She knows so much about men, Zuana thinks admiringly. How could that be? She has never seen the inside of a tavern, never sat and drunk wine with any man, let alone wooed or been wooed by one. Yet she talks of them, talks of all of it, as if she imbibed the wisdom of the world with her mother’s milk. Perhaps there was some manual passed down in her family, too, hidden away in her dowry chest. She would need to protect such a volume against the long noses of church inspectors.
“And these friends? Are they the same ones who found him the post at Parma?”
“The same.” The abbess nods, her attention now distracted as she brushes some piece of dirt or insect carefully from her skirts. “I would have told you this before, but I did not want to compromise your relationship with the girl. You seemed to have such a …a connection with her that I hoped, despite it all, that she might change her mind. I involved you that night only because I was not privy to what had been arranged between them and because I could not watch her all the time.”
“I should have seen it myself. It was in front of my eyes.”
“No. The level of deception was too great. I would not have seen it if I hadn’t known.”
Zuana shakes her head. “I was thinking more of the poppy syrup missing from the dispensary bottle.”
“As always, you are hard on yourself, Zuana. You had been ill and the convent was mad with Carnival. There is no reason to blame yourself.”
“The thing I do not understand is why, having gone to such trouble to find and contact her, he had no qualms about suddenly deserting her.”
The abbess plucks a leaf from the hellebore bush and crushes it in her hand. “As I said, such young men do not care a fig for anything but their own pleasure. If he had had his way he would have taken her, ruined her, and cast her aside. We must thank God that He saw fit to let you save her from herself.”
Zuana sees the two of them standing on the dock, the black water in the background, Serafina fumbling with the ropes on the boat, while she herself does nothing to stop her. The abbess had known all along that there would be no one there to meet her. It had never been Zuana’s job to prevent her from escaping, only to bring her back from the edge when she realized she had been betrayed. “Thank you.” She hears the girl’s voice low in her ears. Surely the abbess must have heard something, too.
“Madonna Chiara, there is something I must tell you.”
“Actually, Zuana, I think that there is not.” She lets the leaf fall, wiping its juice off her hands. “As far as I am concerned, whatever faults you have committed in this matter, you paid your penance in the room with her that night. Anything else that burdens you, you should take to Father Romero.”
It is clear from her tone that the matter is closed.
Yet there are so many frayed ends.
“What happens now? To the girl?”
“She will take the veil and in time become a valued and valuable sister of the convent.”
“And if she is still unwilling?”
“I do not believe there will be any further rebellion. Not now.”
Again the conversation seems finished but Zuana hesitates. “I am concerned that she is fasting so quickly after the evacuation. I—”
“And I am concerned that she continues to take up so much of your—and this convent’s—time.” Her tone is sharp now. “If she is to settle she must accept her lot as an ordinary novice and taste a little bitter fruit like everyone else. Given her sins, it is hardly an onerous penance and will do her no lasting harm. Suora Umiliana can tend to her needs for a while, not you.”
The abbess’s evident anger, and the fact that Zuana is being forbidden access to the girl, is confirmation in itself that she had seen or suspected what took place on the jetty that night. Zuana bows her head to show obedience. It occurs to her that she might mention Umiliana’s evident joy in the novice’s “conversion,” but she knows this is not the time. In the life of any nun, criticism must be accepted with the same humility as praise. You must look to your own soul, Suora Zuana. Umiliana’s words come back to her. Maybe they are both right: she has given too much of her journey to this volatile young woman. There are others who need her more.
“Anyway, you will have your hands filled in the dispensary looking after Suora Magdalena,” the abbess says, more kindly. “I cannot tell you how good it will be for her to be in your care— how good it will be for all of us.” She pauses, rubbing her hands together hard. “Ooh, it is cold out here. You must have grown a second skin in your work. I think I shall go back in time to see Suora Federica before the Sext bell. Perhaps we might walk as far as the second cloisters together.”
Zuana packs her fork and trowel into her bag, and they make their way along the wall of the vegetable garden.
