Murder in an Orchard Cemetery

by Cora Harrison

  Breakfast was a sombre affair. Patrick, rather unexpectedly, appeared just as the meal was drawing to its uncomfortable finish. His eyes went towards hers when he came into the room, and she was touched to see an expression of thankfulness in them before he looked around the room.

  So, Patrick was on the alert for another murder. The Reverend Mother pondered upon the matter as she sipped her tea and nibbled upon the slice of dry toast which was all that she allowed herself at breakfast time. An astute boy, she said to herself, feeling fond and proud of him as he sat beside the bishop, and allowed himself to be persuaded into partaking of some tea and toast. This was no accidental death, nor was it, she had begun to think, one of those, sometimes haphazard, IRA assassinations. No, Patrick was alert for a train of events to follow on that initial death. And she could understand his thought process. Whosoever had dropped the flame into that pipe stuffed with fertilizer and soaked in diesel, whosoever had done that terrible deed had taken an equally terrible chance. It could have been a massacre. But it could also have resulted in the immediate identification and arrest of the culprit. The grounds of the convent were full of strolling members of the religious orders who had come to make their annual retreat and of the nuns and novices of the convent itself going about their daily duties. The windows from the convent buildings, at least from the prime bedrooms, all overlooked the grounds and the sight of a figure creeping through the apple trees might have been sighted by someone who had just woken from an after-lunch siesta.

  There was an uncomfortable atmosphere of fear and suspicion. She was glad that within a few hours Lucy would arrive and her efficient chauffeur would whisk her cousin and that unfortunate child, Sister Mary Magdalen, away from the dangerous precincts of the Sisters of Charity Convent, back to the city of Cork and then up to the privileged heights of Montenotte where the funeral would take place.

  Once breakfast was over she sat patiently listening to a long and rather rambling speech by his lordship who was, she decided, feeling that his idea of mixing laity and the leaders of education in the city had not turned out as felicitously as he had expected, and who was determined to justify his decision by pointing out what a huge success the seven days had been.

  ‘… apart le cadaver, bien compris,’ said Mother Isabelle in rapid French, and the Reverend Mother did her best to suppress a smile. The bishop, she guessed, would not like to dwell on the thought of that particular corpse which had been scattered in small particles all over the orchard. He, too, may have had that thought because he sat down very quickly and allowed Patrick to stand up and explain that he wanted to have a clear picture of who had sat upon that bench during the last few days – names and times, said Patrick solemnly, would be of great use and the sergeant was waiting in the hallway and would not detain them for more than a few minutes on their way to church.

  ‘Just a word, Reverend Mother, if I may delay you for a moment.’ Mother Teresa, accompanied by her mistress of novices, accosted her just as she emerged from giving Patrick as much information as she could remember about the occupancy of the favoured bench in the apple orchard.

  ‘Certainly, Mother.’ The Reverend Mother stopped but was not surprised when Mother Isabelle moved rapidly away. The French superior of the Ursuline Convent in Blackrock had already delivered her private opinion of Mother Teresa, firmly stating that she ‘une femme assez intelligente’ was ‘incapable de supporter les imbéciles avec bonne humeur.’

  ‘I am most sorry to have to tell you, Reverend Mother, that Sister Mary Magdalene will be unable to accompany you and your cousin when you leave this morning,’ said Mother Teresa. She did not, the Reverend Mother thought, look particularly sorry. There was, in fact, a certain note of satisfaction in the voice that made the announcement.

  ‘Oh, dear,’ said the Reverend Mother. She waited for a moment for an explanation but when none came and the two women turned away, she deliberately stood in their path and enquired whether something was amiss.

  ‘It’s just the case that Sister Mary Magdalene finds herself unwell and she feels she is unable to leave the convent today.’ Mother Teresa delivered the words in a very firm tone of voice and then walked off in the direction of the bishop. The Reverend Mother looked after her with a feeling of annoyance. It was certainly an unwritten rule that no one interrupted a conversation between the bishop and one of his flock, so she was unable to question her further. She turned back to the mistress of novices.

  ‘What exactly is the matter with Sister Mary Magdalene?’ she asked bluntly and held the woman with a stern eye. She was not going to be fobbed off with that rather vague statement.

  ‘It may be just a cold,’ said Mother Carmel. She had a worried look on her face. ‘None of the other novices have it, so it may be nothing.’ She frowned and pressed her lips tightly together. ‘No,’ she repeated, ‘none of the others are unwell in any way. It is of course quite serious for the novices, because on Sunday they take their final vows. They, and the whole convent, have been so looking forward to the occasion.’

  The Reverend Mother nodded. Noviciate day was always a happy occasion in the convent in her own community, Sister Bernadette would bake numerous cakes, all of them iced with a pure white icing to symbolize the purity of the new members of the community. The families of the new recruits were all invited to the ceremony, and whatsoever had been there of inner doubts during the last eighteen months, on this day every face would shine with happiness.

  Yes, indeed, it was important that all would be well for this ceremony on Sunday. Poor Sister Mary Magdalene would have no members of her family present, thought the Reverend Mother – both parents were now dead and her brothers out in the far-distant land of Australia. It crossed her mind that Lucy and perhaps one of her daughters might be prevailed upon to take the place of an absent family and she resolved to have a word with her cousin later.

  In the meantime, it was important to make sure that there was a valid reason why the girl should not attend her father’s funeral.

  She waited until the mother superior and the mistress of novices had retired from the dining room and then slowly and meditatively, threading her beads between her hands, she made her way up the stairs and towards the novices’ dormitories.

  When she had climbed the last staircase and had emerged upon the corridor at the top of the house, she was waylaid.

  It was Mother Carmel, herself, who, obviously, had come up by a different staircase.

  The Reverend Mother did not hesitate.

  ‘I just want to give a first-hand account of Sister Mary Magdalene to Mrs Murphy; I feel that I should assure my cousin that all possible care is being taken of the girl,’ she said instantly. ‘Of course, you and I know, Mother, that the laity does feel that the girls are not cared for as they would have been in their own homes. I’ve often,’ said the Reverend Mother with a sigh, ‘had to prove to anxious relatives that we in the convent would care for their daughters as well as they could do, themselves, within the confines of their homes.’

  Mother Carmel looked a little bewildered. She was, guessed the Reverend Mother, slightly baffled as to the exact relationship between Lucy and the girl known in the convent as Sister Mary Magdalene. ‘I’d be glad if you would have a look at her,’ she said and looked at the Reverend Mother with a worried frown. ‘It’s nothing, I’m sure,’ she said. ‘She’s a worrier, always fancying herself ill. If it were anything, the others would have it as well.’ She had the air of one who sought to reassure herself.

  ‘Just a head cold,’ hinted the Reverend Mother. She moved her veil forward, with a quick movement of her head. It was her summer veil, transparent and thin with age and through it she could clearly see Mother Carmel’s face. It bore, she noted with misgiving, an air of anxiety, a certain expression where worry struggled with a desire to say that all was well.

  ‘Yes, I suppose so.’ The rejoinder was uttered slowly and with a certain amount of reluctance.

  Not a very experienced mistress of
novices, she guessed. A woman who was a little out of her depth and who was eager to shift some of her responsibilities onto another pair of shoulders.

  ‘I haven’t been too long in this office,’ she confided with an anxious look around her. ‘Previously I held responsibility for the grounds.’ She heaved a sigh. Did not say that plants and trees were easier to care for, but the Reverend Mother understood that involuntary escape of air and smiled at her reassuringly. ‘God gives us the gifts to care for all of his creation,’ she said reassuringly. ‘Now let’s have a look at Sister Mary Magdalene.’

  The girl was stretched out upon the bed. A pair of young novices were there in the room with her, but they were both standing over beside the window at quite a distance from the bed. They started guiltily when their mistress of novices entered the room.

  ‘She keeps telling us to stand away from her. She says that she’s infectious,’ said one girl. She took a step forward, followed by her fellow novice and then both stepped back hurriedly as Sister Mary Magdalene half sat up in the bed and sneezed violently, grabbing a handkerchief at the last moment and scrubbing at the moist patch on the bed covers. The young novices looked at each other.

  ‘She has a fever,’ said one. ‘I felt her forehead.’

  ‘Just a head cold,’ said Mother Carmel with an effort. She went forward towards the bed.

  ‘Stand back,’ said the Reverend Mother sharply. ‘Stay over there by the window.’ Carefully she extracted a couple of pins from her wimple and pinned the veil securely over her face, covering eyes, nose and mouth. She felt in her pocket and extracted a pair of smooth, almost paper-thin leather gloves and pulled them over her hands. They had been given to her by a leather merchant once as a Christmas present about twenty years ago. He had told her how to care for them and had given her a supply of wax and saddle soap and by now they washed as easily as cotton. She attributed some of her immunity to disease to their protective shield.

  ‘Let me feel your forehead, my child,’ she said, and went forward and placed a hand on the skin. It burned through the thin layer of leather within seconds. An exceedingly high temperature, she guessed.

  ‘Open your mouth, my child,’ she said, wishing that she had her small pocket torch. Nevertheless, strong sunlight streamed through the window and she had light enough to see the bad news. Sister Mary Magdalene’s throat was covered with a thick grey membrane. Her breath came thick and fast and her nose ran almost continuously into the damp handkerchief.

  ‘Close your mouth, sister,’ she said gently. And then she thought hard.

  Undoubtedly it was diphtheria. And diphtheria was highly infectious. Potentially the whole community was at risk. Diphtheria took, she remembered, about two days after exposure to make its appearance. Five days without any symptoms usually meant that you had undoubtedly escaped. She looked around the room. A big dormitory. It probably adequately fitted the eight young novices with a curtained-off area for the mistress of novices.

  ‘What are your names?’ she asked the girls huddled together at the window.

  ‘I’m Sister Rose and she’s Sister Monica.’ Sister Rose of Lima had a complexion that matched her name and despite her fright, she had not paled. Sister Monica, a very tall girl, looked more delicate. The Reverend Mother hoped they might escape.

  ‘Did she go to morning service?’ she asked, and they shook their heads in denial. That, at least, was something.

  ‘We didn’t go either,’ said Sister Rose. ‘We had permission to stay with Sister Magdalene as she was crying and feeling very poorly. She told us that she kissed a little girl with diphtheria, kissed her on the lips. She shrieked at us to keep well away from her.’

  ‘I see,’ said the Reverend Mother, rapidly running through what needed to be done. These two might need to be isolated. The nuns and the visitors to the convent were probably safe. She was, she was almost sure, immune after her years of exposure to children in her school, and would stay to nurse the girl. Not for long, she thought, seeing the sunken eyes and listening to the laboured breathing. She turned to Mother Carmel.

  ‘Inform your mother superior of the situation, Mother, please. And would you be good enough to phone Dr Scher and tell him that I think it is diphtheria and phone my cousin, Mrs Murphy, the number is Montenotte twenty-three, and explain to her that she must not come to collect me.’ And then she took pity on the very white face of the mistress of novices and said gently, ‘Don’t worry. I’ll stay here. You have not yet been near enough to catch the infection, so you must stay away now, and the rest of the novices will have to be accommodated in another dormitory. Don’t worry,’ she said again, and gave the woman a brisk nod. She would not waste any more time on her until Dr Scher arrived and put an official seal on all arrangements.

  NINETEEN

  ‘Now, look here, Reverend Mother,’ said Dr Scher. Punctual as always, he came to make his daily visit at precisely nine thirty in the morning. ‘I’m the doctor,’ he went on, ‘and you are a teacher, a manager, a miracle worker; anything you like, but just keep it in your mind that I am the doctor and do what I tell you. And what I am telling you now is to get to your feet and come out into the fresh air with me. Stand a good six feet away from anybody that you meet, if you wish, but I’m one hundred per cent certain that, after all those years and all those outbreaks, that you are immune to diphtheria and immune, Reverend Mother, means that you can’t pass it to someone else. But what you can do is run down your own health by getting no fresh air and sitting all day and half the night too, You are no chicken, you know, Reverend Mother!’

  The Reverend Mother sighed. He was, she was sure, correct. Generally, she was able to balance the good of the majority against the individual need. It was important that she stayed vigorous and well. Obediently, she rose to her feet.

  ‘What’s the prognosis?’ she asked, looking down at the white face of the girl. Divested of her nun’s regalia, the young novice looked like a sick child.

  ‘Not good,’ said Dr Scher abruptly and almost angrily. ‘What can you expect? The girl is malnourished and a good stone underweight. When I came in here this morning, there was a lay sister polishing the convent’s treasures. Cups and plates made from pure gold! And they don’t feed their novices. Sell the stuff and give those girls a few good steaks!’

  The Reverend Mother had tried in the past to feed Dr Scher with the official view of the Church that nothing was too good for God, but he had been impatient with her explanations and silenced her with the argument that a loving God would prefer children to be fed and housed to having more than £30,000 spent upon the ornate church in Turners Cross. Now she merely said, ‘The food was probably available, but the appetite was lacking.’

  ‘Well, then you tempt her to eat, you get food that she likes, make her plate look attractive, and when all else fails, you get a doctor to look at her. You don’t watch a girl get thinner and thinner, paler and paler. After all, they took her away from her family. What’s the good of names like “mother” and “sister” when no one took notice of what she looked like? I knew that she was malnourished the first minute that I saw her.’

  ‘Has she any hope?’ asked the Reverend Mother in a low voice. And then, after a quick glance at his face, she added, ‘How long do you think that she has got?’

  Dr Scher made no answer but went to the door and rang the bell placed on the corridor windowsill. An elderly lay sister who had suffered from diphtheria a few years ago was acting as assistant nurse to the Reverend Mother and she appeared instantly, rather bored with her other task which was to darn worn towels and sheets from the linen cupboard. The Reverend Mother summoned her as little as possible because the woman was starved for lively conversation and a good five minutes were wasted in satisfying her desire for gossip. Now, disturbed by Dr Scher’s verdict, she merely nodded at the woman, gave one last glance at the white, unconscious face on the pillow and then followed Dr Scher who was impatiently holding the door to the stairs open for her.

 
They descended the stairs in silence and neither spoke until they reached the terrace outside the convent building. From time to time, she was conscious that he had looked at her uneasily and when they reached the wall, he said apologetically, ‘Forgive me.’

  ‘There is nothing to forgive,’ she said. ‘Sometimes you shock me – and I’m sure that’s good for me – but you never offend me.’

  ‘Like that new vogue for electric shock treatment in my own profession,’ he said with a half grin. ‘If it doesn’t kill you, it does you good, so they say.’ He gave a tentative look at her and she rewarded him with a smile.

  ‘Now tell me the answer to my question,’ she said. ‘Is she in danger of death?’ Odd she thought, as she waited for the answer, the way she found it hard to pronounce the words ‘Sister Mary Magdalene’, but used the pronoun ‘she’ or the word ‘girl’. What had possessed Nellie Musgrave, only daughter of a rich man, to choose that name? Very wild, unsatisfactory, had been her school’s verdict. And her brothers? Failed to take advantage of one of the best educations in Ireland. Went off to Australia to work on the land. What had been the home life of those three children when their mother was killed in a car crash? Even the sudden dismissal of a cook who had been fond of the children and loved by them could have added to their maladjustment.

  Dr Scher turned to face her. ‘Yes,’ he said bluntly. ‘The answer to your question is yes, and I will go further and tell you that I believe that short of a miracle she will die within a few days. I’ve given her a sedative and it’s about the only thing that I can do for her now. To put it bluntly, she will either die from heart failure or from choking. That’s why I’ve given her a lethal dose and I will go on giving it to save her from agony. And don’t give me any lectures about respecting human life,’ he added savagely.