There was a sick room for those in the school with occasional illness. I was not conscious of any great level of sickness, certainly not on a regular basis save for routine coughs and colds, but Agnes said that every few months there would be a stomach sickness that would cause the sisters to warn everyone to be careful to wash their hands and clothes more often. I never gave any thought to such matters – I had always been healthy. I remained so when, two months after our arrival, a bout of illness like this came to the school. The word ‘dysentery’ was overheard being used by some of the nuns and the older girls looked it up in the dictionary. The few who caught it spent a lot of time going backwards and forwards to the toilets, and as the little sick room quickly became inadequate for the sufferers one of the classrooms was converted to a sick room. I went in there once to visit one of Agnes’ friends and it was very smelly and we came out holding our noses and giggling. Neither of us caught the infection and those in the school who did so seemed to make a recovery within two or three days. There was an elderly doctor who came in every day and the sisters acted as nurses, and at every assembly the Mother Superior would remind us of the need to wash our hands and be hygienic.
When the illness had almost run its course, and the school was beginning to return to normal, Mary fell ill. She seemed very pale one day and that night she asked to be accompanied to the toilet during the night, which was what we always had to do, and then she was ill the next morning. Sister Teresa came to look at her and ordered that she be transferred to the temporary sick room. I was lost without her support and although Agnes and Aileen tried to help I missed Mary’s arm round me and her making sure that I was always in the right place at the right time.
I went to see Mary in the sick room. By then she was the only patient and one of the sisters was able to look after her needs all the time. She was sleeping when I visited but woke up when I held her hand and smiled at me. She looked rather thin. The next day the doctor came again and when he had visited Mary he went to see the Mother Superior and seemed to be there for a long time. I asked Sister Teresa if I could go and see my sister again, and she said no. Later that afternoon we all heard a noise and looked out of the classroom window to see a horse-drawn carriage draw up at the front of the school and two of the sisters carrying blankets into it. Sister Teresa came into the classroom and I was allowed to go out with her as Mary was carried into the back of the carriage, all wrapped up in sheets with only her face peeping out.
‘Where is she going?’ I cried, and was told that she was going to the Gauhati Civil Hospital in the town so she could be made better.
I called out to Mary and waved at her but I do not think she saw me. Sister Teresa held me tightly by the hand as the doors of the carriage were closed and the two horses were led off.
I was very upset. I cried in the classroom during the rest of the afternoon and despite Agnes’ and Aileen’s best efforts I would not join in the games. By the early evening I had cheered up a bit and the sisters kept a close eye on me. My favourite, Sister Teresa, came and sat with me for a few moments when I went to bed beside the folded blanket where Mary would normally be sleeping.
The next day, Tuesday, at prayers in the morning and in the evening there was a prayer for Mary’s swift recovery. The same thing happened on Wednesday and I was so lonely without my sister that I asked the sisters if I might go to visit her in the hospital. They said they would ask the Mother Superior and on the Thursday I was allowed to go with Sister Teresa to the hospital. This was on the other side of the town and we went in a small carriage and climbed the stairs to the third floor and walked down a long corridor to a big dormitory which the sister said was called a ward. Halfway down the row of beds I could make out Mary’s face above the blankets and I shook myself free of Sister Teresa and ran over. Mary seemed so thin and white but she smiled when she saw me and I held her hand and kissed her. Her face was quite cold. She tried to say something and I put my ear close to her mouth and heard, ‘I hope you are being a good girl, little sister?’
I chattered to her for as long as I was allowed; I told her what I had been drawing in class and that I missed her at night. After about half an hour the nurse who was in charge of the ward came over and said that Mary was tired and we should not stay any longer. I tried not to cry and kissed my sister goodbye and was taken down the ward holding Sister Teresa’s hand. At the door I turned to wave but I could not see Mary waving back.
Mary died the next day. I did not know what had happened save that the doctor came to the school and went straight in to see the Mother Superior. Then, when we were playing just before lunch we saw all the sisters go into the Mother Superior’s office and come out ten minutes later. Sister Teresa looked around and when she saw me she asked me to go with her whilst the other sisters gathered the day scholars and the boarders together at the other end of the courtyard. I was taken into the Mother Superior’s office which was the first time I had been there since we had arrived at the school ten weeks before. This time she seemed less fierce and asked me to go round her desk and stand beside her chair. She then asked me what I knew of heaven and when I tried to explain she said that my sister Mary had gone there.
It is a long time ago, but I remember crying and that Sister Teresa tried to comfort me. I had seen dead animals: one of the village cows had died just before we left, and the killing of chickens was an everyday event. Somehow I had an image of Mary lying motionless like the cow in the field. I was led outside and Agnes and Aileen were waiting with Sister Mary, obviously having been told to look after me. I could see that Aileen had been crying too. They tried to get me to play in their games but my head was spinning and all I could think was that I was not going to see my big sister ever again. I sat on the ground in a corner and sobbed.
Prayers were said that evening for ‘our departed sister Mary’ and I cried again. At bedtime I again saw Mary’s folded bedclothes and flung myself on them. Sister Teresa crouched beside me and stroked the tears from my face until I fell asleep.