Lady of the Lake

On a day when the calendar slipped from late summer to early fall, I went to an art exhibit in my hometown. The exhibit was held in a grand mansion which was converted to an Arts Center. The historic old house, bequeathed to the city by a generous benefactor for cultural purposes, had floor to ceiling vaulted windows overlooking the rolling, immense waters of Lake Michigan. It was very windy that day, and the waves crashed into the rocks dotting the shoreline, sending a spray of water into the air. The turbulence in the air changed the water’s color from its normal cerulean blue to a stormy gray. The Lake was a mercurial mistress, sometimes serene but often dark, mysterious and moody. 

Being in that building brought back the memory of being next door, in another scenic, imposing mansion, for my brother’s wedding reception. The building where the reception was held had once been a girls’ boarding school. Before that, it was the private estate of a rich man. When the house changed hands from its private owner to an Episcopal girls boarding school in 1865, a chapel was added as well as wings which served as living quarters for the students and nuns, who served as teachers.

The school eventually closed and was later converted to its present historic site, special events venue, and arts center. The site was also used as a haunted house during Halloween. It was an ideal setting for Halloween, both because of the building’s dark, Gothic architecture and for its daunting reputation. It was rumored to be haunted by ghosts. Visitors saw faces in the window, human shaped shadows in corners, and heard echoing footsteps in deserted hallways. This ghost story, like many before it, came from facts and hearsay, cobbled together to make for a spooky tale.

When I was there, I looked around in nervous fascination for ghosts. I didn’t see, hear, or feel any ghostly activity. A ghost is a nebulous presence. A bright noisy wedding reception in the early evening was not the right sort of spot for spirits to appear. They were surely waiting for the darkest nightfall to make an appearance. 

The religious boarding school had been designed for troubled girls from wealthy families, mostly hailing from the wealthy north shore suburbs of Chicago. The girls’ misdeeds were often minor, but alarming to their upper crust parents – girls running around with the wrong sort of boys, acting wild or unladylike, or simply being strong willed and disobedient. At the first sign of wayward behavior, the girls were shipped off to the school where they were dealt with by a strong hand. The hope was that they would eventually find salvation, or simply have their evil ways beaten out of them.

One young lady, Abigail Montgomery, had been sent there because her parents had discovered a budding romance between her and the family’s stablehand, a muscular, swarthy young man who looked at their daughter with hungry eyes. On their vast Lake Forest estate, the young groomsmen had met their daughter while she had been out riding. The two young people had fallen head over heels in love. They took every opportunity to sneak off together, often galloping away on their favorite horses to parts unknown where they could be blessedly alone. Fearing their daughter’s reputation would soon be tarnished, the parents quickly put a stop to their fledgling courtship. Together, they decided that Abigail had to be sent away post haste to boarding school.

Abigail naturally fought tooth and nail against the idea that she would soon be parted from her beloved. She kicked and screamed to no avail, her protests falling on deaf ears. Her parents would not even tell her where they were sending her. She just knew that she was to be exiled somewhere far away. She might as well be going to Timbuktu. 

Her first day at school surely had to be the worst day of her life. Abigail stepped down from the horse drawn carriage and trudged up the rough cobblestone walkway, dragging her feet the whole way. She didn’t want to make this ordeal easy for anyone. She glanced angrily up at the large gray building with tall towers and sprawling wings looming before her. It had an ominous, brooding presence. You're mine, the building seemed to say. There's no escape. A nun in long flowing robes scurried down the front steps towards her.

“Greetings,” the nun said. “I’m Sister Mary Agnes. May God be with you. I am here to oversee the spiritual well being of your daughter. This must be Abigail.’”

Her words, while they should sound welcoming and warm, instead sounded cold and flat. 

“Yes, this is Abigail,” her mother said. “I believe we wrote to you about her situation. She needs to be watched closely. We don’t want her consorting with the wrong sort of person.”

“Yes, indeed. Have no fear. I’lll watch her myself.”

Abigail shuddered. Although the nun was not a large woman, she had an imposing presence. Her long dark robes made Abigail think of a hovering, black crow swooping down to wreck her life.

The nun continued speaking.

“We’ll start by making Abigail realize the world does not bend to her will. She is here to serve others, not to be idle or seek evil and frivolity.”

Abigail looked at the ground. She didn’t realize she had been such an evil person. All she had done was ride a horse and kiss a boy. Was that so wrong? Her father, a distinguished, tough as nails businessman, also looked discomfited by the nun’s words.

“Yes, well . . . We’ll miss her, but we're told that this school has a fine reputation.” Feeling uncomfortable, he tried to make the parting less awkward and palatable for everyone.

Sister Mary Agnes lifted one corner of her mouth in a sardonic smile. Something about the girl brought back the shadow of her previous life, before she had become a nun. The girl was a looker — a tall, willowy blonde, who despite her statuesque height, managed to look delicate – the kind of girl men swarmed around to protect. The exact sort of girl who had bedeviled her in her youth - stealing her only beau away from her, her true love, her intended, Charles – the man she had always pictured herself marrying. When he had unceremoniously dumped her for another woman named Hannah, who looked almost exactly like this girl Abigail, it had stung. The betrayal had forever changed the trajectory of her life.

Mary Agnes had no interest in any other man. With rather plain looks, she knew her prospects were limited. Charles’ betrayal had sealed her fate. With her heart broken, Mary Agnes didn’t look back, but had quickly joined the church, becoming a nun. Now she lived to take revenge on others. Every pretty girl she saw was a Hannah substitute. Her students were stand-ins. And the parents gave her free rein. Spare the rod and spoil the child. This new one looked almost exactly like Hannah. Mary Agnes rubbed her hands together in glee. She could hardly wait to get her alone. 

The next day, after her parents had left, Abigail found herself alone, lonely, and hurting. Refusing to give into her misery, she squared her shoulders in determination. She needed to find some way out. She turned to her roommate for help, a red-haired girl named Penny. 

“Hi Penny, I’m Abigail. Obviously, I’m new here. What can you tell me about the school and its teachers?”

Penny looked startled, but managed a slight smile.

“Hello. It’s nice to meet you. “ She gathered her thoughts, speaking carefully, her smile quickly fading. “I don’t know what you did to warrant being sent here, but I’m afraid it’s a punishment. The nuns won’t make it easy on you. In their eyes, you have already sinned and you'll be forced to pay for your transgressions.”

“What do you mean?” Abigail asked. “How will I be paying for my so-called sin?”

“The nuns’ll find a way to punish you. They love to whack students’ hands with rulers and do other mean things to them. Sister Mary Agnes is the worst. She comes after me for having red hair. She says my hair’s a sign of the devil and I must belong to him.”

Abigail swallowed nervously.

“That’s terrible,” she paused. “I did get a strange vibe when I met that creepy nun. I’m going to try to steer clear of her. “

“Good luck with that,” Penny said doubtfully.

Her words were prophetic. The very next day as Abigail and Penny sat next to each other in English class, Sister Mary Agnes moved swiftly and silently towards them. She stopped in front of Abigail’s desk and gazed malevolently at her.

“Miss Montgomery?” The nun’s voice was stern.

“Yes, Sister?” Abigail replied meekly.

“Are you aware of the dress code?”

“Yes, ma’am. I’m wearing the required uniform my parents bought me.” 

Abigail didn’t know what the nun was getting at since she was dressed exactly like every other girl, in the regulation navy blue skirt with her white blouse buttoned uncomfortably up to the top of her neck.

“I need to measure the length of your skirt. It looks a little short to me. Stand up and move to the front of the classroom.”

Abigail silently stood up. She could feel the eyes of the other students on her as she walked to the front of the classroom.

“Now kneel on the ground,” the nun instructed. “Your skirt should be touching the floor.”

Abigail did as she was told. To her dismay, she noticed that her skirt didn’t quite touch the floor. It hovered a few scant inches above, her legs in white hose peeking out from underneath her skirt. Being tall and slender, the skirt was not cut to accommodate her frame. 

“Just as I thought,” the nun said triumphantly. “Stand up, child.”

Abigail stood in confusion. What was the nun going to do?

Mary Agnes walked over to a wooden barrel in the corner. She took out a metal scoop and dropped several scoopfuls of white rice on the floor. 

“Kneel there.” She instructed.

“On the rice?” Abigail asked dumbfoundedly.

“Yes, on the rice.” The nun’s voice was icy. “You will remain there for the rest of class. You need to reflect upon your sin of wantonness, or showing the world what should be kept pure and private.”

Having no choice, Abigail knelt on the scattered rice. The sharp grains of rice dug into her knees, causing her to grimace in pain. Tears flooded her eyes, but she would not give the nun the satisfaction of watching them fall. The class seemed interminable. Abigail felt her hose rip to shreds on the sharp grains of rice as she knelt. The pain did not lessen throughout the long class hour, but rather intensified.

Over the course of weeks, Abigail soon discovered that this episode of punishment and torture was merely the beginning. The nun seemed to delight in punishing her. Sister Mary Agnes’ punishments were many and varied – a sharp rap of a ruler against her already bloody, bruised knuckles, the kneeling on the rice, her face shoved into a circle of chalk drawn onto a chalkboard causing her to cough and wheeze from the chalky particles that invaded her throat and lungs . . . The punishments were endless.

The worst punishment of all was when Abigail had been forced to remove her blouse and endure a whipping in front of the whole class. Abigail’s sin that time had been in asking to use the restroom. The nun had become enraged at being interrupted while teaching. She told Abigail she needed to master control of her body’s natural physical urges. One way of doing so was by learning to submit to pain. The pain was for her own good, she told Abigail. It was a lesson she needed to learn if she were to remain holy and sanctified. 

Whatever respect and obedience Abigail normally had for her elders quickly turned into hate. And she wasn’t alone. Penny was also often singled out for punishment. For whatever reason, as Penny had told her on that first day, the sight of her red hair seemed to enrage Sister Mary Agnes. She often told Penny that the girl carried the mark of the devil on her, as evidenced by her red hair. This evil also had to be beaten out of the child. Besides the repeated beatings, Sister Mary Agnes had even gone as far as to cut off all of Penny’s beautiful, long red hair, causing her now to look like a scared, bald baby bird. 

Another girl named Sarah, who was quite developed for her age, had what the nun called “a bad girl’s body”. This curvy body apparently was also a mark of evil, according to the nun. Her body was expressly given to the girl by the devil to tempt men. That body also had to be controlled and submitted to painful lashes with a whip to demonstrate the girl’s purity and allegiance to God. 

The three girls – Abigail, Penny, and Sarah – together formed a bond, a sisterhood of being the nun’s unwilling victims. Together, they vowed to take their revenge on Sister Mary Agnes. Penny soon noticed that the nun often walked up the curving staircase that led to the school’s observatory. In fact, she climbed up the stairs almost every night at roughly the same time, around 8:00 p.m. 

The observatory was an oval shaped room, much like a lighthouse or a belltower. It afforded a 360 degree view not only of Lake Michigan, but also of the school’s property. It was an ideal spot for the nun to either stare broodingly out the windows at the turbulent waters, or to scope out the school’s property, making sure no students were sneaking around or breaking curfew. To get to the tower, the nun had to climb up the steep staircase that had several landings. 

Penny suggested the girls follow the nun up the staircase and remain there in waiting until she came back down. Each of the girls would stand on one of the landings and take turns giving Mary Agnes a hard shove to send her tumbling and crashing down the stairs. The goal was to terrify the nun and send her a strict warning. Don’t mess with us. You’ll be sorry. 

Abigail could hardly believe they were about to put this plan into motion. She had feelings of misgiving. Her conscience told her it wasn’t right to hurt another human being, but then her head and heart reminded her of the nun’s cruel behavior to all three girls. Sister Mary Agnes surely deserved punishment. 

The day finally arrived. Shortly after eight o’clock, the nun climbed the staircase, shutting the observatory’s heavy wooden door behind her. All three girls silently tiptoed up the stairs in their bedroom slippers. Abigail had decided that she wanted to be at the top. She felt that Sister Mary Agnes was most cruel to her. She wanted to to make the first push. In for a penny, in for a pound. 

The nun stayed in the tower for the better part of the hour. Finally, she left the observatory, pushing the heavy wooden door open. Abigail stood with her body pressed up against the wall on the stairway’s landing, making herself as small as possible. The stairway was unlit, save for a lantern held aloft by the nun. The girls had climbed the stairs several times and knew each step, twist, turn, and landing in the dark. The element of surprise was their greatest weapon. They were going to startle the nun and make her hurt. 

The stair creaked as the nun climbed down, her dark robes sweeping the stairs as she descended. She at last got to the first landing where Abigail stood. The nun had not noticed her. Abigail felt rage and fury mounting inside her. Sheer hate propelled her to give a mighty push to the nun’s bony shoulders. The nun tried to catch herself but fell headlong down several flights of stairs, crying out and twisting her ankle when she fell painfully on the second landing. She was still upright, but wobbled precariously.

As she wobbled, Penny next gave another mighty shove to Sister Mary Agnes, who, this time fell face first to the next landing, where she landed with a mighty crash. Now she was not moving. For a moment, there was a stunned silence as the two girls realized the enormity of their actions.

Now it was Sarah’s turn. She thought of the many times the nun had made her feel ashamed and dirty for simply existing. For being a girl, for being unabashedly female in body and spirit. She thought of the painful punishments meted out by the nun– the floggings, the sharp rulers, the harsh words, the constant humiliation. She also took her rage and fury and balled it up inside a mighty push that sent the nun’s inert body crashing down the last tier of stairs.

Mary Agnes had finally reached the bottom. Unmoving. Still. The deed had been done.

Outside the waves furiously crashed against the rocks, as the wind howled in shared pain. Inside an eerie silence prevailed. The girls slipped away into the night, leaving the black robed figure lying prone on the floor. The nun lived and breathed no more, never to hurt them again.

On the shores of Lake Michigan, to this day, the restless spirit of Sister Mary Agnes roams the hallways, caught between two worlds. On a dark, deserted night, you might just see her lurking in the shadows. The lady of the lake still seeks her due.