Donna Fedele's final rites and death

Donna Fedele Vayla di Brea’s final rites and death complete the maternal role she had freely taken on toward Lelia Camin and the care she extended to Massimo Alberti. As a sudden infection leaves her beyond medical help, she receives the Church’s last rites, entrusts Lelia with a message of sorrow and hope for Massimo, and waits anxiously for him to return. At dawn, with a crucifix in her hands and fresh roses from Valsolda beside her, she dies with a smile. The vigil makes her death both a private farewell and the culmination of a promise associated with Marcello Trento’s death.

Illness and the last vigil

Donna Fedele’s condition worsens almost suddenly after midday. She has no pain, but her fever rises so high that the doctor recognizes the onset of a general infection. There is nothing more to attempt: her body has lost its power to resist, and death is near. Fully conscious of her condition, she asks at once for a priest and the viaticum. The parish priest of San Mamette is summoned, and by five o’clock he has administered the rites, including the anointing of the sick. The narrative emphasizes her faith, piety, and resignation, not as a denial of the gravity of her illness but as the manner in which she meets it.

Even after receiving the sacraments, Donna Fedele remains concerned about Massimo. A telegram from him, sent from Porto Ceresio, visibly disappoints her; Lelia understands that Donna Fedele believes he might have avoided the journey. She asks repeatedly when he will return, then apologizes for her anxiety. She wants to tell him a few things and fears he will not arrive in time. Lelia cannot reassure her, held back by grief, while Cugina Eufemia tends the patient with steady composure. Her calm reflects a religious humility that Lelia observes with surprise and reverence.

The wait is shaped by the practical arrangements Donna Fedele has been trying to secure for Lelia. Lelia cannot remain in Valsolda, and returning to Velo fills her with dread; she is still months short of adulthood. Donna Fedele proposes taking her to Turin and, if Lelia’s father consents, leaving her with her cousin at Santhià. They agree that the journey will follow a doctor’s approval, that the cousin will be telegraphed to meet Lelia, and that letters arriving at San Mamette will be forwarded. Donna Fedele decides to proceed without waiting for paternal permission, trusting the family’s safety and Lelia’s urgent need for a place to stay. Her arrangements show the practical weight of the maternal responsibility she has assumed.

A message for Massimo

At six, after asking the doctor and Cugina Eufemia to leave, Donna Fedele calls Lelia to her bedside and puts an arm around her neck. She asks Lelia to tell Massimo that, thinking of him and his poor mother, she has died with a sorrow and a hope. The request places Lelia in a painful position. She suspects the meaning of the sorrow and hope but cannot make them her own; carrying the message also feels like exerting pressure on Massimo’s spirit. Yet refusing the dying woman would be unbearable. Her assent does not convince Donna Fedele, who lets her arm fall and acknowledges that there are other things she would have liked to say but no longer has the strength.

Donna Fedele takes a crucifix into her hands and does not speak for a time. At nine she asks again for Massimo. When a light appears in the darkness, the doctor identifies the special boat; she sends a note to Oria asking that Massimo come immediately. As the evening advances, she seems to lose her sense of time and distance, asking first whether the boat has arrived and then whether Massimo has reached her. He comes after eleven, accompanied by Don Aurelio. The familiar voice and face of Don Aurelio revive her, and when Massimo enters, the atmosphere in the room briefly changes so completely that those present mistake it for a turn toward recovery.

Consent and farewell

Donna Fedele asks whether Massimo has read a letter from Lelia’s father and signals that it should be shown to him. The letter grants consent to Lelia’s arrangements: her father will remain a mere agent, leave Montanina because its air does not suit him, and asks Massimo to approve the proposed accounting. Massimo holds the letter before his eyes to satisfy Donna Fedele without reading it aloud. Its arrival resolves a practical uncertainty at the bedside, though it cannot alter the course of her illness.

The fresh roses in the room become part of Donna Fedele’s leave-taking. When she gestures toward the covers, Cugina Eufemia thinks she wants the flowers placed on the bed and reaches for them. Donna Fedele signals no. Massimo and Lelia understand what she wants but do not dare to say it; Don Aurelio, more familiar with death, voices the request that the roses be scattered afterward. Donna Fedele thanks him with her eyes. The gesture binds the bedside farewell to the flowers already associated with her life and to the care of those who remain.

Her large brown eyes close, and her hands grow still on the crucifix. Don Aurelio is not yet certain that she has died, because her eyelashes move slightly. He asks whether she suffers and whether she can commend those present to the Lord. Her lips stir; Don Aurelio understands that she has said she is happy and tells the others. He asks them to kneel, and after two minutes of silence affirms that she is happy and calls those present to rejoice and adore.

Death, roses, and remembrance

At sunrise Donna Fedele lies dressed in black, the crucifix between her hands. The faded roses from the Villino delle Rose and the fresh roses of Valsolda are together beside her. Her closed eyes and pale lips retain a gentle smile, described as if death had restored the expression of kindness familiar to those who knew her. The image gathers the vigil’s physical details—the cross, the flowers, the change from night to morning—into a final portrait shaped by religious faith.

The account presents her death as the completion of a beneficent life of service and of the supreme offering she had sought to make. It also recalls a promise made in prayer at Marcello Trento’s deathbed. Earlier, Donna Fedele and Massimo had knelt together at Marcello’s grave and placed roses on the fresh earth; now roses again mark a passage through grief. The recurrence does not erase sorrow: the message she entrusts to Lelia explicitly holds sorrow and hope together. Her final scene instead brings those strands into a single act of farewell, with Lelia serving as messenger, Massimo summoned to the bedside, Don Aurelio interpreting the last signs, and the flowers carrying memory into the dawn.