Then Margaret began her story.
“You know,” she saith, “it is this year forty-seven years since Annora and I were professed. And wherefore we were so used, mere babes as we were, knew I never.”
“Then that I can tell thee,” I made answer, “for it was Queen Isabel that thrust us in hither. Our father did somewhat to her misliking, what indeed I know not: and she pounced on us, poor little maids, and made us to suffer for his deed.”
“Was that how it was done?” said Margaret. “Then may God pardon her more readily than I have done! For long years I hated with all the force of my soul him or her that had been the cause thereof. It is past now. The priests say that man sinneth when, having no call of God, he shall take cowl upon him. What then of those which thrust it on him, whether he will or no? I never chose this habit. For years I hated it as fervently as it lay in me to hate. Had the choice been given me, any moment of those years, I would have gone back to the world that instant. The world!” Her voice changed suddenly. “What is the world? It is the enemy of God: true. But will bolts and bars, walls and gates, keep it out? Is it a thing to be found in one city, which man can escape by journeying to another? Is it not rather in his own bosom, and ever with him? They say much of carnal affections that are evil, and creep not into religious houses. As if man should essay to keep Satan and his angels out of his house by painting God’s name over the door! But all love, of whatsoever sort, say they, is a filthiness of the flesh. Ah me! how about the filthiness of the spirit? Is there no pride and jealousy in a religious house? no strife and envying? no murmuring and rebellion of heart? And are these fairer things in God’s sight than the natural love of our own blood? Doth He call us to give up that, and not these? May it not be rather that if there were more true love, there were less envy and jealousy? if there were more harmless liberty, there were less murmuring? When man takes God’s scourge into his hands, it seems to me he is apt to wield it ill.”
“But, Margaret!” said I, “so shouldst thou make Satan cast out Satan. Forbidden love were as ill as strife and murmuring.”
“Forbidden of whom?” saith she. “God never forbade me to love my brethren and sisters. He told me to do it. He never forbade me to honour my father and mother—to dwell with them, to tend and cherish them in their old age. He told me to do it. Ay, and He spake of certain that did vainly worship Him seeing they taught learning and commandments of men.” (Matthew 15, verse 9, Vulgate.)
“O Margaret! what art thou saying? Holy Church enjoins vows of religion.”
“Tell me then, Annora, what is Holy Church? It is a word that fills man’s mouth full comely, that I know. But what it is, is simply the souls of all righteous men—all the redeemed of Christ our Lord, which is His Body, and is filled with His Spirit. When did He enjoin such vows? or when did all righteous men thus band together to make men and women unrighteous, by binding commands upon them that were of men, not of God?”
“Margaret, my Sister!” I cried in terror. “Whence drewest thou such shocking thoughts? What will Father Benedict say when thou confessest them?”
“It is not to Father Benedict I confess them,” she said, with a little curl of her lips. “I confess to him what he expects to hear—that I loved not to sweep the gallery this morrow, or that I ate a lettuce last night and forgot to sign the cross over it. Toys are meet for babes, and babes for toys. They cannot understand the realities of life. Such matters I confess to—another Priest, and He can understand them.”