IN a week that resolved nothing for the orphans of Goldenbridge, one issue, at least appears to have been settled. Goaded by what she perceives to be the portrayal of Sister Xavieria on Prime Time "as if in the Garden of Gethsemane", and its reporter as St Bernadette, Christine Buckley has told The Irish Times that she intends to take legal proceedings over the case.

It has also emerged that seven other "orphans" have begun legal proceedings against the Sisters of Mercy through the Wicklow solicitors, Augustus Cullen & Co. Augustus Cullen has written to the order, asking for all records relating to its clients as well as outlining what happened to each of them, seeking proposals "to rectify the wrongs of the past". The order's solicitors, Arthur O'Hagan, have since replied, stating that the letter is under consideration and offering the following advice: "From a legal viewpoint, however, we would have to advise our client that any claim (if any) would be well statute barred by now.

Actions for physical assault are limited by the 1958 Act to three years only from the date of the assault. But Mr Augustus Cullen told The Irish limes last night that there are special circumstances in these cases - not the least of which is that his clients were children at the time of the alleged assaults.

He also believes that there was a "spell of fear" in the intervening years, during which they were unable to discuss these events with anyone, not even among themselves. "I believe", he said, "that there was a shroud of secrecy among many of them up to the time of the Dear Daughter documentary."

As to the nature of the assaults, the former residents have, he believes, an action for basic assault "if they can show genuine physical consequences scars, burst eardrums, for example. Injuries of a psychological nature may be more difficult to prove, but the action will be for assault and consequential emotional damage".

Meanwhile, Ms Buckley and other former residents of the orphanage have taken issue with the Prince Time programme on several levels, alleging bias, breach of agreement on how her participation was to be handled, and a failure to confront Sister Xavieria on a number of issues, notably the case of baby Marion Howe, who died within days of her admission to Goldenbridge of dysentry, according to the post mortem examination.

The baby's father, who was discouraged from coming home for the funeral, but who made the journey anyway, claims that the child was burned to the bone on the inside of both knees, wounds for which he was never given an explanation A nun who he believes to be Sister Xavieria told him at the time that it was "just an unfortunate accident", he says.

At no point, say the former residents, was Sister Xavieria confronted by any of her accusers, or by evidence of their injuries, which they say were incurred under her regime. Why, they wonder, was she not asked about these when she denied ever cutting or wounding a child?

Why, when she admitted that a child was admitted to Goldenbridge with a prolapsed rectum and put sitting on a potty, could it not then be deduced that other children were even more vulnerable to being left sitting on potties?

Why, asks psychologist Bernadette Fahy, herself a former Goldenbridge resident, was the process of memory recall, as explained by Dr Patricia Casey, not equally applicable to the orphans as well as to others such as Sister Xavieria? "If she had seen children strapped to potties, she said on Prime Time, she would have remembered that. So she seems able to choose her memories.

"What does that say about her process of memory recall? What she seems to be saying is that she has a different memory recall process to the other professionals, including Dr Casey. It also seemed to me that she apologised for everything that might seem reasonably acceptable to the public, but anything that might be deemed of a `criminal nature' she denied or forgot", said Ms Fahy.

Christine Buckley can produce a letter written by Sister Xavieria to a past pupil in which the nun seeks her comments and writes: "The allegations all nearly have a basic bit of truth, but are blown up to an unbelievable state". The word "all" is underlined by the writer; the word "nearly" is a later addition to the text.

FOR the Sisters of Mercy, the fall out from Sister Xavieria's television appearance was, clearly, a risk they considered worth taking. Far from being the frail old lady, as originally portrayed when print reporters sought interviews with her after Louis Lentin's documentary two months ago, she was as articulate and alert as a woman half her 78 years.

Nonetheless, the order declined to make her available for interview to Louis Lent in for his documentary or, more recently, to journalists seeking interviews since Prime Time was broadcast.

In the end, perhaps the lasting impression of Prime Time for many was the conflicting memories of the sisters, Sheila and Christina Doyle. Sheila, who recalls being sent to the furnace room, is stunned by her sister's statements on Prime Time to the effect that she had never seen babies strapped to potties.

But Bernadette Fahy, for example, recalls children strapped to potties as routine: "And prolapsed rectums were common . . ." But what the programme did, she says, was to highlight the disagreement between the sisters instead of dealing with the central issue which no one disputes - that a child was consigned to the nightmare of what seemed like many hours in a furnace room.

Perhaps the only chink of light in the programme for the nun's accusers were the words of Sister Margaret MacCurtain, in which she explained the culture of convents then: "the terrible repression of sisters" in which everything was "stifled", in which the children appear to have been subject as much to the vows of chastity and poverty as the nuns themselves.

This, the Goldenbridge residents believe, is a beginning, at least, in their search for explanations.

Christine Buckley readily agrees that yes, she got an education while at Goldenbridge. "They say I was lucky - lucky? I slaved to earn my fees for nursing".

This week, solicitors' letters were exchanged between the producers of Prime Time, on the one hand, and Christine Buckley and Louis Lentin on the other, about guarantees the latter claim were given about their participation in Prime Time. "At all times", says Christine Buckley, I have been available for interview by RTE, then the one time I asked if I could go on, there is this . . ."

The events of this week have set her back 40 years, she says. As we spoke, the phone rang insistently; she took 24 calls yesterday morning from distressed people who had lived in Goldenbridge. She now feels responsible for them and feels guilty about using the answering machine.

Her domestic life is at a stand still; she has had time to cook just three dinners since Louis Lentin's documentary was broadcast. Where once she smoked 10 cigarettes a day, she now smokes 50.

But the issue, she insists, is not simply a difference between Christine Buckley and Sister Xavieria, even if that is how it has been portrayed this week.

"This is not about one nun - it is about years and years of abuse that went on behind walls. We want an independent public inquiry. How many millions were spent on the Beef Tribunal? That was an inquiry into beef It seems that we are less than beasts".

Next week, she will present herself with her solicitor at a Garda station to give her contribution to an investigation into events at Goldenbridge. She expects to spend four to five hours telling her story.