Gilman, Dorothy - A Nun in the Closet

by Dorothy Gilman

  ANun in the Closet

  by Dorothy Gilman

  Prologue

  At the Abbey of St. Tabitha the sisters met to discuss gravely which of the seventeen among them should leave the abbey and go out into the world to look over the property so astonishingly bequeathed to them. Upper New York State lay only a few hundred miles from the abbey but the sisters were aware that the trip could be perilous-word had filtered through to them of Inflation and Muggings-and it was difficult to think which of them was seasoned enough to go. They were not without worldly accomplishments: Sister Vincent played the lute, and had composed several original pieces; Sister Beatrice illuminated manuscripts that blossomed like flowers under her brush; Sister Maria wrote exquisite poems for the small magazine they printed three times a year but none of these gifts was felt to be exactly right for the assessing of "one hundred and fifty acres with house in disrepair" that the mysterious Mr. Moretti had left to them.

  Theirs was a democratic order, and after prayer and reflection the sisters each wrote a name on a slip of paper and handed it to the abbess. She read them aloud, one by one. "Sister John . . . Sister John . . . Sister John . . ." When she had finished there were seventeen votes for Sister John, which did not surprise her; she had often thought that if souls could be captured and pinned like butterflies Sister John's soul would have a width and a breadth to outdo them all. It would also, she thought dryly, have particularly exuberant colors.

  "Well then," said the recipient of seventeen votes, "I shall choose Sister Hyacinthe to go with me, if I may."

  There was a start of astonishment among them at this, and fourteen pairs of eyes moved to Sister Hyacinthe, who sat in the corner, and then fourteen pairs of eyes fled guiltily elsewhere.

  "A very sensible decision," announced the abbess.

  Because, she wrote that night to their mother-house in Switzerland, when we run out of money Sister Hyacinthe knows how to make a very good dinner out of herbs, weeds, and ground nuts. Sister John, of course, is the only one who can mend our printing press when it breaks down.

  These skills, she thought, were surely potent enough to confront the world for which they prayed each morning at Matins, before they weeded the vegetable garden and while the bread was baking.

  St. Tabitha's had been a part of the rolling green Pennsylvania countryside since 1955, when it had been invited to the United States by a bishop whom nobody could remember now but who had probably been impressed by the fact that the small Swiss order lived by the simple rules of St. Benedict, insisted upon autonomy and would never appeal for any funds. It was Mother Clothilde who crossed the Atlantic to establish the order, and within two years the abbey had gained eighteen American sisters; this, however, proved to be its peak year. In those early days a primitive septic tank was a recurring problem, and Mother Clothilde made the mistake of digging it out personally, with the help of Sister Emma. Both sisters succumbed to serum hepatitis within the week. No new sisters came to join them, and the remaining seventeen survived the passing years by sewing altar cloths, printing their small devotional magazine called Reflections, growing their own vegetables and baking and selling bread.

  It was the bread that saved them. Quite suddenly in 1968 it became a gourmet item in the nearest community-due entirely to something called health foods, which the sisters found incomprehensible-and now each morning, promptly at half-past six, one of Mr. Armisbruck's vans arrived to carry away sixty loaves of freshly baked bread, thirty of which went to his delicatessen in northern Bridgemont, and thirty to his shop in Bridgemont Corners. It was on the heels of this modest solvency that news came of the property bequeathed to them by a total stranger named Joseph Moretti.

  "Did he really like our bread so much?" asked Sister Hyacinthe, in whose mind one miracle was connected with another.

  "We have no idea," confessed the abbess. "The lawyer, Mr. Cherpin, is kindness itself about describing the property and sending maps, but he flatly ignores all my questions about Mr. Moretti. Since so few people know of our existence it's all very puzzling."

  Sister John said promptly, "How do we get to New York State without any money?" She had a practical mind that went at once to the point.

  It was to Mr. Armisbruck, a Lutheran, that they took this problem, and Mr. Armisbruck listened attentively over a cup of alfalfa tea while the abbess explained the facts of the legacy. There were not only the one hundred and fifty acres, she pointed out, but there was the house, too, which was thought to be furnished. An inventory would be necessary . . . .

  Land was something that Mr. Armisbruck understood at once. "How much money have you for the trip?"

  The abbess turned to Sister Maria, who said without hesitation, "Nineteen dollars and sixty-three cents."

  Mr. Armisbruck considered the situation, aware of seventeen pairs of eyes watching him. The solution, he said at last, was quite simple. If one of the sisters would learn how to drive, and if they would consider increasing the number of loaves they baked to seventy, he would be glad to lend them one of his bright red Armisbruck Delicatessen delivery vans. If they would also put in a word for his family in their daily prayers-Mr. Armisbruck was a man who liked to cover all his bets-he would throw in a full tank of gas and make a contribution of twenty-five dollars to the order.

  The sisters were delighted by such a rain of miracles after years of drought. Driving lessons were subsequently given Sister Hyacinthe by the delivery boy. Mr. Armisbruck's van was packed with five loaves of bread (Baked Fresh Every Day at the Abbey of St. Tabitha); with two bedrolls, a shovel, a flashlight, a box of Sister Hyacinthe's healing herbs, a soup kettle, a few books and the deed to the Moretti property.

  On the sixth day of July the sisters lined up along the driveway under the maple trees to wave good-by to Sisters John and Hyacinthe. The van pulled away, narrowly missing a sycamore and tumbling a post in the fence as it turned into the main road. "Benedicamus domino," said the abbess.

  "Deo gratias," responded the sisters.

  1

  Sister Hyacinthe was as dark as Sister John was fair, given to small superstitions, a certain amount of brooding that drew her brows together frequently, and a tendency to expect the worst. There was Indian blood in her background and this gave her cheekbones prominence and her skin a dark cast. She had been raised in impoverished hill country, her only contact with culture a group of Catholic nuns working among the poor. There was, or so Mother Clothilde had said, not a great deal to do with her.

  Except enjoy her, Sister John had pointed out, but she appeared to be the only one who appreciated Sister Hyacinthe's fey qualities.

  Sister John had never found anyone threatening; it was not in her nature, which was cheerful and abundantly optimistic. Nothing was impossible, she felt, if one only had faith. Sister Vincent said that she was like a silver bell, .999 pure, that always struck the right note. If at times this was tiresome to live with it was leavened by her competence, which was formidable, and her eagerness, which could be misplaced but was always ardent. Physically she was as luminous to look at as a Renoir.

  Sister Hyacinthe, on the other hand, was pure Gauguin, and when the sisters of St. Tabitha prayed for the capacity to love God's less fortunate creatures it was frequently she who came unbidden to their minds. In the early days Mother Clothilde had tried her on sewing but her stitches were wild and she absentmindedly sewed altar cloths to her lap. She was indifferent to reading and to writing; she was a hazard in the kitchen and when Sister Vincent played Bach she fell asleep. Only with growing things did she feel at home, and it was the present abbess, more pragmatic than Clothilde, who reasoned that if this was her only gift then she might as well bec
ome an accomplished botanist, learning the scientific names of plants as well as their uses.

  During the trip into New York State it became obvious that driving was not going to be added to Sister Hyacinthe's small list of skills. Sister John decided that Mr. Armisbruck's delivery boy must have been an incipient speed demon and the licensing examiner distraught when he tested her, for there was a distinctly erratic quality to her driving. They were stopped three times by policemen, once for driving only twenty miles an hour on the thruway, a second time for driving over eighty miles an hour, while a third police car overtook them with sirens shrieking because Sister Hyacinthe had seen skullcap and puffballs growing beside the thruway and parked to gather a few plants.

  "There seem to be a great many regulations," said Sister John when this crisis had been met. "What was it he thought you were collecting?"

  "Cannabis sativa," Sister Hyacinthe told her indignantly. "I explained that it was Scutellaria lateriflora but he said you couldn't trust anybody these days."

  "Strange," said Sister John, and returned to her map, which suggested that presently they would leave the thruway behind them. It was a thought that pleased her because she knew God watched over them but she couldn't help feeling that Sister Hyacinthe's driving must tax Him to the limit.

  By four o'clock, however, they had mercifully exchanged the thruway for Route 9-W. By half-past the hour they were in Gatesville asking directions to Fallen Stump Road, and five miles later Sister Hyacinthe drew up under a sign that read FALLEN STUMP ROAD. "I'm tired and my plants need water," she announced. "Are we nearly there?"

  They peered down a country road that looked abandoned by all but postmen, lovers and Boy Scouts. The limbs of trees, heavy with dust and heat, hung low over an oiled dirt surface, and from the bushes came the keening of locusts. "According to the lawyer's map," said Sister John, "the Moretti property is bounded on three sides by this road."

  Sister Hyacinthe looked expectantly into the wall of laurel on the right.

  "According to his written directions," went on Sister John, "there's a road into the property nine tenths of a mile further along."

  "Like a treasure hunt," said Sister Hyacinthe, nodding, and drove the van on down the road until her companion, eyes on the odometer, cried, "Stop!"

  "Over there," said Sister John, pointing to a gap in the laurel and there, in just the right place, stood a pair of stone pillars almost totally obscured by ivy. Sister John climbed down and crossed the road and a moment later plucked a fallen mailbox from the grass. Time and weather had bleached most of the printing on it but the last four letters remained, and they were unquestionably e-t-t-i. "I think we're here," she called to Sister Hyacinthe. "Aim the van between the pillars and let's see what's on the other side."

  A small jungle of undergrowth and a graveled driveway lay on the other side, and then the laurel thinned and they came out on a huge expanse of lawn grown wild with yellow mustard. At the crest of the lawn, some distance to their right, stood a house that bristled with turrets, gingerbread, eaves, gables and porches.

  "But it's beautiful!" gasped Sister John. "Look at its size, Sister Hyacinthe, the view, the trees-this isn't a property, it's an estate."

  Sister Hyacinthe's glance was skeptical. "Mmmm," she murmured noncommittally, and shifted gears, steered the van around a curve past a secondary drive that led to a barn and drew up beside the sagging front porch. The porch ran the width of the house, laced with thick wisteria vines knotted like macrame and beaded here and there with fading purple blossoms. As the engine died there was silence except for a low murmur from the thruway, which they could see winding like a serpent across the valley on their left.

  "How wonderfully peaceful," murmured Sister John.

  Sister Hyacinthe turned and gave her a curious glance. "Something moved in one of the upstairs windows, you know."

  "Nonsense, Sister Hyacinthe, the house has been unoccupied for years."

  "Something moved," she said stubbornly. "I saw it when we stopped back there to look."

  "A curtain perhaps. There may be a window cracked or broken so that the wind blows through the house."

  "There isn't any wind."

  Sister John's glance was patient; it was she, after all, who insisted that Sister Hyacinthe kept them from being like peas in a pod (or like Pisum Leguminosae, she would add wryly). "A trick of light, then. The sun on the window."

  "Or Mr. Moretti," said Sister Hyacinthe, crossing herself. "Doesn't it strike you as odd how little that lawyer would tell us about him?"

  "Yes, but the lawyer made it plain that he's dead."

  "Even worse," Sister Hyacinthe said, nodding. "The house is haunted, I feel it. Just see how dark it is and how the trees scrape against the windows. I know something moved upstairs, we'll go inside and Mr. Moretti will be walking the halls and what do we do then?"

  "Thank him for bequeathing the house to St. Tabitha's," said Sister John briskly, "and then say in a polite but firm voice 'in the name of Jesus Christ go away,' which I believe is what one says to ghosts. Now are you going to come inside with me, Sister Hyacinthe, or sit here crossing yourself all afternoon?"

  "I'll come," Sister Hyacinthe said gloomily.

  Sister John picked up the long skirts of her blue cotton habit and ran lightly up the steps, opened a creaking screen door and inserted a key into the massive door behind it. Sister Hyacinthe followed nervously. The door gave a groan of protest, shuddered, opened and Sister John led the way into the hall.

  Inside they stopped, taken aback by the opaque flat silence of the house. On either side of the hall loomed a dark and cavernous room; instinctively they turned toward the living room, whose far wall contained the more windows. The windows only faintly relieved the darkness, however, for ivy and wisteria had woven intricate patterns across the glass, blotting out all daylight except tiny chips of brilliance no larger than coins. In this green twilight Sister John and Sister Hyacinthe exchanged glances.

  "Grim," admitted Sister John.

  "But look, there's light somewhere," cried Sister Hyacinthe, and plunged joyfully across the main hall and down a passageway to follow dimness a shade lighter than the murk of the hall. Passing a succession of doors she emerged into blinding sunshine that came from a single window in a room at the back of the house. It was a kitchen, lined with ancient wooden cupboards and a tin sink. "Thank God-sunlight," she said fervently.

  Sister John, following, stepped to a light switch, flicked it and when overhead illumination blended with the sunlight said with relief, "And I thank God for electricity, considering the fact that it'll be dark in a few hours . . . Sister Hyacinthe, we'd better unpack while it's still daylight. We'll have bread for supper, some of Sister Scholastica's cheese and one of your herb teas."

  "Valerian, I think," said Sister Hyacinthe. "It soothes the nerves."

  They carried in bedrolls, the flashlight, food and the box of herbs, turning on lights as they went, lights that showed the living room to be not empty at all but crammed with shapes that looked like a herd of sheeted animals encamped for the night. Sister John unwrapped their supplies and began to slice bread at one corner of the kitchen table while Sister Hyacinthe hunted for a pail to fill with water for her plants. After opening the door of a broom closet, and then a pantry, she opened a third door and disappeared. From somewhere in the back she called, "There was a garden out here once. I can transplant my herbs tomorrow."

  Her voice grew louder and she reappeared carrying a bucket. Moving to the sink she turned the faucet, twisted it back and forth, and said in exasperation, "Sister John, there's no water."

  Sister John looked up. "Nonsense, there's electricity."

  "Yes, but no water."

  Together they attacked the spigot, which turned easily enough but produced only squeaks and a hollow rattling of pipes. "There has to be water somewhere," protested Sister Hyacinthe.

  "The turn-on is probably in the cellar," Sister John said with a notable lack of enthusia
sm.

  "I don't think I could bear the cellar yet," confessed Sister Hyacinthe. "I saw a well in the garden, an old stone well with a roof over it, but there ought be water in it, enough at least for my herbs. If there's more we can boil it for drinking." She looked at Sister John defiantly. "My plants simply have to be watered or they'll die from the heat."

  "Then of course you must water them," agreed Sister John.

  They carried the box of herbs and the bucket down wooden steps to a bricked path that encircled what must have been a kitchen garden. In the center of the circle stood the well, surrounded by beds of weeds and earth, a birdbath, and a rusted iron bench. A private hedge enclosed this domesticated circle, but the hedge, like everything else, had given up the ghost long since and grown wild.

  "Throw a pebble," suggested Sister Hyacinthe.

  Sister Hyacinthe tossed a handful of gravel down the well and listened. "It splashed," she said, and bending over the wall peered inside. "Something's already down there, Sister John, but it doesn't look like a bucket." Turning, she looked at Sister John and then beyond her and gave a startled cry.

  A bearded young man stood just inside the privet hedge watching them. He wore an Indian headband across his forehead, a pair of faded blue jeans, nothing more, and his hair and beard were a bright ginger red. "Did I frighten you?" he asked.

  "No," gasped Sister Hyacinthe.

  "Yes," said Sister John calmly. "We didn't hear you."

  "I came by the path through the woods," he said, gesturing vaguely behind the privet hedge. "Would you believe I didn't even know there was a house here?"

  "I could believe it," said Sister Hyacinthe, nodding.

  He looked puzzled. "You're not camping out, too, are you? I mean-nuns?"

  "In a manner of speaking we're camping out, yes. Nuns do, you know. They can."

  "I'm Unitarian myself," he said. "We're camped about half a mile away on Fallen Stump Road-four of us, usually, except when Bhanjan Singh comes. We heard these noises last night in the woods, I promised the girls I'd check them out."