SISTERS IN SILENCE.
Just before eleven o'clock on the following morning two sisters of the
Order of Saint Agnes, one of the religious Orders which devote
themselves to nursing the poor, were passing through the Tuileries
Gardens, sombre figures in their ample plain, black habits, black
head-dresses, and deep, white collars, their hands beneath their gowns
and gaze downturned, when one of them chanced to note the frail,
pathetic little figure of a woman resting upon one of the seats.
It was Jean Ansell. Worn and weary after hours of aimless wandering, she
had entered those gardens so beloved of Parisian _bonnes_ and children,
and sunk down upon that seat just within the high railings skirting the
busy Rue de Rivoli, and had then burst into bitter tears. Her young
heart was broken.
Within sound of the hum of the never-ceasing motor traffic, up and down
that fine, straight street of colonnades to the great Place de la
Concorde, where the fountains were playing, the stream of everyday life
of the Gay City had passed her by. None cared--none, indeed, heed a
woman's tears.
Men glanced at her and shrugged their shoulders, and the women who went
by only grinned. Her troubles were no concern of theirs. Hatless, with
only an old black shawl about her, and with her apron still on, she
found herself hungry, homeless, and abandoned. Moreover, she was the
wedded wife of a dangerous criminal!
Those who passed her by little dreamed of the strange tragedy that was
hers, of the incidents of the past night, of the burglary, the betrayal,
the arrest, the flight, and the crowning tragedy. Indeed, she herself
sat in ignorance of what had happened to the pair after they had left
the house.
She was only wondering whether Ralph had found her note, and whether on
reading it, he had experienced any pang of regret.
She was only an encumbrance. He had bluntly told her so.
And as she again burst into tears, for the twentieth time in the
half-hour she had rested upon that seat, the two grave-faced sisters
noticed her. Then, after discussing her at a distance, they ventured to
approach.
She was sitting in blank despair, her elbow upon the arm of the seat,
her head bent, her hand upon her brow, her whole frame convulsed by
sobs.
"Sister, you are in trouble," exclaimed the elder of the two thin-faced,
ascetic-looking women, addressing her as she placed a hand tenderly upon
her shoulder. "Can we be of any assistance?"
Poor Jean looked up startled, dazed for the moment. She was amazed at
sight of them. Ah, only those who have been adrift in Paris--the bright,
laughter-loving, gay city of world-wide fame--know how hard, cruel, and
unsympathetic Paris is, how the dazzling shops, the well-dressed crowds,
the brilliantly-lit boulevards, the merry _cafes_, and the clattering
restaurants all combine to mock the hungry and weary, the despairing,
the penniless.
The girl looked up into the kind, rather sad features framed by the
white linen head-dress, and tried to speak. She endeavoured to reply,
but so weak was she after a whole day and night without food, that she
suddenly fainted.
It was some time before she recovered consciousness, but as soon as she
was sufficiently calm she gave them a brief account of what had
happened. She said nothing about her husband's latest exploit, but
merely told them how she had left him because of his neglect and
brutality, combined with the fact that she had made the astounding
discovery that he was a thief.
They sat beside her, listening attentively to her story, and expressing
the deepest sympathy.
Then, after a quarter of an hour's conversation, the two sisters agreed
that they could not leave her there alone, and suggested that she should
accompany them to the convent, situated a few kilometres out of Paris,
close to Enghien.
So, after taking her to a small restaurant near and giving her some
food, they took a taxi to the Gare du Nord, and half an hour later
entered the big convent of the Order, a grey, inartistic, but spacious
place, with large shady gardens at the rear, sloping down to the Lake of
Enghien.
In the heavy door was a small grille, and when one of the sisters rang
the clanging bell a woman's face peered forth at them with curiosity
before admitting them.
Jean, in her weak, nervous state, had visions of long, stone corridors,
of ghostly figures in black habits and white caps moving noiselessly,
and of a peace and silence entirely strange to her. Inside, no one
spoke. Save those conducting her to the rooms of the Mother Superior,
all were mute.
On every wall was a crucifix, and at each corner in a small niche stood
a statue of the Holy Virgin.
They passed by the fine chapel, and Jean saw the long, stained-glass
windows, the rows of empty chairs, and the Roman Catholic altar, the
burning candles reflecting upon the burnished gilt, and the arum lilies
in the big brass vases on either side.
At last, shown into a large bare room, the walls of which were panelled
half-way up--a room bare, austere, and comfortless, with an utter lack
of any attempt at decoration--Jean sank into a big leather-covered
arm-chair, and one of the sisters took the old black shawl from her
shoulders.
A few minutes later there entered an elderly, stately woman, with hard
mouth and aquiline nose, yet in whose eyes was a pleasant, sympathetic
expression--a woman very calm, very possessed, even austere. She was the
Mother Superior.
With her was another sister, also a probationer in the white dress, big
apron, and cap with strings, proclaiming her to be a nurse.
The two sisters who had found the poor girl introduced her to the Mother
Superior, who at first looked askance at her and whose manner was by no
means cordial.
She heard all in silence, gazing coldly at the girl seated in the chair.
Then she questioned her in a hard, unmusical voice.
"You have been brought up in London--eh?"
"Yes, madame. I was a modiste, and my father was a restaurant keeper."
"You speak English?"
"Quite well, madame. I have lived there ten years."
"We have a branch of the sisterhood in England--near Richmond. Perhaps
you know it?"
"Yes, madame. I remember my father pointing the convent out to me."
"Ah, you know it!" exclaimed the elder woman. "I was there last year."
Then she reverted to Jean's husband, asking where they were married, and
many details concerning their life since that event.
To all the questions Jean replied frankly and openly. All she concealed
was the fact that Ralph and Adolphe had committed a burglary on the
night when she had taken her departure.
"I could not stand it any longer, madame," she assured the Mother
Superior, with hot tears in her big eyes. "He tried to strike me, but
his friend prevented him."
"His friend sympathised with you--eh?" remarked the woman, who had had
much experience of the wrongs of other women.
"Yes, madame."
"In love with you? Answer me that truthfully!" she asked sternly.
"I--I--I really don't know," was the reply, and a hot flush came to her
pale cheeks.
The questioner's lips grew harder.
"But it is plain," she said. "That man was in love with you! Did he ever
suggest that you should leave your husband?"
"No--never--never!" she declared very emphatically. "He never made such
a suggestion."
"He did not know your intention of leaving your home?"
"No. He knew nothing."
The Mother Superior was silent for a few moments, surveying the pale,
despairing little figure in the huge carved chair; then, with a woman's
sympathy, she advanced towards her and, placing her hand upon her
shoulder, said:
"My child, I believe your story. I feel that it is true. The man who was
a criminal deceived you, and you were right to leave him to his own
devices, if he refused to listen to your appeal to him to walk in the
path of honesty. To such as you our Order extends its protection. Remain
here with us, child, and your home in future shall be a home of peace,
and your life shall be spent in doing good to others, according to the
Divine command."
At her words the three sisters bent to her enthusiastically, calling her
by her Christian name; while Jean, on her part, raised the thin, bony
hand of the Mother Superior and kissed it in deep gratitude.
From that moment she became a probationer, and joined the peaceful,
happy circle who kept their religious observations so rigidly, and who,
during the hours of recreation, chattered and made merry together as
women will.
In her white dress, linen apron, and flat cap with strings, her first
duties were in the linen-room, where she employed her time in sewing,
with three other probationers as companions, while each day she attended
a class for instruction in first aid in nursing.
Thus the weeks went on until, in the month of November, the Mother
Superior came to her one afternoon with the news--not altogether
welcome--that as she spoke English so well, it had been arranged that
she should be transferred to the branch in London, and that she was to
leave in two days' time.
So attached had she become to them all that she burst into tears and
appealed to be allowed to remain. The matter, however, had been decided
by the Council of the Order, therefore to stay was impossible. The only
hope that the Mother Superior held out was that she might come back to
Paris at frequent intervals as a visitor.
Long and many were the leave-takings, but at last came the hour of her
departure.
Then, with a final farewell to the Mother Superior, she entered the taxi
with her small belongings and drove to the Gare du Nord, where, in the
black habit of the Order, she took train for London.
The journey by way of Calais and Dover had no novelty for her. She had
done it several times before. But on the arrival platform at Charing
Cross she saw two sisters of her Order awaiting her, and was quickly
welcomed by them.
Then, hailing a taxi, the three drove at once away through Kensington,
across Hammersmith Bridge, along Castlenau, across Barnes Common, and at
last into Roehampton Lane, that long, narrow thoroughfare which, even
to-day, retains a semi-rural aspect, its big, old-fashioned houses
surrounded by spacious grounds, and its several institutions which have
been built on sites of mansions demolished during the past five years or
so.
The Convent of Saint Agnes was a big building, constructed specially by
the Order some twenty years ago. Shut off from the dusty, narrow roads
by a high, grey wall with a small, arched door as the only entrance, it
stood about half-way between the border of Barnes Common and Richmond
Park, a place with many little arched windows and a niche with a statue
of the Virgin over the door.
Here the Mother Superior--a woman slightly older than the directress in
Paris, but with a face rather more pleasant--welcomed her warmly, and
before the next day had passed Jean had settled down to her duties--the
same as those in Paris, the mending of linen, at which she had become an
adept.
In the dull November days, as she sat at the window of the linen-room
overlooking the frost-bitten garden with its leafless trees and dead
flowers, she fell to wondering how Ralph fared. She wondered how all her
friends were at the Maison Collette, and who was now proprietor of her
dead father's little restaurant in Oxford Street.
Through the open windows of her little cubicle, in the silence of night,
she could see the red glare over London, and could hear the distant roar
of the great Metropolis. Oft-times she lay thinking for hours, thinking
and wondering what had become of the man she so unwisely loved--the man
who had destroyed all her fondest hopes and illusions.
December went on, a new year dawned--a year of new hopes and new
resolutions.
She had settled down in her new home, and, among the English sisters,
found herself just as happy as she had been at Enghien. No one in the
whole sisterhood was more attentive to her instruction, both religious
and in nursing, for she was looking forward with hope that by March she
would pass from the grade of probationer to that of nurse, and that she
would soon go forth upon her errands of mercy among the poor and
afflicted.
And so, after the storm and stress of life in the underworld of Paris,
Jean Ansell lived in an atmosphere of devotion, of perfect happiness,
and blissful peace.