went out and had lunch. There were a fewmen in the café sitting
with coffee and glasses of kirsch or marc on the tables. I sat down at a table. «Can I eat?» I asked the waiter.
«It is past time forlunch.»

«Isn’t there anything for allhours?» «You can have choucroute.» «Give me choucroute and beer.» «A demi or a bock?»
«A light demi.»
The waiter brought a dish of sauerkraut with a slice of ham over the top and a sausage buriedin the hot wine­soaked cabbage. I ateit and drank the beer. I was very hungry. I watched the people at the tables in the café. At one table they were playing cards. Two men at the table next me were talkingand smoking. The café was full of smoke. The zinc bar, where I had breakfasted, had three people behindit now; the old man, a plump woman in a black dress who sat behind a counter and kept track of everything served to the tables, and aboy in an apron. I wonderedhowmany children the woman had and what it had been like.

When I was through with the choucroute I went back to the hospital. The street was all clean now. There were no refuse cans out.The day was cloudy but the sun was trying to come through.
I rode upstairs in the elevator, stepped out and went down the hail to Catherine’s room, where I hadleft my white gown. I put it on and pinned it in back atthe neck. I looked in the glass and sawmyself lookinglike a fake doctor with a beard. I went down the hailto the delivery room. The door was closed and Iknocked. No one answered so I turned the handle and went in. Thedoctor sat by Catherine. The nurse was doing something at the other end of the room.

«Here is your husband,» the doctor said.
«Oh, darling, I have the most wonderful doctor,» Catherine said in a very strange voice. «He’s been telling me themost wonderful story and when the pain came too badly he put me all the way out. He’s wonderful. You’re wonderful, doctor.»
«You’re drunk,» I said.
«I know it,» Catherine said. «But you shouldn’t say it.» Then «Give it to me. Give it to me.» She clutched hold of the mask and breathed short anddeep, pantingly, makingthe respirator click. Then she gavea long sigh and the doctor reached with his lefthand and lifted away the mask.
«That was a very big one,» Catherine said. Her voice was very strange. «I’m not going to die now, darling. I’m past where I was going to die. Aren’t you glad?»
«Don’t you get in that place again.»
«I won’t. I’m not afraid of it though. I won’t die, darling.»
«You will not do any such foolishness,» the doctor said. «You would not die and leave yourhusband.»
«Oh, no. I won’t die. I wouldn’t die. It’s silly to die. There it comes. Give it to me.» After a while the doctor said, «You willgo out, Mr. Henry, for a few moments and I
will make an examination.»
«He wants to see how I am doing,» Catherine said. «You can come back afterward, darling, can’t he, doctor?»
«Yes,» said the doctor. «I will send word when he can come back.»
I went out the door and down the hall to theroomwhere Catherine was to be after the baby came. I sat in a chair there and looked at the room. I had thepaperin my coat that I had bought when I went out for lunch and I read it. It was beginning to be dark outside and I turned the light on to read. Aftera while I stopped reading and turned off the light and watched it get dark outside. I wondered why the doctordid not send for me. Maybe it was better I was away. He probably wantedme away for a while. I lookedat my watch. If he did not send for me in ten minutes I would go down anyway.
Poor, poor dear Cat. And this was the price you paid for sleeping together. This was the end of the trap. This was what people got forloving each other. Thank God for gas, anyway. What must it havebeenlike before there were anaesthetics? Onceit started, they were in the mill­race. Catherine had a good time in the time of pregnancy. It wasn’t bad. She was hardly ever sick. She was not awfully uncomfortable until toward the last. So now they got herin the end.

You never got away with anything. Getaway hell! It would have been the same if we had been married fifty times. And what if she should die? She won’t die. People don’t diein childbirth nowadays. That was what all husbands thought. Yes, but what if she should die? Shewon’t die. She’s just having a bad time. The initiallaboris usually protracted. She’s only having a bad time. Afterward we’d say what a bad time and Catherine would say it wasn’t really so bad.

But what if she should die? She can’t die. Yes, but what if she should die? She can’t, I tell you. Don’t be a fool. It’s just a bad time. It’s just nature givingher hell. It’s only the first labor, which is almost always protracted. Yes, but what if she should die? She can’t die. Why would she die? What reasonis there for her todie?There’s just a child that has to beborn, the by­product of good nights in Milan. It makes trouble and is born and then youlook afterit and get fond of it maybe. But what if she should die? She won’t die. But what if she should die? She won’t. She’s all right. But what if she should die? She can’t die. But what if she should die? Hey, what about that? Whatif she should die?
The doctor came into the room. «How does it go, doctor?»

«It doesn’t go,» he said. «What do you mean?»
«Just that. I made an examination­­» He detailed the result of the examination. «Since then I’ve waited to see. But it doesn’t go.»
«What do you advise?»
«There are two things. Either a high forceps delivery which can tearand be quite dangerous besides beingpossibly bad forthechild, and a Caesarean.»
«What is the danger of a Caesarean?» What if she should die! «It should be no greater than the danger ofanordinary delivery.» «Would you do it yourself?»
«Yes. I would need possibly an hour toget things ready and to get the people I would need. Perhaps a little less.»
«What do you think?»
«I would advise a Caesarean operation. If it were my wife I would do a Caesarean.» «What are the after effects?»
«There are none. There is only the scar.» «What about infection?»
«The dangeris not so great as in a high forceps delivery.» «What if you just went on anddid nothing?»
«You would have to do something eventually. Mrs. Henry is already losing much of her strength.The sooner we operatenow the safer.»

«Operate as soon as you can,»I said. «I will go and give the instructions.»
I went into the delivery room. The nurse was with Catherine who lay on the table, big under the sheet, looking very pale and tired.
«Did you tell him he could do it?» she asked. «Yes.»
«Isn’t that grand. Now it will be all overin an hour. I’m almost done, darling. I’m going all to pieces. Please give me that. It doesn’t work. Oh, it doesn’t work!»
«Breathe deeply.»
«I am. Oh, it doesn’t work any more. It doesn’twork!» «Get another cylinder,» I said to the nurse.
«That is a new cylinder.»
«I’mjust a fool, darling,» Catherine said. «But it doesn’t work any more.» She began to cry. «Oh, I wanted so to have this baby and not make trouble, and now I’m all done and all gone topieces and it doesn’t work. Oh, darling, it doesn’t work at all. I don’t care if I die if it will only stop. Oh, please, darling, please make it stop. There it comes. Oh Oh Oh!» She breathed sobbingly in the mask.

«It doesn’t work. It doesn’t work. It doesn’t work. Don’t mind me, darling. Please don’t cry. Don’t mind me. I’mjust gone all to pieces. You poor sweet. Ilove you so and I’ll be goodagain. I’ll be good this time. Can’t they give me something? If they could only give me something.»
«I’ll make it work. I’ll turn it all the way.» «Give it to me now.»
I turned the dialall the way and as she breathed hard and deep her hand relaxed on the mask. I shut off the gas and lifted the mask. She came back from a long way away.
«That was lovely, darling. Oh, you’re sogood to me.»
«You be brave, because I can’t do that all the time. It might kill you.»
«I’m not brave any more, darling. I’m all broken. They’ve broken me. I know it now.» «Everybody is that way.»
«But it’s awful. They just keep it up till they break you.» «In an hourit will be over.»
«Isn’t that lovely? Darling, I won’t die, will I?» «No. I promise you won’t.»
«Because I don’t want to die andleave you, but I get so tiredof it and I feel I’m going to die.»
«Nonsense. Everybody feels that.» «Sometimes I know I’m going to die.» «You won’t. You can’t.»
«But what if I should?» «I won’t let you.»
«Give it to me quick. Give it to me!»
Then afterward, «I won’t die. I won’t let myself die.» «Of course you won’t.»
«You’ll stay with me?» «Not to watch it.» «No, just to be there.»

«Sure. I’llbe there all the time.»
«You’re so good to me. There, give it to me. Give me some more. It’s not working!» I turned the dialto three and then four. I wished the doctor would come back. I was
afraid ofthe numbers above two.

Finally a new doctor came in