The Family Way (Molly Murphy, #12)

We asked at the inn about vehicles for hire and were told that we’d be likely to find a cab at the station. Gus conceded that she had had enough of being the driver for one day and was content to let someone else drive us up the hill.

“Tomorrow I’ll look into hiring a buggy for us at the livery stable,” she said, “but in this heat let someone else sit up front and crack the whip.”

I was still having misgivings about taking Bridie with us to such an inhospitable-looking place, and she solved the problem by saying she didn’t feel well and wanted to take a nap. The innkeeper promised to check in on her, so I left her lying on her cot.

We found a horse and cab standing in the shade of some trees near the station, and climbed aboard. It was a tight squeeze with three of us in the passenger seat and we were hot and uncomfortable by the time we turned into that narrow lane between the fir trees. I had been fighting off sleep until Sid suddenly exclaimed, “There it is. Look, Gus. It is deliciously Gothic—like something out of the Middle Ages. How long has this convent been here?”

“It used to be the old fever hospital, so I was told,” I said. “It had been abandoned for some time when the nuns came down from Quebec and took it over during the last century.”

“They obviously looked for the most uncomfortable building in New York State,” Sid said. “To make it easy to do penance every day. And avoid purgatory.”

She and Gus exchanged a chuckle.

I felt the hackles of my Catholic roots rise, but I’m afraid I had to agree with them. It was the most uncomfortable-looking building in New York State. We climbed down, stiff and sweating after the trip, and attempted to straighten out the creases in our dresses and mop our perspiring brows. I tucked flyaway strands of sweaty hair under my hat and adjusted the little veil so that I looked prim and proper. I realized that the nuns would also have to approve of me as a potential employer for Katy, and my friends, however much I was fond of them, were a trifle bohemian in the way they dressed.

Sid strode up to that massive front door and gained great pleasure from hammering on it with the iron knocker.

“One now expects it to open and Frankenstein’s assistant to lure one inside,” she said. “If an aged nun with a hunchback says, ‘Come inside, young mistress,’ I don’t think I’ll go.”

We waited for a while, the sun beating down upon our backs and heat radiating from that blank stone wall. Sid knocked again. “Perhaps they are all at prayer,” she said. “Or at tea.”

Then slowly the door opened, with a deep creaking noise. A young woman stood there, a pale creature, dressed in a simple black dress with a deep white collar. Her hair was pulled back severely from her face into a braid down her back and there was no bulge under her pinafore.

“Pax vobiscum,” she said.

“Oh, hello.” I stepped forward and held out my hand. “I wondered if we might have a word with Katy. I spoke with her the other day and have decided that I’d like to offer her domestic employment in my household when she is ready to leave.”

“With Katy?” For a moment I wondered if she was simpleminded.

“Yes, you have a young woman here called Katy, don’t you? She was minding the door last time I came.”

I saw a spasm of pain cross her face. “Oh, ma’am. I’m sorry to tell you that Katy is dead.”

“Dead? Oh, no. Did the baby come early then? Did she die in childbirth?”

She shook her head as if trying to shake out a bad memory. “No, ma’am. She fell down a flight of steps and broke her neck. The poor baby died too, God rest its little soul.”





Twenty

We stood staring at her, frozen like a group of statues, our shadows black and rigid on the ground in that bright sun.

“I’m so sorry,” I said. “She seemed like such a nice cheerful girl.”

“Oh, she was, ma’am,” the girl said. “I understand that everyone here was very fond of her. They were most upset about it.” She paused. “Would you like to come in? I’m not supposed to keep you standing on the doorstep. I can fetch one of the sisters.”

I was trying to make my brain work, but it refused to. “No, thank you,” I said. “There is little point now that Katy is no longer with you.”

“You might want to consider one of the other girls for service in your house,” she said. “They are always looking for good situations and kind people who will take them in, knowing their past.”

I hesitated, wondering if she was trying to convince me to hire her. “Are you about ready to leave here yourself then?”

She smiled for the first time. “Oh, no, ma’am. I’m about to enter the order. I’m a novice here.”

“You’re going to be a nun here?” Sid asked before I could stop her. “To shut yourself away before you know anything of life?”

The girl smiled again, such a sweet smile. “Oh, yes. It’s what I’ve wanted for a long time. I know I have a calling.”

“You’ve been here for a while?” I asked.

“Almost a year now,” she answered.

“Then you will remember a girl called Maureen O’Byrne who left abruptly a couple of months ago?”