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Updated: June 7, 2025
And even when Sister Marie-Aimée said nothing at all, I could see her frown, and her eyes looked crossly at me and followed me about. I felt crushed with shame, so crushed that I could scarcely lift my feet. I tried to hide in the corners as I walked; and, in spite of it all, next time I had lost my handkerchief again. Madeleine used to look at me with sham compassion.
I hunted up the most beautiful hymns of praise that I could find, and repeated them without getting tired. "Star of the Morning, make Colette whole." The first time, I remained on my knees for so long that Sister Marie-Aimée scolded me. Nobody noticed the little signs which we made to one another, and the nine days of prayer passed off without any one knowing anything about them.
When I sat down next to her she used to look at me queerly. She said she thought I was a queer little thing. One day she asked me if I thought her pretty. Directly she said it, I remembered that Sister Marie-Aimée said that she was as black as a mole. I saw, however, that she had a broad forehead, fine big eyes, and the rest of her face was small and refined.
I could not forget the unkind look she always gave me when she passed the old bench and saw me sitting there with Sister Marie-Aimée and M. le Curé. So I waited impatiently to hear what she would say to Mademoiselle Maximilienne. M. le Curé had been away for a week, and Sister Marie-Aimée used to talk to me every day about my new work. She told me how glad she would be to see me on Sundays.
Madeleine, who had been following Sister Marie-Aimée about, wanted to go and fetch a longer stick, but Sister Marie-Aimée stopped her, and said, "It is lucky to have got away." Bonne Justine, who was standing near me, hid her eyes and murmured, "Oh, it is shameful, shameful!" and I thought it was shameful, too. I felt as though Sister Marie-Aimée had grown smaller.
It was late at night when I went to sleep, and I began to expect the farmer's wife directly morning came. I wanted her to come, and I was afraid of her coming. Sister Marie-Aimée looked up quickly every time the door opened. Just as we were finishing dinner, the porteress came and asked if I were ready to go. Sister Marie-Aimée said that I should be ready in a moment.
Adèle came into the room, and Madame Alphonse said, "If you see my husband, tell him that my brother is here." It was some minutes before I understood. Then I realized suddenly that the young man in the white smock was Madame Deslois's eldest son. A sense of shame which I had never felt before made me blush fiercely, and I was ever so sorry that I had spoken about Sister Marie-Aimée.
Every time she rang Veronique went out to see who was coming in. She always had something disagreeable to say about each one of the sisters whom she recognized. One evening the bell sounded. Veronique, who was looking out, said, "Well, here's one whom nobody expected." She put her head into the kitchen again, and said, "It is Sister Marie-Aimée."
She put on a timid kind of voice, and said, "Sister, here is a new girl." I expected to be scolded; but Sister Marie-Aimée smiled, kissed me several times, and said, "You are too small to sit on a bench, I shall put you in here." And she sat me down on a stool in the hollow of her desk.
She did not tell me who had told her this, but she said it was an awful shame. She was very fond of Sister Gabrielle, who used to treat her like a little child. She did not like "that Sister Marie-Aimée," as she used to call her when she knew that nobody heard her but ourselves.
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