CHAPTER 12
THE WORDS —leave, escape, freedom —remained little more than silent thought well into the summer. Girt, Gwenneth, I, and a growing host of other sisters made painstakingly new acquaintance of each other, maneuvering the length of the refectory tables, making tentative signs.
Have you any news from outside?
Would you like to work beside me in the garden?
We could have no obvious gathering together, but a membership was soon enough established, with Girt and I acknowledged as its head. Girt because messages continued to be slipped in by the ever-increasingly amorous Hans, while I resumed my role as primary reader and interpreter of meaning. Then whispers, signs. Scraps of paper slipped into sleeves, smuggled in prayer books. Eventually destroyed.
One morning in the final week of June, I was met in the hallway outside the chapel after morning services by Sister Anne, who held a tray with a small loaf of dark bread, a pitcher of water, and two pears. Without any exchange of words, I knew this was intended for Sister Gerda, and I’d been charged with its delivery. I hadn’t seen her since that afternoon when I shared Luther’s passage. On the occasions I asked to deliver Sister Gerda’s tray, I’d been resolutely refused permission. Twice I’d sat on the ground outside her door, my presence begging an audience, only to leave —ignored.
Now, this.
I took the tray with a brief nod and wound my way through the dormitory to the dark hallway. It was cooler here than anyplace else within the convent walls. Almost pleasantly so, though the damp prevailed. As on previous occasions, I balanced the tray on my hip as I rapped on the door, speaking out, “Good morning, Sister Gerda.”
The door opened, and she emerged from the shadows, taking the tray and depositing it on the rough-hewn table beneath the scrap of window. She came back, holding the two pears, offering one up to me.
“I couldn’t.” Knowing how little the woman ate. But she insisted, going so far as to take my hand and press the fruit into my palm.
What I wanted more than anything was to be invited over the threshold. To sit on the floor or share the narrow cot and take in the wisdom of this sister who devoted so much of her time to prayer and meditation. Still, I should not reject her offer of hospitality, and once my fingers closed around it, I said, “Thank you” before sinking my teeth in for a juice-filled bite, thankful to know it was soft enough for Sister Gerda to enjoy.
For minutes, neither of us spoke. We simply ate together, smiling as we wiped errant juice from our chins. When the fruit was gone, eaten down to a dotting of seeds on our palms, Sister Gerda took the timer from its shelf and turned it to begin the flow of sand.
“I have been praying over the words you left to me.”
“Thank you,” I said again, wanting to tell the woman what an honor it seemed to be so gravely considered, but not willing to waste a single precious second on my own words.
“You asked me what it means, this idea of being both a subject and free. But I suspect, in the days that have passed, you have come to your own conclusions.”
“Yes.” Again, no need to speak what was clearly understood.
“And I suspect now, in all your attempts to speak to me, and to have me speak to you, that you are seeking some kind of blessing.”
“Truthfully, Sister, I don’t know what I want.”
“But you’re beginning to suspect?”
The boldness of Sister Gerda’s words did nothing to bolster my strength, and I looked quickly up and down the dark hallway to see that no one else listened. “I–I haven’t —”
“Don’t try to convince me that it hasn’t crossed your mind. Leaving. Don’t think you’d be the first woman to take her veil back out into the world. It happens. But there is a difference between leaving a convent and abandoning your vows.”
“I made my vows to the Church.”
“Not to God?” Her good eye twinkled behind its cloud.
“He wants nothing but my devotion, and I could be just as devoted to him living the life that other good Christian women live.”
“Why, then, do you seek me out?”
“Because I need someone to tell me what to do.”
“Someone did tell you what to do. Many years ago. All your life, isn’t that so? Be truthful to yourself, my Katharina. What you want is for someone to grant you permission to do what is impermissible. You want someone to transcend God’s authority over your life.”
“I don’t —”
Sister Gerda held up her hand. “I have made my choices, even within the narrow confines of this life. No one sentenced me to this cell. No one insisted I take on the severity of my vows. Some —our abbess, for one —consider me locked away, and thankfully so. But others, daily —and you above all know this —beg me to speak. They think that just because I spend so much time with my lips closed, I must be gathering wisdom for those moments when I open them. They see my life as a miracle because I wasn’t left to die at birth. Or because I live on, without my sight. Without my face. And because I have so little time —” she glanced at the rapidly emptying glass —“I won’t bother with a lie. I have no greater insight to the Father than do you. Or anyone else who seeks him.”
She crossed to her table and came back with Luther’s words.
“I heard; I understood and remember. Every word.” By her tone I knew she’d been wrestling with the concept of freedom every bit as much as I had all this time. “Do not assume I am a prisoner here. I am subject to no man. I decide if, and when, and to whom I will speak. But I am subject to every man —or to every woman here, bound to live according to the expectation of holiness that you set upon me.”
“I could never be what you are.”
Sister Gerda laughed. Softly, with most of its impact hidden behind her hand. “Nor should you ever want to. Nor could I have the courage to embark on the adventure that awaits you.”
The remaining grains of time numbered in the mere hundreds. “There’s no adventure.”
“You are subject to God, first and foremost, and to the Church as his embodiment. What a narrow trestle to walk upon. See that you do not stumble, as you are now subject to all who watch, and look to you.”
“But I —”
“We’ll not speak again, not until it will be time to truly give you the blessing you seek.”
Time emptied itself, revealing nothing but the solid planks of the door as it eased shut.
We whispered plans. Veils intertwined, shielding lips and holding words close. Some, bold, stating we must lock arms and stride straight out the front gate, out to the mysterious, waiting world. Others demanded rescue. Gallant men like the knights of legend, each riding in on a swift white horse and tearing out with a virgin clasped to his chest.
“Keep your wits about you,” I would hiss, my eyes trained on whatever task gave us an excuse to gather. “Think to yourselves —why have you come here? And now, why must you leave? This isn’t a matter of an escapade. It’s an escape, and the only safe way to escape from a place is to know that you have somewhere to escape to.”
“What you need are husbands,” Girt said one afternoon in late October. A small gathering of our committed sisters were in the otherwise empty refectory, slathering the tables with oil, meticulously wiping it into the minuscule cracks in the wood. Each moved a square of cloth in ever-widening circles, knowing we had the luxury of two hours to work and whisper until dinner at noon.
“Easy for you to say.” Gwenneth rested her pouting face on one hand while the other performed its chore, listlessly. “We don’t all have a suitor at the gate.”
Girt leaned forward, drawing us in. “I’m not the one who’s saying it.”
I didn’t trust Girt’s knowing smirk. “Who is, exactly?”
“Luther.” Her gaze circled the table, obviously hoping for a bigger reaction, but most gave little more than a shrug of recognition.
I held myself still. “What part does he have in it?”
“Hans says he’s —what’s the word? Sympathetic. Yes, sympathetic to our plight. That he understands what it is to leave the Church —”
“We’re not leaving the Church,” Gwenneth interrupted.
I touched her sleeve to silence her. “I know what he means. He was a monk. He understands. But what does one have to do with the other?”
“Hans says he has friends. Luther has friends. And that he thinks he can match us with suitable partners.”
Therese wadded up her rag and tossed it to the middle of the table. “That’s the end of it.” She spun on the bench and had stormed to the doorway before I caught up to her.
“Wait —”
“No. I won’t stay to hear another minute of this talk. It’s one thing to walk away from the solemn vow you took in the name of the Holy Trinity. Then, to turn your back on the truest of Christian marriage. But now —to walk yourselves into this . . . this . . .” Therese contorted her face in search of a word for the disgust lurking beneath.
“None of us have committed —”
“Like a market. Worse yet, like when I was little, with my mother. And men would come —”
I didn’t mean to slap her. I was just as surprised as Therese when I felt the sting of it radiating across my palm. Not since the days of our childhood wrestling had I struck out at a sister, and I fought back my own tears the moment I saw Therese’s welling in her blue eyes.
“You shouldn’t —” I choked —“you shouldn’t say such things about your mother, God rest her soul.”
“My mother’s soul is not at rest,” Therese said. “Not with all the sin she heaped upon it. And if you follow through with this, mark me —yours won’t be either. There’s still time, you know. To forget it all. To confess and repent.”
“I’ve nothing to repent.” My anger boiled even as my palm cooled.
Perhaps the slap hadn’t been as sharp as I feared. Therese’s cheek bore only the slightest tinge of pink as her expression softened into one of genuine concern. “Be careful, my friend, that your pride doesn’t become a source of betrayal.”
“Is that a greater danger than being betrayed by my friend?”
“I’ll say nothing. You have my word. I can’t do anything to guard your soul, but I won’t purposefully try to get you in trouble here. Do you believe me?”
I had no choice. “I’m sorry I slapped you. Will you forgive me?”
“I do already.” And to prove it, Therese bridged the distance between us and rested her pink cheek next to mine, as if placing a kiss.
She left, and I returned to the others.
Girt looked uneasy. “What was that all about?”
“Just a disagreement among sisters.” I came back to the table but left the cleaning cloth untouched. “Now, what is it Luther said? About husbands?”
“You told me once you didn’t want to hear any more from him. That you only wanted Scripture —”
“Girt!” My hands twitched, no doubt sending a reminder of the violence they’d inflicted, and all the women recoiled at the sight. “There is no longer time or reason for pettiness. If we’ve set our minds to leaving, as I believe we —and others —have, then from this moment out we have to be in accord. Now, what says he?”
“Only that . . .” She squinched her face, remembering. “I don’t know the words exactly. Hans told me a little, but he didn’t have time to read them for me.” She shifted in her seat and reached to the bottom of her robe, producing a scrap from a pocket in the hem. “Here.”
She handed over a now-familiar offering, a scrap from a leaflet, carefully torn, beginning and ending with unfinished text.
. . . if you have a daughter or friend who has fallen into such an estate and you are sincere and faithful, you should help her to get out, even if you have to risk your goods, body, and life for it. . . .
It was from a writing called “Against the So-called Spiritual Estate of the Pope and the Bishops,” according to Girt’s closed-eyed, careful recitation.
“But we don’t all have families out there to help us,” Sister Ave said. She was the youngest of us, barely sixteen years old, and as lovely as youth commanded. “Or friends. I don’t know a soul outside of here. And my family? I’ve no doubt my father put me here in the first place to keep me from marrying someone against his approval. Someone who would sully the bloodline.”
I smoothed the paper in my lap, tracing a single finger across the words. “I think you’re wrong. I think you do have a friend. We all do. And Girt —” I looked up and coaxed a smile —“your friend just happens to be perhaps the most important and special friend of all. Tell him he needs to find a way. Not just for you, and not just for us, but for all the sisters who want to leave.”
“How many will that be?”
“I don’t know yet. Tell him —and I know this will be very hard for both of you —but tell him he has to stay away. For a long while, because sisters have been noticing your conversations, and it’s only a matter of time before the abbess bans him completely. Or sends you away. Tell him to stay away until . . .” I calculated. How long would it take to know how many contemplated this same dream of freedom? Moreover, how long would it take to communicate with Luther, if he were really so inclined to give aid? “After Christmas. Well after Christmas —mid-January. And even then, not to come without a plan. Tell him we’ll do exactly as he says.”
Girt’s smile had faded at the mention of Christmas, but I steeled my heart against sympathy.
“It has to be. If God wills, this will be the last Christmas you celebrate apart from each other. The last New Year you won’t ring in together. Now, isn’t that worth a little sacrifice?”
The sound of approaching footsteps stole any chance to hear Girt’s reply as we returned vigorously —and silently —to our abandoned task. I made a point to offer a warm, welcoming smile to each of the six sisters, including Sister Margitta, the oldest of our order who was more often than not spared any taxing daily chores. The soft, wrinkled skin puckered as she eyed me with appreciative curiosity.
“Sister Therese reports that more help is needed in oiling the tables? But it seems to me you have plenty of capable hands.”
“Capable, but idle.” This from a girl named Anna Marie, a pock-faced novice who had yet to say anything pleasant since her arrival. I ignored her slight.
“We are capable, Sisters, but short one set. The scent from the oil, it seems, is giving Therese a headache this morning. We need only one of you to take her place, and I know we’ll get the task completed in plenty of time.” I directed my gaze. “Do you think, Sister Margitta, you could stay? I trust your industriousness to make up for our lost time.”
“Of course.” She had the good sense to understate her agreement. “It’s good to know that there are some who will still find good use in these old hands.” Those with her wished us blessings on the day before departing.
Immediately, we went to work. For a time there was no conversation, only the shushing of the rags on the wood, soon accompanied by the warbling hum of Sister Margitta. Low and comforting, like I imagined the sound of a lullaby. The tune circulated, unfamiliar. Not a hymn, not anything we’d ever heard in chapel, or even from the strains of the evening choir. But it was simple, inviting. Just six notes in the melody. Someone —Gwenneth, most likely —found a harmony. I listened, in awe of the phenomenon of such immediate unity. Then, as if by design, Ave’s sweet, clear soprano gave life to a lyric.
The white doves are flying,
The white foxes slipping,
Over, and under, and right through the wall.
The words peeked out from behind the tune, and two rounds later, another sister joined in. Then another. Then Girt.
Finally, me. Seeing myself first as the fox, wily and elusive. The rabbit, swift and smart. Most of all, though, the dove. The same as Noah sent out from the ark, looking for God’s promise of home.