The eye narrows, but the voice remains courteous. Again, it says, I’m very sorry, dottore, but that’s simply not possible. Even in daylit hours only the educants’ close relations may enter the parlor. And under no circumstances can inebriated persons be admitted. Good night, dottore.
Crivano places his left hand in the door as she closes it. The wooden edge presses against his fingers: it’s quite smooth. As if he might be only the latest player in a scene repeated many times at this portal. Inebriated? he scoffs, pressing his nose to the crack. Sister, I am a physician; I will thank you to leave such diagnoses to me. Open now, and fetch the signorina. It is very important that I speak with her at once. It concerns an exceedingly vital matter of state security.
The nun gives the door a careful shove to indicate her conviction, and Crivano winces. He can feel eyes from the campo on his back. We’d like to assist you, dottore, the muffled voice says. Simply return tomorrow with a relative, or a written directive from the Council. Good night.
I am a relative, Crivano shouts. I am. I am the young lady’s brother.
The pressure on his hand lessens a bit. As I understand it, the nun says, the signorina’s siblings are all deceased.
Yes, Crivano says. That’s right. As you can very plainly see, I am dead. I have come back tonight from my sailor’s grave to visit my young sister, and would fain be admitted to your parlor at once.
Again, I bid you good night, dottore.
Now see here, good sister, Crivano says, moderating his tone. I have been asked to visit the signorina by her cousin, Senator Giacomo Contarini, whose name I’m sure is familiar to you. This was a special request put to me by the senator himself. I believe he gave authorization for my visit. Consult with your abbess if you must, and supply her with another name: I am called Vettor Crivano.
After a lengthy silence, the door swings slowly inward.
Without bothering to take his robe, the nun directs Crivano to a pair of high-backed caquetoires, lights an oil lamp on the candle-stand between them, and stalks away down a dim corridor, leaving him alone. Aside from scattered chairs and endtables the large room is bare. Over the cold hearth hangs a painting of Catherine of Alexandria in the antique style: gilt aureole shimmering in the lamplight, spiked wheel demolished by a touch. Crivano seats himself, resting Trist?o’s wrapped mirror across his knees, resting his stick atop the mirror.
He falls asleep immediately, then jolts awake again, uncertain of where he is. Overhead and across the city, bells toll once for sundown; vespers echo through the wall from the adjacent sanctuary. A commotion in the corridor: footfalls and whispers. Then Perina, with the nun at her heels. She sweeps forward with a long unladylike stride; the nun’s white hands flutter about her face, trying to fix her veil.
When her eyes find his black shape in the lamplight, they burst with gleeful surprise; her mouth forms a word that her breath never catches. Now she’s made out his face. Her expression becomes confused, alarmed. Dottore Crivano? she says.
His stick slides to the floor as he rises. He bows deeply, steadying himself on the backrest. Signorina, he says, it is I.
This is an unanticipated pleasure, she says, and I am glad that you have come. But what urgent matter brings you here at such an odd hour?
Pious lady, I must confess: I have dissembled. For this I beg your pardon. The exigency that impels me to your parlor can claim as its ambit naught save the animal confines of my own person. It is perhaps a priest’s sanctuary I should seek, but my feet led me here, in hope of opening my mouth to evacuate my brain. Fair Perina, I have come lately upon a man who fought at Lepanto, and the reminiscence thusly prompted made me long for your ready ear and kind attention. Will you sit with me?
They sit. With great effort Crivano retrieves his stick from the floor. Be brief, the nun says. Perina, I trust you know the rules that govern proper conduct in the parlor, and I trust you will keep the dottore cognizant of them.
The nun crosses the room, lights a second lamp, sits, and takes up a drop-spindle and a basket of wool. Her unblinking eyes prick him through the shadows as she spins.
After our last meeting, Perina says, I felt certain that thereafter you would seek to avoid me. I feared that my many questions had given offense. So I am very happy to see you now, dottore. Though I do wish I had known to expect you.
He smiles, looks at her. Disgusted with himself for having been even a bit surprised when the senator told him who she is. So much Cyprus in her—though she’s never set foot there and never will. So many echoes that she herself cannot hear. Being near her carries an illicit thrill of invisibility, a thrill compounded by her appearance: dark wool frock and swiftly donned veil, accidental and ingenuous, unornamented for the eyes of men. This pleases him. He could tell her anything.
The senator explained to me who you are, he says.