Black Apple (11 page)

The scrape of an opening door jarred her back to her hard bed in the dormitory. Raising herself on one elbow, she looked behind her to see a girl slip from the infirmary. Ruth Crier. Smarty-pants Rude, as she had taunted her. Oh, but now Ruth’s face was swollen, her eyes puffy, lips cracked. She was sick, too sick to be out of bed.

“Ruth,” she hissed.

Ruth walked towards her, looking to the far end of the dorm. For her big cousins, probably.

“Ruth, are you okay? You’re not supposed—” Ruth was right beside her, and, oh, Rose Marie’s skin turned to ice. She could see right through her!

“Ruth. I’m sorry, you know, about our fight, that time I—” Tears smeared her vision. “Don’t go,” she sputtered. “Get back to that hospital room. Get better.”

She tried to say more, to ask Ruth to forgive her, to beg her to stay, please stay with her in the dormitory, at the school, in the world, but her words were sinking under a sea of sad, and all that came out were sobs.

Ruth wasn’t listening, anyway. She couldn’t hear. She was already gone, a ghost, a shadow.

S
TANDING BEFORE
the nuns in the dining hall, Mother Grace waited for Sister Bernadette to deliver what appeared to be one of her more successful attempts at an omelette and take a seat. “Sisters,” she began, “I don’t need to remind you that three students died from fever in the past week: Lydia Weasel Foot, Ruth Crier, and Maryanne Little Horse. Close to a dozen girls are still ill. Keep them in your prayers.”

Wimples bobbed wearily.

“I have an important announcement. Father Damien, now going on four years deceased, may he rest in peace, will be replaced by Father William, arriving at the school at the beginning of next week. Some of you may recollect William,” she added, carefully draining her voice of any telltale scorn. “He served at St. Mark’s when the boys were still in attendance at this school, as a dorm supervisor—was it eight years ago? Then he went to St. Gerard’s for—what was it, three, four years?”

“Five,” Sister Joan snapped decisively.

“No matter. He then returned to Montreal to complete his education and take his vows as a priest.” That Father William, then Brother William, had not left under the best of circumstances she would not mention.

As the dining hall buzzed with speculation, she removed her glasses and pressed a finger and a thumb against her eyelids. She reminded herself that though she had been disturbed by the rumours surrounding William when he left St. Mark’s, her knowledge of them could very well give her a certain power over the man, one she might be forced to use if he should decide to wrest control of St. Mark’s from her grasp.

“Be sure to welcome Father William back to the fold,” she added, sitting.

  *  *  *  

The next morning after Matins, she motioned Sister Cilla to her office. The previous evening over three fingers of brandy—certainly no more than four—she had come to the conclusion that if God wouldn’t show her the way to fulfil her destiny, then she must find it herself. The pompous voice of Sister Joan had clanged through her mind, declaring,
God helps those who help themselves.

“Your new assignment, an additional assignment,” she told Cilla, “is to assist Sister Joan in the classroom.”

“Oh my, yes, Mother Grace,” Sister Cilla replied, looking both pleased and flustered. “That will be along with—”

“—your assignment of assisting Sister Margaret in dormitory supervision? Yes, Sister Priscilla. Unless you feel that is too much responsibility.”

“No, dear, oh law, I didn’t mean that, Mother Grace.”

“I’m relying on you, Sister,” she confided, “to bring young Rose Marie Whitewater to me, should she . . . upset Sister Joan or try to escape her class. It’s part of my plan . . . I don’t want any more . . . untoward incidents. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, Mother Grace.” Priscilla nodded enthusiastically.

Mother Grace was pleased. Perhaps all would work out for the best. Sister Cilla had a certain melancholy that had not been alleviated by dormitory work, and by giving her this new assignment, she could very well be killing two birds with one stone.
Vieilli,
what a terrible expression. Another one popped into her mind, one that Father William had bandied about years ago:
Idle hands are the Devil’s workshop
. And if anyone should know, it would be William.

  *  *  *  

Father William arrived at the end of March, two days after Mother Grace’s birthday, one she again passed without mention. The temperature had risen from thirty-four below to “a balmy minus-nineteen,” as Brother Abe announced before lunch. Father Alphonses met William at the Hilltop station as he stepped from the train into a gust of wind that, according to Alphonses, very nearly swept him off the platform.

“Welcome back,” Mother Grace greeted William as he entered the dining hall. Father Alphonses excused himself and went upstairs to visit Father David in the priests’ suite. “And congratulations,
Father
William.” As he sat on the bench across from her, she reached over, touched his shivering hand, and whispered, “We’re all very proud of you.”

Father William looked tentatively at Mother Grace, a hint of gratification in his eyes. But before he could open his mouth, she hurried on.

“I’m sure you’ll find yourself very busy. Father David, you’ll see, is very old now, and not always”—she paused—“sound. More provocative than ever, but at least he still remembers how to say Mass.” She forced a chuckle. “But I’m sure you’ll be taking that over from time to time. My, what with serving as our spiritual guide, preparing sermons for your flock, giving Mass, and hearing confession for all the intermediate and senior girls—Father David will still hear the sisters’ confessions—you’ll be run off your feet. It’s a heavy load, to be sure, William.” She was careful not to mention the school administration, which was considered by the Church to be the job of a priest. “I certainly don’t envy you your new responsibilities.” She patted his hand again, smiling warmly if disingenuously. She had not mentioned the name of the young boy.

R
OSE MARIE, SITTING
in class, felt an itch in her tummy. Ruth and two big girls dead and now the shadows and sickness of the school were seeping inside her, making the fire worms wriggle and burn. She couldn’t stand it! One foot shook, her fingers twisted, and as soon as Sister Joan turned to the board, she slid out of her seat.

No sooner was she out the classroom door than Sister Joan was screaming her name and Sister Cilla was on her tail. Before she could pick up speed and run through the front door, Sister Cilla had her skirt in her fist and was hauling her in like a fish on a line.

“Let go of me!”

One hand squeezing her upper arm, Sister Cilla dragged her down the hall.

“Let me go!”

Dropping to a crouch, Sister wrapped her long arms around her, wiry and warm. “It’s all right, Rose Marie,” she said. “God will show us the way.”

Us?
She was too surprised to say anything.

Sister Cilla stood up, just like she had never hugged her. “Come on,” she said, and they walked to Mother Grace’s office.

“Were you misbehaving in Sister Joan’s class, Rose Marie?” Mother Grace asked, her sharp blue eyes digging in and holding her.

“No.” She blinked away the blue, her heart banging. “I mean yes.”

Mother Grace almost smiled. Rising from her chair, she plucked a book from her shelf. “Follow me,” she ordered, sweeping from the room.

Rose Marie trotted behind.

Entering an empty classroom, Mother Grace pointed at the first front-row desk. “Sit,” she ordered, opening the book. “Catechism,” she said, and placed the book in front of Rose Marie. From the teacher’s desk a few feet away, Mother Grace snatched up three sheets of lined paper, a pencil, and an eraser. “You will copy out the
Corporal Works of Mercy
,” she said sternly, leaning over and sliding her index finger down the page. “Start here.” She creased the spot with her fingernail. “Copy as many lines as you can before I return in—let’s see—an hour. Do you understand me?”

Rose Marie nodded.

Mother Grace cleared her throat.

“Yes, Mother Grace.”

  *  *  *  

Back in her office, Mother Grace put the classroom keys back on the hook. This was the chance she was giving the child. She thought she had seen something in her: a quickness of mind and not just of body, a certain understanding that was beyond her years, those dark, inquisitive eyes darting everywhere.
Oui
, she could recognize acuity when she saw it. Perhaps. She sighed. Perhaps not. After all, Sister Mary of Bethany had been an intelligent young woman, one she had believed capable of redirecting her young woman’s passion to a deep and abiding love for the Lord, a practice she, herself, was more than familiar with.
Mon Dieu
, she had been wrong.

This girl, Rose Marie Whitewater, was not Sister Mary of Bethany, she reminded herself, not a young woman of twenty, but a mere child of seven, and one, she had heard from Sisters Priscilla and Margaret, who had difficulty sleeping. She knew from Sister Joan that the girl had an egregious lack of self-control. “Though her wild nature is accompanied by a good memory and a superior vocabulary,” Joan had acknowledged grudgingly.

No doubt Rose Marie had never been taught discipline or given religious training before arriving at the school. If she could not control her agitation and perform the task, or if it was more than she was capable of,
ça ne fait rein.
But if she could make herself sit still long enough to copy out at least three of the seven
Corporal Works of Mercy
before she had learned to print much more than twenty-six disconnected letters and her name, then clearly she had the determination necessary to succeed in the world. The Christian world.

Mother Grace rubbed an aching finger joint and smiled. The girl might have prospects. After all, she, herself, had been given an opportunity for a better life when she was young.

Mother Grace recalled how the Sunday before her thirteenth birthday, she had sat at Mass in the Église Jeanne d’Arc and noticed a young man looking her up and down with an intensity that had frightened her. As she glanced around at the farmers, labourers, and merchants, she recognized, for the first time in her life, the hard work, large family, and grinding poverty that most surely were her fate, and while the rest of the congregation rose to sing, she collapsed on the prayer bench and beseeched the Lord for rescue.

He in His mysterious way had provided.
Dieu soit loué.
First had come an unexpected endowment from dear Uncle Gabriel, who had witnessed her birth. She had come into the world suddenly, the story went. Her parents’ third child and first daughter, she had torn from her mother’s womb with such force and protruding limbs that Maman, washing dishes and speaking in comforting tones to her younger brother, doubled over as watery blood gushed from her womb.

Gabriel, the only one to witness the violent birth, was so shocked that he vowed to God that if He saved the life of his favourite sister and her emerging child, he would devote himself to His service.

Once he was ordained as bishop a mere thirteen years and one month later, Uncle Gabriel decided to remember the child whose traumatic birth had caused him to enter the priesthood. He had provided his niece with the means to receive a convent school education. He had intervened and changed her life. As perhaps God intended her to change Rose Marie Whitewater’s life.

  *  *  *  

How hard those strings of letters were for Rose Marie to form! She stared down at the lines, curves, and dots that meant sounds and pauses, but so many, all jumbled together in lumps!

Her tummy grew hot. She closed her eyes and tried to will the heat away, but instead it built, the fire worms itching and burning and crawling. She couldn’t stand it! She dashed to the door, turned the knob, and pulled. It didn’t budge. Again she turned the knob and yanked with every bit of strength she had. Locked.

She ran around the room. She smacked into the far wall. She ran back to the door, turned and pulled and kicked the door jamb. She beat her fists and stamped her feet. She jumped up and down and up and down until her legs were jelly and her eyes ran. She crawled to the row of narrow windows and pulled herself up on tiptoes to look outside. Already the sun was fading. A dark snake slid down the sky.

She went back to the wooden desk, climbed into the seat, and picked up the pencil. At first she couldn’t find Mother Grace’s fingernail line. She banged her head on the desk, but that made the sore spot above her left eye hurt. She looked back to the blotchy page, found her place, and started to print. One letter, two letters, a short word. She lost her place. She stood up, jumped up and down, then sat. Another line, her insides jiggling hot. She ran around the room. She picked up the pencil and started another sentence. Over and over, until the pencil felt firm in her fingers and forming the letters made the worms settle down and sleep.

  *  *  *  

After an hour and ten minutes, Mother Grace surveyed the clumsy letters pressed into the damp paper, its blue lines bleeding. Rose Marie’s seven
Works of Mercy
were more than she had expected. “Good,” she said, trying to keep a note of triumph from her voice. “Very good, child.” Rose Marie smiled shyly up at her, and, despite or because of the girl’s damp eyes and missing front tooth, she was charmed. Almost. “Don’t count your chickens before they’re hatched,” Sister Bernadette often warned.

“Off you go to class.
Va t’en,
” she ordered, but softly.

Once Rose Marie was gone, Mother Grace grinned to herself. Clearly the child could overcome her rambunctious nature when required. Now she would take her under her wing, helping her grow and flourish, just as God most assuredly intended. But timing was problematic. The school year was almost over, and there might not be much point in starting the necessary private lessons. She’d have to wait until September to work with the girl, missing precious months.