Sacred Hearts by Sarah Dunant

Author:Sarah Dunant [Dunant, Sarah]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, pdf
Tags: prose_history
ISBN: 978-1-58836-902-4
Publisher: Random House, Inc.
Published: 2009-03-18T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

AND SO IT happens that in preparation for caring for others, Serafina finds herself first addressing the sufferings of Christ Himself.

The old nun and the young novice meet together that afternoon in the chapel, with the great crucifix in their sight. Outside, the weather is almost clement for the time of year but the chapel remains as cold and damp as the grave. Umiliana, in contrast, heats the air with words, never letting her eyes move from the girl’s face while she describes passionately the ways in which beside the pain of Jesus Christ all the pain of the world is as nothing, how every drop of blood He shed was like a flood washing over the surface of the earth, taking man’s wickedness with it, so that through His sacrifice we are given the chance to live again, whatever our sins.

Then, to reinforce the message, she gives the novice a passage to read out loud from the teachings of Santa Caterina of Siena. It is a clever choice, for in her way Caterina was a great rebel herself, pursuing her ardent love for Christ against the more conventional marriage planned for her by her parents. Hers was a disobedience, however, that was exquisitely rewarded, as the passage shows, describing how after years of self-mortification and prayer the Lord saw fit to come to her and offer her His wounds to kiss, opening His side for her so that His blood flowed like milk, and as her lips tasted it she was filled to the brim with love, as if the spear had gone into her very own flesh.

Serafina has a good voice and the novice mistress listens attentively, joy like a soft sweat on her skin, almost as if the miracle is happening to her then and there. The saint’s words are so powerful, so visceral, that even the girl herself is affected—so for that moment she stops thinking of the pad of ointment concealed under her shift, or the white pebbles strewn in the grass to mark her way to the spot by the wall where, having taken the imprint of the chief conversa’s keys, she will throw the package over for him to catch.

Later, when the convent is on its way to supper and she is called instead by the abbess and given dispensation to miss the meal in order to assess the condition of the chief conversa, she is surprised by how calm she feels at the prospect. She remains unperturbed when she walks into the tiny dank cell, buried away in the corner of the second cloister and reeking of sweat and old menstrual blood, to be presented with the sight of the woman who lies there, arms as thick as ox legs and her face puffed up with fever. No doubt it helps that the patient is barely conscious, for it means that as Serafina leans down to listen to her breathing it is easy to slide her hand under the pallet far enough to locate a thick metal stem, then a wedge of key teeth.

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