"
Sister Seraphine instantly fell prone.
"I cannot walk," she said.
"You will not walk," replied the Prioress, sternly. "You will travel
upon your hands and knees."
She crossed to the door, unlocked and set it wide.
"Moreover," she added, from the doorway, "if you do not appear in my
presence in reasonable time, I shall be constrained to send for Mother
Sub-Prioress."
The cell of the Prioress was situated at the opposite end of the long,
stone passage; but in less than reasonable time, Sister Seraphine
crawled in.
The unwonted exercise had had a most salutary effect upon her frame of
mind.
Her straight habit, of heavy cloth, had rendered progress upon her
knees awkward and difficult. Her hands had become entangled in her
torn veil. Each moment she had feared lest cell doors, on either side,
should open; old Antony might appear from the cloisters, or--greatest
disaster of all--Mother Sub-Prioress might advance toward her from the
Refectory stairs! In order to attain a greater rate of speed, she had
tried lifting her knees, as elephants lift their feet. This mode of
progress, though ungainly, had proved efficacious; but would have been
distinctly mirth-provoking to beholders. The stones had hurt her hands
and knees far more than she hurt them when she beat upon the floor of
her own cell.
She arrived at the Reverend Mother's footstool, heated in mind and
body, ashamed of herself, vexed with her garments, in fact in an
altogether saner frame of mind than when she had called upon "Wilfred,"
and made reiterated mention of trappings of crimson and silver bells.
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