Chapter 23

AN UNEXPECTED MEETING

The enquiry was to be made in the guest-parlour on the next morning.

* * * * *

Ralph went to mass first at nine o’clock, which was said by a priest from the parish church who acted as chaplain to the convent; and had a chair set for him outside the nuns’ choir from which he could see the altar and the tall pointed window; and then, after some refreshment in the guest-parlour, spread out his papers, and sat enthroned behind a couple of tables, as at a tribunal. Mr. Morris stood deferentially by his chair as the examination was conducted.

Ralph was a little taken aback by the bearing of the Abbess. In the course of the enquiry, when he was perplexed by one or two of the records, she rose from her chair before the table, and came round to his side, drawing up a seat as she did so; Ralph could hardly tell her to go back, but his magisterial air was a little affected by having one whom he almost considered as a culprit sitting judicially beside him.

“It is better for me to be here,” she said. “I can explain more easily so.”

* * * * *

There was a little orchard that the nuns had sold in the previous year; and Ralph asked for an explanation.

“It came from the Kingsford family,” she said serenely; “it was useless to us.”

“But--” began the inquisitor.

“We needed some new vestments,” she went on. “You will understand, Mr. Torridon, that it was necessary for us to sell it. We are not rich at all.”

There was nothing else that called for comment; except the manner in which the books were kept. Ralph suggested some other method.

“Dame Agnes has her own ways,” said the old lady. “We must not disturb her.”

And Dame Agnes assumed a profound and financial air on the other side of the table.

Presently Ralph put a mark in the inventory against a “cope of gold bawdekin,” and requested that it might be brought.

The sister-sacristan rose at a word from the Abbess and went out, returning presently with the vestment. She unfolded the coverings and spread it out on the table before Ralph.

It was a magnificent piece of work, of shimmering gold, with orphreys embroidered with arms; and she stroked out its folds with obvious pride.

“These are Warham’s arms,” observed the Abbess. “You know them, Mr. Torridon? We worked these the month before his death.”

Ralph nodded briskly.

“Will you kindly leave it here, Reverend Mother,” he said. “I wish to see it again presently.”

The Abbess gave no hint of discomposure, but signed to the sacristan to place it over a chair at one side.

There were a couple of other things that Ralph presently caused to be fetched and laid aside--a precious mitre with a couple of cameos in front, and bordered with emeralds, and a censer with silver filigree work.

Then came a more difficult business.

“I wish to see the nuns one by one, Reverend Mother,” he said. “I must ask you to withdraw.”

The Abbess gave him a quick look, and then rose.

“Very well, sir, I will send them in.” And she went out with Mr. Morris behind her.

They came in one by one, and sat down before the table, with downcast eyes, and hands hidden beneath their scapulars; and all told the same tale, except one. They had nothing to complain of; they were happy; the Rule was carefully observed; there were no scandals to be revealed; they asked nothing but to be left in peace. But there was one who came in nervously and anxiously towards the end, a woman with quick black eyes, who glanced up and down and at the door as she sat down. Ralph put the usual questions.

“I wish to be released, sir,” she said. “I am weary of the life, and the--” she stopped and glanced swiftly up again at the commissioner.

“Well?” said Ralph.

“The papistical ways,” she said.

Ralph felt a sudden distrust of the woman; but he hardened his heart. He set a mark opposite her name; she had been professed ten years, he saw by the list.

“Very well,” he said; “I will tell my Lady Abbess.” She still hesitated a moment.

“There will be a provision for me?” she asked

“There will be a provision,” said Ralph a little grimly. He was authorised to offer in such cases a secular dress and a sum of five shillings.

Lastly came in Margaret herself.

Ralph hardly knew her. He had been unable to distinguish her at mass, and even now as she faced him in her black habit and white head-dress it was hard to be certain of her identity. But memory and sight were gradually reconciled; he remembered her delicate eyebrows and thin straight lips; and when she spoke he knew her voice.

They talked a minute or two about their home; but Ralph did not dare to say too much, considering what he had yet to say.

“I must ask you the questions,” he said at last, smiling at her.

She looked up at him nervously, and dropped her eyes once more.

She nodded or shook her head in silence at each enquiry, until at last one bearing upon the morals of the house came up; then she looked swiftly up once more, and Ralph saw that her grey eyes were terrified.

“You must tell me,” he said; and put the question again.

“I do not know what you mean,” she answered, staring at him bewildered.

Ralph went on immediately to the next.

At last he reached the crisis.

“Margaret,” he said, “I have something to tell you.” He stopped and began to play with his pen. He had seldom felt so embarrassed as now in the presence of this shy sister of his of whom he knew so little. He could not look at her.

“Margaret, you know, you--you are under age. The King’s Grace has ordered that all under twenty years of age are to leave their convents.”

There was a dead silence.

Ralph was enraged with his own weakness. He had begun the morning’s work with such determination; but the strange sweet atmosphere of the house, the file of women coming in one by one with their air of innocence and defencelessness had affected him. In spite of himself his religious side had asserted itself, and he found himself almost tremulous now.

He made a great effort at self-repression, and looked up with hard bright eyes at his sister.

“There must be no crying or rebellion,” he said. “You must come with me to-morrow. I shall send you to Overfield.”

Still Margaret said nothing. She was staring at him now, white-faced with parted lips.

“You are the last?” he said with a touch of harshness, standing up with his hands on the table. “Tell the Reverend Mother I have done.”

Then she rose too.

“Ralph,” she cried, “my brother! For Jesu’s sake--”

“Tell the Reverend Mother,” he said again, his eyes hard with decision.

She turned and went out without a word.

* * * * *

Ralph found the interview with the Abbess even more difficult than he had expected.

Once her face twitched with tears; but she drove them back bravely and faced him again.

“Do you mean to tell me, Mr. Torridon, that you intend to take your sister away?”

Ralph bowed.

“And that Dame Martha has asked to be released?”

Again he bowed.

“Are you not afraid, sir, to do such work?”

Ralph smiled bitterly.

“I am not, Reverend Mother,” he said. “I know too much.”

“From whom?”

“Oh! not from your nuns,” he said sharply, “they of course know nothing, or at least will tell me nothing. It was from Dr. Layton.”

“And what did Dr. Layton tell you?”

“I can hardly tell you that, Reverend Mother; it is not fit for your ears.”

She looked at him steadily.

“And you believe it?”

Ralph smiled.

“That makes no difference,” he said. “I am acting by his Grace’s orders.”

There was silence for a moment.

“Then may our Lord have mercy on you!” she said.

She turned to where the gold cope gleamed over the chair, with the mitre and censer lying on its folds.

“And those too?” she asked.

“Those too,” said Ralph.

She turned towards the door without a word.

“There are the fees as well,” remarked Ralph. “We can arrange those this evening, Reverend Mother.”

The little stiff figure turned and waited at the door. “And at what time will you dine, sir?”

“Immediately,” said Ralph.

* * * * *

He was served at dinner with the same courtesy as before; but the lay sister’s eyes were red, and her hands shook as she shifted the plates. Neither spoke a word till towards the end of the meal.

“Where is my man?” asked Ralph, who had not seen him since he had gone out with the Abbess a couple of hours before.

The sister shook her head.

“Where is the Reverend Mother?”

Again she shook her head.

Ralph enquired the hour of Vespers, and when he had learnt it, took his cap and went out to look for Mr. Morris. He went first to the little dark outhouse, and peered in over the bottom half of the door, but there was no sign of him there. He could see a horse standing in a stall opposite, and tried to make out the second horse that he knew was there; but it was too dark, and he turned away.

It was a warm October afternoon as he went out through the gatehouse, still and bright, with the mellow smell of dying leaves in the air; the fields stretched away beyond the road into the blue distance as he went along, and were backed by the thinning woods, still ruddy with the last flames of autumn. Overhead the blue sky, washed with recent rains, arched itself in a great transparent vault, and a stream of birds crossed it from east to west.

He went round the corner of the convent buildings and turned up into a meadow beside a thick privet hedge that divided it from the garden, and as he moved along he heard a low humming noise sounding from the other side.

There was a door in the hedge at the point, and at either side the growth was a little thin, and he could look through without being himself seen.

The grass was trim and smooth inside; there was a mass of autumn flowers, grown no doubt for the altar, running in a broad bed across the nearer side of the garden, and beyond it rose a grey dial, round which sat a circle of nuns.

Ralph pressed his face to the hedge and watched.

There they were, each with her wheel before her, spinning in silence. The Abbess sat in the centre, immediately below the dial, with a book in her hand, and was turning the pages.

He could see a nun’s face steadily bent on her wheel--that was Dame Agnes who had fetched the cope for him in the morning. She seemed perfectly quiet and unaffected, watching her thread, and putting out a deft hand now and again to the machinery. Beside her sat another, whose face he remembered well; she had stammered a little as she gave her answers in the morning, and even as he looked the face twitched suddenly, and broke into tears. He saw the Abbess turn from her book and lay her hand, with a kind of tender decision on the nun’s arm, and saw her lips move, but the hum and rattle of the spinning-wheels was too loud to let him hear what she said; he saw now the other nun lift her face again from her hands, and wink away her tears as she laid hold of the thread once more.

* * * * *

Ralph had a strange struggle with himself that afternoon as he walked on in the pleasant autumn weather through meadow and copse. The sight of the patient women had touched him profoundly. Surely it was almost too much to ask him to turn away his own sister from the place she loved! If he relented, it was certain that no other Visitor would come that way for the present; she might at least have another year or two of peace. Was it too late?

He reminded himself again how such things were bound to happen; how every change, however beneficial, must bring sorrow with it, and that to turn back on such work because a few women suffered was not worthy of a man. It was long before he could come to any decision, and the evening was drawing on, and the time for Vespers come and gone before he turned at last into the village to enquire for his servant.

The other men had seen nothing of Mr. Morris that day; he had not been back to the village.

A group or two stared awefully at the fine gentleman with the strong face and steady intolerant eyes, as he strode down the tiny street in his rich dress, swinging his long silver-headed cane. They had learnt who he was now, but were so overcome by seeing the King’s Commissioner that they forgot to salute him. As he turned the corner again he looked round once more, and there they were still watching him. A few women had come to the doors as well, and dropped their arched hands hastily and disappeared as he turned.

The convent seemed all as he had left it earlier in the afternoon, as he came in sight of it again. The high chapel roof rose clear against the reddening sky, with the bell framed in its turret distinct as if carved out of cardboard against the splendour.

He was admitted instantly when he rang on the bell, but the portress seemed to look at him with a strange air of expectancy, and stood looking after him as he went across the paved court to the door of the guest-house.

There was a murmur of voices in the parlour as he paused in the entry, and he wondered who was within, but as his foot rang out the sound ceased.

He opened the door and went in; and then stopped bewildered.

In the dim light that passed through the window stood his father and Mary Maxwell, his sister.