An elderly nurse entered the waiting room. Her cap was perched on hair dyed butter yellow, her hound's cheeks had bull's-eyes of rouge on the bones, her down-turned mouth was unevenly lipsticked in raspberry red. "Doctor will see you now," she announced.
The girl and woman jumped up. The nurse walked past them. "Me?" asked Lampley.
She wheeled about; he followed her. The girl took the woman's seat and began fussing with her hair; the woman sank into the girl's chair and rolled the magazine. The dummies' eyes crinkled and winked behind their veils; they had no mouths.
The nurse led him through a cracked and splintered door, the frame eaten by termites and dry rot. She swished her stiff skirt down a hall smelling of anaesthetics, dried blood, food cooked and forgotten. The plaster was cracked and bulging, seemingly held in place by the thick, greasy paint. The hall opened on a dressing room with triple-mirrored vanity-table. Cotton smocks of varying lengths hung on hooks. "Put on a gown please," she ordered.
"But I...."
She gave him an arch look. "You wouldn't expect Doctor to do your little work while you had your clothes on, now, would you? Come, dear—there's no use being shy at this stage. And let's not keep Doctor waiting; Doctor's a busy man."
She drew the curtain behind her; it was glossy-green with the word PULLMAN stitched to it. The Governor slowly took off his jacket, tie and shirt. There was a calendar on the wall, a calendar for the year he had gone into politics, after he and Mattie had been married for eighteen months. The picture was of an abnormally short-torsoed girl saying, "Let's have fun!"
Lampley selected the longest gown. It was not only too short, the edges were grimed. He put it on and pulled the curtain aside. The nurse said, "Let's not be nervous, dear. If you'd seen as many as I have come in to have their little work done you wouldn't think any more of it than brushing your teeth. I've had it done myself a dozen or two times. This way, please."
She preceded him into a grim office. Blue skies and flowering trees were painted on the glass of closed windows. There was a gray operating table under floodlights, and an oak desk with mustard-colored streaks. A man with a sharp nose, close-clipped gray mustache, large, cloudy spectacles sat behind the desk, looking over pads, pencils, ash-trays and a portable radio. A wilted rose was thrust into a buttonhole of his nylon smock. Two younger nurses leaned their elbows on the table, intent only on their animated conversation.