Sister Margaret Hickey, a financial officer for the order of the Daughters of Charity, died of cancer yesterday at St. Joseph's Provincial House in Emmitsburg. She was 83.

A mass of Christian burial for Sister Margaret will be offered at 10 a.m. tomorrow in the Basilica of the National Shrine of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, Emmitsburg.

A native of Albany, N.Y., Sister Margaret graduated from business school there and later studied at Fairfield University in Bridgeport, Conn., and the University of Detroit.

She entered the Daughters of Charity in Albany in 1935. She served in the financial offices of several hospitals before her appointment as treasurer of the Emmitsburg province in 1958. Under her supervision, the present Provincial House was built there in 1964.

Sister Margaret was assigned to Providence Hospital in Washington in 1970, and in 1975 to St. Agnes Hospital in Baltimore, where she oversaw building additions and the relocation of several departments.

In 1990, Sister Margaret was assigned to the Seton Day Care Center in Emmitsburg to assist in developing a financial system.

She is survived by two nieces and a nephew.