Please rest assured that this is not the last chapter of this story, even though it might seem like it.
May 17, 1829
Yesterday evening, after dinner, I was outside in the garden, watering the flowers, when Papa stepped outside and said, "Cosette, I don't want you out in this heat for too long. Why don't you come inside and get washed up? Then we can go to church."
"But it isn't Sunday," I said, confused.
He said we were going to church anyway, so I came back inside, and later, as we were walking to church, he explained to me why we were going there on a Saturday. He asked me if I knew whose Feast Day it was, and I said St. Margaret's. He asked if I knew her patronage, and I said she was the patron saint of orphans.
Papa said, "Yes, but what else?" I didn't know, so he told me. "She's also the patron saint of those who are falsely accused, of unwed mothers, and of prostitutes."
The last two quite surprised me. "Unwed mothers?" I repeated. "Prostitutes? But... it doesn't seem right that they should have a patron saint."
Papa frowned. "You mustn't be judgmental, Cosette," he said. "They need prayers too, as much as any of us do. Perhaps more so. When we get to church, I want you to light a candle and say a prayer to St. Margaret for prostitutes, unwed mothers, and all those who are unfairly accused."
It seemed like an unusual request, but I could tell it was important to Papa, so I did as he asked. I lit a votive candle and knelt and prayed to St. Margaret for a long time — so long that when Papa finally told me I could stop, my knees were sore, and it was quite dark outside as we walked home. Being in church for so long had made me start thinking of my Confirmation, and on our walk home, I told Papa that when I was confirmed, I wanted to take St. Agnes as a my saint.
"Your Confirmation is still some years away, Cosette," he reminded me. "You might change your mind between then and now."
"Maybe," I admitted, "but I don't think I will. I read in my catechism that St. Agnes was martyred when she was just a little older than I am. She's the patron saint of young girls, virgins, chastity, and of gardeners."
Papa looked at me, his eyebrows raised. "Gardeners, did you say?"
I grinned at him. "That's why I want to take her as my saint when I'm confirmed, Papa. You see, she's already my saint, since she's the patroness of young girls and virgins, but she's your saint too, since you worked as a gardener for so long. I want a saint who can intercede for both of us."
Papa smiled and put one arm around my shoulders. "I do like that idea."
I honestly wasn't trying to fish for information what I asked him next. I was only curious. I said, "Papa, when you were confirmed, who was your saint?" He said it was Simon Peter, and then I started wondering. I wanted to be confirmed by the patron saint of my father's profession — could Papa have done the same? St. Peter was a fisherman, so had Papa's father been a fisherman, too? Did he grow up in a coastal town? Fishing was hard work, with heavy nets full of fish and boats of every size — was that how Papa had gotten so strong?
I asked why he chose Simon Peter, but Papa said, "I didn't; the priest did. Where I grew up, it was custom for the parish priest to assign a saint to you when you were confirmed."
I knew it was hopeless, but I asked anyway, "Where did you grow up?"
We had just reached home. Papa pulled the key from his coat pocket and unlocked the front gate surrounding the garden. He always keeps it locked. "Go on inside and get ready for bed, Cosette," he told me. "I'll be in soon to tell you goodnight."
But I didn't move. He was acting as if he hadn't even heard my question, and that made me angry. I asked, "Papa, why don't you want me to know?"
His response was so fast and so unexpected that for a moment, I thought I'd imagined it. He said, "Because, child, it would only sadden you. Now go inside and get ready for bed." That time, I obeyed him. I walked down the hall to my room, wondering what sort of sad things Papa kept to himself.
The window in my room overlooks the garden. I looked out and saw Papa still outside, pacing back and forth across the grass. He looked so troubled. I sighed and drew the curtains, and later, after I'd bathed and changed into my nightgown, I looked out again. He was still there, but now he was sitting on the garden bench, brooding in the darkness. I couldn't see his hands, but it seemed like he might've been praying. He stayed out there for a long time — so long that I thought he wasn't going to come in to kiss me goodnight. Papa still kisses me goodnight every night, which perhaps is silly at my age, but I like it.
Finally, I was lying in bed reading before I went to sleep, and Papa came in and sat on the edge of my bed. He said, "Cosette, I know there are a lot of things I haven't told you... but you'll understand that someday."
How could he say that? "I'll never understand anything," I told him, "if you never tell me anything."
"I'll tell you when you're older, child."
He'd said that before, and it made me angry. Without meaning to, I blurted out, "I don't believe you." Papa looked shocked by that — and perhaps he had a right to. I'd never spoken to him that way before. But I went on recklessly, "Well, I don't. I don't believe you're ever going to tell me anything."
He stood up from my bed and paced once around my room, thinking. Then he sat down again, put both hands on my shoulders, and said, in the sternest tone I'd ever heard him use, "Cosette, listen to me. I'm your father. That means I know what's best for you. I know it's hard, but you have to trust me about this." I looked away and didn't answer, and Papa moved one hand to cup the side of my face. He added, his voice tender again, "I don't want you going to sleep angry at me."
"I'm not angry at you, Papa," I said — and I wasn't angry anymore, not exactly. It was hard to know how to feel. I do love Papa so much, but I felt frustrated with him and so sick and tired of never getting any answers to my questions. But I wasn't angry.
For a moment, he just looked at me. Then he said, "Give me a kiss, then, and go to sleep, my girl." I kissed his cheek, and he kissed my forehead, hugged me hard, and whispered into my ear that he loved me. I feel asleep wondering why it was so strangely important to him that I say a prayer to St. Margaret for prostitutes and unwed mothers.
::
May 19, 1829
Feast Day of St. Ivo, patron saint of abandoned children
I think I should put journal away and not write in it anymore. I'd hoped I could learn more by writing down my history, but all I've done is raise more questions than answers. It's been much harder than I thought. It's even been frightening.
Perhaps Papa has always been a vagabond, wandering from place to place, going by different names, and when he passed by me in the woods and saw me struggling to carry the water-bucket, he took pity on me and decided to take me along with him for company. Perhaps that's all I was to him, just a child that he happened across and brought with him. Perhaps – and this suspicion bothers me the most – what he said about my mother sending him before she died was only a lie he made up to comfort me.
That suspicion bothers me the most because it makes sense. I can't simply dismiss it. Papa told me that my mother asked him to care of me, but he also told me that he doesn't know my exact age or birthday. My mother would've had to have known that, obviously, and if he truly did know my mother, then why didn't she tell him?
I don't really think that I'm nothing more to Papa than some child he found in the woods. I believe he loves me just as if I were his own flesh-and-blood daughter. And I don't really think that he's lying when he said he knew my mother, but it's possible. That's what upsets me so. Any scenario is possible, you see, because I know so little about Papa, and he'll never tell me. All last night, one terrible possibility after another flitted through my mind, about why Papa would change his name and avoid policemen, and I tossed and turned and had such awful dreams.
Yes, I'm curious about Papa's past, but I don't want to feel suspicious of him. I don't want to think he might have lied to me, not about my mother or anything else. I don't want to feel like I can't trust him, because if I can't trust him, then who in this whole wide world can I trust? No one.
I don't want to consider the possibility that someone (or worse yet, several people) out there are hunting for him and might still find him. I don't want to imagine that he might be taken away from me. Being separated from Papa was always, literally, my worst nightmare.
I had nothing before Papa found me – nothing and no one. I was all alone and unloved in the world. Whatever his reason is for changing his name and avoiding the police, if... that reason ever catches up with him, I could be left alone again, to fend for myself. I would probably have to live on the streets, like those poor beggars Papa always gives alms to. But that wouldn't even be the worst thing; the worst thing would be living on the streets without Papa. I feel I could get through anything, as long as I still had him, but if
No, I can't write about this anymore.