"Wasn't that beautiful!" Sister Madeleine spoke of the poem. Rita laughed aloud with pleasure, sheer pleasure that she had read without stumbling. "That was beautiful, Rita. Don't ever tell me you couldn't read a poem." she said.
"Do you know what I was thinking, Sister?"
"No. What were you thinking? Your mind was far away. Poetry does that to you."
"I was just thinking that if young Emmet were to come to you.. "
"Emmet McMahon?"
"Yes. Maybe you could cure his stutter, getting him to read sonnets and everything."
"I can't cure a stutter."
"You could make him read. He's too shy to read at school. He's fine with his friends; but he hates it when Brother Healy comes to him in class. He was the same when he was in Babies. He got red in the face with fright."
"HE'd have to want to come. Otherwise, it'd only be a torture to him."
"I'll tell him the kind of magic you do."
"I think we should talk less about magic, you know. People might take you seriously."
Rita understood at once. There were people in Lough Glass who were suspicious of Sister Madeleine, the hermit. They thought she might not come in a direct line from God. It had been a whispered that people who believed in herbs and cures from the olden times might be getting their power from the very opposite of God. The Devil hadn't been mentioned, but the word had stood hovering in the air.