There comes a sudden hushing and shushing as Suora Scholastica emerges from behind the curtain and stands waiting patiently, her full-moon face beaming with nervous excitement. Someone claps her hands to signal silence. She clears her throat.
“Welcome, dear friends and benefactors of the convent of Santa Caterina, to this, our humble entertainment.” Behind her the curtain rolls and twitches as someone moves along against it.
“In the same way that the body needs food and sleep to thrive, so the spirit also needs recreation and rest.”
She pauses, smiling broadly, and around the room people smile back, for it is impossible not to be affected by her enthusiasm.
“For this reason those wise men who established convents saw fit to allow the sisters to put on sacred plays and comedies by which to aid learning and to enjoy a little spiritual fun.”
Someone in the audience lets out a little cheer, and a ripple of laughter moves through the rows. A few of the noblewomen of Ferrara will no doubt have heard stories of convents where such entertainments are banned or curtailed, following the new rules from Trento, and are concerned lest the same thing should befall their own sisters and daughters here.
“The first scene—” Scholastica raises her voice to make it heard. These words have taken her many months to compose, and she is determined that people are going to listen to them. “The first scene of our presentation of the martyrdom of Santa Caterina takes place in the emperor’s palace in Alexandria.”
The curtain parts, pulling slowly back from either side to reveal a wooden cutout of an entrance with two painted pillars on either side. To the left stand a few noble courtiers and scribes, draped in fabrics and hats, and opposite them the emperor, tall and imperious, though still recognizable as Suora Obedienza, in a velvet cloak and a gold diadem, with a fuzzy black beard clinging precariously by two straps to her chin. A spirited interchange takes place between them about the pleasures of pagan living and the power of the gods, and then the music starts, with the courtiers giving a short dance, the steps of which most of the ladies in the audience could execute with their eyes shut.
Everyone now is craning her neck to see. Even Umiliana, who of course must disapprove in principle, cannot help but be a little curious in practice. Zuana glances back toward Serafina, who sits upright, eyes to the stage with an almost fierce attention. This time next year she could be behind the curtain herself, for there are ample opportunities for good voices during the musical interludes. Next year. How many Matins and Vespers and prayer hours will have come and gone before then? There was a time when Zuana knew the answer to that—could compute the number of offices, even the number of psalms sung, between each and every feast day. Everything becomes easier when you stop counting. Has the girl reached that stage already?
The dance is interrupted by the banging of a drum and through the back entrance two soldiers appear, their brass helmets picking up the flare of the candles. They pull with them a figure in a long white shift and a wig of golden curls down to her shoulders. This arrogant young girl has been found defying the will of the gods in favor of her own Savior. The audience gives a little gasp of pleasure. She seems so small, too fragile almost to be God’s messenger. Yet she must debate with the emperor’s scribes and either recant her Christian beliefs or be tortured.
She—Perseveranza—opens her mouth, and a breathy singsong voice comes out. She is not the convent’s greatest actress but there is a passion to her when it comes to portraying martyrdom, and once given the stage she is not afraid to use it.
The emperor claps his hands to begin the debate. The scribes open their books and pontificate but Santa Caterina passionately rebuts every argument. From offstage comes a loud crash, followed by a cry. The actors momentarily freeze, glancing nervously in the direction of the noise. The audience hears a stifled giggle and hushing. The debate starts again. Words fly. Caterina trumps her opponents, and the emperor claps his hands to mark the end of the debate, only to trap part of his beard between his palms so that it pulls away from his face and he/she has to hold on to it as the curtain closes. The smiles are everywhere now. Everyone except the actors yearns for such mistakes, for in a world so finely ordered they offer a taste of splendid, infectious chaos.
Out from behind the curtain three young women in peasant costumes emerge to talk about the wonder of the young virgin (and give the converse time to move the scenery). One of them, Eugenia, offers up a song about the joys of nature. The audience is entranced. She is a pretty thing, and with her veil and habit gone she moves her body elegantly to the music. It is as well that there are no men in the audience to admire her, though they might find her a little thin for the fashion. Before Serafina’s arrival she had been the nightingale of Santa Caterina, and she has clearly taken her dethronement hard. I must mention it to the abbess, Zuana thinks. She moves her head to try to spot Chiara—she will be in the front somewhere, next to the most influential of the guests—but the crowd is too thick.
The song ends and the audience offers up a little gasp of pleasure. Onstage, Eugenia positively glows with her triumph. Zuana glances back to see what Serafina is making of the challenge.
But Serafina is not there. Her seat is empty.
Zuana turns and looks farther along the row—perhaps she has moved to get a better view—but it is hard to tell, as the room outside the throw of the candle flames is gloomy.
In the twilight beauty of the bell tower in Zuana’s mind’s eye, the abbess speaks to her again. Officially, as it is within the first three months, she should not be allowed to watch the play, but she has done the convent such service with her voice that I feel it would be cruel to deny her the entertainment.
Could she have left? Become so tired that she must retire to her cell? Surely not. No novice, however fatigued, would miss such entertainment. Though if she had slipped away no one would have noticed, for the whole audience, especially those toward the back, are transfixed by what is taking place onstage.
Zuana acknowledges a sharp twinge in her gut.
Of course, usually the novice mistress would look after her, but she will be too busy with the other performers. So I would like you to keep a watch on her.
She slips out of her seat and moves behind, to the back of the refectory, to check more thoroughly.
Though it would be better if you do not make your observation too obvious. She has worked hard these last few weeks, and I would not like her to think we do not trust her.
There is no one there. The girl has disappeared.
Zuana makes her way toward the door, trying not to disturb those around her. The last thing she sees is the curtain opening to reveal two of the converse scuttling offstage too late after setting up the wheel.
Outside, the upper loggia of the cloisters is growing dark and it takes a few seconds to adjust her eyes. Once she does she is surefooted: down the stairs and across the courtyard toward the girl’s cell in the corner. The door is shut, no light from underneath.
She turns the latch and pushes it open.
She has not been in here since that first night almost three months before. She has an image of a young woman flattened against the wall, hair wild, howling for her lost freedom. I am buried alive in this tomb. The snarl of fury. So much rebellion. So much life …
In the deep gloom she makes out the shape of a figure in the bed. Where has it all gone? She remembers the weight of her body as the sedative started to work. “It will not make me give in.” And now what? Was she really so broken? So ready to curl up and die here, just like all the rest?