Many years later, having been brought up in a non religious household, and in the first flush of my Anglo Catholic phase, I was sent to confession. I racked my brains to think of things to say, no doubt unable to see my own misdemeanors for the plank in my eye. I remembered my mother’s anger when I called her a witch; and then it resurfaced, the memory of my theft and the desecration of a grave, and my face felt hot, as if it had happened yesterday. Fortunately, the priest was a lot more benign than Marion’s headmistress. He was gentle, reassuring and I think rather amused, so my six year old self, hidden inside a grown woman, was absolved and set free!