Chapter 6 The Jewish One #2
“Here in St. Cloud’s, nothing is ideal, but we do the best we can,” Dr. Larch began. “The one we’re thinking of, the one who might work out for you, is a special girl—she is loved and looked up to by all the girls.”
“The boys look up to her, too,” Nurse Edna added.
“She’s fourteen, almost fifteen, but she seems much older—she’s very mature for her age,” Dr. Larch continued.
“She’s very tall, too—and she keeps growing,” Nurse Angela said.
“She must be fully grown—she can’t keep growing!” Nurse Edna cried.
“Knowing her, she’ll keep growing—she likes being tall, and she’s very determined,” Dr. Larch told the Winslows.
“She sounds wonderful!” was all Constance could say.
“Well, we only know what we can see for ourselves—we were told so little about her,” Dr. Larch said; now his voice sounded doubtful.
“She is wonderful, Wilbur,” Nurse Angela interjected, as if she knew what the doctor was going to say and she wished he wouldn’t say it.
“The circumstances of her coming here were, at first, familiar to us—she was left here when she was a child, after dark, with no explanation and very little information,” Dr. Larch began, but he paused; he was looking at his nurses on the examination table. “Your turn,” the doctor told them.
It was a cold, snowy night in 1908 when the little girl was left on the front porch.
Nurse Edna was with the infants when she heard the loud knocks on the door.
Edna had to settle down a baby before she went to see who it was.
Dr. Larch had gone to bed, but he was still awake; the knocking was loud enough for him to hear it.
“When a child is left on the porch after dark, a child that young is usually crying—not this girl,” Edna told the Winslows.
The abandoned girl was angry; she was kicking the newel post at the top of the porch stairs, but she didn’t try to go after the woman who’d left her.
In the dim glow cast by the porch light, Nurse Edna could see the woman who was leaving—already on her way back to the train station.
“Please don’t go—please tell me something about her!
” Edna called to the woman. That was when Nurse Edna realized there were two women.
One of the women was beyond the reach of the porch light, in the darkness.
The unseen woman’s voice resonated in the dark.
“She’s Jewish!” the invisible woman shouted.
“She knows,” said the woman Edna could see. “She also knows her name and how old she is—that’s all she knows,” the woman added; she was receding from the porch light, into the darkness.
“Is one of you her mother?” Nurse Edna asked the woman she could still see.
“She has no mother!” the invisible woman cried; by now, the two women had disappeared in the darkness.
“What is your name, dear child?” Edna asked the angry little girl, who was still kicking the newel post.
“Esther, like the queen—Queen Esther,” the girl answered. She enunciated with unusual clarity; she didn’t speak like a child.
“Queen Esther! I’m just Edna,” Nurse Edna told the little girl.
“I’m just Esther,” Esther said, giving the newel post a gentler kick.
“How old are you, Esther?” Edna asked; she guessed the girl was five, a tall five-year-old with strangely adult enunciation.
“I’m almost four,” Esther answered.
A very tall three-year-old, Edna was thinking, when she heard one of the infants crying—maybe the baby she had tried to settle down before she went out on the porch. Esther heard the infant crying, too.
“Is that a baby? I’ve never seen a baby,” Esther said. She was indignant when Edna asked her if she had a cough or a cold. “I’m not sick—I’m just tired!” the girl told Edna. “Are there other kids here? I don’t know any kids,” Esther added. (The Winslows were getting the picture.)
Nurse Angela had heard the invisible woman shouting (and what she shouted) all the way from the girls’ division; some of the girls who weren’t asleep had heard what the unseen woman shouted, too. It was hard not to hear the She’s Jewish! and the She has no mother! if you were awake.
Angela told Edna that Dr. Larch was not in bed; he was waiting to meet the new orphan in his office, in his pajamas. He’d heard the She’s Jewish! and the She has no mother!—as some of the boys had. Children repeat what they’ve heard. What the angry-sounding woman had shouted would get around.
In an orphanage, many children have no mother. The significant part of Esther’s story was her Jewishness—being a Jew mattered to Esther. In Dr. Larch’s office, it had been strange when Esther started speaking of herself in the third person.
“Esther has no mother and no father,” the girl began—her first words to the doctor.
“I’m sorry about that, Esther,” Dr. Larch told the girl.
“The king loves Esther more than the other women,” Esther said.
“Good for the king!” Dr. Larch cried. He’d stood up from his desk and was searching his bookshelves for his Bible, seldom used.
“Haman is the bad guy—he wants to kill all the Jews,” Esther went on with the story.
“Haman sounds like a very bad guy,” Larch said; he’d found his Bible and was opening it to the table of contents.
“Esther and Mordecai save the Jews—they’re Jews,” Esther explained to Dr. Larch.
“Mordecai sounds like a good guy,” Larch said. Esther just nodded; she would let no one interrupt her story. “Shouldn’t Esther tell the king what Haman is plotting against the Jews?” Dr. Larch asked Esther. He knew the story was biblical; definitely the Old Testament, Larch was thinking.
Esther sighed, nodding again; if she didn’t like to be interrupted, she would let no one rush her story, either. “The king hangs Haman,” Esther said; she approved of the hanging.
“Good for the king!” Larch cried again.
“Haman’s kids get hanged, too—ten of them,” Esther added.
“They had it coming!” Dr. Larch cried. It was evident that Esther thought so, too, from the vigorous way she nodded.
Who would read or tell a kill-or-be-killed, Old Testament story to a child?
Larch was wondering. He’d found The Book of Esther in the Old Testament.
“You were named for the Esther in the Bible?” Dr. Larch asked her.
This time, when she nodded, Esther smiled—only a small smile.
“Who told you that you’re Jewish?” Dr. Larch asked Esther.
“My mother wanted me to know,” the girl answered firmly.
“But who told you, dear—was it one of those two women who brought you here?” Edna asked the child.
“Not them. He said he was a rabbi,” Esther answered. “Another man was with us—he wrote everything down.”
“The rabbi in your synagogue—you were brought up Jewish?” the doctor asked Esther, who fiercely shook her head.
“I don’t know any Jews—I really want to!” Esther cried. “I don’t know any other rabbis,” she added.
“Is your mother dead, dear—do you know if she’s alive?” Nurse Edna asked Esther.
“The rabbi told me she was dead—I just know I’m a Jew,” Esther said. “My mother wanted me to know,” she repeated softly.
“There are other kids here, Esther—you’re going to make some friends,” Nurse Angela told the abandoned child. “We’ll find a Jewish family for you. Won’t we, Wilbur?” Angela had asked the doctor.