Embracing Darkness (39 page)

“Don’t forget to be home before 5:00 this afternoon, dearest,” Mrs. Gail Aberfoyle would remind her husband every Sunday after leaving church services at the Congregationalist Church of Holly. “Mother arrives promptly at five. You know how she prides herself on punctuality!”

The mayor would frown and say, “Yes, dear. I won’t forget. I’ll be at the office only for an hour or two and on my way home well before five.”

Errol Aberfoyle’s main reason for going to his office on Sundays was twofold. First, local business was temporarily up, and there were more bribes to be paid. Another way to profit was to permit the illegal but tacitly condoned sale of firearms or whiskey. For every such transaction His Honor made twenty percent, but if it needed to go directly through his office he got fifty percent. All that was required was his having to put in some weekend hours.

The second reason was that Mayor Aberfoyle couldn’t stand his wife. On the day they got married he had told her, “Just don’t end up like your mother, my love.” He now knew all too well that women always become eventually mirror images of their mothers.

Errol Aberfoyle also made it a habit to frequent the newly legal “Watering Hole” on Tuesdays, since that was the evening when the men who worked in the local granite quarry would come in. In the weeks when they actually received their salaries, Monday was payday. Mayor Aberfoyle and his cronies knew that when it came to New Hampshire quarrymen, three things held true: they knew granite; they were big drinkers; and they were terrible at cards.

Errol Aberfoyle even bought a few rounds for the dozen or so men, who would come right after work, as a way of getting them to play cards while the night was still young. “Let’s get these boys something to wet their whistles with, Mr. Pease!” the mayor would say. This usually would be followed by his saying to whomever happened to be standing beside him, “Gotta make this quick. I gotta get my ass in bed before eleven. I’ve got work tomorrow at eight a.m.”

This ploy worked well for Mayor Aberfoyle. His palm would get nicely greased on Sundays, and he took the quarrymen for most of their pay on weekdays. Then there were the weekends when his mistress, Deirdre Crothers, worked in the hatcheck closet. Mayor Aberfoyle closely resembled ex-President Grover Cleveland. He was a large man with a belly that protruded more than his wife would have liked. Symbolizing his craving for beer, beef jerky, and the nightlife, it was a constant reminder to Gail Aberfoyle of why her husband was never home with her on weekend evenings. To satisfy his sexual cravings, Mayor Aberfoyle would sneak into the hatcheck closet with Deirdre, close the door, and sandwich her between his belly and the coats. When he pressed against her too hard, Deirdre would grab a healthy portion of belly fat and squeeze it as hard as she could, causing the Mayor to wail like a coyote in heat.

Although alcohol was once again legal in the United States, the attitude of folks toward “The Watering Hole” hardly changed. The desire for and the consumption of alcohol never wavered, regardless of the financial crisis that had befallen the country. Drunkenness was a means of escaping life’s harsh reality. Men in particular usually had no bones about turning their pockets inside out for liquor when their families were starving.

With the rise in unemployment came an increase in alcoholism, which in turn exacerbated tempers. Fathers, angry over the destitution their families had to endure, were known to take out their frustration on the easiest of victims—their children.

Between 1930 and 1932, child visits to the hospital in Exeter were up nearly 400%. Scores of children of all ages sat in the waiting room on any given day with ruptured eardrums, broken arms, punctured spleens, and stab wounds. Even a number of infants had been violently shaken by the very men responsible for bringing them into this world. No wonder that the nurses in the emergency ward of Exeter Regional Hospital went from repulsion at the horror they witnessed firsthand in 1930 to something like weary indifference by 1932!

That’s pretty much how it went in Holly for the first three years of the Depression. Alcoholism and child abuse had spun out of control, but, being the kind of citizens they were, most residents of Holly minded their own business.

There were other things to worry about: the economy, for one, which weighed heavily on everyone’s mind, as anyone at the time could have told you; and for another the upcoming election, which featured a charismatic fellow from New York State by the name of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a distant relation of Teddy Roosevelt. Unlike his cousin, however, this new Roosevelt was a Democrat who endorsed the same liberal views as many a New Englander. And even though not a New Englander, he hailed from upstate New York, which many from southern Connecticut to northern Maine figured was close enough.

On the other side of the political fence, the Republicans voted to renominate Hoover and his tired policies that had done nobody any good. It was certainly a shock to many that with the way things were, and the way the country was going, President Hoover actually ran for reelection in 1932. People around Holly vilified him.

“He’s got some nerve,” Father Poole heard someone say just as Sunday Mass was letting out. “Thinking we’d go and elect that fat ass to another term in office when he’s done diddly squat for this country over the last three years.”

Father Poole couldn’t tell who had said it, which was surprising to him since there were only four men in attendance with their families that Sunday. This pitiful number meant that more and more people were staying home on Sunday mornings, and as a result the collection plate suffered.

This was true not only for St. Andrew’s. The Congregationalist Church of Holly, the New England Baptist Church on James Street, and the United Methodist Church on the western side of Kensington Street, which was a rather posh area, all saw declines in church attendance. Moreover, “Hoover flags,” which depicted pockets turned inside out, started popping up everywhere.

Another of Phineas Poole’s parishioners remarked on the last fellow’s comment about Hoover by adding, “Yeah, there’s a slogan goin’ around: ‘In Hoover we trusted. Now we’re busted.’”

None of this was news to Father Poole. Everywhere he turned he saw discontent on people’s faces. In fact, there was so much unhappiness that people began complaining in the confessional about Hoover, the economy, the 25% unemployment rate, and the lack of hope.

“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned,” someone said as Phineas opened his confessional’s window. “It’s been four months since my last confession.”

“Yes, my son,” Father Poole replied.

“I’ve been having impure thoughts.”

“Go on, my son.”

“I’ve been fantasizing over committing a sin.”

“Which sin?”

“The fifth.”

“Whom do you fantasize killing?”

“President Hoover.”

Father Poole paused for a second and then spoke, feeling uneasy. “I see, but surely you know that you could never act on this.”

The man sighed loudly and answered, “I don’t know, Father. I mean, I’m out of work; my wife’s been taking in sewing; my kids go to bed still hungry after dinner, if you can call it dinner. But what really gets me is that I feel it’s my fault. I mean, I voted for that son of a bitch!”

Father Poole understood the hopelessness that everyone felt. He had felt it too when Zachary had run away from St. Andrew’s once and for all, mocking Father Poole as he did so.

It was hard enough having to deal with the spiritual dilemmas of his flock, who were now even questioning the very existence of God because, as someone was heard to say, “He just doesn’t give a rat’s ass about anyone. I mean, He wouldn’t even save His own Son from hanging to death on that cross!”

People were angry, as was evident to Phineas, but still he found comfort and a sanctuary of sorts. He had, after all, Jessica, Jonas, and Sister Ignatius to make him happy. What’s more, he had a cook who was a God-fearing Christian and who didn’t make too much noise.

Given the economy, Argyle Hobbs’s shifts had to be scaled back to twenty hours a week because the archdiocese was reducing funding to its churches. That, coupled with the lower turnout for Sunday Mass, was severely jeopardizing St. Andrew’s. Ellen even told Phineas at one point, “You know how you’ve been taking only 75% of the collection for the children? I think you’d better take it all now.”

In 1932 some new and unexpected additions came into the rectory. When word had finally gotten out about how the priest and the nun had taken in unwanted children, the response was overwhelming.

In May of that year Molly Kelly and Nora O’Day approached little Jessica, who now at five years old was permitted to sit by herself in the back pew for a few minutes while Sister Ignatius went to fetch Mrs. Keats. Before this Jessica had always stayed hidden in the Benson house with Argyle. Now that he wasn’t around as much, Sister decided that it was time to let her start coming to church. If anyone asked, she’d tell them that Jessica was the daughter of a sick relative and was just visiting until the relative got well.

The two nosy ladies asked Jessica where she lived.

“I live here,” Jessica replied.

“No honey,” said Molly Kelly. “I mean, where do you sleep at night.”

“With Sister,” answered Jessica candidly.

It didn’t take long for the two gossips to spread their news to the other parishioners of St. Andrew’s. By the time Father Poole ended the service with his final “
Dominus
vobiscum.
Ite
missa
est
,” the whole church was buzzing.

Father Poole had always been terrified that Captain Ransom would find out about Jessica, and now his fear was about to deepen even more. But Mrs. O’Day would later remind him, “What goes on in St. Andrew’s
stays
in St. Andrew’s. After all, we Catholics must stick together!”

This was certainly a relief to Sister Ignatius, whom the news had reached just seconds into the Nicene Creed. Betty Jakowski leaned forward, tucked her chin into Sister Ignatius’s left shoulder, and whispered, “Don’t you worry, Sister Ignatius. We’ll keep your secret. We won’t let anyone take those two kids away from here.”

After the service Father Poole walked as usual to the church’s front steps to say his goodbyes to everyone. Although a smaller showing now than before the Depression, when even then St. Andrew’s was little more than a quarter full on a Sunday morning, more people were in attendance on this particular Sunday than previously in the last year.

Perhaps it had to do with the fact that it had been a warm and sunny week, which always puts people in a good mood. The day before had been especially pleasant, and people around town even got the urge to go outside and work around their properties. Some planted new gardens. Others either put down fertilizer on their dead lawns or swept up the debris of the previous winter off their porches and reattached their porch swings to the chains that had hung idle for the past six months.

In any event his congregants smiled at Father Poole a lot more jovially on this Sunday than was their custom, and he had no idea why—that is, until Sister Ignatius came running up to him with Jessica in her arms.

“I need to talk to you, Phineas,” Sister Ignatius whispered in his ear. “
Right
now
.”

“Can’t it wait?” he asked.

She rushed down the stairs with Jessica in tow. Once on the grass she turned back to him. “
You
be the judge. I’ll wait for you.” She said, sounding angry, and then stormed over to the Benson house. Phineas didn’t take his eyes off the two of them until they disappeared from view behind the front door.

Since his mind was on Sister Ignatius and what she possibly could have meant by “
You
be the judge,” Phineas tuned out the many offers of charity coming his way from parishioners as they filed out of the church.

Just then he heard the following words: “Anytime at all you be needin’ anything, Father, you come to Milly and me.” Patty Flynn had married two years earlier and now had a one-year-old son as well as a newborn daughter. There was a time when Father Poole wished Sister Ignatius on Patty, hoping the two would somehow fall in love so that she’d leave St. Andrew’s.

Hearing Patty Flynn mention his wife Milly made the priest think of Ellen. Then he was called back to the present by another parishioner, Miles Wickham, a Protestant convert with a surprisingly high voice for someone his age who found himself in a front pew every Sunday thanks to his wife Charlotte.

“Hey, Father Poole,” Miles began, sounding more like a seven-year-old boy than a middle-aged man. “Times are tough, but my Charlotte’s overflowing with extra milk from our fourth child. I’m sure she can pump up a little extra every now and again if you ever start taking in infants.”

“Thank you, Miles,” the priest replied vacantly, as he hadn’t the faintest idea of what was going on.

“It’s the least we can do for the church,” added Miles, who kept surveying the other parishioners to see their reaction to his generosity.

“Hey, Father!” shouted Albert Wilson, again taking Phineas by surprise. “I think it’s a wonderful thing you’re doing here!” he said boldly, yet not nearly manly enough to hide his effeminate manner. People around town called him “Fairy Dust.”

It seemed apparent to Father Poole that all of his St. Andrew’s parishioners had somehow found out during that particular Sunday’s Mass that he, the nun, the old groundskeeper, and their deaf-mute cook were harboring homeless children.

Giving the priest two quick winks and a grin that showed he was missing two teeth, Albert Wilson said, “I’ll be sure there are extra eggs in your grocery order to send up to you folks.”

Then Mrs. O’Day blurted out, “Who
are
these children, Father? Where did they come from?”

Father Poole never had felt more overwhelmed in his life. He backed up into the handrail, feeling one of its spikes dig into his left buttock, and declared, “They were either abused or abandoned.”

The parishioners all stopped in their tracks as if they had just heard that President Hoover had been assassinated.