A GENTLE APRIL RAIN HAD LEFT THE BRANCHES OF THE TREES IN HER ladyship’s park glistening in the sunlight. Hidden among the leaves sparrows, or maybe robins, I don’t know much about birds, chirped gaily, in utter distain for our human quandaries. Easy for the birds. When hostilities break out in one tree, they can just fly away to another. They can build their nests and lay their eggs and not give a royal damn about spoiled princesses who wear patches over one eye and spit orders at you as though you were a slave. The bitch.
Well, Teresa wore me down. I wound up going back to Toledo with her, not because she forced me to, but because she made me feel so guilty, as though I’d forsaken her. I folded my few possessions—two clean shifts, an assortment of herbs and pastilles, a few forbidden books, a package of letters—and stuck them into a burlap sack. With a lump in my throat I looked around my cell as though to fix it in my mind. The bare, wood-frame window that overlooked a red pantile roof. The heavy wooden beams that crossed the ceiling. The plain wooden crucifix that hung over my bed. The blue and white ceramic wash basin. I walked out and closed the door, knowing some other nun would sleep in my cell that night. Mother Úrsula accompanied me to the gate, and I climbed into the covered cart. The driver snapped the reins, and the wobbly contraption began to lurch unsteadily down the road. Fray Julián mounted his dapple and trotted beside it. I wanted to cry.
I wasn’t surprised to see Doña Luisa and Teresa waiting for me in the great hall. Her ladyship looked the same, except that her hair was sparser and greyer than the last time I’d seen her, and she had a few more lines by her eyes and over her lip. What mesmerized me was the exquisitely stunning creature that stood beside her. She was like those portraits of goddesses you see in grand houses, goddesses with unnatural features such as branches for arms—beautiful, yet grotesque. She had a complexion like moonlight and thick black hair coiled high on her head to form a cone into which gold ribbon was woven. A billowy ruff of the finest lace encircled her alabaster neck and a heavy gold chain lay on her bosom, rising and falling with her breathing. Her lips were like a rose, just as poets describe the lips of beautiful ladies in books. Her nose was aquiline and aristocratic, and her cheeks high and sculpted. But her eyes were what held my attention. One, edged with sweeping, silken lashes and surmounted by a perfectly arched brow, glistened with the richness of polished mahogany. The other was invisible, hidden by a patch.
Doña Luisa nodded slightly in acknowledgment of my presence. “Doña Ana de Mendoza y de la Cerda, Princess of Éboli,” she said, by way of introduction. The breathtaking cyclops with the pointed head looked down her perfect nose and nodded without smiling. Doña Luisa’s fluffy, brown and white dog scampered into the room. I don’t know whether it was Brutus or a younger replacement. “Lift your leg and pee on the princess,” I whispered under my breath, but the animal ran up to Teresa, yipping and wagging its tail. Doña Luisa laughed indulgently. Doña Ana looked on with indifference. “Go on,” I whispered inaudibly, “pee on her.”
Of Doña Luisa’s ladies-in-waiting, only María de Salazar was present. She had changed. Instead of a frilly gown and gaily colored hair ribbons, she was wearing a plain, gray dress. Her hair was tied back in a knot. She greeted me with imploring eyes. I suddenly remembered this girl had begged to me to intervene with Teresa to help her become a nun, but Braulio’s letter from the Low Countries had made me forget all about her. I’d never answered.
I was waiting for Doña Luisa to ask me if I was hungry after my long journey, but since she had already had her dinner, it didn’t occur to her.
“Perhaps Sister Angélica and Fray Julián would like to eat something,” said Teresa, reading my mind. “There was so much left over from the midday meal.”
Doña Luisa raised an eyebrow, as if surprised by this novel idea. “The servants have already cleared the tables,” shot back Doña Ana.
“No matter,” said Teresa with defiant cheeriness. “I’ll serve them and clean up afterward.” She took my arm and led me out of the room. I sensed tension. What was going on? Teresa had always navigated deftly through the shark-infested waters of Doña Luisa’s moat.
“I can attend to it,” said Doña Luisa, a smile like a porcelain doll’s painted on her face. “I’ll ring for a kitchen maid.”
“Never mind,” chirped Teresa. “Your Ladyship hasn’t been so good at attending to things lately.”
Doña Luisa looked at Teresa as if she hadn’t quite grasped her meaning. Doña Ana shot her poisoned darts out of her one gorgeous eye. She must have been asking herself who this cheeky nun took herself for. Still, she didn’t dare reprimand her. Teresa might not be a high-ranking noble, but she was a celebrated holy woman with a huge following. Even a powerful woman like the Princess of Éboli thought twice about tangling with her.
Teresa guided me into the servants’ quarters and brought me what for Doña Luisa were leftovers, but was for me, used to the sparse pickings at San José, a luxurious meal. She directed a manservant to bring a slice of partridge and some vegetables to Fray Julián in the room where he would spend the night before heading back to Ávila.
“What was that all about?” I asked, as soon as we were alone. “Has she still not sent your memoir to Juan de Ávila?”
“She sent it, finally, and Fray Juan sees nothing objectionable in it, praise God.” She was picking at a poultry wing. “It certainly took her long enough,” she added.
“I thought you’d already eaten. Where do you come off, telling the duchess she’s incompetent?”
“Oh Lord, when there’s food in front of me, I just can’t leave it alone. Lead me not into temptation,” she intoned, pushing away the wing. “No, this isn’t about my book. It’s about the new foundation in Toledo. Doña Luisa keeps saying she’ll help, God love her, but like so many other rich ladies, she’s so consumed with her jewelry and parties, she never gets around to keeping her word. I’ve been trying for weeks, but I haven’t been able to find a suitable house for a convent.” She picked up the wing and began to nibble. “You’d think with all Doña Luisa’s connections in this city, she’d be able to find us a place. She promised to make inquiries, but the days go by and she does nothing. What’s worse, I haven’t even been able to get the consent of the archbishop to found a convent.” She cut a large piece of cheese and put it in front of me. “Eat this, Angélica, and try these grapes.” She started eating them herself.
“Because Doña Luisa hasn’t helped set up a meeting with him?”
“No, because he’s been arrested by the Inquisition for advancing Lutheran ideas. He’s in Rome now awaiting judgment by a papal court. It’s a tragedy, really, because he would have been sympathetic to our cause … I think. Now the government of the diocese of Toledo is being run by a pack of fools headed by a certain Gómez Tello Girón. Doña Luisa has made a few halfhearted attempts to petition him on our behalf, but she could try harder.”
“Even if Doña Luisa is dragging her feet, you can’t go around insulting a benefactress.”
“I hate the whole idea of benefactresses. And now, since Doña Luisa has a convent on her property in Malagón, that one-eyed devil Doña Ana wants one on her own estate in Pastrana.”
“That’s not a very Christian attitude, Teresa. The poor woman is half-blind.”
“Don’t pretend to sympathize with that monster. I saw the way you looked at her. You were hoping Brutus would pee on her skirts, weren’t you!”
“Damn! You’re a mind reader, Teresa de Ahumada.” We both burst out laughing. “But you’re right. There’s something so haughty about the woman.” Teresa had polished off the grapes and was now cutting slivers of cheese—tiny slivers, so minuscule I guess she thought I wouldn’t notice.
“She’s the wife of Ruy Gómez de Silva, the king’s best friend and confidant, so you can see why she’s full of herself. He and the princess have nine children.”
“Heavens, she’s as slim as a girl. Teresa, if you want a piece of cheese, just take it.”
“Vade retro, Satanás,” she growled, pushing the cheese under my nose. “If I eat one more piece, I’ll have to go to confession and own up to the sin of gluttony. Do me a favor, Angélica. Eat the damn thing.” She paused for me to slice off a portion, place it on a piece of bread, and pop it into my mouth. “Yes,” she went on, “she’s as slim as a girl. Of course, if you had unlimited money and an army of servants to boss around, you’d be in good shape too. Although I’m sure our way of life is much healthier for the soul. Anyway, that spoiled brat of a woman is so puffed up with her husband’s importance that she dared to order me to accompany her back to Pastrana. On second thought, give me one teensy slice more of that cheese. No, no … that’s too big. An itsy bitsy piece.”
“What did you tell her?”
“That I was busy in Toledo. That I had to finish my business here before I could even think of another project. I’m stalling, of course. Eventually, I’ll have to tell her no outright.”
“Listen, I forgot to tell you. That girl, María de Salazar, wants to become a nun.”
“I’ve been here for weeks. Why didn’t she tell me?”
“She’s afraid of you, so she wrote to me, instead.”
Teresa chuckled. “I wondered why she’d given up all her pretty dresses. Well, I’ll talk to her. If she’s serious, I’ll find a place for her. She’s very smart. She’d make a good prioress.”
As I entered the sumptuous room the duchess had assigned to me, I caught my breath at the reflection that flickered back at me from the mirror over the mantel. I hadn’t seen my own image in a mirror for seven years. I was forty-nine years old. I’d never been pretty, but the face I remembered at least held the ripeness of youth. The one in the glass—drawn and sallow, with creases by the eyes and mouth—had lost its juice. I thought suddenly of Braulio. “I’m glad he’s gone,” I whispered. “I’m glad he never saw me like this.”
The next day Teresa sent for Isabel de Santo Domingo, an old friend from Ávila, a tough, practical woman known as “the advocate” because she could argue any detractor of the reform into the ground. She was more than twenty years Teresa’s junior, but already known as a master of rhetoric. Her first oratorical victory was over her uncle, Antonio de Vera, a member of the town council that had tried to shut down San José. When Isabel told him she wanted to join precisely that convent, he had a fit. Isabel entered anyway, and Don Antonio threatened to appeal to the bishop and have her removed by force. But when he went to give her his ultimatum, she argued her case so eloquently through the grille that she reduced him to tears. Now, whenever there was a battle to be won through language, Teresa called on Isabel.
Sister Isabel was a fighter, but she was happiest doing the dishes. At San José, I often saw her scrubbing pots, lost in prayer. It was as though the act of scraping food off a pan calmed her, allowing her soul to soar. It was a form of recollection. Sometimes when a sister was feeling down, Teresa would send her to the kitchen to scrub with Isabel because she believed that hard work was the best cure for melancholy. “You can be just as holy in the kitchen as in the chapel,” she’d say. “Just look at Sister Isabel. God also roams among the pots and pans.”
Isabel arrived in Toledo the next day. After she’d rested from her journey, she and Teresa set out for a little church near the house of Don Gómez Tello Girón. I stayed behind to make some medicines. A flu was going around, and several of Doña Luisa’s servants were ill. I imagined Teresa and Isabel hurrying along the narrow, winding streets, sometimes making a wrong turn and having to retrace their steps. (Toledo is a labyrinth, full of alleys and dead ends, identical side streets, and mews that open onto tiny plazas.) I imagined people turning to look at them, two nuns in a hurry, each shabbier than the other. Then I forgot about them and got to work.
Hours later, they returned, exhausted but satisfied. They’d managed to get permission for a new Carmel, provided it had no endowment or sponsor. That was fine with Teresa. She hadn’t wanted a patron to begin with. During the next few days she was so busy with the negotiations with Gómez, she hardly noticed that the Princess of Éboli had left Toledo, practically without saying good-bye. Doña Ana had been escorted, according to Amalia, the parlor maid, not by her husband, but by a handsome young courtier named Antonio Pérez.
Within the next few weeks, Teresa managed to find a house on the Calle de San Juan de Dios, in the old Jewish quarter, near the building that had once been the Sinagoga del Tránsito. Doña Luisa made no move to open her purse, so Teresa had to borrow money from the wife of the duchess’s valet for the down payment. The official founding date of the Toledo Carmel is May 14, 1569. It was the poorest foundation Teresa had made so far. Doña Luisa left town without giving us so much as a candlestick for the chapel. “We don’t have enough wood even to roast a sardine,” grumbled Teresa.
“Don’t complain,” I said. “At least she took María de Salazar with her to Malagón, and she’s going to pay the child’s dowry. The only thing is, the girl is going to profess as María de San José. I wish she’d take another name. We already have a María de San José in Ávila.”
“You can’t do too much honor to Saint Joseph,” shot back Teresa. “Listen, are you going to eat that bit of bread?”
In spite of its destitution, the Toledo Carmel thrived. “I wasn’t worried,” Teresa told me nonchalantly. “God told me everything would work out.”
One morning, just after we’d settled in, an Italian-style coach of the kind they call a carroza arrived at the gate of the new convent. It was a magnificent vehicle drawn by six black horses, with a black roof and exterior walls decorated with flower motifs of gold inlay. A sole passenger descended. I happened to be at the turn. “Doña Teresa de Ahumada,” he said curtly.
“Do you mean Mother Teresa de Jesús?” I answered, just as curtly.
“I have orders to bring her back with me in the coach,” he said, ignoring my question.
I considered what to do. He was obviously an emissary from a noble house. His rudeness made me want to send him to the Devil, but I considered the possible consequences to the reform of insulting an influential aristocrat, and thought better of it. “One moment,” I said. “I’ll get her.”
Actually, it would have been pointless to send him to the Devil because he came from the Devil herself. I was in the kitchen with Isabel plucking chickens—a gift from some kind neighbors—when Teresa rushed in and ordered us to drop everything and get cleaned up. “We have to leave for Pastrana,” she said.
“Just like that?”
She sighed. “The princess has sent for us, and she’s not used to being disobeyed.”
“To Hell with her,” growled Isabel.
Teresa shook her head. “I’m sorry,” she said, “but her husband is one of the most powerful men in Spain. If we make her angry, she could cause terrible problems for the reform.”
We traveled all night, and by the next morning the carroza was rolling into Pastrana, a beautiful old town that had once belonged to the powerful Knights of Calatrava. Doña Ana de Mendoza, mother of the one-eyed princess, acquired it long after the knights were gone from the town. She had had a magnificent ducal palace built on the grounds, which the Princess of Eboli now possessed. Still, the princess wasn’t satisfied. Her cousin Doña Luisa had a convent on her property, and the princess wanted one too. But she was determined to do Doña Luisa one better. She’d have not only a nunnery, but a friary as well.
Breakfast at the Eboli palace was usually around ten o’clock. By then, Teresa, Isabel and I had been up for hours. As in the convent, we rose at five o’clock, prayed Lauds, and began our daily tasks. Mine were to attend to Teresa’s health needs, brewing chamomile tea and preparing charcoal pastilles to calm her stomach. Isabel was in charge of laundry. While we worked, Teresa wrote. Her Dominican friend, Father Báñez, had asked her to compose a book on prayer suitable for nuns. She’d completed a first version of The Way of Perfection, but the censors demanded corrections, and now she was finishing the revision. By the time we joined the princess for breakfast, she’d put in hours of writing. Her head was clear, and her stomach was calm.
Doña Ana’s first order of business was the closestool, a lidded, box-like chair with a plush seat, open in the center, which stood by her bed. Underneath was a gilt chamber pot designed to catch Doña Ana’s patrician shit. Next to the closestool was a jug of salt water and a sponge on a stick to wash the aristocratic bottom, along with a porcelain container filled with moss and lavender to deodorize and perfume it. After the servants had emptied the pot, the princess, still in her nightshift, received her entourage. Together with her ladies she knelt in prayer in her private oratory. Then she returned to bed, where, propped up on enormous feather pillows, her long, black hair scattered wildly on her shoulders, she breakfasted with her doncellas, who sat on cushions around her bed. Servants brought in silver trays laden with ham, cheese, sardines with olives, sweet red peppers, and beer imported from the Low Countries.
For me, the early morning hours were glorious, filled with quiet activity or cheerful chatter. But the moment we entered Doña Ana’s inner sanctum, I felt morose. The imperial boudoir stank of excrement, sweat, and sardines. Even rosewater couldn’t disguise the stench. Teresa, Isabel, and I squatted on cushions and waited for the headaches we’d soon be nursing.
“I’ve begun to furnish your new convent,” the princess gurgled one morning. She popped a fig into her mouth and waited for Teresa to protest. “I’ve bought paintings, a solid gold monstrance, a silver incense boat, a Dutch lace altar cloth, and a crucifix inlaid with mother-of-pearl. Only the very best for my nuns. Have a slice of Serrano ham, Mother. It’s very good.”
Teresa bit her lip. “Thank you,” she said finally.
“We have the permits,” said the princess, looking out over the room as though she were King Don Felipe addressing an assembly. “I think you’ll be able to move in by the end of June.”
Teresa chewed her ham without looking up. “As much as I appreciate Your Highness’s generosity,” she said, “I must ask you to consult me before buying anything more.” She smiled grimly. “Poverty is an essential element of the discalced Carmelite rule.”
Doña Ana turned to chat with one of her ladies-in-waiting about a Chinese vase she’d seen at court. She was going to ask the king to give it to her. Don Felipe was very fond of her, she said pointedly.
“By the way,” she said to Teresa without looking at her, “there’s a nun I want you to take. Catalina Machuca. She’s been in an Augustinian convent in Segovia, but she’s a friend of mine, and I want her here. I’ve already sent for her.”
“I don’t know if I’ll go ahead with this foundation,” Teresa shot back, clearly at the end of her tether. “Discalced Carmelite convents are supposed to be founded without benefactors.”
Doña Ana popped another fig into her mouth, then licked her fingers slowly. “You’ll go ahead with it,” she said. “You gave my husband your word.” She turned to face Teresa. “My husband, advisor and lifelong companion to the King. And don’t tell me you don’t accept benefactors. Doña Luisa is sponsoring one of your convents in Malagón.”
“Well, actually,” began Teresa thoughtfully, “perhaps I will accept an endowment.”
“Yes,” said the princess, “of course you will.” She pretended to adjust her eye patch.
“I’ll accept it,” said Teresa, “but I want a guaranteed monthly income, to be fixed in advance. I’ll have Fray Domingo Báñez draw up an agreement. He’s one of the best legal scholars in Spain.” She paused. “By the way, tell your friend Catalina Machuca not to burn her bridges with the Augustinians.”
The blood drained from Doña Ana’s cheeks, and for an instant she forgot the half-eaten fig in her hand. “A guaranteed monthly income! What are you talking about?”
“If I’m going to install eight or ten nuns on Your Highness’s property, I have to make sure they’ll be provided for. What if Your Highness loses interest in this project in a month or two? A convent is not like a pretty bauble, Your Highness. You can’t just walk away and forget about it when you get bored.” Teresa gave her a smile that oozed warm molasses. “And about Catalina Machuca, I’ll have to interview her. No postulant can enter a Carmel without my permission.”
Doña Ana’s chin quivered. Suddenly, a long, high-pitched squeak like air escaping a valve filled the room, followed by a fetid odor. The ladies ate their breakfasts, pretending not to notice. I covered my mouth to stifle a laugh. It’s the figs, I thought. They’ve upset her stomach.
“I want to be alone,” snapped the princess. Her ladies quickly abandoned their plates and disappeared.
“She needs to use the closestool,” I whispered to Teresa, when we were out of earshot.
Catalina Machuca arrived in a simple mule-drawn coach the next day. I expected a haughty aristocrat like Doña Ana, but she turned out to be a small, mousy girl bedeviled by nervous ticks. Whenever she felt pressured, she rested her right hand on the crown of her head and rubbed her left eyebrow with her middle finger. She jerked her head incessantly when she answered questions and tapped her foot when she prayed. It was clear she wasn’t cut out for the life of deprivation and discipline a Carmel would expect of her. Even so, Teresa treated her kindly, interviewing her at length and explaining the difficulty in changing religious orders.
“You know I want the best for this convent,” Doña Ana told Teresa. She was standing with her arms crossed, in a pose that said she meant business. “Doña Catalina is the youngest daughter of a distant cousin of my husband. My husband, the king’s most intimate friend. She’s an extraordinarily devout young woman. You simply must admit her.”
“I have written to Fray Domingo Báñez for his opinion on the matter,” said Teresa calmly. “I should have an answer in a few days. I will abide by his decision.”
I didn’t see her letter to Báñez, but I’m sure Teresa explained she meant to reject the girl. Within a fortnight, Báñez wrote admonishing her not to allow Doña Ana to dictate who would enter the convent. Catalina burst into tears when Teresa gave her the news. She whimpered and hiccoughed all afternoon until Vespers, then retired to Doña Ana’s suite.
“She’s disconsolate,” I said to Isabel as the two of us sat sewing.
“She’ll get over it.”
“I have the feeling Doña Ana will do something to get even. Women like her are not used to being crossed.”
I was right. That evening, after the post-supper entertainments, the princess asked Teresa for a copy of her Life.
“I’m sorry, Your Highness,” Teresa said resolutely. “I wrote that book for my spiritual directors. It’s very personal.”
“Doña Luisa read it,” snapped the princess. “I know you brought along a copy written in your own hand. Why shouldn’t I be allowed to read it? Am I less trustworthy than my cousin? I promise no one will see it except me. I’ll guard it with my life!”
Teresa held firm until the princess’s husband intervened. Don Ruy was such a decorous man, so elegant and honorable, how could Teresa say no? Especially since he, as the king’s confidant, had considerable power over the reform. Finally, against her better judgment, she handed a copy of her memoir over to the Princess of Éboli. It was a terrible mistake.
Angélica del Sagrado Corazón Toledo,
30 September 1576