To go further, though in each case the child under inquiry was able to cite a fellow room occupant, usually a fellow pupil, who could vouch for her presence in her room throughout the entire period when the said events are alleged to have occurred on the said evening, each mentioned a detail or details that contrasted with the testimony of her schoolmates. In several instances there arose conflict over the very question of whether the girls were asleep for the entire period or even in their rooms. In the sole case of Miss de L’É. there was, the inquisitors noted, a solid story, to which another figure in the house, in this instance her bondswoman, might attest. One pupil, Miss Mary Margaret S., developed considerable disquiet during the inquiry, specifically on the question of her actions on that evening. Despite the general concurrence of her answers by her roommate Miss Josephine O’G., she became so discomfited at this particular question that she expelled the contents of her stomach. The sisters present were not completely inclined to believe them.
After this initial period of inquiry concluded, the pupils were then individually asked to lie supine on the large serving table, which had previously been cleared of its usual artifacts in preparation for this portion of the inspection, against the east-facing wall. A white sheet was draped so that it concealed both the upper and lower portion of their torsos. Each girl was then told what this portion of the inspection would entail, which provoked several exclamations. In the case of said Miss Mary Margaret S., Sr. Alphonse Isabelle had to spend several minutes attempting to pacify her, and when this did not succeed, she was held down, by force, until such time as she was sufficiently becalmed, in order that the inspection could be properly undertaken.
The small clothes of each of the inspected were removed. In several instances this was only achieved with great difficulty. In the case of Miss Mary Margaret S., further force had to be applied to ensure that she would comply with this action. The author of this report, having served as the director of the convent’s infirmary since its establishment, and thus possessed of deep familiarity with the human anatomy and physiological principles, proceeded to examine each of the inspected. In half the cases the results were inconclusive. Although it did not appear as though any of the inspected had recently given birth, this inspector, having viewed in manuscript illustration the essential parts at the conclusion of such an event, was unready to make a decisive declaration. On this point the other nuns concurred initially, although the Reverend Mother Superior, on continued examination, adjudged decisively that the inspected were still in an unmolested state. Only in the case of Miss de L’É. did it appear that the observed anatomy appeared incontrovertibly unchanged, as it ought.
Given that none of the sisters was in the least suspected in the matter, this second part of the inspection left all of the inquisitors present with great disquiet, though each duly was subjected to a similar examination, in the author’s case the determinant being the Reverend Mother Superior. In none of the reverend sisters, by the Grace of the Holy Mother, did the observed anatomy appear incontrovertibly transformed.
In every instance in the inspection concerning the matter that is the case, the effort was made to preserve the inspected’s dignity….
Sr. Germain Ruth M. deP deK.
The nuns’ official report, I heard Sr. Ambrose Jeanne telling Sr. François Agnès early one morning several weeks later as I sat undertaking piecework on the other side of the sewing room, having been delivered to Gethsemane’s mayor by the white driver and mechanic who had returned from Missouri with Fr. Malesvaux, who was sojourning at the convent before returning east to Maryland, appeared, at least temporarily, to have soothed the passions of the sheriff and the townspeople, if not Reverend White. The summer heat, which had returned full blast, turning the air inside and outside the convent to glass, was, however, stoking the exact opposite effect.
Among their own population, Sr. François Agnès explained, they had identified a possible suspect: a white woman, the daughter of recent settlers in the town, was thought to have been secretly with child. Sr. François Agnès’s expression, and the clipped, elliptical quality of her Latin, the language into which she and the other nuns sometimes slipped when they hoped to avoid being overheard, suggested she thought the penalty ought be severe.
After the hubbub waned Eugénie had for several weeks remained in bed. The summer air cottoning everything had wrapped her in fevers and induced fainting, from which she now appeared fully recovered. The ranks of her classmates had, however, thinned only to three white girls, two of them Josephine and Mary Margaret, neither of whom had been fetched home as she had requested, though Josephine’s replacement servant, an often surly young woman named Marvel, who quickly took up with Diejuste and Ayidda, and whom I renamed Marinette because of her temper, had shown up, a sack in hand, on a coach from the east. The only other white girl was Annie Lawrie Geddes, who may or may not have been from New Jersey. These three white girls moved about as if in a state of shock, or suspended animation; their regular classes having ended, they had only to attend a daily course, after breakfast, that involved close reading and study of the Scriptures, in English, and because of the heat to participate in the various light indoor domestic tasks in the convent, such as replacing candles in the chapel, or helping to dry herbs and blooms and the first summer fruits for preservation, or copying out passages from English-language religious books to be sent to Catholics elsewhere in the countryside and country. At all other times they were allowed to read, or knit, or embroider, or sketch. None showed enthusiasm in anything she did, Eugénie even less so than the rest.
Sr. François Agnès concluded her conversation and called me over, telling me that I should wrap up my sewing and attend to Miss Eugénie, who would be finishing her breakfast and heading to class. I ascended the stairs slowly, as I had of late ceased to move with dispatch, unless it was absolutely necessary. Since the incidents of several weeks ago, Eugénie, recognizing the changes in my behavior, had responded accordingly. She no longer expected me to wash with her waste water; she took good care not to hand her comb to me in expectation that I would run it through her hair, or point to her chamberpot unless I was ready to touch it. In the hallway I saw Marinette; she was sweeping, but paused as I passed, and greeted me with her eyes. I replied in kind. The main floor was otherwise quiet; I imagined the sisters were either in the refectory or the chapel or downstairs, or otherwise occupied. At the stairwell to the next story, I saw Ayidda polishing the banister; we exchanged fulsome waves. The stairs themselves seemed to melt as if wax under my feet; it took me a while to reach the bedroom.