The Rag Nymph (aka The Forester Girl)

by Catherine Cookson

  ‘Come, my dear, it will be all right. Sit down. She’s upset; and I suppose naturally, she seems very fond of you. Were you fond of her?’

  ‘Fond?’ Millie’s lids were blinking, and her lips were licking up the salt tears as she brought out, ‘I…I love her. And Ben.’

  ‘Ben? Who is Ben?’

  ‘He is the man who works there, lives with her. She…she took him in when he was a little boy.’

  ‘Oh, she’s a good soul.’

  ‘She’s lovely.’

  Lovely? That half-washed, great hulk of a woman? Maybe she was quite intelligent; but she was no more so than were quite a number of the poor she already knew. Yet, what was she thinking, poor?—when she could apparently afford to pay the fees for this child. Obviously there was money in rags. But she had to admit that this child was of a different type altogether: her voice, her manner suggested a refined type of background. She’d have to find out more about her. The only thing Father Dolan had been able to tell her was that her mother had died of a fever soon after arriving in the town; he himself had learned this from the constable. Apparently there were no relatives, the father, too, being dead.

  Again she rang the bell, impatiently this time, and the nun who appeared was contrite, saying, ‘I’m sorry, Reverend Mother; I…I had to show her out. She was agitated; she was walking across the lawn instead of to the gate.’

  ‘It’s all right. It’s all right, Sister Aloysius. What is your class doing?’

  ‘I left them sewing, Reverend Mother.’

  ‘Well, we have a new member of our family. Her name is Millie Forester. Isn’t that right?’ She was looking down on Millie now, and Millie answered, ‘Yes, that is my name…Millie Forester.’ And the tone of the voice seemed to surprise Sister Aloysius as much as it had done the Mother Superior. And the sister was further surprised when, holding out a hand to Millie, it was not taken but, instead, the child began to walk out before her, only to be brought to a stop by the nun saying, ‘You must always ask Mother Superior if you may leave her presence. You say, “May I go now, Mother Superior?”’

  ‘Why? She…she knew I was leaving the room.’ The nun and her superior exchanged glances; then Mother Francis, with a small inclination of her head, gave the nun leave to take this very awkward child away.

  If the Mother Superior and the nun were thinking the child was odd, it was nothing to what Millie was thinking about them and her introduction to the school and its inmates.

  Three

  Everything that happened to Millie during that first week in the House of Christ the Saviour she objected to. She discovered there were seventeen pupils, ranging in age from six to twelve, and that they were housed in two so-called dormitories, which were divided by panels into cubicles, each being about twice the area of its narrow iron bed, just enough to hold a chest of drawers and leaving standing space in which to undress. There was no chair. And that first night she experienced how one undressed for bed and how one was expected to lie. Sister Mary saw to that. Having been told to strip off her clothes, even her shift, without looking at her body, and don a long, unbleached, calico nightdress, she was then told how she must lie in bed, straight down, her hands by her sides. And when she protested she never lay like that and had proceeded to demonstrate how she did lie, crossing her legs and pulling her knees up, she had let out a high squeal when the side of Sister Mary’s hard hand came across her knees in a whacking thump. For a moment she had lain stunned, then had vowed to herself she would be out and away by the next morning. It didn’t matter about that evil man with the smiling face; she would go to the police herself and tell them what he meant to do.

  She knew she wouldn’t sleep; moreover, she was hungry. That had been an awful tea they’d had at five o’clock; two slices of bread and fat, a slab of hard cake and a bowl of milk; then nothing else, only a drink of water, if they wanted one, before they came to bed, and it only half-past seven. And then there was that chapel and the kneeling. No, she couldn’t stand it; and she wouldn’t sleep. No, she wouldn’t sleep…

  She was startled out of her wits by the clanging of a loud bell being rung over her head, and then somebody shouting in the dormitory: ‘Up! Up! Up!’

  She was sitting in a daze on the edge of the bed when a head came round the partition, saying, ‘You had better put a move on else you’ll get scalped.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Hurry up! Get into your clothes, all except your dress. Put on the cloak.’ The hand came round now and thumbed to a hook on the wall. ‘You’ve got to wash.’

  She didn’t hurry getting into her clothes, although she felt cold, and so she was last in the line of children to scramble down the stone stairs and into a room with a linoleum-covered floor. Along the length of one side there were also cubicles; along the opposite side were narrow benches, on each of which was a basin of cold water, also a piece of blue-mottled soap, with a rough towel hanging from a nail in the wall above the basin.

  Very intimate sounds were coming from the cubicles, but it wasn’t until the girl who had beckoned her earlier on came out of one of them and pointed to another where the door was open, and whispered harshly, ‘Don’t you want to go?’ that she realised, Yes; yes, she did want to go. But dear, dear! In front of all these girls? Yet each cubicle had a door, although she noticed there was no bolt on the inside.

  When she came out to the sound of splashing and spluttering, she made her way to the end bowl, and there she washed her face and hands; but again she was last in the line to run up the stairs and finish her dressing.

  When there came, in the distance, the sound of another bell ringing, the girl from the next cubicle actually came in and tugged her out into the room, whispering, ‘You’ve got to line up!’ Having got her into the line the girl glanced at her and whispered, ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Millie.’

  ‘Mine’s Annabel, Annabel Kirkley. Stick with me; but watch out for Mabel Nostil, that’s her at the end with the black hair. She sucks up. How old are you?’ This question came out of the side of her mouth and Millie, quick to catch on, muttered, ‘Ten.’

  ‘I’m nearly eleven.’

  ‘Quiet!’

  The command was bellowed. ‘Get moving!’ The voice was thick Irish. Millie remembered it from the previous evening. This nun had read passages of some sort to them but Millie had been unable to make out half of what she had said.

  The children marched down the stairs, the nun coming behind, and in the hall they met up with the older girls and, now forming two files, they walked, hands joined as if in prayer, slowly along a corridor, and into the chapel.

  The chapel was a large household room. At one end was an altar, and to the side a group of statuary of the Holy Family; on the other stood a plaster saint arrayed in a brown habit. He could have been anybody, one of the hundreds of saints; but, later, Annabel informed her that he was known among the girls as Mr Billy Brown.

  Millie thought that they would never cease praying. She didn’t know what they were praying about. She was tired of kneeling, listening to their voices droning on: ‘Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name’, and ‘Hail Mary, full of grace’, which was all she could make out of the second bit, because what followed was just a mumble.

  She was ready to be lulled asleep by the monotonous chant when they all stood up and repeated, ‘God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Ghost.’ She’d often wondered about the Holy Ghost, and now wondered further if Mr Dickens’ stories had any connections with Him. She liked Mr Dickens’ stories.

  She was surprised still further when more prayers had to be said before they could start their breakfast: ‘Bless us, O Lord, and these Thy gifts which we are about to receive from Thy bounty. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.’

  Ben knew a number of Grace-before-meals, and they were all funny. This one certainly wasn’t.

  A large dollop of thick porridge was placed before her, and a nun came round and poured a minute amount of milk over
it. There was no sugar on it, but it tasted of salt. Then followed a slice of bread with half a sausage lying across it. She rather enjoyed that. The hot drink was supposed to be tea but tasted awful. Then more prayers: ‘Thank You, O Lord, for this Thy gift of precious food. May we be worthy of it this day. Amen.’

  Following breakfast, she stuck tight to Annabel. It was upstairs again, and now twenty past eight, and she was informed by her apparent new friend that they had to join a small team to clean the toilets, which meant bringing the buckets downstairs, emptying them in the larger buckets arrayed along the wall by a side door; then wash out each utensil under a pump and return it to its particular cubicle.

  Following this ritual, she was separated from Annabel while waiting for it to be decided which class she would attend first.

  So it was a short time later she found herself under the hard eyes of Sister Mary, the large nun she remembered from last night, and her very hard hand. She it was who took the reading, writing and arithmetic but, of course, not until after more prayers.

  Millie was two hours under Sister Mary, and during this time she learned that the nun did not always bother to use her hand, she also used a ruler that seemed as flexible as rubber, for when it hit knuckles it bounced back from them.

  When the ruler first came in contact with Millie’s knuckles she actually cried back at the startled sister, ‘Don’t do that! I have done nothing wrong. My sums are correct.’

  The nun’s eyes seemed to be popping out of her head as she again wielded the ruler. This time it caught Millie across the wrist, and when she reacted by rising from her seat in an effort to leave the room, she found herself thrust back with such force that her head bobbed on her shoulders. Then the big face was brought down to hers and the words came between small misshapen teeth: ‘Do we understand each other now? Eh, miss?’ she demanded. ‘No, your sum wasn’t wrong, but you are writing instead of printing. Do you understand me? I want your work printed. There’s plenty of time to show off your handwriting when you’ve doubled your age. You understand?’

  She didn’t quite, but what she did understand was that she hated this woman, and the thought momentarily came to her that that man wouldn’t surely have been as bad as this mean-faced nun.

  At ten-thirty, Sister Mary left the class and Sister Monica took her place. And now there was a new form of prayer. It was called Scripture and Bible stories.

  Millie did not care much for Sister Monica either. She was sarcastic: when she herself was first asked a question, and she answered it, the woman made game of how she spoke. But she did not retaliate: she was too upset, almost confused at her previous treatment to even pay attention.

  Sister Monica stayed with them for half an hour. Sister Aloysius followed. She was small. She, too, was Irish, but she had a soft voice and a kind face: her job was to teach sewing and singing. This was to be a singing lesson, and she wrote the words of a hymn, in print of course, on a blackboard. Then, taking a funny little instrument, she struck her desk with it. It went ‘Ping!’ and then the children began to sing.

  Millie found this half-hour soothing. When a bell rang the singing immediately stopped; and there were more prayers. At twelve o’clock the class was dismissed, and there followed a rush for the toilets and ablutions. Ten minutes were allowed for this.

  Dinner consisted of pea soup, which Millie found quite nice—she could taste there had been some kind of pork boiled in the liquid—followed by a meat pudding. There was quite a good helping of pudding but only a tiny piece of meat. However, with the two medium-sized potatoes and a spoonful of carrots, she found this also quite to her liking.

  After dinner, they were all marched out to the back garden, which was similar to the front, where they could walk about or play catch ball, but were not allowed to stand and talk to each other.

  School restarted at one o’clock, with more prayers. These went on for fifteen minutes, again under the hard gaze of Sister Mary. But at a quarter past one Sister Benedicta took over. She taught geography, but it seemed that there was only one country in the world and that was Ireland. Nevertheless, she had a quiet voice, and Millie could put up with her. She was later informed by Annabel that she was known as Body Smell because she had to empty the slops into the cesspit. They did that for their sins, she said, a kind of penance. But it seemed that Sister Benedicta must sin a lot because she always seemed to get the dirty jobs.

  It should transpire that twice a week those who cared could learn to cook; but apparently Millie herself was to be given no choice; she was sent, with another five girls, to the kitchen at three o’clock and there came under the influence of Sister Cecilia, to whom God had given a nice nature and a light pair of hands with pastry. It was the time spent with this woman that became instrumental in deterring Millie from making her escape from this prayer-ridden, ignorant set of women, from which Mother Francis must be excluded. As Sister Cecilia was to say to her, one could live without reading, writing or arithmetic, sewing, singing or geography; and yes—there would be a twinkle in her eye—with some, even without the good God; but one couldn’t live without food and without those who knew how to make it appetising to the tongue.

  After her first visit to Millie, Aggie returned home somewhat perplexed, and she said to Ben, ‘I don’t know quite what to make of her. She hates the place. As far as I can understand she’s made only one friend; but that would be enough if it’s a good ’un. But there’s a sister there called Mary she would like to strangle. She said so. And you know something? She showed me the marks on the back of her knuckles and her wrist where that bitch had walloped her with a rod of some sort, right from the first day.’

  ‘Well, why don’t you bring her home? You’ll find some place different from that. That was your friend’s recommendation, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Don’t forget it was yours an’ all. Now don’t forget that.’

  ‘Aye. Yes, you’re right. But it shouldn’t be allowed, the hammerin’.’

  ‘Oh, but I had to laugh, or nearly so, for you daren’t laugh in there. There was a sister watching us all the time, and when we went to walk out into the garden she said it wasn’t allowed. “Well, whoever told you it isn’t allowed, tell them to come and tell me,” I said, and I took the child outside. It was there she told me about this sister and showed me her hand. “Don’t worry, Mrs Aggie,” she said; “I’ll get me own back on her before I leave this place, you’ll see, if it’s only kicking her shins.” And she will an’ all, she’ll do it.’

  Ben started to laugh now. ‘You know, you can’t believe she’s the same child that was so polite a couple of years ago. She got on your nerves then, didn’t she? Remember when she used to stand there and madden you with her politeness and that voice of hers. She’s still got the voice but the politeness has slipped away a bit.’…

  …Almost at that very moment Millie was standing before the Mother Superior, who was voicing that very word, politeness. ‘You have been impolite to Sister Mary because she chastised you for taking your visitor out into the garden. She also tells me that you are unruly. What you must learn, child, is obedience. We must all learn obedience, obedience to God’s will. And it should happen that it’s God’s will that you have been sent to us for protection and education. So, don’t let me, ever again, hear that you have been impolite to any of the sisters. And, don’t, don’t’—she held up her hand, her voice holding a note of authority now—‘give me your opinion of the matter. And that’s another thing you must learn: you should speak only when you’re spoken to, unless you wish to make a serious request. You may go.’

  Millie’s visit to the sanctum was the first of many during the weeks and months that were to follow, and all resulting from Sister Mary’s reports. There was an open war going on between the child and the nun, and the class was aware of it and daily seemed to await events. In the main, it was a time of misery which unknowingly strengthened her character and at the same time introduced her to a friendship which resulted in her opening her ey
es to another way of life, a life that she recognised and knew she could fit into; for it was during the first summer holiday that she was invited to spend a day with Annabel at her home.

  Annabel had talked so much to her parents about the beautiful girl with the long golden hair, and how she had openly stood up to Sister Mary, that it was decided to invite this child to have tea with the family. Annabel’s father was the manager of Crane-Boulder’s Cotton Mill. It was considered one of the advanced mills, advanced in that their employees worked only the ten-hour day and finished work at one o’clock on a Saturday. So it should happen that Mr Kirkley was at home when the guests arrived and was able to add to his surprise and not a little amazement when his daughter’s friend was delivered at his door by Raggie Aggie, for Aggie had long been a known character, she and her handcart, and now the pony-drawn flat-cart; and of course the fact that she was almost as broad as it was. He recalled tales about her, that she had at one time belonged to a respectable family of farmers; unbelievable now, for she could certainly no longer be placed in that category.

  Something would have to be done about this. He had imagined the nuns to be very particular whom they took into their house as pupils. However, before the visit ended the husband and wife both admitted to being charmed with Annabel’s friend, and that they could understand their daughter’s feelings towards her, for the girl was not only as beautiful as Annabel had described her, but also she had the most pleasing and cultured voice. They had understood from their daughter that her parents were dead. But why, they asked of each other, should a child like that be under the care of the rag woman? Kirkley thought it was something worth looking into.

  He did, and when he eventually learned that the child’s mother had committed suicide and that out of compassion the rag woman had taken her into her house to save her being put in the workhouse or farmed out, again they both agreed that the rag woman had worthy motives. And so, during the holiday, Millie was again invited to tea, and on this visit she amused them, together with their other children, a twelve-year old son and a five-year old daughter, when she gave them an imitation of the nuns, excelling herself when she touched on Sister Mary.