At seven thirty she awoke, startled by a hand on her shoulder. By the time she looked up Sister Bernadette had already silently moved on to the next bed. Bridget forced her eyes to stay open, although she did not feel as bright or alert as she had when she wakened earlier. She also had a strange feeling of unease within her.
She lay as the other girls started to move silently around the polished floors of the cavernous room, methodically retrieving their slippers, quilted dressing-gowns and washbags from their bedside lockers. She waited whilst the first half dozen padded down the dormitory then out into the cold tiled corridor to walk towards the toilets. After they had finished, the girls would move back out into the panelled corridor where there were long rows of sinks. They would wash in silence, under the modesty of nightdresses and dressing-gowns, and then brush their teeth.
It was only in silence, the girls understood, that they could hear God’s voice.
Bridget sat up now, trying to shake off the heavy, groggy feeling, when remnants of an uncomfortable dream came drifting back to her. It was about her parents, and her aunt had been involved somewhere. When she started to remember more of the dream, she felt her chest tighten. She threw back the sheet and blankets and swung her legs out of bed until her feet touched the cold wooden floor. She bent to retrieve her slippers from the locker and put them on, and then she reached for her dressing-gown. She buttoned it all the way down from her chin to her ankles, and then she paused to use her hands to smooth down her sand-coloured, bobbed hair. It was always tossed around in the morning, flicking out in the wrong direction as opposed to curving under. It had, she often thought, been much easier to manage when it was long and she could just tie it back in a pony-tail. But the long hair had disappeared with any vanity attached to it, as had the things of her old life.
When she had first arrived at the convent school, she had lined up with the other girls until her turn came and then a pretty young nun lopped eight inches off her hair, and told her how much easier it would be to manage. An older girl was already sweeping up the long strands of Bridget’s hair as she moved from the chair, eager to see her reflection. But she was to learn the first of many lessons about patience that day. There were no mirrors to hand. And it would be that night before she saw how her shorn hair looked in the small mirror above the sink as she washed for bed.
The smiling young nun, she soon discovered, was wrong about the new style being easier to manage. She had not realised that Bridget Tracey’s hair had a stubborn wave which refused to lie flat. From that day on, her flyaway hair would require taming with a wet comb every single morning to make it reasonable-looking. And living with it would become one of the items on her daily list of mortifications. The list which would accompany her on the spiritual path to becoming a nun.
As she walked out of the dormitory and down the pitch-pine staircase with the ever-present Sister Bernadette and the other girls from her class, she felt the more vivid parts of the dream were lodged firmly in her mind. Memories of being somewhere she should not have been, hearing conversations she should never have heard. Conversations that were now beginning to take on meanings she had not considered before.
She walked across the yard to the church, silently reciting prayers to drown out the snatches of dream. But the memory refused to budge as she went through the morning routine of Mass. She tried to concentrate on the priest’s voice, the lit candles on the altar, the stained-glass windows and the statue of the Sacred Heart.
As she ate breakfast in silence in the refectory hall, the uncomfortable feelings lingered on and she found she wasn’t as hungry as usual. Normally she devoured a large bowl of milky porridge followed by several thick slices of brown bread and butter and jam. This morning, she found it hard to swallow down one slice of bread.
When they left the dining hall and the silent morning period, several girls and Sister Bernadette remarked on how serious she looked and checked if she was feeling alright. Being naturally chatty, Bridget was usually one of the first to break the silence after breakfast, and they had noticed she was unusually quiet.
“If you need to talk about anything private,” the nun whispered, “we can go into one of the quiet rooms.”
“I’m grand, Sister,” Bridget said. “I’m just a bit tired. I didn’t sleep very well last night and I think I’m still trying to wake up.”
“Do you feel up to doing your chores?”
“Yes,” she said, annoyed with herself for bringing on all this unwanted attention. “I’ll be fine.”
Sister Bernadette looked doubtful. “Well, if you change your mind later and you want to talk to someone...”
Bridget was grateful for the kind nun’s concern but she didn’t want to talk about anything to anyone. Especially the dream and the memories it had brought flooding back. Things she had never talked about – that she had tried very hard to forget because of the damage it could do to her family.
After breakfast Bridget joined her designated group for chores. This morning she was on the rota for cleaning the sinks upstairs. It was one of the jobs which she liked, because the white, soap-splashed porcelain showed speedy results after a short period of work. She went to the store to collect her apron and cleaning equipment and then silently climbed the wide wooden staircase to begin.
Half an hour later she was back in the dormitory changing into her school uniform: her navy crossover pinafore, her blouse and tie and her grey V-neck sweater. Her black brogues, well polished the previous evening, went on over her knee-length grey socks.
Dressed and sorted, and carrying her leather satchel full of books, she then joined the other girls out in the corridor which was now filled with the scent of fresh beeswax polish. Silently they made their way downstairs, out across the courtyard, and over to the classroom buildings.
Bridget’s first class was English and, as always, the fifth years started their mornings off in school with another round of prayers. After that, they settled down to silent reading of an eight-page extract from a novel by Mary Lavin, followed by two pages of questions on it.
The literature class over, the girls then moved across the yard to the maths lesson taught by Sister Frances. Half an hour into the session, Bridget was in the middle of working on an algebra problem when Sister Bernadette knocked on the classroom door. All eyes turned to watch as the two nuns had a whispered conversation, then Sister Frances came up the aisle towards Bridget, a serious look on her face.
“You can leave that for today, Bridget,” she said quietly. “You’re to go over to the main office.”
“What about my homework?”
“Don’t worry about that.”
An ominous feeling building inside her, Bridget closed her books and put them back in her satchel, then, without looking at any of the other girls, she followed Sister Bernadette out of the classroom.
When they were out in the corridor, Bridget looked at the nun. “Where are we going?”
“You have to go home,” Sister Bernadette told her, “so you need to go up to the dormitory now and quickly collect your coat and any other belongings you need to take with you.”
“Is there something wrong?”
“Don’t be worrying now,” the nun said, her voice calm and soothing. “Just run upstairs and get your things and then come down into the office.”
As she walked up the wide staircase, Bridget ran over in her mind all the things that could possibly be the reason for her going home. None of them were good. She had heard of girls being sent home because the nuns thought they were more suited to ordinary life outside the convent. She had heard of others leaving because their vocation had over time become lost to them. A girl could be there one day and gone the next, with no explanation. And, if the other girls asked Sister Bernadette or one of the younger nuns what had happened, they were told that it was private information between the Mother Superior and the families.
Bridget did not think she fell into either of those categories. She’d had a meeting only
last week with her Spiritual Director, and afterwards she felt they were both happy that all was going well. Her prayer sessions and her connections with God were at the stage they should be for an aspirant nun in fifth year, and when asked if she felt that her vocation was getting stronger, and if she still felt she was prepared to devote her life to God, she had no hesitation in saying, “Yes”.
She was also fairly certain that the nuns were happy with her both in school and in her general religious life. And, if they had any problems with her, she felt that they would have given her some kind of indication by now. Surely, she thought, they wouldn’t just tell her in the middle of a maths class that it had been decided she was no longer suitable material to be a nun?
When she came back down, Sister Bernadette was waiting at the foot of the stairs for her. She had a smile on her face, which struck Bridget as being nervous.
When she spoke, her voice was kind. “We’re just going to the office now, Bridget.”
Bridget felt her heart quicken as they walked down the corridor to Mother Superior’s office. There was no point in asking Sister Bernadette anything more – she had obviously been instructed to say nothing.
As they came near to the door, the nun went ahead of her and after knocking she opened it. She held it back to allow Bridget to enter.
The minute Bridget saw Patrick sitting on the straight-backed chair opposite Mother Superior, she realised something was very wrong.
“Sit down, Bridget,” Mother Superior said. “I’m afraid Mr Trimm has come to collect you on behalf of your family. We have some very sad news for you...”
“Is it Angela?” she asked. Angela was always the first one that came into her thoughts if anything was wrong in the family. Angela was the one who had struggled with poor health all her life – having one operation after another on her leg. Everyone else in the family was fine.
“No, my dear – it’s your father,” Mother Superior said, an unusually soft and sympathetic look on her face. “He took ill and died in the early hours of the morning.”
Bridget looked at the elderly nun, in her mind repeating slowly the words she had just heard. “My father?” she said, her voice incredulous. “But he was fine when he brought me back here on Sunday...” She turned to look at Patrick. “Are you sure it’s my father?”
Patrick nodded then cleared his throat. “I’m sorry to bring you this sad news, Bridget. We’re all in terrible shock about it, especially your poor mother. She asked me to come and collect you.”
Bridget thought of her mother now, and suddenly realised that she did not want to go home. She wanted to stay here in the safety of the convent and the nuns, within her daily routine of comforting silences and prayers.
Here, she could imagine that all was the same at home as when she had left it. She could imagine that her father was still there, keeping things running at home and in the shop and in the bar.
“We will be saying special prayers for you, Bridget,” Mother Superior said. “And you will be in our thoughts until you come back.”
Patrick stood up and went over to lift Bridget’s bag. “The car is outside,” he told her.
Bridget looked at the two nuns and felt she was going to cry. She did not want to leave the convent, and she did not want to go home if her father was not there.
Chapter 9
When Fiona looked out of her bedroom window the following morning, she thought it was as bleak as the night before, the greyness and the rain echoing the shock and sadness in the house.
Her mother was already downstairs with Mrs Mooney. After the fire was revived and the kettle boiled, the three women sat and drank tea and went over the events of the previous night in minute-by-minute detail, and then they cried.
After a while the housekeeper took up residence in the kitchen and started to make the first of the plates of sandwiches that would be needed for the next few days. Fiona and her mother forced themselves to make phone calls and answer the door to people – and then come back to make more tea, make more calls and meet more people.
Earlier in the morning, Patrick had put the regulatory signs up on the doors of the pub and the shop, to inform customers that they were closed until further notice due to sudden bereavement.
The time began to quicken as Angela and Bridget returned home, Angela brought down from Dublin in a car by the manager of the office she worked in, and Bridget collected from the convent by Patrick.
As Fiona expected, both her sisters were shocked and upset, and she and her mother had to put their own sadness aside to comfort them. Angela and Bridget had to be told about the hospital visit all over again in great detail, and how their father himself had not realised how serious his condition was.
“He seemed in great form yesterday evening in Dublin,” Angela said. “When I think of him carrying in the box of groceries, laughing and joking with me...” She looked at her mother now, remembering what her aunt had told her on the phone. “Was he okay out at Aunt Catherine’s later on?”
Her mother shifted her gaze to stare out the window. “He was the same as always. He didn’t mention having any unusual aches or pains.”
“I just can’t believe it,” Angela said, her eyes filling with tears again. “I just can’t believe I won’t see him again.”
Bridget went over and put her arm around her sister. “The one consolation is that we know what a good person Daddy was, and he will have his reward for that soon. He wouldn’t do any harm to anyone, and would always help whenever he could.”
“He always did his best,” Nance echoed. “He hadn’t a bad bone in his body.”
Angela closed her eyes now, trying not to look at her mother, trying not to think about the things her aunt had told her in the phone call about the argument.
“He will be in heaven looking down on us all,” Bridget said. “And we can pray to him and talk to him in the same way we always did.”
“Yes, we can all pray to him,” Nance echoed. “That’s the only comfort we have.”
Fiona looked at her mother, her eyes hollow and ringed with dark shadows. “But that’s acting as if things haven’t changed,” she said. “That’s just pretending. He’s dead – gone forever. Praying and talking to him as if he’s alive, when we can’t see him or feel him around. It’s just not the same thing at all.”
“Don’t be talking like that,” their mother said distractedly.
“I agree with Fiona,” Angela said. “Praying to him or talking to him is not giving me any comfort at the moment either. I just wish we could turn the clock back and none of this had happened.” Her face crumpled now as she thought how different life would be without her father.
Bridget tightened her arm around her sister. “Everybody has their own way,” she said, her voice soft and comforting, “but I’ve found that praying always makes me feel better when anything is wrong. Even when something as devastating as this happens.”
“Well, we’re all devastated, no doubt about it,” Nance said. “None of us expected this to happen. Not in a million years. But it has happened, and now we have to pull together, girls. We need to get through the next few days – the wake and the funeral and everything.”
Fiona shook her head. “Just the thought of it all...”
“We have things that need to be done,” her mother said. “The same that all families have to do when they get bad news like this.”
Then, all three girls listened as their mother outlined what she thought would happen with the funeral arrangements and over the next few days, and what they all had to do.
Seán Tracey’s three living brothers and three sisters had been informed of the sad news. The brother and two sisters who lived in Tullamore soon arrived at the house. His brother, Jimmy, was stony-faced and silent, while the two sisters cried and said how shocked they were because Seán always looked so fit and well. Their tears set the family’s raw grief off again and Fiona had to lead her mother and Bridget upstairs to their bedrooms to comfort them and leav
e them for a while to compose themselves in private.
Angela helped Mrs Mooney to make tea for the visitors, and after a while they stopped talking about Seán and the terrible shock of his unexpected death, and they began to discuss how they would accommodate the others who were travelling over from England and from Cork and Dublin.
It was decided that the families from England would stay at Jimmy’s house and the two sisters’ houses in Tullamore, and Frank from Cork who was coming with his wife and son and daughter could stay in the rooms above the bar. Patrick, it was arranged, would see to the fires in the rooms and make sure there was hot water for them, and Mrs Mooney would make sure the beds were all in order and that they were well fed. If necessary, Patrick’s sister-in-law would also be on hand to give any extra help needed.
In the middle of the afternoon, a black hearse rolled slowly up the street and came to a halt in front of the house, bringing Seán Tracey’s body home to rest. The undertakers in their formal black suits and hats came in to offer their sympathies and find the place where the family wanted the coffin to reside.
“The dining-room,” Nance told them. “In the centre of the room.”
Then, the women retreated to the kitchen, leaving Patrick and Seán Tracey’s brother and brothers-in-law to deal with the practicalities of bringing the coffin in.
A short while later the dining-room door was opened and Nance and her daughters came into the room which was unusually and beautifully lit with large candles, to view the waxen lifeless figure that had once been a husband and father. They blinked back tears as they stared wordlessly down into the coffin at Seán, dressed in his good suit, each noting familiar details like his tie, his wedding ring and the brown rosary beads which were wound around his fingers.
A Letter From America Page 6