The Orphan Keeper

by Camron Wright

  Chellamuthu is just . . .

  Eli’s fingers hovered over the keys while his brain considered what to type. In truth, he didn’t know Chellamuthu’s actual age. But also, in truth, typing the number that was tingling the tips of his fingers would be a blatant lie.

  As a lifelong Christian, he was well aware of the ninth commandment. Thou shalt not bear false witness. Yet also as a lifelong Christian, he believed as Matthew had preached, that one should not turn away a little child, for of such is the kingdom of heaven.

  If he typed an accurate number, the family—any family—would reject the boy, sight unseen. Eli knew from experience that it was almost impossible to place an older child.

  However, if he lied and put down the age they wanted to hear, it was unlikely that a family, as they stood with welcoming arms at the airport, would do anything but accept and love the child. In this case, lying meant he could save another boy.

  He typed the rest of the line:

  Chellamuthu is just 3.

  Was it worth it? Could he live with such deception? Eli reached behind his neck to scratch at his scars.

  Absolutely.

  And if God disagreed, well, he could cast Eli down to hell when judgment time came. But for now, while his heart was still beating in his body and his lungs were still pulling in air, he would do whatever it would take to save a child.

  He finished the letter.

  I commend your goodness, your desire. Orphans have no one to watch over them. They need to be cared for and loved. It can be a thankless job, but it is one that comes with its rewards.

  He who keeps the orphans keeps them from harm, watches over their lives, their comings and goings. He keeps them like a shepherd keeps his flock.

  To that end, may God bless us all as we turn tragedy into hope.

  With kind regards,

  Eli Manickam, Orphanage Commissioner

  Chapter 14

  When Linda Rowland was frustrated, she would bake. She found that the straightforward directions of most recipes helped clear her head, that mixing batter was an activity she could do with Rux and Josh, and when they were finished, they’d have something that was both appreciated and delicious.

  With Eli’s letter sitting open on the table, Linda had orange rolls cooking in the lower oven, cranberry pumpkin bread baking in the top, and she was now mixing chocolate chip cookie dough that she was starting to eat raw.

  Adopting children was always a roller-coaster ride, but with this latest go-around, Linda was getting nauseated. Her heart now ached for the girl who would never leave India, but she also fretted for the boy who was still there waiting.

  For good or bad, when God had baked Linda, he double measured her compassion. Questions swirled with the aroma of the breads.

  Was all this mess just part of God’s master plan? Was this boy, Chellamuthu, meant to be part of our family? How am I to know for certain?

  A friend of Linda’s from church insisted that God was always in charge. If that was true, then why, at times, did he seem so unorganized?

  “How do we know, Fred?” she asked as they sat that evening at the table eating warm rolls she’d just pulled out of the oven. “How do we know if this is actually God’s doing or just . . . bureaucrats?”

  Fred smiled. “Maybe He uses bureaucrats. Perhaps they’re cheaper, easier to manipulate.”

  She wasn’t ready for his humor. “You’re okay with another boy, then? When do we stop—at a football team?”

  She didn’t have to ask. The answer was leaking from his eyes. “I teach PE,” he said, with a grin. “What’s one more boy? The issue is that you need to be okay with it.”

  Her head shook back and forth, like a puppy with a toy. “Argh! How am I supposed to know? God can be so frustrating?”

  “Maybe we aren’t,” Fred answered.

  “Aren’t what?”

  “Supposed to know. Perhaps there are times He trusts us enough to move forward without giving us every little answer.”

  “Little?”

  He waited for more, but she was grinding her teeth.

  “Nothing to add?” Fred wondered.

  Her reply was curt and clear.

  “I think I’ll make some muffins.”

  The next communication from Eli wasn’t a letter. It was a telegram. Linda tore it open as if it contained money. Her eyes darted line to line. Hopefully this was good news about their son.

  Dear Mr. & Mrs. Rowland,

  Thank you for your patience and faith. May God bless you and your loving family. In our country there are many fees to arrange the proper paperwork. Unfortunately, it has been more costly than expected. Kindly send another $400 as soon as possible to cover these unforeseen costs.

  Soon you will welcome your son into your caring family.

  Kind regards,

  Eli Manickam, Orphanage Commissioner

  Linda’s jaw clenched. Her posture stiffened. “It’s not right,” she murmured.

  The letter didn’t just smell fishy. It was downright rotten. Had such a request happened just once, she would have ignored the issue. Last time it was money for the girl’s medical expenses. Now it was unforeseen costs for the boy. She knew full well that this was the nature of foreign adoptions, to throw money into a hole of hope and then pray that one day a child would pop out—but there was a limit.

  “Take my money,” she said, “but don’t you dare start jerking around my boy.”

  At church on Sunday, a lesson had been given about a girl praying to God to protect the birds that her brother was trying to catch in his traps. While it was a common Christian story that Linda had heard many times before, the ending always made her smile.

  At first the little girl prayed that the birds wouldn’t fly into the traps. Next, she prayed that if they did, the traps would malfunction. Lastly, the girl went outside and kicked all of her brother’s traps into teeny little pieces.

  Linda didn’t need to call Fred. He’d back up her decision. The time for prayer and patience was past. It was time for Linda to start kicking some traps.

  She hurried to the phone and punched in the number of her friend Jessica. After the niceties, she skipped right to her question. “Jessica, how’s your brother the senator doing?”

  “Busy. Why do you ask?”

  “Honestly? I need a favor.”

  “What’s up?”

  “I know the senator is always swamped, but we’ve already paid this orphanage in India nearly $5,500, and I just got another letter asking for $400 more. I don’t want to be unreasonable, but I get the feeling they’re trying to take advantage of us, and I was hoping that, well . . .”

  “You’d like me to see if he’ll make a few calls? Rattle some chains?”

  “That would be amazing. Is that possible?”

  “Did you vote for him?”

  Linda laughed. “I’ll vote for him twice next time.”

  “I’ll see him tomorrow. Don’t stress—he loves assignments like this. I’ll have him call the consulate, and they’ll get to the bottom of it. Now, if I remember correctly, he flies back to Washington on Friday. Can you get me copies of your paperwork?”

  “I’m on my way! I’ll bring them now—and I hope you know you’re my favorite friend in the world!”

  Linda made three copies of everything and then drove toward town. She glanced in the rearview mirror and brushed back her hair. “Don’t mess with Blondie,” she snarled to a man half a world away. “You have no idea who you’re dealing with.”

  Chapter 15

  Maneesh sat at Eli’s desk waiting for him to arrive. He added up pending payments, studied a list of current children, then sorted the names of hopeful parents.

  When the phone rang, a woman in the adjacent room answered it and then entered. “Sorry to interrupt, sir.”

 
“What is it?”

  “The phone. They asked for Mr. Eli, but he isn’t here, and I thought you would want to take it.”

  “Why, who is it?”

  “The police, the head constable. He wants to come and visit. He says he’s bringing someone from the American consulate!”

  Chellamuthu awoke early, used the cement trough, and washed his face in the fountain. Vikesh would arrive soon, and the two had already drawn up grand battle plans.

  Then a car outside the gate honked. Nobody came. It honked again—long and loud.

  “I’m coming. I’m coming!” Eli rushed from his office but jarred to a stop when he saw Chellamuthu standing there. “I was just coming to get you,” he said to the boy.

  Mrs. Sundar stepped from behind Eli lugging two large suitcases, as if she and Eli had decided to run off together. She glanced down at Chellamuthu and passed him a polite smile—one that also appeared to carry a secret. She leaned in to Eli. “Tell me again which ones?”

  Eli cupped his mouth so Chellamuthu couldn’t hear. As Mrs. Sundar listened, her eyes scooted back to the boy and then toward the room where the children slept. She nodded her understanding. “I’ll be right back.”

  Eli swung the gate wide and a van entered. While the driver loaded the two suitcases into the vehicle, Eli bent down.

  “I have exciting news for you, Chellamuthu. We have found a family in America who wants to adopt you. Do you know what that means?”

  Chellamuthu wrenched back. “But I already have a family!” he protested.

  It was an argument Eli would never win. “Chellamuthu, you are going to have a remarkable life. Trust me. You will see. Now get in the van. You get to ride on an airplane!”

  Mrs. Sundar returned with a baby in each arm. One of the younger toddlers was trailing her, lassoed by the woman’s words of encouragement.

  It was all happening so fast. Why hadn’t they warned him? Why couldn’t Eli have said something about this last night? Why hadn’t Chellamuthu run when he’d had the chance?

  “I don’t want to go,” he declared, hardly believing the words himself as they spilled from his mouth. “I’m playing with Vikesh today!” he protested, as if that would be sufficient reason to let him stay.

  “Chellamuthu, it’s normal to be nervous,” Eli said in a half-hearted attempt at sympathy as he lifted the boy up onto the seat. He motioned for him to sit against the far window.

  The van was clean, and the driver was smiling. But neither fact prevented the smells, sounds, and suspicions of Chellamuthu’s first kidnapping from sitting right there beside him. When he twisted around to crawl out, Eli was blocking his way.

  “I can’t go to America,” he said. “We’re defending the Khyber Pass.”

  The driver smiled. Eli smiled. After Mrs. Sundar climbed in beside the children, the doors slammed closed. The van had just started to move when Chellamuthu hollered, “Wait! I forgot something! Please . . . I . . . I have to go to the bathroom!”

  Perhaps it was the utter despair that scratched in his voice or the panic dripping like tears from his eyes that begged Eli to reach into his heart and grant the boy a last request. “Please, hold up for a second.”

  When the driver obliged, Eli pushed the door open to let Chella­muthu step down. “Hurry—and while you’re at it, get your ­sandals.”

  Chellamuthu ran across the yard and would have kept running if there had been any place to hide. Instead, he stopped beside his sleeping mat, pulled up on the corner, and retrieved the picture he’d so carefully drawn of his family. It was still sandwiched between two sheets of plain paper, and while he hated to fold it, he had no choice.

  He trudged back to the waiting van, and without any further delay, the vehicle pulled out from the yard and onto the street that led toward the airport. Eli was busy now checking through the paperwork to make sure all was in order. Mrs. Sundar was rocking one baby, dangling her fingers in front of the other, and vocally assuring the restless toddler sitting at her side that all was well.

  Chellamuthu glanced back at the walls and building that had been his home. The van was half a block away and gaining speed, so Chellamuthu couldn’t be certain, but just as the Lincoln Home for Homeless Children disappeared into the clutter of the surrounding buildings, he thought he saw Vikesh at the outer door reaching up to knock.

  His next words were a whisper.

  “I didn’t even get to say good-bye.”

  A day earlier, standing beside both Eli Manickam and a district judge in Coimbatore, four different women took money to swear they were the sole living parent of their named child—two babies, a toddler, and an older boy—recently placed at the Lincoln Home for Homeless Children.

  Each affirmed she was an unfit mother and completely unable to provide proper care while expressing a heartfelt desire that her child be given up to a better family in a country with more opportunity. Three of the women actually cried.

  Once the judge was also paid, the proper papers were signed, stamped, and prepared.

  Eli dabbed at his face with his sleeve. Saving children was not only arduous, it could be expensive. Greed, it turns out, has long fingers.

  Although Eli and the children were ready to leave the country, the cogs of paperwork at the American consulate in Chennai weren’t quite as easy to grease. It had taken hours of sitting in sticky waiting rooms before three of the four children were cleared and permitted to board the flight.

  But there was a problem with the last boy—an older boy with a runny nose and scarred feet.

  Ring, ring, ring . . .

  Linda stirred. Fred didn’t move.

  Ring, ring, ring . . .

  She lifted her head and glanced at the clock. 3:07 a.m.

  Ring, ring, ring . . .

  She rolled up from the bed and grabbed at the receiver. Her voice was shaky and faint. “Hello?”

  “Hello, ma’am. Is this Linda Rowland, wife of Fred Rowland?” The voice reaching through the phone was both low and formal, sounding almost like a marketing call. All Linda could think was, What a terrible way to start a conversation at three in the morning. He continued, “I’m very sorry to call so late . . . err . . . early. It’s urgent, and with the time difference, well, I had no choice.”

  Time difference? “Please, who is this? What is this about?”

  “Mrs. Rowland, my name is Matt Conway. I’m calling from the consulate general’s office in Chennai, India.”

  “What is it? Is everything okay?”

  “I’m not sure. Are you adopting a boy from India named Chellamuthu?”

  A breath. A pause. “Yes. What’s wrong?”

  “Ma’am, I’m sorry to be the one to tell you this, but I’m processing the paperwork, and it says that Chellamuthu is three years old.”

  “Yes, that’s correct. The boy we’re adopting is three. Does that matter?”

  The sound of the man exhaling raced more than eight thousand miles through the phone to land in her bedroom clear as day. “The boy is standing here in front of me, and regardless of what the paperwork says, there is no way in hell—excuse my language—this boy is only three.”

  “Well . . . how old is he?” It was Linda’s turn to sigh.

  “The kids here are sometimes smaller, so it can be hard to tell. Best case, ma’am . . . maybe seven or eight. Realistically . . . more like nine.”

  Fred was sitting up now. “Honey, what is it? What are they saying?”

  Linda didn’t move, didn’t flinch, couldn’t speak. How could she take a boy who was already older than her other children? She’d read the articles. She knew what problems that could cause.

  Mr. Manickam had said that the boy was three!

  “Ma’am? Are you there?”

  A second passed . . . and then a dozen . . . and a dozen more. The man must have known they were still conne
cted because Linda was both puffing and growling into the phone.

  “Ma’am? Would you like us to still send you the boy?”

  The pressure in her chest was racing for her throat. It would take but a moment before the mix of anger and sorrow would begin to wrestle with her heart, making it difficult to stay composed.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Conway,” she finally said. “Please give me your number. I’m going to have to call you back.”

  Eli approached the man at the desk one more time, serving him the same argument. “As I said, it was a simple mistake in the paperwork. His birthday is off by a couple of years. Don’t penalize the boy for that.”

  The man quit typing, glanced up, looked Eli square in the eyes. “A couple of years? Are you telling me, sir, that you really believe this boy is just five?”

  Eli’s entire body shrugged. “Perhaps six.”

  Seeing the man wasn’t buying, Eli nervously checked his watch. An hour longer and they’d miss their flight.

  “Look, Mr. . . . Manickam,” the man said as his smile grew wider. “Nothing’s changed. It’s like I told you already, and I don’t expect to have to tell you again. If Mrs. Rowland calls back and says she is okay with his age, then I’ll let the boy board.”

  His voice deepened. “But if she’s not, I can tell you as sure as Indians love their curry, this boy won’t be leaving India.”

  Linda rocked gently back and forth as she sat beside Fred on the edge of the bed. She’d wept. She’d paced. She’d cussed. She’d screamed. She’d come full circle and wept again. It didn’t take long to rest and reload.

  “It’s not right! First, he was supposed to be a girl. Then, he was a three-year old boy. Now, we find out our ‘baby’ is eight! EIGHT! If we take him, there will be problems. He’ll be older than our boys. He doesn’t speak English. He’ll have bonding issues. He’ll never have the chance to be cradled in my arms as a baby. How can we take an older boy, Fred? How could these people do this? It’s not right! It’s just not.”