Bakhita

by Veronique Olmi

  * * *

  —

  The door to the institute opens, Stefano introduces himself to the portinaia, the doorkeeper sister who invites them in. Bakhita is not familiar with these sisters whose habits are not like those worn by the nuns she sees in the street, moving about in groups and veiled like women in the East, these sisters wear a shawl over their robes and a traditional headdress like the local women. The little party is shown into a long cold room whose walls and ceiling are covered in dark wood, the vast hearth is empty, there is a large table, a sofa, a few chairs along the wall, but they all stand in silence, Bakhita notices the crucifix on the wall, a pale Christ with blood all over his face. She does not know she is in the visiting room. Does not know that her life has just changed as radically as the day her two captors took her from her village.

  In that visiting room Maria Michieli has a lengthy conversation with Luigia Bottissela, Mother Superior, who is soon joined by other sisters, all called “Madre,” all attentive and disguising their shock at the sight of Bakhita, this young woman who is so astonishingly and entirely black. They talk quietly, earnestly, with brief nods of the head, full of diligent understanding. Stefano, hat in hand, hardly intervenes, leaves Signora Michieli to explain, lay out Bakhita’s documents, her clothes. Everything goes as expected. Bakhita meanwhile, stands a little way away with the children, as befits a servant. He can tell she has no idea what is going on and has a fierce sense of betrayal. He would like to go over and talk to her, but knows he must not intervene, Clementina told him so the day before, “Leave la Michieli to manage the situation, exactly as if it were her decision. You hold your tongue for once, Stefano!” He stands, silent and anxious, how will Bakhita interpret this change? Will she think he doesn’t want her in his house? If only he could tell her the battles he fought in order for her to be here at this institute today. Eventually, Maria comes over to Bakhita.

  “You are to stay here. This is your home.”

  There is silence. Then Bakhita looks at Stefano, who did not think the information would be imparted like this, so bluntly. He can see she does not understand. That she feels singled out, isolated. Panic steals across her face. She clutches Mimmina a little more tightly. He comes closer, smiling, slowly weaving together the words “Suakin,” “leaving,” and “home.” She needs to know that the options are leaving for Sudan or staying here. Now. With the Madri who have other young girls like her in their care. The word Bakhita picks out is “Madre.”

  “Madre?” she asks. “Mama?”

  Mother Superior comes over to her, smiles at her, and welcomes her. Bakhita looks into this old woman’s eyes and instantly sees who she is. She is good and knows many things. Bakhita smiles too, and inclines her head. But she has not set Mimmina down, and Stefano can see that la Michieli is pretending not to have noticed. With a sigh of relief, Maria Michieli thanks the nun, adjusts her hat, and asks the three little girls to say their goodbyes. Mimmina softly buries her face in Bakhita’s neck. Maria comes over to them, looks her nanny in the eye. It is an order.

  * * *

  —

  Bakhita knew she would be parted from Mimmina for the duration of her trip to Suakin, but she did not know it would be now. A feeling of falling once again, of being reacquainted with loneliness, like an ice-cold cloak. She takes her pain inside her like a dagger to her stomach and gently sets the child down. Nudges her slightly toward her mother, who is waiting. Mimmina comes to take refuge in her arms again. Maria yanks the child toward herself. She won’t give in to a tantrum this time, not here, in front of all these nuns, she’ll show them what a mother is. “You’re coming!” she hisses between her teeth, and pulls the child by the hand. Mimmina wails that she is hurting her, so Maria picks her up brusquely, imperiously. “Now you be quiet!” The child howls and sobs. Bakhita steps back with her eyes pinned on her all the time. There is already nothing she can do for her. Not even console her.

  Stefano is rooted to the spot, Melia and Chiara have also started to cry, while Mimmina is reaching out for Bakhita and wailing. Her cries echo around the visiting room, Maria teeters between anger and humiliation. The nuns watch, slightly horrified, and try to intervene, some fetch water and a little treat for the child, others pull up chairs, sit themselves down, but Maria cannot keep hold of Mimmina who arches her back and pummels her mother’s knees with her furious feet, her whole body straining toward Bakhita, whose eyes glisten with tears, the nuns can see, they are confronted with genuine pain, and Signora Michieli can complain all she likes of tantrums and childish behavior, the nuns can see this is something quite else. An awkward tension settles over the room, like an unvoiced altercation. Mother Superior murmurs that, alas, she will not be able to keep the Moretta. She must go with her little mistress. Maria agrees reluctantly, this is yet another defeat but yes, she will have to take her daughter’s nanny to Africa or the separation could threaten the child’s health. This ever-present fear of death, the emotional blackmail, and at the end of the day, she’s never alone with her daughter! Bakhita listens without understanding what has happened, but she can see the fear and pain on every face. Is it her fault? She said nothing. Did nothing. Is prepared to obey. But if only she could be allowed to console Mimmina…Stefano jumps to his feet, this time he will intervene, he cannot accept that their little Moretta sister will not be baptized, cannot accept that he has come so close to the goal and that it is all falling apart now, he will save her at all costs!

  “That’s impossible!”

  Everyone turns to look at him, the only man among them, now almost forgotten.

  “Stefano, surely you can see my daughter needs her nanny. It would be cruel to separate them.”

  “Yes, signora, it would be cruel to separate them, I agree, it would be cruel.”

  “Well then, let’s go and let’s have no more talk about it, I’m exhausted. All that work for nothing!”

  Coats are adjusted, and hats, Maria Michieli gives Bakhita a nod which means “Off you go, then!” but Bakhita does not move. Inert, silent, she just stands there, unsure which order she should obey. And now Stefano enters the fray again.

  “There’s a solution!” he cries. “It’s so obvious and so…practical. For everyone.”

  Maria Michieli sighs and looks over at the nuns, as if to say, “Don’t mind him,” and the door is opened for them. Stefano stands in her way.

  “Little Alice can stay here while you make the trip to Suakin, signora,” he says. “Leave her here. She will be taught too. When you come back she will know all sorts of things, children learn fast.”

  “Go to Africa without my daughter?”

  “Don’t subject her to such a tiring trip…”

  Maria is at a loss for words. People always make a fool of her. Always imply her child can’t possibly live with her. She is a mother with empty hands. All her best intentions are in vain. In this moment of astonishment, Mimmina takes refuge in Bakhita’s arms. Silence again. No more sniffling sounds from the child whom Bakhita soothes with tender words, stroking her neck. Melia and Chiara come over to her and clutch their “little sister’s” tunic, shaken by the scene, by the altercation between adults, but most of all by their father’s emotion, he loses his usual authority when he talks to la Michieli.

  Bakhita does not realize it but she looks like her own mother now. A tree with its branches. With these children clinging to her, she is beautiful, full of a generous beauty and a profound humanity. And Mother Superior sees this.

  “How could the child stay here, Signor Checchini?” she asks. “She cannot live with the abandoned children nor with the unbaptized adults.”

  But when she asks this, she already has an answer. She knows it is not for her to supply it. Nor for Signor Checchini. The answer must come from Signora Michieli. The poor woman who understands none of this. The powerless mother.

  * * *

  —

  And in her terrible,
stealthy, guilty fear, Maria Michieli leaves her daughter with her nanny. She will land alone on the shores of a country that, without her child, already feels like an aborted dream.

  * * *

  —

  On November 29, 1888, Bakhita and Mimmina both entered the Institute of the Catechumens in Venice. Stefano personally paid Alice Michieli’s fees, the sum of one lira a day, and as he had done for his little Moretta sister, he handled the administrative issues and obtained the relevant papers, which was no mean feat, because this was certainly the very first time a baptized child would live among the catechumens with her black nanny.

  * * *

  —

  On that November day, when the portinaia closed the door behind the Moretta and the child, not one of them could know that Bakhita had finally come home.

  On the first day, Bakhita waits to be given orders. Imagining that here, as everywhere else, she will be serving masters. With Mimmina by her side, she will be doing housework, washing, cooking, gardening, sewing, and embroidery, whatever is asked of her. But nothing is asked of her on the first day. She wonders whether Parona Michieli explained properly. Slave. Abda. Do the nuns know what that means? She prostrates herself at Mother Superior’s feet as Westerners do, upper body bent forward, forehead to the ground, hands absolutely flat. But Mother Superior pulls her to her feet with a smile. Baffling.

  * * *

  —

  In the afternoon she simply sits in the cloisters where Mimmina plays fivestones and hopscotch, which Bakhita asks her to do quietly because there is a peculiar gentleness in this place, one she is trying to understand. The cloisters are unusually clean and calm. The little recesses in the walls are adorned with statues and ivy, rather straggly olive trees grow alongside oleanders with no blooms and lemon trees with no fruit at this time of year; red leaves caught in the Venice wind roll over the paving stones. Watering cans stand in line beside a pair of shears and a broom, everything apparently in its rightful place, everything neat and precise. The silence is broken only by a bell marking out the hours, a delicate sound compared to the city’s heavy church bells that Bakhita can hear beyond the institute’s walls. The city, which is so near and so far. This place is a shelter, she can sense it, a refuge. It takes her a while to realize there is not a single man’s voice. Not a single shout. And apart from the languid cats on the roof, no animals either.

  A stone balcony runs above the cloisters, and on one side of the quadrangle, over two floors there are rows of tiny, blue-shuttered windows, all identical and symmetrical. But the windows are silent. The afternoon is mild and deserted. Every now and then, a nun passes through the cloisters and tilts her head toward them, Bakhita can see they all do their best to hide their shock at the sight of her. She smiles shyly, spreads her hands, a gesture that implies a fatalistic, “Oh yes, I’m black. Very black. That’s just the way it is. I’m sorry.” And she can see their embarrassment, and the pink in their pallid cheeks. Only one risks a kindly little laugh at the sight of this Italian gesture coming from a Negro girl blacker than hell itself.

  * * *

  —

  Toward the end of the afternoon, the air grows crisp, the sunlight fleeting, Bakhita is cold, sitting on this bench, but does not know where to go. She waits longer, submissively patient, and then all at once hears something. A procession. Murmuring. She recognizes these sounds and her heart freezes. She stands up to hear it more clearly, and when the rows of little girls walk past, led by two nuns, she snatches Mimmina to her, the child wails but Bakhita holds her tightly and hides her as best she can in her arms, her face pressed up against hers, forcing her to be quiet, almost suffocating her in her attempt to save her. The procession passes, fifteen or so little girls in gray pinafores, with clogs on their feet, no chains, and white like the most expensive slaves in Africa, the Circassians. Where are they being taken? Why have the nuns bought them? These children are not from here, she can see it in their eyes scouring the place for some reference, some form of help. They are here without their families. Did the nuns buy them to free them, as the consul used to? They have passed her now. The clunk of their clogs fades. Bakhita puts Mimmina back to the ground, the child hits her and says she’s horrible and she doesn’t like her anymore.

  “You don’t like me anymore?”

  “No.”

  “Well, I still like you.”

  “I don’t want you to.”

  “That’s impossible. I still like you.”

  Mimmina gives her a sidelong glance, her eyes full of her childish anger and hunger for indulgence. And then, reassured, she goes back to her fivestones, her games full of imagination and daydreams, under the soft slow eyes of the woman she struggles not to call mama.

  * * *

  —

  The day is over and they have done nothing but be together. They do not yet eat in the refectory with the other young girls preparing for baptism but in the kitchen, where Bakhita cannot swallow a thing. She is given a bowl of soup and is terribly ashamed, sitting there doing nothing, she is so embarrassed that she has tears in her eyes. Who can tell her why she’s here? Do the nuns think she’s worthless? That she doesn’t know how to do anything and nothing can be asked of her? Where are the nuns she saw passing? And the little girls? This is a source of great concern, she wants to know why the cook is so gentle and why she herself feels so alone in this vacillating unpredictable world.

  * * *

  —

  At night she sleeps with Mimmina in a room of their own on the third floor, their window looks out over the building opposite, on the far side of the canal, and the back of the basilica of Santa Maria della Salute. The fishermen who pass under their windows in their boats call out in Venetian, a different Venetian than that spoken by Zianigo’s peasants, but in their gruff exchanges, she recognizes disagreements or greetings, men hailing each other. The November night is cold and comes early, seagulls are furtive shapes skimming across the dark sky, and foghorns remind them that the sea is nearby. With her forehead to the windowpane and little Mimmina in her arms, Bakhita feels protected. Together they watch the night close in, just as they normally do, the first to see the moon or a star appear has won. But unlike in Zianigo, here there is only a very small corner of sky. Bakhita hums and Mimmina rests her hand on her chest, she likes the way it reverberates under her palm, she laughs and Bakhita sings deeper and deeper notes, because what she wants, always and every day, is to hear this child laugh. Their life is full of rituals, and for several months now there has been the ritual of the three Latin prayers recited while they kneel at the foot of the bed with their hands steepled. They are sometimes halfhearted, sometimes suddenly diligent, Bakhita carries the child along with her because she rarely wants to keep going to the end, and says her Amen after the first phrase. “Amen no,” Bakhita says. “Amen yes,” the child replies. And Bakhita soldiers on, come what may. After their prayers on this particular evening, Mimmina joins Bakhita in her bed, it is their first evening away from home and she is sad, the sheets are rough, the pillow smells of mothballs, she huddles close to her nanny and lulls herself to sleep by gently tracing the tattooed marks on her arm, like a little path in the sand, while she sucks the thumb of her other hand. That is how she falls asleep, in this familiar landscape, her nanny’s smell, with her hair tickling her neck, and no harm can come to her.

  * * *

  —

  Bakhita is woken by a bell at dawn. It must be very early, the sun is not up, but she can already hear muffled sounds and surreptitious movements. She gets up softly so as not to wake the child, opens the door a fraction and sees them. Heads bowed, hands tucked inside their sleeves, the nuns walk along the corridor in the shadows, seeming to glide in the chill half-light, and now they disappear behind a black velvet drape. Bakhita goes back into her room and wonders what the nuns do behind the drape. She cannot help thinking of the little girls in gray pinafores and wooden clogs. Images of zarebas an
d markets, of caravans and harems spring up like knife blades, memories she thought she had lost, and the terror is back, perfectly intact, as if she were seven years old. Here she is in this bedroom in the middle of nowhere, and who would come if she called for help? She looks at Mimmina. A familiar face that reminds her who she is: She is nineteen years old, her name is Bakhita, she is nanny to this little girl whose name is Alice Michieli and who lives in Zianigo. She repeats this reality to herself over and over, but the memories lurk there, at the foot of her bed, the past is a loyal dog. A village on fire. A bundle behind a banana palm. Loneliness. And fear, fear growing by the day, like an empty landscape.

  * * *

  —

  And then she hears it. It is quiet and mysterious. Slow and slightly sad. She comes out onto the landing again, barefoot. Strains her ears. The nuns are singing. A litany, high-pitched and almost shy. These women have gotten out of bed to sing at night. She listens to them, and her fears slowly dissolve in their song. Her body relaxes. Her breathing eases. The nuns’ singing is clear and the velvet drape as light as a curtain of sand in the wind. Above the cloisters is the square of sky with the first glimmers of daylight, which belong to all those setting out to sea, herding animals to the fields, or working the land. Those who speak little and work so hard that they die of it and never even stop to wonder at this. She looks at this sky, is it morning in Olgossa? Is there an old woman sitting on a baobab trunk, waiting for daybreak like her, for the tasks to be done, and for everything that will never happen again?