Vow of Silence Read online

  A Vow of Silence

  Veronica Black

  Contents

  Title Page

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  Copyright

  ONE

  Sister Joan’s least favourite hour of the day was the hour of recreation sandwiched between supper and Benediction. In one sense it justified its name since all that the members of the Community did was to recreate the events of the day in minute and tedious detail from Sister St Jude having lost and found her spectacles to Sister Patrick having seen a cloud in the shape of an angel. As Sister St Jude lost her spectacles somewhere or other every day and as Sister Patrick was always seeing angels – often in places where no self-respecting angel would have touched down – conversation lacked sparkle. Reverend Mother Agnes seldom attended the recreation on the grounds that the novices would find it more difficult to relax with the eagle eye of the Prioress on them. Sister Joan suspected, however, that Reverend Mother Agnes found the period as tedious as she did herself.

  Now she smiled modestly for the ten thousandth time as Sister Clare said, ‘Such beautiful embroidery, Sister Joan! If it were not a sin I might be quite envious of your talents.’

  ‘We all have certain talents to be used for the glory of God,’ Sister Francis said. Sister Francis could be relied upon to state the obvious. The faint reproach in her voice was there to remind them that personal compliments were not encouraged.

  ‘It would be a great help if the Lord let me know what my particular talent is,’ Sister Edith said wistfully. Sister Edith was large, well meaning and clumsy. Her cooking was abominable; her cleaning enthusiastic but slapdash; her voice tuneless. She approached every task assigned to her with grim determination but so far her particular metier had eluded detection. Sister Joan considered the suggestion that Sister Edith might have the virtue of forcing her companions to practise charity and patience, but the remark would have been unkind. In any case the moment had passed. Sister Patrick was drawing their attention to a faint stain on the wall that looked like the outline of a cherub. Several of the others professed to see the resemblance too which was hardly surprising since a wall relief depicting a cherub had been removed for cleaning not long before, an event which they all seemed to have failed to notice.

  A discreet tap on the door announced Sister Clement, one of the two lay sisters. The two lay sisters didn’t often attend the recreation hour either since they were required to man the outside telephone, run any last-minute errands needed before Benediction, and type out the duty roster for the next day.

  ‘Dominus vobiscum,’ Sister Clement said.

  ‘Et cum spiritu tuo. What is it, Sister Clement?’ Sister Francis who was in charge of the recreation looked an enquiry.

  ‘Reverend Mother’s compliments and will Sister Joan please go and see her?’

  A summons to see Reverend Mother Agnes during recreation was not unusual. The Prioress often took advantage of the period to have a quiet talk with one or another of her Community, to give news from home, to discuss doubts and difficulties concerning vocations, or occasionally to reprimand in decent privacy some fault that might shock the novices if it were commented on in general confession.

  Sister Joan was already folding up her cushion cover though she paid Sister Francis the courtesy of a murmured,

  ‘By your leave, Sister?’

  ‘Certainly, Sister Joan.’ Sister Francis inclined her head graciously.

  A summons from the Prioress was expected to be obeyed promptly. Once outside the recreation room Sister Joan glided briskly in the direction of the parlour.

  Parlour was actually a misnomer since the main parlour where visitors were admitted was situated at the other side of the building. The smaller room where the Prioress spent much of her time was never glimpsed by the general public who would not have recognised the bare and austere apartment as being a parlour at all.

  Reverend Mother Agnes matched the austerity of her surroundings, her long face and aristocratic hands giving her a strong resemblance to an El Greco stepped out of his frame, with only her sweet, clear voice to impart femininity to her aspect. Her habit, of dark purple to denote her position in the Community, was cut on economical lines; beneath the white wimple her long, pale eyes surveyed the younger woman without emotion as Sister Joan entered with the customary,

  ‘Dominus tecum.’

  ‘Et cum spiritu tuo. Close the door and sit down, Sister Joan.’

  As usual the younger woman was intrigued by the contrast between the harsh masculinity of her appearance and the bell-like clarity of her voice. Someone had whispered to her once that Reverend Mother Agnes had given up a promising career to enter the religious life. She would not have been surprised to learn that it was true, but she was unlikely to learn it from the Prioress herself who kept the rule of silence about one’s previous existence conscientiously.

  ‘I apologise for interrupting your recreation, Sister,’ Reverend Mother Agnes said now, resting her folded hands on the flat-topped desk at which she was sitting.

  ‘It was not wildly exciting, Reverend Mother,’ Sister Joan said dryly.

  Usually her remarks caused the long, thin mouth of her superior to twitch, but tonight Reverend Mother Agnes remained grave.

  ‘You have been with us for five years‚’ she said.

  ‘From when I entered the religious life,’ Sister Joan said.

  The Prioress had just begun on her second term of office, it being the rule in the Order of the Daughters of Compassion that no sister might serve more than two consecutive five-year terms as Prioress.

  ‘There is a vacancy in our House in Cornwall,’ Reverend Mother Agnes said.

  Another rule of the Order stipulated that no more than fifteeen professed nuns and lay sisters should comprise one House. In an age of dwindling vocations this necessitated some juggling of inmates.

  ‘I am sorry if it is bad news,’ Sister Joan said.

  ‘Good news though not as the world sees it. Mother Frances passed away peacefully in her ninety-first year. She was my own Novice Mistress many years ago. A very fine woman. May her soul –’

  ‘And the souls of all the faithful departed through the mercy of God rest in peace,’ Sister Joan chimed in, crossing herself.

  ‘Reverend Mother Ann has written to enquire if we can spare them a sister,’ Reverend Mother continued.

  ‘And you want me to go?’

  The voice was convent calm but Sister Joan’s dark blue eyes had flashed mutinously. After five years she still had not complete command of her eyes.

  ‘For the last three months ever since Sister Jane made her full profession we have been one in excess of the rules‚’ Reverend Mother said without reproach. ‘Who goes is, of course, my responsibility. I have thought deeply about it. I have decided that you are the one most fitted. I wish to send someone I can trust absolutely, someone who is not tied hand and foot by convention.’

  Sister Joan sat up straighter, the spark of rebellion becoming a spark of interest.

  ‘I don’t quite follow you, Reverend Mother,’ she said cautiously.

  ‘You don’t follow me because I am not yet leading you anywhere,’ the other said. ‘Last month I received a letter from Mother Frances. We did exchange letters once or twice a year. She was in the habit of keeping in touch with all her former novices. She saw it as her duty. The letter troubled me very much. I did not answer it since I was unsure how to answer it
.’

  That Reverend Mother Agnes should confess herself uncertain was unique in Sister Joan’s experience.

  ‘Perhaps you had better read it for yourself,’ she was saying, sliding a piece of paper across the desk.

  The handwriting was the delicate italic script of a nun who has grown old in the cloister, with a faint shakiness here and there.

  ‘In the Name of Our Blessed Lord,

  ‘My dear Mother Silence,

  ‘You will forgive your old Novice Mistress for addressing you by your old nickname, I claim the privilege of age. My felicitations on your nearing the end of your second term of office. I too am nearing the end and trust soon to be elected into a higher sphere. I count myself blessed that my intellect remains clear though my old enemy, migraine, troubles me occasionally. I think often of the pleasant recreations we used to have under Mother Celeste. It is a sign of age, is it not, when the past becomes clearer than the present? I know you will excuse the evil writing. How I wish I had the penmanship of dear Sister Bridgit O’Reilly. You remember her, I trust?

  ‘If circumstances enable you to visit I shall look forward eagerly to what we both must realise will be the last time.

  ‘Yours Affectionately in Our Lord, ‘Mother Frances Byrne.’

  Having read it through twice Sister Joan looked up, her small face puzzled. ‘Forgive me, Reverend Mother, but I don’t see –’ she began.

  ‘Mother Frances had a rooted horror of nicknames‚’ the Prioress said. ‘She certainly never bestowed any upon her novices. I believe the salutation enjoins discretion upon me.’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘She gives no hint of that.’ Reverend Mother Agnes took back the letter and tapped it with a long forefinger. ‘What she speaks about in this makes no sense at all. She never suffered from migraine headaches in her life. During my novitiate I was the one troubled by migraine. And the recreation periods under Mother Celeste were the opposite of pleasant. Mother Celeste, God rest her soul, was of the opinion that the Inquisition ought never to have been abolished.’

  Sister Joan choked back a giggle. This was not, she sensed, a time for levity.

  ‘Finally she calls to mind the penmanship of Sister Bridgit O’Reilly. Sister Bridgit was a lay sister during my novitiate. A very good, sincere girl, completely illiterate.’

  The blue eyes fixed on her opened more widely.

  ‘Is it possible,’ Sister Joan said after a moment or two, ‘that Mother Frances was going senile?’

  ‘Senility does not write a short, coherent letter, in which as much misinformation as possible is crowded into as brief a space as possible,’ the Prioress said. ‘I believe that Mother Frances was trying to convey to me that all was not well. I also suspect that whatever was troubling her could not be confided to Reverend Mother Ann.’

  Reverend Mother Ann would have read the letter in accordance with regulations.

  ‘You say that you didn’t answer this, Reverend Mother?’

  ‘I delayed.’ There was regret in the pretty voice. ‘I read it over several times, trying to work out the best plan of action. Finally I telephoned the convent and enquired after Mother Frances. I was informed her long life was moving peacefully to its close, and that had I travelled to see her it is very doubtful if she would have rallied sufficiently to recognise me. A few days ago I received word of her death. It was announced, Sister.’ Sister Joan blushed slightly. Announcements of professions, of anniversaries and of deaths in the various Houses of the Order were read out during supper, and for her own part she often permitted her’ mind to wander.

  ‘I feel that I ought to have responded to the letter, perhaps set her mind at rest,’ the Prioress said. ‘I dislike unfinished business, Sister.’

  ‘You want me to become part of the Cornwall Community?’

  ‘Reverend Mother Ann has requested one of my professed sisters. She wants one who can undertake teaching duties. You have a Diploma, do you not?’

  ‘Only in Art and Literature, Reverend Mother.’

  ‘I presume you can make shift to teach other subjects?’

  ‘Yes, Reverend Mother.’

  Again the meek answer, the flash of the blue eyes.

  ‘You are thirty-five years old, are you not? Yours was a late vocation.’

  ‘Between the saddle and the ground,’ Sister Joan said with a sudden, disarming grin.

  ‘You lived enough in the world to acquire a certain sophistication, an impatience with the conventional way of doing things. You are also alert and efficient.’ The blue eyes were raised to the long face opposite.

  ‘I have no relish for intrigue,’ the younger woman said bluntly.

  ‘Meaning that when you enter the Cornwall House your first loyalty must be to your new sisters? Your first loyalty must be to God, child, and if there is some wrong, some injustice He wishes to be discovered then it is your duty to discover it.’

  ‘And report it to you?’

  ‘When you leave here my authority over you ceases,’ the Prioress said, ‘so I must leave it to your own good judgement to decide what is to be done should there be anything – shall we say irregular?’

  ‘May I ask what Reverend Mother Ann is like?’ Sister Joan said.

  ‘I have never personally met her,’ the Prioress said disappointingly. ‘I know her only by reputation. She is reputed to have a brilliant mind. Her father was Professor Gillespie, the noted archaeologist. I understand that as a girl she accompanied him on several of his digs. When he died she entered the religious life. I also understand that the Benedictines were very disappointed that she didn’t choose them. Our own Order is comparatively modest. We do not even have the distinction of having been founded by a saint, though it is my hope that in her own good time Rome will remedy that.’

  She glanced as she spoke towards a framed photograph on the wall. The thin, bright-eyed gaze of the young woman who gazed out from the frame held the attention of the most casual observer. It could have been the face of a mystic or of a fanatic, the eyes blazing into some private vision, the lower lip drooping and vulnerable.

  ‘They say she had many lovers,’ the Prioress said. ‘There was considerable opposition when she founded her first convent, many asking quite reasonably why she was not content to join one of the existing Orders, but she wanted to leave her individual stamp upon the religious life. Well, she got her way. If she wishes to be raised to the altars she will get her way in that too. As she stood in line for the gas chamber she called out that they would remember her. Twenty-eight years old with a life crammed full of incident behind her. Sister Joan, am I to send you to Cornwall?’

  She was bending the rule, giving the other a choice.

  ‘When would you wish me to leave?’ Sister Joan asked.

  ‘I can telephone them tomorrow and tell them to expect you on Saturday. You will want to write to your family and inform them of your change of address.’

  ‘Yes, Reverend Mother.’ Sister Joan rose and gave the customary bow.

  ‘You will be travelling down with a new novice,’ the Prioress informed her. ‘A very nice child of nineteen has decided to enter our Order. As we have our quota of eager hopefuls she will enter the Cornwall House. One of their novices left recently so there is a space.’

  A space into which the girl of nineteen might or might not fit. At nineteen, Sister Joan thought, she had been in her first year at Art College, drunk on the new sights, colours, and personalities. Meeting Jacob.

  It struck her now as a strange and ironic fact that they had met on the steps of the tiny chapel, she about to enter, he leaving with a portfolio of rapid, scintillating sketches underneath his arm. It had been a foretaste of their relationship.

  ‘If there is anything to be discovered, Reverend Mother,’ she said, banishing memories of Jacob and his portfolio, ‘how do I contact you? That is assuming that what I find cannot be communicated for some reason to Reverend Mother Ann?’

  ‘The school where you will be teaching is not
within the enclosure‚’ the Prioress told her. ‘It is a small private school for the children of those who live on Bodmin Moor. So you will have more freedom of movement than is usual. You will not, of course, take advantage of it unless it is absolutely necessary.’

  The bell for Benediction began to ring. Sister Joan bowed again and went out, closing the heavy door softly, automatically smoothing down the skirt of her ankle-length grey habit.

  The rest of the Community were filing into the chapel. The four novices (no House was supposed to accept more than four at one time) trotted past under the watchful eye of Mother Euphemia. All those who had served a term as Prioress were entitled to retain the prefix of ‘Mother’ and to sew a narrow purple ribbon to the sleeve of their habit, one ribbon for each five-year term served. These apparently childish distinctions of dress were all a part of the minute detail that went to make up the religious life, like the blue habits and white bonnets of the novices.

  ‘You must understand that you are preparing to leave the world,’ Mother Euphemia had told her on her own arrival five years before. ‘The dress of the novices sets them apart from the professed and from the laity. During your novitiate you will begin to learn how it feels to be different from the majority.’

  The blue habit reached to mid-calf, showing thick black stockings and rubber-soled black shoes. Under the white poke bonnet her head had been shaven. She had never felt more ridiculous, nor realised more clearly her vanity.

  The two years in the novitiate had been struggled through, to be followed by the vowing herself to poverty, chastity, obedience and compassion for one year. During that year her hair had been permitted to grow an inch, her poke bonnet exchanged for a white veil. At the end of the third year, despite a letter from Jacob, she had exchanged the blue habit for a grey one and taken perpetual vows.

  In five years she had not left the convent. In five years she had not entered a shop, ridden on public transport, spoken with any man save the priest in the confessional. In five years she had not watched television, or read a newspaper, or listened to the radio.