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200 Gloria This seeing the sick endears them to us, us too it endears. —Gerard Manley Hopkins Named after Swanson the star, she knew good actresses from bad and did some acting herself. But that was years before the three-pronged cane, the walker and the wheeled and cushioned chair. “Sometimes I could scream,” she said, “but why, what good would it do?” Everything declinable declined except her will. The nurses were amazed, “We’ve never cared for anyone like her.” Roses brought her to tears as did the memories of those she loved. She aimed a special scorn at frauds and hypocrites. “Some women marry money, and there’s a name for that . . .” “If being Christian means forgiving someone who harmed anyone I loved and never even apologized, I think that’s asking a lot . . .” At eighty-two she hated “being trouble for the nurses,” who already loved her frankness and her bold contempt of death. 201 To anyone who came to visit, she would smile and say, “Still here.” If dying were a play—and that her final line—, she said it jauntier than Swanson ever could. Those selfsame words said something surer and beyond denial when she died. The nurses understood. For Gloria Abdou ...

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