“Don’t be afraid,” said the Reverend Mother, and drawing me to her side she asked me to tell her what I had told Alma about Sister Angela.

I repeated our conversation as nearly as I could remember it, and more than once Alma nodded her head as if in assent, but the Reverend Mother’s face grew darker at every word and, seeing this, I said: 

“But if Sister Angela did anything wrong I’m sure she was very sorry, for when she came back she said her prayers, and when she got to ’Father of all mankind, forgive all sinners . . .’”

“Yes, yes, that will do,” said the Reverend Mother, and then she handed me back to the Mother of the Novices, telling her to warn me to say nothing to the other children.

Alma did not return to us at dinner, or at recreation, or at chapel (when another chaplain said vespers), or even at nine o’clock, when we went to bed.  But next morning, almost as soon as the Mother of the Novices had left the dormitory, she burst into the room saying: 

“I’m leaving this silly old convent, girls.  Mother has brought the carriage, and I’ve only come to gather up my belongings.”

Nobody spoke, and while she wrapped up her brushes and combs in her nightdress, she joked about Sister Angela and Father Giovanni and then about Mildred Bankes, whom she called “Reverend Mother Mildred,” saying it would be her turn next.

Then she tipped up her mattress, and taking a novel from under it she threw the book on to my bed, saying: 

“Margaret Mary will have to be your story-teller now.  By-by, girls!”

Nobody laughed.  For the first time Alma’s humour had failed her, and when we went downstairs to the Meeting Room it was with sedate and quiet steps.

The nuns were all there, with their rosaries and crosses, looking as calm as if nothing had occurred, but the girls were thinking of Alma, and when, after prayers, during the five minutes of silence for meditation, we heard the wheels of a carriage going off outside, we knew what had happened—­Alma had gone.

We were rising to go to Mass when the Reverend Mother said,

“Children, I have a word to say to you.  You all know that one of our novices has left us.  You also know that one of our scholars has just gone.  It is my wish that you should forget both of them, and I shall look upon it as an act of disobedience if any girl in the Convent ever mentions their names again.”

All that day I was in deep distress, and when, night coming, I took my troubles to bed, telling myself I had now lost Alma also, and it was all my fault, somebody put her arms about me in the darkness and whispered: 

“Mary O’Neill, are you awake?”

It was Mildred, and I suppose my snuffling answered her, for she said: 

“You mustn’t cry for Alma Lier.  She was no friend of yours, and it was the best thing that ever happened to you when she was turned out of the convent.”