to heal an infant child

From the back of her thatched-roof house, the woman heard her eight-month-old son crying. The frazzled lady waited a few breaths. The wailing did not subside; it grew more frantic. At last, she left her pile of washing and rushed around the side of the house to the source of the shrieks.

The infant boy lay kicking and screaming as a stray pig dragged him around by his ears.

The mother flew at the pig, shouting nonsensical things, waving her arms, scaring it off. Then she swept down and scooped up the little child, cradling the wounded ear against her chest. A neighbor, hearing the commotion, rushed over. Within seconds the old lady had recounted the dreadful event.

"His ear... his ear," the woman moaned.

Suddenly, the neighbor remembered: Hospital Brenda! A few years ago, she reminded her distraught friend, a falling coconut had smashed her son's nose. A saintly Canadian nun took pity on their desperate situation and had admitted the boy to Hospital Brenda (incidentally the best Ears, Nose and Throat hospital in Haiti and only right down the road). The neighbor suggested going there first and immediately, as the good sister's doctors had restored her son's nose to normal at very little cost to the family.

The two women tore down the road, the mother pressing a cloth on the side of her now silent son's head. They arrived at Hospital Brenda and, given the urgency of the child's plight, were given instant audience with the little Canadian nun herself.

When Sister Evelyn saw the little bundle, whose ear continued to bleed, her worn face crinkled with worry. Though she had no formal medical training herself, years of "field experience" had given her an ability to assess most medical conditions and incidents with incredible accuracy. Something had to be done for this little one. She gathered the baby, who had begun to whimper, in her arms and clucked her tongue quietly as she listened to the poor woman tell of how a pig was eating her son's ears.

"Of course, of course we can do something. He will be fine... you will be fine little one." Then, looking directly the grandmother, still visibly overcome with grief, she went on, "and don't you even think about the cost."

Photo courtesy Fr. Marc Boisvert