Finding Ashley - Danielle Steel Page 0,34

the end, though. They all did. It broke my heart to see the look on their faces when we took the babies away minutes after we delivered them. I tried to at least let the girls see them, and hold them when I could get away with it. Our orders were to take the babies away immediately, with no contact between mother and child, after everything they’d been through. We practiced natural childbirth, so there was less liability for us. The adoptive parents were usually waiting in the nursery. That was the end of it for the girls from that point on. They had no contact with their babies, no chance to hold them or say goodbye. It was very traumatic for most of the girls. All of them probably.

“After a while, I just couldn’t do it, it was too painful to watch, worse than labor and delivery. I let the nursing nuns take the babies from them. I couldn’t. I gave up midwifery and the Church when I left. In a way, it destroyed me too. I recovered, but it took a long time, and I never really forgave myself for being part of it. We had very strict orders about our protocols. That’s why I wrote the book. I wanted to make people aware, and maybe to get absolution. The Church claimed we were providing a noble service, but they never admitted how much money they made. I think we’d be even more horrified if we knew how much they made in all those years.”

“Were there local girls there too?” Hattie asked her.

“Very few. Most of their parents couldn’t afford it. There were a few socialites and aristocrats from London, the occasional French girl, or Spaniard or Italian, but mainly Americans. They could pay more to send their daughters away, and the Americans who adopted the babies liked adopting from other Americans. It was mainly a business for the Church.”

“Why did they burn the records?” Hattie asked in a sad voice. She hated to think of what her sister had been through.

“Why do you think? So no one could be contacted, no one would talk. The girls’ parents didn’t want anyone to know their daughters had given birth out of wedlock. And a lot of the adopting parents often pretended the babies were their own. They disappeared for six months, and then suddenly reappeared with a baby. Burning the records protected everyone, including the Church for what they’d made. They did it for decades, long before I got there, and when I realized what was happening, and how it was handled, I finally gave up and left. It took me another year to give up my vows and ask to be released. It soured me forever on everything I believed about the goodness and innocence of the Church. I didn’t want to be part of it. It turned my years as a nun into a travesty. I felt as though I did more harm than good and had been part of a cabal to coerce those girls into giving up babies they wanted. Their parents didn’t even show up to pick them up after what they’d been through. We just put them on a plane and sent them home, two weeks after delivery. Stand ’em up and out the door. Next. It was heartless and profitable. Be careful,” she warned Hattie, “if you read too much about it, it may do the same to you. I didn’t want to be part of a church that did things like that for pure profit. Maybe, if they’d done it for free, out of ignorance and some archaic beliefs, I could have forgiven them. But not for profit to the degree it was. I’m sure there were some innocents involved, but the nuns who ran Saint Blaise’s then knew what they were doing. They didn’t care at all about the girls, just about the babies they could sell to rich, desperate couples. The truth is ugly,” she said in a matter-of-fact voice, but her eyes were sad when she talked about the girls.

Hattie showed her the photograph of Melissa at sixteen then, and Fiona shook her head. “I’m sorry, but I don’t remember her. The only thing I remember about that year is who the movie stars were that we gave babies to. I think there were three major stars that year.” She named them, and Hattie was startled by who they were. All three were very famous Hollywood