It was the day of the month when the nuns watched by day and night
before the Sacrament. Cecilia's watch came at dawn, at half-past two,
and the last watcher knocked at her cell in the dusk, telling her she
must get up at once. But Cecilia answered:
"I cannot get up, Sister, I cannot watch before the Sacrament this
morning."
"And why, Sister? Are you ill?"
"Yes, I am very ill."
"And what has made you ill?"
"A dream, Sister."
And seeing it was Angela who had come to awaken her, Cecilia rose
from her pillow, saying, "A horrible dream, not a counterpart like
yours, Angela; oh! I can't think of it! It would be impossible for me
to take my watch."
And walking down the passage, not knowing what to make of Cecilia's
answers, Angela stopped at Barbara's cell to tell her Cecilia was ill
and could not take her watch that morning.
"And you must watch for her."
"Why... what is it?"
"I can tell you no more, Cecilia's ill."
And she hurried away to avoid further questions, wondering what
reason stupid Cecilia would give Mother Hilda for her absence from
chapel and the row there would be if she were to tell that a
counterpart had visited her! If she could only get a chance to tell
Cecilia that she must say she was ill! If she didn't--Angela's
thoughts turned to her little counterpart, from whom she might be
separated for ever. No chance of speaking happened as the procession
moved towards the refectory; and after breakfast the novices bent
their heads over their work, when Mother Hilda said:
"I hear, Cecilia, that you were so ill this morning that you couldn't
take your watch."
"It wasn't illness--not exactly."
"What, then?"
"A bad dream, Mother."
"It must have been a very bad dream to prevent you from getting up to
take your watch. I'm afraid I don't believe in dreams." The novices
breathed more freely, and their spirits rose when Mother Hilda said,
"The cake was heavy; you must have eaten too much of it. Barbara, you
must take notice of this indigestion, for you are fond of cake." The
novices laughed again, and thought themselves safe. But after
breakfast the Prioress sent for Cecilia, and they saw her leave the
novitiate angry with them all--she had caught sight of their smiles
and dreaded their mockery, and went to the Prioress wondering what
plausible contradiction she could give to Angela's story of the ugly
counterpart, so she was taken aback by the first question.
"Now, what is it that I hear about a refusal to get up to take your
watch? Such a thing--"
"Not laziness, Mother. Mother, if you knew what my dream was, you
would understand it was impossible for me to watch before the
Sacrament."
"A dream!"
Cecilia didn't answer.
"You can tell me your dream...I shall be able to judge for myself."
"No, no; it is too frightful!" And Cecilia fell upon her knees.
"One isn't responsible for one's dreams."
"Is that so, Mother? But if one prays?"
"But you don't pray for dreams?"
"Not for the dream I had last night."
"Well, for what did you pray? Praying for dreams, Cecilia, is
entirely contrary to the rule, or to the spirit of the rule."
"But Veronica, Angela, Rufina--they all pray that their counterparts
may visit them."
"Counterparts!" the old woman answered. "What are you talking about?"
"Must I tell you?"
"Of course you must tell me."
"But it will seem like spite on my part."
"Spite! Spite?"
"Because they have gotten beautiful counterparts through their
prayers, whereas--Oh, Mother, I cannot tell you."
The Prioress forgot the stupid girl at her feet.
"Counterparts!"
"Who visit them."
"Counterparts visiting them! You don't mean that anybody comes into
the convent?"
"Only in dreams."
Cecilia tried to explain, but stumbled in her explanation so often
that the Reverend Mother interrupted her:
"Cecilia, you are talking nonsense! I have never heard anything like
it before!"
"But what I am telling you, Mother, is in the gospel Nicodemus--"
"Gospel of Nicodemus!"
"The harrowing of hell!"
"But what has all this got to do--I cannot understand you."
The story was begun again and again.
"Veronica's counterpart an angel, with luminous tints in his flesh;
Angela's a child drowned in Noah's flood! But--" The Prioress checked
her words. Had all the novices taken leave of their senses? Had they
gone mad?... It looked like it. Anyhow, this kind of thing must be
put a stop to and at once. She must get the whole truth out of this
stupid girl at her feet, who blubbered out her story, obviously
trying to escape punishment by incriminating others.
"So you were praying that an angel might visit you; but what came was
quite different?"
"Mother, Mother!" howled Cecilia; "it was a dwarf, but I didn't want
him in my bed. I've been punished enough.... Anything more horrible--"
"In your bed!... anything so horrible? What do you mean?"
"Am I to tell you? Must I?"
"Certainly."
"After all, it was only a dream."
"Go on."
"First I was awakened by a smell coming down the chimney."
"But there are no chimneys."
"I'm telling what I thought. There was a smell, which sometimes
seemed to collect in one corner of the room, sometimes in another. At
last it seemed to come from under the bed and... he crawled out."
"Who crawled out!"
"The dwarf--a creature with a huge head and rolling eyes and a great
tongue. That is all I saw, for I was too frightened; I heard him say
he was my counterpart, but I cried out, Mother, that it was not true.
He laughed at me, and said I had prayed for him. Then it seemed,
Mother, I was running away from him, only I was checked at every
moment by the others--Veronica, Barbara, and Angela--who put their
feet out so that I might fall; and they caught me by the arms; and
all were laughing, saying, 'Look at Sister Cecilia's counterpart; she
has got one at last and is running away from him. But he shall get
her; he shall get her.' I ran on until I found myself in a corner,
between two brick walls, and the dwarf standing in front of me,
rolling up his night-shirt in his hands, and telling me he was in
great agony; for his punishment was to swallow all the souls of the
nuns who had made bad Communions, and that I was to come at once with
him. I wouldn't go, but he took me by both hands, dragging me towards
the chapel. I told him Father Daly would sprinkle holy water upon
him; but he didn't seem to mind, Mother. If I hadn't been awakened by
Barbara knocking at my; door I don't know--"
"Now you see, my dear child, what comes of praying for
counterparts.... This must be seen into at once."
"But you will not say that I told you?"
"Cecilia, I have heard enough; it isn't for you to ask me to make any
promises. Be sure, I shall try to act for the best. Mother Hilda and
Mother Philippa know nothing of these stories?"
"Nothing; it is entirely between the novices."
"You can go now, and remember not a word of what has passed between
us, not a word."
"But I must confess to Father Daly. My mind wouldn't be at rest if I
didn't, for the dwarf did take me in his arms."
"You can confess to Father Daly if you like; but I can't see you have
committed any sin; you've been merely very foolish." And the Prioress
turned towards the window, wondering if she should consult with
Father Daly. The secret would not be kept; Angela and Veronica would
speak about it, and there were others more or less implicated, no
doubt, and these would have recourse to Father Daly for advice, or to
Mother Hilda.
"Come in. So it is you, Teresa? Disturbing me! No, you are not
disturbing me; I am not busy, and if I were it wouldn't matter. You
want to talk to me. Now, about what?"
There was only one subject which would cause Evelyn to hesitate, so
the Prioress guessed that she had come to tell her that she wished to
leave the convent.
"Well, Teresa, be it so; I cannot argue with you any more about a
vocation. I suppose you know best."
"You seem very sad, Mother?"
"Yes, I am sad; but you are not the cause of my sadness, though what
you have come to tell me is sad enough. I was just coming to the
conclusion, when you came into the room, that things must take their
course. God is good; his guiding hand is in everything, so I suppose
all that is happening is for the best. But it is difficult to see
whither it is tending, if it be not towards the dissolution of the
Order."
"The dissolution of the Order, Mother!"
"Well, if not of its dissolution, at all events of a change in the
rule. You know that many here--Mother Philippa, Sister Winifred,
aided and abetted by Father Daly--are anxious for a school, and we
can only have a school by becoming an active Order. You have helped
us a great deal, and our debts are no longer as pressing as they
were; but we still owe a good deal of money, and as you do not intend
to become a member of the community you will take your money away
with you. And this fact will strengthen the opposition against me."
The Prioress lay back in her chair, white and frail, exhausted by the
heat.
"May I pull down the blind, Mother?"
"Yes, you may, dear; the sun is very hot."
"Your determination to leave us isn't the only piece of bad news
which reached me this morning. Have you heard of Sister Cecilia's
adventure with her counterpart?" Evelyn nodded and tried to repress a
smile. "It is difficult not to smile, so ridiculous is her story; and
if I didn't look upon the matter as very serious, I shouldn't be able
to prevent myself from smiling."
"But you will easily be able, Mother, to smile at this nonsense.
Veronica, who is a most pious girl, will not allow her mind to dwell
on counterparts since she knows it to be a sin, or likely to lead to
sin, and Angela and the others--if there are any others--"
"That will not make an end to the evil. Everything, my dear Teresa,
declines. Ideas, like everything else, have their term of life.
Everything declines, everything turns to clay, and I look upon this
desire for spiritual visitations as a warning that the belief which
led to the founding of this Order has come to an end! From such noble
prayers as led to the founding of this Order we have declined to
prayers for the visitation of counterparts."
Evelyn was about to interrupt, but the Prioress shook her head,
saying, "Well, if not the whole of the convent, at all events part of
it--several novices." And she told Evelyn the disease would spread
from nun to nun, and that there was no way of checking it.
"Unless by becoming an active order," Evelyn answered, "founding a
school."
The old woman rose to her feet instantly, saying that she had spoken
out of a moment of weakness; and that it would be cowardly for her to
give way to Mother Philippa and Sister Winifred; she would never
acquiesce in any alteration of the rule.
"But you, too," she said, "are inclined towards the school?"
Evelyn admitted she was thinking of the poor, people whom she had
left to their fate, so that she might save herself from sin; and the
talk of the two women dropped from the impersonal to the personal,
Evelyn telling the Prioress a great deal more of herself than she had
told before, and the Prioress confiding to Evelyn in the end her own
story, a simple one, which Evelyn listened to with tears in her eyes.
"Before I came here I was married, and before I was married I often
used to come to the convent, for I was fond of the nuns, and was a
pious girl. But after my marriage I was captured by life--the vine of
life grew about me and held me tight. One day, passing by the door of
the convent, my husband said, 'It is lucky that love rescued you, for
when I met you you were a little taken by the convent, and might have
become a nun if you hadn't fallen in love. You might have shut
yourself up there and lived in grey habit and penances!' That day I
wore a grey silk dress, and I remember lifting the skirt up as we
passed the door and hitting the kerbstone with it. 'Shut up in that
prison-house! Did I ever seriously think of such a thing?' These were
my words, but God, in his great goodness and wisdom, resolved to
bring me back. A great deal is required to save our souls, so deeply
are we enmeshed in the delight of life and in the delight of one
another.... God took my husband from me after an illness of three
weeks. That happened forty years ago. I used to sit on the seashore,
crying all day, and my little child used to put his arms about me and
say, 'What is mammie crying for?' Then my child died; seemingly
without any reason, and I felt that I could not live any longer amid
the desires and activities of the world. I'll not try to tell you
what my grief was; you have suffered grief, and can imagine it.
Perhaps you can. I left my home and hurried here. When I saw you
return, soon after your father's death; I couldn't but think of my
own returning. I saw myself in you."
"But, Mother, do you regret that you came here?"
The old nun did not answer for some time.
"It is hard to say, Teresa. There are deceptions everywhere, in the
convent as in the world; and the mediocrity of the Sisters here is
tiresome; one longs for a little more intelligence. And, as I was
saying just now, everything declines; an idea ravels like a sleeve.
Are you happy here?... You are not; I see it in your eyes."
"The only ones who are happy here," Evelyn answered, "I am sure, are
those like Veronica, who pass from the schoolroom to the novitiate."
"You think that? But the convent is a great escapement. You came
here, having escaped death only by an accident, and when you went to
Rome to see your father you came back distraught, your mind unhinged,
and it was months before you could believe that your sins could be
forgiven. If you leave here, what will become of you? You will return
to the stage."
Evelyn smiled sadly.
"You will meet your lovers again. Temptation will be by you; you are
still a young woman. How old are you, Teresa?"
"Thirty-eight. But I no longer feel young."
"Then, do you not think it better to spend the last term with us? I
am an old woman, Teresa, and you are the only friend I have in the
convent, the only one who knows me; it would be a great charity if
you were to remain with me.... But you fear I shall live too long?
No, Teresa, the time will not be very long."
"Mother, don't talk like that, it only grieves me. As long as you
wish me to stay I'll stay."
"But if I weren't here you would leave?" Evelyn did not answer. "You
would be very lonely?"
"Yes, I should be lonely." And then, speaking at the end of a long
silence, she said, "Why did you send away Sister Mary John? She was
my friend, and one must have a friend--even in a convent."
"Teresa, I begged of her to remain. And you are lonely now without
her?"
"I should be lonelier, Mother, if you weren't here."
"We will share our loneliness together."
Evelyn seemed to acquiesce.
"My dear child, you are very good; you have a kind heart. One sees it
in your eyes."
She left the Prioress's room frightened, saying. "Till the Prioress's
death."