Clementia is known to be as mad as a field of spring lambs, yet when it is discovered, close on sunrise, that the girl has quietly died in the night, this account of hers moves like a soft breeze through the convent, bringing a sense of wonder and hope to all who hear it.
IN THE MIDST of death, however, life must go on, and a convent leading up to Easter is a busy place.
Letizia and Suora Zuana, who had been the ones to find the girl without pulse or any sign of life, take the body to the mortuary room behind the dispensary, where they wash and dress it for burial. In lieu of a public laying out, prayers are said in chapel. While everyone is mad with curiosity to see the corpse, it is the abbess’s duty to return the convent to normal life as soon as possible, and with her authority renewed she is obeyed without question.
That same day is also when the trousseau for the noble wedding must be completed and packed for collection the next morning. Such is the importance of the commission that the abbess herself supervises the process as the chest is brought downstairs to a room close to the infirmary ready for transportation to the river storehouse that afternoon.
In the mortuary, Zuana and Letizia place the girl in a rough wood coffin, covering her body with a length of white muslin (the gold cloth is used only for those who have taken their vows). Zuana then dismisses Letizia—who has been unexpectedly affected by the sight of the bone-thin young body, to the point where she is overcome by tears—and keeps vigil herself during the afternoon work hour.
Halfway through she is joined by the novice mistress, who has humbly gone to the abbess and asked if she might be allowed to say her own private farewell.
The two women kneel by the coffin together. The last time they tended a corpse was at the death of Suora Imbersaga, when Zuana had been so moved by the novice mistress’s febrile joy. Now she cannot help but be aware of a dark turmoil within her fellow choir nun, as if however much she tries she cannot, will not, forgive herself for whatever her part was in this strange young woman’s death.
Eventually, after what feels like hours of prayer, the older woman rises slowly to her feet and makes her way silently to the door.
“Suora Umiliana?”
She stops and waits.
“You told me once that you wished you had been my novice mistress. Well, I share that feeling, and if you would let me I would like to come to you sometimes, to talk more about how I might reach closer to our Holy Father.”
The old woman shivers. “You should not come to me,” she says harshly. “I am not worthy.”
“Oh, but I think you are. Please. I do believe that you might help me.”
And while there are some things in this room that are ripe with deceit, this is not one of them.
Umiliana stares at her, nodding slightly, her white hairs and pitted chin trembling as the tears start to flow.
“I will do my best.”
JUST BEFORE VESPERS the abbess calls the chief conversa to her chambers and asks her to wait until after supper before they move the chest to the storehouse, since she herself would like to make a last check on the contents.
When the nuns disperse to their cells for private prayer, Zuana and the abbess meet in the mortuary. Between them they easily lift the girl’s body out of the coffin and carry it through a now unlocked door to the room where the trousseau chest is waiting. As they place her under layers of embroidered wedding silk, Zuana searches for a pulse. It is steady enough when she finds it, though faint, like that of someone heading toward death. The consensus of the two sources is that a body can remain as if in a state close to death for up to twenty-four hours and still emerge in health. But the first source is an observation from some heathen tribe found in the Levant, and the second, her father’s, relies on descriptions but no living proof. They will just have to hope. At rest the girl looks so fragile, more bone than body still, her hands carefully bandaged with salve beneath. Such a long way from the peach-ripe young beauty who first entered. But then, with the scars of having half his throat cut open, her prospective husband will surely be no prettier.
