With very little regard for other vehicles on the street, totally absorbed in only one problem: finding a parking place. By the time we reached the hospital I was all right. That is to say, I was no longer shaking. How I felt was another matter. A matter in which I took no pleasure. But at least I looked the way any average citizen of middle years should look while entering a morgue to identify the body of his mother. If this does not provide a sharply etched picture, I am not surprised. I have never in my life seen a man of middle years while he was entering a morgue to identify the body of his mother. Francis Xavier Special Surgery on Columbus Avenue is not noted for a profusion of mirrors. “I’ll wait for you,” Herman Sabinson said. Then he must have seen something in my face, because he added, “If you want?” I did, of course. Which is why I had to refuse. “No, thanks,” I said. “You told me to act like a guy who grew up on East Fourth Street.” Herman Sabinson tapped the knot in his tie, touched the embroidered flower under the knot, and tipped the golden sign of Caduceus that held the tie to his well-fed little belly.
