Shadows of the Workhouse

fifty years and was known by virtually everyone.
    To say that by the age of ninety she was eccentric would be an understatement. Sister Monica Joan was wildly eccentric to the point of being outrageous. There was no telling what she would say or do next, and she frequently gave offence. Sometimes she could be sweet and gentle but at other times she was gratuitously spiteful. Poor Sister Evangelina, large and heavy, and not gifted with verbal brilliance, suffered most dreadfully from the astringent sarcasm of her Sister-in-God. Sister Monica Joan had a powerful intellect and was poetic and artistic, yet she was quite insensitive to music, as I witnessed on the occasion of her shocking behaviour at a cello recital. She was very clever – cunning, some would say. She manipulated others unscrupulously in order to get her own way. She was haughty and aristocratic in her demeanour, yet she had spent fifty years working in the slums of the London Docklands. How can one account for such contradictions?
    Whilst being a professed nun and a devout Christian, in her old age Sister Monica Joan had become fascinated by esoteric spirituality, ranging from astrology and fortune-telling to cosmology and centric forces. She loved to expound on these subjects, but I doubt if she knew what she was talking about.
    At the time I knew her, she was verging on senility. The focus of her mind seemed to come and go, to shift and change. Sometimes she was perfectly rational, while at others it was as though she were seeing the world through a mist, trying to grasp, things half-seen. Yet I suspected she knew her mind was going, and occasionally used the fact to get what she wanted. Somehow she had a magnetic quality about her and she fascinated me. I loved her dearly and enjoyed spending time in her company.

    When Sister Julienne solemnly told the group in the dining room that Sister Monica Joan would be prosecuted for theft, a wave of shock had rippled around the table. Novice Ruth cried quietly.
    Mrs B protested vociferously that she wouldn’t believe it. Trixie said she wasn’t surprised. Sister Evangelina snapped, “Be quiet, we’ll have none of that,” and sat very still, staring down at her plate, but her temples were twitching, and her knuckles went white as she gripped her hands together. Sister Julienne said: “We must all commit Sister Monica Joan to our prayers. We must seek God’s help. But I will also engage a good lawyer.”
    I asked if I might visit Sister Monica Joan in her room that afternoon, and permission was readily given.
    As I mounted the stairs, my mind was in a turmoil. How would I be received by a lady who had been visited by the police, from whose chest of drawers numerous stolen items had been extracted, and who had been told that she would be facing prosecution?
    Sister Monica Joan’s room was not the customary cell of a nun, bare and plain. Hers was an elegant bed-sitting room with all the comforts due to a distinguished old lady. These were probably a great deal more than any other nun might expect, but Sister Monica Joan had a knack of always getting her own way. Since the pneumonia she had spent more time in her room, and I had been a frequent and happy visitor. But on this occasion, my heart was pounding with anxiety.
    I knocked, and heard a sharp: “Enter. Come in, don’t just stand there. Come in.”
    I entered, and found her at her desk, notebooks and pencils all around her. She was scribbling away furiously and chuckling to herself.
    “Ah, it’s you, my dear. Sit down, sit down. Did you know that the astral permanent atom is equivalent to the etheric permanent atom and that they both function within the parallel universe?” She seemed to have no recollection of what had been going on, for which I was profoundly relieved. If she had been in a state of remorse it would have been hard to know what to say.
    I grinned and sat down. “No, Sister. I didn’t know about the parallel universe, nor the permanent atoms. Do tell me.”
    She started to draw a diagram for my benefit. “See here, child, this is the point within the circle, and these bands are the seven parallels that are the unifying stability within the atoms that are the essence of the parallel universe wherein men and angels and beasts and others . . . I think.”
    Her voice trailed away as she scribbled furiously, her mind obviously racing ahead of her pencil. Suddenly she cried out, her voice squeaking with excitement: “I have it.