On Saint Tabitha’s Day, Mother Beckert rides through the crowded, filthy Holy City on her way to an audience with the Pope. The flagellants, pilgrims, beggars, punishments, and prostitutes reinforce Mother Beckert’s disgust with what the city has become under the cardinals and the so-called Saved. Although she has returned because she was summoned, Mother Beckert makes clear that she still sees the Holy City as corrupt and spiritually hollow.

A handsome, well-dressed young man climbs into the shared carriage and introduces himself as Caruso. Mother Beckert distrusts his looks, manners, and vague answers about his background, though the conversation also reveals her own history as a hardened missionary who has served in brutal climates and abandoned ordinary comforts. When Caruso says he is from Alexandria but admits he is really a man from many places with many names, Mother Beckert immediately suspects that he is hiding important truths.

As the carriage passes prostitutes, Caruso lightly asks whether Mother Beckert disapproves of them. Mother Beckert answers sharply that prostitution is only a symptom of deeper corruption, then uses the moment to lecture Caruso about the sin she hates most: hypocrisy. Because the Saviour can forgive confessed sins, Mother Beckert argues that dishonesty about one’s own nature is the gravest offense, and she warns Caruso against pretending to be better or holier than he is.

The conversation turns when Caruso reveals that he carries a papal summons. Mother Beckert tells him that, despite the letter, the real meeting will be with Cardinal Zizka, not the Pope. Mother Beckert explains that she and Zizka have known, admired, and despised each other since seminary, describing Zizka as an adaptable, treacherous political force while presenting herself as the rigid opposite. Finally, Mother Beckert reveals that Zizka summoned her as a replacement as well, almost certainly to reclaim her old benefice in the Celestial Palace: the secretive Thirteenth Chapel. Caruso realizes he may have been called there too, hinting that Zizka is assembling new people for a dangerous hidden purpose.