She handed me the journal. I turned to the end of the narrative and said, “Well, she says she has reached the conclusion that she’s on the trail of the Holy Grail, and that the Grail is the cup that gives everlasting life, and the search for the cup of Christ is the search for the divine in each of us.”
I read “‘But the wine in the cup has a bitter taste. In Gesthemane, Jesus asked if it might pass from him. He knew, as I am beginning to understand, that those who drink from the cup must undergo a crucifixion. And beyond that, I trust, the other side of vulnerability and exposure, lie redemption and release.’ And there she stops. It’s so frustrating. My feeling is that if she’d got her life back together she would have finished her story. She would have written her play. The abrupt ending seems to suggest that things went badly wrong for her and she went under.”
Sister Eleanor said, “It looks very much that way, doesn’t it? But let me offer you an alternative possibility. Let us suppose that when Annabel left the journal with Miss Bonhart all those years ago she was at a very low ebb, as the evidence seems to suggest. Perhaps she went to the Winchester literary festival in an attempt to hold on to what felt like the remnants of normal life, to assure herself that there was still a world to which she belonged.
“She might, in search of succour and solace, have visited the cathedral, as she did in Norwich. Perhaps she might have heard the choir rehearsing for evensong. They might have been singing a familiar hymn, with words that touched Annabel – such as, perhaps, ‘Oh love that will not let me go’. Do you know the hymn?”
“Yes, I do…”
“Let us imagine that as Annabel sat listening to those wonderful voices, singing with such purity of expression, she may have felt she could not bear to go back to the life she had lived. Her search for something she needed desperately but could not find may have become too much for her. Perhaps she felt she must assuage her desperate inner hunger and loneliness, either fill that empty space inside or obliterate everything. Perhaps she had come closer to the edge than she realized. That is easy to do.”
“Yes.”
“Let us imagine Anna walking out of the cathedral and finding her way to some peaceful place, perhaps the city’s water meadows. She may have walked along the bank of the stream for several minutes, not really quite sure why she was there. Then, can you imagine that she may have gone right to the water’s edge?
“She may have looked at her reflection in the water, and wondered if there was any point in going on. It was late afternoon, and becoming dark. The water looked cool and inviting. She thought: It would be so easy to simply stop, to put an end to it all, to quietly slip away.
“Suddenly she hears again the beautiful singing of the cathedral choir… ‘Oh joy that seekest me through pain, I cannot close my heart to thee, I trace the rainbow through the rain, and feel the promise is not vain that morn shall tearless be…’ She realizes suddenly that in the crucifixion love and grief co-existed, and hope was born out of suffering and apparent failure. It was possible.”
I said, “Sister, how can you be so sure… you’re not imagining this, are you? You know the story… You met Annabel. It’s true, isn’t it?”
“Yes, I knew her. I knew her well.” The Sister leaned forward, put her hand over mine and pressed it gently, saying, “I am Annabel.”
I was stunned. How was it possible? Sister Eleanor was Annabel?
“But you can’t be. You can’t possibly be. I’ve seen her grave!”
“I’m sorry to give you such a shock.”
“But – what happened to you, after Winchester? This isn’t possible. How can you be Annabel?”
“The only answer to that is, by God’s grace! I can’t tell you how much it meant to me to see my journal again. Let me tell you the rest of my story. But first, I think you need another cup of tea!”
While I tried to take in Sister Eleanor’s astonishing revelation and make sense of it, she poured me more tea and handed me the cup.
“I am sorry. This is a dreadful shock for you,” she said.
“But – I saw your grave!”
“The grave is that of a dear friend who borrowed my false identity. Let me start at the beginning. I shall tell you everything. Are you all right? Would you like some air?”
“No. No, please. I want to hear your story.”
“Very well. While I was in Winchester, I saw, in the festival programme, that Freida Bonhart was to give a talk on how to get a book published. I decided to go. I’d been thinking I might do more research on Julian and write a novel, rather than a play. When I arrived back from the water meadows it was almost time for the talk, so I went straight there. I had the journal in my bag.
“After the talk, on an impulse, I asked Miss Bonhart if she would read my manuscript and give her opinion. I hadn’t put my name on it because really, at that point, I hadn’t intended showing it to anyone. As you’ll have observed, it’s more a personal journal than anything else. I’d thought of it as the basis for a piece of work, nothing more. If I’d been thinking straight I would not have had the temerity to foist something so raw and incomplete on poor Freida Bonhart.
“When I walked up to her, I realized that I ought to introduce myself and the name Annabel Lee came into my mind. In the hubbub, she must have heard it as Anna. I seemed to remember that the poem was about obsessive love and a girl who drowned. I was feeling confused and uncertain. I don’t know why I didn’t simply give my real name. I think I felt I had no identity, and so my name had no relevance. It’s Eleanor Thornton, by the way; that’s my old, worldly name, at any rate. There was some thought in my head about finding a new identity. I really wasn’t thinking clearly.
“That night I had a very strange dream. I was in a vast library somewhere, and someone was showing me rows and rows of books. This person was guiding me, it seemed. He or she took me along row after row, and all I can remember the person saying was, ‘Can you find the one you are looking for?’ Then my guide said, ‘Don’t forget, this library is open all the time; you can come here whenever you wish, night or day.’ I didn’t understand the meaning of the dream, but it left me feeling calm and peaceful.” I was startled, remembering my almost identical dream.
“The following morning I went to the cathedral again. I sat there for quite a long time. When I looked at my watch I saw that it was midday. I hurried to Frieda Bonhart’s hotel, with the intention of retrieving the manuscript, or, if she felt inclined to read something so raw, to at least give her my name and address. But they said she had already checked out and returned to London.
“As I drove back to London, I realized that I would not be able to tackle a new play or anything else. I became aware that I was losing my grip on all the things that were familiar to me. I didn’t feel able to concentrate on anything.
“What was I to do with the rest of my life? Could I continue to try to make a career as a playwright? Should I return to teaching? I had done very little work for several months and was running out of money. I felt I had achieved nothing with my life. There had been times when I had felt I was making a worthwhile contribution: when I was teaching, and when I saw one of my plays performed and watched the audience – it happened once or twice – motionless and silent, engrossed in the action on stage. But all that had gone.
“My change of heart in the water meadows at Winchester had saved my life. I had been given hope. But though I never forgot that there was hope, I had not yet completed my journey to Calvary. In my dream about Julian she had spoken – or I had imagined she had spoken – of hope… ‘Hope always lies through and beyond despair…’”
I said, remembering the words, “‘To discover hope, we must move into the darkness and risk the loss of the few remaining reference points that seem to make some sense of the bewildering landscape.’ I’ve read the passage many times.”
“I really came to understand the meaning of those words,” said Sister Eleanor. “I had lost my reference points – career, success, reputation�
� what Julian calls ‘these things that are so little, in which there is no rest’. I had let people down and was no longer considered reliable. I had always taken pride in my work and felt deeply ashamed of my failure.
“But failure is an opportunity for God to come in, to heal and to love. Only when we become vulnerable do we allow him to reach us. When people asked Jesus why he ate with publicans and sinners, he replied, ‘Because I’m here to tell sinners that God loves them.’ Only when we see no way forward and know we’re helpless do we at last allow God to take charge.
“Some part of me knew I was about to disappear from the world and would not want to be found. And that’s still true. I don’t want to return to the old me. I have a new identity, in the real meaning of the words.
“You know, the odd thing was – another coincidence, if you still believe in them – the odd thing was that though I chose the name Annabel Lee on the spur of the moment, because I was feeling depressed, much later, after I had come here, I saw the connection.”
“Annabel Lee, in her kingdom by the sea…”
“‘… her highborn kinsmen came and bore her away from me, to shut her up in a sepulchre in this kingdom by the sea,’” Sister Eleanor continued, quoting the poem by Edgar Allan Poe. “And here I am, in a kingdom by the sea. And this is, after all, a kind of death to the world, like Julian’s enclosure.”
“Yes, I get it now,” I said, wondering what kind of investigative journalist needed to have every last detail pointed out to her.
“Don’t blame yourself,” said Sister Eleanor. “You were seeing things in a different light. We all do that at times. We see the literal truth and miss the creative possibility. I could never have painted angels in my old life. I would not have been open to the possibility of what angels might look like. If I couldn’t imagine them, how could I paint them?”
She looked towards her canvases. One, which hung near a window that looked out onto the garden, was of an angel with outspread wings. Eleanor had infused it with what seemed almost an internal light. The angel’s expression was full of serenity, joy and love. It was a very beautiful painting and I wanted to keep looking at it.
Sister Eleanor said, “God’s messengers are everywhere. Sometimes they come from heaven and sometimes from earth. What I missed was the point of the poem, that Annabel is loved. She is the beloved, as we all are. I missed that connection. But perhaps some part of me did not.”
“I was never quite sure how much of your story was autobiographical – ”
“Oh, all of it was.”
“Frieda Bonhart couldn’t find any trace of your plays.”
“They were performed in some very obscure theatres! A couple were done in Ireland, one in Prague, another in Miami. There are an awful lot of playwrights out there – and an awful lot of plays! And of course, you didn’t have my real name. Poor you. I’m sorry to have inadvertently put you to so much trouble,” said Sister Eleanor.
“Oh, and the Welsh song! I was so amazed to find it. Why was it with the book?”
“Oh, I wrote the song for a character in a play. A woman called Jane, who was Fool to Mary Tudor. I don’t speak Welsh myself. A friend translated it for me.”
“It felt so strange. Because I am Welsh and Welsh was my first language.”
“Well, now perhaps we know why I decided that Jane should be Welsh!”
“At the very end of your journal it seemed as though you were getting your life back to normal.”
“I hoped so, but it was an illusion. I had a long way to go… The day after I attended the literary festival I became ill with a viral infection, which turned into pneumonia. Because of the weakness of my immune system – the lupus that caused my childhood problems – the infection didn’t respond to antibiotics. My depression over Mark and the rest of my life had weakened me further and increased my vulnerability. I think attitude has a lot of influence over disease, particularly anything affecting the immune system. I was ill for three months and was not expected to live. Then, unexpectedly, the doctors located a new antibiotic drug. I was a beneficiary of the research into Aids. That worked and I steadily got better.
“Although my health was improving, I was left with a residue of depression and unhappiness. Having been close to death, I became acutely aware that I could easily pick up an infection that could kill me. I felt vulnerable. I went to recuperate at a cottage on the coast.”
“At Cley…”
“Yes. I wrote the letter to Miss Bonhart some eighteen months after I’d met her, after I had begun to recover my strength. I wrote again but never received a reply. Several years later I learned that she had developed Alzheimer’s and I decided she had probably thrown the journal away – after all, there was no name or address on it. I thought it best to let it go, with the past.”
“But who is buried in the churchyard at Cley?”
“My friend Frances is buried there. Frances lived with me for several months, when she was going through the final stages of cancer. Sadly, she had fallen out with her family. There was something about Frances’ life that her parents could not accept and it caused great bitterness and enmity. She wanted to spend her last months in peace.
“I had mentioned that if a letter addressed to Annabel Lee came while I was out she should keep it for me. It amused her to borrow my stolen identity. She said it was an appropriate choice. She even changed her name by deed poll, so that she could not be traced. Frances made me promise not to reveal her secret to her family if they should ever come looking for her. I thought that a mistake, but I am bound by my promise. So, now, are you, Joanna.
“But before then, living by the sea, I gained strength. I went for long walks and came to love the area. I had a little money left and my plays were earning me meagre royalties. I started painting again, for the first time in years. Painting was always my first love as a small child. I had lost it on the way.
“During my second year at the cottage, I began to work part-time as a volunteer at a home for young women in King’s Lynn. Someone whose portrait I had painted arranged it. I was really only there to do a little administration, as a way of regaining my confidence. But as it turned out I received far greater blessings there.
“I was so humbled by what I saw. Young girls who had been prostituted were trying, with great courage, to piece together their broken lives. Their childhood had been stolen. They needed loving support from adults who would not exploit their vulnerability. Gradually, the girls came to trust and confide in me. Most were addicted to drugs, but determined to end their addiction. Where did they find the strength to fight for control of their lives? The home was truly a place where, just as at Calvary, hope and sorrow met.
“Once a week, a sister from St Etheldreda’s would deliver vegetables to the home. She would stop for a cup of tea before her return journey and we’d talk for five or ten minutes. I found myself looking forward to those conversations. I started to go to church again.
“Over the course of that year, my conversations with the Sister who brought the vegetables made me more and more certain that I had at last come upon the way of life that was right for me. Eventually, I plucked up courage to ask for an appointment with Mother Abbess. I think it’s fair to say that she combined a kind welcome with an unwavering insistence that I consider all the sacrifices and difficulties the life would entail. She was very generous. Each time we spoke, the stronger my conviction became that I wanted to dedicate the rest of my life to prayer and that this was the right place for me.
“Three years after I had moved to the cottage I came here as a postulant, a candidate. Then I became a novice, a trial member of the order. After that I had three years under simple vows before making my final vows.
“So… Annabel did find meaning,” I said.
“She did, most assuredly.”
“This is not the end I expected to my search for the lost lady…”
“When is anything what we expect it to be? Has it brought resolution, and acceptance?”
“In a way. Yes it has, of course. Julian has kept her promise. I still have a million questions, though – more now, perhaps.”
We sat in silence for a few moments, looking out across the marshes. I said, “Julian has certainly made me see things in a different light. She gives me a sense of acceptance and welcome. She makes me feel that I’m not some supplicant with her nose pressed against the glass – which is how I’ve always felt about religion – but someone who’s expected and wanted.”
“That’s exactly what you are – the beloved child coming home, if you so choose,” said Sister Eleanor.
“I’m still a journalist. I still need to rationalize what I’ve heard, even though I know that isn’t how it works. According to Julian, Jesus didn’t die to pay for our sins – which is what I was taught as a child.”
“That’s the orthodox view, but the idea of Jesus paying a debt doesn’t make sense to me. You’ve only got to look at what Julian says to realize that Jesus didn’t die in order to appease God’s anger. Julian tells us fourteen times that God has no anger within him. She tells us four times that this vitally important message was given in each of her sixteen revelations. It isn’t a matter of Jesus’ death enabling God to change his mind. God never needed to change his mind. His mind has always been one of inexhaustible love. It’s a question of our minds being changed and us coming to him.”
“But what about all the stuff about hellfire and damnation – and remission of sins…?”
“Julian says she didn’t see hell in any of her visions. The atonement is a great mystery. Jesus said he gave his life as ransom for many, that his blood was given in remission of sins. But you have to accept that in the context of the time. All the references to the wrath of God in the Book of Common Prayer and the Old Testament – I can’t accept any of it. It’s just not possible in the light of Julian.”
I said, “It’s strange, isn’t it, to think of her spending her life locked away from the world, and yet having such a profound and revolutionary message that she can become an abiding influence on people’s lives hundreds of years later.”
The Greening Page 28