“Weren’t you frightened? I’d have been terrified,” she said. A man’s hand on her face in the dark . . .

“Not at all. I felt quite peaceful.”

“Did he speak?”

“No, he never spoke. He just touched my cheek—his skin was soft as a child’s.”

“And then what? Did he vanish, or fly away, or just slip out of the door?”

Kitty looked offended.

“He seemed to glide away behind me so I couldn’t see him anymore.”

“Did you tell anyone about it the next day? The other girls or Sister?”

“I didn’t say anything to the girls—they would have thought I was making it up. Martha was very scornful of religion—for a clergyman’s daughter. But I did tell Sister Maria Goretti and she said it was a sign that St. Bernadette had heard our prayers.” She beamed at Jean from her metal prison.

“And you never mentioned it to anyone else?”

“I told Elsie, of course, but she thinks it was just a hallucination. But it wasn’t. I was as wide awake as I am now. You don’t believe me either, I can tell.”

“I’ve been called to believe far stranger things lately,” Jean replied with a noncommittal smile. There was nothing to be gained by demolishing Kitty’s delusion if it gave her comfort. “Did your condition improve after this . . . visitation?”

“Yes, it did,” said Kitty firmly. “It did. From that day onward I no longer felt abandoned by God, and that gave me the strength to accept my condition and live the best life I can.”

Tears of admiration sprang to Jean’s eyes. Kitty’s bravery and stoicism were a rebuke to her own luxurious troubles.

“I’m studying theology, you know,” Kitty went on. “With Elsie’s help. She reads the books to me and I dictate my essays to her. I’m very blessed.”

After the unnerving whooshing of the iron lung, the silence outside the house was precious as never before. Jean wheeled her bicycle back down the slushy gravel of the driveway deep in thought about this stealthy bedside angel with his gentle hands. Kitty’s testimony had unlocked a door now, and Jean felt that only by returning to St. Cecilia’s and standing in the room where it all took place would she come to a proper understanding of what had happened to Gretchen in the summer of 1946.

Nursing: An emergency table may be made by using an ironing board placed alongside the patient’s bed. This makes a very handy lightweight table, and is the right height for drinks and plates.

33

The back door of the ambulance opened and Mrs. Swinney, supported by Jean on one side and a walking stick on the other, made a slow and queenly descent to the pavement. She stood for a moment, looking about her as if expecting some kind of reception committee, before allowing herself to be led down the driveway to the house. She had lost weight in the weeks she had been away and her muscles were thoroughly wasted. What remained of her strength seemed concentrated in the fingers of her right hand, which were now digging into the flesh of Jean’s arm.