17
Starting that night, I got busy. I had to work quickly, because Mimmo was very good at convincing people, rich and poor, men and women, animals and devils, as Sister Teresa said.
A saw was easy to find in the equipment shed behind the kitchen. There were saws of all shapes and sizes. And after gulping down the milk and soft, bland bread among all those flaccid white faces — I swear! what other colouring could all those future brides of Christ have? — instead of going to bed I waited until all the doors were closed before slipping out. Hugging the walls closely — I knew every stone of those corridors, every corner and every door — I climbed up toward the cool darkness, even darker than the pitch-black of the stairs. Luckily there was neither moon nor stars. Though the mornings were sunny, for days and days a dense cloud covering descended from sunset to dawn, obscuring Mother Leonora’s firmament. She moaned about it — it wasn’t the cloudy season — but for me it was a sign that I had to act, or saw, if you prefer. For several nights I sawed until dawn, protected by that mass of clouds until the first light of day. I sawed at four places, the four points that supported the weight of the telescope. When my work was done, I threw myself on my bed, exhausted — I hadn’t slept for days and days — and contented. At last I could sleep. Now all I had to do was wait for a clear night.
Strangely enough, however, I couldn’t sleep a wink, maybe because I had become used to sleeping little or not at all, or because I was worried that the balustrade might be replaced. I would fall asleep but then quickly wake up, obsessed with keeping an eye on it. A clear night did not come. It rained now, even in the daytime.
‘What a shame, princess, just this year when nature promised such a great harvest! There hasn’t been such a spell of foul weather around here as long as anyone can remember. All that good wheat and hay will be ruined if this continues.’ I prayed along with Mimmo that the skies would clear, because otherwise my wheat and hay would rot as well if things went on like this.
There was nothing I could do. At night, clinging to the window bars, I almost wept with rage. Not a star could be seen, not a breath of wind stirred that dark, dense mass. Exhausted, I sank onto the bed. Let it all rot, wheat and rye and hay. That night I would sleep. I’d had enough. And I slept so deeply that, according to what they told me afterwards, only Sister Costanza’s slaps — she never missed an opportunity — were able to wake me up. Howling, weeping, doors slamming in the wake of the frantic clanging of the bell, dragged me out of bed terrified. I thought: an earthquake!
‘Worse than that, child! Worse! Hurry, come to the chapel, you’re the only one missing. We’re all in the chapel, praying. Mother Leonora fell from the tower! Who would have expected it?’
I had never heard such joy in Sister Costanza’s sorrowful voice.
‘Who would have thought she’d go up to her observatory! There’s been nothing but thunder and lightning all night. Who would have imagined it! Come, hurry! Mimmo has laid her out as best he could; he’s the one who heard the scream. Come to the chapel to see her one last time and keep vigil for her!’
Keep vigil? Me? All night and maybe the next morning too, when I was dying for some sleep? I wouldn’t dream of it.
‘Come, child, get a move on! Don’t stand there in a daze. Naturally, I understand how you feel; you are the one most affected by this tragedy. You were so devoted to her and she loved you so much! But take heart. Accept this great trial that God has sent you.’
So then, if I were the most affected, I could very well faint out of grief and thus avoid the ordeal they wanted to inflict on me. E caddi come corpo morto cade, I fell like a dead body falls, as the Poet and master of life says. And there was no way to wake me, either that night or the following day.
18
I woke up only when my bowels, which had become a hard knot in the prior twenty-four hours, began turning into countless burning tentacles. My tongue — at first I didn’t know I had a tongue — was so swollen and parched that the nursing sister had difficulty getting me to swallow a teaspoonful of a warm, fragrant liquid.
‘Poor child! How she’s suffering! Look at the state she’s in! Three days without eating or drinking! And still she’s spitting out this little bit of broth!’
I wasn’t the one spitting it out; on the contrary, I liked it. It was my tongue, which no longer obeyed me. Had I perhaps taken too many of those pills? I’ll explain: in order to be able to sleep for so long, every night and every morning during those three days I had swallowed some of those capsules that make you sleep. The doctor had introduced me to them a long time ago. Veronal, they were called, and every night he would give me one to quiet me. At that time, despite my fear, I had never swallowed them; instead I had hidden them away for a time when I might perhaps need them. And it was a good thing, because they spared me a final meeting with Mother Leonora, and, from what I now learned, her funeral as well. The pills had proved useful, but I was so afraid of having taken too many — the doctor had told me that they could be toxic — that I couldn’t help asking, ‘Am I dying?’
‘No, daughter, no, don’t say that word again. You’ve done nothing but repeat that word these past three days. No, the doctor examined you. There’s nothing wrong with you. Just grief and malnutrition, that’s what he said, and that all we could do was hope you might regain the will to live. I see that this will has returned, since you are afraid of dying. Eat, child, and pray. Wanting to die is a terrible sin. Mother Leonora would be saddened. Think of her, and take heart. What a pity you didn’t see her! Her body was all shattered, but her face was untouched, beautiful and serene. The face of a saint.’
If a doctor — I wonder who this new doctor was? — had said there was nothing wrong with me, I had nothing to worry about, so I gulped down that good broth that flowed into my stomach like liquid sunshine.
‘Good girl, Modesta, brava! That’s the way to make Mother Leonora happy, not by wanting to die, as you’ve done these past days! That’s how Mother Leonora wanted to see you. Eat, eat. Don’t disappoint her now that she’s dead, just as you would not have disappointed her when she was alive.’
So as not to disappoint Mother Leonora, I ate so much that in a few days I was back on my feet and able to listen to Sister Costanza’s cackling voice without much fear of the suitcase — it was an obsession with her — that she laid on my bed when she came in.
‘Gather your things, Modesta. You may take with you your precious rosary, the picture of Saint Agatha and the books that Mother Leonora in her immense generosity gave you, your personal undergarments and the bands. Don’t forget the bands: continue binding your chest even after you are exposed to all the worldly dangers where you are going.’
I didn’t dare ask for an explanation, or take my eyes off the suitcase where already some small bedbugs evoked by Sister Costanza’s words began to dot the tan-coloured leather with black.
‘I am not permitted to utter worldly names and places; we no longer belong to that world. But you must not worry, because Mother Leonora has thought of you. In her magnanimity she wanted you to be the one to choose whether to join the ranks of the Lord or remain out in the world. And so that you might make this choice freely, in full awareness, she also decided that you should first come to learn about the world. That is all. They will come for you in the afternoon … I see your bewilderment, my daughter. Like you, I disagree with this, because the Lord sent you here when you were nothing but a defiled, terrified little creature and your place is here with us. But that is what her will states and that is what must be done. Go in peace. My heart is untroubled: I know that we shall meet again.’