Sister Teresa

by George Moore

And in this way Evelyn was made to feel her responsibility so much that in the end she consented to give up part of her money to the nuns. So long as she had just enough to live upon it did not matter, and she owed these nuns a great deal. True that she had paid them ten times over what she owed them, but still, it was difficult to measure one's debts in pounds, shillings, and pence. However, that was the way the nuns wanted her to measure them, and if she could leave them fifteen hundred pounds—. And as soon as this sum was agreed upon, Sister Winifred never lost an opportunity of regretting that the convent was obliged to accept this magnificent donation, hinting that the Prioress and herself would be willing (and there would be no difficulty in obtaining the consent of the choir sisters) to accept Evelyn's services for three years in the school instead of the money.

"Five hundred a year we shall be paying you, but the value of your teaching will be very great; mothers will be especially anxious to send their daughters to our school, so that they may get good singing lessons from you."

"And when I leave?"

"Well, the school will have obtained a reputation by that time. Of course, you will be a loss, but we must try to do without you."

"Three years in this convent!"

"But you are quite free here; you come and go as you please. After all, your intention in leaving the convent is to teach music. Why not teach music here?"

The argument was an ingenious one, but Evelyn did not feel that it would appeal to her in the least, either to continue living in the convent after she had finished her book, or to go back to the convent to give singing lessons three or four times a week.

It would be preferable for her to give fifteen hundred pounds to the convent, and so finish with the whole thing; and this she intended to do, though she put Mother Winifred off with evasion, leaving her thinking that perhaps after all she would teach for some little while in the convent. It was necessary to do this, for Mother Winifred could persuade Mother Philippa as she pleased; and it had occurred to Evelyn that perhaps Mother Winfred might arrange for her expulsion. Nothing could be easier than to tell her that somebody's friend was going to stay with them in the convent, that the guest-room would be wanted. To leave now would not suit Evelyn at all. The late Prioress's papers belonged to the convent; and to deceive Mother Winifred completely Evelyn agreed to give some singing lessons, for they had already begun to receive pupils, though the school was not yet finished.

This teaching proved very irksome to her, for it delayed the completion of her book, and she often meditated an escape, thinking how this might be accomplished while the nuns played at ball in the autumn afternoon. Very often they were all in the garden, all except Sister Agnes, the portress, and she often left her keys on the nail. So it would be easy for Evelyn to run down the covered way and take the keys from the nail and open the door. And the day came when she could not resist the temptation of opening the door, not with a view to escape; but just to know what the sensation of the open door was like. And she stood for some time looking into the landscape, remembering vaguely, somewhere at the back of her mind, that she could not take the Prioress's papers with her, they did not belong to her; the convent could institute an action for theft against her, the Prioress not having made any formal will, only a memorandum saying she would like Evelyn to collect her papers.

So it was necessary for her to lock the gate again, to restore the keys to the nail, and return to the library. But in a few weeks more her task would be done, and it would be pleasanter to go away when it was done; and, as it has already been said, Evelyn liked landmarks. "To pass out is easy, but the Evelyn that goes out will not be the same as the Evelyn who came in." And a terror gathered in her mind, remembering that she was forty, and to begin life again after forty, and after such an experience as hers, might prove beyond her strength. Doubts enter into every mind, doubt entered into hers; perhaps the convent was the natural end of her life, not as a nun, but as an oblate. The guest-room was a pleasant room, and she could live more cheaply in the convent than elsewhere. There are cowardly hours in every life, and there were hours when this compromise appealed to Evelyn Innes. But if she remained she would have to continue teaching under Mother Winifred's direction. A little revolt awoke in her. She could not do that; and she began to think what would happen to her when she left the convent. There would not be money enough left her to sit down in a small flat and do nothing; she would have to work. Well, she would have to do that in any case, for idleness was not natural to her, and she would have to work for somebody besides herself—for her poor people—and this she could do by giving singing lessons. Where? In Dulwich? But to go back to the house in which she lived her life, to the room which used to be hung with the old instruments, and to revive her mother's singing classes? No, she could not begin her life from exactly the same point at which she left off. And gradually the project formed in her mind of a new life, a life which would be at once new and old. And the project seemed to take shape as she wrote the last pages of her memoir of the late Prioress.