Our Lady of the Lost and Found Read online

  I recalled having seen the movie Song of Bernadette on television several months before. It was shown after the late news on a night when I couldn’t sleep anyway, so I had stayed up and watched the whole thing. It was either that or the Home Shopping Network.

  A raven-haired, dewy-eyed Jennifer Jones had won an Academy Award for her 1943 portrayal of Bernadette Soubirous, the sickly, illiterate, poverty-stricken fourteen-year-old girl to whom Mary had appeared eighteen times in 1858 in a grotto named Massabielle just outside the town of Lourdes in southern France. The movie was based on a novel which was, in turn, based on actual documented events. After the opening credits, the following words appeared in elegant script on the screen: For those who believe in God, no explanation is necessary. For those who do not believe in God, no explanation is possible.

  At first no one believed Bernadette’s story of the beautiful lady in the grotto, not even her own family who berated and abused her for her idiotic imaginings. Even the dean of Lourdes did not believe her. But as word of Bernadette’s visions quickly spread, people began following her to the grotto in ever-increasing numbers. The dean told Bernadette to ask for a small miracle to prove the divine identity of her lady. He wanted this lady to make the wild rosebush in the grotto bloom right then, in the last week of February. The rosebush did not bloom. Instead, on the lady’s instruction, Bernadette fell to her knees, dug in the dirt, smeared it on her hands and face, and then ate some. The crowd hollered with derision and declared her insane. But later that day, a spring began to flow at that very spot. A blind man was healed. A dying baby was saved. And so began the legacy of the miracles at Lourdes.

  I remembered all that had befallen poor Bernadette in the aftermath of her visions, the price she had paid for the privilege of having been so chosen. She was tormented, ridiculed, and humiliated for her ecstasies, endlessly harassed, intimidated, and interrogated by medical, government, and religious authorities.

  I remembered Mary saying to Bernadette:

  —I cannot promise to make you happy in this world but only in the next.

  Eight years after her meetings with Mary, Bernadette was counseled by the dean of Lourdes to enter the convent of the Sisters of Charity at Nevers. He warned her that there was no corner of the world where she could hide and lead a normal life. He said she must now assume the responsibility of having been chosen and so dedicate her life henceforth to God. Bernadette did not want to be a nun but, at the age of twenty-two, she entered the convent. Although it was not supposed to be a prison, she lived there in a small bare cell and spent her days scrubbing pots and washing stone floors. Even there she was scorned and shunned by many of the nuns who could not conquer their own envy and resentment, their own failures of faith.

  Bernadette’s health steadily declined and she died in the convent on April 16, 1879, at the age of thirty-five. Many years later her body was exhumed and found to be incorrupt, untouched by the normal processes of decomposition and decay. On June 14, 1925, Bernadette was beatified by the Roman Catholic Church, and in 1933, on December 8, the feast day of the Immaculate Conception, she was canonized. It was said that Mary had given Bernadette three sacred secrets but these were never revealed.

  Today about 4 million visitors pass through Lourdes each year and 27,000 gallons of water flow from the miraculous spring each day.

  Now here I was with the Virgin Mary in my kitchen. I did not want to be so chosen. I was not Catholic and I did not want to become a nun. I did not want to be ridiculed, humiliated, or interrogated. I did not want people to follow me around expecting miracles. I did not want happiness only in the next world. I wanted it now.

  I did not want to be privy to her secrets. I knew enough about secrets already: how hard it is to keep them, how impossible it is to forget them, how they grow in your heart when you’re not looking, busily multiplying like feverish rabbits, silently mutating like malignant cells.

  Tell me no secrets, I’ll tell you no lies.

  While the coffee brewed, Mary dropped the uneaten black olives back into the jar and put them in the fridge. Then she washed the dishes and stacked them in the rack to dry. She was humming a spritely tune I did not recognize. My silence did not seem to bother her. She wiped the table with the damp dishcloth and did not look at me. I was starting to wonder if she might be drawing this out on purpose, giving me plenty of time to imagine the worst. Faint tweaks of annoyance began to flit through my growing consternation.

  She rummaged in the bottom cupboard beside the stove and came up with a black lacquered tray I had not used in years. On it she arranged two mugs, two spoons, a jar of honey, and a small pitcher of milk. I thought these ordinary objects that I handled every day without really looking at them might take on an unearthly radiance in her hands. But they remained unchanged: the cheap glass pitcher with a chip on its spout, the sticky plastic jar with the honey inside half-crystallized and flecked with toast crumbs. In her graceful hands these objects were just what they had always been: inanimate, imperfect, unmoved; certain, silent, and above reproach.

  She poured the coffee into the mugs, brought the tray to the table, and sat down. She was silent while I added milk and stirred in a teaspoon of honey. Apparently she preferred her coffee black. She took a sip and made a small appreciative sound in the back of her throat.

  Finally she looked at me.

  —I need a place to stay for a week, she said.

  —Here? I croaked. You want to stay here?

  —Yes, she said. I am so tired. I need a break.

  She brushed the stray curls back from her forehead and sighed, the same sighing I’d heard the night before in the living room in the corner by the fig tree. Her face faltered in the sunlight and I could see it then around her eyes, in the lines on her forehead and on either side of her mouth. I could see that fatigue all women of a certain age are prone to, that bone-deep weariness that can only be caused by life itself. By all those hours of smiling and frowning, laughing and crying. By all those days of explaining and regretting, hoping and housework. By all those nights of yearning and longing, searching and praying. By all those weeks of loving and caring, worrying and waiting. By all those months of wondering where does the time go. By all those years of aging and changing and staying the same.

  By all those years of keeping the faith.

  I know full well how it wears you down, like water dripping on a rock. How it puts gray in your hair, wrinkles in your brow, a knot in your stomach, a slump in your shoulders, an ache in your throat, and a stone in your heart.

  I could not imagine how it must feel to have been living a life for two thousand years.

  —I can certainly understand that, I said.

  She looked relieved.

  —I need to rest up before next month, she said.

  I must have looked puzzled.

  —The month of May, she explained, was dedicated to me hundreds of years ago. Around the world people will be honoring me in special ways. A lot will be expected of me and I must not let them down.

  —Of course not, I said.

  —I know I could go and stay anywhere, she said. I could check into a fancy hotel and order all my meals up from room service. I could go to a seaside resort or take a cruise and spend whole days just dozing in the sun. But that’s not what I want, that’s not what I need. I am tired of having no fixed address. I’ve been hungering for a home, a real home, if only for a little while. I want to stay here with you.

  —Why here? I asked. Why me? I’m not even Catholic.

  —Ah yes, the proverbial question, she said, laughing wryly. Well, you have a comfortable home with an extra bedroom. You are a fine writer. I’ve always been a great lover of books.

  I recalled that, in my Medieval and Renaissance Art course back in university, we had indeed looked at several paintings in which she was pictured with a book in her hand or her lap. Most of these were paintings of the Annunciation. When the angel Gabriel appeared to make his big announcement, he had apparently c
ome upon her while she was reading. There were also several depictions of Mary as a child with her mother, Saint Anne, and they had a book open between them, Anne teaching her daughter to read.

  —And you’re between books right now, Mary continued, so I figured I wouldn’t be coming at a bad time. Besides, you’re a great cook and I’ve been just dying for a home-cooked meal.

  I had no idea how seriously I was supposed to be taking all of this. She went on.

  —And you are quiet, she said. I looked into some other homes before coming here but they were all so crowded and chaotic. There were crying babies always demanding to be fed or changed, surly adolescents playing loud obnoxious music and slamming doors, big smelly dogs galloping up and down hallways, crabby-faced adults arguing, worrying, always rushing around. I want peace. I want quiet. The people of your country have a reputation for being quiet, polite, decent, and rather reserved. I haven’t been to this country nearly as often as I’ve been to some of the others. I thought I was long overdue for another visit. So…why you? Why not?

  —Besides, she went on, I knew if I came here, I would indeed get some rest. You are not going through a crisis right now—a crisis of faith or anything else. You are not contemplating suicide or murder. You are not suffering from a terminal illness. You are not blind, deaf, mute, lame, or simple-minded. You are strong, you are healthy, you are talented. You don’t need me at all right now. And besides, you are not afraid of me.

  —Well, maybe a little bit, I had to admit. This is a lot to take in.

  —I’m sure it is. But I did try to warn you, Mary said. There were signs that I was coming. But I didn’t want to make as grand an entrance as I have been known to in the past.

  —Signs? I asked.

  And then suddenly some of those unusual incidents of the previous week began to make sense. The squirrel, the mechanical healings, the day all my errands were completed without a single frisson of frustration. And that sighing last night in the corner—which had apparently not been a figment of my imagination after all.

  —I’m sorry, I said. I didn’t know they were signs. I thought I was just having a good week.

  —I was trying to be discreet, Mary explained. This time I didn’t want the whole world to know I was about to put in an appearance.

  Much as, in retrospect, I could read the signs, still I knew that nothing could have really prepared me for this.

  Mary got up and refilled her coffee. I had barely touched mine. I was well beyond my coffee quota for the day and my stomach was queasy—for that and any number of other reasons, no doubt.

  When she sat back down, she looked at me sternly and said:

  —There is only one thing about you that troubles me.

  While listening to all that she had just said, my mind had been racing with reservations, protestations, excuses, and reluctance. I had been piling up all the reasons why I did not want her here. Besides thinking about how I did not want to be chosen, how I was not willing to risk the havoc it was bound to wreak on my quiet life, I had also been thinking of how I do not much like having houseguests, divine or otherwise. I had been thinking of how they always interfere with my routines, they want clean towels and regular meals, they want to help, they want to talk, they want to engage me every time I turn around, and the more unobtrusive they try to be, the more they just get in the way.

  But now I was stung to hear that she might have some reservations about me. This was like being hurt when you’re not invited to a party you didn’t want to go to anyway.

  I had to admit that I desperately wanted her to like me. I wanted so much to please her. With all my heart, I wanted to be worthy.

  —What is it? I asked with trepidation.

  —I am not entirely sure that you’ll be able to keep my visit a secret, she said. Will you be able to resist the temptation to go and write a book about it afterwards?

  —Probably not, I admitted.

  Obviously there was no question of trying to lie to her.

  —Then you must make me a promise, she said. You must promise me that you will use a pseudonym and you will call it a novel. When that book comes out, I want to see in big letters that disclaimer on the copyright page: This is a work of fiction.

  —Yes, I said quickly. I promise.

  She leaned closer to me and the look on her formerly friendly face was almost threatening.

  —Do you know what will happen if you break this promise?

  I could just imagine. I thought about Lot’s wife turned into a pillar of salt. I thought about the ten plagues of Egypt: water made blood, frogs, gnats, flies, death to herds and flocks, boils and sores, thunder and hail, a plague of locusts, three days of darkness, the firstborn slain throughout the land. I thought about the Great Flood. I thought about Adam and Eve banished forever from the Garden. I thought about the trials of Job. I thought about being struck down in the prime of life, now when everything was going so well, now when all my dreams were finally coming true.

  —Divine wrath, I muttered.

  —If you break this promise, divine wrath will be the least of your problems, Mary said. Divine wrath will not even be necessary. If people find out that I have been here, that I have talked to you, eaten with you, and slept in your house, they will descend upon you in droves. They will make a plague of locusts look like a minor inconvenience.

  She took a deep breath and her voice became that of a fire-and-brimstone preacher hectoring his flock. Clearly, this was nothing like the casual conversation she had made over lunch.

  —They will come to your house by the thousands, she said. They will come by the busload, the curious and the faithful both. Some will even come on their knees. There will be traffic jams, parking problems. The neighbors will complain. The police will come. Every newspaper, magazine, and talk show in the world will cover it. You will be featured on the front page of the National Enquirer for months. You will be ridiculed and revered throughout the land. After a while, you will not know which is worse.

  Her dark eyes were nearly shooting off sparks as she warmed to her topic.

  —You will be worshipped and reviled. You will be called visionary, angel, prophet, saint, and divine messenger of God. You will also be called charlatan, crackpot, heretic, blasphemer, witch, and vile whore of Satan. Some will say you should be beatified, canonized. Others will say you should be burned at the stake. Most will just shake their heads and say you should be locked up.

  She sat perfectly still while she spoke, with her hands folded together on the table in front of her.

  —Fast-food stands will spring up, she said. They will sell hamburgers, hot dogs, popcorn, ice cream, and cotton candy in your front yard. There will be a gift shop in the driveway. They will sell souvenir bumper stickers, teeshirts, posters, pencils, fridge magnets, and holy trading cards. They will camp in your yard, both front and back. There will be Porta Potties. They will dig up your garden searching for a miraculous spring. If they don’t find one, they will declare the water that comes from your garden hose holy. They will bottle it and sell it by mail-order. They will drink it, bathe in it, and wash their cars with it.

  Fully transported now by her own vision of hell on earth, Mary continued. I could do nothing but listen. It was as if the kitchen around us had receded and all I could see was her face.

  I remembered watching a television program about a woman in New Mexico who had seen the face of Jesus in the scorch marks on a flour tortilla she was frying for her husband’s breakfast. I remembered that more than eleven thousand people had since trooped through their kitchen to have a good look.

  —They will follow you everywhere, Mary said. They will touch your skirt, your legs, your shoulders, your hair. They will fall on their knees before you in the supermarket, in your favorite restaurant, even in the dentist’s waiting room. They will beg you for miracles. They will cling to your ankles and wash your feet with their tears. They will go through your garbage and your recycling box. They will steal your underwear of
f the clothesline, peel the paint from your walls, pull the plants out of your flower beds, and worship all these things as holy relics.

  I could see that, given the right topic, she had a definite tendency to pontificate. This, I suppose, was to be expected. I also noticed that, the longer she spoke, the fainter her accent became, until, by this point, it had disappeared altogether.

  —They will heap so many offerings on your front step that you will not be able to open the door. You will be barricaded inside your own home by the mighty force of their adulation. They will fill up your mailbox with letters, more letters, thousands of letters, just like the letters they write to me.

  She closed her eyes and quoted a long litany of desperation.

  —Please cure my mother’s breast cancer. Please cure my father’s bad heart. Please cure my cousin’s varicose veins. Please cure my son’s brain tumor. Please cure my acne which is making me very ugly and unhappy.

  —Please let my baby be born healthy. Please let me pass my Science test on Tuesday. Please let me win the lottery so I can buy a new car.

  —Please make my husband stop drinking and fooling around. Please make my husband stop beating me. Please make me stop loving him anyway.

  —Please forgive me for lying to my mother. Please forgive me for hitting my dog. Please forgive me for sleeping with my best friend’s wife. Please forgive me for ending up in jail again.

  —Please help me find a good job. Please help me find a good man. Please help me find my cat. Please help me find my daughter who ran away from home two years ago. Please help me lose twenty pounds by next Saturday. Please help me. Please help me. Please help me.

  She bowed her head and her voice dropped to a whisper.

  —When you go to bed at night, still you will hear their voices, like music in the next room, a waterfall in the distance, leaves in the wind, like your own blood coursing through your veins. You will never be able to get them out of your head. Their prayers and promises, their nightmares and dreams. Their pain. Their hope. Their faith. Their innocent faith will break your heart.