The Bridal Wreath

by Sigrid Undset

She told herself that this cutting adrift from home and kin and church was but for a time. Erlend must take her by the hand and lead her back into it all. When her father had given consent to their love, she could go to him as of yore; when she and Erlend were wed, they could confess and do penance for their transgression.

She began to seek for tokens that other folk were not without sin any more than they. She hearkened more to tale-bearing, and marked all the little things about her which showed that not even the Sisters in the convent here were altogether godly and unworldly. These were only little things—under Lady Groa’s rule Nonneseter to the world was a pattern of what a godly sisterhood should be. Zealous in their devotions, diligent, full of care for the poor and sick, were the nuns. Their aloofness from the world was not so strict but that the Sisters both had visits from their friends and kin in the parlour, and themselves were given leave to visit these in the town when aught was afoot; but no nun had brought shame upon the house by her life all the years of Lady Groa’s rule.

But Kristin had now an ear alive to all the little jars within the convent walls—little wranglings and spites and vanities. Save in the nursing of the sick, none of the Sisters would help with the rough housework—all were minded to be women of learning or skilled in some craft; the one strove to outdo the other, and the Sisters who had no turn for learning or the nobler crafts, lost heart and mooned through the hours as though but half awake.

Lady Groa herself was wise as well as learned; she kept a wakeful eye on her spiritual daughters’ way of life and their diligence, but she troubled herself little about their souls’ health. She had been kind and friendly to Kristin at all times—she seemed to like her better than the other young girls, but that was because Kristin was apt at books and needlework, diligent and sparing of words. Lady Groa never looked for an answer from any of the Sisters; but on the other hand she was ever glad to speak with men. They came and went in her parlour—tenant farmers and bailiffs of the convent, Preaching Friars from the Bishop, stewards of estates on Hovedö with whom she was at law. She had her hands full with the oversight of the convent’s great estates, with the keeping of accounts, sending out church vestments and taking in books to be copied and sending them away again. Not the most evil-minded of men could find aught unseemly in Lady Groa’s way of life. But she liked only to talk of such things as women seldom know about.

The prior, who dwelt in a house by himself northward of the church, seemed to have no more will of his own than the Abbess’ writing reed or her scourge. Sister Potentia looked after most things within the house; and she thought most of keeping such order as she had seen in the far-famed German convent where she had passed her noviciate. She had been called Sigrid Ragnvaldsdatter before, but had taken a new name when she took the habit of the order, for this was much the use in other lands; it was she too who had thought of making the maidens, who were at Nonneseter as pupils and for a time only, wear novice’s dress.

Sister Cecilia Baardsdatter was not as the other nuns. She went about quietly, with downcast eyes, answered always gently and humbly, was serving maid to all, did for choice all the roughest work, fasted much more than she need—as much as Lady Groa would let her—and knelt by the hour in the church after evensong or went thither before matins.

But one evening, after she had been all day at the beck with two lay sisters washing clothes, she suddenly burst into a loud sobbing at the supper table. She cast herself upon the stone floor, crept among the Sisters on hands and knees, beat her breast, and with burning cheeks and streaming tears begged them all to forgive her. She was the worst sinner of them all—she had been hard as stone with pride all her days; pride, and not meekness or thankfulness for Jesus’ redeeming death, had held her up, when she had been tempted in the world; she had fled thither not because she loved a man’s soul, but because she loved her own vain glory. She had served her sisters out of pride, vanity had she drunken from her water cup, self-righteousness had she spread thick upon her dry bread, while the other Sisters were drinking their beer and eating their bread-slices with butter.

Of all this Kristin understood no more than that not even Cecilia Baardsdatter was truly godly at heart. An unlit tallow candle that has hung from the roof and grown foul with soot and cobweb—to this she herself likened her unloving chastity.

Lady Groa went herself and lifted up the sobbing woman. Sternly she said, that for this disorder Cecilia should as a punishment move from the Sisters’ dormitory into the Abbess’s own bed, and lie there till she was free of this fever.

“And thereafter, Sister Cecilia, shall you sit in my seat for the space of a week; we will seek counsel of you in spiritual things and give you such honour for your godly life, that you may have your fill of the homage of sinful mankind. Thus may you judge if it be worth so much striving, and thereafter choose whether you will live by the rules, as do we others, or keep on in exercises that no one demands of you. Then can you ponder whether you will do for love of God, that he may look down upon you in His mercy, all those things which you say you have done that we should look up to you.”