Consequences II

Noel is a little like Monica's admirer in Thank Heaven Fasting.. that young man, Carol, was very vain and tiresome, but Monica put up with him because she had no other prospects of a husband. However, Alex begins to find Noel increasingly annoying. Her parents let them get engaged, privately but do not announce it. Within a few weeks, Alex feels she can't live with Noel's lack of any real affection for her any longer and she breaks off the engagement. Her parents are horrified. They suspect that she will not have many more chances of getting married and that if news gets out that she jilted Noel, she will ruin her chances altogether. Alex is very upset but feels she had no option. Her parents continue to take her into society but she dislikes it more and more and she does not have any suitors. Barbara, the next girl, is now over her accident, when she fell off the "tightrope". The Clare parents decide to send her to a friend in France to learn about society. She goes off happily and takes to life in France very well and soon becomes sophisticated and fashionable, though she is not as pretty as Alex. After a year or so, she returns. She is only 17, but she seems very well able to come out in Society and tells Alex that she has had an admirer in France who writes her love letters. Alex is getting furiously jealous of her younger sister. Barbara decides to make her come out early at just 17. It is the Diamond Jubilee year and the family go to various events. Alex is coming home from one such event, with only her maid as chaperone. She is tired and hot, and the maid, who is a Catholic, suggests that they go to a nearby church to rest for a little. It appears that the order where Alex went to school now has a house and church in London. It is a Belgian order and Alex has had nothing to do with them since she left school. She agrees to walk to the church and rest up.. and when she gets there, she does feel a little happier. She wonders if perhaps something good is finally going to happen for her. In the church, she is waiting for her maid to find a cab, and she finds to her shock that there is a nun in the chapel. It is Mother Gertrude, one of the senior nuns. Gertrude sees how unhappy Alex is, as they talk, and she begins to persuade her to turn to religious life. Over the next couple of months, she visits the church often and develops a crush on Mother Gertrude. Gertrude believes that Alex has a vocation and encourages her to think so too. The Clares are not happy with her for becoming so religious and "Slumming"... and arguments break out in the house. Barbara's French beau lets her down. She had thought he was going to propose and he marries his cousin Marie in France. She is in a bit of a bad mood. Alex withdraws more and more from society and her parents get more annoyed with her. Another row escalates. Her father tells her that if she can't be happy with her own family and the upper class way of life, she can leave. Her mother reminds her that the family are not very rich, and that the house and most of their money is left to their 2 sons, so she and her sisters won't be very well off, if they do not marry. Feeling pressurised and unwanted, Alex decides to leave. She contacts Mother Gertrude, who invites her to come and stay at the convent and she goes.