We are one with God in birth and death.
—Anonymous
The nurse opened the big double doors from the living room, to let in the warm air of a Burgundy country night. The farmstead had been built into the hillside, some twelve hundred years earlier, because the high cliffs offered natural protection from marauders, and because the spring nearby gave an ample supply of clean water. There was nothing left of the original buildings, but the current farmhouse and barn built around the high-walled courtyard were easily seven hundred years old, their basic structure still intact despite the repeated renovation of the interior. This farm had been first, at least so far as the historians could tell, but eventually other farms had arrived, and a town had grown around the spring, with merchants lining narrow, cobblestoned streets, and then an abbey, a cathedral and eventually two, a chateau and finally a canal. All of the town's wealth had come from the vineyards then, and even now most of it still did. It was a peaceful place, and though she had been reluctant to leave the bright lights of Paris, she had come to be glad that she had.
There was a noise behind her, and she turned to see her patient, carefully negotiating the stairs. She turned to him.
"It's late, M'sieur. You should be sleeping."
"Probably." He took another step down, his hand trembling on the balustrade, and she went to help him. "But I can't sleep, so I'm here." His few remaining hairs were long and white and straggling, and the effort of coming down from the top floor had made him short of breath.
"And you should call me to help you on the stairs. Mon Dieu, imagine if you should fall."
"I can still get myself around."
She pursed her lips disapprovingly but didn't say anything more, and helped him down the last stairs. He had been a great man once, and such men usually adapted poorly to the restrictions of age and infirmity. When he was down she brought over his wheelchair, and he sank into it with evident relief.
"Is it clear out?"
"It's beautiful."
"Take me outside, please."
She smiled and wheeled him through the already open doors and onto the flagstones of the courtyard. It had been a hundred years at least since the barn had seen a cow, the ancient byre long since converted to garage space, but the original timbers still held up the roof, rough-hewn and blackened with age. She could hear the spring burbling in the background, as it had for the long-forgotten farmsteader who'd originally claimed this little piece of France. Nothing ever changes here. Even the canal was three hundred years old, and little new had been built since then, though the abbey was now a community center, and the chateau a hospital.
"Can you bring my binoculars?"
"They're right here. I knew you would want them."
"Merci." He took them and held them to his eyes, searching up into the southern sky with trembling hands. There was a star there, brighter than the others, almost big enough to perceive as a distinct shape.
"It gets bigger every time, doesn't it? Brighter?"
"It does, M'sieur." In truth she couldn't see that it did, but it seemed important for him to believe it was true. She wasn't even sure he could see it at all, not really, between the trembling of his hands and the grey fog that obscured his once sharp eyes. And yet he always knows where to look. She waited patiently while he lowered the heavy lenses, then raised them to look again, and glanced at her watch. An hour to go. One more hour and then the overnight nurse would come and she could go home. Guillame would have Sophie in bed, and they could have a little time together before bed themselves. The evening shifts weren't bad, and . . .
There was a clunk, and she looked down to see the binoculars on the flagstones. For a second she thought her charge had fallen asleep, as he often did at such times, but there was something wrong. Quickly she knelt before him, starting a quick first-aid assessment, He was breathing, but one look at his face told her all she needed to know; the left side side was slack, the other normal. She took his hands in hers to confirm her suspicion, found the left side limp. A stroke, and a big one. She took out her pad, tapped it once to call the ambulance.
"No . . ." Her patient was speaking. He caught her arm with his right hand, his grip surprisingly strong.
"Quoi?"
"No . . . let me go . . ."
"M'sieur . . ."
"Let . . . me . . . go . . ."
She looked at her charge. He did have a Do Not Resuscitate order in place, but at the moment he wasn't in need of resuscitation, and with prompt medical attention he wouldn't be. Her pad was speaking to her. She couldn't make out the words, but she knew what they were. Emergency services, asking for an address. Her charge shook his head, his hand still on her arm. His left eye was closed with the stroke, the right pleading. He knew what was happening, and he didn't want to become what he was becoming, didn't want the life he was about to face, his last shreds of independence taken away. Her pad spoke again. Slowly she raised the pad to her ear. There were rules to follow in such circumstances, but there was also the right thing to do. "Je m'excuse, c'est une erreur." She tapped it again to disconnect the call. "I'll take you inside," she said.
"No . . . Here . . ." The stroke was clearly mostly on the right side, but her charge's language function had been impaired as well. A bilateral stroke then. Without help he would die soon, but he knew that, perhaps he even wished it. There was a table in the courtyard, with an umbrella, surrounded by wooden chairs. She went and got one, sat beside him, held his right hand and squeezed it. He leaned back and looked up again, and she leaned down to retrieve his binoculars in case he asked for them. He didn't, and so she just sat quietly. You couldn't be a geriatric nurse without learning how to help the dying through their last hours. His breathing became quicker, and then after a while it slowed again. The pressure of his hand on hers grew weaker, and he slumped slightly, still facing up to the stars but, she was certain, no longer seeing them.
"Suzanne . . ."
"Yes," she said, though her name was Cecile. She leaned closer to hear him better.
"We're safe now . . ." His words were clear again, and he sounded somehow younger. He was speaking with a different part of his brain, as his mind regressed to his youth.
"Yes, of course, we're safe."
"They can't follow us here, Susie. Not ever. Don't you worry."
"I know, I'm not worried." She squeezed his hand. "Don't you worry either."
"No. We're safe." His hand relaxed further, and he didn't speak again. The nurse sat quietly, listening to the burble of the spring. The overnight nurse would be along soon enough, and they could look after everything then.