Sarah Miller - The Miracle and Tragedy of the Dionne Quintuplets

In an empty nursery, behind two woven wire fences topped with barbed wire, five nine-year-old girls waited for their father. Five suitcases sat alongside them. Five smiling Shirley Temple dolls were clutched in their arms. Yvonne stared out the window at the yellow brick mansion up the hill. Annette quietly seethed, pretending not to be afraid. Ccile sat in a corner, rocking her doll. milie prayed that it was all just a bad dream. Marie tried to tell a silly story, but no one laughed.

At the sound of their fathers footsteps in the hall, all five sisters hugged their Shirley Temples closer to their chests. The moment they dreaded had come.

For the first time in their lives, the Dionne Quintuplets were going home.

Oliva Dionne did not speak as he and his five identical daughters walked through the hospitals guarded gate, down the road, and through another gate that led to the colossal Georgian house that was to be their new home. He did not lead them up the steps to the grand front door. Instead, he entered through a service door into the kitchen. Yvonne followed first, trying to be brave for her sisters sake. Though Yvonne was no more than a few minutes older than Annette, Ccile, milie, and Marie, she had acted the part of the little mother since she was a toddler.

For nine years Mr. Dionne had battled with the government to unite his family under a single roof. Now that his triumphant moment had arrived, the man who had once crawled through a drainpipe to elude hospital guards just so he could glimpse his five famous babies through a window spoke a single sentence.

The little girls are here , he told his wife, and continued into the house, leaving his daughters standing in the unfamiliar kitchen with their dolls and suitcases.

Bonsoir, Mom , Yvonne, Annette, Ccile, milie, and Marie said, greeting their mother in a mixture of French and English.

Supper will be ready soon , Mrs. Dionne replied in French, then called for two of her elder daughters. Show the little girls around the house, she instructed.

Without a word, the little girls followed as their big sisters pointed into one doorway after another. The living room, the den, the sewing room, their fathers office. Redolent of fresh paint and filled with pristine furniture, the house felt new and sterile, more sterile by far than the hospital that had been their home since they were four months old.

Then they reached the dining room. Like everything else in the house, it was big, in this case big enough to seat fourteenMr. and Mrs. Dionne, Yvonne, Annette, Ccile, milie, Marie, and their seven brothers and sisters, Ernest, Rose-Marie, Thrse, Daniel, Pauline, Oliva Jr., and Victor. An archway divided the room in half, with a table on each side. This side is for our family , the little girls remembered one of their elder sisters saying. The other side is for your family.

Not one of the bewildered nine-year-olds knew what to say.

The knock at the back door roused Douilda Legros from her bed. Auntie, please hurry and dress and come over, Oliva Dionne called. Elzire, she is very sick. Please hurry, he said again.

Auntie Legros was on her way in minutes.

It was only a short drive across the road to the Dionne farm, but it was long enough for Douilda Legross worries to unreel through her mind. Poor Elzire had never had such a difficult pregnancy. Headaches, dizzy spells, vomiting. Painful legs and feet swollen to twice their normal size. A finger pressed into her skin left a deep dent. Now and then the edges of her vision went black.

Two, perhaps three weeks ago it had become so bad Elzire had finally consented to let her husband, Oliva, consult the doctor in spite of the cost. The doctor had ordered Elzire off her feet entirely, but that was next to impossible on a three-hundred-acre farm with five young children to care for.

And now? The urgency in Olivas voice could only mean something worse yet. Perhaps the worst thing of allthe baby, coming too soon.

Auntie Legros let herself in the front door without waking Ernest, Rose-Marie, Thrse, and Daniel, asleep upstairs, and made her way to the bedroom at the back of the house. Eleven-month-old Pauline slept in a crib at the foot of the big wooden bed where Elzire lay. Her nieces black eyes peered up out of a pale and puffy face. Auntie, she said weakly in French, I dont think that I will be able to pull through this time.