by Carmel Bird
There is nothing tentative about these two, and teenage sex in Venice is wild and sweet and bright and breathless. Totally hot, as Loyola boys would say. And strange to say the Montale family doesn’t seem to care or mind any of this, seems to have almost forgotten that Rufus is there at all. They think Corazón is a very pleasant girl. She is too. Well, Mario and Valentina Montale are busy people – they have mouths to feed and a whole lagoon to attend to. They must see to the plans to hold back the Adriatic Sea and save La Serenissima from drowning.
They provide fresh fruit and shellfish, as well as elegant platters of shining pasta and green leaping vegetables – linen napkins white as snowflakes, old family china embossed with gold and mysterious with tiny repeated images of mermen, dark blue glass goblets from Murano. Valentina used to be a dancer, and Corazón admires her straight springy back and her balletic stride, learning from her quite a bit of useful Italian. Valentina drinks only lime juice. She gives Corazón a long black cashmere sweater.
For the time being Corazón’s fertility cycles are regulated by the contraceptive pill so thoughtfully prescribed by her doctor. So that’s something. She has, furthermore, made a decision not to go to Confession for she has no intention of reforming, and will carry a degree of guilt when she occasionally accompanies Diana to Holy Communion, knowing that her actions, unconfessed, forbid her to do this. Corazón Mean is going to hell. Sex is supposed to take place only after marriage, and for the purpose of unfettered procreation. You can see that Corazón is failing here. Yet in most ways her life has entered a new and glorious phase and she is afloat on happiness.
The awful part comes when it is time for her to go to Paris with her aunt. She is wrenched away, trying not to show her distress too much in case Diana should guess what has been going on. But Diana and Rosita seem to have fallen into a stupor of pleasure, to have eaten the lotus of Venice, and are blind.
They set off all three for Paris. Corazón weeps hysterically at night in bed, but is quite the actress in public. Rufus comes back to earth, completes his camera work, and goes back to school in Melbourne. But by now at least Rufus and Corazón have both acquired cell phones and can spend their time texting. Teens are moving into a whole new phase, and Rufus and Corazón are right up there. We can perhaps thank God for that. It makes life almost bearable for Cora in the depth of her misery, as her fat sweet salty tears bubble into wad after wad of tissues and her darling eyes rim red with anguish and grief. Rufus, you realise, has his studies to take his mind off things, and he is in fact keen to get home and put the film together. One good thing to be noted is that Rufus remains more or less faithful to Cora. I can see that this might almost be a mediaeval legend of love and loss and quest and love again. Either that or it could be a soap.
Chapter Ten
The Turntable
The dark stone convent and church of Le Sourire de l’Enfant Jésus are located just beyond Pont de Neuilly, out past the old Sacred Heart Convent Des Oiseaux.
The three women, Diana, Rosita, Cora stepped through a small door that was set into the greater double doors, doors not dissimilar to the Spanish doors back in Melbourne at Lisieux. High above the doorway was a weathered stone carving of the Virgin of the Smile, her empty arms cradling the air. Diana and Rosita and Corazón paid their visit on a warm and welcoming Paris afternoon. Corazón was still in shock at having been wrenched away from Rufus, the delights of Paris somewhat tarnished by her jaded vision, and probably blurred from time to time as tears glistened along her lower eyelashes. She was naturally comforted by the presence of the cell in her shirt pocket, a direct line to Rufus. She was still obedient to Diana, still agreed without protest to the visits to old convents, historic cathedrals, important museums, nostalgic cafés. They all went for a ride in a carriage through the Bois de Boulogne, Rufus keeping track of it by text. Corazón scarcely slept at night, so busy and alert was she to her real life on her cell. She moved through the days like the sleepwalker she had become.
So there they were, with, in that old-fashioned manner again, a letter of introduction from Cosimo. Diana carried a glorious bouquet of golden lilies to present to the sisters, also a generous contribution to their funds.
The parlour and hallways of the convent smelt of the sweetest honey and lavender, and the surfaces gleamed with beeswax. Beaming Sister Annalise, in a habit that was definitely pre-Vatican Two, like something from a mediaeval miniature, greeted them joyfully and showed them the vast kitchen garden where the bees looped lazily around the rosemary bushes, making honey for the sisters to sell. Annalise was accompanied by Sartre the large and elegant convent poodle.
‘He was given to us by a dear philosopher friend.’
They wandered down the gravel paths, past a few cows, through a little nut grove, apple orchard, a row of pomegranate trees. Goldfish in a small round pond. Behind the cowshed was a spanking new studio bright with gleaming glass where two sisters with their sleeves rolled up worked away tirelessly on their Macs. The honey market is a worldwide thing. Also the market in wax candles. Also the adoption market. Babies are brisk business.
There was the old well where the Virgin appeared to the hunter. There was the orphanage – a tall brick building with barred windows beyond the orchard.
Annalise said, ‘The orphanage is undergoing renovations. We have a very active program of short-term care and one of adoptions. It is not possible to see over the building just at present.’
Two workmen were sitting on a stone wall, cheerfully smoking.
‘Here is the original convent wall with its turntable. This was the location of many miracles. The Blessed Virgin chose this place to offer new life to little babies who had died. The distressed mothers could bring their babies here and leave them on the turntable. If the Blessed Virgin so decided, when the table turned, the living child was returned to the mother. When we go into the church you will see the miraculous statue of Notre Dame du Sourire de l’Enfant Jésus. It is so very very precious and beautiful, you will see.’
And they did see this. Accompanied by Sartre, they all entered the church. It was built in the twelfth century, the walls thick and dark, shadowed deeply by time. In the heart of the great gloom, five circular stands of candles burned, throwing out a burst of incandescence that radiated hope and beauty and truth and safety. Kneeling to the side was a nun in prayer. It was her task to replace the candles as they burnt down. Nothing was permitted to gutter. This was the perpetual cycle of burning prayer for the intention of the mothers and babies of the whole world. In fact all those nouns should by capitalised, but I decided it looked weird. There was one large candle in the centre of each circle, and this was burning for The Peace of the World. These sisters have all bases covered. Like the prayers of Sister Veronica in Tenerife whose hair went home in a box on a Melbourne tram, these prayers are of the type that keeps everything ticking along. Is there something obsessive-compulsive about replacing each candle as it is about to go out? Such incredible vigilance these people are able to exercise. So much wax!
And in the distance, high up, rises the altar, white marble carved with vines and doves, decorated in gold, one deep vermilion lamp burning before the tabernacle, and in a glittering glass case, a crystal cabinet, stands the dark mysterious little figure of Notre Dame du Sourire. Her arms are empty and peeping from beneath the foot of her robe is a tiny mouse.
‘She is often affectionately known as La Souris, the Mouse,’ said Annalise.
At the altar steps another nun was kneeling in prayer.
They were not only at prayer, these nuns, they were also on guard. You only have to think of the Bambinello to realise the wisdom of this. And the presence of Sartre was also not only sentimental but strategic. Nobody expected one of these visitors to commit a sacrilege or a robbery, but in fact you never really know about people, no matter whose letter of introduction they carry. And Rosita, while paying respectful attention to the things Annalise was telling them, was as ever preoccupied with her project to
uncover the stolen statue. In fact the three guests were all preoccupied in their own ways: Cora with Rufus, of course; and Diana with two matters. For Diana there was the inclusion of this statue and its history in Federico’s book and there was the permanent and constant presence of Xavier in her heart.
To the left of the altar was a low door. Annalise led the party down a narrow winding stone staircase lit by the unforgiving light of flickering thick fluorescent strips. They came to the crypt chapel, the Chapelle des Enfants, which was lit by candlelight, and where there was another altar guarded by a kneeling figure, and on this altar was a copy of the Virgin from upstairs, but this time the sculptor had put into her arms his version of the baby. That was one thing. But around the walls on stone steps were ranged fifty or so statues of the Infant Jesus. Many of them were little copies of the Infant of Prague with his crown, his red cloak, his left hand holding up the orb, his right hand raised in blessing. Five of them were copies of the Bambinello, with his sulky little face, his stumpy foot.
Rosita was breathless with the shock of it. Was this the answer to her prayers? Had she stumbled upon the Bambinello, led here by grace? But no, alas, they were all plaster or else faithful but cheap wooden copies. But so like. She really was shaken. Their clothing was exquisite, the needlework of tireless nuns and women such as Rosita’s own mother and Callianthe. The jewels looked real. Almost real. Perhaps some of them were real? Could that be possible? There are questions you can’t ask.
Sister Annalise explained. ‘Many of the statues have been donated by grateful parents who have been good enough and fortunate enough to receive the babies and children from our care, in one way or another. The oldest one was donated in the thirteenth century, by the Lady Rinella of Garland whose baby suffered fatally from mosquitoes and, most tragically, from bee-stings, but was returned to joyous life by our Blessed Virgin. That baby grew up to be the Blessed Otto of Garland. You will see that the statue has a tiny mosquito on one foot and a bee on the other. Extras.’
As well as the impressive collection of Infants – it was the Chapelle des Enfants – on shelves down one wall there was a positive tidal wave of small and dusty plastic statues of the Baby Jesus, many accompanied by typed notes, all placed there in gratitude by parents less affluent than those who had donated the major works. Most of these figures were hollow, and some of them could glow in the dark, resembling, as I always think, fluorescent snot.
Although Corazón thought the crypt was some kind of crazy nightmare place, Annalise had her attention with the story of the baby’s allergy. Things have come a long way since the thirteenth century, all the way from the turntable to the EpiPen.
As they all came up again into the light of day, and once again passed through the gardens, Corazón caught a glimpse of a pregnant girl in a blue and white smock emerging from the orphanage with a laundry basket in her arms. One minute she was there, and then she was gone. Corazón, mind you, thought very little of this apparition. She was deep in sweet and anguished thoughts of her own love and loss and hope. The pregnant girl with the basket barely registered on Cora’s retina.
Annalise gave Diana an envelope containing documents regarding the history of the miraculous statue. They lit some candles in the crypt, bought some glowing amber jars of holy honey, and took their leave.
‘That was beautiful, was it not, Cora?’ Diana said.
‘Um, yes, beautiful.’
‘It was astonishing, really,’ Rosita said. ‘I have never before seen a display such as the one in the crypt.’
‘The sisters are such dedicated women,’ said Diana.
Corazón was busy as a bee with her cell.
At night she would have the cell beside her on the pillow, ready to attend to every text, every call from Rufus, and there were plenty. In the early hours of the morning she would watch the Eiffel Tower as its lights went out in sections, from the top down, until it was just a tall dark shape of shadow against the sky.
In her dreams Rosita began to encounter the figures in the crypt. The dream, she decided, was trying to tell her something. Possibly trying to tell her that the stolen statue was not being concealed in an auction room, after all, but was actually on display somewhere, possibly masquerading as a copy of itself. But wasn’t that risky? And why would this be done? Were the thieves waiting, just biding their time until it was safe to sell it? Would it ever be safe to sell it? But then, you can’t sell the Mona Lisa, can you, and people do insist on stealing it. Does it all come down to taking something because its desirability lies in its very fame? Does it simply come down to power? To the thrill of getting control of an object that should be out of your reach? Is it like the man who shoots his unfaithful wife dead because if he can’t have her nobody can? Like the statue of Venus who strangled the bridegroom in cold and jealous rage in the story by Mérimée that Avila used to read to me?
Well, the dreams came back from time to time. She dreamt in Paris and then in Diana’s apartment in Barcelona. Then eventually, there she would be, tucked up in her own walnut bed with the star like a beacon on the headboard, home by the river, far far away from the crypt of Le Sourire, and into her sleeping mind would drift those rows and rows of wooden, plaster, stone, wax statues of a little Boy, row upon row of them, none of them smiling, not a one. In the flicker of the candlelight the pouting mouths and frowning brows grew deeper and darker and stranger, and in her slumbering heart Rosita knew that the real Boy was concealed among the many copies, biding his time, frowning and pouting and biding his time.
The problem and paradox here is that if the Genuine Bambinello does not desire to be found, who then is Rosita to expose him? Who is Rosita to interfere with the power of Furta Sacra?
These conundrums gave her a headache. She tried to soothe her troubled mind and spirit by painting little images – icons really – of the Bambinello. One she gave to Callianthe who encouraged her to make some more so that eventually she became noted for them, and they were in demand at church fêtes. I like to imagine she would put a sign on the back of them saying: ‘Have You Seen this Boy?’ In every church she ever visited, first in Europe and then in Australia, she would light a candle for the Bambinello and his safe return to the Aracoeli. So much melted wax or tallow or whatever they make candles out of these days.
She finally summoned her courage and wrote a letter to Cosimo, describing her dreams, feeling a little foolish to be doing so. Cosimo replied kindly and politely, thanking her for her loving concern and perseverance. Rosita the Spinster would persevere to the end.
Chapter Eleven
La Sagrada Familia
Diana’s apartment in Barcelona is a vast Art Nouveau kind of affair with architraves resembling wooden versions of the entrances to the Paris Metro. The doors and some of the windows are filled with gleaming bevelled glass. In a long gallery are ranged hundreds of replicas and some originals of Black Virgins originating in places as distant as Russia and Brazil. Most of them are from Mediterranean countries.
This collection is to my mind the antithesis, the flip side, of my snow globes. There is an ominous, eerie, profound seriousness about Diana’s gallery where the works are protected by shutters permanently closed against the light. A low insistent glow can be summoned from floor lighting, rather reminiscent of the lighting in an aircraft when it is about to ditch into the sea. It is also possible to shine a little mobile spotlight on the figure of your choice. Again, this reminds me of the reading lamps in aircraft. This is a cabin then, where all these little black statues are seated and ready for take-off or landing. Some of their originals, of course, have had the experience of flying quite independently about in search of a resting place where they can perform their miracles. In spite of the language I have used to describe this collection, which is incredibly valuable by the way, unlike my globes, I find the whole thing utterly beautiful, like a song or a poem or something. Diana invited Avila/Barnaby and me to her apartment recently, and I have to say the gallery totally took my breath away
and had my eyeballs spinning like a creature in an animation. Avila was beside herself and moved about the room in silent awe. Replicas of paintings of the Black Virgin hang in the wall spaces.
When you have a collection like this you have to figure out a way to order the pieces. Diana wisely decided to do it by country, and so you start with Algeria and move on through Austria, Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Czech Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, England, France (Diana has more than three hundred), Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Lithuania, Malta, Mexico, Netherlands, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Spain, Switzerland and Turkey. You will note the absence of America and Australia. The Black Virgins mostly follow the pilgrim routes of the early mediaeval church – or perhaps I should say the mediaeval church followed them. Some wandered into South America, following the Franciscans. They are associated with miracles, the kinds of miracles that have never really been so fashionable in the New World – statues bubbling up in springs, statues discovered by shepherds in the centre of trees split by lightning, statues lifted from the seas in the nets of astonished fisher-folk, statues butted out of bramble bushes by questing herds of cattle, statues floating in on storm tides, statues flying in on lonely clouds – black statues with the faces of beautiful old goddesses.