Chapter 25
“Oh! come, then, best beloved of my heart; come, Lamb of God, adorable flesh…nourish, cleanse, and purify my soul…all unworthy as I am to receive thee…” Ardent love swelled her throbbing bosom…for her amiable spouse…
Several days later, after making sick calls, Joseph was returning the pyx to the cathedral when he noticed the new bride sitting alone in the pews.
At first, he hardly recognized her. She wore such fine gowns now (this one of violet silk) and her long hair was hidden beneath a large, frilly bonnet.
But more than that, her posture had altered.
Her shoulders, neck, and head—everything above her corset—drooped like a bruised flower.
She stared down at her hands, sheathed in black lace mitts.
They lay limp on her lap beneath a crumpled handkerchief.
He could not pass her by. “Are you all right, Miss Conley? Pardon me: Mrs. Stratford?”
She released a harsh puff of breath. “I wish—” She broke off suddenly and closed her eyes.
Her jaw clenched, and the tendons in her slender neck tensed above her lace collar.
“Please, Father: I wish you’d call me Tessa.
” She turned her reddened eyes to him and attempted a smile—the barest quiver at the edges of her lips, as if they’d forgotten the shape. “We shall be family soon, after all.”
“Then you must call me Joseph.”
“I-I couldn’t, Father.” She dropped her eyes to her lap again.
“It wouldn’t be right.” She raised the handkerchief and blotted her nose.
Before Joseph could formulate a question, she looked up to the altar.
“’Tis such a comfort, knowing He is always here, whenever I need Him.
” Her strained voice belied her words, as if she sought comfort but had not found it.
“In County Clare, most of the churches must also serve as schoolhouses or threshing-floors. So God resides in the Tabernacle only when the Priest is celebrating Mass.” Her fingers worried the handkerchief in her lap.
“I only wish I could receive Him every day. When I take Him into my body, I can feel His strength suffusing me. I can feel Him inside me—not an invasion but a completion.”
“Daily communion isn’t only for Priests. You are welcome to receive every day.”
She squeezed her eyes shut. “How am I to approach Someone so holy when I feel so unclean?”
“You haven’t been reading any Jansenists, have you?”
She kept her eyes closed. “If I’ve—lain with my husband… ” It was only a whisper.
Suddenly her distress and her exhaustion made sense.
She was passionate about their Lord, horticulture, and music; of course she would bring that passionate nature to her marriage bed.
Perhaps she’d startled her husband (hadn’t he thought ladies incapable of desire?) and they’d quarrelled.
Now, she was struggling to reconcile the yearnings of her body with the yearnings of her soul.
Nervously Joseph glanced behind him to confirm that no one else had entered the cathedral.
He should speak of sexual matters only inside the confessional.
But how could he ask her to uproot herself when she looked too weak to stand?
Slowly Joseph sat, an arm’s length away from her, and lowered his voice.
“Provided you do nothing to preclude conception, finding pleasure in the marital act is only a venial sin, and you need not confess venial sins before you receive Our Lord. He recognizes your contrition.”
“But if I refuse my husband, that is a mortal sin?”
They should definitely be inside the confessional. “Has he asked something unnatural of you?” Please, please don’t ask me to define—
She shook her head.
“Then, yes: if your husband desires intercourse and you refuse him, you commit a mortal sin.”
Her eyes opened slowly, though she only stared at the back of the bench before them. “What if I want to refuse him? Is that also a mortal sin? I feel nothing but dread and repulsion and…”
Joseph had been wrong.
“I knew it would be painful the first time, but not— I think there is something wrong with me.” She shielded her face with her hands, muffling her words. “I’m so sorry, Father; I shouldn’t be telling you this.”
“Have you discussed it with your husband?”
“How can I?” She opened her hands. “It would humiliate him!”
“He must know something is wrong.”
She shook her head fiercely. “He is quite content.”
The man was even more obtuse than Joseph had feared. Had her husband really mistaken discomfort for purity? “But—the act remains painful for you?”
She nodded miserably.
This was so far beyond his ken… What would a physician of the body ask? She’d been married only a week; perhaps this despair was premature. “How many times…?”
She gripped the back of the other pew for support. “Every night.”
Joseph swallowed. “Surely his ardor will fade in…” A month? A year? If she were his wife…
She nodded again, pulled herself to her feet—merciful God, did Joseph only imagine it, or did she wince at the movement?—and turned away from him. “I will bear it. I must.” She hurried into the aisle. “He is my husband. ’Tis all he asks of me, and all I have to give him.”
Joseph followed. “Tessa, wait.”
She was muttering as if to herself. “I want children; if this is the cost, I must—”
“Tessa!” Joseph loped ahead of her. As gently as he could, he grasped her arms just below her shoulders.
Finally she stopped her flight, though still she trembled.
Joseph stooped so he could look up into her distraught face instead of down at her.
She must not feel threatened; she had already suffered enough at men’s hands.
“First and above all: Never think that your body is all you have to give. It is not even the most remarkable part of you.”
Her eyes flickered to his—only a moment, but her breaths seemed to be calming.
“Second: Would you allow me to consult with my father?”
Was her new gasp relief, or trepidation?
“He will not know I am asking on your behalf,” Joseph promised.
At last she nodded. “If I were braver, I would ask him myself. He has been nothing but kind. But this; ’tis so difficult to speak of.”
“I am glad you spoke to me. You can, Tessa, always—no matter the problem. I will find you a remedy.”
Joseph went immediately to his parents’ house.
The sign declared his father at home. Through the open window, Joseph saw him at his desk.
Yet Joseph lingered on the sidewalk as if he were mired in quicksand.
How exactly did one begin such a conversation with one’s father, with the rapist of one’s mother?
But who else could he possibly ask? Joseph wished Hélène and Liam were already married.
Sometimes his father seemed so compassionate…
Joseph hesitated so long that his father looked up from his medical journal and peered through the window. “Is that you, Joseph?”
He made sure no one on the street was close enough to hear. “Your offer of a medical-sacerdotal consultation…”
“It remains open.” His father stood, pulled the door wide, and smiled. “My door is always open to you, son.”
Joseph was careful to shut it behind him.
He closed the windows and the door to the hall.
Keeping his eyes on the rug, he crossed to face the desk where his father waited.
He felt he should not sit, and he could not look at his father.
“The marital act…it should not be consistently painful for the wife?”
“It should not.”
“If it is painful, might there be a medical reason?”
“There might. I don’t suppose this woman described the nature of her pain to you?”
“No.” Joseph gulped the word.
“Could you not persuade her to see me?”
“I promised her anonymity. She is understandably reluctant to speak of such matters.”
“Then I must find my way blindfolded. But in my experience, it is most likely that her husband is simply a fool.”
I think that is very likely.
“This couple, how long have they been married?”
Joseph could not be specific without betraying Tessa’s confidence. “Not long.”
“Did both of them enter the marriage as virgins?”
“Yes.”
“I stand by my diagnosis: their problem is ignorance, and it is easily remedied. If I cannot see them… Are they literate?”
“They are.”
“Then I shall write a letter. I shall offer as much information as I can and extend my own invitation. Will that suit?”
“Yes; thank you.”
“Thank you for coming to me. I should address this letter to the wife?”
Again Joseph nodded.
His father began hunting among his books. “I will need a few hours to prepare my prescription.”
What his father produced wasn’t a letter or a prescription. It was a treatise—so many pages crammed into an envelope that it bulged.
At Joseph’s incredulous expression, his father shrugged.
“I have seen the cost of ignorance too many times. I would write a book, but your mother would probably die of mortification upon its publication. And I might be arrested for indecency. So, I must disseminate my gospel one couple at a time. I left it unsealed purposefully, Joseph, so you can read it yourself. This woman will not be the first wife who will come to you anguished and confused. You are wise to reach out, and you would be wise to educate yourself for the future.” Now his father seemed reluctant to release the letter.
“Whether you read it or not, promise me you will deliver it tomorrow.”
“I promise.” Joseph took the envelope.
His father must have heard the hesitation in his voice.
“Make no mistake: This woman is in pain—unjust, utterly unnecessary pain. Pain that is not only physical but spiritual. She doubts her love for her husband, his love for her, her decision to marry at all—she doubts even God, that He should require such a thing of her. If that doubt is not lifted, it will drive a chasm between this woman and her husband, between her and God. You hold her salvation, there in your hands.”