Chapter Twenty-One

Sara, Lucy, and Anne were weeding vegetables planted in the common land near Jan and Maynard’s workshop. The Lauryn family were entitled to three long strips of field in the monastery land and the annual rent was due at grain harvest. In return for maintenance on hazel fences that surrounded the pigsty, their neighbours allowed them to use the oxen team to plough in April. Now the peas were high and overcrowded with unwelcome leafy competitors.

Today, it was doubtful if Lucy was much help because both Anna and Sara had to spend time to check the leaves Lucy put in her mouth were not deadly nightshade, or harbouring a chewy caterpillar, or some foul pest about to sting her. Still, the three young ladies felt themselves a good team in the summer morning light and set about their work with a will.

Sara also kept a harvesting eye out for a cabbage or cauliflower big enough for dinner this evening. She merely laughed when there appeared to be nothing useful. She did find edible leaves to keep in her pocket. She showed some of the tiny plants to Anne. ‘Look at these insignificant creatures! Does it not seem a shame to take these babies before they’re fully formed?’ They’d eaten most of the food stored from last year although she did have beans for pottage. Knowing there was freshly baked bread at home they hoped Jan and Pierre would bring back a fish or two from their outing this afternoon. July could be a lean month before the harvest started. The Lord would provide.

They were bending and hoeing between rows of peas when Sara straightened, wiped her hot face with a muddy hand, and said, ‘I’ve been meaning to ask you something.’

‘You may ask,’ Anne cared not one whit and said, blithely, ‘Anything.’

‘It’s personal, Anne,’ Sara said, sounding strangely nervous. ‘I don’t want you offended.’

Anne looked at this woman who’d become dear to her since Claude died a year since. Without the confidence of her real sister and with no brother to talk to Anne had come to rely on the support and friendship of Sara. Anne couldn’t see harm in anything Sara might say to her, ‘Proceed, dear friend. I’m not afraid of your questions.’

Whenever she had time and ability to slip away from her duties at the priory, Anne came to the workshop. She practiced her fighting skills with Pierre, learned from Jan, and from Maynard, and helped Sara with housekeeping. She helped Lucy to talk and to learn her alphabet. As well as basic reading, the child could now manage some numbers and a few French words amongst her Dutch. However, her ability to differentiate weeds from pea plants was low.

‘I thought, perhaps,’ Sara said, ‘You might consider marriage.’

‘I don’t have to think of such things,’ Anne laughed. ‘It’s not for me.’

Sara said, ‘Are you sure?’

‘No, Sara, I’m not sure.’

‘You know a woman always needs male protection in this life.’

‘To be a nun is to have that protection from God. Who better?’

‘Well, then … ‘ Sara straightened up her back and stretched. ‘I suppose you’d have no family telling you what to do, nor husband drinking or gambling away the family income.’

‘Just the other nuns!’ The two chuckled, thinking of gambling nuns, as they threw the weeds into their trugs.

‘But, Anne, what about having a physical relationship with a man? Don’t you ever get the longing?’

‘They say that passes.’

‘But you feel it sometimes?’

‘You know the Mother has plans for me to visit the Lille Béguinage? She says I’ll see how other women live their lives. She says she’ll even release my dowry if I ask.’

‘Is the Béguinage enclosed?’

‘No, the religious women are free to come and go. They’ve connections to the Hospice Comtess, you know it?’

Sara nodded across the pea rows. ‘I heard of the Countess Jeanne de Flandre from my grandmother. She was a patron of this area.’

‘It’ll be of interest to visit. I can see how women work as nurses and teachers. I can also experience Lille society. It’s a chance to encounter city life before I make my final decision. The Mother has been so encouraging sometimes I feel she’s almost pushing me to leave. I don’t know why.’

‘Perhaps she wants you to know what you are giving up. Perhaps she doesn’t want you to be nun?’

Anne looked at her friend in shock. That would be wrong. Of course, the Mother wanted her to be a nun. Why wouldn’t she? ‘It will certainly be an education. I hear Lille’s a vibrant town.’

‘Then, I don’t know if you’ll return. The people of Lille will take one look at you and want you for their own.’

‘As is only natural.’

The two girls laughed heartily, and Lucy joined in, thinking it good fun. She ran to her mother for an embrace. After Sara smoothed her daughter’s hair back from her face and retied the little cap tightly on her head, she looked at Anne tenderly.

‘I’ll miss you, Anne. You’ve become a sister to me.’

‘I too, will miss you, Sara, but we can always write.’

‘You’d best teach Lucy quickly for I’m not proficient with the quill! Oh, Lucy don’t eat dirt! Here, have this radish. Wait! I’ll wipe it for you.’

The hoeing then resumed. Some of the weeds were intransigent and needed extra effort to remove. ‘Isn’t it remarkable how the weeds begin to resemble the pea plants themselves as they try to grow unnoticed?’

‘And yet they are all God’s creation.’

‘Spoken like a true nun. When would you go, Anne?’

‘I still have time. The Mother says I can go when I feel ready.’

‘There’s another option,’ Sara paused before continuing. ‘An idea has been growing in my mind for some time.’

‘Yes?’

‘You’ll not be angry?’

‘Tell me, Sara!’ Anne laughed at her anticipation. ‘I can’t imagine what you mean!’

‘That you marry someone near here.’

Anne thought this most amusing. ‘Have you a suitable neighbour in mind? Not Dirk Geerarts?’

‘No, Anne. Not Dirk!’ Both girls laughed to imagine the hairy old wheelwright as a suitable companion for Anne. Sara’s voice changed to a more sombre tone. ‘No. Not a neighbour. As I want you for a sister, I am thinking of my brother.’

‘Your brother? You have another brother?’

‘Anne.’ Sara smiled at her. ‘No, I only have Maynard.’

That is when Anne realised, she had been wrong to think so lightly of Sara’s power. She had struck home, and struck hard, but Anne took most offence on behalf of Jeanette, Sister Thecla. How could Sara think such a thing? ‘Maynard?’ Anne was stupefied. ‘I can’t marry Maynard!’

‘Why? Is he so hideous?’

‘Sara! It’s impossible! Have you forgotten? It was only two years ago?’

‘Time heals … ‘

‘No. No, it doesn’t. Impossible.’ Feeling more than out of countenance, feeling ire, nay, feeling rising fury, Anne straightened up to leave. ‘I’m sorry, Sara. I would like to have you as a sister without having to get married. Let’s leave it at that. I’d best return to the priory.’ She took the hoe to the end of the row. She heard Sara calling her but did not look back as she strode up the track toward the Sainte Scholastique. Anne wished she didn’t have to be so harsh. But marriage? To Maynard? Of all men in the world? Unthinkable. She felt righteous and angry, and her feet pounded the dry soil as she marched.

As she walked, she reflected upon the last twelve months. The twisting sadness that took her in the night when she remembered her brother, and then her sister. Both lost to her. Both so near to her in the convent, one in the graveyard and the other in a cell. Well, thought Anne. She had best join them for there was no way she’d leave them and there was no way in the world she would betray her sister.

Growing up in the orphanage meant leaving the safe arms of Sister Absolem, leaving the warm lap of Sister Agnes (may she rest in peace), and rising to take on responsibility of her own. Getting to the top of the dorm by the door, Anne became the one in charge of the girls’ dorter. She was the one who hugged the little ones when they were upset. She was the one who called them ‘ma petite chou’. With her history, Anne resisted being bossy and mean. She resisted making any child stand in a corner with their arms stuck out for hours. She resisted beating anyone. She was known as the gentle one, but she did not put up with nonsense, either.

All this charity to the young ones did not stop her being punished by her superiors. She was often on bread and water, especially when there was rice pudding. Or apple flan. Which was rare so she didn’t miss it because she had hardly ever had it.

Some of the nuns berated her on many occasions. They swore, even if they killed her or starved her to death, she would make herself into a martyr and turn it all to her own purposes. How many times had she heard, ‘All Anne de Breuil thinks of is Anne de Breuil. Fie upon her!’

And now she would leave the dorter and become a nun. What else was there for her? If she didn’t swear to love God for the rest of her life, she’d get nothing. At least as a postulant she’d get a room of her own. She longed to be in her own private space. That would be reward enough. That and being with her brother and sister for the rest of her life.

As she walked through the forest sun-shards she looked up at the canopy of brilliant green above her. The leaves caught with fire-edges and the trunks grew high, the branches curving to meet overhead like a living version of the interior of their church. The insects hummed, the breeze shifted the leaves, and birds flitted and chirped through the branches. As she stood and gazed around her, breathing with the forest she knew that her name, Breuil, meant woodland. She was of woodland, she came from the forest, she was part of the trees. The strong stems rose around her, the boughs arched overhead and the different level ceilings of golden-tipped, gloss-green were far better than any grand Cathedral she could imagine. She felt God here, love and light all around her. In her.

She lay down on the cool damp ground, feeling the softness of fallen leaves bedded down under her, years and years of leaves carpeting the ground, until she felt part of the earth. She felt, “… enfolded in the weaving of divine mysteries.”

Anne loved to lie on the ground under the trees, even in winter, but far more these idyllic summer days, to see light dazzling through leaves, watching God’s creation shimmer above her. She looked at the dappled shifting leaf vault and prayed to the Virgin Mary to intercede for her with God. She asked for a sign that she was choosing the right path. Should she choose an internal life of contemplation, a life where she’d be married to Jesus for all eternity or should she choose a life living among people on this earth, beyond the convent walls?

She wondered what sort of sign God might send? What would make her think of safety and enclosure? It could be a small thing, a bee or an ant crawling into their God given home, or it could be up there, in the crown of the tree, with soft feathery growing things sheltered by a loving nest. She searched the treetops nearby but could not see an obvious portent. She knew that did not mean it was not there, just that she could not read God’s intentions. She didn’t feel there was a sign here for her, other than a feeling of comfort in this Godly place. Perhaps that was presage enough. Her anger began to subside, replaced with rising thoughts of love and God and she hoped she was making the right decision. She wished always to be in the arms of Our Lord Jesus Christ. She wanted to be in love with life, in love with God, and to give her life to serving God. She fell back and gave her body and soul to him that created all.

She’d read the words of Teresa of Avila in wonder. The idea that God could be a lover, a far better lover than a human, was joyous. Anne felt her body alive. She wanted to wrap herself into the softness and feel the hardness of the oak under her. The curving roots enfolded her, and she embraced all living things. The smell of moss was acrid and sweet at the same time.

All this, and her body, was part of the one thing, the one life, and Anne was late for prayers again.

After her epiphany in the forest, and a late dash for None, Anne made for the Prioress’s office. She stood outside for a moment, listening. Was there someone else in there with the Mother? She could hear nothing well with the door closed at any time, so she knocked, and the Mother admitted her, saying she was pleased to see her. There was no one else there.

Anne took a deep breath. Now she was here, looking at the Prioress, she didn’t know how to say it. She opened and shut her mouth without producing any sounds.

The Mother looked up at her and frowned a little. She looked puzzled by Anne’s lack of vocabulary, as was Anne. ‘Yes, daughter?’

Anne swallowed and found enough air to breath out, ‘I will be a nun.’ Even to her own ears she sounded determined.

‘You sound certain.’ The Mother put down her quill and paid full attention to Anne, who nodded. She felt sure she was doing the right thing. ‘Yes, Mother.’

‘What happened to change your mind? When last we spoke you were still doubtful? We were considering a visit to the Béguinage? Will you still do that?’

‘No, Mother. I cannot leave Claude. Or … Sister Thecla. Ever.’

‘So, you are here for love of family.’

‘And love of God, Mother.’

‘It’s true, Anne. God is your family.’ Anne held her breath as the Mother watched her. ‘You’re a thinker, a reader and writer. Do you think God is calling you, child?’

‘I think so, Mother.’

‘I think you will make a good candidate for religious life, Anne de Breuil. You tend to attempt everything you do with intensity.’

‘Thank you, Mother. How soon can it be?’

The Mother looked at Anne seriously. It was a careful look. Anne felt as though the Mother was appraising her whole life. Was Anne capable of following through a lifetime promise? An eternal promise? At this moment, Anne felt she was. She stood up straight, showing the Mother as best she could, that she was ready to obey the Rule of Saint Benedict and ready for a life with Jesus. ‘After Saint Anne’s feast day,’ said the Mother, ‘After your name day, we shall accept you formally into the community.’

‘Thank you, Mother.’

The Prioress’s assessment continued, ‘Do you feel if you hesitate, you might be tempted to another path?’

‘No, Mother. I feel I ought to begin as I mean to continue.’

The Mother continued to gauge her, looking at her, calculating, frowning just a little less than before. ‘If you change your mind, you must tell me. If there are any doubts, any doubt at all, you will come to see me.’

‘Yes, Mother.’

‘Anne?’

‘Yes, Mother?’

‘Please reconsider visiting Lille before you become a candidate. It would be an interesting trip for you to meet some of my relatives. I had written them letters and hoped you would carry them for me. If your mind’s made up, and it is God’s will that you become a nun, well then, good. God will decide. But you are so young, child, only eleven … ‘

‘Twelve!’

‘I beg your pardon, Anne. Twelve years old. You have so much time ahead of you. Will you think about it?’

‘Of course, Mother.’

The regular rasping of blade on wood called Anne into the workshop. Houtachtig rushed out barking but soon recognised his good friend when she bent to pat him and fondle his ears. Of course, he must rush for a stick for that is what he loved best. With a mighty arc Anne threw it, and the dog made a black and white blur as he dashed away. Anne went inside and saw that Maynard was at work carving at his workbench. He no longer had the fine control he once had but he was able to create simple patterns in the softer woods. As far as she knew, he demonstrated patience with his disability, and was always polite and friendly with her. She didn’t want to approach him, feeling sensitive to Sara’s words. She didn’t know if Sara had discussed her idea with her brother, and she didn’t wish to know.

Jan was watching Pierre closely as the youngster turned a bowl on the pole lathe. Shavings of wood fell to the ground. Noticing how much litter there was, Anne picked up the broom and began to clean around the menfolk.

Jan said, ‘No need to do that, My Lady.’

Anne laughed, ‘There’s no need to call me fancy names, either.’

Jan said, ‘Is there not? Was it not Saint Anne’s feast day last week? You must be a young lady after that.’

‘I’ll be a postulant.’

Pierre stopped his foot pushing the pedal to turn the lathe and held the metal tool to one side. ‘You’ve decided?’

‘Yes.’

Jan turned to her, surprised, ’You’ve come to say goodbye?’

‘I’ll have another year before my final vows, but, yes ... ’

She went to see Lucy and embraced the little one before saying ‘Goodbye,’ to Sara, Jan, and Maynard. She embraced Pierre, who could not hide the tears running down his face.

Anne kissed him on both cheeks. ‘You’re Claude’s best friend, Pierre. I take you for brother, too.’ She turned to the rest of the little group and said, ‘I take you all for my family. Will you visit me in the parlour sometimes?’

After a quick glance at Maynard, Sara attempted a joke, ‘We’ll know where to find you.’

Anne noticed that Jan went to stand near Maynard and clapped him a pat on the back. She saw the father left his hand on the younger man’s shoulder as she turned to go.

‘Perhaps Lucy would like to play with my sword.’ Anne gave them a watery smile. ‘For I won’t use it anymore.’