Then with a deep breath, I lifted my hands and played a song whose rhythm came from somewhere deep within my childhood. Savior, like a shepherd lead us . . .

Halfway through, Bridget formed her fingers over the keys and inserted chords with the melody, awkwardly at first, then gaining confidence. Her volume grew and so did her gladness, and a smile equaling her wide, vivid eyes that now danced. We tripped with laughter through the piece several times, stopping to try out different variations of the chord patterns, and soon she was adding her own designs.

I folded my hands onto my lap after the sixth or seventh run-through and stared down at the keys as the song faded. “I’ve watched many a student come under Father’s teaching. Never in my life have I seen another human being pick up music so handily, as if it were a language they’d heard all their lives and were fluent the moment they used it.”

She shrugged in her usual way, hands lacing in her lap. “Weren’t much to it. There are rules and patterns. I just followed them.”

“That’s not easy for most people.” I swept my feet over the tile floor, hands gripping the round edge of the stool. “It seems at times the Almighty short-suits us in some areas to give us others in spades. It’s his way of balancing us out so none of us can be too stuck on ourselves.” I turned to her. “You’ve a great deal to offer that baby, Bridget, and you’re the one meant to give it to her. She’s yours, and if she’s put together the way you are, well, there’s no one better to mother her than someone who understands.”

Her hands gripped her knees, shoulders arched forward as she stared down at the keys. “When you asked before if I wanted to leave here . . . well, I do. Sometimes so much it aches. When I looked down at that little face, and me the only mother she had, all I could think was that I didn’t even know how to hold her. To hug and coddle and . . .” Her arm shook, fingers working the fabric of her gown as her voice trailed off. “But it tears me apart to think of not having the chance. Of never getting better . . . or of going home and being worse.”

“Give her the gift of yourself, Bridget. Of all you are, short suits and spades. Of your own sort of mothering. You’ve no idea how a girl longs—” I stopped as memories crested over me.

One large tear rolled down her white cheek. “Sometimes I think you were sent here not because you’re mad—but to show the rest of us the way out of our pits. You were sent here to rescue us. Me, most especially.”