“Yes, I know. It isn’t my usual time. I was supposed to see the doctor today because—” Margaret stopped herself. She hadn’t told Ruth about her lobotomy. She couldn’t bear to hear any more criticism about her decision.
“Yes?”
“Oh, it’s nothing really.”
“It doesn’t seem like nothing. You can tell me. What is it?”
“Well, it’s just that your husband is going to fix me tomorrow. Today was my preoperative appointment.”
Margaret watched Ruth’s eyes grow so wide she feared they might tear at the edges.
“Your preoperative appointment? Maggie, no!” Ruth reached out to the wall to steady herself.
“What is it? You look upset.” Margaret was surprised by the intensity of Ruth’s reaction. Ruth seemed a little unhinged today. “Is everything okay?”
Ruth looked Margaret in the eyes. “Listen, Robert isn’t here and, to be frank, I don’t know when he’ll be back. But you can’t do this.”
“What?” Margaret recoiled. “But you told me I could fix this.”
“Not this way.” Ruth looked around nervously and then waved Margaret toward the house. “Why don’t you come inside for a few minutes. We can talk there.”
Margaret looked at her hesitantly.
“Really, you’d be doing me a favor,” Ruth said, sounding falsely upbeat. “I haven’t had much sleep and could use some fresh coffee. Perhaps Robert will return by the time we are finished!” Ruth gave her a smile, putting Margaret a little more at ease.
“All right. I could use some coffee too.” Margaret smiled back tentatively and followed her up the path and into the kitchen.
When the women were settled at the table, two steaming mugs in front of them in spite of the heat of the summer day, Ruth made her case.
“Margaret, did you know that I was there when Robert first learned about lobotomy? When he had the idea to do it here in America? I actually helped him develop and popularize lobotomy in this country.” Her voice caught.
“No, I hadn’t realized. So . . . good. Okay.” Margaret smiled. “I feel better already.”
Ruth shook her head. “When we began doing lobotomies, it seemed like the only treatment that worked for some of our most difficult patients. And for the very ill, the violent, the psychotics, it was lobotomy or be relegated to a lifetime in restraints, locked up in the secure ward of the hospital. We had a higher standard of care at Emeraldine, but the public hospitals were—are—so overcrowded . . . We thought that Robert was giving people back their lives. And I believed, for many years, that a lobotomy might very well have saved my brother had it been possible at the time.”
“Don’t you still?”
Ruth hesitated. “No. Not anymore. You see, when Harry was in the hospital, we all just wanted him to get back to normal, to be himself again. And when he died, I spent years wishing I could have done more.”
“But look at all that you have created as a result! You are the strongest woman I have ever met. I wish I had just a tiny bit of your force and ability.”
“But you do! Don’t you see? You know, you are entitled to be frustrated sometimes. To feel angry. It is entirely natural that you will have great days and utterly awful ones. We all do. Now that I’ve had time to really process my brother’s death, I wonder if the best thing I could have done for Harry might have been to tell him it was all right for him to feel what he was feeling. He went through horrible suffering in the war. And we never acknowledged that.”
Ruth took a deep breath and looked Margaret in the eye pleadingly.
“Maggie, you can’t have a lobotomy. Whatever you do . . . please, please don’t do that. Whatever my husband says, don’t believe him. You can’t. You just can’t.”