Read Online This Magnificent Desolation by Cara Shores, Thomas O'Malley - Free Book Online
Authors: Cara Shores, Thomas O'Malley
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here, he says. I wouldnât tell you otherwise. And God has always taken them into his care. I remember how hard the year of that terrible blizzard wasâmany people died, not just children. And of course many children died aboard the Holiday Train. We werenât even able to break ground to bury the dead. They all remained in the charnel house until spring. And it was late coming that year. I remember the pickaxes they had to use on the ground, and there simply wasnât enough room. We buried them all together: mothers, fathers, daughters, and sons. The other children were all orphans. We buried them in the childrenâs graveyard.
The monasteryâs record books say that an influenza epidemic took a dozen children in 1902, but still, the blizzard and the Holiday Train, well, itâs hard to imagine worse than that. Iâd never experienced anything like it. He shakes his head slowly, still unbelieving, and Duncan wonders what he sees upon the plains beyond the monasteryâs walls. Perhaps mechanized snowcats laden with the Holiday Trainâs dead rumbling over the snow-covered hills, or the shrouded figures of gravediggers hunched against the wind over their spades and pickaxes, or, at the end of spring, the pallbearers from the chapel carrying the small coffins containing the children from the charnel house to the grave.
I held so many of them during baptism, he says. And so many families begging me to baptize their children, their infants who had died before they could receive the Sacrament of Baptism. All of them so small they weighed next to nothing. The curtains sweep back and Father Toibin is holding up his hands, empty hands cradling the air. Next to nothing, he says again, and then: We baptize dead children with our tears and it is with our tears that they enter heaven.
He comes forward and touches Duncan, not without kindness,on his arm. Enough of this morbidity, he says. That was a long time ago. He shakes his head. Children have died here, Duncan. Children will always die here. We hold them in Godâs care and yet they die. This is why we have the childrenâs graveyard. This is why we offer up prayers at Mass. This is why we have faith in God and believe that they are all with him now.
I almost died too, didnât I? Dr. Matthias thinks thatâs why I canât remember things. Or at least itâs a part of why.
You were very sick and we are blessed that you survived, that you are here now.
Duncan thinks of his mother in her coffin wrapped in white roots and her face turning toward him, the pupils of her eyes so large and blue he can see his own longing reflected in them.
Do you think my mother, he says, after she left me here, what do you think happened to her?
Father Toibin purses his lip and considers the question, as if he is weighing what to say, and at first Duncan thinks he will say nothing at all. The children of the Home know that this is the question you do not askâit is sacrosanct and unwritten but the priests and Brothers will not talk about the childrenâs parents.
Every so often, Father Toibin begins slowly, I used to get a letter from her. They stopped years ago, of course. He waves absently at the air, as if, Duncan thinks, all letters from parents eventually stop when they move on to their new lives and new families or when they simply die.
But she sent money when she could for your support. Even though she could not be a mother to you, Duncan, you were very much in her thoughts. I think, in leaving you here, she felt she was doing what was best.
Duncan looks at him. Instead of feeling pleasure and happiness at the unexpected news, he finds that he is suddenly numb; nausea rolls in his stomach and he fights to settle it.
Finally he says: Can I see her letters?
Father Toibin places his hand on the side of Duncanâs head. Let me think about that, okay? I want you to understand that your mother made a choice a long time ago. We
The monasteryâs record books say that an influenza epidemic took a dozen children in 1902, but still, the blizzard and the Holiday Train, well, itâs hard to imagine worse than that. Iâd never experienced anything like it. He shakes his head slowly, still unbelieving, and Duncan wonders what he sees upon the plains beyond the monasteryâs walls. Perhaps mechanized snowcats laden with the Holiday Trainâs dead rumbling over the snow-covered hills, or the shrouded figures of gravediggers hunched against the wind over their spades and pickaxes, or, at the end of spring, the pallbearers from the chapel carrying the small coffins containing the children from the charnel house to the grave.
I held so many of them during baptism, he says. And so many families begging me to baptize their children, their infants who had died before they could receive the Sacrament of Baptism. All of them so small they weighed next to nothing. The curtains sweep back and Father Toibin is holding up his hands, empty hands cradling the air. Next to nothing, he says again, and then: We baptize dead children with our tears and it is with our tears that they enter heaven.
He comes forward and touches Duncan, not without kindness,on his arm. Enough of this morbidity, he says. That was a long time ago. He shakes his head. Children have died here, Duncan. Children will always die here. We hold them in Godâs care and yet they die. This is why we have the childrenâs graveyard. This is why we offer up prayers at Mass. This is why we have faith in God and believe that they are all with him now.
I almost died too, didnât I? Dr. Matthias thinks thatâs why I canât remember things. Or at least itâs a part of why.
You were very sick and we are blessed that you survived, that you are here now.
Duncan thinks of his mother in her coffin wrapped in white roots and her face turning toward him, the pupils of her eyes so large and blue he can see his own longing reflected in them.
Do you think my mother, he says, after she left me here, what do you think happened to her?
Father Toibin purses his lip and considers the question, as if he is weighing what to say, and at first Duncan thinks he will say nothing at all. The children of the Home know that this is the question you do not askâit is sacrosanct and unwritten but the priests and Brothers will not talk about the childrenâs parents.
Every so often, Father Toibin begins slowly, I used to get a letter from her. They stopped years ago, of course. He waves absently at the air, as if, Duncan thinks, all letters from parents eventually stop when they move on to their new lives and new families or when they simply die.
But she sent money when she could for your support. Even though she could not be a mother to you, Duncan, you were very much in her thoughts. I think, in leaving you here, she felt she was doing what was best.
Duncan looks at him. Instead of feeling pleasure and happiness at the unexpected news, he finds that he is suddenly numb; nausea rolls in his stomach and he fights to settle it.
Finally he says: Can I see her letters?
Father Toibin places his hand on the side of Duncanâs head. Let me think about that, okay? I want you to understand that your mother made a choice a long time ago. We
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