Chapter 66: Sister Mysteries "Please Don't Let Me Hang"

When I open my eyes, Teresa is standing beside my bed in the convent. My mouth is as dry as the sheet that covers my straw mattress, the mattress that prickles the skin of my back.

Teresa is crying, her face as wet and pink as a ham. 

Sniffling, she turns away so that I won't see her cry but of course I know full well because she is using the bottom half of her white apron to wipe her eyes.

"Will you come with me today?" I whisper out of my cottony mouth. My heart drums inside my chest.

Teresa nods. "Of course." She sets the back of one hand against my cheek. Her own cheeks are glistening in tears.  "It's all his fault," she says, sniffling, wiping her eyes again with the apron. "If it weren't for Father Ruby, Mother Yolla would let you stay here she would protect you I just know sh..."

"Shhhhh," I lift my hand to stop her speaking.  I shake my head. "It's too late for that. It's too late." I push the covers back, I stand

I stand convicted of a crime I didn't commit, I will hang

if I return but return I

I don't stand instead

I sit on the bed for a moment thinking I have no choice but to go back today

I stand up, my stomach quaking. Señora told me to take the missing pages of my journal to the authorities so I will

"I will fix you anything you like for breakfast," Teresa says.  "I baked corn muffins but I'll make you..."

"Nothing, I couldn't possibly eat." I shudder. My eyes meet hers. "I am so..." I am about to say frightened but if I say the word, then it will just hang there in the air scaring me further. Instead I try to think what I want my last meal

"Fix me a cup of oatmeal please?"

She nods and leaves the room and I sit back down on the bed. Somehow I have to dress I have to
I must get in the wagon and go back to jail.

I slip the dress that Arthur bought me over my head. Soft calico little blue flowers red hearts soft cotton sleeves covering my elbows. Ever since I was arrested, I haven't been allowed to wear the habit I wore

just like Teresa wears today, the two of us once glued together

no more.

Soon I am in the kitchen where Teresa is stirring oatmeal on the wood stove. The corn muffins she baked earlier smell so pleasing that I lift one to my mouth and take a small bite.  Teresa begins lifting the oatmeal into a bowl. I sit down at the table and stare into oatmeal this is more than a cup, this is a whole bowl, I feel I may throw up

Teresa sets a cup of coffee in front of me. 

Arthur enters the kitchen, clutching the brim of his hat. "Good morning ma'am," he says, his dark eyes opened wide. "I was hoping I'd find you here in the kitchen."

I nod. "Yes," I say trying for a smile, but not succeeding.

Clearing his throat, Arthur drops his gaze to the floor. "You know that..." he starts, and stops and starts again, "that if you...I mean, if you have any inclination to....uh...go or leave without..." here he shrugs, nods. "God knows I would take you wherever you wanted to go, anywhere that..." His voice trails off.

"No," I say, emphatic. Again I try for a smile but nothing at all happens on my face. I push the bowl of oatmeal half-way across the table. "I must do what Mother Yolla says." And in that moment I realize that I am willing to go back to jail not because of what Mother Yolla has said -- that she cannot protect me --

[CHAPTER 63 lays it out bare]

but because of what Señora said when she woke up out of the coma last night

I KNOW SHE WOKE UP I KNOW SHE SPOKE TO ME I SWEAR SHE SQUEEZED MY HAND SHE WOKE UP

[READ IT FOR YOURSELF IN CHAPTER 64]

Arthur fingers his hat, the brim stained.  His eyes are pools. He says nothing, but stares at the floor again.

I turn to Teresa at the sink. "I think we should go right now, because I can't stand it another minute."  Poor Arthur just stands here, he would do anything to have me say that I would go somewhere anywhere with him I could never go I could never marry Arthur so how could I go anywhere but where

I have to go back and face it, the crime for which I'm not guilty

Teresa isn't sniffling but she when she speaks now her voice is raspy. "We must stop by the lawyer's office first, he should be there to escort you."

"I'm not sure that is necessary." I take another small bite of the corn muffin.

"Please Renata, you've got to listen to me on this." Teresa's expression is fierce.

I inhale. "It won't make any difference, he is so ineffectual I don't see..."

"PLEASE RENATA." Teresa steadies her gaze on me. "We've got to. We will need all the help we can get."

"And please if you would, let me take you in my wagon," Arthur says. "Please ma'am, I beg you just to let me do just this one thing."

I study his weathered face, his frown. This is a good face a good man one that I could never marry I am devoted to doing holy work no matter if the nun's life is over for me forever.

"Alright," I say, inhaling. "Alright. But let's just go." 

Teresa unties her apron. "I'm ready, I'll be outside."

I stand and go to my room and kneel beside my bed. I carefully lift the straw mattress and dig deep into the straw where the missing journal pages lie, just where I hid them, so many months ago so that I could protect Señora because she wasn't going to get any trial at all, being a Mexican woman who could speak hardly any English

[READ THE MISSING PAGES IN CHAPTER 65 WHICH TELLS HOW ANTONIE DIED HE WASN'T MURDERED

WELL MAYBE TECHNICALLY HE WAS BECAUSE HE WAS ALIVE WHEN WE DISCOVERED HIM IN THIS WARM POOL OF BLOOD]

I would say that

he wished himself dead.

Señora begged me when she woke from the coma last night she said

[IN CHAPTER 64 ]

Señora spoke in Spanish 

[and I cannot say it myself 

sp I had to go on the Internet and get one of those English to Spanish translations:]

Tome la revista páginas tomar ellos les muestran a las autoridades por favor, Renata que todos conocemos, se me que terminó Antonie, he mantenido la hoja hice el final cut y él venció en un charco de sangre en mi regazo,

["Take the journal pages take them show them to the authorities please Renata let them show the whole world so they know that it was me who finished Antonie, I held the blade I made the final cut and he expired in a pool of blood in my lap]

As we prepare to leave, I see Mother Yolla standing in the courtyard. She seems frozen, a dozen feet away. As Arthur helps me up into the wagon, she is as still

as a statue, she looks so tired, so sad, her face is pale, she looks so much older than she

just stands there watching, she doesn't wave we don't wave back not

able to protect me, Father Ruby forbid her from letting me hide in the convent.

Arthur snaps the reins the horse bolts forward and the three of us, me in between Arthur and Teresa bounce on the rutted path leading to the dusty road.

We are headed back to the jail, to the courthouse to deliver me, to deliver the missing pages of the journal to try to convince them
some
HOW? SOME WAY
HOW I AM NOT SURE HOW CAN WE POSSIBLY
WHAT CAN ANYONE SAY TO CONVINCE THEM
=======

that I

don't deserve to hang.