AFTER LEADING THE photographer and his assistant to the staff quarters, the matron pauses in the midst of her bustling activity. She passes down a corridor that, to all appearances, is no different from any other. She stops by a door that is no different from all other doors.
Why, then, does she grow damp about the armpits?
He is, after all, only an idiot.
But the matron, against her better judgment, has come to believe that there is something else, something yearning and human, something trapped inside that lumpy body, struggling to escape. She believes that she sees it in his eyes, the moment when he first awakes, and in his hands, when he defends himself from her washcloth. She felt it, perhaps, when he twisted away from her, and she pursued him, towel steaming; she felt it snuffling against her skirts, burrowing towards the warmth of her red hands. Something fierce and intelligent and alive.
The matron reports to the director: M. Jouy is in no condition to leave the hospital. He must remain under our care. The family will have to be informed.