Open Wounds by S. C. Farrow

Author:S. C. Farrow
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9786197458428
Publisher: Dixi Books Publishing
Published: 2019-09-02T16:00:00+00:00

The Hanging of Jean Lee

THURSDAY 15TH FEBRUARY 1951

Four days before the execution

The pungent odour of turpentine and beeswax, used to polish the pine wood floor, lingers in every hard-angled corner of the chapel as Sister Agnes kneels in a pool of pale lamplight, in the silence that’s loudest before dawn, with her head bowed, her eyes closed, and her fingers woven tightly together as she whispers to God. ‘I’m lost, Father. I’ve lost my way. I have no idea what I’m doing here. What am I doing here? What is my purpose? Help me, Father. Guide me. Please don’t let me stray.’

At the end of her prayer, Agnes rests her head on her hands and sighs. She didn’t sleep well last night. In fact, she hasn’t slept well for many nights. For the last four months, her sleep has been broken and plagued by nightmares.

There are so many who are lost. So many who need their help. The Community’s resources are stretched to the limit, as is her ability to feel sympathy for those she’s sworn to help. She used to find satisfaction in this honest, down-to-earth work. But now... Now, she’s not so sure.

***

The late afternoon sun beats down on the laundry’s ancient brick walls making them hot to the touch. Inside, the windows in the large stand-alone building are firmly shut and barred. The lime render, not painted since 1921, flakes off the walls.

Steam rises in clouds from the boiling water in the massive coppers and is trapped in the arched ceiling creating an unbearable humidity. The nuns leave the outside doors open, but without a breeze the building is little more than a steam room.

Thirty-seven girls work in the overwhelming heat. Kathleen, the youngest, is barely thirteen-years old. She was sent here because her widowed father decided he could no longer care for her. And with no living relatives to take her in, this was the best he could do for her. Now, she spends her days in the laundry folding sheets and her nights in the crowded dormitory curled up in her cot and sobbing into her pillow.

At twenty-two, Edith is the oldest girl. When she was seven-years old and starving hungry, the corner grocer caught her stealing biscuits when her alcoholic mother neglected to feed her. Now a woman, Edith has the most responsible job in the laundry, ironing altar linen and the parish priest’s surplices.

Other girls stand at the row of sinks that line the far wall scrubbing tablecloths from city restaurants. Some use giant mangles to press sheets for the women’s hospital while the rest soak the sheets and habits that belong to the nuns.

‘We’d better hurry,’ Sister Margaret says, as she uses the long wooden pole to heave a soaking wet sheet from a copper boiler into the nearby laundry trough. ‘It’s almost time for the penitents to go to tea and for us to go to Vespers. You don’t want to miss it again tonight.’

‘I missed it once,’ Agnes sighs, sweating

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