Grasping at Water

Chapter 3-1

Three

This is what she said:

Those who look carefully see that the mundane and the everyday are alive with the pulse and possibility of the miraculous. Think about your kitchen table. It is very familiar in its ordinariness and practicality. A flat timber surface, scratches here and there, four straight wooden legs. It is not a big table but it is well made, the tabletop perfectly rectangular in shape, with its longer sides exactly ninety centimetres apart along the entire one hundred and fifty centimetre length. In Euclidean geometry those longer sides of your rectangular table are defined as being parallel—and parallel lines, by definition, do not meet or intersect. But imagine that both long sides of your kitchen table happen to rest perfectly on two meridians of longitude. You remember from your school days that meridians of longitude meet at the poles, and here we move from the kitchen to the great circles of hyperbolic space. Planes versus spheres. Parallel versus non-parallel lines. Limits versus infinity. What you see versus what is. Things viewed from a greater perspective often look very different to things that exist within the limits of our day-to-day vision. What do you really know of your kitchen table?

Kathryn sat at her kitchen table, a glass of red wine in her hand, the forty-year-old folder from Dr Smith’s archives in front of her. On its cover, in the ‘Patient’s Name’ box, she read ‘Known as Julie X’. She took a gulp of wine, put the glass down on the table, and brought her hands together, raising them to let the tips of her index fingers rest on her lips, prayer-like. She stared at the folder, hesitating to look at its contents. She lowered her hands, spread her fingers out on the table’s surface, and thought of the rings that once circled the fourth finger of her left hand. She lifted the glass for another gulp and was aware of the earthy flavour in her mouth. She placed the glass down again, noticing the dark knot of honey-coloured wood next to where the glass sat. She listened to the silence of the late-night kitchen.

She opened the folder and fanned its contents across the table. At a glance, she could tell that it was a collection of medical reports, newspaper clippings, records and transcripts of interviews, miscellaneous jottings, and a small faded photo. On closer inspection she saw that someone had taken the time to give each item a number and a heading of sorts—a description of the item’s origin, type, and a date. She began to read.

Item 1: Xeroxed copy of Emergency Department admission notes; attending doctor not named.7 May 1973, 7.30 am

Female, age uncertain but estimated to be around 30 years, brought to Emergency Dept by ambulance at around 7.20 am after being pulled from Sydney Harbour by a ferry crew. Crew members reported woman was breathing when rescued. Ambulance officers attending reported breathing and blood pressure normal, and no apparent signs of trauma to head or body. No signs of hypothermia.

Examination on admission:

Temperature: 36.5C

Respiration: 13

Blood pressure: 120/70

Pulse: 65

Non-communicative; uncertain if this is due to lack of comprehension or of speech, or both. At this stage, patient is unable to be identified, and cannot/will not identify herself. Social Work assessment ordered. Patient to be transferred to a general medical ward for overnight stay by which time, hopefully, family will be located.

Item 2: Newspaper clipping, Herald Sun, late edition, 7 May 1973.A young woman was pulled from Sydney Harbour early this morning by Manly ferry crew members after a passenger spotted her floating near Fort Denison. The ferry immediately called for assistance and Water Patrol Officers responded. Ambulance officers were contacted and were at Circular Quay when the ferry docked to transport the woman to the emergency department of Royal Harbourside Hospital where she remains in a stable condition and under observation. The woman showed no signs of physical injury, but is apparently confused and disorientated as she is unable to give any account of herself. Police are appealing for help in identifying her. She is described as being about 30 years old, 5’ 2” tall, and of slim build. She has light brown, closely cropped hair, pale complexion, blue eyes, and was wearing a long, grey woollen dress but no shoes or jewellery. Contact North Sydney Police Station if you have witnessed anything in relation to this incident or if you have any information about this woman.

Item 3: Typed copy of Resident Medical Officer’s report on incident of 8 May 1973; attending doctor not named.Re: unidentified female patient, admitted one day prior (7 May) following her discovery in the harbour.

11.20 am: paged to urgently attend a patient on Level 4 Medical Ward experiencing sudden onset of breathing difficulties and paralysis of the lower limbs. Arrived within 5 minutes of being called but, on examination, found patient to be breathing normally, lower limbs mobile and responsive to stimuli. All other vital signs normal. Patient was still unable/unwilling to identify herself, still not speaking, but did shake her head when asked if headache was present. Appeared somewhat drowsy but otherwise well.

Recommendations: allow patient to rest but continue half-hourly obs.

(Note that patient was seen by psychiatric Dr J J T Smith yesterday pm; Dr Smith to be informed of this latest development. Note, expedite Dr Smith’s recommendation for neurological consultation for this patient.)

Item 4: Transcript from tape recording of Sister Margery Plimsoll’s account of her first meeting with mystery woman, which took place on evening of 8 May 1973. Recorded during interview with psychiatrist Dr J J T Smith on 25 May 1973.I remember every detail, every thought, word, and action of our first meeting. It is etched in my mind like a woodcut design, which I have used as the stamped background to my life since that time. Many nights I dream of it; many nights I dream of the other meetings. All of the meetings, all of our conversations, inspire my days and soothe my nights.

When I came on duty at ten pm for the overnight shift, I was told by the head nurse of the departing shift that the woman had slept for some hours following a short episode of breathing difficulty and partial paralysis earlier in the day, but had awoken at around six pm and appeared bright-eyed and alert. She had eaten all of the evening meal before falling into a normal and very peaceful sleep as soon as the main ward lights were turned off. But, so far, the woman had not spoken a word.

I admit to being intrigued by the woman’s flawless skin—very pale, but very beautiful, as if it had never seen the sun. Strange, though, that her hands were quite calloused, indicating manual labour. There was something about the woman that disturbed me. Something familiar; a chord of recognition, but I could not find the melody.

‘Are you all right, dear?’ I whispered, placing my cool hand on the woman’s forehead. Here, I thought I detected a slight rise in temperature and so I reached for a thermometer.

‘Just pop this in your mouth, dear. You seem a little warm. That’s right, just hold it there gently. It won’t take too long,’ I assured her. I took the woman’s right hand in mine and held it as I waited for the temperature to register. When I removed the thermometer, I saw that her temperature was indeed elevated and she seemed a little agitated. She began to make a series of small, sighing sounds, forming her mouth into shapes that suggested speech.

‘What is it, my dear?’ I asked, leaning my head closer to her quiet utterances. ‘What can I do for you? If you tell me your name, I’ll be able to help you.’

‘Ju, jul … ju,’ the woman breathed, the quality of her voice as gentle as bubbles in dishwater.

‘Is your name Julie?’ I prompted. (I have a particular liking for that name. If I’d had a daughter, that is the name I would have given her.)

‘You must tell me, my dear,’ I tried again. ‘I see now that you can speak after all and, if you tell me your name, I’ll be able to contact your family to take you home. I’m sure you’d like that.’

The woman shook her head, rapidly and vehemently, and then she fell back against the pillow and, reaching her right hand toward me, patted my arm. Such a kind touch. And, as no other patients called for my attention, I remained with the woman, gently stroking her forehead and close-cropped brown hair, until the first pale rays of dawn tapped at the east-facing window at the end of the ward. The woman seemed to respond to those rays. I noticed her eyes moving under their fragile lids; I saw her fingers twitch; I heard her take a solid inhalation, and then she awoke.

‘How are you feeling?’ I asked.

‘I am well. And you are well. And all is well, and all shall be well,’ she answered, even though I had asked only about her health. Later, of course, I would understand what she meant but, at that time, I just thanked God that the woman was beginning to communicate. It gave me confidence to try, again, to find out something about her.

‘Yes, you do seem well,’ I began. ‘I’ll check your temperature again in a minute but, perhaps, you’ve now remembered your name.’

‘I have not forgotten it,’ she said.

‘Oh, that’s good. If you tell me, I can let the right people know and we can help you get home to your family.’

‘What is your name?’ she asked, not seeming to be ignoring me but, rather, enlarging the communication. It seemed a reasonable question so I answered, ‘I am Sister Margery.’

‘Sister Margery.’ She said it as a repetition, not an address. ‘It is a good name. But do you understand that even though you have told me your name, I cannot help you get home?’

‘Yes, I see. But I’m not a patient, I’m a nun, so my home is here, in my work in this hospital, in my prayers, in my dedication to others, and to God,’ I tried to explain.

‘Then we are the same, Sister Margery. Like you, I am home already.’

I was confused, and I told her so.

‘Then I will tell you a tale, and you will see something of me in the tale, and you will understand better …’

Once, long ago, there was a woman who delighted in the ordinary things of her everyday life. She loved the high heat of a summer’s day, and the deep chill of winter evenings. She loved the fragrance and colours of her garden in spring, and the way that the bees gathered sweetness from the garden’s flowers. She loved the way in which the rain tumbled in plump drops over the eaves of her cottage on darkening autumn afternoons. Best of all, she loved the open arms of her husband and the laughter of her children. But one day, there were no more children—they had grown and gone on with their own lives and her husband had died and her work in the cottage was no longer joyous; it was hollow. But her heart was still full, for, in her ordinariness, she had learnt to love and to suffer; she had embraced the lessons of everyday life. The sun still shone, and the rain still fell, and the bees still gathered. And so she knew that she too must be useful. But her home was no longer the place of her usefulness. And so she left it, to find her work in the home of the world.

Something in that tale moved me. I cannot describe what it was. I stopped asking her for details of her life after that. I just called her ‘Julie’ because that name had come to me when she had made those first sounds. I know it didn’t really suit her. Julies are outgoing, pretty, and popular. She was nothing like that, but I hoped that giving her an ordinary, happy name would stop others pestering her about irrelevant details.

Item 5: Handwritten note in Medical Ward nursing file of morning of 9 May 1973. Authoring nurse not named.Sister Margery reported at shift changeover this morning that during the night, the mystery patient gave her name as ‘Julie’. Files relating to this patient will now be marked as ‘Julie X’ until more conclusive identification comes to light.