The Midwife's Confession (34 page)

Please be open,
I thought as I got out of the car and started walking on the wet sidewalk toward the main street. I walked fast, my backpack over my shoulder, the folder inside it ready to tell the story.

The rectangular sign next to the door read Missing Children’s Bureau, and I could see a light on inside. The door was unlocked and I pushed it open and walked into a small room filled with old-fashioned chairs and a love seat and a bay window overflowing with plants. There was a desk right in the middle of the room, but there was no sign of another human being and I wasn’t sure what to do.

I heard a clinking noise coming from somewhere in the next room and a woman suddenly appeared in the doorway. She had really short gray hair, narrow little black-framed glasses and she was holding a stick of celery in her hand. Her eyebrows shot halfway up her forehead when she saw me.

“You startled me!” she said, then smiled. “May I help you?”

“I’m here to see Anna Knightly,” I said.

“Oh, Ms. Knightly’s with her daughter at Children’s,” she said, sitting down behind the desk.

I felt suddenly dizzy at hearing someone else talk about Anna Knightly like she really, truly existed. It had all started to feel like a fantasy to me. I had to balance myself with my hand on the edge of the desk.

“Are you all right, honey?” the woman asked me, and then her words sunk in. Her daughter. My
sister.
And wasn’t I
at
the Missing Children’s Bureau?

“Children’s?” I asked. “Do you mean…isn’t this the Missing Children’s Bureau?”

“Yes.” She looked confused. “Oh. No, no. She’s at Children’s
Hospital.
Did you—” she looked at me strangely, then checked her computer screen “—you didn’t have an appointment with her, did you? I thought I reached everyone.”

“No, but I need to see her.” A hospital? My sister was sick? “I know something about a missing child,” I said. “I need to talk to her about it.” I didn’t want to tell the woman who I was. What if she thought I was lying? What if she called the police?

“Oh, well, you can give me the information. Ms. Knightly doesn’t generally deal directly with—”

“No, that’s okay. I really need to talk to her. When will she be back?”

“She’s taking some time off to be with her daughter. Would you like some coffee? A soda?”

The woman was worried about me now. I imagined how I looked after a sleepless night, my hair half-combed, my teeth unbrushed. I’d totally forgotten about the toothbrush in my backpack.

“No, thank you. I came a long way to see her, though.” I felt my voice break. “How can I talk to her? Please. I really need to.”

She looked at me like she was trying to decide what to do. “Give me your cell phone number and I can—”

“I don’t have one.” My voice cracked again and I knotted my hands together in front of me. “I forgot it when I left the house. Just tell me where the hospital is.” I could tell right away that was a mistake.

The woman shook her head. “Now, look,” she said. “Ms. Knightly is dealing with a serious private matter and you can’t disturb her, all right?”

I’m a serious private matter,
I thought. “Oh, I know,” I said. “I wouldn’t.”

The woman handed me a small notepad. “Write down your name and a way she can reach you.”

“There
is
no way. I forgot my phone.”

She sighed. “Tell me what this is regarding, honey, so I can help you.”

“It’s private,” I said.

She gave me one of those smiles that said she was getting annoyed. “Well, look.” She leaned back in her chair. “I’ll be here until five. I’m sure I’ll speak with her sometime today. I’ll ask her how you can get in touch with her, then you can stop back late this afternoon and I’ll tell you what she says. But if you could give me some more information, it would be very helpful.”

I thought about those prepaid phones you could buy. I’d never used one, but maybe I could get one of them and give the number to this woman and she could give it to Anna Knightly.

“Can I get your number?” I asked.

“Of course.” She handed me a card from a little tray on her desk and I put it in my pocket.

“Thanks,” I said, and turned to go.

“You’ll come back later?” she asked, but I was already out the door, trying to figure out my next move.

I passed a bank on my way back to my car and used the ATM to get some money. I had forty dollars with me, but I’d need more for gas and maybe a prepaid phone if I could find one. My mind was moving in a different direction, though. When I got to my car, I turned on the GPS and did a search for hospitals. There were a bunch of them, but the only one that had to do with children was called Children’s National Medical Center. Was that it? I liked the words
medical center
a lot better than I liked the word
hospital.

It was in Washington. I plugged the address into the GPS. It was thirty-two minutes away. Yesterday, thirty-two minutes of driving would have sounded impossible to me. Now it sounded almost as easy as taking my next breath. But…the woman
had
used the word
hospital.
I couldn’t deny that, and I saw my father’s torn-apart face. I quickly waved my hand in front of my eyes as if I could erase the vision that way. I’d go. I’d go into the lobby and ask someone to take a note to Anna Knightly. I’d just driven three hundred and eighty-two miles by myself on no sleep. I could handle a hospital lobby. I had to.

46

Emerson

Wilmington, North Carolina

The café was swamped. Even though it was a holiday, half the people in Wilmington seemed to have stopped by
Hot!
this morning. We’d run out of the raspberry-cream-cheese croissants I was becoming known for and Sandra and my waitress were having trouble keeping up. So I ignored my cell when it rang, not even taking the time to glance at the caller ID. Jenny was off from school, most likely lolling around the house, and I’d check my messages as soon as I had a break. But then the café phone rang and that I couldn’t ignore. Offices often placed their lunch orders in the morning to be picked up later, but I didn’t expect many of those calls on Columbus Day.

I grabbed the phone near the cash register. “Hot!” I said.

“Mom!” Jenny shouted in my ear, her voice raspy and frightened. “I have to tell you something.”

“What?” I carried the phone into the kitchen, alarmed.

“Please don’t kill me!” She sounded as though she’d set the house on fire. “I think Grace is on her way to find that Anna Knightly lady.”

I frowned, disbelieving. How could Grace—how could
Jenny
—possibly know about Anna Knightly? “What do you mean?”

“Tara called to say that Grace is gone. She took the car and Tara thinks she went to Chapel Hill, but I’m afraid—”

“Grace doesn’t even drive.” I felt so confused. I wanted to poke holes in whatever story Jenny was trying to tell me.

Sandra whisked by me with a tray of sandwiches and I stepped closer to the back door and out of the way.

“I called Cleve and he said he talked to Grace last night and she said she wanted to go to Virginia to find her mother.”

“Wait!” I had to stop her. “How could she—or you, for that matter—possibly know about her…about Anna Knightly?”

Jenny didn’t answer right away. “I heard you.” She sounded tearful. “I wasn’t trying to snoop, but I was coming downstairs when you and Ian were talking yesterday. And then I found that letter Noelle wrote. I went over to Grace’s and told her everything.”

I remembered the creaking sound from the stairs.
Oh, God
. I tried to imagine how devastated Grace had to have been. I pictured her reading Noelle’s letter to Anna Knightly. “You should have come to
me
with this, not Grace!”

“I’m sorry,” Jenny said. “But Grace had a right to know.”

“She may have a right to know, but, Jenny! We hadn’t even told Tara yet.”

“I didn’t think she’d, like, take off or anything,” she said. “Cleve said he thought he’d talked her out of going, but she was gone this morning and she’s not in Chapel Hill, at least not when I talked to him. So I think she’s on her way to find that woman!” Her voice rose to a fever pitch again.

“I need to get off the phone,” I said. “I’m going to Tara’s to tell her what’s going on.”

“Grace is such a terrible driver,” Jenny said. “If I thought she’d do something like this I never would have—”

“I know. I’ve got to get off.”

I hung up the phone and grabbed Sandra to tell her I was sorry, but she was going to have to take over for the next couple of hours. She gave me a frantic look, but she could tell from my face that there was no point arguing with me. In my car, I tried to call Ian before starting the ignition but his voice mail picked up and I imagined he was deep in his golf game by now. I was going to be on my own with this.

Yet when I pulled up in front of Tara’s house, I saw Jenny’s car parked on the street, Jenny waiting for me on the sidewalk in the misty rain. She was hugging herself, shivering, her arms tight across her chest, and I knew I was not going to be on my own with this, after all.

47

Tara

I heard the car door slam and ran to the front window, hoping against hope I’d see Grace walking up the sidewalk. But it was Emerson and Jenny, and as I watched them nearly run up to my front door, all I could think about was that they had horrible news to give me. The scenario was completely different, yet I had that same sickening feeling as I had the day the cop showed up at my classroom door to tell me Sam was dead. I knew the second I saw that young guy in uniform that something terrible had happened. I had the same feeling now.

I pulled open the front door.
“What?”
I called as they neared the porch. I felt the blood leave my face and the two of them swirled in my vision.

“We think we know where Grace is,” Emerson said as she stepped onto the porch.

“With Cleve?” I asked.

Emerson turned me to face the house. “We think she’s okay, Tara. Let’s sit down someplace, all right? We have a lot to explain to you.”

“What are you talking about?” I allowed her to lead me toward the family room. “Jenny, have you spoken to her? What do you mean, you
think
she’s okay? Where is she?”

“We’re
sure
she’s okay,” Emerson said more emphatically. She had her hand on my back and was guiding me toward the sofa. I sank into it. She and Jenny sat shoulder to shoulder on the love seat.

“Is she with Cleve?” I looked at Jenny, who shook her head, then lowered her eyes to her lap as though she couldn’t bear to look at me, which did nothing to ease my mind.

“Listen to me, Tara,” Emerson said. “The other day, I figured out the identity of the baby Noelle stole from the hospital. I think it was Grace.”

I stared at her, not comprehending. “That’s impossible. Grace was never in the hospital, you know that.” I glanced at Jenny. She was still avoiding my eyes, but apparently she knew about Noelle and the baby.

Emerson leaned forward. “Honey, listen,” she said. “I found more information on when Anna Knightly’s baby disappeared. It was around the time Grace was born. Right around the end of August 1994.”

“No,” I said, confused. “You mean 1998, when she stopped being a midwife.”

“It was 1994, and Grace was the only baby Noelle delivered around that time.”

“But Grace was born September first.” I knew I was stubbornly missing the gist of this conversation.

“I know it’s confusing,” Emerson said. “I know it’s unbelievable. But I think Noelle delivered your baby, not Grace, and it was your baby she accidentally dropped. And then she went to the hospital and took Anna Knightly’s baby and brought it back to your house and passed it…her…off as your baby. And that was Grace.”

“That’s insane,” I said.

“There were no other babies Noelle delivered during that time,” Emerson said. “No torn-out pages from the book or anything. I really think it was Grace, Tara. I’m so sorry.”

I ran my hand through my hair, thinking, thinking. I remembered the night Grace was born. The realization that something was wrong. The moments when Noelle was debating whether to call an ambulance before she managed to turn Grace inside me. I remembered that long dark night and the deathlike sleep that had gripped me afterward.

“I held her, though,” I said, frowning. “I nursed her right away.” She’d felt so warm, almost hot, against my skin. I’d loved that warmth. I could still remember it. Then the dreamless sleep. But Sam…had he been asleep, too? Could we have slept long enough for my child to slip through Noelle’s hands? Had we slept long enough for her to rush to the hospital and steal her replacement? As unbelievable as I’d found the whole idea before, now it seemed a hundred times more so.

“You’re saying…the baby I gave birth to died?”

Emerson stood from the love seat and sat down next to me, her arm around me. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “I—”

“How does Jenny know all of this?” I asked. Jenny still wouldn’t look at me. She reminded me of Grace today, she was so quiet.

Emerson hesitated. “I talked to Ian about this yesterday, when I…connected the dots, and Jenny overheard.”

“You told Ian? Before you told
me?
” I pulled away from her, suddenly angry. “I’m the last to know about my own child? How long have
you
known?”

“I figured it out the night before Suzanne’s party,” Emerson confessed.

“And you didn’t tell me?” I felt like slapping her, I was so furious. I stood. “How could you tell Ian and not me?” I asked. “How dare you do that?”

“I didn’t know how…” Emerson shook her head. “I was afraid of hurting you.”

I couldn’t absorb it all. Just couldn’t. “Where is
Grace?
” I asked. There was no room in my mind at that moment for the baby I’d lost. A child who didn’t quite exist for me yet. There was only room for the child I loved with all my heart. “Where is she? Why is she—”