The Second Life of Mirielle West

by Amanda Skenandore

  “I’d be careful,” Mirielle said. The residents talked about ways to keep others safe. Boiling your dishes after meals. Disinfecting the things you touched. Sleeping in a separate room. “I won’t even hold or kiss her. I just have to know my daughter’s okay.”

  “Dr. Ross is correct. Children are more susceptible to the disease. But that’s not what I’m talking about.” Sister Verena walked to a nearby bench and sat down. Mirielle followed. The boughs of a giant oak tree shaded them. Sister Verena’s hand disappeared into the stiff folds of her skirt. A moment later, it reappeared from some hidden pocket with a palmful of candy hearts. She offered one to Mirielle. Be True, the heart’s inscription read.

  “I think of my son every day, Mrs. Marvin.” She paused, looking down at the candies in her hand. “I gave him up not because I didn’t love him, but because I didn’t want to burden him with shame. The shame of being a bastard. It was the only gift I had to give him.” She offered Mirielle another heart, then flung the rest of the candies over her shoulder into the grass. “Right or wrong, your disease carries a stigma too. Would you risk that on your daughter?”

  “No one will find out.”

  “You cannot be certain. It stands to reason that—”

  “I don’t care about reason!”

  “What about your family here at Carville?”

  The residual sweetness on Mirielle’s tongue turned chalky and bitter. “I only have one family. And if you try to stop me from going to them I’ll . . . I’ll . . .” But what could Mirielle do if Sister Verena truly meant to stop her? Escaping through the fence was one thing, but breaking out of the jail was another thing entirely.

  Sister Verena cast a furtive glance at the plantation house. “Come with me.”

  Mirielle followed her through the colony, regretting she’d ever thought to ask permission to leave. When they arrived at the small office tucked between the men’s infirmaries, Sister Verena went straight to her desk and began rummaging through one of its drawers. Did she have a key for the jail inside? A syringe filled with morphine to plunge into Mirielle’s arm to sedate her? More of those stupid candy hearts?

  Something silver flashed in Sister Verena’s hand as she closed the drawer. “We cannot change the past, Mrs. Marvin. What we did or did not do. But we can live true to the present.” She pressed a heavy medallion into Mirielle’s hand.

  “What’s this?”

  “A medal of St. Christopher. He’ll protect you on your journey.”

  “My journey?”

  “Tonight at eight, Watchman Doyle will be called to investigate a disturbance on the far side of the colony. The rest is up to you.”

  CHAPTER 57

  As soon as the sun dipped below the horizon and the sky began to darken, Mirielle grabbed the small valise she’d packed and returned to the canteen. As she’d hoped, Frank was alone. He plunged a mop into a bucket of soapy water, then sloshed it across the floor.

  “Come back tomorrow,” he said without sparing a glance in her direction. “I’m closing up.”

  “I need your pliers.”

  His mop stilled. “What?”

  “I’m leaving. Tonight.”

  Frank didn’t move. The hum of the radio drifted in from the rec hall. The gamblers’ heckling. The early chirping of a cricket or two from outside.

  “I’ll climb the fence again if I have to. Broken bones be damned. But one way or another, I’m leaving.”

  He shook his head and resumed mopping. “I’m done doing ya favors.”

  Mirielle stalked over and grabbed the mop handle. “I’m sorry for what I said to you. It was rotten, and I regret it. But this isn’t about me, or you and me. It’s about my daughter. I’ve got to get home to her.”

  “Ya wanna talk turkey, Polly? Let’s talk turkey.” His shortened fingers tightened around the mop, and he yanked it away from her. “I knew ya was trouble the first time I laid eyes on ya. Couldn’t see beyond the brim of your own hat, you. And even that was pushing it. I knew, and I fell for ya anyway. That’s on me. But Jean, she’s just a child. No way for her to know what ya are. Now she’s off in the wind and who knows what’s happened to her. That’s on you.”

  “In the wind? What are you talking about?”

  “If ya hadn’t been holed up in your room, you’d of heard. Jean ran off over a week ago. Ain’t no one’s seen or heard from her since.”

  Mirielle’s breath faltered, as if her lungs had forgotten how to expand. The fragmented memories of their last interaction flashed in her mind. The magazine slamming against the wall. Jean jumping on the bed and trying to pull Mirielle up. “Has someone checked the nearby towns? And what about her father? Has he been contacted?”

  “Jean was a drop-off, remember? The docs don’t know her family name or where she’s from.”

  “But we know she’s from a small town. She talked about her father’s boat shop and . . . and shrimp fishing in some bay.”

  “Ya just described half of Louisiana and a good part of Mississippi.”

  “It’s a start. Maybe Irene knows—” Her eyes met Frank’s and quickly retreated to the floor. “I mean, maybe one of the other gals at the house knows something. Or the twins.”

  “Ya think Doc Jack and Sister Verena ain’t already asked ’em? Hell, a whole search party went out. Nothing. If you’d been up outta bed, thinking of someone else besides yourself, maybe ya could of helped.”

  His words stung like antiseptic to a cut. “That’s not fair. I—”

  “Life ain’t fair. A gal like you oughta know that by now.” He slammed the mop into the bucket and let go of the handle. Sudsy water spilled over the sides. He stomped behind the counter and bent down. Mirielle heard the clank of glass and metal as he rummaged around.

  Jean absconded? Mirielle couldn’t wrap her brain around the news. Where had she gone? She was only ten years old. How could she survive out there on her own? “There’s got to be something we can do.”

  Frank stood and held out a rusty pair of pliers. “Worry about yourself. That’s what you’re good at, after all. Let those of us who actually give a damn worry about Jean.”

  Mirielle itched to slap him. She did give a damn. So much it hurt to breathe thinking about Jean out there on her own. But what about Mirielle’s daughter? Standing here wasn’t helping either of them. She grabbed the pliers from Frank’s hand and stormed out.

  CHAPTER 58

  Mirielle walked along the rutted River Road all through the night. Her heels chafed against the back of her shoes until her skin blistered and her toes went numb. The levee overlooked one side of the road; forest and farmland abutted the other. Despite what Frank had said when they’d gone frog hunting last summer—no panthers in these parts and that alligators couldn’t climb trees—she jumped at every snapped branch and rustle of leaves.

  Just before dawn, an old Holsman motorcar, the kind she remembered from her girlhood when automobiles were still a rarity and wonder, rattled down the road. The lamp affixed to the front blinded her, and the dust kicked up from its huge, wagon-like wheels settled in her nostrils. It lurched to a stop beside her. The driver said something in a thick accent that sounded like an offer for a ride.

  “I’m headed to New Orleans,” she said.

  The driver, an older man with the type of long, bushy beard that had gone out of style with the last century, reached down to her.

  “Climb up in den,” he said—or at least that was her best translation.

  The sky had only just begun to lighten from black to bluish-gray. If this man meant to hurt her, he’d have no trouble of it here in the middle of nowhere. But she hadn’t time to waste. “Thank you,” she said, taking the man’s hand.

  The engine wheezed, and the carriage rattled. The cracked leather seat snagged on her stockings. Were it a race, Mirielle would have put her money on an old-fashioned horse and wagon to win out over this tired machine, but it beat walking.

  They arrived at the New Orleans depot midmorning. The b
ustle and noise set her heart skittering. The handle of her valise was slick with sweat. She told herself it was just fear of being caught, but deep down, she knew that Carville, with its country quiet and earthy aromas and lazy afternoons, had softened her steely, city-girl sensibilities.

  The line for the ticket counter snaked through the lobby. Mirielle took her place at the end, her eyes flickering every few minutes to the large clock on the far wall, watching its long, metal hands inch toward eleven.

  Below the clock stood the bank of phone booths Frank had taken her to. Her stomach twisted thinking about that night. How kind he’d been to risk a month in jail just so she could call home. His parting words in the canteen bullied into her mind. Worry about yourself. That’s what you’re good at, after all. But Mirielle hadn’t walked all night and hitchhiked a ride from a complete stranger because she was worried about herself. Helen was sick and needed her. Where was the selfishness in that?

  She’d be careful at home. Wash her hands, boil her dishes, clean with disinfectant. None of the staff at Carville had contracted the disease. Not one in thirty-four years. She’d find a doctor or a pharmacist who could get her chaulmoogra pills. Once Helen was well, their lives could finally go back to normal.

  But what if the health department found her? Or one of the doctors or nurses at County General recognized her? Despite its hundreds of thousands of residents, Los Angeles wasn’t such a big city when you were the wife of a motion picture star. Mirielle could take care not to spread the disease—it was only feebly contagious after all—but she couldn’t do anything about the stigma.

  The hands on the clock were nearing noon when she finally reached the ticket counter.

  “Destination?” the clerk said.

  Mirielle hesitated. “Los Angeles. First-class.”

  When the clerk told her the price, Mirielle opened her purse and reached inside for her money. Her fingers grazed the delicate silver chain of the St. Christopher medal. She’d assumed the token was Sister Verena’s tacit blessing for Mirielle’s journey home. But not a minute before giving Mirielle the medal, she’d been lecturing her on shame and stigma. What had she said of her son? That letting him go was the only gift she could give him.

  The clerk repeated the price, but Mirielle just stood there like a mannequin in a shop window.

  We cannot change the past, Sister Verena had said. But we can live true to the present.

  At the time, Mirielle had thought she was talking about Helen’s illness. Encouraging Mirielle to go to her. But what if she’d meant something else?

  “You gonna buy this ticket or not, ma’am?” the clerk said.

  Mirielle ached to hand over the money and be gone to California. She’d hand over her very heart, still beating in her palm, if it meant seeing her girls again. But she shook her head and stepped out of line.

  As much as Mirielle hated to admit it, Sister Verena had been right. Even a quick trip home wasn’t worth the risk. Not while the world still saw her as a monster. Sister Verena had been right on another point too. Mirielle did have another family to consider. Another little girl who needed her. Jean.

  CHAPTER 59

  Shuttered within the telephone booth, Mirielle waited for the operator to connect her to home. The butler answered.

  “This is Mirielle. Is Charlie home?”

  “No, ma’am, I’m afraid he’s out.”

  “And Helen? Is she better?”

  He paused. “Still at the hospital, ma’am.”

  “Tell Charlie I called and”—her voice broke—“tell him . . .” She ached to say, I’m on my way home.

  “Ma’am?”

  “Tell him I’m thinking of them all, will you please?”

  “Of course.”

  Mirielle hung up the receiver and sagged against the booth wall, too raw inside to weep. Perhaps it was best that Charlie wasn’t in. The slightest hint that he’d welcome her home and her resolve would crumble.

  Now what? She hadn’t slept in over thirty hours, but didn’t have time to rest, nor did she trust herself to rise if she did. A meal, though. That would quiet her stomach and clear her thoughts.

  She bought a sandwich from a street-side vendor and ate it in the train station lobby. The bread was stale and the meat chewy, but it buoyed her nonetheless. She pulled the St. Christopher medal out of her purse and fingered its raised surface. She’d never been the praying sort and put little stock in the papists’ coterie of saints, but she closed her eyes and made a short plea to God that he look after Helen where Mirielle could not. Then to St. Christopher—whoever he was—that he help her find Jean.

  When she’d finished, she tucked the medal away in her handbag and focused on the here and now. With sixty-two dollars in her purse and the authorities soon to be on the lookout, Mirielle couldn’t afford to dally. She suspected Jean aimed to get home. But where was home? She tried to recall everything Jean had said to her but quickly gave up. Once Jean started talking, she’d yapped almost as much as Irene. Somewhere in all those words, though, lay a clue.

  Mirielle took a deep breath and closed her eyes again. After Felix’s death, she’d all but lived in the past. The gin had helped with that, but also thinking of specific things, touchstones like the softness of his favorite jacket or the nutty smell of the warmed milk he drank before bed. She fanned her fingers over the wooden bench and imagined herself sitting on the living room floor with Jean. She recalled the tickle of wind over the nape of her neck and was high up in the observation tower with her again. She fought back the smell of luggage and cigarette smoke, remembering instead the woody scent of the oak tree she and Jean had climbed.

  After several minutes of sifting memories, it came to her. Jean had boasted once that people came all the way from New Iberia and Lafayette to buy boats from her father. The names meant nothing to Mirielle, but she found both towns on the glass-covered railroad map on the wall. The Missouri Pacific line out of New Orleans stopped at both, first New Iberia and farther down the line, Lafayette.

  Mirielle hurried back to the ticket line and asked for a first-class seat to New Iberia. Upon opening her purse, she begrudgingly changed her mind and bought a coach ticket. The train left a few hours later. As it pulled away from the station, Mirielle’s heart squeezed tighter with every turn of the wheels. This was not the course she’d imagined for herself when she’d packed her bag yesterday. That course—and every course she’d imagined before it—led home.

  * * *

  She arrived in New Iberia at sundown. The town was tiny by Los Angeles standards. Automobiles kicked up dust alongside mule-drawn buggies on the unpaved roads. Main Street boasted a gas and greasing station, several grocers, a creamery, two cafés, a theater, a hotel, and a bank. A glance down the intersecting streets revealed a spattering of stately homes with columned façades like the big house at Carville. The rest of the homes were simple shotguns with weathered siding and wide front porches.

  She took a room at the hotel and fell asleep as soon as she finished dinner. Strange dreams plagued her through the night—arriving at long last in California but finding her home abandoned and crumbling; jumping into a swimming pool to save Felix only to find that the lifeless body floating on the water’s surface was Jean; running from men brandishing chains and shackles, unable to climb Carville’s fence to safety.

  The next morning, she awoke tired but hopeful. Jean was out here somewhere, and Mirielle would find her. The hotel’s staff greeted her warmly when she sat down for breakfast in the dining room and obliged her with answers to her questions about boatwrights in the neighboring towns. She’d hoped it would be as simple as a single name, but the staff listed several well-known craftsmen in the area.

  When she asked whether the hotel had a car for hire, they laughed but happily rang around until they found her a ride with Mr. DeRouen, the soda delivery man. She surreptitiously wiped down her fork and glass with a hankie after eating. As feebly contagious as the disease might be, she’d hate to expose anyone
else.

  When she’d arrived the night before, Mirielle was too exhausted to feel conspicuous. But as she waited in front of the hotel for Mr. DeRouen, the weight of passersby’s stares unsettled her. She’d dressed with care that morning, donning a long-sleeved blouse instead of a more seasonal short-sleeved one, tying a scarf around her neck, disguising the spots on her legs beneath dark-colored stockings. Even so, Mirielle had to fight the urge to fold in on herself.

  Mr. DeRouen rattled up in a mud-speckled white truck with the bottling company’s logo scrawled in red letters across the side. He looked a year or two shy of twenty, but his dark hair and summer blue eyes reminded her of Frank. The likeness settled Mirielle’s jumpy nerves while at the same time stirring a vague pain inside her. Would she ever see Frank again? Beyond getting Jean safely back to Carville, Mirielle’s endgame was unsettled. Sister Verena was right; it wasn’t worth the risk to her family to return home uncured. But could she endure a life of captivity until then?

  She accepted Mr. DeRouen’s handshake and returned his timid smile.

  “Thank you for taking me around. I’ll pay you for your trouble.”

  “Nah, ma’am. Happy to do it.”

  He helped her into the cab of the truck. “Where ya from, if ya don’t mind me askin’?”

  Mirielle hesitated. “California.”

  “That explains it,” he said, revving the engine and coaxing the truck into gear.

  “Why I talk so funny?” Mirielle kept her voice light despite her renewed self-consciousness.

  “Nah.” He cast a shy glance in her direction. “Why you’re so perdy.”

  Mirielle tugged on her scarf. To her relief, the rattle of soda bottles as they drove made further conversation impossible. She turned and looked out the side window at the passing sugarcane fields and moss-draped oaks.

  Would Mr. DeRouen show her the same kindness if he knew she was a leper? She’d not be “perdy” in his eyes but grotesque. Instead of a handshake, she’d get a boot in the stomach. All the more reason she had to be careful and find Jean soon.