, now the left shoulder, then the right shoulder. He eased the newborn from the womb and the nurse quickly clamped the umbilical cord in two places and cut it.

  This one didn’t need to be whacked on the bottom to breathe. The red-faced baby boy let out a tremendous howl, and the nurse and doctor laughed.

  “Anna, you have a beautiful big baby boy, and from the sound of him he’s going to be quite a talker. Nurse, call the father in to the side room.”

  Antonio had heard the cry, not in his ears, but in his mind and heart.

  He knew!

  He had beaten the nurse to the door, and she was startled to see him already standing there waiting.

  “Come in, Mr. Galen. Dr. Agnelli is with your wife ... and your new son!”

  When he was let in to the birthing room, he stood for a moment looking at his wife lying there, weary.

  “Antonio, we will call him Roberto, after my father, and Antonio, after you. Here is your son. Roberto Antonio Galen.”

  With his fire-scarred hands he held the son he had always wanted. He whispered gently to the new life in his hands.

  “You will be strong and smart, figlio mio, and I will teach you to be tough against the world.”

  Their eyes met and forever bonded.

  ...

  Now fifteen, Berto Galen had come to understand he could realize his dreams only through his own hard work. His father had instilled in him the need to drive himself to be the best, and consequently he had made only one friend in high school—and even that one purely by chance.

  The school’s public address system vibrated and hummed as the afternoon announcements began.

  “The following after-school activities will be offered this year…”

  Saved by the PA!

  He started to sink back into boredom as he listened to the familiar list of athletic and social activity clubs.

  Then he heard it:

  “The Radio Club will have its first meeting today in room 215 at 3 p.m.”

  Something different! Give it a try, at least once.

  The 2:50 bell rang.

  He grabbed his book bag and headed for the west staircase, the nearest to 215, which as an upper classman he was permitted to use.

  He lumbered down the hallway, watching his classmates putting the new freshmen through their ritual hazing: Coats reversed, walking backwards, books balanced on heads, and worse—all to “welcome” the “little brothers and sisters” to the school.

  No one had attempted anything like that with him the previous year. His stony stare had seemed to intimidate even the older kids.

  He pushed open the fire door and started up the steps when he saw Thornton about to slam a smaller kid against the wall.

  His classmate, Greg Thornton, wasn’t the brightest bulb in the pack, but he was the meanest. Freshman Hazing Day was like a high holy day for him. The unofficial rules didn’t permit physical abuse, but that never stopped him.

  “Cut it out, Thornton!” he shouted, surprising even himself.

  “Back off, lard face! I was just explaining to this lowly frosh why this stairway is off limits to him.”

  Thornton raised his arm to strike the younger boy, who was trying to protect himself with his book bag, but then Thornton felt such a tight grip on his arm that he couldn’t move. The pain intensified and he fell to his knees.

  “For future reference, Greg, leave the freshmen alone. Oh, and by the way, did you know that lard used to be the major ingredient in soap? It’s very useful for cleaning up bad situations.”

  Thornton felt the pressure release on his arm and he was able to stand again. He glanced at his classmate, glowered at the younger boy, and then walked away.

  Galen examined the scrawny younger boy, with his crew cut, somewhat cross-eyed, looking like a deformed, de-furred rabbit.

  “What’s your name, little brother?”

  “Robert Edison,” the boy replied, then like a machine gun, he rattled off “and I know who you are, you’re George Orwell!”

  Dear God, he thought, not another jokester.

  “Okay, I’ll take the bait. Why is my name George Orwell?”

  “Because you’re my big brother! Get it?”

  Maybe he should call Thornton back and let him torture the kid, but in a silly way it was funny.

  “Okay, I asked for it. Where are you headed?”

  “Radio Club meeting and we’d better hurry.”

  The boy was a quick thinker to assume Galen was going there, too.

  “Lead on, Edison.”

  “Uh, George, what’s your real name?”

  “Galen, Robert Galen.”

  They had begun calling each other by their last names, because it became too confusing for both to use Bob.

  Appropriately enough, Edison was a whiz at electronics, albeit a bit spastic in his movements. They had agreed they would try for their amateur radio licenses together, so they quizzed each other on theory and practiced Morse code by speaking out the dashes and dots in what sounded like demented baby talk.

  They each took their licensing exams and easily passed. They became hams, able to use communication equipment, to understand its theory, and to be able to build and repair it.

  Both felt immensely proud, although unlike most of the mid-teenagers of the day, they couched their enthusiasm in subdued tones to conceal the emotion.

  “Good job, Edison.”

  “Likewise, Galen.”

  Their shared interest made high school much more tolerable for them. Each knew he was a misfit, not the outgoing sociable type, but each had special knowledge and abilities the kings and queens of the prom lacked.

  ...

  It is said that time is a turtle when you wish it to race and a rabbit when you wish it would dawdle. In some ways school couldn’t finish fast enough for Berto, and in other ways he never wanted it to end. Soon graduation approached. He had grown to love electronics, but he held tightly to an even greater love. When he wasn’t tinkering with Edison or hanging around Dr. Agnelli in his free time he would visit the town clinics and ask to follow the doctors on their rounds. He knew deep down that being a doctor was a siren call to him. The name Dottore Berto still echoed in his mind.

  He had won scholarships to attend university, so his father’s troublesome question about affording it all had been partly answered, at least for this first big step.

  Galen had expected his father to share his happiness about being able to go to university, but the closer he came to leaving home the quieter his father became, and his mother had no answer when his father summarily rejected all conversation. Then, as graduation day approached, he realized this might be the end of spending
time with his only friend, Edison.

  He also knew Edison could take care of himself now. The scared rabbit was gone. The young man had gained the confidence and strength of knowing he could do something really well: electronics.

  They promised to stay in touch, a promise they both fully intended to keep.

  ...

  A little more than three years later a much-anticipated letter reached Galen, as he was now called in his days at university.

  He had breezed through his studies, so he could always find time for extra lab work and experimentation. As an undergraduate he had published eight papers and more kept filtering through his mind, but that all-important letter had dominated his consciousness ever since senior year had begun.

  Galen hesitated to open it for fear of what it might not say. Boyle, his roommate, watched him clutching the envelope, not moving, almost not breathing, so he snuck up from behind, snatched the envelope away, but after a second thought and a sheepish grin, he handed it back to the man with those powerful arms.

  Boyle had gotten along fine with Galen most of the time, but he had heard what The Bear—as Galen also was known—could do when provoked, and he was not about to tempt fate, not after what Trish had told his girlfriend Mary about her date with the big guy.

  Come on, Freiling, finish up. You’re not saying anything new.

  Galen sat bored witless listening to his physiology professor drone on, repeating the obvious in less than understandable terms.

  “And so, ladies and gentlemen, just remember that beneath the surface we are what our distant ancestors were. Or, to use a catchy phrase, Ontology recapitulates Phylogeny.”

  Score another dried-up conundrum for the prune face! Come on! I’ve got a lot to do before seeing Trish tonight.

  “We think ourselves superior to the lower animals, and yet, when we are threatened, we revert. We become that lower order of animal whose prime motivation is survival. Then that wonderful powerhouse, the autonomic nervous system, kicks in and floods the body with stimulants, even rage-producing hormones and other chemicals that precipitate the possible alternative reactions of fight or flight.”

  … or fucking.

  “Just remember that when you think you are the rational beings the philosophers say you are. When you are cornered, you are nothing more than a reptile. Have a nice weekend, and don’t forget your fifty-page paper is due Monday.”

  Okay, that’s more like it. I finished your stupid paper last week, so no sweat.

  He stopped by the dorm, glanced at what he did have to finish, and decided Saturday would be soon enough. Meanwhile, a quick shower and change, then off to pick up Trish at her room. What a sharp girl—decent-looking and smart, kind of fun to talk with. He checked his finances. Enough put aside from tutoring the freshmen having difficulty with organic chem to have a nice meal at the Alpine in town, then maybe a stroll around the park before the movies.

  Let her pick what she wants to see. It can’t hurt to build some brownie points for later.

  He was feeling good as he did his shave-and-a-haircut-two-bits knock on her dorm door. He could hear giggling on the other side. The female guardian of coed virtue, who looked like Freiling’s twin and stared at him as if he were vermin, had to relent on her special Power of No to any boy attempting to trespass the girls’ dorm. This was Friday night.

  She was standing in the hallway, a few of her dorm mates nearby. He stared at her: saddle shoes, solid gray poodle skirt, and light pink sweater that accentuated her, uh, front-to-back dimensions. Her light brown ponytail topped a strawberry-freckled face.

  Oh, yes, he was feeling good tonight!

  “How’s the Alpine sound to you, Trish?”

  As he had hoped, it sounded great: burgers, cherry Coke, and something new to the college town, pizza. Not the real stuff like the nanas in the old country would make, but none of his classmates would know the difference.

  Satisfied, they headed out for a quick walk around the park, then the Hitchcock movie down the street, then … who knows?

  The old streetlights cast multiple shadows as the couple rounded the monument to Oliver Wendell Holmes. They were about to do the return half-circle when two of the shadows separated from the darkness and stood blocking their way.

  “Looka what we got here, a broad and a pig! Maybe we oughta make pork chops and save the broad for dessert!”

  The bigger one laughed, his eyes staying focused on Galen and Trish, his hand wrapped around a snub-nose .38.

  The shorter one started to laugh as well. “Let’s see how much pork the pig has!”

  He held a metal pipe and started to wave it around in front of the couple, who stood there staring in shocked silence.

  Galen felt strange, almost as if he were standing to the side watching what was happening to him. He felt a flush beginning to burn in his face and a fine trembling in his entire body as the short mugger kept waving the pipe closer and closer. He suddenly recalled the part of his physiology paper on the flight/fight syndrome:

  When you are fighting for your life there is a weird transformation into the limbic-brained beast that resides within all of us. You function (“you” meaning a person, not you specifically) on two levels, almost standing outside of yourself as you descend into the darkness within. You feel the other person’s life. The rational ghost denies the truth of the outcome while the limbic beast howls both rage and conquest. Then you physically collapse. The difference between that action and the premeditated action of a trained killer is the overwhelming chemical surge as the sympathetic nervous system floods you with all the rage-producing chemicals it can. Then you lash out at those who seek to kill you and return the favor.

  The surge that erupted within him could not be controlled. His left hand shot out, grabbed the shorter man’s wrist in an iron grip and swung the pipe down across the hand of the gunman. His ghost image felt the bones break and heard the agonized scream as the pipe clattered to the street.

  His right arm moved forward, his hand grasping the shorter man’s neck and tightening until he could feel the cartilage start to give way.

  The larger mugger picked up the pipe and started to swing it. Galen dropped the other man, blocked the pipe wielder’s arm and twisted it until an audible crack sounded; again the man let out a guttural scream. Galen started to reach for the screamer’s neck.

  “Stop, for God’s sake, stop! You’re killing them!”

  He suddenly froze at her words. God, it was real! He was living the prophetic words of his own paper!

  He leaned against the lamppost, staring down at the two men writhing in pain on the grass-bordered walk.

  Then he turned to her and saw her staring at him—not in relieved gratitude but in fear and horror. He saw it in her eyes: To her, he was the beast incarnate, someone capable of killing, even though he probably had saved her life, or at least her honor.

  “I’m going home,” she said softly, then turned and walked away.

  “Come on, Galen, fish or cut bait. It’s not going to change if you keep staring at it. Let me open it for you. If it’s not good, I’ll put it down and leave you alone for awhile, okay?”

  Galen took a deep breath and handed the envelope over, then sat down on the edge of his bed.

  Boyle carefully opened the letter, glanced over it, looked up mournfully at his roommate, put the letter on his desk, opened the door and took a half-step into the hall.

  Galen’s heart fell, just before Boyle broke into a big grin.

  “You got in, you big ape!” he yelled, taking off as fast as he could down the hallway before Galen could grab him.

  He went to the desk and picked up the heavy linen paper letter with the gold-embossed seal at the top.

  Dear Mr. Galen:

  It is with great pleasure that we notify you of your acceptance to the Class of 1965 of the university’s Medical School. Your exemplary academic record and test scores indicate the potential for a great career in your chosen future field of medicine.


  We welcome you. Please submit the enclosed matriculation forms as soon as possible. You have also been granted scholarship status. You will report for introductory orientation session next August 1.

  It was signed by the dean.

  He ran outside and stood in the middle of the quad, arms outstretched, eyes turned up to heaven.

  “I made it!” he shouted, to everyone and no one.

  He felt on top of the world as he walked the main corridor of the science building where he had spent most of the last three years. As he passed by one of the labs, he heard his name being called.

  “Mr. Galen, may I see you for a moment?”

  It was Dr. Freiling, professor of physiology. Galen had gotten the only A ever granted by the shriveled old man. It must have royally pissed him off, but Freiling couldn’t have done anything else. Galen’s papers and exams were perfect, and he had even caught a mistake in one of the solutions the professor himself had explicated.

  “Yes, Dr. Freiling?”

  “Mr. Galen, I hear by the grapevine that you’ve been accepted to medical school. Is that so?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Mr. Galen, I know that you are brilliant, but to be honest, you don’t have the personality to be a good doctor. I wouldn’t want to be under your care.”

  Galen knew he was being baited. It was Freiling’s style, a last-resort attempt to gain the upper hand.

  “Yes, sir, thank you for your confidence in me. Is there anything else?”

  Freiling shook his head, frowned and walked away.

  Galen felt as though he had just been shot down by the Red Baron. He knew Freiling was a bitter man, but even so, he had done well in his class and had hoped that would be all that mattered.

  He walked to the pay phone halfway down the hallway and called his parents. It had only been two years ago that they had finally installed a telephone.

  He whirled the dial wheel once, and when he heard the operator he gave her the number. A moment later, his mother’s quiet voice said, “Hello?”