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Chapter 7

Chiaria’s surprise!

Chiaria held her pregnancy well, only confiding in the confessional to the padre who visited every other month, mostly because the nuns prayed every day and just didn’t have that much to confess, until Chiaria.

Padre Phillipa told her to fake illness with a contagious tumor in her stomach and he would have a midwife in the next town over to deliver the baby.

The Mother Superior and other residents of the convent believed her and were told not to visit. They prayed and prayed that the tumor would leave her body and not be contagious. The midwife was the same one who delivered Emilio. She was now in her nineties and very arthritic.

She couldn’t pass up the chance to again deliver a human. She was pleased that she was chosen by the padre and had a few drinks and then celebrated with him. Chiaria, with little pain and screaming, delivered two dark-haired babies. The midwife tried to deliver in her normal way of reaching in and grabbing the baby and help it out, but delivering twins was new to her!

When she grabbed the first head and gently pulled, it was a long process as she realized that something else was attached. She cried out to the padre that the devil was at work and the baby had two heads and four legs, a sure sign that the nun was being punished by God for her “indiscretion.” She also yelled to the padre that the devil was being delivered to kill all associated with this unnatural event.

When the padre prayed over the baby, they both saw that they were twins and attached at the big toes. Praise the Lord! The good Lord is challenging us to test our faith.

Chiaria was recovering nicely, holding the two babies and trying to figure out the best way to nurse them with their feet stuck together. The padre was in a dilemma; he had to protect Chiaria and still tell the convent nuns how her “surgery” went. Not wanting to lie, he found two large mushroom caps, cut off the stems, pushed them together, and held them at a distance to show the nuns the size of “growth” that came out of Chiaria.

He warned them to be careful and not get too close, for fear of anything contagious, and showed them to the good sisters before putting it into a fire. He thanked the sisters for their prayers as he told them that it was their prayers that helped Chiaria survive the “surgery.” He likened it to giving birth, although not one sister knew what that meant!

Chiaria, after the midwife cleared her to leave with the babies, was undecided what to do. She only knew the convent life and was very concerned that the good sisters at Our Lady of Knock would not accept her children or her back and she would be homeless.

As she was walking back to town from the midwife’s stable home, holding the quiet twins, she saw the Mormon mini-temple.

It has to be a sign, Chiaria thought. A good Christian place to leave the twins so that they will be raised in a good, God-fearing environment.

No one was there when she went in, and she decided that they were a poor congregation that donated all their alms to the locals.

This is to be another sign. They live a frugal life as only two sleeping bags and a tent are inside. I will leave the twins here with a simple note that asks them to take care of them and name them Guido and Luigi, two lesser-known saints, although I don’t know what they did, only that I like the names.

Chiaria dropped off the twins and went back to the convent to pray, eat, and have a roof over her head. No one knew any better when she returned; they all believed that their prayers saved her and what the padre showed them.

The Mother Superior did question her, “Chiaria, where doth thou go for you medical treatment? I understand that the padre brought you a good distance from Our Lady of Knock to a specialist.”

“Mother Superior, I received the best treatment for the condition that I had, and it was unfortunately not close by. Did not the good Padre give you updates?”

“No, my daughter, he gave no updates until he showed us the tumor and then cast it into the fire to purge the disease,” answered Mother Superior. “Was it truly something that we could have caught here at the Knock and thereby you were isolated?”

“Yes, Mother, there was a possibility that you could have caught what I had,” Chiaria clearly stated, with honest conviction. “I can assure you that if anyone else would have had it, or still may, the best option is move far away until it is gone!”

Whew, whew, whew, thought Chiaria after the Mother Superior’s inquisition and suspicions were answered. She owed one to the good padre for his support.

Life at the convent of Our Lady of Knock went back to normal for Chiaria, at least for a short while.