“It’s all right, Booty. Will you tell her I said thanks?”
He nodded. “You, um . . . you look real good, Emma.”
“A lot thinner, right?” I said, laughing. “Would you like to see the baby?”
“Sure.” He followed me like a timid schoolboy over to where Grace lay sleeping. I had fashioned a crib for her out of an empty dresser drawer. “She’s lovely,” he whispered. “I can’t begin to imagine why her father wouldn’t want her.”
I thought of Patrick’s tears and pleas, then realized that Booty was talking about Karl Bauer. If that was the lie I had to perpetuate, I’d better get used to repeating it from the very beginning. “My husband came from a very large, very poor family. That’s why he didn’t want any children.”
“Doesn’t seem fair, does it?” Booty murmured. “The ones that don’t want children have dozens of them . . . and the ones that would love a wee babe like this one can’t have any.” I looked at him in surprise.
“Are you talking about yourself, Booty? You and Sheila?”
“She miscarried four times, and two other babies died soon after birth. We don’t dare try for any more.” I felt my heart soften toward Sheila Higgins.
“I’m so sorry.”
“Aye. So am I.”
A few hours after Booty left, O’Brien and Black Jack showed up at my door. “Congratulations, Emma! Booty told us you’d had a baby girl.”
“Would you like to come in and see her?”
O’Brien looked around warily. “That punching priest isn’t lurking about, is he? He packs a wallop like a kangaroo!”
“I don’t want to hit him again,” Black Jack added. “I feel awful about the last time. I never laid a hand on a priest before, and I surely wouldn’t want to do it again . . . but he just came at me!”
“I know. It wasn’t your fault. Come on in.” I led them over to see Gracie.
“Wow! I never seen a person that small!” O’Brien said. “She have a sunburn or something?”
“All babies are red at first,” I said, laughing. “Do you want to hold her?”
O’Brien appeared horrified by the idea, but Black Jack’s sinister face softened into a smile. “Could I?” he asked.
The sight of that huge, powerful man holding little Gracie in hands the size of cinder blocks brought tears to my eyes. “What’s her name?” he asked.
“It’s Gracie . . . Grace Eva.” I couldn’t force myself to say Bauer any more than Patrick could.
“We’ve come to find out if you need anything,” O’Brien said. “We feel real bad about the still and all.”
“I knew the risks.”
O’Brien smoothed back his thatch of red hair. “We want to do something for you. We was wondering how things stood with the kid’s father.”
Again, I caught myself picturing Patrick. I forced myself to change the image to Karl. “My husband has filed for divorce. He didn’t want a baby in the first place—which is why I left him—so I don’t think he’ll cause any problems. But thanks for the offer.”
He grinned and draped his arm around my shoulder. “I’m available whenever your divorce is final.”
I laughed and gave him a quick hug before freeing myself. “I plan to live here very quietly with my daughter. Your life-style is a bit too exciting for me, I’m afraid.”
“We’re gonna give up rum-running for a while till the heat cools. We’re operating a blind pig downtown now.”
“A what?”
“A speakeasy . . . you know, a rum joint that operates behind a legit place.”
“It still sounds illegal to me.”
He laughed. “Yeah, well . . . you know what they say about leopards changing their spots. If you ever need work, Emma, look us up. We’d trust you with our lives, right, Black Jack?”
Black Jack hadn’t heard a word we had said. He held Gracie in his arms, his eyes fastened on her tiny face as if hypnotized. I rested my hand on his shoulder. “You’d make a marvelous father, Black Jack.”
“You think so?” he whispered.
“I know so.”
After they left, I found two brand-new twenty dollar bills stuffed inside Gracie’s diaper. I couldn’t help wondering if they were counterfeit.
THIRTY-THREE
* * *
I didn’t talk to Patrick again for four years. He kept his promise to the bishop not to contact Grace or me. He anonymously paid half our rent, but we rarely saw each other—and even then it was at a distance.
Grace was such a quiet, timid child that the Mulligan sisters allowed us to stay in the apartment. They even watched her for a few hours every day when I went to work part time at the diner again. I was working there one afternoon when Dora the cashier pulled me aside.
“Did you ever see a bigger waste than that?” she asked, nodding toward one of the tables. I looked and saw Patrick sitting alone in a booth by the window. “A man as handsome as Father O’Duggan wasted on the priesthood!” Dora shook her head. “But I suppose if he wasn’t a priest he’d be breaking women’s hearts, right?”
“Yes . . . I suppose so,” I stammered.
“Well, don’t just stand there, girl . . . take the man some coffee. He’s sitting in your booth.”
My hands shook as I retrieved the coffeepot. I would probably spill it all over him. Patrick looked up as I approached. “Coffee?” I asked.
“Thanks.”
Sure enough, I slopped it all over the saucer as I poured. I had to pull napkins from the chrome holder on his table to wipe it up. “Anything else? Do you want a menu?”
“I need to talk to you, Emma,” he said softly. “Do you have a minute?”
I glanced around. My other customers didn’t need anything, and the cashier was momentarily hidden behind a man who was paying his check. “I guess so. For a minute.”
Patrick exhaled. “I had to pay a call on old Mrs. Mulligan today. I saw Grace. The Mulligan sisters didn’t introduce her to me, in fact they quickly shooed her off to the kitchen, but I knew right away who she was.”
I glanced around again to see who was watching. “She has your eyes, Patrick. The color of the sky.”
“Aye . . . and my hair. I had to resist the urge to caress her curls and feel the wrinkled texture of them. Her hair is so much like my own that if I bent my head to hers, no one could ever tell where mine ended and hers began.”
“That’s why you have to promise me you won’t go near her,” I whispered urgently, “that you’ll stay away from her.”
“I came to ask you if I could see her once in a while, talk to her—”
“No! You have to stay out of her life!” I looked over my shoulder and saw the cashier watching us. When I turned back, Patrick was staring into his coffee cup. His broad shoulders sagged.
“I suppose this is the punishment for my sin, the penance I’ll be forced to pay every day of my life. To see my daughter, to ache with love for her, but to be unable to hold her in my arms.” He looked up at me and I saw the sorrow in his eyes. “Like Cain in the Old Testament, ‘My punishment is greater than I can bear’”
“I’m sorry. I have to go. Dora is watching us.”
“Emma, wait. Is she okay? Does she need anything? Is she . . . is she happy?”
I thought of Grace’s rippling laughter, the sound of her feet clattering up the stairs to bring me a bouquet of dandelions. I was luckier than Patrick; I had Gracie. I could snuggle beside her to read bedtime stories and feel the warmth of her arms around my neck as she kissed me good-night.
“I wish you could know her,” I said. “She’s a beautiful child—contented, curious, loving. She’s the joy of my life.”
“Are you okay?” he whispered.
“Yes. I’m okay too.”
A customer at the counter signalled for more coffee.
“I have to go. Please stay away from Grace.”
I carried the coffepot to the man and refilled his cup. When I glanced at the booth again, Patrick was gone, his cup o
f coffee untouched.
* * *
That winter I became ill with pneumonia. I had felt the illness trying to overpower me for several days, but I thought I could fight it off. Who would take care of Gracie if anything happened to me? I couldn’t get sick. I couldn’t. Then the fever gripped me with blazing fists and I nearly died.
When I first awoke and realized that I was in the hospital, I became hysterical. “Where’s Gracie? Where’s my baby? I have to go home to my baby!” I would have run out into the snow to find her, barefoot and in my nightgown, if one of the nursing sisters hadn’t hurried into the room to calm me.
“Shh . . . it’s all right Mrs. Bauer. I’m sure your daughter is being cared for.”
“Where is she? Please tell me where my Gracie is!” My chest ached with every breath I drew. I felt as though I were drowning.
“I don’t know where your little girl is, but she was with your priest the night he brought you in.”
“With my priest? Was it Father O’Duggan?”
“Yes. He’s been coming to the hospital every day to see how you’re doing. I’ll tell him to look in on you when he comes today. He’ll ease your mind about the child. Try to rest until then.”
But I couldn’t rest until I found out where my Gracie was. It felt as though hours had passed before I finally heard his voice in the corridor outside my ward. He walked through the door behind the nursing sister, and our eyes met. I warned myself to be careful what I said to him with a room full of other patients and the nun hovering beside us.
“Here he is, Mrs. Bauer,” the sister said cheerfully. “She’s been so worried about her little girl, Father O’Duggan. I told her you could ease her mind.”
“Gracie’s just fine,” he said. “She’s in very loving, capable hands. How . . . how are you feeling?” I knew by the stilted way he spoke and by the way his hands clutched the brim of his hat that Patrick was struggling with his emotions. I willed the nun to go away and give us some privacy before he broke down, but she stayed close to his side.
“Father O’Duggan, could I . . . I mean . . . I would like to make a confession.” I hoped it was the right thing to say. I saw by the relief on Patrick’s face that it was.
“Of course,” he said. “Would you excuse us please, Sister Mary Margaret?” The nun smiled sweetly and drew the curtain closed around my bed. Patrick’s tall body slumped with emotion as soon as we were alone. “Thank God! . . . Emma, I was so afraid you were going to die!” He groped for my hand.
“Don’t, Patrick. Please don’t.”
He closed his eyes for a moment, then backed up a step. “I’m sorry.”
“Where’s Gracie? Is she all right?”
“Yes . . . she’s fine. I took her to my mother’s house.”
“What?” I stared at him, horrified at the thought of our secret being exposed. “Why did you take her there? Does your mother know?”
“Hush, Emma. She knows, but no one else does. I only asked her to keep Grace the one night because there was no other place for her to go except the orphans’ home. But from the very first moment they met, Gracie stole Mam’s heart. Mam won’t even consider letting me take her someplace else. And Gracie is happy there. I wish you could see them together, baking cookies—”
“Stop!” I covered my face, weeping. “Please stop . . .” I couldn’t bear the image of Gracie nestled in her grandmother’s arms. I knew she would never see Mam again once I got well.
“Is there some other place you’d rather I take her?” he asked quietly. “Do you want me to contact your parents in Bremenville?”
“No! You can never take her there! If Karl sees her he might make trouble!” I was so upset I began to cough uncontrollably.
“I’ll get help . . . a nurse . . .” Patrick cried in alarm. I shook my head. At last I got my coughing under control again. I lay back against the pillow, exhausted and wheezing.
“Emma, the doctors say you’re going to be here for a few more weeks. You’re still very ill with pneumonia. Even if you went home, you couldn’t take care of Grace.”
“Why did you make her part of your life? She knows you now, and after I’m well . . .”
“I want to continue to be part of her life. I told the bishop that I will either take proper care of my daughter from now on, or I’ll quit. I can’t have my child starving, her mother freezing. I can’t believe that would be God’s will. My priestly vows don’t change the fact that I have responsibilities as her father.”
“But I don’t want anyone to know.”
“They won’t know. I’ve asked for an increase in my coal allowance at the rectory. It will make its way into your coal bin, anonymously. And I’ve arranged for a line of credit for you at Booty’s store. No one but the three of us will know who’s paying your bills. But you have to tell me what you need from now on . . . what Gracie needs. You have to let me help you.”
“You swore you’d never tell Gracie the truth. You swore on your Bible.”
“And I’ll keep my promise. But I want to be part of her life. I want to talk to her, be her friend. I’ve held her in my arms, Emma. You can’t ask me to go back to the way things were before. You can’t ask me to pretend to be a stranger again. It isn’t fair to Grace . . . or to me.”
“No, Patrick! You can’t! I appreciate all your help, but things have to go back to the way they were! There’s no other way to disguise the truth!”
“Emma, listen. . . .”
“No. Please leave now.”
He drew a deep breath and lifted his chin, composing himself. Then he shoved the curtains aside and strode from the room.
When the doctors finally discharged me a month later, Patrick borrowed Booty’s car to drive me home from the hospital. He brought Gracie with him. I was so happy to see her again, I didn’t want to let her out of my sight or out of my arms.
“What on earth are all those bags for?” I asked when I saw the backseat full of parcels.
“Those are all my new clothes, Mama. Wait until you see. I have warm stockings and a nightgown, and Mam knit me a new pair of mittens—and she even made me a dolly.”
“I can’t wait to see everything, sweetie.” I glanced at Patrick and saw him staring very intently down the road. We might have been an ordinary family, returning from a trip to Grandma’s house—but we weren’t. Gracie chattered away happily. I had never heard her so talkative before.
“Mam sent home some food to eat too. I helped bake the soda bread. It’s my job to put the raisins in. She says no one else can do it as good as me. Can we have some for a treat when we get home, Mama? Can Father O’Duggan stay and have some too?”
“He’s probably too busy,” I said quickly. But Gracie turned to look up at him, her eyes full of longing.
“Are you too busy?” she asked. I sensed Patrick’s struggle. He didn’t want to hurt Gracie by refusing, but he knew I didn’t want him to stay.
“Your mother will need to rest when she gets home,” he finally said.
“Oh.” Gracie managed to convey the full measure of her disappointment in a single word. I looked at their faces, so hauntingly alike, and knew that Patrick was right. I was being unfair to both of them by keeping them apart. I lifted Gracie’s chin and smoothed the hair from her forehead.
“I’m not too tired for a tea party, sweetie. And Father O’Duggan is welcome to stay.” She and Patrick smiled simultaneously, like images in a mirror, and my heart nearly shattered.
Before I could recover, Gracie started chattering again. “Mam said you might be in farm for a while. What does that mean, Mama? Are you in farm?”
I looked to Patrick for help. “I think she means ‘infirm,’” he said, grinning.
“Gracie, infirm means that even though your mother can leave the hospital, she might not be completely well and strong for a while.”
“I’ll take care of you, Mama. I promise I will.”
When we arrived at the apartment, I discovered that someone had been there bef
ore us, tidying up, filling the shelf with canned goods, building a fire in the stove. The coal scuttle was full.
“Oh, it’s so good to be home!” I said, sighing. Patrick had to make two trips up the stairs with Grade’s things and all the food his mother had sent. As he paused for breath after the second trip I said, “Would you stay and have tea with us?”
“Only if you’ll sit down and let Gracie and me fix it.”
I watched them work side by side, heating the water, arranging three mismatched cups on the tray, slicing the soda bread. Patrick’s hand swallowed Grace’s completely as he helped her guide the knife. He looked so solid and protective beside her, yet he was so gentle and patient with her. I thought of my own papa.
We ate our little meal companionably, as if we belonged together. I’d rarely seen Gracie so happy. But my heart was breaking, and I knew that Patrick’s was too. All too soon it would have to end.
“Gracie, why don’t you take this last piece of soda bread next door and see if Clancy would like it,” I said when we’d eaten our fill. “Let him know that we’re home again, okay?” After she had skipped off on her errand, I turned to Patrick. He was jiggling the grate in the stove to remove the ashes before adding more coal. “You were right,” I said softly. “It would be much too cruel to expect you to walk out of Grace’s life again. I can’t do that to either one of you.” He stopped with a shovelful halfway to the door. His eyes shone with hope.
“You mean . . .?”
“Yes. You’re already part of her life now. You have to continue . . . but promise me you’ll only be Father O’Duggan, the priest, to her . . . not her father. You can’t play favorites with her, Patrick. No one can ever know she’s your daughter.”
“I’ll figure out a way to include her with all the girls in my parish. I’ll make it work, Emma, I swear.”
“I know you will.”
He closed the stove, then peered out the front door to see if Gracie was coming back. When he saw no sign of her, he walked over to where I was sitting and pressed something into my hand.