The Golden Dog [300]
The news of the tragedy in the market-place had been early carried to the Convent by the ubiquitous Bonhomme Michael, who was out that day on one of his multifarious errands in the service of the community.
The news had passed quickly through the Convent, agitating the usually quiet nuns, and causing the wildest commotion among the classes of girls, who were assembled at their morning lessons in the great schoolroom. The windows were clustered with young, comely heads, looking out in every direction, while nuns in alarm streamed from the long passages to the lawn, where sat the venerable Superior, Mere Migeon de la Nativite, under a broad ash-tree, sacred to the Convent by the memories that clustered around it. The Ste. Therese of Canada, Mere Marie de l'Incarnation, for lack of a better roof, in the first days of her mission, used to gather around her under that tree the wild Hurons as well as the young children of the colonists, to give them their first lessons in religion and letters.
Mere Esther held up her finger warningly to the nuns not to speak, as she passed onward through the long corridors, dim with narrow lights and guarded by images of saints, until she came into an open square flagged with stones. In the walls of this court a door opened upon the garden into which a few steps downwards conducted them.
The garden of the monastery was spacious and kept with great care. The walks meandered around beds of flowers, and under the boughs of apple-trees, and by espaliers of ancient pears and plums.
The fruit had long been gathered in, and only a few yellow leaves hung upon the autumnal trees, but the grass was still green on the lawn where stood the great ash-tree of Mere Marie de l'Incarnation. The last hardy flowers of autumn lingered in this sheltered spot.
In these secluded alleys the quiet recluses usually walked and meditated in peace, for here man's disturbing voice was never heard.
But to-day a cluster of agitated nuns gathered around the great ash- tree, and here and there stood groups of black and white veils; some were talking, while others knelt silently before the guardian of the house, the image of St. Joseph, which overlooked this spot, considered particularly sacred to prayer and meditation.
The sight of Mere Esther, followed by the well-known figures of Amelie and Heloise, caused every head to turn with a look of recognition; but the nuns were too well disciplined to express either surprise or curiosity in the presence of Mere Migeon, however much they felt of both. They stood apart at a sign from the Lady Superior, leaving her with a nun attendant on each side to receive Mere Esther and her two companions.
Mere Migeon de la Nativite was old in years, but fresh in looks and alert in spirit. Her features were set in that peculiar expression of drooping eyelids and placid lips which belongs to the Convent, but she could look up and flash out on occasion with an air of command derived from high birth and a long exercise of authority as Superior of the Ursulines, to which office the community had elected her as many trienniums as their rules permitted.
Mere Migeon had been nearly half a century a nun, and felt as much pride as humility in the reflection. She liked power, which, however, she exercised wholly for the benefit of her subjects in the Convent, and wore her veil with as much dignity as the Queen her crown. But, if not exempt from some traces of human infirmity, she made amends by devoting herself night and day to the spiritual and temporal welfare of the community, who submitted to her government with extreme deference and unquestioning obedience.
Mere Migeon had directed the two sorrowing ladies to be brought into the garden, where she would receive them under the old tree of Mere Marie de l'Incarnation.
She rose with affectionate eagerness as they entered, and embraced them one after the other, kissing them on the cheek; "her little prodigals returning to the house of their father and mother, after feeding on the husks of vanity in the gay world which