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Updated: June 29, 2025
On that the lay-sister led him into the parlour, and went in search of the Reverend Mother. The floor was so thickly bees-waxed that the rug slipped under his feet, and, afraid lest he might fall down, he stood quite still, impressed by the pious pictures on the walls, and by the large books upon the table, and by the poor-box, and by the pious inscriptions.
But as if love had favoured my vows, when I was within a hundred paces of the cottage I saw the peasant woman coming out to meet me. "Sir," said she, accosting me, "the young nun begs you to return this evening at nine o'clock; the lay-sister will be asleep then, and she will be able to speak freely to you." There could be no more doubt. My heart leapt with joy.
As a rule the privileges accorded to the nuns consisted merely in their being allowed to receive visits in the presence of a lay-sister, and to perform in concerts on the feast-days of the order; but some few convents had a name for far greater license, and it was a common thing for the noble libertine returned from Italy to boast of his intrigue with a Venetian nun.
The candle which lighted this dreary place was fixed in a bottle. "What have you decided on doing?" said I. "I have decided on nothing, for an unforeseen incident has confounded us. The lay-sister has been asleep for eighteen hours." "She will die of convulsions or of an apoplectic fit to-night if you do not call a doctor, who may possibly restore her to life with a dose of castor oil."
"Reverend Mother," said the old lay-sister, in a voice which strove to be steady, yet quavered; "for long hours you have studied, not heeding that the evening meal was over. Chide not old Antony for bringing you some of that broth, which you like the best. You will not sleep unless you eat."
Not for one moment could she doubt that our Lady, in answer to Hugh's impassioned prayers, had chosen to make plain the Divine will, by means of this wonderful and most explicit vision to the aged lay-sister, Mary Antony.
She it was who made me turn when she saw you following us. I lifted my veil for you to see that I was she of whom I thought you were in search, and happily the lay-sister did not notice me. She wants me to return with her to the convent in three days, as she thinks I have an incurable dropsy.
Mary Mark very properly refused to allow the old" "Lay-sister," interposed the Bishop, sternly. Mother Sub-Prioress gasped; then made obeisance: "the old lay-sister to leave the Convent. Whereupon Sister Antony sent Mary Mark to deliver the Reverend Mother's message to me, bribing her, with the promise of a gift from you, my lord, to leave her the key.
See how he has rushed through the incense-bearers, thrust aside lay-sister Agatha, scattered the two-and-twenty damosels who sang so sweetly and he stands before the novice with his hands out-stretched, and his face shining, and the light of love in his gray eyes.
I found my fair friend looking somewhat sad, and on my enquiring the reason she told me that a nephew of the country-woman's, who had come from Chamberi that morning, had told her that he had heard from a lay-sister of the same convent, whom he knew, that two sisters would start at day-break in two days' time to fetch her; this sad news, she said, had made her tears flow fast.
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