The Family Way (Molly Murphy, #12)

We walked back to our dormitory in silence, took our day clothes from the pegs on the wall and began to dress, all too stunned to talk. A head reared up from the end bed. “Is it time for breakfast yet? I’m starving.” Elaine asked drowsily.

“Yes, who is on breakfast duty?” someone else joined in. “Come on, hurry up. We want something to eat before mass.”

“What was all the fuss about?” Elaine asked. “Where did everyone go running off to?”

“Sister Jerome. She fell down the steps to the crypt. And it turned out she killed Maureen and Katy.”

“That’s what you thought all along, wasn’t it, Molly?” Elaine asked. “That’s why you came here.”

I looked at her with surprise. “All those questions,” she said. “Frankly I’d wondered myself, but I thought it wiser to stay silent. Has someone called the police in?”

“Sister Jerome is dying,” someone said quietly. “I think Mother’s going to let her die in peace.”

It seemed that everyone today was putting on her day dress without bothering to wash first. I did the same. As some of them went down to the kitchen I looked at the rumpled empty bed beside mine and suddenly remembered about Aggie and her awful screams. There had been no sounds coming from the maternity wing when I went past earlier. And Sister had left her to follow me to the chapel. Did that mean that she was alive or dead? I prayed that just one of last night’s dramas had a happy ending. I decided to go and find out for myself.

I walked down the hall and as the others descended the stairs to breakfast, I went in the opposite direction, through that forbidden door. As I pushed open the door I heard the sound of a baby crying. The first room I came to had eight beds in it, but only three were occupied. At the foot of each bed was a crib. Three faces looked up at me expectantly as I came in.

“You’re new,” one of the girls said. “Have you brought breakfast? It’s late and we’re hungry.” She was nursing a baby and didn’t bother to cover herself as I came in. “And where’s Sister this morning?”

“Sister has had an accident,” I said. “I’ll see about breakfast. I wanted to know what happened to Aggie.”

“Aggie? The one who kept us awake all night with that awful row?”

“Yes.”

“I expect she’s still in delivery, sleeping.”

“Where’s that?”

“Two doors down the hall. But get a move on with breakfast, won’t you?”

I went on down the hall and pushed open the door cautiously, not sure if I wanted to see what was awaiting me. A still, white form lay in the bed. She looked so pathetically young and frail that a lump came to my throat. She had claimed she was dying and it was true. I looked across at the cot where a tiny baby lay, apparently asleep. As I tiptoed over to it a voice said sharply, “Hey, what do you think you’re doing? Get your hands off my baby.”

And Aggie sat up, glaring at me.

“I came to see how you were,” I said. “I was worried.”

“Oh,” she said. “It wasn’t too bad in the end. Went quite quickly really. And I’ve got a baby boy. Fancy that. A baby boy—me!” And a big smile spread over her thin, pinched face. At the sound of her voice the baby stirred. Dark eyes fluttered open and I could have sworn he stared straight at me. And I knew that I had to go home, back to loved ones and normality.





Thirty

Later that morning I rode beside the doctor, back down the hill to the town. Sister Jerome still lingered on and as far as I knew had not died by the time I left. I did not go to see for myself. They had taken her on a stretcher to the nuns’ guest room where Blanche had killed herself the night before, so that she didn’t have to endure the bumping of going upstairs. The doctor had said that little more could be done for her and it was only a matter of time. Her fellow nuns were praying beside her whether she wanted it or not. I thought it ironic that she would die in the same room where Blanche had taken her life, thanks to Sister Jerome’s callous behavior. Or had she? I wondered if Sister might have had a part in that death too. Now we’d never know.

After mass I had been summoned for a long interview with Mother. She listened to the whole story, her boot-button eyes surprisingly alive and alert in that old face. When I had finished she said, “Our order came here almost a hundred years ago. Our mission was to pray for the sinfulness of the world from which we had shut ourselves away. Then a few years ago a young girl came to our doorstep, with child and desperate. Her family had cast her out and she had nowhere to go. We took her in and decided that we would never turn away a girl in similar circumstances. Clearly God had sent her to us. Word got out and more girls came. Suddenly we found ourselves not only praying the offices, but caring for mothers and babies. We were no longer cut off from the world, however hard we tried. It was a mistake. We should never have strayed from our original purpose.”