I shook my head. “Perhaps they’re going to transport her to somewhere more appropriate,” I said without conviction. What could be more appropriate than our own church, our own entrance, where she could be seen from every part of the building, touched by anyone entering?

Rosamonde was making her way as quickly as she could toward the group of workmen. “You can’t take her!” she shouted hoarsely. “You can’t steal her from us!”

I hurried after her. “Be careful, ma soeur, you’ll do yourself an injury.”

But Rosamonde was not listening. She hobbled to the doorway where the men were taking pains to avoid chipping the marble steps.

One positioned the rollers. Two others levered the statue into position. Two more at the rear kept her steady whilst the foreman directed the operation.

“What are you doing?” demanded Rosamonde.

“Careful, Sister,” said one of the men. “Don’t get in the way!” He grinned, and I saw the crooked line of his blackened teeth.

“But it’s the saint! The saint!” Rosamonde’s eyes were round with outrage.

In a way I understood her. The big saint-if saint she was-had been a part of the abbey for years. Her stony face had watched us live and die. Countless prayers had been uttered beneath her mute, impassive gaze. Her round belly, her massive shoulders, the black bulk of her tender, indifferent presence had been a comfort, a touchstone to us across changes and seasons. To remove her now, in this time of crisis, was to make orphans of us at a time when we needed her most.

“Who ordered this?” I said.

“The new confessor, Sister.” The fellow barely glanced at me. “Mind yourself, she’s coming down!” I thrust Rosamonde away from the steps just as the statue, supported on either side by the workmen and from beneath by the rollers, came crashing down the steps onto the path. Dust puffed up from the cracked earth. The man with bad teeth steadied the saint while his assistant, a young man with red hair and a cheery smile, maneuvered a cart into position on which to load her.

“Why?” I insisted. “Why remove it at all?”

The red-haired man shrugged. “It’s just orders,” he said. “Maybe you’re getting a new one. This one looks old as God.”

“And where will you put it?”

“Dump it in the sea,” said the red-haired man. “Orders.”

Rosamonde clutched at me. “They can’t do that!” she said. “Reverend Mother will never let them do it! Where is she? Reverend Mother!”

“Ma fille, I’m here.” The voice was small and flat, almost colorless like its owner, and yet Rosamonde stopped struggling and stared, her poor baffled face tugging between hope and dread.

Mère Isabelle was standing at the church door, hands folded. “It’s time we were rid of this blasphemy,” she said. “It has been here too long already, and the islanders are a superstitious folk. They call it the Mermaid. They pray to it. It has a tail, for God’s sake!”

In spite of myself I spoke out. “But ma mère-”

“This object-is not the Holy Mother,” said Isabelle. “And there is no such saint as Marie-de-la-mer. There never was.” Her nasal voice rose a little. “How can you bear it here? This thing in our church! Pilgrims coming to touch it! Women-pregnant women-scraping dust from it to brew their charms!”

I began to understand. Not the saint herself, but the use to which she had been put; the touch of fertility in the barren house of God.

Isabelle took a breath. Now she had begun to speak it seemed she could not stop herself. “I knew it the moment I set foot here. The unconsecrated burials. The secret excesses! The curse of blood!” It was almost hysteria, but she was cold for all that. Angélique Saint-Hervé Désirée Arnault had her own formula and would stick to it no matter what.

“And now,” she said. “It dares to attack me. Me! Taunts me with blood! My confessor locates the source and purifies it. But the evil remains. The evil remains.”

She stayed for a minute in silence, contemplating the evil. Then, with a crisp Praise be!, she turned and was gone.

The bell for Nones went soon afterward, and there was little time for discussion. Not that I would have dared voice my doubts in any case, for the fear of losing contact with Fleur kept me from speaking my mind. Throughout Nones I found my mind straying to Mère Isabelle’s words on the church steps, words of which she herself seemed barely conscious.

The curse of blood. The evil remains.

The new well is close to complete now, its water as sweet and clear as she could have wished. LeMerle has exorcised the church itself, the font, the sacristy, and all the holy vessels, declaring them free from taint. He has intimated the same of Perette and Alfonsine too, to my relief, although there are still rumors. Alfonsine seems quite disappointed that she has been given this clean bill of spiritual health, and her visible chagrin causes Marguerite to speak slightingly of actresses and attention-seekers.

And yet the evil remains.

I tried to keep my eyes from wandering, but time and again found myself staring at the giant emptiness that had once held Marie-de-la-mer. A small sacrifice, I told myself, compared with the return of my daughter, for what was a statue to a living child, a frightened child?

LeMerle was behind it, of course. What he wanted with the statue I could not guess, but its removal-that of the one symbol of our unity and our faith-had brought us one step closer to surrender. He must become our symbol now, I realized; he was to be our only salvation. During the service he spoke of female martyrs, of Sainte Perpetua and Sainte Catherine and Christina Mirabilis, of the mystery of death and the purity of fire, and he held us in his palm.

Abbaye de Sainte-Marie-MèreÎle-des-Noirs-MoustiersJuly 26th, 1610

Monseigneur,

It is with the Greatest Pleasure that I am able to inform Monseigneur that Everything He has so wisely foreseen is proceeding according to Plan. My Charge shows the most Commendable Zeal in all the Reforms she has instigated, and the Abbey is almost Restored to Former Glory. The Church Roof still requires some Labor, and I regret to say that much of the South Transept has been grievously Damaged by Weathering, however we entertain Great Hopes of seeing the Whole Complete by the Beginning of Winter.

The Original Name of our Abbey, as Monseigneur will have Noticed, has also been Restored and all Signs and Intimations of the Vernacular Name erased in favor of the Above. I add my most earnest Entreaties to those of Your Niece, Monseigneur, that if Your busy Schedule enables You to Grace us with a Visit in the Coming Months, we should be most Honored and Gratified to receive Your August Presence.

I remain your most obedient servant,

Blah, blah, blah.

I have to admit I’ve a neat turn of phrase. Your August Presence. I like that.

I’ll have it sent in the morning by special envoy. Or maybe I could ride out to Pornic myself and send it from there-anything to get out of the stink of this place for a few hours. How Juliette can bear it, I can’t imagine. I only bear it because I have to; and because I know I won’t be here for long. These cloistered ones, these toadstools, have a very special rankness, and the scent of their hypocrisy turns my stomach. Imprisoned here I can hardly breathe, hardly sleep; I must ask Juliette to make me a soothing draught.

Sweet Juliette. The fair girl-what’s her name? Clémente?-is well enough for my needs, and touchingly eager to please too, but she’s no worthy quarry. For a start, her eyes are too large. Their color, that of a flawless summer sky, lacks that discordant note of slate and embers. Her hair too, fair as foam, is hopelessly wrong. Her skin too white, her legs too smooth, her face unmarred by sun and grime. Call me ungrateful if you like. A honey-fall like that, and I must hanker after that stiff-necked maypole with her flinty eyes. Perhaps it’s her hatred of me that gives it spice.