I know the daughter, Isabel did by the scene where they were on the stairs,but I wasn't sure if Madame did. I'm not sure either if at the end when she blesses herself and says "God forgive me for what I have harboured here" meant that at that moment she had sudden;y realized what kind of sick relationship the girls' were in?
shareYes, though it's not really clear why she reaches that conclusion. I suppose their being undressed in the middle of the day is strange, but you'd at least need to see some fingering before making any accusations about sisters...but maybe that type of thing happens more frequently than women would let us believe
shareNo, though the scene reads as though she does.
Christine is in an extremely high state of mental agitation during the accusation scene. She has visible tremors, is fearful, and both she and her sister have spent the majority of the day in disproportionately dread anticipation of their employer's punishment over the burnt blouse and broken glass. Christine, who has already shown herself to be paranoid and obsessed with the idea of her employers attempting to separate herself from her sister, has 'lost it' in this scene and, by projecting her fear of her incestuous relationship being discovered on the conversation, interprets Madame's accusations as if she knows about Lea and Christine.
Some support of this:
As mentioned in the comment above mine, it's not clear how or why Madame has reached her conclusion.
The behavior of Madame and her daughter in this scene is out of character. The daughter, normally quietly spoken and frightened of going up the stairs just moments ago, is aggressive and spitting insults as she eggs her mother on. Madame, never one to hold back, has not mentioned their being together before this, and she most certainly would have had she known. She merely thinks them odd, and says so. Coming home to a dark house and finding your normally very calm and professional maids disheveled and distressed, a regular person would arrive at the conclusion that the maids are ill, rather than they're humping each other.
Neither Madame, nor the daughter could have known about the incest. The accusations seem to come completely out of left field as neither of them has stumbled upon any scrap of evidence that the sisters are in an incestuous relationship throughout the entire movie.
Christine has already shown herself to be paranoid and delusional, frequently imagining that Lea is attempting to seduce the daughter or vice-verse. She has also exhibited a tendency for becoming extremely upset and agitated when confronted/ yelled at, leading to her lash out violently in response (the hem instance comes to mind).
The parallels between the sisters and the objects (a permanently-stained, white satin for Lea, the younger, innocent sister who's now corrupted, and a shattered glass for Christine, who's psyche is broken and dangerous) further allows the substitution of their discovery with that of the sisters' relationship.
So basically, Christine has gone off-reservation and we're hearing Madame through Christine's skewed mental filter.
~Or~
Everything I've just said is total crap and the writing is just bad. They never do explain that whole "Sister Veronica" thing.
I'm kind of leaning towards this second explanation.
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Yeah...the ending to this film isn't all it could be. The whole thing builds up to this...and suddenly it gets murky and rushed. You'd think if the sisters were ever to have a deep, impassioned discussion, it would be over those two dead bodies!
shareI think she knew, I mean their chemistry was so obvious and Madame would need to be blind and stupid not to have caught on.
But I agree, the ending was so lame. I mean, come on!