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Updated: July 29, 2025
There were toilette vessels of beautifully shaped and brightly polished brass, and on a silver salver was a refection of manchet bread, comfits, dried cherries, and wine. Sister Mabel explained that a lay-sister would be at hand, in case anything was needed by the noble ladies, and then hurried away to vespers. Jean threw herself upon the cross-legged chair that stood nearest.
So it came to pass that, as he rode up to the door and dismounted, flinging his rein to Brother Philip, the Bishop found himself confronted by the queer little figure of the aged lay-sister, drawn up to its full height and obviously upheld by a sense of importance and dignity.
Moving along the cloister, she seated herself upon the stone slab in the archway overlooking the lawn and the pieman's tree; then drew forth from beneath her scapulary, the worn leathern wallet which had belonged to the old lay-sister, Mary Antony.
"Hapless one! I have made a mistake. I am the nun you saw this morning, but I am French. In the name of God keep my counsel and begone, for I have nothing to say to you! Whisper, for if the lay-sister woke up I should be undone." "Do not be afraid of my discretion.
He waved his hand kindly to imply that he knew what I had done. He and his wife were in the Sisters' front garden walk conversing eagerly with the Mother Superior. They neared the gate. Suddenly the Mother Superior went back, the lay-sister guarding the gate let the pair out and the three of us hurried off together. We found ourselves now in the uproar and vortex of the struggle.
She was as humble as a cloistered lay-sister, and as silent as if she were not a woman, and patient as the sucking lamb, and industrious as the ant, clean as the ermine, and pure as a saint of those times in which, by the grace of the Most High, saintly women were born into the world.
Well, two days ago, my dear friend begged the abbess and my aunt to allow me to sleep in her room in the place of the lay-sister, who, having a very bad cold, had carried her cough to the infirmary. The permission was granted, and you cannot imagine our pleasure in seeing ourselves at liberty, for the first time, to sleep in the same bed.
"I thus hoped to be delivered before the expiration of the three months; but I have assuredly made a mistake, for the time draws to an end and I feel no signs of a speedy delivery. I am obliged to return to the convent, and yet I cannot do so. The lay-sister who is with me is a perfect shrew. She has orders not to let me speak to anybody, and never to let my face be seen.
I have contrived to gain over the lay-sister and the gardener, as well as another nun, and that miracle was performed by my cunning assisted by my lover's gold. "He answers for the fidelity of the cook and his wife who take care of the casino. He has likewise every confidence in the two gondoliers, although one of them is sure to be a spy of the State Inquisitors."
"That is impossible. Catherine is in retreat." "So the lay-sister told me; but I thought " "Sister Catherine is going to be clothed next Saturday, and I can assure you, Mr. Phelan, that the wishes you tell me of are forgotten. I know her very well. I can answer for Sister Catherine."
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