Vigil Read online

  As we watched the sisters and priests amble about between their chores, their heads bowed as they went, I noticed that one of the sisters was not as sullen as the rest. She had a spring to her step, she ate the worms in her bowl with gusto like the rest of us, and when she shoveled fresh dirt over the latrine, the most unpleasant chore of all, she often whistled. Sister Josepha came from the United States and spoke Spanish with a heavy accent we all found amusing. When we laughed at the way she said certain words, she’d laugh along with us and never became angry or accuse us of disrespect like some of the others.

  It felt good to laugh. When this piece of dormant humanity stirred within me it filled me with newfound energy. Whenever Sister Josepha mispronounced a word, I felt that it was my duty to correct her, and sometimes I’d correct her so often that she’d prop her hands on her hips and say, “Ana, you’re a wonderful teacher but don’t you think you should give your student a break every now and again? Un descanso?”

  She was small and stout, and she had a round head that looked even more so because of the wimple she wore from the moment she woke in the morning to the moment she went to sleep at night. I loved the way her curly brown hair peeked out of the edges like a crust, making her face look like a thick pupusa. I did everything in my power to be near her and it was a mystery to me how every child in the compound wasn’t glued to her side as I was. Didn’t they feel the healing that emanated from her, the warmth, the hopefulness? She was the only one among us who was fully alive, breathing deeply while the rest of us gasped for air.

  No matter what Sister Josepha was doing, be it sweeping the filth out of the huts, stirring a pot of something at the outdoor kitchen, or shoveling dirt over the latrine, should she look to her right, she was almost certain to find me standing there waiting, simply waiting for her to notice me. But I wasn’t as passive as I looked. Her right elbow belonged to me and if someone had attempted to take it from me, I would’ve fought for it as fiercely as some of the boys fought for their food. Sometimes, she’d ask me to help her; at other times, she just let me stand there doing nothing. But even doing nothing was something, so long as I was near Sister Josepha.

  As constant companions, we had plenty of time to talk, so I asked her why she’d become a nun, and if it was because she knew that life with a man would lead to nothing but heartache. This brought a bemused smile to her lovely round face. “Of course not,” she said. “I was in love once, believe it or not, but when God spoke to me and directed me to follow him, I had to listen and obey.”

  “God spoke to you?” I asked, intrigued. “With your ears all covered up, it must’ve been difficult to hear him.”

  Sister Josepha laughed. “No, no, silly. When God speaks to you, you don’t hear him with your ears,” she said, pointing to the side of her head. “You hear him with your heart.”

  “Is that like smelling with your eyes and tasting with your nose?”

  She laughed again, which pleased me greatly because her laugh made me feel as though all the angels in heaven were smiling upon me. “Something like that,” she said, giving my ear a playful tweak.

  It wasn’t a surprise to any of us that back in the United States Sister Josepha had been a teacher, because she had a way of talking that made you stop whatever you were doing just to listen. After the chores were done we often gathered around to hear her explain the war, and as the pieces slowly came together, things started to make sense to me.

  “The war that is killing your people and destroying your land isn’t really your war,” she said. “This war belongs to the Soviet Union and to my country.”

  At first we didn’t understand how this could be true when we hadn’t seen people from any of these countries she mentioned. We’d seen only El Salvadoran men and boys wearing soldiers’ uniforms, but she explained that while the Americans and the Russians didn’t fight the war themselves, the Guardsmen were trained and supported by the Americans, and the Rebels by the Soviet Union and other communist allies.

  One of the boys said, “It’s like a soccer game. Don’t you want your country to win, Sister Josepha?”

  “There are no winners in this kind of game,” she replied sadly.

  Another boy said, “My father was killed by the Guard because they thought he was a communist. When I’m older, I’m going to kill all the Guard so that the communists win the war.” He raised an angry fist in the air, but could hold it only for a few seconds before breaking down in sobs.

  Sister Josepha rushed to embrace him, and the boy wept on her shoulder for a long while as we looked on. “Forgiveness and understanding is the answer, little one,” she said over and over until he was still and quiet against her breast.

  Sister Josepha removed her wimple and veil only at night before she went to sleep. She carefully hung the stiff white fabric on the hook next to her hammock and brushed off the dust that had accumulated over it throughout the day with a cloth she kept tucked into her sleeve. I could tell she was uncomfortable to have us see her short brown hair that looked like tiny snails stuck to her head, but there was no way to avoid it as the sisters and priests slept in the same huts with the children. She never lay in her hammock in the daytime, but one afternoon she excused herself after announcing that she wasn’t feeling well. As her constant companion, I knew better than anyone that she’d been feeling poorly for several days and had spent quite a bit of time behind the trees where the latrine was located. I maintained enough distance to give her privacy, but I was close enough to hear the blustery sounds of her stomach upset, which I still considered strangely holy when coming from her.

  I stood guard outside her hut when she went in to lie down, and waved away the children who tried to enter, explaining that Sister Josepha was ill and needed to rest. After a few minutes I became anxious and went in to check on her. I was relieved to find her soundly asleep and snoring lightly, her wimple and veil hanging on its hook as usual. I felt suddenly compelled to remove them from the hook, and without thinking about it, tiptoed over to the small mirror at the far end of the hut. I put the wimple over my head as I’d seen Sister Josepha do countless times, and then draped the veil over the top, allowing the fabric to fan across my shoulders. I stared at myself in the mirror for a very long time, mesmerized by the sight of my face that had been transformed from plain and unremarkable into something angelic. I saw the great sadness in my eyes, and my mouth set straight with resolve. Crowned as I was, my banal misery had been elevated to a sacred kind of suffering. All at once, I’d taken several steps up the ladder leading to heaven and put a remarkable distance between me and the calamity of my species. I had no doubt that I was staring into the face of providence.

  I felt a hand on my shoulder and saw Sister Josepha’s reflection behind me. I’d been so captivated that I hadn’t heard her wake up or walk across the hut toward me. “Ana,” she said, her face shining. “You look…you look beautiful.”

  Tears sprung to my eyes. I was ashamed that she’d caught me with her precious wimple, but also stunned by what she’d said to me. Never in my life had anyone told me I was beautiful.

  I removed the wimple and handed it back to her. “I want to be like you, Sister Josepha. I want to be a teacher and I want to be the bride of Christ and no other.”

  Sister Josepha embraced me. “Thanks be to God,” she said.

  Following my revelation, Sister Josepha and I became even closer than before, and at night after I’d sung my lullabies to Teresita, she’d allow me to sleep with her in her hammock. I curled up beside her and tried very hard not to be a disturbance. But sometimes, if she was still awake, she would encircle me with her arm as my mother used to do, and she’d say, “When the war ends we’ll all be free of this misery. Let us pray for a quick resolution to the war, Ana.”

  “Yes, Sister. Let us pray.”

  “And you shouldn’t feel guilty about surviving when so many others have died. These matters are up to God and not us.”

  I accepted her words gratefully, the way
Teresita accepted my lullabies. I would never know for certain why God chose me to live, but if nothing else, my ignorance about such things and my submission to the mystery of my survival created a willing servant, and I understood that my life was not my own.

  After several nights of this talk, I realized that Sister Josepha felt badly because she was unable to single-handedly stop the war. Dear Sister Josepha. I wanted to take her sweet pupusa face in my hands and tell her not to worry about such things anymore, that it was like trying to count all the stars on a moonless night, an impossible task that would only keep her awake.

  “I would like to leave this place and go to your country,” I said to change the subject. “Let’s imagine that we’re two birds flying over the sea and the mountains and valleys on our way there.”

  “I’m surprised you’d want to go to the United States after all I’ve told you.”

  “I don’t understand all the politics you teach us, Sister, but I think it must be a wonderful place.”

  “Why?”

  “Because any place you come from has to be wonderful.”

  She kissed the crown of my head and said, “Someday, I will take you there.”

  One evening as I slept next to Sister Josepha, I was awakened by a horrible and familiar sound. This time I had no doubt about the source of the howling, and immediately turned and shook Sister Josepha awake. She was unconcerned and thought, as I had the first time I’d heard it, that it was nothing but feral dogs or coyotes calling to one another. As we listened, the howling got louder and I began to shake and whimper with fear.

  “Even if it is the Guard, they won’t bother us here,” Sister Josepha said, trying to calm me, but I was pulling at my hair and felt that all the terror I’d suppressed while hiding in the sewing cabinet was bursting out of me all at once.

  “They’ll kill us, Sister,” I cried.

  “Quiet,” she said. “You’ll upset the others.”

  I repeated more softly, “But they’ll kill us. We have to hide.”

  Sister Josepha didn’t move, but she was pensive. I could only hope that she was listening to God’s voice in her heart. Suddenly she sat up and swung her legs out of the hammock as she reached for her wimple. In no time she was fully dressed and lacing up her shoes. By then, the howling was so close that I was certain the soldiers were only a few hundred yards away.

  “If they are soldiers as you say, I’ll go speak to them and explain that there are no rebel guerrillas here, only children,” she said. “And if they’re hungry, I’ll give them something to eat.”

  It was foolish to think that sensible talk and a plate of food could ever combat the evil that possessed these men. They were hungry for blood, and they wouldn’t return to the hell that had spawned them until they’d had their fill of it. Already I could sense the pounding of their boots out on the road, the rattle and click of their weapons, their sniggers and jeers. “Don’t you hear them?” I asked, still trembling.

  “Try and calm down, Ana. I want you to wait here while I—”

  I grabbed her sleeve midsentence and I pulled her through the hut of sleeping children, and out the door toward the back of the compound where the latrine was located. We weren’t spotted only because our hut was the farthest from the road. I had every intention of pulling her deep into the jungle, but Sister Josepha took back control just as we reached the perimeter of the compound and pulled me behind the tree where the latrine was located. The stench was overwhelming, but this is where she insisted we wait. She whispered sternly, “Once you’re satisfied that all is well, we’ll go back. I just hope we didn’t wake the other children.”

  From behind the tree we could see that there were about ten soldiers in all. Some were leaning on their guns while others urinated into the well, chuckling and shoving one another playfully. One man became annoyed when his boot was splattered with urine and he kicked dirt at the one who’d splattered him, who in turn spit at him, causing those watching to laugh out loud. If we ignored the guns and the uniforms, they could’ve been boys playing among the coffee trees on their way home from school. If their mothers caught them behaving in such a fashion, they’d be in for a spanking or worse.

  Then we saw one of the priests come out of his hut to address the soldiers. The sight of gray hair gleaming in the moonlight let us know that it was Father Anselmo, who was in charge of the orphanage. We were too far away to hear his words but we could see that the men were listening to him because they were no longer leaning on their guns and had started to walk toward him and gather round the way we gathered around Sister Josepha.

  As Father Anselmo spoke he lifted his hands in a desperate plea, and all at once the soldier standing behind him lifted the butt of his rifle and struck him hard on the back of his head. Sister Josepha gasped as he fell face forward on the dirt and the same man who’d hit him placed his foot squarely on the old priest’s back. Father Anselmo’s arms and legs flailed about pitifully, reminding me of a lizard after it had been speared by a sharp stick. Often the poor creature lingered and squirmed long after the boy who’d speared it lost interest, but I was always quick to end its misery with a large rock. Standing behind me now, Sister Josepha’s arms encircled me.

  Some of the Guardsmen drifted away and began to pass out cigarettes among them. The soldier standing over Father Anselmo became momentarily distracted by this, and the old priest was able to arch his back in an effort to stand, but the guard brought his foot down hard, and the old man crashed back to the ground. He started flapping and thrashing again, and the guard bumped him on the head with the butt of his gun a few more times to quiet him down. Then he called out to his companions, pointed his weapon at the priest’s head, and pulled the trigger, after which the squirming instantly stopped.

  Sister Josepha jumped at the sound of that single fatal shot and squeezed me so hard I could feel her heart thumping wildly against my back. She began to mumble frantic prayers just as another soldier appeared with the young nun who slept in the hut next to ours. Sister Roberta was fair and slight, and so quiet that I often wondered if she’d taken a vow of silence. The soldier was dragging her roughly by her arm toward the other men. In one swift motion he ripped off her modest dress, as though it were made of paper, and pulled off her undergarments, until she stood naked before the men. She tried vainly to cover her breasts and genitals, but the soldier whacked her hands away with the barrel of his gun. She wailed, and the trembling of her pale thighs was visible even from a distance.

  Sister Josepha shrieked in horror just as the men exploded with a cheer and began to drop their trousers. She grabbed my arm and pulled me away, but not before one of the men turned to look toward where we hid. I’ll never forget his eyes, like bleeding scabs that will never heal.

  We ran deep into the darkness of the jungle, but I had no doubt that they were after us. We’d been spotted by one, and surely the rest had heard Sister Josepha’s scream. They would never allow any witnesses to their terror survive. They were stronger and faster and knew the jungle well. They were probably just a few steps behind us and soon they would catch us, brutally violate us, and kill us like dogs. I was certain that I could hear them thrashing through the jungle behind us, but I was also strangely fortified. Deaf to the children’s screams, the gunfire, the jeering, and all the horrifying sounds of war, I heard only the howling deep in my soul as my arms and legs moved in torpid spasms through the undergrowth, desperate to get away and nothing more. The dense sounds of the jungle and the thickening presence of nature surrounding us were more shielding than I could’ve imagined. It didn’t scare me as before, and I embraced whatever it brought, even death, knowing that the fatal bite of a rattlesnake would be an infinitely better way to leave this world than what I’d just seen.

  As we ran deeper into the jungle, the roots and low branches slowed us down, and Sister Josepha’s veil and wimple were snagged so many times that she had no choice but to remove the lot and sacrifice it to the jungle that had saved us. We ran
all through the night. As dawn was coming up, we could see its delicate gray light through the trees, and Sister Josepha stopped and fell to her knees. Gasping for air, she pulled me down next to her, and together we prayed for Father Anselmo and Sister Roberta and all the souls that had perished. It hurt me deeply to see sweet-hearted Sister Josepha weeping so inconsolably, as though she’d lost all faith in humanity and maybe even God. I threw my arms around her neck and clung to her, but I couldn’t weep. I felt an elation I didn’t quite understand. My heart and lungs were infused with a sensational power, and I felt that I could run a hundred miles through the jungle without stopping once to catch my breath. I’d escaped the howling dogs yet again, and with my precious Sister Josepha beside me, I was no longer alone.

  Three

  THE DISTANT SOUND OF a car door slamming caused Ana to jump slightly and focus her gaze on the farthest corner of the garden. Still at the window, she was able to see where the drive veered toward the gate and where she was almost certain that there was something moving just beyond the laurel trees. She then remembered that she hadn’t closed the gate after Dr. Farrell left that morning, and she was preparing to go downstairs to take care of it when she realized that a woman dressed in a dark cloak and veil was making her way up the path toward the house. She was somewhat portly and wobbled on her feet as she walked over the gravel, but she was able to steady herself with her cane and was making slow but steady progress.

  The cloaked woman emerged from under the shadow of the trees, and Ana immediately recognized Sister Josepha’s round face, uncharacteristically tense as she concentrated on her trek over such uneven terrain. Ana gasped and was charged by a sudden bolt of energy. After making certain that Adam was still asleep, she rushed downstairs and out the front door with the unfettered exuberance of a child. She ran swiftly and nimbly over the gravel, waving as she went and calling out, “Wait, Sister Josepha! Wait and I’ll help you to the door.” By the time Ana reached her, Sister Josepha was smiling and squinting behind her square spectacles. Ana pulled her into such an ardent embrace that the older woman dropped her cane, but she was chuckling and obviously delighted to be received with such enthusiasm.