Celia falls in love with Valerio and suddenly dies

Celia falls in love with Felismena, who is living in disguise as Valerio, while Valerio serves as the go-between for Celia and Don Félix. The affair turns on a cruel misreading: Celia takes the messenger’s repeated visits as signs of his own affection, while Felismena uses those visits to secure favors for the man she loves. Once Celia understands the true purpose of Valerio’s appeals, she rejects him; soon afterward she dies following a sudden faint. Her death brings the concealed love triangle to its breaking point and sends Don Félix away into disappearance.

Causes and Background

Felismena recounts this episode to the nymphs as part of the history of her search for Don Félix. In the account, she is serving him at court under the name Valerio, concealing both her identity and her love. Don Félix has become enamored of Celia, and Felismena carries his letters and requests to her. The arrangement makes her an intermediary in the courtship of the man she loves and the woman he desires.

When Celia asks about Felismena’s discretion, Valerio praises her as a woman whose many misfortunes have taught her much, though she has not learned to protect herself from further suffering. The remark anticipates the position in which Felismena has placed herself: she understands the cost of carrying messages for Don Félix, yet continues to do so. Celia reads Don Félix’s letter and agrees to answer. But she tells Valerio that her response is a favor to him, not a debt owed to Don Félix. Her words disclose the feeling that the disguise and service have allowed her to mistake for reciprocated love.

The Messenger Between Them

Felismena carries Celia’s answer back to Don Félix, who is glad to receive it. For Felismena, delivering that happiness is itself a torment: by her own account, she is using her efforts to win favors for the man who has paid little attention to her love. She nevertheless continues to act as messenger. Celia conceals her feelings for Valerio for more than two months, though Felismena gradually understands them. At first, she hopes that Celia’s love for her may weaken Celia’s attachment to Don Félix and so ease the distress of the man she serves.

The hope does not come to pass. The more Don Félix believes that Celia is forgetting him, the more distressed he becomes. Felismena continues to obtain Celia’s favors for him, and Celia sends those favors through Valerio, whose mediation lets her see the person she loves. When Don Félix tries to send messages through other servants, Celia receives them so badly that he learns to send Valerio instead. The arrangement thus binds all three more tightly: Don Félix depends on Valerio’s access to Celia, Celia welcomes Valerio’s presence, and Felismena must facilitate a courtship that wounds her.

Felismena also weeps before Celia, pleading with her not to treat Don Félix harshly. Celia is moved by the tears, but she reads them as evidence that Valerio loves her and wonders why he would so diligently solicit favors for another man if he returned her affection. Felismena sees no safe choice. If she openly returns Celia’s love, Celia might turn away from Don Félix; if she does not, Celia might resume loving him, leaving Felismena’s own hopes without a future. Meanwhile, she fears that Don Félix’s grief may cost him his life. Her attempts to preserve his happiness therefore keep her trapped in the very role that conceals her own feelings.

Recognition and Rejection

As Don Félix and Celia’s relationship worsens, Felismena continues to carry messages and admits to inventing some so that Don Félix will not be saddened. On one occasion, seeing how deeply his despair has affected him, she again begs Celia to show him favor. Celia then realizes that Valerio has been sincerely asking her to treat Don Félix well, rather than using those requests merely to prolong his own visits. The understanding reverses the meaning she had assigned to their meetings: what she had taken as a lover’s pretext is revealed as service to a rival.

Celia responds with tears, anger, and reproach. She says she had believed Valerio sought Don Félix’s favors only to enjoy her company, and now takes his earnest advocacy as proof that he does not love her. She declares that Don Félix must not see her if he wishes her to live, and orders Valerio not to appear before her again. She withdraws into a room and shuts the door. Valerio calls and tries to explain, but Celia refuses to let her in; from inside, she says that she wants no remedy for the hurt except death and threatens to take her own life. The scene ends not with reconciliation but with a closed door and Felismena unable to reach the woman whose affection she had concealed from.

Death and Aftermath

Felismena returns to Don Félix and tells him she could not speak with Celia because Celia was occupied by a visitor. The next morning, news spreads through the court that Celia suffered a faint during the night and died. The account presents her death as sudden, following the fierce confrontation, but does not establish that the quarrel caused the faint. Felismena is struck both by Celia’s death and by Don Félix’s grief: his laments and tears intensify the pain of the woman who has spent the episode serving his love for someone else.

That same night, after learning of Celia’s death, Don Félix disappears from his house. Neither his servants nor anyone else knows where he has gone. The loss therefore leaves Felismena not only bereaved and still concealed, but once again searching for the man for whom she had made herself a messenger. She later says that she has spent more than two years traveling in her adopted shepherdess’s dress to find him. In the story she tells the nymphs, Celia’s death is the decisive turn from an already painful triangle into a prolonged absence: the woman Felismena loved is dead, and the man she loves has vanished.

Narrative Role

The episode reaches the reader through Felismena’s retrospective narration. Its central irony is carried by the messenger role itself: Celia falls in love with Valerio because of the contact that Felismena’s service makes possible, while the same service repeatedly confirms that Valerio’s attention is directed toward Don Félix. When the disguise’s emotional meaning collapses, Celia’s affection turns into rejection, and Felismena’s attempt to protect Don Félix has helped bring her to the final confrontation without making her own love speak plainly.

The reported sequence also links private misunderstanding to public consequence. Celia’s anger first confines the crisis to a locked room; by morning, her death is known throughout the court, and Don Félix’s disappearance begins a new stretch of Felismena’s search. Her account places the loss of Celia beside the loss of Don Félix, but does not make them interchangeable: Celia’s death closes one attachment, while Don Félix’s unexplained absence keeps Felismena’s pursuit unresolved.