by Henry Hack
The next day, Pam reached out for me around eleven o’clock and she was in the same gloomy mood as yesterday. “Bad news,” she said. “Frankie spent only a couple of months in foster care with a family that owns a farm in upstate New York. He’s back at the state school again.”
“What happened? It sounds like that would have been a good life for him.”
“The headmaster, Fred Eglund, said the Hammond’s – that’s the family’s name – returned him because he burned down part of their barn.”
“That’s hard to believe. What did Frankie say?”
“He told Eglund it was an accident. He said he just went out there late one night to sneak a cigarette and he fell asleep. The flames next to him woke him up and he ran out of there and ran back to the house to wake everyone up.”
“Sounds reasonable to me. Why didn’t they buy it and forgive him?”
“Who knows? Eglund says they’re a tough, strict pair.”
“I hope he soon finds another family to take him in.”
“Me, too,” Pam said.
We hung up and I know that Pam felt as shitty as I did – and guiltier than ever.
CHAPTER SEVEN
“How awful!” exclaimed Sister Eugene Baptist. “I can’t believe a mother could do that. That poor young boy.”
“Do what?” I asked looking up from my magazine.
Sister Eugene was still staring at the television and held up her hand toward me. “Listen,” she said.
The News 12 anchorwoman said, “So now there is an all-state alarm out for Angela Chandler for the murder of her husband and abandonment of her son. She may be driving a 1986 dark green, four-door Chevrolet, plate number FSV-7624. Any information on her whereabouts should be forwarded to Detective Wallace Mason at the Ninety-Eighth Detective Squad in Levittown.”
The name Chandler caused a shiver to pass through my body. I asked Sister Eugene what details I had missed.
“Oh, Audrey,” she said. “This Chandler woman is suspected of murdering her husband – but that’s not the worst part…”
“What could be worse than that?” I interrupted. “Oh, what was his name?”
“Uh, Jim, they said…James Chandler.”
A stronger shiver coursed through me. I said, “And what else did his wife do? What was worse than killing her husband?”
“After the funeral she abandoned her son. The boy came home from school to an empty house and an empty glass with a note under it. How heartless can you be?”
“Why didn’t the police arrest the wife right away?” I asked.
“Not enough evidence, but I guess when she fled that kind of proves it, right?”
“Yes, I guess so. What was that poor boy’s name? Did they mention it?
“Yes, Audrey. It was Frankie. Frankie Chandler.”
Oh my God. Frankie. My son!
I fell in love with Jimmy Chandler on the rebound after my longterm relationship with Charlie Gerraghty had dissolved. Charlie told me if I wouldn’t go all the way with him he would find another girl who would, assuming that there were plenty of them around. I didn’t doubt him on that, but I had been raised a strict Roman Catholic and we were just out of high school. We had been boyfriend and girlfriend since seventh grade and no way was I was going to have sex with him or any other guy. No way, that was, until I met Jimmy Chandler.
After Charlie left me, I started to hang out in bars to drown my sorrows in beer or wine. I would socialize with my fellow typing-pool workers one or two nights a week after work in Manhattan, then on Friday in the local places in northern Queens – Bayside, Whitestone and Little Neck.
One Saturday night, I was in Desmond’s, an Irish pub in Little Neck, with a high school friend when a good-looking guy struck up a conversation with us. He bought us both a drink and we had a good time laughing and drinking. After about twenty minutes, he said he had to get back to his friends and asked for my phone number. He said, “I’d like to call you soon.”
I hesitated a bit and figured, why not? He called me the very next day at my home, where I lived with my parents, and I agreed to go with him to a movie on Wednesday night. And so began our whirlwind romance. Jimmy was older than me – I was eighteen and he was twenty-two – and he had a draftsman’s job in the city. He was a nice guy, never pressuring me to have sex despite several steamy make-out sessions where I knew he was ready to burst out of his pants.
About three months later, after we had one beer too many, we were going at it hot and heavy in his car at the rear of Desmond’s parking lot. This time he reached between my legs and I didn’t stop him and you know what happened next. Still charged up, we got a room at a local motel, and to be vulgar, we screwed our brains out in a wild, steamy night of emotional release.
What I had withheld from Charlie Gerraghty for two years, and what I pledged to my parents and my church I would never do before marriage, I did that night, willingly and lustfully, with Jimmy Chandler. And, of course, to pay for my terrible sin, I got pregnant.
After I missed my first period I waited another month before I visited the doctor who confirmed the pregnancy. When I told Jimmy, he was surprised. We always used protection after that first memorable night, but now that proved to be an unnecessary after the fact precaution. He said, “I’m happy, Ellen. I love you and we’ll get married right away.”
The question of abortion never arose. We were morally against it and were so in love we figured we would be one happy little family. Then reality set in – in sharp hard doses – and things got bad, then worse, then unendurable.
Jimmy had been brought up a single child in Colorado. Although very wealthy, his parent’s snobbish attitude and treatment of their son – as if he was imposing on the harmony of their existence – caused Jimmy to leave them as soon as he could, right after he graduated from high school. No sooner was their son’s cap and gown off, the Chandlers got on a plane for Europe and Jimmy hopped a Greyhound bus for New York City. The invitation to our wedding was returned by them with a one hundred dollar check and their regrets that they would be unable to attend due to previous commitments.
My parents, George and Eleanor Weston, were also less than thrilled with our planned marriage and when I told them of my condition, they went ballistic. I had to listen to my father’s pontifical, Roman Catholic ranting, including that I was forever destined to burn in hell, that I was a no-good tramp, that my child would be illegal and condemned to limbo when he or she died. Or was it purgatory? The damnations were coming so fast and furious I couldn’t keep track of them. When he had vented out, I was given a week to get out of the house, and out of his life forever.
The wedding ended up to be a small affair – only friends attended – our party being boycotted by my relatives after a call from my dear old dad. And Jimmy had no relatives he was aware of. So we had a civil marriage and a reception where the bride did not get to dance with her father and the groom did not get to dance with his mother. Not a great start to a life of wedded bliss, but we vowed to be happy despite it. Jimmy and I and our baby would not only survive, we would prosper – or so I planned.
I moved in with Jimmy in his small one-bedroom apartment in Whitestone and we eagerly awaited the birth of our child. Frank Chandler arrived on time, a healthy eight pounds, with no complications. There was no doubt who his father was – the likeness was apparent even at that early age. But our initial euphoria with our new baby quickly wore off. Things went downhill in many areas. Experienced couples would say there are only three things that cause trouble in a marriage – sex, money and children. And it seemed we had all three problems at once.
My sexual desires and responses took a steep nosedive after Frankie’s birth. I just wasn’t interested in making love to Jim anymore. I didn’t know if it was physical or mental, but I do know the guilt put upon me by my parents and the guilt by being brought up in the Catholic Church weighed heavily on me all the time. And the more I rejected Jim’s attempts at lovemaking, the madder he got, oft
en leaving the apartment and coming home hours later with the smell of alcohol on his breath.
Then there was Frankie himself. He was forever crying and never slept through the night even after six months had passed. He was always sick, nose running, fever spiking, coughing all the time. It seemed I was always at the doctor’s office with him writing checks for co-payments. Babies cost a lot of money and we didn’t have much to begin with, just Jim’s meager salary and me not working. We had no car and had trouble making the rent, and unlike other couples in our position, we had no parents or relatives to turn to for short-term assistance.
I became desperate and sought refuge in the church, not my former parish of St. Gregory’s where the place would explode in flames if I walked in, but in St. Barbara’s a couple blocks away from the apartment. I would wrap Frankie up and get down on my knees in a rear pew and pray to God for help and guidance, but none came. I was afraid to speak with a priest, afraid to confess my mortal sin, afraid of their scorn, rejection and condemnation.
By the time Frankie was nine months old, I was desperate. I hated Jimmy, I hated my life, I hated myself and God help me, I hated Frankie. Thoughts of suicide became attractive – how else could I end my misery? But my Catholic teachings once again intervened. I had committed a terrible sin in that car. How could I now compound it with an even worse sin in the eyes of the church?
I stopped going into St. Barbara’s, but one mild, spring day with a light breeze blowing, as I walked past it pushing Frankie in his stroller, trying to clear my mind of my troubles, a very old nun walked down the church’s steps and stopped to admire Frankie. For once he was not fussing or crying and the nun stroked his cheek and said, “God has given us a beautiful baby and God has given us a beautiful day.”
“Thank you,” I said as the nun stood up.
She looked me directly in the eyes, still smiling as if she were looking into my soul. “God bless you,” she said. “I will pray for both of you. Find peace in the Lord.”
As she walked away I felt that she had seen into the very core of me and sensed my troubles. And she had somehow given me the answer to them.
Jimmy used to come home from work promptly at six o’clock until things went sour. Now it was rare for him to make an appearance before nine, smelling of alcohol, not asking about dinner, plopping himself on the couch in front of the TV. On this day, a Wednesday, I was fully prepared by four o’clock. My clothes were all packed and Frankie was sleeping soundly. I had deliberately kept him up past his usual nap time weathering the hysterical crying that resulted, but now I hoped he would sleep for at least four to five hours.
Before putting the note in the envelope marked “Jimmy” I unfolded it and read it slowly one more time:
Dear Jimmy,
I know I have made all our lives miserable. By leaving now, I sincerely believe that you and Frankie will have a much better life and future without me. My sins are unbearable and will continue to drag us down if I stayed. I must seek my redemption elsewhere. Maybe you would be better off if you put Frankie up for adoption. He might be too much of a burden as you try to make a better life for yourself. I am sorry for what I put you through. Ellen
I did not sign it, Love Ellen – that would have been hypocritical. I sealed the note in the envelope, picked up my suitcase and went out the door, locking it behind me. I did not kiss Frankie good-bye. I just left.
When I walked out of our Queens apartment that day I knew exactly where I was going. I had done internet research and located several convents that were open to accepting new members to the novitiate – not only accepting, but begging girls to join. It seemed the church’s problem in recruiting new members of the priesthood spilled over to the sisterhood. I’m sure I could have given the bishops and the cardinals a few good reasons for their problem, but I was not out to criticize the church – after all, I needed it for its ability to hide me for the rest of my life and for me to eventually, hopefully, prayerfully, earn my redemption and salvation.
I chose one way out east on the south fork of Long Island. It was called St. John of the Cross and was spread out over a hundred acres in an idyllic, pastoral setting. I had already decided to tell them the truth, well not all of it. In my interviews I told the Mother Superior I had a baby out of wedlock and gave it up for adoption. I was now grievously sorry for my sin and wished to devote my life to God. After I confessed this sin to the kindly priest who served the convent, Father Francis Mulvey, I was accepted as a novice in the Dominican Sisters of St. Joseph. I cut my long blond hair, removed the liner and mascara from my blue eyes and scrubbed the magenta lipstick from my mouth. I was ready to don the habit of a nun for the rest of my life.
St. John’s parish operated an elementary school which served the affluent surrounding communities providing a religious education from kindergarten through the eighth grade. I served as an aide to the teaching nuns while I went to college at night to obtain my teaching degree and credentials. By the time I completed my requirements I was there for six years and received my first assignment to teach the second grade, replacing Sister Amelia who retired at the age of seventy-five.
When I stepped into the classroom that September I could not help remembering that my son would probably be starting second grade himself this term. Not that this was the first time I had thoughts of Frankie – oh, no, I thought of him often, of how he was doing, of how Jim handled his upbringing, if he gave him up for adoption, if Jim ever told him of me, if Jim ever tried to find me – yes, I had a lot of thoughts and second guesses and self-recriminations, and I probably always would.
So, two years later, when Sister Audrey brought my attention to the television news and I learned that Frankie was now an orphan, I didn’t know what to do. Should I claim him and leave the convent? I could get a public school teaching job and support him, but what did I know about raising a child? And I was content in my life – but would Frankie be content in his? I agonized and prayed constantly for several days and finally reached my decision. I would do nothing. I had willfully abandoned my son eight years ago and I would now willfully abandon him once more. I was a wonderful God-loving Christian, wasn’t I?
CHAPTER EIGHT
The next night, after I was certain that it was too late for a visit from Hammond, I slipped out of bed, put my bathrobe and slippers on and glanced at the alarm clock as I left the bedroom. It was 2:17, and I was pretty sure everyone was sound asleep. I went slowly down the stairs to the kitchen. My heart was pounding – I remember that distinctly. There on the kitchen table, where they always sat, were two packs of cigarettes belonging to Mr. and Mrs. Hammond awaiting the first puff of the day for the early risers.
Sitting atop Mrs. Hammond’s box of Marlboro lights was a box of wooden matches. A Bic Lighter rested on Mr. Hammond’s red box of Marlboros. I took the Marlboro lights and the box of matches and carefully eased out the kitchen door, not making a sound. I was in the barn a few minutes later and struck a match and glanced around. I spotted the half dozen milk cows in their stalls and opened the half doors to shoo them out. They were not in the mood to move, but I’m sure they would when they smelled the smoke. And I sure wouldn’t miss their foul smells when I got out of here.
I piled a mound of straw in the far corner of the barn away from the door that I had left open for the cows to run out. I took out a Marlboro and lit up drawing in the smoke, but not inhaling. I was not an experienced smoker and didn’t want to have a loud coughing fit. When the cigarette was halfway smoked, I pushed it under the pile of straw and then lit the straw on fire with a match. As the flames grew higher I backed away and placed the boxes of cigarettes and matches on the floor. The cows started to move their feet and snort a bit and only needed a bit of coaxing now to bolt from their stalls and gallop toward the open barn door. I stayed a moment longer to make sure the dry wooden walls in the corner where I’d started the fire were burning. As the flames reached up toward the inner roof, I ran back into the house, put on the kitchen lights
and began screaming, “Wake up! Wake up! The barn’s on fire!”
I ran upstairs yelling all the way and burst into the Hammond’s bedroom. “Get up! The barn’s on fire!” I yelled.
When I saw them arise I ran out to the other bedrooms and awakened all the kids. I heard Mr. Hammond tell his wife to call the Fire Department and then get over with him to the barn. “And bring all the kids,” he shouted. “Maybe we can put this out.”
We couldn’t put it out though, and when the fire department arrived and did their job, about one third of the barn was gone. “What happened here?” the fire chief asked.
“Danged if I know,” Hammond said. “I was in a sound sleep and one of the kids woke me up yelling that the barn was on fire. Frankie, it was.”
“Frankie?” the chief said.
“Uh…yeah, it was me that woke everyone up.”
All eyes now turned toward me and the chief asked, “Did you start the fire, son?”
“Uh….yeah…but it was an accident!”
“Why you little…” Hammond started to say, reaching for me.
“Hold on, sir,” the fire chief said. “How did it happen?”
“I couldn’t sleep, so I went down to the kitchen for a glass of water and I saw the cigarettes on the table,” I said with my eyes focused on my feet.
“And then?”
“I took a pack of Marlboros and the box of matches and went in to the barn to try to smoke.”
“You little son-of-a-bitch,” Hammond said.
The chief put his hand up and said, “Please, let Frankie finish.”
“I sat down in the straw and lit the cigarette. I was so tired. I took a few puffs and then the next thing I remember I was coughing on the smoke, but the smoke was not from the cigarette, it was from the straw. Then I saw the flames and I got scared and ran for the door. But I thought about the cows, so I opened their gates and shoved them out.”