The Cider House Rules

"Oops," Candy said, bending to pick up the jelly for her while Mary Agnes stole the barrette--little John Walsh observing her deft moves, admiringly. A trace of blood, or maybe rust, on Mary Agnes's bare shin caught Candy's eye and made her feel queasy; she needed to restrain herself from wetting her finger and trying to rub the streak away. When she stood up and handed the girl her jar of jelly, Candy felt a little dizzy. Some grown-ups were coming out of the hospital entrance, and their presence helped Candy compose herself: I've not come here to play with the children, she thought.

"I'm Doctor Larch," the old man was saying to Wally, who seemed transfixed by the determination with which Smoky Fields was devouring the jarful of apple-cider jelly.

"Wally Worthington," Wally said, pumping Dr. Larch's hand, handing him a jar of Ira Titcomb's honey. "Fresh from Ocean View Orchards. That's in Heart's Rock, but we're very near the coast--we're in Heart's Haven, almost."

"Heart's Haven?" said Wilbur Larch, examining the honey. A sea breeze seemed to spring off the boy--as distinctive, Larch thought, as fresh, crisp hundred-dollar bills. Whose face was on a hundred-dollar bill? Larch tried to imagine.

"Tell her," Curly Day said to Homer Wells, pointing to Candy, but there was no need to point. Homer Wells had seen her, and only her, from the moment he emerged from the hospital entrance. Young Copperfield clung to her leg, but this didn't seem to impede her gracefulness--and nothing could interfere with her radiance. "Tell her I'm the best one," Curly said to Homer.

"Hello," Candy said to Homer because he was the tallest person present; he was as tall as Wally. "I'm Candy Kendall," she said to him. "I hope we're not interrupting anything." You are interrupting two abortions, one birth, one death, two autopsies, and an argument, thought Homer Wells, but all he said was, "He's the best one." Too mechanically! thought Curly Day. He lacks conviction!

"Me," Curly said, stepping between them. "He means me. I'm the best."

Candy bent over Curly and ruffled his sticky hair. "Of course you are!" she said brightly. And straightening up, she said to Homer, "And do you work here? Or are you one of . . ." Was it polite to say them? she wondered.

"Not exactly," Homer mumbled, thinking: I work here, inexactly, and I am inexactly one of them.

"His name's Homer Wells," Curly told Candy, since Homer had failed to introduce himself. "He's too old to adopt."

"I can see that!" Candy said, feeling shy. I should be talking to the doctor, she thought awkwardly; she was irritated with Wally for creating such a crowd.

"I'm in the apple business," Wally was saying to Dr. Larch. "It's my father's business. Actually," he added, "my mother's business."

What does this fool want? thought Wilbur Larch.

"Oh, I love apples!" Nurse Edna said.

"I would have brought lots of apples," Wally said, "but it's the wrong time of year. You should have your own apples." He indicated the barren hillside stretching behind them. "Look at that hill," he said. "It's washing away. You ought to plant it. I could even get you the trees. In six or seven years, you'd have your own apples; you'd have apples for more than a hundred years."

What do I want with a hundred years of apples? thought Wilbur Larch.

"Wouldn't that be pretty, Wilbur?" Nurse Edna asked.

"And you could get your own cider press," Wally suggested. "Give the kids fresh apples and fresh cider--they'd have lots to do."

They don't need things to do, thought Dr. Larch. They need places to go!

They're from some charity, thought Nurse Angela cautiously. She put her lips close to Dr. Larch's ear and whispered, "A sizable donation," just so Dr. Larch wouldn't be rude to them.

They're too young to give their money away, thought Wilbur Larch.

"Bees!" Wally was saying. "You should keep bees, too. Fascinating for the kids, and a lot safer than most people think. Have your own honey, and give the kids an education--bees are a model society, a lesson in teamwork!"

Oh shut up, Wally, Candy was thinking, although she understood why he couldn't stop babbling. He was unused to an environment he couldn't instantly brighten; he was unused to a place so despairing that it insisted on silence. He was unused to absorbing a shock, to simply taking it in. Wally's talk-a-mile-a-minute style was a good-hearted effort; he believed in improving the world--he had to fix everything, to make everything better.

Dr. Larch looked around at the children stuffing themselves with honey and jelly. Have they come here to play with the orphans for a day and to make everyone sick? he wondered. He should have looked at Candy; then he would have known why they were there. He was not good at looking in women's eyes, Wilbur Larch; he had seen too much of them under the harsh lights. Nurse Angela at times wondered if Dr. Larch even knew how he tended to overlook women; she wondered if this was an occupational hazard among obstetricians, or if men with a tendency to overlook women were drawn to the obstetrical field.

Homer Wells did not overlook women; he looked right into their eyes, which might have been why, Nurse Angela thought, he seemed to find their position in the stirrups so troubling. Funny, she thought, how he has seen everything that Dr. Larch does, yet he will not watch me or Nurse Edna shave anyone. He was so adamant in arguing with Dr. Larch about shaving the women for abortions. It wasn't necessary, Homer always said, and the women surely didn't like to be shaved.

"Like it?" Dr. Larch would say. "Am I in the entertainment business?"

Candy felt helpless; no one seemed to understand why she was standing there. Children were colliding with her at hip level, and this awkward, darkly handsome young man, who was surely her own age but seemed somehow older . . . was she supposed to tell him why she'd come to St. Cloud's? Couldn't anyone tell just by looking at her? Then Homer Wells looked at her in that way; their eyes met. Candy thought that he had seen her many times before, that he'd watched her grow up, had seen her naked, had even observed the act responsible for the particular trouble she was now presenting for cure. It was shattering to Homer to recognize in the expression of the beautiful stranger he had fallen in love with something as familiar and pitiable as another unwanted pregnancy.

"I think you'd be more comfortable inside," he murmured to her.

"Yes, thank you," Candy said, not able to look in his eyes now.

Larch, seeing the girl walk toward the hospital entrance--recognizing that deliberate way of walking that predictably happens to someone who's watching her own feet--thought suddenly, Oh, it's just another abortion, that's all this is about. He turned to follow the girl and Homer, just as Smoky Fields finished the jar of jelly and began to eat a jar of honey. Smoky ate with no apparent satisfaction; but he ate so methodically that even when he was jostled by a nearby orphan, he never took his eyes from his little paw as it scooped its way into the jar. When he was severely jostled, a kind of growl--or gurgle--caught in his throat, and he hunched his shoulders forward as if to protect the jar from other predators.