The Testaments

53

I’d made it into Gilead. I’d thought I knew a lot about it, but living a thing is different, and with Gilead it was very different. Gilead was slippery, like walking on ice: I felt off balance all the time. I couldn’t read people’s faces, and I often didn’t know what they were saying. I could hear the words, I could understand the words themselves, but I couldn’t translate them into meaning.

At that first meeting in the chapel, after we’d done the kneeling and the singing, when Aunt Beatrice took me to a pew to sit down, I looked back over the room full of women. Everyone was staring at me and smiling in a way that was part friendly and part hungry, like those scenes in horror movies where you know the villagers will turn out to be vampires.

Then there was an all-night vigil for the new Pearls: we were supposed to be doing silent meditation while kneeling. Nobody had told me about this: What were the rules? Did you put up your hand to go to the bathroom? In case you’re wondering, the answer was yes. After hours of this—my legs were really cramping—one of the new Pearls, from Mexico I think, began crying hysterically and then yelling. Two Aunts picked her up and marched her out. I heard later that they’d turned her into a Handmaid, so it was a good thing I’d kept my mouth shut.

The following day we were given those ugly brown outfits, and the next thing I knew we were being herded off to a sports stadium where we were seated in rows. No one had mentioned sports in Gilead—I’d thought they didn’t have any—but it wasn’t sports. It was a Particicution. They’d told us about those back in school, but they hadn’t gone into too much detail, I guess, because they didn’t want to traumatize us. Now I could understand that.

It was a double execution: two men literally torn apart by a mob of frenzied women. There was screaming, there was kicking, there was biting, there was blood everywhere, on the Handmaids especially: they were covered in it. Some of them held up parts—clumps of hair, what looked like a finger—and then the others yelled and cheered.

It was gruesome; it was terrifying. It added a whole new dimension to my picture of Handmaids. Maybe my mother had been like that, I thought: feral.

54

Becka and I did our best to instruct the new Pearl, Jade, as Aunt Lydia had requested, but it was like talking to the air. She did not know how to sit patiently, with her back straight and her hands folded in her lap; she twisted, squirmed, fidgeted with her feet. “This is how women sit,” Becka would tell her, demonstrating.

“Yes, Aunt Immortelle,” she would say, and she would make a show of trying. But these attempts did not last long, and soon she was slouching again and crossing her ankles over her knees.

At Jade’s first evening meal at Ardua Hall, we sat her between us for her own protection, because she was so heedless. Nonetheless, she behaved most unwisely. It was bread and an indeterminate soup—on Mondays they often mixed up the leftovers and added some onions—and a salad of pea vines and white turnip. “The soup,” she said. “It’s like mouldy dishwater. I’m not eating it.”

“Shhh…. Be thankful for what you are given,” I whispered back to her. “I’m sure it’s nutritious.”

The dessert was tapioca, again. “I can’t handle this.” She dropped her spoon with a clatter. “Fish eyes in glue.”

“It’s disrespectful not to finish,” said Becka. “Unless you’re fasting.”

“You can have mine,” said Jade.

“People are looking,” I said.

When she’d first arrived, her hair was greenish—that was the sort of mutilation they went in for in Canada, it seemed—but outside our apartment she had to keep her hair covered, so this had not been generally noticed. Then she began pulling hairs out of the back of her neck. She said this helped her think.

“You’ll make a bald spot if you keep on doing that,” Becka said to her. Aunt Estée had taught us that when we were in the Rubies Premarital Preparatory classes: if you remove hairs frequently, they will not grow back. It is the same with eyebrows and eyelashes.

“I know,” said Jade. “But nobody sees your hair around here anyway.” She smiled at us confidingly. “One day I’m going to shave my head.”

“You can’t do that! A woman’s hair is her glory,” said Becka. “It’s been given to you as a covering. That’s in Corinthians I.”

“Only one glory? Hair?” Jade said. Her tone was abrupt, but I don’t think she meant to be rude.

“Why would you want to shame yourself by shaving your head?” I asked as gently as I could. If you were a woman, having no hair was a mark of disgrace: sometimes, after a complaint by a husband, the Aunts would cut off a disobedient or scolding Econowife’s hair before locking her into the public stocks.

“To see what it’s like to be bald,” said Jade. “It’s on my bucket list.”

“You must be careful what you say to others,” I told her. “Becka—Aunt Immortelle and I are forgiving, and we understand that you are newly arrived from a degenerate culture; we are trying to help you. But other Aunts—especially the older ones such as Aunt Vidala—are constantly on the lookout for faults.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” said Jade. “I mean, Yes, Aunt Victoria.”

“What is a bucket list?” Becka asked.

“Stuff I want to do before I die.”

“Why is it called that?”

“It’s from ‘kick the bucket,’ ” said Jade. “It’s just a saying.” Then, seeing our puzzled looks, she continued. “I think it’s from when they used to hang people from trees. They’d make them stand on a bucket and then hang them, and their feet would kick, and naturally they would kick the bucket. Just my guess.”

“That’s not how we hang people here,” said Becka.

55

I quickly realized that the two young Aunts in Doorway C didn’t approve of me; but they were all I had because I wasn’t on talking terms with anyone else. Aunt Beatrice had been kind when she’d been converting me, back in Toronto, but now that I was here I was no longer any concern of hers. She smiled at me in a distant way when I passed her, but that was all.

When I paused to think about it I was afraid, but I tried not to let fear control me. I was also feeling very lonely. I didn’t have any friends here, and I couldn’t contact anyone back there. Ada and Elijah were far away. There was no one I could ask for guidance; I was on my own, with no instruction book. I really missed Garth. I daydreamed about the things we’d done together: sleeping in the cemetery, panhandling on the street. I even missed the junk food we’d eaten. Would I ever get back there, and if I did, what would happen then? Garth probably had a girlfriend. How could he not have one? I’d never asked him because I didn’t want to hear the answer.

But one of my biggest anxieties was about the person Ada and Elijah called the source—their contact inside Gilead. When would this person show up in my life? What if they didn’t exist? If there was no “source,” I’d be stuck here in Gilead because there wouldn’t be anyone to get me out.

56

Jade was very untidy. She left her items in our common room—her stockings, the belt of her new Supplicants probationer uniform, sometimes even her shoes. She didn’t always flush the toilet. We’d find her hair combings blowing around on the bathroom floor, her toothpaste in the sink. She took showers at unauthorized hours until firmly told not to, several times. I know these are trivial things, but they can add up in close quarters.

There was also the matter of the tattoo on her left arm. It said GOD and LOVE, made into a cross. She claimed it was a token of her conversion to the true belief, but I doubted that, as she’d let slip on one occasion that she thought God was “an imaginary friend.”

“God is a real friend, not an imaginary one,” said Becka. There was as much anger in her voice as she was capable of revealing.

“Sorry if I disrespected your cultural belief,” Jade said, which did not improve things in the eyes of Becka: saying God was a cultural belief was even worse than saying he was an imaginary friend. We realized that Jade thought we were stupid; certainly she thought we were superstitious.

“You should have that tattoo removed,” Becka said. “It’s blasphemous.”

“Yeah, maybe you’re right,” said Jade. “I mean, Yes, Aunt Immortelle, thank you for telling me. Anyway, it’s itchy as hell.”

“Hell is more than itchy,” said Becka. “I will pray for your redemption.”

When Jade was upstairs in her room, we would often hear thumping noises and muffled shouts. Was it a barbarian form of prayer? I finally had to ask her what she was doing in there.

“Working out,” she said. “It’s like exercising. You have to keep strong.”

“Men are strong in body,” said Becka. “And in mind. Women are strong in spirit. Though moderate exercise is allowed, such as walking, if a woman is of child-bearing age.”

“Why do you think you need to be strong in body?” I asked her. I was becoming more and more curious about her pagan beliefs.

“In case some guy aggresses you. You need to know how to stick your thumbs in their eyes, knee them in the balls, throw a heartstopper punch. I can show you. Here’s how to make a fist—curl your fingers, wrap your thumb across your knuckles, keep your arm straight. Aim for the heart.” She slammed her fist into the sofa.

Becka was so astonished that she had to sit down. “Women don’t hit men,” she said. “Or anyone, except when it’s required by law, such as in Particicutions.”

“Well, that’s convenient!” said Jade. “So you should just let them do whatever?”

“You shouldn’t entice men,” said Becka. “What happens if you do is partly your fault.”

Jade looked from one to the other of us. “Victim-blaming?” she said. “Really?”

“Pardon?” said Becka.

“Never mind. So you’re telling me it’s a lose-lose,” Jade said. “We’re screwed whatever we do.” The two of us gazed at her in silence; no answer is an answer, as Aunt Lise used to say.

“Okay,” she said. “But I’m doing my workouts anyway.”

Four days after Jade’s arrival, Aunt Lydia called Becka and me to her office. “How is the new Pearl getting along?” she asked. When I hesitated, she said, “Speak up!”

“She doesn’t know how to behave,” I said.

Aunt Lydia smiled her wrinkly old-turnip smile. “Remember, she is freshly come from Canada,” she said, “so she doesn’t know any better. Foreign converts are often like that when they arrive. It is your duty, for the moment, to teach her safer ways.”

“We’ve been trying, Aunt Lydia,” said Becka. “But she’s very—”

“Stubborn,” said Aunt Lydia. “I am not surprised. Time will cure it. Do the best you can. You may go.” We went out of the office in the sideways manner we all used when leaving Aunt Lydia’s office: it was impolite to turn your back on her.

The crime files continued to appear on my desk at the Hildegard Library. I could not decide what to think: one day I felt it would be a blessed state to be a full Aunt—knowing all the Aunts’ carefully hoarded secrets, wielding hidden powers, doling out retributions. The next day I would consider my soul—because I did believe I had one—and how twisted and corrupted it would become if I were to act in that way. Was my soft, muddy brain hardening? Was I becoming stony, steely, pitiless? Was I exchanging my caring and pliable woman’s nature for an imperfect copy of a sharp-edged and ruthless man’s nature? I didn’t want that, but how to avoid it if I aspired to be an Aunt?

Then something happened that changed my view of my position in the universe and caused me to give thanks anew for the workings of benign Providence.

Although I’d been granted access to the Bible and had been shown a number of dangerous crime files, I hadn’t yet been given permission to access the Bloodlines Genealogical Archives, which were kept in a locked room. Those who’d been in there said this room contained aisles and aisles of folders. They were arranged on the shelves according to rank, men only: Economen, Guardians, Angels, Eyes, Commanders. Within those categories, the Bloodlines were filed by location, then by last name. The women were inside the folders of the men. The Aunts didn’t have folders; their Bloodlines weren’t recorded because they wouldn’t be having any children. That was a secret sadness for me: I liked children, I’d always wanted children, I just hadn’t wanted what came with them.

All Supplicants were given a briefing about the Archives’ existence and purposes. They contained the knowledge of who the Handmaids had been before they were Handmaids, and who their children were, and who the fathers were: not only the declared fathers, but the illegal fathers also, since there were many women—both Wives and Handmaids—who were desperate to have babies in any way they could. But in all cases the Aunts recorded the Bloodlines: with so many older men marrying such young girls, Gilead could not risk the dangerous and sinful father-daughter inbreeding that might result if no one was keeping track.

But it was only after I’d done my Pearl Girls missionary work that I would have access to the Archives. I’d longed for the moment when I’d be able to trace my own mother—not Tabitha, but the mother who’d been a Handmaid. In those secret files, I’d be able to find out who she was, or had been—was she even still alive? I knew it was a risk—I might not like what I discovered—but I needed to try anyway. I might even be able to trace my real father, though that was less likely since he had not been a Commander. If I could find my mother, I would have a story instead of a zero. I would have a past beyond my own past, though I would not necessarily have a future with this unknown mother inside it.

One morning I found a file from the Archives on my desk. There was a small handwritten note paper-clipped to the front: Agnes Jemima’s Bloodline. I held my breath as I opened the file. Inside was the Bloodlines record for Commander Kyle. Paula was in the folder, and their son, Mark. I wasn’t part of that Bloodline, so I wasn’t listed as Mark’s sister. But through Commander Kyle’s line I was able to discover the true name of poor Crystal—of Ofkyle, who’d died in childbirth—since little Mark was part of her Bloodline too. I wondered whether he would ever be told about her. Not if they could help it, was my guess.

At last I found the Bloodline on myself. It was not where it should have been—inside Commander Kyle’s folder, in the time period relating to his first Wife, Tabitha. Instead it was at the back of the file in a sub-file of its own.

There was my mother’s picture. It was a double picture, like the kind we’d see on Wanted posters for runaway Handmaids: the full face, the profile. She had light hair, pulled back; she was young. She was staring right into my own eyes: what was she trying to tell me? She wasn’t smiling, but why would she smile? Her picture must have been taken by the Aunts, or else by the Eyes.

The name underneath had been blanked out, using heavy blue ink. There was an updated notation, however: Mother of Agnes Jemima, now Aunt Victoria. Escaped to Canada. Currently working for Mayday terrorist intelligence. Two elimination attempts made (failed). Location currently unknown.

Underneath that, it said Biological Father, but his name, too, had been redacted. There was no picture. The notation said: Currently in Canada. Said to be a Mayday operative. Location unknown.

Did I look like my mother? I wished to think so.

Did I remember her? I tried to. I knew I should be able to, but the past was too dark.

Such a cruel thing, memory. We can’t remember what it is that we’ve forgotten. That we have been made to forget. That we’ve had to forget, in order to pretend to live here in any normal way.

I’m sorry, I whispered. I can’t bring you back. Not yet.

I placed my hand on top of my mother’s picture. Did it feel warm? I wanted that. I wanted to think that love and warmth were radiating out of this picture—not a flattering picture, but that didn’t matter. I wanted to think that this love was flowing into my hand. Childish make-believe, I know that. But it was comforting nonetheless.

I turned the page: there was another document. My mother had had a second child. That child had been smuggled into Canada as an infant. Her name was Nicole. There was a baby picture.

Baby Nicole.

Baby Nicole, whom we prayed for on every solemn occasion at Ardua Hall. Baby Nicole, whose sunny cherubic face appeared on Gilead television so often as a symbol of the unfairness being shown to Gilead on the international stage. Baby Nicole, who was practically a saint and martyr, and was certainly an icon—that Baby Nicole was my sister.

Underneath the last paragraph of text there was a line of wavery handwriting in blue ink: Top Secret. Baby Nicole is here in Gilead.

It seemed impossible.

I felt a rush of gratitude—I had a younger sister! But I also felt frightened: if Baby Nicole was here in Gilead, why hadn’t everyone been told? There would have been widespread rejoicing and a huge celebration. Why had I myself been told? I felt entangled, though the nets around me were invisible. Was my sister in danger? Who else knew she was here, and what would they do to her?

By this time I knew that the person leaving these files for me must be Aunt Lydia. But why was she doing it? And how did she want me to react? My mother was alive, but she was also under sentence of death. She’d been deemed a criminal; worse, a terrorist. How much of her was in me? Was I tainted in some way? Was that the message? Gilead had tried to kill my renegade mother and had failed. Should I be glad about this, or sorry? Where should my loyalties lie?

Then, on impulse, I did a very dangerous thing. Making sure no one was watching, I slipped the two pages with their glued-on pictures out of the Bloodlines file, then folded them several times and hid them in my sleeve. Somehow I could not bear to be parted with them. It was foolish and headstrong, but it was not the only foolish and headstrong thing I have ever done.

57

It was a Wednesday, the woe day. After the usual putrid breakfast, I received a message to go immediately to Aunt Lydia’s office. “What does it mean?” I asked Aunt Victoria.

“Nobody ever knows what Aunt Lydia might have in mind,” she said.

“Have I done something bad?” There was a big choice of bad things, that was for sure.

“Not necessarily,” she said. “You might have done something good.”

Aunt Lydia was waiting for me in her office. The door was ajar, and she told me to come in even before I’d knocked. “Close the door behind you and sit down,” she said.

I sat down. She looked at me. I looked at her. It’s strange, because I knew she was supposed to be the powerful, mean old queen bee of Ardua Hall, but right then I didn’t find her scary. She had a big mole on her chin: I tried not to stare at it. I wondered why she hadn’t had it taken off.

“How are you enjoying it here, Jade?” she said. “Are you adjusting?”

I should have said yes, or fine, or something, the way I’d been trained. Instead I blurted, “Not well.”

She smiled, showing her yellowy teeth. “Many have regrets at first,” she said. “Would you like to go back?”

“Like, how?” I said. “Flying monkeys?”

“I suggest you refrain from making that kind of flippant remark in public. It could have painful repercussions for you. Do you have something to show me?”

I was puzzled. “Like what?” I asked. “No, I didn’t bring—”

“On your arm, for instance. Under your sleeve.”

“Oh,” I said. “My arm.” I rolled up the sleeve: there was GOD/LOVE, not looking very pretty.

She peered at it. “Thank you for doing as I requested,” she said.

She was the one who’d requested it? “Are you the source?” I asked.

“The what?”

Was I in trouble? “You know, the one—I mean—”

She cut me off. “You must learn to edit your thoughts,” she said. “Unthink them. Now, next steps. You are Baby Nicole, as you must have been told in Canada.”

“Yeah, but I’d rather not be,” I said. “I’m not happy about it.”

“I’m sure that is true,” she said. “But many of us would rather not be who we are. We don’t have unlimited choices in that department. Now, are you ready to help your friends back in Canada?”

“What do I have to do?” I asked.

“Come over here and place your arm on the desk,” she said. “This won’t hurt.”

She took a thin blade and made a nick in my tattoo, at the base of the O. Then, using a magnifying glass and a minute pair of tweezers, she slid something very small into my arm. She was wrong about it not hurting.

“No one would think of looking inside GOD. Now you’re a carrier pigeon, and all we have to do is transport you. It’s harder than it would have been once, but we’ll manage it. Oh, and don’t tell anyone about this until granted permission. Loose lips sink ships, and sinking ships kill people. Yes?”

“Yes,” I said. Now I had a lethal weapon in my arm.

“Yes, Aunt Lydia. Don’t slip up on manners here, ever. You could trigger a denunciation, even for something so minor. Aunt Vidala loves her Corrections.”

58

Two mornings after I’d read my Bloodlines file I received a summons to Aunt Lydia’s office. Becka had also been ordered to attend; we walked over together. We thought we were going to be asked again how Jade was getting along, whether she was happy with us, whether she was ready for her literacy test, whether she was firm in her faith. Becka said she was going to request that Jade be moved elsewhere because we’d been unable to teach her anything. She simply didn’t listen.

But Jade was already in Aunt Lydia’s office when we got there, sitting on a chair. She smiled at us, an apprehensive smile.

Aunt Lydia let us in, then looked up and down the corridor before closing the door. “Thank you for coming,” she said to us. “You may sit down.” We sat in the two chairs provided, one on either side of Jade. Aunt Lydia herself sat down, placing her hands on her desk to lower herself. Her hands were slightly tremulous. I found myself thinking, She’s getting old. But that did not seem possible: surely Aunt Lydia was ageless.

“I have some information to share with you that will materially affect the future of Gilead,” Aunt Lydia said. “You yourselves will have a crucial part to play. Are you brave enough? Do you stand ready?”

“Yes, Aunt Lydia,” I said, and Becka repeated the same words. The younger Supplicants were always being told they had a crucial part to play, and that bravery was required of them. Usually it meant giving up something, like time or food.

“Good. I will be brief. First, I must inform you, Aunt Immortelle, of something that the other two already know. Baby Nicole is here in Gilead.”

I was confused: why would the girl Jade have been told such an important piece of news? She could have no idea of what an impact the appearance of such an iconic figure would have among us.

“Really? Oh, praise be, Aunt Lydia!” said Becka. “That is such wonderful news. Here? In Gilead? But why have we not all been told? It’s like a miracle!”

“Control yourself, please, Aunt Immortelle. I must now add that Baby Nicole is the half-sister of Aunt Victoria.”

“No shit!” Jade exclaimed. “I don’t believe this!”

“Jade, I did not hear that,” said Aunt Lydia. “Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control.”

“Sorry,” Jade mumbled.

“Agnes! I mean, Aunt Victoria!” Becka said. “You have a sister! That is so joyful!! And it’s Baby Nicole! You are so lucky, Baby Nicole is so adorable.” There was the standard picture of Baby Nicole on Aunt Lydia’s wall: she was indeed adorable, but then, all babies are adorable. “May I hug you?” Becka said to me. She was fighting hard to be positive. It must have been sad for her that I had a known relative but she did not have any: even her pretend father had just been shamefully executed.

“Calm, please,” said Aunt Lydia. “Time has passed since Baby Nicole was a baby. She is now grown up.”

“Of course, Aunt Lydia,” said Becka. She sat down, folded her hands in her lap.

“But if she is here in Gilead, Aunt Lydia,” I said, “where is she, exactly?”

Jade laughed. It was more like a bark.

“She is at Ardua Hall,” said Aunt Lydia, smiling. It was like a guessing game: she was enjoying herself. We must have looked mystified. We knew everyone at Ardua Hall, so where was Baby Nicole?

“She is in this room,” Aunt Lydia announced. She waved a hand. “Jade here is Baby Nicole.”

“It can’t be!” I said. Jade was Baby Nicole? Therefore Jade was my sister?

Becka sat with her mouth open, staring at Jade. “No,” she whispered. Her face was woeful.

“Sorry about not being adorable,” Jade said. “I tried, but I’m terrible at it.” I believe she meant it as a joke, to lighten the atmosphere.

“Oh—I didn’t mean…” I said. “It’s just…you don’t look like Baby Nicole.”

“No she does not,” said Aunt Lydia. “But she does look like you.” It was true, up to a point: the eyes yes, but not the nose. I glanced down at Jade’s hands, folded for once in her lap. I wanted to ask her to stretch out her fingers so I could compare them to mine, but I felt that might be offensive. I didn’t wish her to think I was demanding too much evidence of her genuineness, or else rejecting her.

“I’m very happy to have a sister,” I said to her politely, now that I was overcoming the shock. This awkward girl shared a mother with me. I’d have to try my best.

“You’re both so lucky,” said Becka. Her voice was wistful.

“And you’re like my sister,” I told her, “so Jade is like your sister too.” I didn’t want Becka to feel left out.

“May I hug you?” Becka said to Jade; or, as I suppose I should now call her in this account, Nicole.

“Yeah, I guess,” said Nicole. She then received a little hug from Becka. I followed suit. “Thanks,” she said.

“Thank you, Aunts Immortelle and Victoria,” said Aunt Lydia. “You are demonstrating an admirable spirit of acceptance and inclusion. Now I must trouble you for your full attention.”

We turned our faces towards her. “Nicole will not be with us for long,” said Aunt Lydia. “She will be leaving Ardua Hall shortly, and travelling back to Canada. She will be taking an important message with her. I want you both to help her.”

I was astonished. Why was Aunt Lydia letting her go back? No convert ever went back—it was treason—and if that person was Baby Nicole, it was treason ten times over.

“But, Aunt Lydia,” I said. “That is against the law, and also God’s will as proclaimed by the Commanders.”

“Indeed, Aunt Victoria. But as you and Aunt Immortelle have now read a good many of the secret files I have been placing in your way, are you not aware of the deplorable degree of corruption that currently exists in Gilead?”

“Yes, Aunt Lydia, but surely…” I had not been certain that Becka, too, had been treated to the crime files. Both of us had obeyed the TOP SECRET classification; but more importantly, each of us had wished to spare the other.

“The aims of Gilead at the outset were pure and noble, we all agree,” she said. “But they have been subverted and sullied by the selfish and the power-mad, as so often happens in the course of history. You must wish to see that set right.”

“Yes,” said Becka, nodding. “We do wish it.”

“Remember, too, your vows. You pledged yourselves to help women and girls. I trust you meant that.”

“Yes, Aunt Lydia,” I said. “We did.”

“This will be helping them. Now, I don’t want to force you to do anything against your will, but I must state the position clearly. Now that I have told you this secret—that Baby Nicole is here, and that she will soon be acting as a courier for me—every minute that passes in which you do not divulge this secret to the Eyes will count as treachery. But even if you do divulge it, you may still be severely punished, perhaps even terminated for having held back, even for an instant. Needless to say, I myself will be executed, and Nicole will soon be no better than a caged parrot. If she won’t comply, they’ll kill her, one way or another. They won’t hesitate: you’ve read the crime files.”

“You can’t do that to them!” Nicole said. “That’s not fair, it’s emotional blackmail!”

“I appreciate your views, Nicole,” said Aunt Lydia, “but your juvenile notions of fairness do not apply here. Keep your sentiments to yourself, and if you wish to see Canada again it would be wise to consider that a command.”

She turned to the two of us. “You are, of course, free to make your own decisions. I will leave the room; Nicole, come with me. We wish to give your sister and her friend a little privacy in which to consider the possibilities. We will return in five minutes. At that time, I shall simply require a yes or a no from you. Other details regarding your mission will be supplied in good time. Come, Nicole.” She took Nicole by the arm and steered her out of the room.

Becka’s eyes were wide and frightened, as mine must have been. “We have to do it,” Becka said. “We can’t let them die. Nicole is your sister, and Aunt Lydia…”

“Do what?” I said. “We don’t know what she’s asking for.”

“She’s asking for obedience and loyalty,” said Becka. “Remember how she rescued us—both of us? We have to say yes.”

After leaving Aunt Lydia’s office, Becka went to the library for her day shift, and Nicole and I walked back to our apartment together.

“Now that we’re sisters,” I said, “you can call me Agnes when we’re alone.”

“Okay, I’ll try,” Nicole said.

We went into the main room. “I have something I want to share with you,” I said. “Just a minute.” I went upstairs. I’d been keeping the two pages from the Bloodlines files under my mattress, folded up small. When I returned, I unfolded them carefully and flattened them out. Once I’d laid them out on the table, Nicole—like me—couldn’t resist placing her hand on the picture of our mother.

“This is amazing,” she said. She took her hand off, studied the picture again. “Do you think she looks like me?”

“I wondered the same thing,” I said.

“Can you remember her at all? I must’ve been too young.”

“I don’t know,” I said. “Sometimes I think I can. I do seem to remember something. Was there a different house? Did I travel somewhere? But maybe it’s wishful thinking.”

“What about our fathers?” she said. “And why did they blank out the names?”

“Maybe they were trying to protect us in some way,” I said.

“Thanks for showing me,” said Nicole. “But I don’t think you should keep these around. What if you get caught with them?”

“I know. I tried to put the pages back, but the file wasn’t there anymore.”

In the end, we decided to tear the pages up into small pieces and flush them down the toilet.

Aunt Lydia had told us we should strengthen our minds for the mission ahead of us. Meanwhile, we should continue on with life as usual, and not do anything to call attention to Nicole, or arouse suspicion. That was difficult, as we were anxious; I for one lived with a sense of dread: if Nicole were to be discovered, would Becka and I be accused?

Becka and I were due to leave on our Pearl Girls mission very soon. Would we even go, or did Aunt Lydia have some other destination in mind? We could only wait and see. Becka had studied the Pearl Girls standard guide of Canada, with the currency, the customs, and the methods of purchasing, including credit cards. She was much better prepared than I was.

When the Thanks Giving ceremony was less than a week away, Aunt Lydia called us to her office again. “This is what you must do,” she said. “I have arranged a room for Nicole at one of our country Retreat Houses. The papers are in order. But it is you, Aunt Immortelle, who will be going in Nicole’s stead. She herself will take your place, and will travel as a Pearl Girl to Canada.”

“Then I won’t be going?” said Becka, dismayed.

“You will go later,” said Aunt Lydia.

I suspected it was a lie, even then.