"
But alas! it was proved too clearly that she was not at all
good, and indeed she began to think so herself, only she did
not see how she could help it.
Madelon got into great disgrace in the very first weeks after
her arrival at the convent, and this was the occasion of it.
The only room vacant for her was a cell that had been occupied
by a sister who had died a short time previously, a sister of
a devout turn of mind, who had assisted her meditations by the
contemplation of a skull of unusual size and shininess. The
cell was a cheerful, narrow little room, looking out on the
convent garden, and the first pleasant sensation that Madelon
knew in the convent was when she was taken into it, and saw
the afternoon sun shining upon its white-washed walls, and the
late climbing roses nodding in at the open window; but she
became possessed with a perfect horror of the skull. She
discovered it the first evening when she was going to bed, and
was quite glad to pop her head under the bed-clothes, to shut
out all sight and thought of it. But awaking again that first
night in her grief and loneliness, she saw a stray moonbeam
shining in, and lighting it up into ghastly whiteness and
distinctness, as it stood on a little bracket against the wall
beneath a tall wooden crucifix.
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