Mère Esther reflected a moment, and said, “We have long found it easier to pray for souls than to relieve bodies. I thank good St. Joseph for this prospective blessing upon our monastery.”
During the long and wasting war, Mère Migeon had seen her poor nuns reduced to grievous straits, which they bore cheerfully, however, as their share of the common suffering of their country. The cassette of St. Joseph, wherein were deposited the oboli for the poor, had long been emptied. The image of St. Joseph au Blé, that stood at the great stair, and kept watch over the storeroom of corn and bread, had often guarded an empty chamber. St. Joseph au Labeur, overlooking the great kitchen of the Convent, had often been deaf to the prayers of “my aunts,” who prepared the food of the community. The meagre tables of the refectory had not seldom been the despair of the old depositaire, Mère St. Louis, who devoutly said her longest graces over her scantiest meals.
“I thank St. Joseph for what he gives, and for what he withholds; yea, for what he takes away!” observed Mère St. Louis to her special friend and gossip, Mère St. Antoine, as they retired from the chapel. “Our years of famine are nearly over. The day of the consecration of Amélie de Repentigny will be to us the marriage at Cana. Our water will be turned into wine. I shall no longer need to save the crumbs, except for the poor at our gate.”
The advent of Amélie de Repentigny was a circumstance of absorbing interest to the nuns, who regarded it as a reward for their long devotions and prayers for the restoration of their house to its old prosperity. We usually count Providence upon our side when we have consciously done aught to merit the good fortune that befalls us.
And now days came and went, went and came, as Time, the inexorable, ever does, regardless of human joys or sorrows. Amélie, weary of the world, was only desirous of passing away from it to that sphere where time is not, and where our affections and thoughts alone measure the periods of eternity. For time, there, is but the shadow that accompanies the joys of angels, or the woes of sinners,—not the reality. It is time here, eternity there!
The two postulantes seemed impressed with the spirit that, to their fancies, lingered in the cell of their kinswoman, Mère Madelaine. They bent their gentle necks to the heaviest yoke of spiritual service which their Superior would consent to lay upon them.
Amélie's inflexible will made her merciless towards herself. She took pleasure in the hardest of self-imposed penances, as if the racking of her soul by incessant prayers, and wasting of her body by vigils and cruel fastings, were a vicarious punishment, borne for the sake of her hapless brother.
She could not forget Pierre, nor did she ever try to forget him. It was observed by the younger nuns that when, by chance or design, they mentioned his name, she looked up and her lips moved in silent prayer; but she spoke not of him, save to her aunt and to Héloise. These two faithful friends alone knew the inexpressible anguish with which she had heard of Pierre's intended departure for France.
The shock caused by the homicide of the Bourgeois, and the consequent annihilation of all the hopes of her life in a happy union with Pierre Philibert, was too much for even her naturally sound and elastic constitution. Her health gave way irrecoverably. Her face grew thin and wan without losing any of its spiritual beauty, as her soul looked through its ever more transparent covering, which daily grew more and more aetherialized as she faded away. A hectic flush, like a spot of fire, came and went for a time, and at last settled permanently upon her cheek. Her eyes, those glorious orbs, filled with unquenchable love, grew supernaturally large and brilliant with the flames that fed upon her vital forces. Amélie sickened and sank rapidly. The vulture of quick consumption had fastened upon her young life.
Mère Esther and Mère Migeon shook their heads, for they were used to broken hearts, and knew the infallible signs which denote an early death in the young and beautiful. Prayers and masses were offered for the recovery of Amélie, but all in vain. God wanted her. He alone knew how to heal that broken heart. It was seen that she had not long to live. It was known she wished to die.