Life With Mother Superior (6 page)

Actually, there was no reason for praying for sunshine; Roughhouse lit candles, demanded it and got it. The Living Rosary day dawned beautifully. The sky was cloudless—a deep blue. And when I say dawned, I mean dawned, because that’s when we got up. Despite the knowledge that the Living Rosary would be formed at 3 p.m. we were ready to board the bus by 9 a.m. Mother Superior insisted that we not put our uniforms on that early and stay in our cotton play dresses as long as we could since the weather had changed abruptly and the thermometer was hovering around 90 at that very moment.

Roughhouse, a complete wreck by now, acquiesced to Mother Superior’s firm command, but she had no faith in it. She was sure we’d be late and the bus would break down.

“Now, now, Sister,” Mother Superior cooed, “the bus isn’t going to break down.”

She acted as though the Lord Himself was going to pilot us into the city instead of shuffly Roger, the janitor.

At last, Mother Superior said it was time to dress. This necessitated almost an hour of buttoning and clasping and hook-and-eying, as our uniforms were anything but easy to get into.

First of all we put on a starched white waist that had sleeves in it. Since it was summer we had cotton sleeves—but the main part of our habit was a twelve-pound pleated jumper of white flannel which one put on and snapped at the right shoulder. The garment was equipped with thirteen snaps at the neckline to which we attached the equivalent of an old-time man’s starched collar, except it was shaped to look like two white pearl shells in front and, under the collar, when you finally got it to stay down, went the red altar-boy bow. The collars were the real problem. They were so starched that they were inclined to snap up, hitting you on the chin at the least provocation. Roughhouse did not want any snapping collars at her spectacle. Finally after a complete inspection and several trips for handkerchiefs we boarded the bus. We were not only exhausted mentally, but the heat was doing its own job. Mother Superior made us all take salt tablets to prevent fainting, and Roughhouse would have put a lettuce leaf under our veils if she thought the effect would have been artistic.

By the time we arrived and lined up, most of the parents were lolling around the golf course. I didn’t see either of mine. They were always late, due to my father’s unerring sense of wrong directions and the fact that he would only drive on the shady side of the road.

The boys’ band from St. Giles arrived and lined up. They were at least in white ducks and white shirts; we were literally steaming by now. The nuns, however, encased in more than we wore, seemed peaceful and cool, except for Roughhouse, who mopped her upper lip with a crumpled linen handkerchief and by this time could hardly speak at all. The band began with the St. Giles song, which was composed by a mathematics professor, and then they launched into an old favorite, “’Tis the month of our Mo-oth-er, blessed and beautiful days.” We were brought to attention and Roughhouse cued us into our marching position-General Patton could have used her. Even Mary and I paid attention to her: “Now . . . now . . . Lillian . . . begin . . . beeeeeeeeeegin. . . .” The top students included two from other classes that I didn’t know, but just their being there gave me a rundown on their way of life.

They walked out single file onto the green to form the cross and the first six beads of the Rosary. The idea was to form the same shape a Rosary would form if you laid it out flat on a table. We had been told that this made “a beautiful tableau.” When this part had been accomplished, pairs of us started marching. As we reached a marker Roughhouse had hidden, the pair split and headed each toward the last girl in the honor section, who stood single file in a long row. Every “bead” was instructed to fan out a bit each time, so that our Rosary had rather a fat, rounded look. We were marching along beautifully to “All Hail to Dear Mary” when something happened up in the first Mystery. In my bones I knew that Mary was up there, and chances were that she was causing the disturbance. I was completely right. It was just her luck to get her foot in the ninth hole. Roughhouse had never taken the function of a golf course into consideration. As Mary got her foot in, she fell down and the Our Fathers in back of her fell on top of her, and so on, until the next “Glory Be” realized that she had better detour.

Roughhouse almost fainted. Mother Superior looked most hot and most displeased. The audience was sympathetic and all the girls quickly got back on their feet, except Mary, who took a little longer as she had to get her foot out of the ninth hole. By the time she got up, she was red as a beet with anger, and somewhat confused. Where on earth she belonged, she couldn’t tell, since the Living Rosary had gone right on living without her. She ducked into the nearest place she could find, crushing herself between an “Our Father” and a first “Hail Mary.” As a “Glory-Be-to-the-Father,” the entire school wondered just what she would do. If she switched and became a “Hail Mary,” there would be eleven to that decade.

When the hymn ended, Lillian began, in her golf-course voice, to shout her message. It was a hot, windy day—the spectators clustered under the trees, but we stood in the sun. It was certainly not as pleasant as the cool park across from the Cathedral. By the time we worked our way around to Mary, even the audience was wondering what would happen. When her moment arrived, she merely shouted “Amen.” The crowd was delighted. Even Mother Superior was said to have laughed—but Roughhouse Rosie did not take it so lightly.

Roughhouse gave Mary a good shake when Benediction was over. I think she would have cracked her, but Mother Superior stepped in and said, “I don’t think Mary put her foot in the hole on purpose—and it turned out beautifully, Sister, just beautifully.”

Roughhouse didn’t believe this at all and sulked all the way home. It wasn’t really until the newspaper gave it a glowing review—due largely to the fact that the editor and the mayor and the citizens preferred the Living Rosary out on the golf course—that Roughhouse felt that all her effort was not in vain. The devotions had come off, if she said so herself, “rather well.”

Chapter Nine: Sister Liguori

We knew something had happened. No one rang the morning bell; only Sister Ethelreda, the tall postulant, came and wakened us, one by one.

“Hush, wake up,” she whispered, “get dressed and try to be quiet.”

“What’s the matter?” we all asked.

“Get up, get up, be quiet, I haven’t time for questions.”

“What’s up, Sister Ethelreda?”

The place was either on fire or we were at war with China, as Sister Mary William had predicted.

“It’s Sister Liguori, she’s dead,” she whispered, and tears flooded her pale gray eyes.

“Dead,” we all breathed back, shocked by the very word.

“Yes, God rest her soul, she died in the night.”

Mary and I sat back on our beds and contemplated this totally unexpected news. Sister Liguori was the only “nice” teacher we had. She taught geometry and she was so bright and nice to us, we simply felt it pointless to pull any of our tricks on her. Without our even realizing, we had become not only fond of her but fond of geometry as well.

“Does this mean we won’t have geometry today?” Florence asked. She seemed saddened, not so much by Sister’s death as the fact that she would miss out on geometry.

“Don’t be silly, of course not,” said Sister Ethelreda; “we won’t have any classes.”

It was a grim holiday that left us bereft of regularity. We dressed quietly and wandered down to the chapel.

No one seemed terribly concerned about us today. This, in itself came as a surprise since usually the Sisters concerned themselves, with nothing but us. This morning, however, they had withdrawn into their own lives, their own community—and whereas we had lost a teacher we liked, they had obviously lost a friend they loved.

Sister Liguori was a tall, heavy-set nun, who seemed to find our nonsense precisely that and nothing more. In fact, Mary and I amused her and she would prod us into telling her about our escapades and secret plans. She would “tsk” and “tusk” a bit here and a bit there, but she took such pleasure in our silliness that it was impossible to do anything but be good as gold in her class. It was our first sample of reverse psychology.

With her lumbering, teeter-tottering kind of walk, she would tread heavily into class and greet us as old and good friends. She kept the whole class amused with geometry did it with such deftness, we never learned her tricks. It was the most competitive atmosphere I had ever been in—leaving the childish gyrations of our senior basketball team looking like a game of tiddlywinks. We learned from Sister Liguori, for instance, the way to bet. There were mornings when we played geometric roulette, there were mornings when we played the horses, and there were mornings when we worked out masterly moves with chess. Whatever background Sister Liguori stemmed from, somebody in her household loved to bet, and she merely applied this universal liking for taking a chance to her geometry class. We had team against team, seat against seat, friend against friend. We bet odds on homework, study hours, masses, prayers. In fact, her entire operation was a healthy cross between a superb auctioneer at work and a bookie. No one would ever go to sleep in geometry and everyone got a good grade. It was a most apt system. Every day we had something that paralleled a daily double to end the class, and the lucky soul that won this parlay got a medal strung through a card with an off-beat shade of ribbon. It was “the” prize to win.

But aside from Sister Liguori’s superb knack of making sixteen unruly girls like such a subject as geometry, we loved her because she had a dog and she was the only nun we ever heard of that had a dog. She didn’t actually own Buttons, as that was against the rules, but one day a mangy, yellow, shaggy, mostly matted lump arrived at the convent for a handout and Sister Liguori happened to be in the kitchen. It just took one meal for Buttons to decide he wanted to live the cloistered life. From what we heard, Mother Superior was not at all keen on having a dog at St. Mark’s, but Sister Liguori was able to convince her that what St. Marks needed most was a watchdog . . . especially now that Roger was getting so old.

Buttons hung about the garden and Sister Gardener said he was an incredible beast with big feet. Sister Cook said he was a big beast with an incredible appetite, but Sister Liguori saw only his beauty. By the end of the semester, she had most of his mats out, and when he had a bath he looked a bit like a bright yellow sheep dog:

Buttons adored Sister Liguori and when she went for a walk in the convent garden, Buttons frolicked around, behind, and in front of her, demanding her attention and getting it in large doses.

He would eat nothing she didn’t feed him. Even though he absolutely adored such things as Mars bars and Hershey chocolate, he would patiently wait until she came down. We tried time and time again to get him to give in and eat some goodie. He would drool over it, but he wouldn’t touch it until he heard, “Well, now my good man, so you have a present?”

Buttons would wail with pleasure, pushing it over to the hem of her black serge skirt. Then he’d get down on his paws and wiggle with pleasurable agony.

“Good boy, go eat it.”

And with yelps of glee, Buttons would swallow whatever tidbit he had.

“What do you think will happen to Buttons?” Mary said, as we were shepherded to the library by the postulant.

“Do you think he’ll eat anything?”

We couldn’t take a chance on going out to see.

There was no point in doing anything wrong today. It was not the moment to get on Mother Superior’s nerves.

“We’ll go down after lunch,” I whispered, and slipped into a seat because Sister Ethelreda was staring at us.

We looked for Sister Cook, to ask about Buttons, but she wasn’t in the kitchen—she’d been relieved by some stern, white-haired lady, who said she had not seen a dog but she thought she’d heard some whining earlier. We looked around, but there was no sign of him.

After lunch, we returned to the library. Sister took it for granted that we would all want to read St. Augustine, but this form of reading never appealed to me and I sat and twiddled my fountain pen and wondered about death. What did happen to people when they died? Was heaven crowded? Did you wear clothes, or go nude? Did you get to do anything but sing or play the harp? What happened to you if you didn’t like harp playing? All the standard revelations came to me and I was nothing but sad and frightened.

At four o’clock, Mother Superior came into the study. She looked as if she had been crying and she spoke quietly, with no expression. She said we could all file down to the chapel where Sister Liguori was laid out. I was petrified. I certainly didn’t want to see her dead, but I couldn’t bear everyone going off and leaving me. I sat frozen to my chair while the rest of the classes filed out.

I had been to wakes many times with my father, but I had never known who was in the coffin, or cared, but this was different. This was someone I had seen walking and laughing and talking yesterday—and now she would be still. Besides, I was embarrassed at seeing a nun asleep.

“Don’t you want to say good-bye to Sister Liguori?” Mother Superior asked.

“I don’t know.” I really didn’t wish to make her angry today.

“Well, she was a good friend of yours,” she said, “always taking your side.”

I felt that terrible ache begin in my throat when tears want to come so badly. I couldn’t cry in front of Mother Superior. There was nothing I could say.

Mother Superior must have understood, for she said, “Well, just say a prayer for her, and if you can’t see her, don’t. She would understand.”

I padded along next to her all the way to the chapel, grateful for her austere company.

The chapel was darkened, the wintry day had blustered itself into a bright, cold sunset that let a late daylight into the chapel, but not a cheery one. Even though the altar lights were on, the room seemed dark and cold.

The black casket was at the foot of the altar. It was the European kind, skinnier at the foot than at the top. There were eight long tapers burning around it. The rest of the nuns were scattered about the chapel praying. It was a silent and timeless moment, as if we were vacuumed into their meditative world. Everything was still. Then, as if by some secret signal heard only by nuns, they arose together and filed one by one past the coffin. Each stopped for a moment for a final prayer. Then, Mother Superior beckoned the seniors and each class filed by. I wanted so badly to see her, but I simply could not face it. Finally, after the freshmen had gone, I went up to the coffin.

As I knelt down, I was amazed to see how pleased she looked—pale and quiet and sleepy, but so secretly amused. It was an expression no undertaker could make or fake, it was simply her face that had had it. And then I realized how very much I loved this nun. It seemed inconceivable to me that anyone could ever like a nun. They were inevitably involved with the other team—the one that always won. Though I knew that Sister Liguori would stand no nonsense, she hadn’t treated us like babies. She merely understood what we were and let it go at that.

That night seemed endless, we slept fitfully. Two of the freshmen had nightmares and we could hear the swish of beads go in and out and up and down the corridors. The Sisters kept a night watch in the chapel.

We had all been told that Sister Liguori would be buried from the Cathedral in town and that we would attend only the Mass. St. Marks had a tiny cemetery where the Sisters were buried. The family would go there, but we would come back to the convent.

The ride to town was the quietest one I ever had. Usually the trip bordered on a combination of utter chaos and hysteria. When we arrived at the Cathedral, we all filed in two abreast and sat directly behind the Sisters. I was fascinated to learn from Mary that in the front row, across from the nuns, were Sister Liguori’s mother, father and three brothers. I was completely overwhelmed that she had a mother or a father and that her brothers looked quite young. I had been under the impression that nuns were born full-grown. It was amazing that the brothers were so
handsome—they were probably in their thirties. They
looked younger than my father and, more fascinating
than any thing, they all looked like Sister Liguori.

The Bishop ran on about her sanctity and made quite a point of her youth. It never dawned on us that Sister Liguori could be considered young. To us twenty seemed aged.

“What did she die from?” I asked Lillian Quig
ley. She was always seated next to me as a precaution
to my talking.

Lillian kindly excused my bad taste in speaking in church and said tearfully (she’d been in tears since it had happened), “Heart trouble.” I don’t think Lillian really knew, but she said it with conviction. It had to suffice.

After Mass, we were dispatched back to the convent
and, with Mother Superior’s superb sense of timing,
for both the faculty and for us, she suggested that we
all go back to work.

As soon as Mary and I had a chance to look for Buttons, we scooted toward the kitchen. He was
plastered against the door, but he was “in” the kitchen.
Sister Cook was baking and crying.

“Did he eat anything?” we asked.

“Not a morsel,” Sister Cook said and broke into tears—real tears.

We tried to change the subject.

“And I doubt if he will,” she wailed.

“Is he mourning?” Mary asked, trying to pat Sister
Cook’s hand.

“Yes, he most certainly is.” She dabbed at her nose.

“Don’t you think he likes us?” I queried, hoping that we could feed him.

“Well, you can try,” she said, and handed us a bowl
of meat she’d chopped up for him.

Mary and I sat on the floor with the mournful Buttons. And, even though he’d take something in his mouth, he simply couldn’t swallow it. We despaired and finally Sister Cook took pity on us and
said, “Leave him be, darlings, he’ll come round. Now
just go play and we’ll try again in the morning.”

We sadly left old Buttons, who simply put his head
back down on the floor and waited patiently for that
which was never to be again.

Even Mother Superior was concerned with the beast
and tried to get him to take something. She kept encouraging us to try too. Finally, one day Roger
drove him to the city to a vet “to get a tonic” they said,
and that was the last we ever saw of Buttons.

It had been a hard winter, Sister Cook said, and
Sister Mary William cried over China and Mother
Superior snapped at us more than usual. We were all
glad to see the Easter holidays come.