An Offering: The Tale of Therese

by Pittman, Allison

  There Father Bastian stood, having donned a white robe, underneath which the brown wool peeked at the hem. By his side stood a solemn-faced boy, not much older than Therese, dressed in a miniature version of the robe. He held a shallow silver bowl and glared at Therese through narrowed eyes as she crossed the cool stone steps to join them.

  “You will act as witness, I presume?”

  “Yes, Father Bastian,” Sister Heida said, tucking Therese close to her side. “And Brother Mark alongside me.”

  Here, the soft-smiled brother who had attended their needs in the refectory appeared silently beside them.

  “And how do you plan to function as the child’s godparents? When you are both—I assume—strangers to her mother? How can you plan to oversee her religious education? Especially given that you—” here he leveled his gaze at Sister Heida—“are not even a resident in this town? You serve with the sisters at Brehna, do you not?”

  “I do, Father Bastian. But I commit myself to holding this girl close in my prayers, as did the mother of the prophet Samuel. I commend her into God’s hands.”

  Brother Mark cleared his throat.

  “And of course,” Sister Heida continued, “she is only steps away from this holy place should she ever be in need.”

  Therese twisted, looking to one adult and then another, ignoring the sniggering of the boy.

  “Indeed.” Father Bastian sounded defeated. “First the sacrament of baptism. And someday, Holy Communion, though for that—”

  Sister Heida interrupted. “Yes. First, baptism. As it is for the smallest of us.”

  Her voice held a note of finality, so Therese was not surprised when the conversation halted and Father Bastian asked the assembled to bow in prayer.

  A quick study, Therese participated in making the sign of the cross upon her breast and brow, and whispered, amen with Sister Heida, Brother Mark, and the surly boy who, in her opinion, spoke too loudly for the occasion.

  Father Bastian folded his hands and rested them on the protruding mound of belly beneath the robe.

  “Brothers and sisters—” he spoke at a volume now to command the attention of the smattering of people on the benches—“you are fortunate today to witness a rare miracle in our church. That of a child, with no religious instruction and no godly direction from home, seeking baptism into the Holy Church, knowing Jesus to be her Savior.”

  With each word, his voice waxed with pride, as if he himself could lay claim to the moment. Behind her, Therese felt Sister Heida suck in a breath and quiver with the effort of silence.

  “And so it is that she shall be baptized. Bow your head, child.”

  Therese did as she was told, bringing into view nothing more than her dirty, bare feet in dark contrast to the cool marble beneath. She hazarded a glimpse at Sister Heida. “Is it all right that my feet are bare?”

  Sister Heida winked. “Most children have bare feet at their baptism. Perhaps it is as God intends.”

  Thus comforted, Therese bowed her head again and heard the sound of Father Bastian’s hand dipping in the bowl of water held by the surly boy.

  “Having demonstrated your love for our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and in professing your belief that he is the forgiver of our sins and the true path to eternal life, I baptize you this day . . .”

  A trickle of cool water commenced at the crown of Therese’s head.

  In the name of the Father.

  Down her neck behind one ear.

  And of the Son.

  Lodging in her bandaged temple.

  And of the Holy Ghost.

  All around her voices said, “Amen,” and in response to Sister Heida’s tug on her sleeve, she raised her head, feeling the water sluice through her hair, pooling in her ear.

  “I suppose we shall both have to answer to God for this.” Father Bastian turned on his heel and sent a cuff to the side of the surly boy’s head, taking the both of them away from the altar and through a door, leaving a suspended tapestry to ripple in their wake.

  Therese looked down at her feet. “I thought I’d be clean.” She turned to Sister Heida, her voice, though small, echoing in the chapel.

  The nun touched her hand to the girl’s face. “You are. In the eyes of Christ you are perfected. What else could matter? Now, shall I take you back to your mother?”

  Therese shook her head, hoping Sister Heida would not insist. “I’m to go visit my grandparents.”

  “Then I shall walk with you there.” She took Therese’s hand and marched her to the back of the church, nodding her head in greeting to those who twisted their necks to watch.

  “It’s too far,” Therese said, naming the village only after they were safely outside. Sister Heida looked surprised.

  “So far?” She bit her lip, considering. “I’m due to return to Brehna, but surely you can’t go so far by yourself.”

  “Yes, I can. I have before.” Suddenly, though, the bravado of accomplishment seemed to fade. “But maybe you can stay with me? Just a little way?” Far enough, she thought, to have the soft green wall of the forest behind her.

  “As long as you need.”

  And from there, Therese led the way.

  Sister Heida traveled with Therese as far as the stream, long enough to teach her a poem about Our Lord, the Good Shepherd, who would lead her beside still waters, even unto the Valley of the Shadow of Death.

  “I will fear no evil,” Therese recited, capturing each word in its perfect sequence “for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.”

  Though she couldn’t understand how a rod or a staff could ever bring comfort. She herself had never been disciplined by anything other than Mutti’s quick hand, in open slaps across her face when she complained too loudly about being hungry or cold.

  “You have a roof, don’t you?” Mutti would say. “And a blanket. And your stomach isn’t so empty you can’t fill it with pity.”

  After such times—rare as they were, and trickling to never by the time Therese turned a big girl of six—Mutti herself would cry the tears Therese refused to shed. She’d pull her daughter close and stroke her hair and feather her face with kisses, all the while begging forgiveness and mercy.

  “I’ll do better. Be better. Once I find a man who’ll marry me. And take us out to live on his little farm at the edge of the village, somewhere close enough so we can walk of a morning to the baker’s for hot, fresh cakes.”

  So while Therese hadn’t been spared the harsh blows and words of an enraged adult, she’d seen plenty of other children chased by angry parents wielding switches and sticks and rods of all sizes. Last summer, her friend Gretyl showed up to play with bruises across the backs of her legs so clearly marked Therese could make out the grain of the wood used to inflict the wounds. When she asked if it hurt, Gretyl set her lips tight and shook her head.

  To ask for an explanation about the rod and the staff, however, would interrupt the lesson. When she recited the final lines, about dwelling in the house of the Lord forever, Sister Heida clapped her hands and declared Therese to be the quickest learner she’d ever known.

  “Oh, what you would do with a proper education.” She spoke with her eyes lifted up to the God who watched above the woods.

  By this time the sun was past its midpoint in the sky, angling through the trees making patches of dark, cool shadows. They crossed the footbridge and arrived at Stein Bar—a number of large, smooth river stones that, piled together as they were, resembled a great, sleeping bear. Papa Bear, they called it. When Therese was little, and Mutti came with her to her grandparents’ house, they would stop here to rest. If the day was warm, they would take cool drinks from the stream and let the water run over their tired feet. After, Mutti would stretch out on Papa Bear’s belly, drape an arm over her eyes, mumble instructions for Therese to stay nearby.

  There would be no time for such a rest this trip, though. Not if she wanted to have both safe passage and supper. Much as she would have loved to tarry and s
hare with Sister Heida the legend about the Great Bear who met with the trickster and traded his life for a fish. Somewhere, Mutti said, a very ordinary-looking man roamed throughout the country, concealing the fact that he had the heart and soul of a bear.

  “I go this way now,” Therese said, pointing out an almost-path that led from Papa Bear all the way to the next village. “It isn’t far. I’ve gone by myself before.”

  “You don’t want me to go with you?”

  Therese shook her head. “They’ll just want to know who you are and why you’ve taken the time to walk with me. They’ll worry that you know about my mother. Because no one is supposed to know.”

  “I suppose, then, this is good-bye.” Sister Heida bent the short distance to wrap Therese in a hug that infused her with the magic strength of Papa Bear. Then, after placing a kiss on each cheek, and one to the girl’s lips, she left Therese alone at the water’s edge.

  She wasted no time watching the retreating black figure, as it was swallowed up in shadows soon enough, reminding her of the shortness of the afternoon.

  “The Lord is my shepherd,” she whispered, picking her steps carefully along the forest floor. “He leadeth me—” She wanted to say through the woods, but feared the true words would disappear from her memory forever if she altered them. Her plan was to stand at her grandparents’ door and knock. The moment the door opened, she would begin her recitation, knowing how pleased they would be at her talent.

  And then, maybe this time, they would let her come in.

  The black clouds rolled in faster than her feet could carry her up the hard-packed dirt path. Oma and Opa’s house was a good trek off the main road, and in the summer it would be hidden by stalks of wheat taller than Therese. Once, when she and Mutti made a visit home to help with the harvest, Oma had complained about their fields being so close to the main road. Any Landstreicher could wander by and take a handful. A bagful, for that matter, and they’d not see a penny for it.

  “Now, now,” Opa’d said, calming her from her rafters, “would we ever miss such a trifle? Even if such a one came with a scythe and sack, would God not provide as always?”

  Therese had been playing nearby, pinching off fat heads of wheat and squeaking them between her teeth. The sun was beating down and the air smelled sweet. Somewhere—off not too far away—the hired workers were laughing at a joke. She could hear Mutti’s laugh among them. The small bit of peace Opa brought to Oma disappeared at the sound of that laughter. Her grandmother’s face flashed a new shade of red, and with a growl she tore through the field, mindless that her stomping feet were trampling the very profit she hoped to make. The next thing Therese heard was her mother’s voice again, but this time wailing in protest, and the unmistakable sound of a palm striking a sun-warmed cheek.

  “Züruck an die Arbeit!” Oma ordered the men back to work with a tone that would suffer no more foolishness, ordering Mutti back to the house to begin preparations for supper.

  It was the last time they’d come to visit together.

  The next time, Mutti walked as far as the gate of the ramshackle fence that surrounded the vegetable garden in front of the house. Then just as far as the path that shot from the road. Then the road, Papa Bear, and finally Mutti walked with Therese only to the outskirt of Brunnendorf, the edge of the square, the end of their street. Today, she didn’t even step outside the front door. And each time, Therese had soldiered on ahead, all the way to Oma’s front door, only to be met with the same scowl.

  Always before there’d been time to turn back and be home before night. But this time, not only was it well past dusk, the clouds brought an early darkness along with the threat of rain. That kind of delay never occurred to her when she bowed her head for the baptismal water, but now, as the first heavy drops fell—cold—on the back of her neck, Therese pushed all fear of the unknown aside and quickened her steps.

  Thou art with me. Thou art with me.

  She kept her head low, seeing her feet flash in and out of sight, the syllables of the prayer in sync with each footfall. Rain drizzled down the back of her dress, dropped onto her cheeks, made rivulets on her brow only to be trapped in the bandage wrapped around it. The ground became increasingly cool, then soft, and she hoped to arrive at the house before it turned to mud. A newly baptized girl with muddy feet would be no more welcome than a little girl with clean feet and bound for hell.

  The generous meal in the monks’ kitchen wore itself down to nothing in her stomach, and she hoped the loaf of bread bundled at her waist wouldn’t grow soggy before she had a chance to proudly offer it for the supper table.

  Look, Oma, she’d say, fresh from the house of Our Lord. And then, why wouldn’t she be ushered in, out of the storm? A child, forgiven by God—why should she take a chill for the sins of her mother?

  Therese glanced up and saw the dim outline of her grandparents’ cottage. Tiny slivers of light shone through the shuttered windows, a thin curl of smoke from the chimney. Steps away now, mere steps. Her bandage, thoroughly wet, drooped over her eye, and she pushed it up without breaking stride. The useless little gate was latched, and her numbing fingers fumbled to open and close it behind her.

  Near the house, Gräber, the hound so named because he’d uprooted an entire turnip harvest one August evening as a pup, sang forth a bark meant to warn of an encroaching visitor.

  “Ruhig, Gräber,” she sang back, matching the dog’s pitch. In an instant, he came out from his shelter at the side of the cottage and met her in the yard, running circles around her, punching with his cold black nose. Therese patted him between his ears, getting a soggy palm in return for the gesture, which she illogically wiped on her equally wet skirt. “Hush, boy,” she repeated, “or else Opa will think there’s a robber in the yard.”

  The sound of the rain must have masked the dog’s exuberance, however, because there was no break in the darkness of the closed door and shuttered windows. Gräber kept with her for the rest of the walk to the house, then tucked himself away, leaving her alone at the door. There she stood for a full minute, working up the courage to knock. When her first weak attempt yielded no response, she tried again, shaking her hand to alleviate the pain of the five sharp raps.

  But it was enough.

  The darkness in front of her swung away, revealing a small, cozy room lit by firelight and a lantern hanging on a chain over the table. For the most fleeting of moments, Oma’s face registered a look of concern for the traveler caught in the storm. Her brows, darker than her graying hair, flew high above her steel-gray eyes, and her thin lips parted with an inhaled breath of surprise. Such was the expression when she was looking above Therese’s head.

  Once she glanced down, however, the brows furrowed, the lips pinched, and the hand that might have been ready to usher in the wayward soul planted itself on her ample hip.

  “Who let you out in this mess?”

  “Guten Abend, Oma.” Therese spoke with her most polite voice, the one she used when she was sent to the landlord with only half of the rent money.

  Oma craned her neck, looking out into the darkness. “Where is your mother?”

  She asked this every time, and Therese would answer, she’s waiting at the stream, or at the gate, or just at the edge of the forest. This time, however, she told the entire truth. “At home.”

  “She sent you out alone? At night, with this storm?”

  “It wasn’t raining when I left, Oma. Earlier.”

  She heard her grandfather’s bellowing inquiry from within the house.

  “It’s the girl.” Oma spoke over her shoulder, not budging from the threshold.

  Therese held her breath. She’d been here, just like this, all those other visits. Each time, Oma would say, “Tell your mother that when she is ready to beg our forgiveness, she can come back into the house. Not before.” Then she would give Therese a few coins, or a loaf of bread, or a bit of ham or sausage wrapped in linen, and send the girl straight away.

  But those were
other days, with either a mother or a warm sun close by to guide the way back home. Not like now, with the wet black night and rainwater pooling in the hollow of her neck.

  “For the love of all things holy, woman, let her in.” Opa came into view, his shock of white hair standing on edge in agitation. “I’ll not have you send her away again without a chance for a visit.”

  Oma made a sound something like a horse and backed away, giving Therese wide berth to walk inside. At the first touch of warmth, the cold she’d suffered hit full force, and she began to shake and chatter until it seemed her bones would break.

  “Komm her.” Opa approached with a blanket, wrapping it around her and leading her to stand next to the fire. “Agathe, go fetch her warm clothes or she’ll catch her death.”

  “And what clothes do you think we have for a girl her size?”

  “One of my shirts, then. Quick, now. Go!”

  Oma’s pace did not match Opa’s urgency. Therese stood very still—as still as she could, given the violence of her shivering—and allowed Opa to lift her dress above her head, as well as the soaked shirt beneath. Perhaps she should have felt shy, standing in nothing but her white mottled skin before him, but he whistled softly, keeping his soft blue eyes trained above her head, and wrapped the blanket tight around her again. The scratchiness of the wool awakened her circulation, and slowly her body grew still in the cocoon of this coarse embrace. Of course, the bread was ruined. It mushed like a pudding in her grip.