by Anita Shreve
The back of Olympia’s skirts is soaked, and she is certain it will leave a wet mark on the chair. Her hat is so heavy with the rain, she is forced to remove it. The knots she has made in her hair hang low on the back of her neck. She pushes the loosened bits behind her ears.
“What is your name?” the sister asks.
“Olympia Biddeford.”
If the sister knows the name, she gives no indication. She folds her hands and presses them under her nose. “And what is the name of the child?”
“I do not know,” Olympia says.
The sister’s fingers are red and shiny. She wears a wedding band on her left hand.
“You wish only to know the health of this child?” the sister asks.
“I . . .” Olympia looks down into her lap. She has brought her purse, and in it a considerable sum of money. She does not like to think about having to buy her child back, but if it comes to that, she is prepared to do so.
“I am not sure,” Olympia says, not quite truthfully.
“You have a husband?”
Olympia shakes her head.
The sister thrusts her chin out in a quick gesture of disapproval.
“And how do you propose to support such a child?”
“I have means,” she says. “I have a house.”
“Where is this house?”
“At Fortune’s Rocks.”
The sister studies Olympia with the faint disdain of the righteous judging the privileged.
“You have a family? A housekeeper?”
“No, not at the moment. My family, that is, my father and mother, live in Boston.”
“I see. Did you have money at the time the child was abandoned?”
“Abandoned is not the proper word,” Olympia says. “The child was taken from me. I was very young.”
“I can see that.” The sister regards her carefully. “How old are you now?”
“Twenty,” she says.
“There are procedures,” the sister explains. “We do not give away children. You understand that.”
“Yes.”
“What name was the child left under?”
“I do not know.”
“This will be difficult then,” the sister says. “Who brought the child?”
“I am not sure. He was taken from me at birth by my father. He himself would not have brought the baby, but I do not know if he would have used his name for the” — she struggles for the right word — “transaction.”
“Exactly,” the sister says.
The nun opens her desk and withdraws a ledger that is stuffed with many papers. She peruses the journal for some time. The pages snap smartly as she turns them.
“I do not see a Biddeford here,” the sister says. “Not for the time you say. Might there be another name?”
Olympia hesitates. She lowers her eyes to the middle distance on the desk. “Haskell,” she answers quietly.
The sister, whose name Olympia still does not know, looks up at her.
“I see,” she says, not consulting her ledger at all now. “First name?”
“John.”
“And why might that name have been used?”
“He was . . . is . . . the father,” she says.
“Yes, I see.” The sister seems to scrutinize her anew. “And might he have brought the child here himself?”
“No, no,” Olympia says. “I do not think so. My father would not speak to Dr. Haskell, nor allow his name to be spoken inside our house. I sincerely doubt he would have had dealings with him.”
“And where might John Haskell be now?”
“I do not know,” Olympia says.
The sister clucks and shakes her head. “You understand that this cannot be done quickly.”
Olympia’s heart leaps. Does that mean that securing the child might be possible? “Yes,” Olympia says, and perhaps she smiles.
“And that the child may not be here at all.”
The sister scowls at Olympia, causing Olympia to recompose her features. “I have prayed that this will not be the case,” Olympia says, realizing at once that the sister will not much credit her Protestant prayers.
“You will almost certainly need legal advice,” the sister says.
“I wish to know if the child is well,” Olympia says. “And I wish to know . . . his name.”
The sister nods her head slowly. What might such a woman’s life be like? Olympia wonders suddenly. A life of celibacy and prayer, of service to others. Would the natural longings for love be so great that one would always feel the loss, or did longings evaporate with religious devotion?
“Many of the children are placed out before the mother can come back for them,” the sister says. “Occasionally they are adopted by legal means. Why have you waited all this time?”
“It is only recently that I could even consider such an action,” she says.
“The gift of a child is a very great treasure,” the sister says. “Do you think that a girl who has sinned should be rewarded for her foolishness with such a gift?”
Olympia opens her mouth to speak, but she cannot answer her.
The sister rises from her chair. “I wish you to remain here,” she says, and leaves the room.
• • •
Olympia sits in her wet skirts and waits for the Catholic nun to return. The room grows chillier, and Olympia shivers, from fear or from the cold or from the aftermath of fright, she cannot tell. She has nothing dry to wrap around her. Rain beats against the tall windows, the sills of which are at the level of her chin. The walls are painted brown, and the paint shines with all its nicks and dents in the electric lights. Behind the sister’s desk is a large ornate cross with a suffering Jesus.
The journal with its papers — papers of differing sizes and colors — sits on the sister’s desk. If she looks in that journal, Olympia wonders, will she find the name she is looking for?
She gets up from the chair to walk around the room to warm her limbs. Her skirts still stick to her thighs, and she has to peel them away from her. She is shivering badly now, and she wonders what is keeping the sister so long. Where exactly has she gone?
The sister knew the name of John Haskell. Of this Olympia is certain.
She walks to the window and looks out at the steady rain that has followed in the wake of the thunderstorm. Then she turns and studies the office, the tall oak filing cabinets partially lining one wall, the many books in a floor-to-ceiling bookcase. The only chair for guests, the one she has sat in, is severe and spartan, and Olympia thinks that the nun must not encourage many visitors.
Her teeth begin chattering, and she clenches them. She searches for a heat source, sees a radiator behind the sister’s desk, but when she goes near to it and feels it, she discovers it is only lukewarm. Still, she thinks, lukewarm is better than nothing, and she leans against it. She is so cold that she no longer cares if the sister catches her behind her desk.
She listens for the sounds of children, but can hear nothing. Once, however, she does hear the clicking of heels along the stone and returns to her chair, but it is a false alarm, and within moments Olympia finds herself leaning on the radiator again. Where are the children? she wonders. Are they housed in this cold, granite building? Surely not. However can this be a children’s home? She does not want to think about it. She has an unpleasant image of children’s cots lined up against a wall, like those of soldiers in a field hospital.
The sister is gone for so long that Olympia begins to imagine she has abandoned her altogether. She wonders if she should go in search of her. She stares at her desk, mesmerized by the sight of the journal with its broken spine and its stuffing of colored papers of differing sizes. From her vantage point, leaning against the radiator, she can make out a few words in pen: the baby which is left, she reads. And awful it is to separate. Olympia takes a step closer. She reaches out and, with the tip of her index finger, opens the journal.
There is a letter lying between two pages.
24 May 1897
To the Sisters of the Orphanage,
I scarcely know what to write but that I am the mother of the darling baby girl who was left on your doorstep with the three dollars in the basket on the night before last. I cannot speak of the terrible pain of separating from my dear one, but not being able to keep her for the reason that no one will employ me with an infant (and I have neither husband nor father to help me) I must give her up to you. Please comfort her and be kind to her and tell her that her mother is named Francine. I cannot now tell you my other name, but I will one day when I come to fetch her, which I pray I will be able to do soon, if I am earnest and hard-working and can save up some money. She is but four weeks old, and I have not been able to pay for her baptism, so please, if you would be so kind, perform this for her. Her name is Marie Christine, and I hope you will keep this name so that I will one day be able to find her again. And if God does not permit this, I hope that we will be reunited in Heaven.
A mother
Olympia shuts her eyes. 1897. How old would Marie Christine be now? Seven years, eight years? Did the mother come back for her as hoped?
Olympia turns to another page.
15 December 1899
Sister M. Marguerite, Mother Superior,
This child is the product of an assault upon the person of a young woman who has had occasion to come under my care. She is a decent girl but is too poor to support this child, having one other by an unknown person. I was present at the delivery of this infant, whom I pronounced to be in good health, although the girl tells me now that the boy has been weak in his breathing for several days. This child is not yet baptized. You will be well advised to place this child out if you have opportunity, since I doubt sincerely the young girl in question will ever return for him. The event that produced the child is a source of great mental suffering for the girl, and as a result of this, she has had to move away from her mother and stepfather, and I hope you will take my meaning in this.
Respectfully yours,
Dr. R. Martin
Olympia’s face grows hot, and there is perspiration at her hairline. She turns another page and comes upon a piece of stationery that is blank but for its letterhead. She notices the name of Mère Marguerite and decides this must be the tiny woman with the black eyes she is still waiting for. And then Olympia notices, on the letterhead, along with a dozen other names printed in the left-hand margin under the heading Board of Directors, the name of Rufus Philbrick. Of course. Olympia turns another page and draws a note, which appears to have been written on a scrap of brown parcel paper, toward her.
4 February 1901
Dear Sisters,
You are so kind and I know that you will love my little Charles. In your kindness, please forgive an unwed mother whose heart is broken. Please also, if I may request this, place him out to a Catholic family, as I do not like to think of him denied Heaven for want of knowing about the Church. You will forgive me if I do not leave my name.
Olympia returns to her chair and stares at the journal. Do all of the other pieces of paper in the book contain similarly wretched letters? She puts her head in her hands. She gave up her child without so much as a note or a dollar, and what excuse did she have? None. She was not poor. She was not the victim of brutality. And the child, whatever else his circumstances, had been conceived in love. That much was true. How could she have so easily given the child away?
Olympia starts when she hears the door behind her open. The sister walks by her and sits at her desk and appears to notice nothing amiss. She does not tell Olympia why she has been so long away, but neither does she look as stern as she did earlier. Indeed, she seems to have softened considerably.
“You are cold,” the sister says.
Olympia is silent.
“Do you want me to fetch you a wrap? Or some tea?”
Olympia shakes her head.
“I have received permission to tell you the child’s name.”
Olympia presses her hands together as if praying and rests her chin on the tips of her fingers.
“It is Pierre,” the sister says.
And Olympia thinks, holding her breath from the shock of the name, His name is Pierre!
“But I am afraid I also have some rather disappointing news to tell you,” the sister says. She looks concerned, and Olympia freezes.
“The boy has been placed out,” the sister says.
“What does that mean?” Olympia asks.
“The boy has foster parents,” the sister explains.
“No,” Olympia says. “This cannot be.”
“I am afraid, my child, that it is.”
“No,” Olympia says with more emphasis. She places her hands upon the sister’s desk. “Surely there is some way to get him back,” she says. “Surely I can have him back? After all, he is mine. He is my flesh and blood. Surely no law can prevent me from having him.” She is unable to keep a note of desperation out of her voice.
“I am afraid that all of this happened some time ago,” the sister says softly, but with an unmistakable note of finality.
Olympia feels the blood leave her head. The sister must see this, for she asks Olympia quickly: “Will you faint?”
“Where is he?” Olympia asks, her mouth having gone dry.
The sister purses her lips and shakes her head. “I cannot tell you that,” she says. “Our policy — ”
“You must tell me,” Olympia interrupts. “Please, I have to know where he is.”
“I cannot,” she says. “I can, however, tell you that he is with a loving mother and father. I know of the persons in question, and I know that he is being well cared for.”
“Do they live here, in Ely Falls?”
“I cannot answer that,” she says. “I am sorry, but this is not really such an unusual circumstance. And if you think about this from the boy’s point of view, is it not better for him to have been all this time with a loving guardian in a warm home, with good food and a good bed, than to have lived with an unwed mother who is shamed and is perhaps too young to care for a young child?”
“I do not have shame,” Olympia says.
The sister sits back in her chair. “How impertinent you are,” she says coldly. “You come here asking for my help and I give it to you, and you dare to tell me, a mother superior of the Catholic Church, that you have not sinned? Have you no conscience, girl?”
“I have a conscience,” Olympia says evenly. “I am sorry for the harm that I have done another woman and her children. But I am not sorry that I loved or was loved. And I do not think I am too young to care for a child. I would have cared for him well even when he was born.”
“Ah, yes, but you did not, did you?” The nun smiles unkindly. “You will find that the law, as well as the church, will vigorously disagree that you are a fit person to care for an infant. An unwed mother, immoral in the eyes of society and a sinner in the eyes of God, is understood to be the least fit of all possible parents.”
“But this is not true,” Olympia says heatedly. “Would you deem a father who has raped his daughter a more fit parent than a strong, young woman who has happened to conceive a child out of wedlock?”
“No one just happens to conceive a child,” the nun says. “There is will involved and intent. Since it is obvious you were not misled and did not suffer a brutality, it would appear that you quite willfully sinned against Nature and against God and against another woman and her family, may God have mercy on your soul.”
Olympia straightens her back. “To love is not a sin against Nature, and I will never believe it so.”
The nun stands. “You cannot hope to be restored to society and to the community of the righteous if you do not confess your sins and beg forgiveness.”
Olympia stands as well. “I will beg,” she says. “You may be sure that I will beg.” She collects her purse, the purse that contains the money with which she was willing to purchase her child. Perhaps she ought to have done that immediately, she thinks, offer
ed the money first. But it is too late now.
“You may be certain that I will beg and plead and fight and use all of the resources available to me,” Olympia says carefully. “But I will one day find out my son’s full name, and I will one day have him with me.”
In a statement of dismissal, the mother superior crosses herself, a gesture Olympia finds distasteful as well as mildly frightening.
* * *
16 August 1903
Dear Mr. Philbrick,
You said to me recently that I might write you if I had need of your assistance. I would not bother you if the situation were not of the utmost importance, and I hope you will find it in your heart to permit me to call upon you and hear what I have to say.
I should like to visit Tuesday next at eleven o’clock in the morning if that is convenient for you. Please do not write my father about this letter or our previous visit. I am now twenty years of age and may speak to you, if you would permit this, as an adult.
I shall await your reply.
Most respectfully,
Olympia Biddeford
17 August 1903
Dear Miss Biddeford,
Of course, I shall help you in any way I can. I shall look forward to your visit on Tuesday, the 21st, at eleven o’clock. I trust you still have my card with my address.
I hope you are well.
Yours sincerely,
R. Philbrick
* * *
Tuesday dawns a brilliant day, which Olympia takes as an omen of a happy outcome. She is nervous at the thought of presenting her case to Rufus Philbrick, but whenever she feels her resolution falter, she thinks of the incomparable reward should her quest be successful. She imagines a boy named Peter sitting on her lap upon the porch while she talks to him of the ocean and the tides and the sun that always rises in the east. Of the summer solstice, of a game called tennis, and of strange-looking crusty creatures called lobsters. She will introduce him to Ezra and will take him with her to the grocer’s. Together they will walk the beach and look for shells that he will put into a bucket.
Olympia dresses this day in a pale peach shirtwaist, which she irons and starches to within an inch of its life so that she will appear to be domestically capable and skilled. In her nervousness, she miscalculates how long her toilet will take, and she is ready nearly an hour before she is scheduled to be picked up. She rehearses her prepared speech, trying for a delicate balance between reason and passion. Rufus Philbrick’s help is essential to her cause.
