In This House of Brede

by Rumer Godden

‘For another thing,’ Philippa went on to Dame Beatrice, ‘I didn’t want to be bothered. I thought I was very well as I was; a human balanced person with a reasonable record; with the luck of having money, friends, love – only suddenly it wasn’t enough – not nearly enough.’ Dame Beatrice nodded; this was what she understood. ‘Everything seemed – not hollow, but – as if suddenly I could see beyond them, into an emptiness, and all the while there was this strange pull;

‘It was splendid,’ said Dame Perpetua in the Abbess’s room. ‘You made it splendid.’ ‘It wasn’t I,’ said Abbess Catherine. ‘It is splendid. That is the blessing of the liturgy, it wipes out self.’