Everyone told Agnes that there had been no other mother. Whatever are you talking about? they cried. When she insisted, they changed tack. You won’t remember your real mother—you couldn’t possibly remember. She told them this wasn’t true; she stamped her foot; she banged her fists against the table; she screeched at them like a fowl. What did it mean? Why did they persist with these lies, these falsehoods? She remembered. She remembered everything. She said this to the apothecary’s widow who lived at the edge of the village, a woman who took in wool for spinning; she continued to work her
...more
