by Helen Bryan
“But you make speeches and stuff, you’re the face of the institute. How do you manage to look so good?”
“Fortunately, being pregnant softens people up. Alejandro and I keep being overtaken by events. And Alejandro laughs and says big families are normal, and I always wanted a big family—probably the adopted-child syndrome—but he’s promised to have the snip after the next one. Very un-Spanish male of him. Oh Lord, don’t write that!” Menina leaned over and switched off the machine. “Without Mama’s help I’d look like something the cat dragged in. My dad won’t go shopping with her any more, says all he does is sit on the husbands’ bench.”
“I’ll get some photos of the kids, too; they’re adorable.”
“They need to get out of the sun now anyway. Girls, come give Mommy a big hug and have some juice,” she called.
Four little dark-eyed girls of seven, six, five, and nearly four in identical smocked sundresses raced across the courtyard, followed by their grandmother.
Becky picked up her camera and aimed it at the children. “You’ve got your work cut out for you, Mrs. Walker.” The little girls and Becky made silly faces at each other while Becky took photos.
“Yes, I do, honey. I’m blessed having so many.”
There was the sound of an engine coming up the new gravel drive through the convent gates. Menina closed her eyes and smiled happily, seeing a dark-eyed man in a blazer and an open-necked shirt, who had driven much too fast to return home, get out of the car with a big bunch of flowers for his wife.
At the bottom of the steps leading up to the old pilgrims’ garden that was now their private one, Alejandro smiled, too, as he heard his daughters’ laughter on the terrace where Menina and her mother and her friend were waiting for him, and his father-in-law calling “get ahold of yourself” to one of the children. He smelled lamb and knew his mother-in-law had set the table under the grape arbor with their wedding china and that a lazy lunch in the shade surrounded by his family and his wife’s best friend would be followed by a siesta. Pregnancy increased Menina’s appetite for sex, and then she would sleep, entwined in Alejandro’s arms while the baby kicked them both. They would visit the nuns’ quarters to hear whatever advice Sor Teresa felt was called for today. And neither of them would have traded this for anything on earth.
Alejandro was halfway up the steps to them when there was a terrible boom like an explosion, and a rumble of collapsing masonry deep inside the convent. He swore, dropped the flowers and leaped up the last stairs shouting, “Menina!”
At the top he nearly collided with Becky swinging past on her crutches propelling herself toward the explosion. She looked more than upset, she looked dangerous, face white and shrieking something incomprehensible. Alejandro quickly counted his children to be sure they were safe and gave his hand to Menina who was struggling out of her chair with a worried expression. He wrapped his arms tight around her. “Thank God!” “It’s alright, darling, it wasn’t a bomb. Hendrik warned me they were pulling a wall down in the old pilgrims’ quarter and it might be loud, but Becky’s a little shaky—I didn’t know till I saw her how badly she’d been injured. I think she’s got post-traumatic shock and she needs help. We have to get her before she kills Hendrik with her crutch.” She pulled her husband toward the cloud of dust billowing from the convent. “She’s been holding it together, by herself, for too long. She needs professional help and peace and quiet. I was so glad she was coming because I thought being here might help, but listen to her, screaming at poor Hendrik! See what I mean? And I’d asked him to join us for lunch because Becky liked him when they met before, but he was married. I didn’t have a chance to tell her he’s divorced now. I hoped meeting him again would remind her there are good guys out there…I’m an idiot.”
Steadying his pregnant wife, Alejandro muttered, “I thought it was a bomb. Not surprised she did as well. But Hendrik and Becky? Ice and fire.”
They listened and could hear Becky’s voice, high pitched and hysterical now. Coughing and waving dust away so they could see, and stepping carefully over pieces of broken wall, they went inside toward the screaming. Which suddenly stopped.
“Do you guess Hendrik’s still alive?”
Alejandro peered into the dimness then nudged Menina as the dust slowly settled. “Maybe you were right.” At the end of a long dark corridor a tall blond man in glasses had his arms protectively around a short woman with hair so sun bleached it was white in the dim light. The woman’s face was muffled in his shoulder and he was murmuring soothing indistinct words into her ear, rocking her gently back and forth. “We’ll go back and let them be,” advised Alejandro.
“Oh!” said Menina. She stopped and panted, leaning on her husband’s arm. “Oh, Alejandro, I think that was a contraction. Just a little one.”
“Thank God I’m home! I thought you weren’t due for another two weeks.”
“Babies don’t keep very good time. But it is early. Probably a false alarm.”
“Papa?”
Their four-year-old stood silhouetted in the entrance.
“Wait there, Marisol, it’s a mess in here. Too dangerous for you. Mommy and I are coming out.”
Marisol stamped her foot. “Hurry because I want to tell you! There was a lady in the garden. She came after the big bang and told me not to be scared. She had a long dress on and it blowed in the wind and I showed her my new tricycle and was ringing the bell and she smiled and went ‘Shhh.’ So I did shhh. Then she showed me a swallow nest hidden in the vines. It had little eggs in it. She asked did I want to know a secret. Guess what? Aunt Becky’s going to get married and live here. Then the lady said she lives here, too, that she was goned away but she came back. I told Granma but Granma said the lady wasn’t really there but she was, Mommy, she was!”
Menina stared at her daughter, and bent over clumsily to give her a hug. “Marisol! Oh, sweetie…” She stared up at Alejandro. “Salome?” she mouthed. He shrugged.
Then there was a snuffle and slow footsteps. A man cleared his throat. Hendrik looked at them solemnly through his horn-rimmed spectacles. “Careful,” he said. He was carrying a large rectangle that seemed to be wrapped in ragged old material. Becky, looking tearstained and drained, limped along behind him. “I was just telling Becky, that we are finding something hidden in the wall that we knocked down. This is a very interesting thing to find, I think. Come, we must see it.” Alejandro went to help him.
In the kitchen Almira hastily cleared the large refectory table and Hendrik laid the object down. Menina said, “It looks like it’s a painting. Behind the wall? Like it was hidden?” She felt another unmistakable sensation. It was a long drive to the maternity hospital in the valley, but first she had to know what this was. She carefully pulled away rotted material, blew the dust off, and underneath they could see the faint outline of a group of people. “What on earth…hand me some bread.” Almira grabbed the breadbasket ready for lunch and passed it to Menina. Everyone gathered around expectantly as Menina dabbed a little dirt off here. Then there. Even Becky looked curious.
They could see the outlines of five heads.
“Oh!” Was that another contraction? Menina tried to ignore it; she needed to know if it was what she hoped it was—the missing piece of the puzzle. She grabbed more bread and worked as quickly as possible until the sitters were visible enough for the others to see. “Esperanza gets to sit on Grandpa’s shoulders. I want to see, too; pick me up, Papa!” demanded Marisol. Alejandro swung her up. She shrieked and pointed at the figure on the right of the portrait. “Mama! There’s you!”
“She’s right!” exclaimed Becky with Hendrik at her shoulder.
“Sure enough is,” Virgil agreed. Almira’s eyes were wide. She crossed herself. The resemblance was unmistakable.
“That’s Esperanza,” said Menina. “And…and the others.” She pointed them out, identifying each one easily. Sanchia, Marisol, Pia with the hair like moonlight, and the dwarf Luz.
“But that’s
my name!” Esperanza protested from Virgil’s shoulders.
“Yes, it is, just like the Esperanza in the picture who is probably your great, great…I don’t know how many great, grandma. Maybe you’ll look like her too one day when you’re older. And when you are, I’ll tell you all about them.” About these girls, and about Isabella who had become Sor Beatriz, and Salome and the Inca commander, how Esperanza had married Salome’s son Don Miguel…everything she knew about her ancestors, which she would tell them made her no less the Walkers’ daughter.
She was distracted from her musings by another contraction. A stronger one. Probably time to go.
“I’d love to eat lunch first but this baby,” she announced, “is going to be born on this table, Alejandro, if we don’t leave for the hospital at once!” There was a flurry of consternation, Almira ran to phone the hospital, Sarah-Lynn was telling Virgil where Menina’s suitcase was, and the little girls began jumping up and down. Alejandro searched his pockets frantically for his car keys, and Sarah-Lynn was giving instructions to everyone.
Menina pointed out the keys where Alejandro had put them on the kitchen table and holding his arm said, “But before I go, we’ve decided what to name her. Or actually, I think the name chose us a little while ago, when Marisol was in the garden.” She raised her eyebrows at Alejandro to see if he agreed. He nodded.
There was a chorus of “What is it? You can’t go until you tell us!”
“It’s Salome, of course,” Menina said, patting her stomach. “Salome is finally coming home.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Photo © Roger Low, 2012
After ten years as a barrister, Helen Bryan left law to write full time. In 2003, she received the Award of Merit from the Colonial Dames of America for her biography Martha Washington: First Lady of Liberty. Her first work of historical fiction, War Brides, was a bestseller on Amazon. She is also the author of the law handbook Planning Applications and Appeals. Raised in Tennessee and Virginia, she currently resides in London with her family.