Anna (55 page)

“We will send for the child,” she said. “You may ask her yourself if she would be unhappy if you went away.”

“But not here,” Anna said. “I couldn't speak to Annette in front of anyone.”

The Reverend Mother raised her eyebrows again.

“I cannot imagine,” she said. “what it could be that you would want to say to your child and not wish
me
to hear. There can be no secrets inside a convent.”

She picked up the small brass bell that lay on her desk and rang it sharply. When the maid entered, she looked hard at Anna as she spoke.

“Tell Sister Francesca,” she said. “That I would like little Annette brought to my room at once. I'm waiting.”

As soon as the maid had gone she turned to Anna.

“The child will be over in a few minutes,” she remarked. “You may say anything you wish to her.”

And taking up her pen, she ignored Anna. With her head a little on one side and her lips pursed, she checked item by item a long list of requirements that Sister Ursula had sent to her. “White calico thirty yards; lawn twelve yards; black net sixteen yards …”

“I shan't go,” Anna kept saying to herself whilst she was waiting
for Annette to be brought to them. “They can't make me go. My place is here—beside Annette. Even if I don't see her, she knows that I am here if she should ever want me. I could never go away and leave her here.”

The knock on the door startled her. She rose quickly and went forward but the Reverend Mother raised her hand.

“Be careful not to do anything to excite the child,” she said. “It is always dangerous to appeal to the emotional side of children.”

When the door opened it was only Annette that stood there; the maid hung back nervously as though apprehensive that something terrible was going to happen to the little girl, as though some plenary punishment were about to be administered to this very small sinner.

But the Reverend Mother's voice was warm and kindly.

“Come in, ma petite,” she said. “Come in and sit down. Your mother is here, she wants to talk to you.”

Annette advanced slowly, cautiously. The Reverend Mother's room was strange to her and she was frightened. She looked from one to the other and then dropped her eyes again. Her hands clasped together in front of her were trembling. Yet somehow she was oddly reserved and self-possessed. Her uniform that Sister Francesca had issued her—a new one because she was growing so fast—was too big for her. It hung below her knees and there was a deep tuck in the striped sleeves.

The Reverend Mother pointed to a chair and Annette climbed obediently into it. She sat bolt upright as she had been told to sit.

“Are you happy here?” the Reverend Mother asked.

Annette paused, surprised that such a question should have been asked her.

“Yes, thank you, Reverend Mother,” she said slowly.

“You don't want to leave here?”

The child was still more puzzled.

“No, Reverend Mother,” she said.

The woman at the desk leaned forward.

“Even if your mother went away for a little holiday, here you wouldn't feel lonely with all your friends about you? The Sisters would still be here. They would look after you just the same.”

The question was too difficult for the child to answer. There must be an answer, she was sure, that they wanted her to make, but she did not know what it was.

She looked from one to the other in bewilderment.

The Reverend Mother was smiling at her encouragingly. She could see now that she wanted her to say “Yes.” But her mother's
face was wrinkled almost as if she were going tocry; it made Annette want to cry too.

Then Anna raised her head and the child could see now that she was crying.

“You wouldn't miss me if I went away?” she asked.

But Annette was still too much bewildered to reply. She began to swing her legs.

“Your mother was asking if you would miss her if she went away,” the Reverend Mother repeated. “With all the Sisters who are so kind to you and all your little friends, do you feel you would be unhappy?”

The question was clearer now. The Reverend Mother had made it easier for her.

“No, Reverend Mother,” she replied.

The Reverend Mother glanced quickly in Anna's direction and sat back. It was her victory. Annette was already more one of them than Anna ever would be.

“Do you want to ask any other questions?” she inquired. “We mustn't keep this little one too long away from her lessons.”

Anna got up and went over to the child.

“Annette,” she said.

The child looked up at her wonderingly. She was aware of an uncomfortable, tingly, hot feeling.

“Then you don't need me any more?” Anna asked. “You've grown so big that you can manage without me.”

Annette looked up and caught the Reverend Mother's eye. She saw that the older woman was smiling. This important person who ruled everything was trying to make it simple and easy for her, so she nodded.

As Anna saw the gesture a sudden feeling of pity overwhelmed her. She went on her knees beside the child and put her arms around her.

“My dear little Annette,” she said. “My poor little Annette.”

Drawing her close she put one hand against the closely cropped head and pressed it against her bosom. She was crying openly now. Annette began crying too, crying and at the same time struggling to free herself. Finally she pushed Anna away from her.

The Reverend Mother got hurriedly to her feet.

“Please remember what I told you,” she said. “We don't want to do anything to upset the child.”

Sister Veronica was kneeling in front of the big trunk that had been dragged out into the centre of the boxroom. She was unlocking it, and, as the lid came open, the odour of the lavender in which the clothes had been packed began to fill the air.

Sister Veronica was quick and businesslike. She took out the top dresses one by one—they were silly summery things—and laid them carefully over the back of a chair. Then she came down to the heavier clothes—a dark cloak trimmed with fur, an embroidered cape, a dress of deep crimson velvet.

“That's more what you want for travelling,” she said. “It's too fine for it really, but it can't be helped.”

She handed it to Anna, stroking the smooth sheen of the material with the back of her hand as she did so. Life in the convent had not destroyed her love of soft costly things.

“And these,” she said. “These will be all right.”

She was holding out a pair of long elegant gloves that had a pattern in seed pearls stitched on to them: they had never been worn and they hung there in Sister Veronica's hand, fresh and new-looking, the token of some forgotten extravagance. As Anna took them from her, as her fingers felt again the cool mossiness of the suede, she found that immediately she remembered everything about them—the little shop that they had come from, the girl who had served her, and even what the weather had been like outside. And, from being a very long way off, that day and every detail of it, suddenly sprang forward so that there were no longer four unhappy aching years between. It was only yesterday that she had bought the gloves and they were in her hands for her to try them on.

But Sister Veronica was standing up now. Her arms were full of garments that she had drawn from the bottom of the trunk: small lacey things, things made of silk, things of pretty colours. She smiled at her.

“They're yours really,” she said. “It was only for a spell that you gave them up.”

Anna took them up and raised them to her face. They were soft —not like the harsh shifts that were worn inside the Order—and she rubbed her cheek against them lovingly. As she did so, she noticed that Sister Veronica was watching her.

“You've no time to do that now,” she said brusquely. “You will have all the rest of the year to do that in. The Reverend Mother will never forgive you if you miss the train.”

And giving Anna a little push she followed her upstairs, carrying
the rest of the clothes over her arm. Then modestly she withdrew while Anna changed.

Inside her narrow room Anna was standing motionless. The pile of clothes still lay on the bed, looking out of place there, and she had made no attempt to start dressing.

“I mustn't go,” she began saying. “I can't go and leave Annette.”

The clock in the small wooden tower of the chapel struck three times. And she started nervously. It was too late now for misgivings; she had spent whole days and nights fighting with herself over the thing and she had decided.

“Good-bye, little Annette,” she began saying. “I'm going away, but don't be frightened, I'm coming back for you. I'm going to take you away from here, I'm going to make you my little daughter again.”

And though she was crying afresh now, she started to strip herself of her uniform, sliding into those fresh clothes that were like putting on the past again. She opened the door and stood there.

Sister Veronica was waiting in the passage outside, her grey form outlined in the pointed window. She turned sharply.

“About time too,” she began and stopped herself.

She was looking at Anna admiringly. It was the frank admiration of a middle-aged woman for a younger one.

“It's just as I told you,” she said at last. “Those are the kind of clothes you were meant to wear.”

Then she glanced inside the room that Anna had just left.

“But that's no state in which to leave a room,” she said. “You've been here long enough to know that.”

Pushing her way past her, she smoothed out the rough linen coverlet and gathered up the uniform that Anna had dropped. It was still lying there upon the floor.

“What a way to treat it, indeed,” she went on. “There's someone else has to wear it when you are gone.”

Her voice sounded different somehow—it was heavy and muffled. Anna looked towards her and saw that Sister Veronica was crying. She went over to her.

“Dear Sister Veronica …” she began.

As Anna stood there she felt an arm go round her. It held her pressed lightly for a moment. And then she was released again.

Sister Veronica was brusque and matter-of-fact once more. She was wiping away her tears and concealing them.

“There's no time for this now,” she said. “The wagon's outside. We're keeping it waiting.”

At the foot of the stairs stood a small group of nuns. They were waiting for Anna. One by one they had made their separate excuses to be there when she left. In every large convent there are always departures and arrivals, but Anna's going was different. There was romance and mystery about it. It was unthinkable that only twelve hours before this lady in the rich travelling cloak had been down on her knees cleaning away the dirt their shoes had made. In the sombre hall she now had the air of someone important; a visitor, to be treated with respect; a patroness even. Her clothes made the stone walls seem even bleaker and more stony. And the coarse habits of the nuns took on the very texture as well as the colour of the walls themselves.

The nuns, even those who had disapproved of her, crowded round to shake her by the hand. It was only after she had gone that one or two of them raised their eyebrows and exchanged glances.

On the doorstep Anna stopped and turned to Sister Veronica. There were tears in her eyes as she spoke.

“Will you do something for me?” she asked.

Sister Veronica nodded.

“If anything should happen to me,” Anna exclaimed. “If I shouldn't come back, will you give this to Annette?”

She held out a letter in her hand. It was addressed to Mlle Karlin at the Convent of the Sacred Heart.

“If I come back here again,” she went on. “You can return it to me. I would rather that I gave it to her myself.”

She handed it to Sister Veronica and stood watching as she put the letter away in the big pocket of her habit. It was an important letter: a letter that had cost Anna the most of the night to write. It was her apology to Annette for the fact that she had ever been born at all.

“You still think I should go off like this without saying goodbye to her?” she asked.

Sister Veronica lowered her eyes.

“That was what the Reverend Mother said,” she replied.

And as she spoke she began moving off to the wagon. It was the same grey cart with the clumsy tilted hood that had brought Anna to the convent. The old nun seated on the plank that served for the driving seat was the same too. She sat there holding the reins of the same tired horse. The wagon was part of a permanent order of things. It made no difference to the old nun up there whether she was fetching Anna or taking her away again; her life had been made up of endless successions of Annas, coming and going, and in a little while, this one Anna amongst so many, would have
been forgotten, while the life of the convent went on smoothly, as unvaryingly as before.

She climbed into the body of the wagon and Sister Veronica lifted up her valise. The old nun in front took down the long whip beside her and flicked it over the creased haunches of the horse. Before Anna could stop her they were moving off.

“Good-bye, dear Veronica,” Anna called.

“Good-bye, Anna,” Sister Veronica answered. “I'll…”

But the rest of her words were lost in the crunching of the gravel.

The grey wooden gates of the convent stood open, and overhead the little statue of the Virgin with her pink cheeks and blue robe looked down at them. Anna sat on the hard jolting seat steadying herself with one hand and waving.

Sister Veronica was waving too but there were tears in Anna's eyes and she could not see plainly. Everything she looked at was swimming and misty.

Sister Veronica seemed quite small now, she was simply a stubby figure in grey standing in the centre of the courtyard waving something white. Then one of the nuns closed the gates and Anna could see her no longer.