Chapter Twenty-Two

chapter twenty-two

March 3, 1930

Lanesborough, New Hampshire

Something is wrong with the baby. We noticed it right away. Margaret spent more time sleeping than she should. And she was not nursing with much enthusiasm. I would put her to my breast and coax her, but she would close her eyes and fall asleep, as if just the act of being awake was too much for her. She seemed to grow smaller and paler. I could see the blue veins through her white skin, watch them pulse.

“Something’s wrong,” I said, stroking the cool cheeks of my beautiful baby girl. She opened her eyes and looked up at me with that serious expression, my little sparrow. I so wished she could tell me what was wrong, what I needed to do to help her. I’ve never felt so helpless and inadequate; so thoroughly unprepared.

“She’ll come around,” Will promised at first. “Keep trying to feed her. It’s common for babies to lose weight in the first few days.” But I knew this was different.

Even her crying seemed weaker and quieter than it should.

At times, her chest made a funny wheezing sound. I called Will in to listen.

“What’s wrong with her?” I asked.

Will did not answer. He examined her, his face tightening with worry, his brow wrinkling.

Will brought us to the Valley hospital. We carried Maggie down the waxed floors and up the elevators to the pediatrics area. The hospital smelled of antiseptic and sickness. I could hear a child crying far off, saying, “Mama, Mama, Mama,” over and over.

One of Will’s older colleagues, Dr. Hansen, greeted us and brought us back into an examination room. Dr. Hansen spent a good deal of time listening to Margaret’s chest with his stethoscope. He tried to give me a reassuring smile, but I could tell something was wrong.

I could hear Dr. Hansen and Will out in the hall, speaking in hushed tones, but could not make out what they were saying. I held Maggie close to my chest, stroking her hair, cooing to her. She looked up at me with her mermaid eyes, gray and stormy. Flecks of black in them caught the light and reminded me of the springs—of their vast depth, the possibility the water held.

“You are my wish come true,” I told her. She blinked and sighed.

When Will came into the room as last, his face was cloudy with worry. “It’s her heart,” he said. “We’ve got to take her to Boston right away. Dr. Hansen is making calls to specialists there. They’ll be expecting us.”

He tried to take Maggie from me, but I held tight to her. I put my own ear against her chest, listened to her heart beating, small and far away.

I made myself ask the question: “Will she live?”

“She’s a fighter. And she’s got the best mother in the world.” He gave a weak smile, but his eyes told me the truth. It was as though he’d reached into my chest and squeezed my own heart until it nearly stopped.

I felt as if water had rushed in, surrounding us, filling my mouth and lungs. I could not move or speak. Will helped me up from the chair. Again, he tried to take Maggie, but I would not let go. We hurried home and packed a suitcase for an overnight trip—an extra suit and pajamas for Will, my black wool dress, stockings, and a nightgown. And plenty of diapers and changes of clothes for little Margaret. I layered her up in her warmest things for the car ride, then wrapped her in the quilt my sister had made for her.

The drive to Boston went on forever. I sat beside Will in the car, the swaddled baby on my lap. She slept most of the way, and I kept checking to make sure she was still breathing. There was a blueish cast to her lips and fingertips.

We navigated the maze of city streets, Will white-knuckling the wheel, shaking his head at the traffic, the busyness of the city. The Children’s Hospital is quite impressive: a massive stone building next door to the Harvard Medical School on Longwood Avenue. There are four columns at the front and a large copper dome that houses the atrium.

We were immediately greeted by a team of doctors. Margaret was examined by cardiac and pulmonary specialists. The best there are, Will said.

After their examination, they brought us back into a wood-paneled office. A nurse brought us coffee and sandwiches, which neither of us touched.

“Perhaps you’d like to wait outside, Mrs. Monroe?” the tall doctor, the cardiologist, suggested. A nurse with a well-meaning face came and touched my elbow, ready to escort me.

“No,” I said. “I want to hear. I want the truth. Tell me what’s wrong with my baby girl.”

The doctors cast glances at Will. He looked at me, then back at them, and nodded.

The news was bleak. They confirmed that due to her premature birth, her heart and lungs would not grow and develop in a normal way. There was more to it than that, medical jargon about valves and oxygen. The doctors spoke slowly. Will asked questions. They all seemed to be speaking another language. Again, I felt the waters rising, roaring in my ears. I shivered from the cold, felt myself sinking down, down, deep underwater, holding little Maggie in my arms.

Together, we sank.

I am Mrs. Monroe and I am drowning.

There is nothing to be done, the doctors said. No operation or medication that may save her.

She is not expected to live to see her first birthday.

“There must be something we can do,” I said, the words little bubbles of air floating up to the surface and bursting.

“Bring her home and love her,” the doctors said. “Treasure each moment.”

Little Margaret struggled for breath in my arms.

And I clung to her, silently promised to never let her go.

April 3, 1930

Will tells me we must prepare ourselves for what is coming; for the inevitability of losing our child. How does one possibly prepare for such a thing? His words sound practiced and strange. He has become a wooden man, an actor reciting lines he doesn’t quite believe. He walks around in wrinkled shirts, hair uncombed, dark circles under his eyes.

“Why?” I demanded. “Why should we have to prepare for such a thing? It isn’t fair or right.”

“It’s God’s will,” he said.

“Then he is not a God I wish to believe in,” I said.

Will opened his mouth to say something more, to argue, to reason, but no words came. He turned and shuffled off like a sleepwalker.

Will sent Reverend Bickford in to see me, thinking surely the dear reverend could offer words of comfort, could quote scripture, give me something to cling to. But I closed my eyes, held the baby to my chest, and asked him, as politely as I could manage, to please leave us alone.

I heard them speaking in the kitchen after. The reverend said, “Even in the most difficult times, we must keep our faith.”

And I laughed then. A snarling, spiteful laugh.

I went into the bathroom and pulled down my thick wool tights. My legs had become a garden of scratches and pokes. I was like a grim version of the tattooed lady at the fair. Here was my daughter’s name, etched into my skin, surrounded by designs of dots, little constellations forming pictures: a sparrow’s egg, a rose, the Brandenburg Springs Hotel, the springs. I pulled out my pin and went over her name again and again, the blood blooming on the surface of my skin.

Margaret

Margaret

Margaret

---

Yesterday afternoon, I was lying in bed with Margaret on my chest, she and I both drifting in and out of sleep. This is how we spend our time—bound together, drifting. I bury my nose in her hair, stroke her back, run my fingers over her shoulder blades, sure I can feel the beginnings of wings there.

I keep her by my side both day and night, my little sparrow child.

If she is to die, it will be in my arms.

Our bed became a boat and we were floating, tossed on a turbulent sea. There was a knock at the door, and Myrtle calling, “Ethel?”

She’s still thinner than she should be, but she’s doing much better now. There is color in her cheeks, and she has been so good to me and Will. In truth, I think the tragedy of our situation has given her new purpose. Helping us seems to allow her to forget the loss of her beloved husband. She cooks us dinner. Cleans the house. Comes over every day to check on us. She holds little Margaret so I can eat and bathe without leaving her alone.

“I’ve been to Brandenburg,” she said, voice barely above a whisper.

I sat up, holding the baby tight against my chest.

“I didn’t make it to the springs, couldn’t find my way, but I went to the General Store and asked the shopkeeper if I could pay someone to go get me some water. It just so happened he had one jar of spring water left.” She showed it to me. “So I bought it. I bought the last jar.” She unscrewed the lid, dabbed a little of the water on her fingers, and touched Margaret’s china-white cheek. “Turn her so I can put some on her lips. A little on her tongue.”

“But Will, he’ll think me mad—”

“Will doesn’t need to know,” Myrtle said, voice firm and sure. “It was the water that brought her to you. Perhaps the water can keep her here. What harm can it do to try, Ethel?”

I lifted the baby from my chest, turned her face out. Her eyes were open. She was looking at Myrtle, eyes wide and expectant.

“There’s a good girl,” Myrtle said, dipping her fingers in the water once again, bringing them to the baby’s lips. “Such a precious girl.” Again and again, she dipped in her fingers, parted Margaret’s lips, placed drops of water in her mouth. The baby made a contented little cooing sound, like a dove. “It would be easier with a dropper,” Myrtle said.

“There’s one in the medicine cabinet,” I told her.

---

Myrtle left the jar and dropper for me. I hid them in the drawer of my nightstand. I gave Margaret another dose before Will got home. Then a third later in the evening, when Will was smoking his pipe in the living room.

When I was changing Margaret before bed, I called for Will. He hurried into the bedroom, sure our daughter had stopped breathing, that this was it, we’d reached the end. He saw her wiggling on the table, the soft rise and fall of her chest. Her hands and feet were a healthy shade of pink. In fact, she was pink all over. Her breathing seemed easier. She made a delighted little squeaking sound when he touched her cheek. She nursed for a long time before falling asleep, then slept through the night for the first time.

“I don’t understand,” Will said, shaking his head, examining and re-examining her, listening to her chest with his stethoscope.

“Perhaps it’s not for us to understand,” I said. “Perhaps it’s a miracle.”

“A miracle,” Will repeated slowly, as if trying the word out, seeing how it felt.

I nodded, smiling. I am Mrs. Monroe. I now believe in miracles.