Silent Keys: Chapter Ten

Don Wilkins was the kind of man who needed to control everything, even the death of his wife, Livi. It didn't quite work out the way he had so carefully planned.

Don woke up with a mouth so dry he couldn't move his tongue. Swollen and sticky, it lay inside the bed of his teeth, refusing to function. If he needed anything, would anyone hear him? If he could only wave his hand, would the nurse see it? The cop always stood with his back to him. Everyone seemed bent on ignoring him.

So why didn't they just pull the curtain so they would've have to look at me?

As if it had a life of its own, his index finger on his right hand started tapping out Morse Code on the bed rail.

H              E                L       P                     M            E   

dit-dit-dah-dit      dit           dit-dah-dah-dit      dah-dah-dit-dit           dit-dit       dit   

When there was no response, he opened his mouth wide, trying to squeeze out any sound at all. The only thing that issued was a raspy cry. Still no response. The cop was just on the other side of that glass wall. Just a few feet away was someone who could help him, but ….

Maybe I really am dead. This is Hell and this is my eternal punishment.

Turning his head from side to side, he discovered the call button pinned near his pillow. Pushing the button, he hoped the nurse would deign to come to him. Maybe she wouldn't. She didn't seem to think he was worthy of her care.

Then he saw his daughter and a sharply dressed older man walking up to the cop. The man introduced himself as an attorney Carol had retained.

Ah, so Carol follows through with her threats. That's my girl.

In a voice that was remarkably calm, the attorney said, "So, my client tells me you won't allow her to remove her dying father from life support. Is this true?"

Before the cop could respond, the lawyer continued, raising his voice just a tad more. It was very effective in conveying a veiled threat. Don had dealt with that voice many times in some of his clients' court cases. It was a special skill law schools must have taught these guys to subtly intimidate their opponents. For the first time in his life, Don was glad that voice spoke on his behalf.

"Judging by the letter she showed me, this patient had no intention of committing murder. It is just happenstance that he survived the pact he made with his wife. Even I, a non-professional in the medical field, can see his obvious state of declining health."

Suddenly, the nurse's voice entered the conversation. "Counselor, this is not the place to argue about this. We have very sick patients on this ward. You need to leave. This officer is performing his duty as …."

"Yes, I know he's performing his duty. He's also denying my client's right to remove her father from medical treatment. This whole situation is absurd in the extreme. He's dying and should be allowed to die as per his wishes that have been stated clearly in this letter to his daughter. You are denying his rights as well as his daughter's."

"There is no reason to think he won't survive, Counselor. We will have him walking out of here in no time and then you can prepare your client to attend his trial. As you may recall, this State doesn't have any laws that cover mercy killings or the right to commit suicide."

"Madam, I'm far more equipped to understand the laws of this State better than you. So, why don't you go back to your station and attend to your nursing duties and I'll attend to my legal duties. Hmmmm?"

The nurse huffed with indignation and jammed her hands into her hips. She opened her mouth for another retort, but the attorney shushed her with a flick of his index finger. "Let's just see how long he will survive when we remove all your efforts to keep him alive. If he does without you pumping air into his lungs and drugs into his arm, then you can have him."

Finally, the cop interrupted. "Listen, I have my orders. I don't have the authority to let anyone do anything other than make sure he makes it to trial. As far as the DA is concerned, your client was in collusion with this man's plan to kill his wife."

"You also don't have the authority, to say nothing of the education, to interpret the law? And you have absolutely no evidence that my client had anything to do with this man's plan. She told me she only heard of this pact through this letter. And I dare you or the DA to prove otherwise. We can take this to court, but it will be after this man dies the death he planned."

The cop tried to protest. The nursed scowled in contempt. In his in-and-out mental state, Don enjoyed this little drama.  For once, someone was taking his side, as if anyone had any control over the outcome.

Don agreed with the lawyer about his prospects for survival. He had felt his life oozing away for the past month, but some barrier continued to prevent that final breath passing blessedly from his lips. Whatever was dripping into his arm was hindering his escape from this illogical existence. If only Carol would venture into his room? If only she would hold his hand until it turned cold? Such simple requests, yet they remained completely outside his grasp.

"Now you listen to me, both of you. I understand you've got your orders. And you, nurse, have great confidence in your healing powers."

Don almost giggled at that one. That woman was the original Nurse Ratchet. She despised him. Her all-important orders must have grated against that hatred, though, and Don was sure she would relish the idea of pulling his plug and celebrating the justice of his death. Save the taxpayers the bill. HA! Maybe she would also be thrilled to know how much he suffered at present knowing he lay in a state of limbo. He would be happy to head downward to Hell if she would only put him out of his misery.

"This whole case is a travesty. I know the DA very well. We went to law school together and someday, officer, when you and I know each other better, I'll tell you stories about your DA and his Judge Roy Bean style of justice."

There was a pause as everyone seemed to take a deep breath.

"So, here's the deal. Nurse, if you don't proceed to take this man off whatever is keeping him alive, I'm holding both of you personally responsible for a grievous miscarriage of justice. You will both pay for whatever emotional harm is suffered by my client and her father. Whatever trial takes place regarding this case will name you two as the defendants, not Mr. Wilkins here. Got it?"

"Hey, You can't do …."  Their voices protested in unison.

"Watch me! I can do all kinds of things with this and it won't be pretty. Now, regardless of the fine medical care this patient has been receiving, he doesn't really have much time left and you're wasting it. So, let's get it done right now."

~ ~ ~ ~~

The drive to Overland Past seemed much longer than in previous years. He and Livi had set up a radio station on this remote mountain pass in the middle of Nevada for nearly twenty years. Don had claimed it with the vigor of NASA planting that flag on the moon. It was his chosen spot for providing communications support for the Pony Express Re-Ride.

On particularly stormy years, Don used his pickup truck to pull horse trailers out of mud that threatened to swallow them. Often, horses had to break trail around these mired vehicles in order to carry out their appointed rounds. The riders loved him for his help, both on the radio and with his truck. Their admiration for him was the highlight of his year. Better than Christmas and well worth the long drive. And Livi bounced in her seat beside him, glowing in the anticipation of a trip away from home.

That first year, Livi helped Don lay out an eighty-meter-long antenna he had assembled from coax and insulators. Once stretched out on the ground, they hoisted it up on poles. Livi shook her head and said, "So this is supposed to catch the signals from the Utah/Nevada border and relay them all the way to Carson City?"

Don chuckled at her still fuzzy understanding of antennas and the magic of radio waves. She made it sound like a huge jai alai game where the player catches the ball in a long basket and flings it across the court. "Yes, dear, have faith. I've measured this carefully and it will work."

And work well it did until the other hams changed the frequency down to seventy meters, rendering the antenna and all their efforts useless. Livi was so upset she climbed into the truck cab to sleep until the riders arrived. She barely spoke to him for a week after they got home.

In subsequent years Livi had fashioned a comfortable camp shelter with tarps hanging from a pop-up. Chairs and a table with coffee and food awaited the receiving riders who would appear just before dark and wait for hours until the riders carrying the mochila full of mail arrived.

Like ghosts in the night, their headlamps would bob in the dark as they slowly ascended the rocky trail. Once on the pass, they would transfer the mochila from one horse to the other and the riders who had waited so long, and had told so many stories, would gallop into the night. After a quick cup of coffee, the arriving riders would turn around and descend back down the mountain. The whole exchange only took a few minutes. Don said it was the most ethereal sports event he had ever witnessed.

The silence after the riders left felt so anticlimactic that Livi stood there, deflated like a balloon, watching the lights flicker out. She told Don it was the same way she felt after a radio contact and the air went dead.

"That's why I don't like talking on the radio, Don. You have these wonderful conversations for a few minutes, getting to know bits and pieces about a friendly stranger far away. And then they sign off and are gone. You may be able to talk to them again or not. I just can't bear that sudden cut-off of human contact. It's too jarring to my senses. And contesting is even worse. Just exchanging call signs and location. That's all. Then it's move on to the next signal. How can you stand that kind of human contact?"

Finally, she told the  truth. So that's why radio never turned her on. Funny, those ephemeral relationships didn't bother him at all. He'd talked to some people many times. The distance between them, the lack of face-to-face intimacy, suited him just fine. Some of the contacts lasted no longer than it took to talk a bit about their equipment. Other contacts lasted much longer, especially with foreign stations. Learning about other countries from someone actually living there was worth the time. Since he had such testy interactions with people he had to deal with in person, these long-distance friends fulfilled whatever social needs he had.

Livi thrived on meeting the Pony riders and hearing their stories. The re-enactment of this romantic slice of American history fascinated her with its modern-day challenges. And for a few hours, she became part of someone's life; maybe a critical part that would comfort them in a stormy, dark place in the middle of nowhere.

Even at the end of June, it always drizzled a chilling rain on that pass. Hotter than hell in the afternoon, temperatures soon dropped close to freezing. As the riders waited in the shelter, Livi always shared the quilts she brought to keep them and sometimes a horse warm and dry.

As one rider galloped away, he called over his shoulder, "thanks, Livi, you're a lifesaver." Her whole body swelled with gratitude knowing how she helped another human being survive a cold night. After they got too old to cover that station, she worried about those riders who waited there without the Wilkins camp to shelter them.

As she thought of the youthful riders of 1860 crossing over this pass, her appreciation for their courage and stamina grew deeper. This annual brush with extreme hardship made her a bit ashamed of her pampered life in the suburbs. Even in the 21st Century, rural life still had its jagged edges to test people's mettle.

The people riding from the eastern side of Nevada were more rustic than anyone she'd ever met. Some regaled her with the bravado of the buckaroo culture from which they sprang. Others stood taciturn, drinking their coffee without much more to say than thank you, ma'am.

Don teased her about the irony of the whole re-enactment. The original Pony Express lasted a mere eighteen months, going bankrupt after telegraph wires spanned the western frontier. The Re-Ride had been thriving since the mid-1980s.

"I guess it's more fun to honor some damned orphan kid tearing across the plains on a rank mustang than it is to celebrate some bright young entrepreneur tapping a telegraph key. Livi, did you know the Nevada State Constitution was sent to Washington over the telegraph lines in 1864? Can you just imagine tapping out every single word of that document on a Morse code key? Now, I think that's worthy of special notice. Does anyone give a damn about that accomplishment? Or who that man was?"

Livi smiled in a patronizing manner and unfurled a quilt over the mattress in the back of the truck. "Come on, Don, it's been a long day. Let's go to sleep."

During the day, as Don set up his radios, she would wander the hillside, bending occasionally to examine a flower or a stone. When she threw the dishwater on the ground one time, a swarm of tiny blue butterflies gathered to siphon the moisture from soil that hadn't received rain in months. She sat for over an hour watching their wings flutter upon the damp earth. Don couldn't understand how she could be so fascinated with a bunch of bugs. At least, she didn't nag him about being bored. She was perfectly capable of entertaining herself doing nothing.

As the years wore on, Don trimmed his station to the bare minimum: a two-meter radio connected to a di-pole hooked on the rear bumper of the truck, an HF radio connected to a vertical antenna weighted on a tripod next to the truck. When the wind tunnel behavior of the pass ripped their shelters to shreds, he gave up on the pop-up affair and relayed messages from the comfort of the truck cab, hardly emerging to talk to the riders.

Despite the cold wind whipping around the truck, Livi continued to hang out with the riders.  She brewed rich aromatic coffee and kept it hot in an urn on the tailgate. Her tasty corn breads were a hit and there was always a pail of apples for the horses along with water. Those horses always needed water even though the riders refused. There were no toilets available. Loping down the canyon with a full bladder must have been excruciating.

Don called her little setup Livi's Smorgasbord, but he loved the treats right along with the riders. That was Livi's thing, providing comfort.

One time, she got defensive when he teased her about it. "I don't care how tough these people are, it's miserable up here and I can see how it wears them out before they even start their run. And their horses! Did you see how that one little horse was shivering after standing in the drizzle and wind? That can kill a horse. And that blanket I threw over him was old and ragged anyway. So, stop being such a grouch about what I do for these people. Just go back to your nice warm truck cab and let me be."

Don was unconvinced about the horse's discomfort. After all, it was just a horse. How do they survive the cold in the wild? Livi was too kind-hearted sometimes, but he had to admit, it was one of the things he adored about her.

The last year they made camp, Don didn't want to tell Livi it would be their finale. It would've broken her heart. He and Livi were entering their eighties. Driving all the way out to the Pass was taking more of a toll each year upon their bodies.

Livi now bent almost double as she walked. And she walked only when she absolutely had to. With his heart giving out on him, his strength failed to support a simple task. It seemed to kick the slats out of them just going from the sofa to the kitchen. Both of them required professional help for everything, it seemed. That forced Don to submit to someone's control over his most private needs. That was the last humiliation he would allow.

About six months ago, Don found Livi's car keys in the cereal cupboard. She couldn't keep a conversation going with him at all. Forgetting what they were talking about at mid-sentence, her eyes would glaze over and stare into space. Words dropped out of her memory. It hurt him to see how she struggled just to say something simple like can I have a drink or I need to go to the bathroom.

Then there was that horrible day when he came into the bedroom where she was sitting by the window. She startled as he approached her, pulling away from him. As he stood there, her face contorted with terror. He could see it clearly in her eyes. That devastating realization she didn't know who he was. In fact, she was terrified of him.

Her mental capacities fluctuated like radio waves in the ionosphere. Good days and bad.

When spring came and she spent more time outside in the garden, she seemed to recover her senses. She recognized him more often than not, to his relief. Maybe, just maybe, there was hope the new drugs were taking effect. Each pill he doled out to her held the promise that she would return to her old self.

In one desperate push, Don and Livi mustered enough energy to set up camp in the Pass one last time. Maybe he didn't have to tell her. He could see it in her eyes. She was exhausted and sat in the truck cab, hardly spending time with the riders at all. He heated up some water on the camp stove and made instant coffee, offering the riders a bag of trail mix to munch. There were no apples for the horses this year. The riders had to help him hoist the water cube to fill the bucket. That was it for him on that count alone. This year was their finale.

When they got home, they both collapsed in bed and slept until Rosaria woke them up the next morning. Shaking Don's shoulder, her voice sounded panicky.

"Senor Don, senor Don, despierta, wake up. Are you okay?"

He squirmed with irritation. Rosaria drew her hand away quickly. "Senor Don…" she whispered then retreated to the kitchen.

The truck was still full of gear and remained so for three days. Don finally asked Rosaria if she would help him unload the truck and put things away. Luckily, she obliged. She was always compliant to whatever he asked. Former housekeepers weren't so cooperative.

A week after they returned from the Pass, Don sat Livi down on the sofa and took her hands. Because of their growing incapacity, Don hatched a plan. If they continued as they were, he would probably die first, and he couldn't bear the thought of Livi surviving without him. And Carol sure as hell wasn't going to be much use. As far as he knew at that time, she had been incommunicado for years.

He had watched Livi sending countless letters to her over the years. Nothing. No response. Who knows, Don often thought, maybe Carol and her hippie-dippie husband had died of starvation on that commune. It would serve them right.

Then, he discovered the cache of letters. They spanned years of correspondence, the envelopes addressed only to Livi. She had kept them from him for some reason. What did she think he would do, take them away and throw them in the fire?

As he read through them, though, he discovered the deep love Carol still maintained for her mother. She asked about him occasionally and wondered if he was still angry with her. It surprised him how these pleas for his forgiveness created a heavy pain in his chest. The ache was so profound he rose and hurried to the bathroom to take a nitro glycerin. He bent over the sink for quite a while, dizzy, clutching his chest as the pain slowly dissipated.

After copying the address, he stowed the letters back in their hiding place. He would need to write her a letter himself, telling him how much he loved her and that he needed her to help them. He told her about their pact, but wouldn't mail the letter until the day before he would put the plan into action. She would have to know. He couldn't bear the thought of her going through life not knowing what had happened to her parents.

He and Livi had already discussed various options when he was diagnosed with heart disease a couple of years ago. With his plan fully worked out and written down on his to-do list, he wondered if Livi would remember what they had finally decided to do. So much of her memory had disappeared.

Right after he mailed the letter to Carol, he sat Livi down on the sofa and took her hands in his. She gazed up at him with a beatific expression of complete faith and love. He was suddenly overwhelmed with emotion. How could he do this without Livi fully understanding what it meant? He hoped to whatever god existed that this was one of her more lucid days.