Obedience (11 page)

Bernard knew, when she heard the bells, that the past was upon her. Fleeting, for the slightest of moments, the soldier was there, in the square, his uniformed figure uncertain, his blue eyes unsettled. Then there was just the priest, coming towards her, smiling at her. She knew she should not have come.

‘Come and have a drink, Sister. Don't be shy,' said the young priest. He was new to the parish and his cheeks were pinched pink with embarrassment and enthusiasm. ‘You must know everyone. And there's fruit juice if you would prefer.'

He stepped away to make room for the schoolchildren filing in turn to the memorial behind the jeep, each laying a paper flower there. A teenage boy began to squeeze out
a sorrowful melody on the accordion. Bernard slowly followed the priest to the drinks table, where he left her.

Two women skirted round the edge of the table, sticking down the white paper cover with tape to stop it blowing up in the breeze. The drinks were served by a dark-haired woman of imprecise old age, in a tight blue coat and a fitted hat. She filled the cups evenly and mopped up spills without fuss.

‘We heard you might be coming, Sister Bernard,' she said, too loudly. Her face was drawn, the wrinkles in it cut deep.

Bernard took her cup of orange juice and moved away. She could not, for a moment, think who it was who had spoken to her. She could not place the other woman, the odd contortions of age making the features inexact. But then she remembered. Faces came back to her, crowding; the odd creased eyes of the boy who was shot with the ambushed Resistance unit, and this, his younger sister, who many years ago had been pretty. She looked again, to make sure; the memory was faint, unused.

The villagers knotted around the table. Corinne was talking to a small group of women, her green beret easily visible, and Thérèse was at the edge of the gathering, bending to pat a dog on a long lead. Bernard tried to slip through the crush but in the end had to push, suddenly anxious to reach open ground. She felt the crowd of people too near. She looked for Thérèse again, but could not pick her out in the mass of dark winter coats, and so she began to make her way down the hill towards the cars, knowing she could not stay.

The woman at the drinks table watched her go, overfilling one of the cups until it spilt. Unapologetic, she surprised the young man she was serving with her hostility.

‘How can she show her face here?'

The man shrugged and smiled. He did not touch the brimming cup; he had no idea what was going on. But when he moved away from the table, a woman in a green beret took his place; heads bent towards each other then, repeating an old war story, infected by time, discoloured and brittle.

Bernard saw them coming, a group of five or six old women, at first, marching down the hill to the car park, the blue of the winter sky brilliant behind them. She felt their anger from a distance. She looked for someone she knew, but Thérèse was out of sight and only Corinne's beret was visible, at the back of the crowd. Panicking, she tripped as she hurried to find Corinne's car, confusing it with other small white cars, and only finding it in the end by chance. But when she tried the door, it was locked, and she could do nothing but turn to face them as they came towards her. She tried to think of something to say, but everything was confused and out of place and there were no words for it. When one of them slapped her, the open hand cold against Bernard's face, her plastic cup slipped from her hand to the ground and she felt splashes of juice through her tights. The women pushed closer. Bernard flung out a prayer, calling for help. She heard laughter, and hoped it wasn't God's.

The voices all around were shrill, too quick and harsh. The accusations fell too densely, like the confusion of sudden hail. Bernard could not make out what was being said. But then the dead boy's sister spoke again, low
and quiet, uncertain of her tone after sixty years of fury.

‘You should never have been allowed to stay,' she said, and Bernard understood this.

If she could have chosen, this was not how the old woman would have had it. She had not imagined a confrontation so ragged and public. She turned away, pushing through the crowd, shaken by tears. The rest of the small mob rearranged itself, men sidling to the front for a better view, and one or two of the schoolchildren, having broken ranks, squeezing between adult legs. The sight of Bernard, small and dark in her worn habit, disappointed them all.

The rest of the women kept coming closer. Bernard took several steps back and was pinned against the side of Corinne's car. Someone stretched out a hand, as though wanting to touch her. A globule of spit flew past the side of her veil and landed with a wet splat behind her on the car window. It might have been aimed at her. Bernard could not think now why this was happening; she couldn't remember anything. There was only this moment, too luminous, enduring for ever.

There was damp around her feet, spilt juice or a shameful trickle of urine. She tried shutting her eyes, but the din around her, the laughter and spiteful talk, echoed in her head and the women pressed in on her even more, closer, their breath a flavour now in the air. Someone reached forwards and pulled the veil from Bernard's head. She felt a rush of cold on her scalp and had to open her eyes. One of the children gasped at her baldness.

There was still no sign of Thérèse or Corinne. They had been pushed away, perhaps, by the crowd, or had not seen what was happening. All Bernard knew was that she
was alone. And it was the young priest, finally, who stepped in to restore a measure of calm. The sight of Bernard's dry pate in the sun shocked him.

‘That's enough. Enough. This is a day for peace, not for violence. And a sister of Christ…'

‘She's not a sister of Christ. She's a Nazi whore.' It seemed old-fashioned, even as it was said.

Someone spat again; the spittle landed like bird droppings on the front of Bernard's habit. She thought she felt it sting.

‘No, no.
Mesdames
. Really. She's an old woman.' From the back of the small crowd, the priest had tried to piece together what was going on, but it seemed confused to him and ridiculous, an odd leftover of some old quarrel, pointless. ‘Perhaps you should get in the car, Sister. Perhaps it would be better if you were to leave now.'

‘I can't… I don't…' Bernard tried to explain.

‘Here, Sister, I have the key.'

And Corinne was suddenly there. Bernard heard the click of the automatic locks opening. But she still could not move.

‘Sister, it's open. You can get in,' she heard Corinne say.

‘Don't come back here. Don't show your face again,' she heard another voice.

But still she could not move.

‘I'll help you, Sister. It's been a shock,' said the priest, putting his arm across hers and trying to turn her so he could open the car door with his other hand. She was unwieldy; he had to tug at her. It took some minutes to manoeuvre her into the back seat. Then the priest passed in her veil. Bernard noticed that it was damp, stained down
one side. She clung to it, trying hard not to look at any faces. The crowd waited, as if to make sure that she really was leaving, and Bernard, her eyes fixed ahead through the windscreen, knew they were still there behind her.

The car did not move. Neither Thérèse nor Corinne got in. Bernard made herself as small as she could on the back seat and tried to pray. But she found only a memory of the soldier, propped above her on his elbow, chuckling with delight, bending to unbutton the tight tunic of her habit, looking at her with something she thought was tenderness, leaning down, his hair falling softly against her skin. It did not seem long ago. It was a comfort.

Outside, Thérèse was standing apart. She saw the villagers loitering, no longer concerned with Bernard, finishing new conversations before they started for home. She saw how Corinne smiled at the women around her, and shook hands with the priest. She saw Bernard's bald head, framed by the back window of Corinne's car, and in the distance beyond she saw the smeared grey walls of the convent, unnecessarily solid, a fortress against the petty evils of a country parish. She waited. The children filed back to school; someone shouted something from the square. It all seemed significant but she could not think quite why.

‘Well then,' was all Corinne said when she finally came. She looked towards the car, but Sister Bernard was hardly visible.

‘I didn't know,' said Thérèse.

‘No.'

‘I mean, I knew things happened, during the war. I'd heard one or two… stories. But not that. Not that she'd, you know…'

‘Informed.'

‘Betrayed them,' said Thérèse, letting the strange words come slowly.

‘The Resistance was strong around here, in all these villages,' said Corinne. ‘There was a lot of support for them; they made good progress. But afterwards, after the ambush… and the information the Germans got. Especially from that poor boy – the things they did to him.' She looked away for a moment, her face creased. ‘It gave the Germans the upper hand for a while.'

‘But it's terrible.'

‘It made a mess of things, certainly. There was chaos after that – all sorts – recrimination and murder and executions… No one knew what was going on or who to trust. You know what it's like in a small place, everyone watching everyone else, little things getting out of hand. People still remember it.'

Thérèse felt her hands tremble. ‘But how did you know… about Sister Bernard?'

Corinne clicked the car keys against her hand. ‘Lots of people know, or knew, at least. But it was mostly glossed over. The convent hushed things up. They've always been good at that.' She smiled. ‘Anyway, it's a long time ago now, I suppose.'

Thérèse knew it was not, and she did not move towards the car.

‘I always assumed… I always thought… I always thought she must be good,' said Thérèse. ‘She always seemed so good. So simple.'

Corinne shrugged and gestured towards the car. ‘We should take her back,' she said.

‘Yes, yes, I suppose. I'm sorry. It's a shock, that's all.'

Corinne nodded. ‘Does it alter your plans, Sister?' she asked.

Thérèse did not understand the question. And then, in an instant, she grasped it all, and how the past had freed her. She sucked in a sharp loud breath, as though surprised by a sudden pain.

‘Oh,' she said.

Corinne saw such doubts in her friend's face that she wanted to say many things, but Thérèse put her hand up, silencing her. She looked away to the convent.

‘I'll walk,' she said. ‘I'll walk back.'

‘Don't be silly. You might as well have a lift. It's uphill.'

‘Just take her. I'll walk. I don't know what to… I don't know anything. I need time, to think. I need someone to help me – I need to pray.' And before anything more could be said, Thérèse had turned away from the cars, cutting down towards the wash house to the path that would take her up the hill.

Corinne watched her go and then was brisk.

‘Good, Sister Bernard. Let's take you home,' she said, pulling the car door open sharply and starting the engine.

Bernard did not thank Corinne, nor turn to wave as she went in through the convent porch. She did not stop to wipe her boots on the mat. She thought she heard the car pulling away behind her, but she could not be sure, and she did not look. She went straight up to her cell, letting the village and its memories fall away.

The following day, the minibus was coming to take them to Les Cèdres. She had very little time. That was
all she could think of now, the rush of it making her head spin, and only this mattering, nothing else. She put her packed bag at the threshold, and moved the tin box into a corner. Then, from the top of the chest of drawers, she picked up the pile of papers and shook the dust from the top sheets. It fell like glitter in the clear light.

She hurried from her cell, anxious, unable to make an ending. On the stairs she stumbled, the air fluttering around her too fast, everything passing. Some of the papers slipped away. She did not stop to collect them. The doorbell rang and she thought it must be Corinne again. She saw a shape through the stained-glass panels of the door, indistinguishable, but she turned away from it and carried on across the hall. Thérèse, coming in the back way, through the refectory, saw Bernard hurry along the corridor, a little old woman carefully holding high a stack of papers as though to protect them from an encroaching sea.

Even through her deafness, Thérèse heard the clatter of the doorbell and, after a very short pause, it sounded again. In her mind, there was still nothing except the anger of the Armistice service, the villagers pushing forwards and bitterness pricking everywhere at the close seams of things. The bell seemed a part of it, a summons. She thought they might have been followed up to the convent, so that it would all continue, and if she could, she would have resisted that. But the bell was too insistent. By the third ring, she was in the wide, marble-floored hallway, her heart loud, even to her spoilt ears.

‘I didn't know if you would still be here. I didn't know when you were going. I couldn't remember,' said Thérèse's nephew, Claude, breathlessly, as he kissed her. ‘And I've got the day off, for the Armistice holiday, so I thought I'd come and…'

‘Soon. We're going soon,' said Thérèse, bewildered by the sudden change. ‘Tomorrow.'

She wiped her sleeve hard across her face, in case the tears still showed. But Claude was looking past her, into the wide hall.

‘Then I'm glad I came.' He remembered to shout. He always did.

From the corner of the porch he lifted up a huge potted plant, rampant with luminous pink flowers.

‘I brought you this, for your new home,' he said, waving it in front of him as he entered.

‘It's beautiful,' said Thérèse.

‘I thought so.'