Lily laughed.
Her son, Marcus, became Richard’s first grandchild.
The town called Richard foolish again when he converted the garage into a nursery.
By then, being called foolish sounded like history repeating itself.
PART SIX — THE WOMAN WHO CAME LOOKING
In 1998, nearly twenty years after the girls were found, a woman named Evelyn Carter arrived at Richard’s house.
She was fifty-three, thin, and dressed in a nurse’s uniform beneath a brown coat. Her hands shook when Richard opened the door.
“I know who left the babies,” she said.
Richard did not invite her inside immediately.
The girls were scattered across the country, though several were home for Christmas. Rose stood behind him. Iris watched from the stairs.
“Who are you?” Richard asked.
“I worked at County General in 1979.”
“Doing what?”
“Maternity nursing.”
The room became still.
Evelyn carried a box containing copies of medical charts, photographs, and one faded blanket fragment.
The nine girls had not been found by chance.
They were not biological nonuplets.
They were nine infants born to different mothers over fourteen months.
The story about one blanket had been fabricated by St. Mary’s to prevent authorities from separating them before identities could be investigated.
Richard stared at her.
“What are you saying?”
Evelyn sat at the kitchen table.
In the late 1970s, a private maternity residence outside town accepted unmarried pregnant women whose families paid for secrecy. Some were teenagers. Some were domestic workers. Some were women impregnated by employers, clergy members, or married men.
The residence promised confidential births and adoption.
Instead, administrators sold healthy white babies to wealthy couples through private arrangements.
Black babies were considered harder to place.
Nine remained.
“The residence was closing,” Evelyn said. “Records were being destroyed.”
“What happened to the mothers?”
“Most were told their babies died or had already been adopted.”
Rose gripped the back of a chair.
“Who put us at the church?”
“I did.”
Richard’s face hardened.
“You left nine infants outside in a storm?”
“It had not started raining yet.”
