"On the crotchV

She laughed deep in her throat. "Mother didn't tell you?'' She pulled her thick rope of hair over her shoulder and twisted it around her hand. "They thought it was blood, you see. It reminded them that even though we are nuns, we're real women, with real bodies. Women's bodies. Every month, we shed real blood." A smile flickered briefly and disappeared. "I wanted to leave the bloody thing up there to give us something to think about. But Olivia said it was obscene. Mother Winifred said it was blasphemous. So I took it down."

"You can't blame them," I said.

She tossed her hair back and leaned forward, her eyes bright. "Exactly! They're not to blame. For hundreds of years, the church fathers have taught us that women's blood is obscene-that women are obscene. The Church is afraid of our bodies, afraid of sex. That's why all this insistence on celibacy. The Church is afraid of womenV

Anne's face had come passionately alive as she spoke. I studied her for a moment. Her political agenda might be irrelevant to what had happened. On the other hand…

"So the bloody swimsuit didn't bother you," I said quietly. "I suppose you were even glad to see it hanging where everybody had to look at it."

She unfolded her legs and slid off the bed. ' 'Mother Hi-laria was wrong when she told me not to talk about the letter. Every woman here should have been talking about the attitudes that spawn that kind of poison." She walked to the window. "But that bloody swimsuit-it was right there where people had to see it. Mother Hilaria couldn't tell people not to talk about it."

"Did they? Talk about it, I mean."

"Not as much as I would have liked." She sighed. "It's hard for women who have grown up in the Church to confront its attitude toward women. But they've got to see how

it can poison everyone. The letter-writer, for instance. Her poison comes from the Church itself."

"But surely someone who writes such letters-"

"Don't you understand?" Anne's dark eyes were flashing, her body tense with the vitality of her argument. "It's not her fault! She's as much a victim as somebody who gets one of her letters. It's the Church that's poisoning people's hearts!"

Anne would have made a great trial attorney. She had just delivered the criminal-as-victim defense as passionately as I'd ever heard it. I paused for a moment, letting the energy of her words ring in the quiet room.

"If someone else hadn't hung the bloody swimsuit on the cross," I said at last, "would you have done it?"

She turned toward the window again. Half of her face was in shadow. "Perhaps."

"Perhaps you did," I said.

There was a long silence as she stood, not looking at me. "You're right," she said after a minute. "I hung it there. I wanted it to be part of our liturgy." She paused. "I don't know. Maybe the symbolism was too subtle. People didn't react the way I hoped."

"I take it, though, that the letter was genuine-that you didn't write it yourself?"

She was offended. "Of course the letter was genuine! Other people have gotten letters, too, haven't they?"

They had, and Anne might have written them, as easily as writing one to herself. But somehow I didn't think so. I answered with another question. "Since you received the letter, have any of your possessions been tampered with? I'm not talking about the swimsuit, of course."

She answered immediately. "Yes, actually. Somebody cut the strings on my tennis racket."

"When was this?"

"A few days after I got the letter-three or four, maybe.''

"Where do you keep your racket?"

"There." She pointed to a racket hanging on the bac' of her door. "I thought at the time there might be a con nection."

Dominica's guitar, Anne's racket. I wondered whether any of Perpetua's belongings had suffered a similar fate. Probably not. She had done her penance.

Anne went back to the bed and sat down. ' 'I suppose you know that my letter wasn't the first. But maybe you don't know that Mother had found out who wrote them. She was planning to put a stop to it"

"She knew?" I stared at her. "Did she tell you who it was?"

She shook her head. "She didn't say how she was plan ning to stop it, either. But it had to be something pretty drastic. Removal to another house, maybe, or even expulsion. Whatever it was, she said she had to talk it over with Reverend Mother General. She wouldn't do that unless it was really serious."

"And then she died," I said quietly.

She looked at me for a moment, started to speak and stopped, started again. "I wonder…"

"Wonder what?"

The words came slowly, almost reluctantly. "Do you suppose that the letter-writer… had something to do with Mother Hilaria's death?"

I watched her face. ' 'What makes you ask?''

She moved her hand over the plaid spread, smoothing it. "When it happened, I believed what Mother Winifred told us. About the hot plate and the puddle of milk and Mother Hilaria's bad heart. But now…" She paused and looked up at me. "The thing is, Mother Hilaria did know who was writing those letters, and she intended to do something about it. Then she died. Was it a coincidence, do you think, or something else?"

"I don't know," I said. "I'd like to find out." I pushed myself out of the chair. ' 'Thanks for your help,'' I added, and hesitated, thinking of another question. "Feeling the

way you do about the Church, Anne, how can you go on being a part of it?''

Anne raised her chin. "I don't intend to."

"What are you going to do?"

"A friend of mine has established an order in Chicago- a group of women who live together and work in a hospice. They have no connection with the Catholic Church. It's a big move for me, but I'm ready to make it. In fact, I'm anxious to leave. There's a limited amount of room in the Chicago house, and if I don't go soon, they'll give my space to someone else."

"Why are you staying?"

"Because I don't want to tip the balance. Actually, I "hink change would be good for St. T's. We're too insular, and there's a tendency to be fixed in our ideas. In my opinion, Reverend Mother General has the right idea, and I personally don't think she's the Wicked Witch of the West, die way some people do. But she's chosen the wrong person to make changes. Olivia is a despot."

I smiled a little. "No redeeming qualities?"

Anne considered. "She's determined, you've got to give her that. But she's made too many enemies. If you ask me, she'd better watch out. Somebody might slip something into her salad."

Chapter Nine

Rue has a reputation as an anaphrodisiac (reducing sexual excitement) and an abortifacient… Unfortunately, the active dose of various extracts of the plant… is at the same level as a toxic dose.

Steven Foster Herbal Renaissance

I was still thinking about what I had learned from both Anne and Dominica as I walked up the path to Jeremiah. The thoughts were driven out of my head by a deep voice.

"Hello, China."

Tom Rowan was lounging on the front step, blue-jeaned legs and boots stretched out in front of him, a brown Stetson tipped forward over his eyes. There was a blue nylon bp bag on the porch beside him. He sat up and thumbed his hat back.

"You look surprised. Didn't Mother Winifred tell you "d be stopping by?"

"Yes, she did. I guess I lost track of time."

"Nothing new about that. Remember?" He gave me a slow grin. "We'd have a lunch date and you'd work right iirough it. Dinner, too." He scooted over so I could sit iown next to him. The narrow wooden step made for a:3zy fit.