“You’re not the only one who’s known disappointment and suffering. Everyone here could tell a tale. We still rise each morning and thank the Lord for a new day.”
“We?” Mirielle snickered. “What tale of suffering could you tell beyond having to wear that ridiculous hat?”
Sister Verena was quiet a moment. Undoubtedly fuming with indignation. Good. Maybe she’d leave.
“When you first arrived, I asked you how many children you had, and you hesitated. Said three, then corrected yourself. Did one die?”
The tenderness in Sister Verena’s voice surprised Mirielle, and she rolled back toward her. “My son, Felix.”
“Mmm . . .” Sister Verena looked over Mirielle’s head out the window, her gaze distant and glassy. “I had a son once too. He had bright green eyes and a head of curly red hair the day he was born.”
“You had a family before you became a nun?”
“No,” she said, still looking away. “The sisters said it best I didn’t hold him.”
“The sisters?”
“At the home for unwed mothers where I stayed.” Her fingers crawled along the rosary beads dangling at her hip until they found the crucifix at the end. “They were right, I suppose. What good could holding him have done. But they did lift him up for me to see. His hair, his eyes, his ruddy cheeks.”
“And what then?” Mirielle asked.
“To the orphanage, of course. Newborns have a good chance of being adopted. Better than older children, anyway. I like to think he found a good home.”
Mirielle raised herself onto a shaky elbow. “How old were you?”
“Fourteen.”
“He’d be a grown man by now.”
“Twenty-four years old just last Sunday.”
“Have you ever seen him? I mean, since they took him away.”
Sister Verena shook her head. She returned her gaze to Mirielle, her gray eyes once again sharp and focused. “I can’t imagine that would do either one of us any good. With God’s grace, he doesn’t even know.”
“How can you say that? You’re his mother.”
“I am not. I am merely the woman who birthed him.” Sister Verena straightened and released the crucifix. The rosary fell to her side, the polished beads rasping against her skirt. “In any case, that woman is gone.”
Her strange mood the night of Christmas Eve made sense now. “But how could you take Elena’s baby when the same thing happened to you?”
“Believe me, Mrs. Marvin, it was not easy. It’s never easy. But we must think of the babies, God’s beloveds and innocent in all this.”
“Why did you tell me this? About your son.”
“You asked about my tale of suffering. And I wanted you to see that life goes on whether we like it or not.”
Mirielle’s elbow gave way, and she fell back against her pillow. Were there no happy stories in this world? “Thanks for the swell pep talk. Now can you please go away?”
Sister Verena frowned and jutted her chin at the slender stack of letters on Mirielle’s nightstand. “Do you know how many patients here haven’t a family who writes them at all? Patients whose disease is far worse than yours. Who never make it to one negative test, let alone twelve. They still manage to get out of bed in the morning.”
“Bully for them.”
Sister Verena stood. “The most despicable part of all of this is that you don’t see the people you’re hurting. Your fellow patients at the dressing clinic and in the infirmary ask when you’re coming around again.”
That wasn’t Mirielle’s problem. So why did Sister Verena’s words sting so? “Please, just let me be.”
“And Jean. It wasn’t enough that her father left her. You abandoned her too.”
Mirielle sat up. “Who are you to talk about abandoning children?”
Sister Verena’s face flushed. Her lips fell open without the benefit of words. She spun around, her skirts swishing and rosary beads clattering, and left.
Mirielle laid down and drew the blankets over her head. Just as her muscles began to relax, footfalls sounded again. Before she could uncover her eyes, a deluge of cold, sudsy water struck her.
For a moment, Mirielle thought she was drowning. Panic surged through her. Foul-tasting water filled her mouth as she screamed. She kicked and clawed at the sodden blankets, desperate to free herself.
The downpour of water stopped long before she managed to untangle herself. Her entire bed was soaked. Water dripped from the mattress onto the floor. She coughed and spat out what little of the dirty, soapy water she hadn’t swallowed.
Sister Verena stood over her with an empty mop bucket. “Like I said. It stinks in here. Either you rise, clean this mess of a room, and start eating, or I’ll have the orderlies drag you to the infirmary where we’ll strap you to the bed and force a feeding tube down your nose. Your choice, Mrs. Marvin.”
CHAPTER 55
Mirielle lay on her wet, dirty mattress, raveled in soggy bedclothes, staring at the whitewashed plaster ceiling. Her fingers drifted to her bracelet, finding the thin, raised line beneath. That was one solution. But when she probed beneath the numbness inside her, Mirielle realized she didn’t want to die. And didn’t want to hurt people the way Irene’s death had hurt her. Yet how could she survive another year at Carville without her family? What if it took her longer than that to accumulate twelve negative tests? What if two years became three, four, ten? What if they never found a cure?
She shuddered. The greater part of her wanted simply to sleep. And sleep. And sleep. To exist apart from the world the way she had after Felix’s death. The March breeze—no, it was early May now, wasn’t it?—licked over her wet nightgown, causing her teeth to clatter. Why hadn’t Sister Verena closed the damned window? And that light! Of all the days to be sunny.
Mirielle dragged herself from the bed to the window. The pecan trees were fully leafed now. Magnolia blossoms scented the air. A woolly caterpillar inched across the windowsill. She started to call for Jean—insects always fascinated her—then remembered with shame how horribly she’d treated her.
She started to close the sash but stopped. Sister Verena had been right about the smell. Now that Mirielle was up, she might as well change her wet sheets and nightgown. The window could stay open until she was through.
Once her dirty sheets were changed, she forced herself to shower. No point in climbing into a clean bed with sweat-crusted skin and oily hair. She’d sleep better afterward.
The water jabbed at her overly sensitized skin like needles. The gurgle of the drain deafened her. But little by little, her muscles relaxed. She lathered her soap and scrubbed every patch of skin. The swirl of bubbles down the drain put her in mind of her children’s bath time. Of splashing and laughter. Of their soft skin and sweet scent.
Despair washed over her again, eating away at her like the rising tide does a sandcastle. But something else stirred too. An echo of her former resolve. She could still beat this disease and make it home.
She turned off the water and toweled herself dry. Steam fogged the mirror above the sink. Mirielle hesitated before wiping it away. Her reflection was gaunt, bones draped in sallow skin, the occasional ropey cord of muscle. No softness. No curves.
The lesion on her neck had returned. Those on the back of her thighs were red and raised. Her weeks of despondence had cost her more than time. She tried not to think of it. Told herself not to look back. But looking forward through the prism of her reflection was no more comforting.
One day at a time. No, even that was too daunting. An afternoon. An hour. She turned from the mirror, wrapped the towel around her withered body, and headed back to her room. She could get through the next sixty minutes without lying down. Without giving in to despair. That was as far forward as she could look.
* * *
The next morning, Mirielle forced herself out of bed with the dawn. She smoothed her sheets and quilt and tucked the edges beneath the mattress, hoping that untucking them would prove
a great enough effort to keep her from crawling back into bed midday. She donned her least baggy dress and twisted her limp hair into a low-lying bun. Maybe tonight she’d find the energy to set it in pin curls. But that was looking too far ahead.
Little things taxed her stamina, like dusting her bedside table or bending down to tie her shoes, and she found herself sitting often. But she’d not allow herself to lie down. In the early afternoon, she knocked on Jean’s door. No answer. She put her ear to the wood and listened. No rustling inside. Usually Jean hurried home from school to throw down her books and shrug off her cardigan before running out to play with the other kids, but Mirielle hadn’t heard a peep.
She had to apologize. The sooner, the better. And somehow make up for shutting Jean out. Mirielle grabbed a hat and started off to look for her. Jean was bound to be cavorting with Toby and the twins atop the observation tower or fighting over the radio dial in the rec hall.
The afternoon warmth surprised Mirielle. But it was May, after all. Winter had retreated without her notice. She huffed her way to the top of the observation tower, only to find the deck empty. The nearby river glinted like a discarded necklace against a velvet green backdrop. Strange to think it had been silently coursing these many weeks, the water it carried when she learned of her positive test long gone to sea. It was darker now than she remembered, high against its banks.
She climbed down and headed for the rec hall. Along the way, passersby greeted her with smiles.
“Missed you in the dressing clinic,” one man said.
“Ain’t the same without you,” said another.
Madge stopped, throwing up her hands. “Look who’s risen from the dead!” She tugged at Mirielle’s baggy dress and pinched her sunken cheek. “You look the part of death too, dollface.”
“Thanks.”
Madge winked and shuffled onward, calling over her shoulder, “Still a hell of a lot prettier than the rest of us.”
When Mirielle arrived at the rec hall, she found several people crowded around the radio listening to a baseball game. Jean wasn’t among them. At the far side of the room, the regular coterie of loud-mouthed gamblers hunkered around their cards and dice. Nice to know not everything changed. She watched them a moment, steeling herself before heading into the canteen. Mail had just been delivered, and people swarmed around the counter while Frank sorted it. He pushed a few strands of hair behind his ear, smiling broadly at something someone had said.
Mirielle didn’t want to be caught staring, but couldn’t look away. How had she spoken such awful things to him? She drank in his smile, bracing herself for the scowl that would cloud his face when he saw her. But when he glanced up from the pile of mail, his eyes swept right over her, a slight twitch of the lips the only indication he’d seen her at all.
She sat down at an empty table to wait out the crowd. Frank might have seen Jean after school and know her whereabouts. Besides, Mirielle owed him an apology too. A copy of last season’s Sears and Roebuck catalog sat on the table. Mirielle flipped through its curling pages to keep her eyes, if not her mind, distracted.
She’d expected anger from Frank. That she could chip away at over time. But if his cool reaction was any indication, his feelings for her—whatever they’d been—had hardened into something not even time could mend.
A letter landed beside the open catalog. Mirielle looked up. Frank stood above her. She hadn’t heard him approach or noticed the crowd thin.
“This came for ya a few days back,” he said, and turned to go.
“Frank, wait.”
He stopped but didn’t turn around. “Unless you’re fixing to order a soda, we ain’t got nothing to say to each other.”
Her fingers drifted to her throat, stroking the raised, scaly lesion as she watched him walk away. She hadn’t even thought to wear a necklace or a scarf. No point in hiding what she was here. No hiding behind it either. She was to blame for this rift between her and Frank. Between her and Jean. Not the disease. It was up to her to fix it. But first Charlie.
She looked down at the envelope, at the tidy rows of letters and numbers penned in Charlie’s hand. His last letter had been awfully tart—not that Mirielle could blame him—but she was surprised he’d written again so soon. Inside the envelope was a single sheet of paper.
May 4, 1927
Dear Mirielle,
Helen is sick. Scarlet fever, the doctor says. She’s under care at the hospital. I don’t know if you’re even getting these damned letters, but as her mother, I thought you should know. I’ll write again when I have more news.
Charlie
CHAPTER 56
Letter in hand, Mirielle hurried along the walkway past the morgue and schoolhouse and chapels. At the hedgerow, she hesitated only a second, then marched on to the plantation house.
Inside, an electric pendant lamp lighted a broad foyer and curving staircase. Beyond the foyer, a hallway ran to the back of the house, branching off into several rooms. Sister Verena intercepted her in the hallway before she could find Dr. Ross’s office. “Mrs. Marvin, what are you doing here?”
“I have to see Dr. Ross.”
“You know patients are restricted from this part of the facility.”
Mirielle brandished her letter. “My daughter is sick. I’m not leaving until I speak to Dr. Ross.”
“Return to the colony and I will broach—”
“What’s going on here?” Dr. Ross appeared in the doorway of a nearby room. Mirielle sidestepped Sister Verena and hurried over to him. “Dr. Ross, thank God, I have to speak with you.”
His lips pursed, drawing his mustache together like an accordion. “You’re not permitted to be here.”
“Please, it’s urgent.”
He glanced past her at Sister Verena with a reproving glare.
“She’s already here, Doctor. Perhaps we can hear her out.”
He sighed and retreated into his office. Mirielle followed him inside and behind her Sister Verena.
“My name is . . . well, my Carville name is Pauline Mar—”
“I remember you, Mrs. Marvin. Not many patients break their arm and wind up in jail within their first week of arriving.” He sat behind a wide desk in a wingback chair. Medical textbooks lined a nearby shelf. A gilded clock ticked like a metronome on the wall. Everything was neat, ordered, polished. Even the silver-framed picture of his family on the credenza behind his desk sat at attention.
“I just received news my daughter is very sick. Scarlet fever.” Mirielle’s voice broke, and she blinked back tears. “I need to go to her. I promise I’ll return when she’s well.”
“I’m afraid that’s not possible, Mrs. Marvin.” He didn’t offer her a chair or even use of his hankie.
“Other patients have been granted permission to go home.”
“In rare circumstances, yes, I’ve allowed patients from Louisiana or Texas leave to attend the funeral of a parent or”—he hesitated—“a child.”
A sob broke past Mirielle’s lips. “Oh God, please don’t make me wait for that. I’ve already buried one child.”
“It’s not a question of circumstance, Mrs. Marvin, but of distance. In order for anyone to leave, they must have written permission from the health department of every state in which they mean to travel. You’re from California, correct?”
Mirielle nodded.
“It’s unlikely New Mexico or Arizona would permit such unnecessary travel.”
“Unnecessary?” She pointed at the picture behind him. “You’re a father. If one of your boys were sick and dying, would you deem it unnecessary to be with him?”
Sister Verena put a steadying hand on Mirielle’s arm, then spoke to Dr. Ross. “Perhaps we could inquire with the health departments in question.”
He shot her another glare. To her credit, Sister Verena did not shrink back. If anything, her indomitable countenance grew larger.
“We can’t go around making exceptions for people,” Dr. Ross said. “Word will get out, a
nd they’ll be asking for a leave slip for the tritest of circumstances.”
“Mrs. Marvin’s circumstances are hardly trite.”
He ignored her and turned his eyes to Mirielle. “Even if all five health departments agreed, it would take weeks to arrange. By then, your daughter will have likely recovered.”
“Or died!”
He winced. “There’s nothing you could do for her anyway, Mrs. Marvin. The fever has to run its course. And your disease. Children are particularly susceptible to the bacilli.”
Nothing she could do? She was Helen’s mother! No one belonged at her bedside more than Mirielle.
“Go back to the colony,” he continued. “And try not to worry. Children are resilient.”
Her hand curled into a fist at his blithe comment. She itched to scramble over his desk and punch him. But Sister Verena’s grip tightened about her arm, as if she could sense Mirielle’s intention.
“My apologies for the disruption, Dr. Ross. I’ll see Mrs. Marvin back to the colony.”
They walked to the hedgerow in silence, Mirielle’s pace clipped. If she couldn’t get permission to travel home, she’d leave without it.
“Galivanting up to the administration building is not what I had in mind when I told you to get out of bed,” Sister Verena said when they reached the hedgerow.
“My daughter is—”
“I understand your concern.” Her voice softened. “Believe me, I do.”
Mirielle plucked a leaf from the hedge and rolled it between her fingers, watching it crumple and stain her skin green. “What I said before . . . about you abandoning your son . . . I’m sorry. It was an unconscionable thing to say.” She dropped the leaf and looked at Sister Verena. “But if you understand my concern, then you must understand why I have to get home.”
“Have you considered that going home might do more harm than good?”
The Second Life of Mirielle West Page 31