The runner stumbles

A nun is found dead in a isolated Catholic church community in northern Michigan, and the priest who leads her, Father Rivard, stands accused of killing her. The play moves back and forth between courtroom questioning, witness accounts, and flashbacks that trace how Rivard came to this out-of-the-way post as a punishment. There he and Sister Rita grow close, and when events oblige her to live in the rectory under his roof, his inner torment becomes overwhelming. Their bond leads only toward tragedy, yet the fuller cost of what they gave up, and the identity of the killer, are withheld until the sudden, dramatic climax. Milan Stitt's work was staged on Broadway and later adapted into a 1979 film.