“Our last rector, the esteemed Giovanni di Tese dei Tolomei, supported the creation of our new Ospedale delle Donne, dedicated to the care of women pilgrims and invalids. You will find your quarters there.”
Umiltà stopped in front of a young man lying on a cot against the wall. He was drenched with sweat and covered with a rash—small, raised, pale, tense-looking bumps dotted his face, trunk, arms, and legs. He moaned in agony as Ospedale staff tended to him.
“We must find a place for him to bear out the remainder of his illness apart from the other pilgrims, however long it may last. Or however short,” Umiltà said, ominously. She bent her head to consult with one of his caretakers. I stared at the suffering pilgrim’s rash and fevered face, and suddenly it hit me. This is the Plague, the great scourge of Europe. We’ll all be dead by tomorrow. I’d appeared right at the most dangerous time in Siena’s long history, the time my brother had spent years studying. I was in the city that would be hit by the most devastating infection the world had ever seen, and it would be worse here than anywhere else, for some reason I still didn’t know. My vision blurred, and I felt myself swaying. Please don’t let me die here, stranded in the past with only five antibiotic tablets. Then my training took over. I’d seen that kind of rash before in med school textbooks—it was smallpox, not Plague. Smallpox had been eradicated in 1975, but we were a long way from 1975. I silently reviewed my immunization record and breathed a quiet sigh of relief. For everyone else’s sake, I was glad Umiltà knew enough to insist on quarantine. But, in ten months, in the spring of 1348, the Plague would come to Siena. It would come to me, if I were still here, and to all my unsuspecting companions in this time and place.
Umiltà led me swiftly through the hall. On our way out, she pointed in the direction of the Church of the Santissima Annunziata. “If you find yourself able, you may join us for Vespers this evening, in the Ospedale’s own chapel,” she said, making me feel like a schoolchild contemplating playing hooky.
I followed Umiltà to the Pellegrinaio delle Donne. We passed through a small courtyard with a round stone well, then up two flights of stairs to a tiny cell just large enough for a narrow bed with a wooden chest at its foot. A small arched window faced the cathedral and the gleaming green Sienese countryside beyond.
“I hope you will find peace on this stage of your journey, and that your respite here will assuage your suffering,” Umiltà said, standing behind me as I gazed out the window at the magnificent facade of the Duomo. I hoped so too.
A timid-looking young woman wearing a brown homespun gown knocked on the door as Umiltà was leaving. She placed a tray laden with a bowl of fragrant soup, a pitcher and goblet, a spoon, and a slab of crusty bread on the wooden chest and backed out of the room, leaving me to eat.
The thick, white soup was completely unfamiliar but delicious. It reminded me of warm vichyssoise without potatoes. The top was sprinkled with spices—cinnamon and nutmeg, what else? Cloves, definitely cloves. And cardamom, like the rice pudding in Indian restaurants. And in the soup itself, the heat of ginger. But I still couldn’t figure out the main ingredient. I wiped the bowl clean with bread, then finished that off too. I looked into the pitcher: wine. I poured and drank, but cautiously. It was ruby-colored, sweet, and watered down—just as well.
The meal took me no more than a few minutes to eat. I sat on the chest, which appeared to serve as both table and chair. Besides that and the heavy canopied bed, the only other furniture in the room looked like a cross between a podium and a desk—one small wooden step and above it a tilted top. An inginocchiatoio—the Italian version of a prie-dieu. The supplicant was supposed to kneel on the step and put his or her arms and maybe an inspirational text on the desk above. The shelf was empty.
Although prayer hadn’t been in my daily repertoire since grade school, my situation made me feel that I should at least try. I knelt awkwardly on the bench and put my hands together. No inspiration came, so I decided to start with the invitation that begins the divine hours, hoping things might flow from there.
“Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will proclaim your praise.” I paused. More personal might work better. “Thanks for that really nice soup. This is a lovely room too, private, great view, quiet.” I was praying, not reviewing a hotel. “And thanks for sending Umiltà. I wasn’t sure what was going to happen with Stozzi out there.” I hoped no one could hear me. The door, heavy and barred, was closed, and the walls looked like solid plaster. “So the thing I’m getting at is, this has been a really extraordinary experience, whatever is going on, but I’d very much like to know how to get home. I’m hoping to leave before May of 1348 ideally. Please.” I realized my eyes were wet.
I wiped my eyes and face with the back of my sleeve and put my forehead down on the cool wood of the inginocchiatoio’s shelf. I knelt there until the light through the tiny window changed to the darker gold of late afternoon. As I unfolded myself I heard footsteps, and then the sound of the door swinging open. I looked up into the face of the same young woman who had dropped off the soup. She was a girl really, maybe thirteen years old, and light wisps of hair escaped from under the edges of her linen coif, floating about her face.
“What was in that remarkable soup?”
She stared at me as if I were from another planet, which I suppose I was, in a way. “The poratta, Signora?” she said.
I’d made another blunder by not knowing what I was eating. “I’m from Lucca.” She kept staring. “I had always heard there was no match for the food here in Siena.”
Her expression softened slightly. “I helped the cook make it myself, Signora.”
I saw I’d hit on a matter of personal conceit. “You are certainly on your way to becoming an exceptional cook.”
Her pale face flushed an appealing pink. “Grazie, Signora. The leeks come from the mercato, but we make the almond milk ourselves, with nuts from the Ospedale’s own grance.”
Almond milk: that was the elusive flavor I’d been trying to identify. The last time I’d had any was out of a cardboard carton at a vegan friend’s house, but it had tasted nothing like this. “Can you tell me what that symbol means?” I said, pointing to a golden ladder embroidered on her dress.
“That is the insignia of our Ospedale—Santa Maria della Scala. The Ospedale gets its name from the steps of the Duomo, across the piazza.”
I risked a personal question. “Do you live here at the Ospedale?”