Embracing Darkness (16 page)

“I want to hear laughter again,” said Ben Benson. He then jumped up like a schoolboy who just heard that school had been cancelled for an entire week. “Let’s climb up that ol’ maple!” Ben shouted.

“Oh, Ben. Sure, it was fine the first few times we went up, but now? I mean… .”

“C’mon, Father! You know the way up just as well as I do. I’ll only go halfway as always, but I want to see you at the top! We haven’t done it in over a year.”

Phineas tried his best to dissuade his elderly friend. “Ben, listen to me. It’s not as though I don’t want to, and believe me I love the tree just as much as you do.”

“I need to know, Father Poole.” Ben wept. “I need to be sure you know your way to the top. For my great-granddaughter, in case I die before she’s old enough to climb. I have to know that she knows every secret of the tree. Please, Phineas, for the memory of my family, I beg you.”

Father Poole put his arms around Ben Benson and instantly found himself doing something he hadn’t done in years. The two men cried together. Less than two minutes later they began slowly making their way toward the tree. Ben walked with a cane for his right leg, while his left arm was wrapped loosely around Phineas’s right one.

When they reached the tree’s immense trunk, Ben put his cane down, placed his hands upon the priest’s shoulders, and lifted his foot toward Father Poole’s crotch. Phineas knit the fingers of both hands together and cupped Ben’s elevated foot. The old man’s bones creaked and his muscles trembled while he tried to exert enough strength to raise himself onto the rope’s first rung, which led to the lowest branch. It took nearly three minutes for the old man to reach the branch, and when he did Father Poole was relieved.

As Father Poole began climbing, he realized that his hands and feet were completely occupied with the rope and that, in case of an emergency, he thus would be unable to help the old man. No sooner had this thought occurred to him than the priest heard Ben Benson call from above, “Hey there, Father!” Phineas struggled to look up while keeping his hands and legs gripped around the rope. He saw Ben about six feet above him, sitting on the lowest branch and gazing down, a curiously peaceful look now on the old man’s face.

“You take ca’ o’ yourself now, ya hear?”

“Ben,” Father Poole called out. “Don’t do anything foolish!”

Ben began to shift his body on the branch while barely hanging on to anything. The priest in a panic began to retreat down the rope, fearing what Ben Benson was about to do, but anything the priest might have done after Ben Benson uttered those last words would have been too late. Ben let go of the branch just above his head and loosened his legs’ grip on the limb where he was sitting. By the time Phineas reached the ground, his friend’s body had already hit with a loud thud.

Father Poole ran frantically to the old man, who was still conscious but convulsing wildly and bleeding profusely from his nose, mouth, and scalp. Crying again, as he had done on the Benson porch, the priest tried to calm his old friend.

“Don’t try to talk,” said Father Poole.

Ben Benson, however, struggled to speak, managing a little laugh amid his pain. “Actually—wanted—to—land—on—my—head,—or—at—least—my—neck. Make—it—quick,—for—me—and—for—you.”

Father Poole’s tears fell onto Ben Benson’s face.

“You—have—my—undying—thanks,” Ben whispered weakly.

The priest didn’t know what he meant and so ignored it, repeating over and over again while he held his friend, “You’re going to make it, Ben! Just hang on.”

Father Poole turned his head and screamed for Argyle Hobbs, but his cries were drowned out as the bells in the tower started sounding again. He tried to scream louder, this time for Sister Ignatius. The bells just kept ringing. Ben, still shaking terribly, began to speak again. His voice now struggled against the blood filling his mouth.

“You—gave—this—old—man—these—last—four—years—a—reason—t’—go—on—living. Taught—me—how—to—live—again.”

He then paused as his body began to convulse violently, spouting even more blood from his mouth. Father Poole began to whimper like a frightened child. Ben continued, even more weakly than before.

“My—great—granddaughter. Children—on—my—hill. Laughter—of—children. Johnny, I’m—coming—home. Granddaughter.” Father Poole realized that Ben was slipping and at the point of delirium. The priest cradled the old man’s head and rocked back and forth.

Ben whispered, “Granddaugh… . Chill-en… laugh-tr… on… my… hill.”

Now fully aware that the priest had heard him loud and clear, Ben Benson died in the arms of his best friend.

Thirteen
Ellen F.
 

Sister Ignatius was given charge of seeing that Ben Benson’s family was contacted. As the old man had told Father Poole on occasion, his grandson’s small family was long overdue for a visit. This, of course, was before Johnny Benson decided to swallow the barrel of a shotgun. Father Poole had instructed Sister Ignatius to do two things: first, inform Johnny’s widow that her late husband’s grandfather had passed away; and, second, persuade her to bury Johnny in New Hampshire.

Father Poole frankly would have preferred to do this himself, but he had taken responsibility for all the funeral arrangements including the casket, the service, the burial, and the social gathering afterwards at the rectory. As Ben Benson’s closest friend for the past four years, Father Poole believed it fell to him to be the executor of a non-existent will. Therefore, Sister Ignatius was elected to phone the grieving widow and convince her to inter her husband’s remains in Holly.

As anyone who knew her could readily attest, Sister Ignatius was not the most subtle of creatures. It was known throughout town that she could be as blunt as a spoon.

A few years before Ben Benson’s death, Sister Ignatius had gone into town to buy provisions for the rectory. As she was searching through the various baskets of fruit, Felix Adams accosted her in front of the dried apricots. He was not a man known for his personal hygiene, and those within a ten-foot radius of Mr. Adams needed to hold their breath until he was out of range. He also resembled a scarecrow because his hair was always disheveled and his clothes mismatched, tattered, and dirty.

An habitual drunkard by night, this man who always seemed to need a shave spent his mornings nursing his hangovers with small talk. He did so both to take his mind off his splitting headaches and to get people to give him money for a variety of reasons. Sometimes he’d lie and ask for donations to fund a new book drive at Wheelwright Academy. Most people knew he was being dishonest because he wasn’t affiliated with the Academy in any capacity imaginable. What’s more, Wheelwright received its funds for books and sundries through private contributions solicited from alumni. Anyone in town with enough common sense would have known this, yet on this particular day Adams was able to solicit a total of $1.39 from those who were not in the know.

“I say, Sister. It
is
a fine day, is it not?” Felix Adams remarked to Sister Ignatius.

Her look was both cautious and suspicious. “Oh?” she replied, selecting her choice of dried apricots from a basket and doing her best not to pay much attention to the unkempt stranger. “I had scarcely noticed.”

Sister Ignatius then began thumbing indifferently through a barrel of apples as Felix drew closer.

“What are you gonna do with those apples there, Sister?” asked Felix Adams. “Bake pies for some church social? As it just so happens, I too am raisin’ money for my church.”

The fumes of his inebriation from the night before hit Sister Ignatius like a runaway locomotive. Nevertheless, she took a deep breath and said boldly, “If you’re looking for money from a Catholic nun, Mr. Whatever-Your-Name-Is, then you’re even stupider than you look.”

Felix withdrew, speechless. Sister Ignatius was the height of an average man, just shy of five foot, nine inches tall. She thus seemed to tower over Felix Adams who, at five foot, five inches, looked like a child being scolded by his mother.

“Why not light a match to your breath?” Sister Ignatius added.

Realizing now that he wasn’t going to get a penny from the unfriendly nun, Adams patted her bottom twice as he leaned forward to bow. “Sorry, Sissy,” he replied. “Didn’t mean to ruffle any feathers under that frock o’ yours.”

Felix turned around quickly in an attempt to find the front door, something that wouldn’t have been difficult for him if he’d had full use of his eyes, which were half closed against the offending light. His only preoccupation at the moment was where he was going to find some poor sap daft enough to give him money. He never thought twice about touching Sister Ignatius’s behind.

As Felix Adams approached the threshold, he felt a thud on the back of his head. He immediately put his hand just above the nape of his neck and felt his hair wet. Bringing his fingers around to his eyes, he saw a red and seedy liquid dripping from them. At his feet lay a squashed tomato. Realizing what had happened, he turned around to face the culprit.

The man was utterly speechless. What could he say to a tomato-wielding nun in front of thirteen people who were now gawking at both of them? Felix Adams was ready to say something when he noticed that she had been holding a tomato in each hand. Deciding not to play the victim, as he felt he didn’t merit this mistreatment, Felix shouted, “YOU SILLY BITCH! YOU’RE MAD AS A HATTER! YOU KNOW THAT?”

No sooner had these words passed his quivering lips than all attention turned from him to the nun. Sister Ignatius rotated her arm over her head, like David preparing to slay Goliath, and hurled the second tomato. The missile landed squarely on the bridge of Felix Adams’s nose, and upon impact tomato juice exploded all over his face. What astonished onlookers even more than a nun’s hurling tomatoes at a man was the fact that Felix barely flinched when the second tomato collided with his face.

Felix Adams slowly brought his fingers up to his eyes and wiped them. His vision was blurred by both the force of the blow and the juice that was now creeping below his tightly closed eyelids. It took a few seconds, but finally Felix opened his eyes and trained them as best he could on the nun. “YOU! YOU! YOU… .” Before the humiliated drunkard could think of what to say next, he saw the fuzzy figure before him appear to spin something around and around.

The next thing Felix Adams felt was a sharp pain in his groin. His eyes opened wide in shock and crossed involuntarily; his knees slanted sharply inward; and both hands grabbed his crotch, now saturated with tomato juice. A collective gasp could be heard from the spectators, who now numbered eighteen as more people were drawn to the spectacle unfolding near the front door of Mason’s General Store. Felix Adams dropped to his knees, his hands still clutching his balls. Sister Ignatius then quite deliberately picked up the sack of fruit that she had put down just a minute earlier to take care of the business at hand. She brought it over to young Dwight Mason who, like everyone else in the store, was catatonic.

Sister Ignatius said, “Now, Dwight? Are you going to take my money or not? I’ve got other errands to run, and dinner starts at five sharp on the hill.”

After reflecting on this story, which had been told to him a few days following the spectacle at Mason’s General, Father Poole decided that Sister Ignatius was indeed the right woman to call Johnny Benson’s widow.
Here’s
someone
who
evidently
can’t
be
pushed
around
by
anyone
, Father Poole thought.

Sister Ignatius had grown into a hard person from a very young age. The only thing she knew for certain about her family, having been raised in Exeter Orphanage, was that she was a twin, yet she was the only one sent to the orphanage. Sister Ignatius had struggled to think of a reason why a parent could have twins and put only one up for adoption. She assumed that her sibling had died at birth and that perhaps the shock of losing a child was too much for her mother. Afraid that she’d lose the other child, she must have resigned herself to giving up the surviving one. It seemed to make sense. Instead of having to experience a painful loss again, the woman may have decided to abandon the challenge of motherhood and relinquish her baby daughter.

This wasn’t too far-fetched an idea, especially for Sister Ignatius whose wounded sense of self-worth dated as far back as she could remember.

Exeter Orphanage was a dilapidated if not squalid place. Its walls were stained with the urine of incorrigible children; rugs, the few there were, had been torn up around the corners; staircases were haphazardly painted, no doubt a result of enlisting the free services of older orphans; the bathroom floors had gaping holes around pipes (some so large that once, while sitting on the toilet, eight-year-old Louisa Elliott jumped up and wet herself when she saw a jumbo-sized rat crawl through the space); and the lead-based paint peeled off the walls with such ease that it was like pulling adhesive tape from a spool. No wonder, then, that the younger children, who found it hard to find anything worthwhile to do during the long and cold winter months, began peeling off the paint in the recreation room as a hobby.

Two girls in particular were keen on this activity: Macy Nugent, a black girl of about seven years, and Evelyn Wild, a six-year-old who looked up to Macy because she was so different from the other girls. Their affinity could also have been attributed to the fact that none of the other children liked the two girls. They ostracized Macy for being a Negro and little Evelyn for having been born with a cleft lip.

The girls of Exeter Orphanage freely shunned those with physical deformities and had a precocious talent for mistreating those whose skin was darker than their own. They made such discrimination a full-time job. Hence, the popular girls of Exeter Orphanage, as young as they were, acted more like adults and less like preadolescent girls. Perfect though they believed themselves to be, they never realized that they too had been shunned and abandoned.