Mrs. Bradley replied that she scarcely thought there would be any difference in shine, and turned to her other neighbour, a newcomer to the guest-house. Dom Pius had gone back to his monastery, and this man was a diffident, thin-faced Carthusian lay-brother who, from the age of sixteen, had never been out of his monastery until he had been sent to St. Peter’s to recuperate after influenza followed by double pneumonia.
“I talked with a man to-day who said he had seen the devil,” he said gently. Mrs. Bradley was interested, and they spent a quarter of an hour discussing such phenomena, Mrs. Bradley being tenderly corrected from time to time in her theology by a white-haired priest on the opposite side of the table.
Mrs. Maslin then drew her attention by saying:
“I hear that you have arranged to send Ulrica to New York. I happen to know that her grandfather hates the sight of her. I think, too, that I might have been consulted before such a step was taken.”
“It is a good plan to send her to New York,” said Mrs. Bradley, unperturbed by the waspish tones. “I had not thought of it.”
Mrs. Maslin, rendered more than usually irritable by this blandness, observed that nothing was going to be done in a hurry, and that, for her part, she should be glad to know how the enquiry into Ulrica’s death was going.”
“It isn’t going. The enquiry is finished,” said Mrs. Bradley. “There is no doubt at all but that Ursula was murdered.” She watched the slow red spread over Mrs. Maslin’s face and neck.
“Of course I meant Ursula,” she said. Mrs. Bradley nodded.
“Of course,” she said pleasantly. “The names are somewhat like, and one is apt to become confused in moments of panic.” That the wish is father to the thought had seldom achieved a more apt exposition, she thought.
Mrs. Maslin achieved a kind of snort, which she hoped the company would interpret as a spasm of grief for her niece, Mrs. Bradley supposed.
“I am taking Mary home at the end of the week,” said Mrs. Maslin, later on in the meal.
“And you really think the New York idea is a good one? For Ulrica, I mean.”
“I think it’s ridiculous!” said Mrs. Maslin, shrilly. “Her grandfather hated her father, and has never seen Ulrica in her life! In any case, my husband must be consulted.”
“I feel that Ulrica is a nervous, temperamental girl who is being influenced to her harm by the associations of this place,” Mrs. Bradley concluded, “but by all means let your husband know what I propose.” She left the table and went in the darkness out of the guesthouse, across the grounds and through the orchard to the cloister and the Mother Superior’s lodging. She climbed the steps, found the door open and went in. The Mother Superior was at Recreation in the nuns’ Common Room and would remain there until she went to night prayers at nine. The little room was pitch-dark. Mrs. Bradley, who always carried a small electric torch, flashed it about to find a chair. It was peaceful in the dark little room, except for the sea, which boomed and thundered restlessly on the other side of the church, and Mrs. Bradley spent a quiet hour, or a little longer, meditating—not, perhaps, precisely after the fashion of the religious—and discovering that, with her work there nearly over, she would be very sorry to leave the convent and more than sorry to give up the society of the nuns. In spite of the nature of her task, the investigation had proved, because of its surroundings, a rest cure, as Cèlestine had foreseen.
It was nearly ten o’clock when the Mother Superior returned. Mother Mary-Joseph came first, stepped inside and lighted a candle. Mrs. Bradley saw her shadow blocking the doorway, and said:
“I am here, dear child. Is the Reverend Mother Superior coming with you?” For she knew, by the height, that this was not the Reverend Mother. Mother Mary-Joseph lighted the candle and put a small globe round the flame to keep it steady. Then she turned her head, and answered:
“Reverend Mother Superior is just behind me.” She went out again to help the old woman up the steps.
“It is Mrs. Bradley, Reverend Mother,” she said. Mrs. Bradley did not speak until the aged Superior was seated. Then she said:
“I want to know whether you will allow me to send the girl Ulrica Doyle to my own home for a time. I think she might be better there than here.”
“I know. You told us, nearly a week ago, that we ought to send those children away. But Mrs. Maslin still stays, and her stepdaughter with her, and what to do with the other child we have not been able to decide. She has almost always stayed here during vacations. She has no home, and her grandfather in America is her guardian.”
“So I understand. Mrs. Maslin must be allowed, I suppose, to do as she pleases with Mary, but I do think that Ulrica must leave, and at my house she would be safe and well looked after. My maid, a Frenchwoman, is a Catholic.”
“It is good of you. It seems the best plan, if you are willing to have her. Send her away when you like. We are in your hands. I have been very greatly distressed, and very much mystified. The attack on poor Sister Bridget…”
“Unintentional. It was meant for me,” said Mrs. Bradley, grinning. She grew serious in the face of the Mother Superior’s expression of deep concern.
“My work here is coming to an end, but not in the way the guilty person intends,” she said. “I have no proof yet, but soon I shall be able to make clear to whomever it may concern that it is only a question of time before that proof is obtained.”
“It is horrible,” said the nun. Mrs. Bradley inclined her head.
“I wish I could have come to another conclusion. I wish I could have proved that the death was an accident.”
“I do hope we did the best thing in having an enquiry made.”
“Do not have any doubts upon that score. At the least it has saved a life—possibly two lives—if that is any comfort to you now.”
“I shall not ask you to name the guilty person.”
“I will tell you immediately who it is, if you prefer to know, but I am not anxious to do so. One thing I do tell you. We shall manage without the police. So much I am prepared to promise for the sake of everyone here.”
“I don’t understand.” She shook her head. “But you will know best. I shall leave it to you. God will guide you.”
A comfortable belief, thought Mrs. Bradley, but one which did not necessarily involve a lightening of personal responsibility. “Pray as though all depended on God; work as though all depended on you,” was the way the old priest at table had expressed it. She rose to take her leave, but before she went the Mother Superior said:
“We had hoped that you were going to join us in the Common Room to-night, but I expect you were far too busy. We shall have an immense debt to pay. You are very good to us.”
“I should like to come and sit with you all again. By the way, Mother Saint Simon-Zelotes has kindly undertaken to effect the repairs to the picture which was smashed the other evening.”
“She is clever. Her copies of our chalice and paten are to be on view—you have heard?”
“Yes; I am immensely interested. How long has it taken her to do them?”
“She has spent about six months on them altogether, and has given all the time she could spare, which, here, with the children to teach, is not very much. She has worked behind double-locked doors and fast-barred windows because of the value of the originals. The Insurance Company insisted upon that.”
“Do you ordinarily keep the originals at the bank?”
“Oh, no. We keep them here, very safely locked away. But one of the children, with the best of intentions, I am sure, told her father that the copies were to be made, and so we had several journalists, and some less reputable people, all very anxious to interview Sister Saint Simon. She gave no interviews, but the project had become public property. The Insurance Company were not well pleased when they knew that, but they did not increase our premium. Sister Saint Jude saw the manager.”