Chapter Eighty-Six
IN HER BAG WERE TWO BOOKS. ONE OF THEM HAD ARRIVED from England with her few belongings she’d left in her boarding house back home.
She took out the copy of The Happy Fairy Book that Harry had given her as a gift and in the tiniest letters wrote her initials inside and a little doodle of a bird beneath it.
“Can you please give this to Elizabeth,” she asked Sister Mary. “Just knowing she has one thing from me will mean so much.”
“We aren’t allowed to send anything that has any notes or letters of any kind. Just like you, the child must start a new chapter when it leaves here.”
“There is no note. It was my favorite book as a child, that’s all.” She doubted the sisters would even notice the small monogram she had inscribed discreetly in the cover’s inner corner.
Sister Mary took it from Ada. “I can put it in the baby’s bag along with the bible we always give to the adopted parents when they take the child home. But as you can imagine, I’ll have no control over what they do with it from that moment onwards.”
Ada blinked away tears. “I understand. Thank you.”
To suppress her milk from coming in, Ada took the advice that the nuns gave her and rubbed peppermint oil into her breasts and placed cool cabbage leaves in her bra, replacing them every few hours.
On the day she was to leave the home, however, her emotions became so strong, Ada leaked right through her dress.
She did not want to walk out the door without her daughter. The idea of separation overpowered her. Part of her felt like she was on board the Titanic once more, and she was having to leave the person closest to her heart all over again.
She closed her suitcase and looked at the door.
Ada had no idea where the nursery was located.
She knew it was not near the rooms in which they placed the unwed mothers.
The sisters knew hearing the wails of the newborn babies would not be good for those women now grieving the loss of motherhood.
But Fanny would not be picking her up for another hour.
That was enough time for Ada to try and find where they were keeping her baby.
She opened the door, her mind made up. She would not leave without Elizabeth.
The buttercup-colored walls outside her room seemed incongruent with the bracing smell of disinfectant in the hall.
“Where are you going, Miss Lippoldt?” Sister Agnes, who was one of the sterner, more elderly nuns working at the home for unwed mothers, stopped her as she reached the door leading toward the staircase.
Ada’s eyes froze like an animal caught in a suspended state of terror.
The sister pulled a small watch on a chain from around her neck. “I believe someone is arriving within the hour to get you.”
It was then the most wretched wail escaped from Ada. Gone was her rigid British upbringing, the societal expectation to show no emotion even under great duress. Ada collapsed to the ground.
“Come now,” Sister Agnes said firmly, pulling her up. “You must get ahold of yourself. Think of the child. Surely you know it would be impossible for you to give her a good life.”
The words pierced her like a knife’s wound. Steely, cold, and sharp.
An icy hand gripped her own, and Ada was swiftly led back to her room. This time, however, Sister Agnes felt the need to remind her that every action had a consequence. On her way out, she locked the door.
“I did as you directed and used the money you gave me from selling that book of poetry you loved so much to get your passage home,” Fanny said.
Ada nodded. She had turned in her original return ticket for England months before, when she’d first relocated to Philadelphia and had no idea when—or if—she’d be returning to England.
Once her Rossetti book was sent over from her flat in London, along with the fairy book from Harry and some of her other things, she had hoped to sell it to raise funds to allow her to keep her baby.
But after the ordeal with Rosenbach, she knew she could no longer approach him to purchase the cherished volume for a fair price.
So Ada had been left with no other choice but to sell it to another dealer, who’d given her less than half of what it was worth.
It was nowhere near enough for her to raise a child on her own.
“I was able to get your train ticket to New York City,” Fanny said as she hugged her in the reception room and took the handle of Ada’s suitcase. “And the boarding pass for the boat to England tomorrow afternoon. You leave from New York Harbor.”
She handed the papers to Ada.
“I feel badly you’re leaving so soon. I wanted to help you get on your feet,” she said.
“It will be better for me to return to London,” Ada said quietly. “I’m not a citizen here, and I was already pushing how long I could stay working for Mr. Rosenbach. It is for the best.”
Fanny’s hand reached out and touched Ada’s shoulder. “I know everything feels so raw right now. I’m not going to lie and tell you your heart is going to hurt any less. But you do learn to endure it.”
Ada’s throat tightened as she forced back tears.
“I have this horrible feeling, Fanny,” she finally managed to say. “Like I feel her kicking inside me. It’s like I’m still carrying her even though I know I’m not.”
Fanny’s lids lowered. “I had the same sensation. I would be working at my sewing station, and I was sure I felt those flutters in my belly.” She paused. “Honestly, it still happens to me, Ada.”
“It feels almost cruel,” Ada said. “A constant reminder of what I’ve lost.”
Fanny put down Ada’s suitcase and put an arm around her. “Maybe you need to think about it another way… like she’s still with you.”
Ada nodded. “Yes,” she said.
“I can come with you to the train station,” Fanny said.
“It’s better I go alone,” Ada said. “I have a big trip ahead.”
Fanny nodded and handed Ada her valise.
The gratitude she had for Fanny was overwhelming. There was so much she wanted to say to her friend, but Ada didn’t want to break her composure. And one thing she did know for certain was that after all that had transpired between them, the bond between them transcended words.