by Tim Marquitz
“For the souls of Javier Vergara, Louisa Pena, Rachel Davies, Joseph R. Mulcahey, and Michael O’Bannon, that they may be welcomed into your eternal kingdom, we pray to the Lord.”
The church thundered back in one mechanical voice;
“Lord hear our prayer.”
It was done.
That night, while perusing the sports page of the evening edition, he turned to the obituaries and read that one Michael O’Bannon had somehow managed to step into an open manhole in the instant between when the city workers had removed the safety barrier and turned to replace the heavy cover. He had fallen and died of a broken neck.
The supplicants had spoken, unifying their will, just as his Uncle Patrick had taught him. The shepherd conducted the sheep. The Mass was the staff with which they were goaded.
#
Monday Father Matthew assisted him in the Mass. He was a nervous sort, and nearly tripped over the altar boys a couple times, but never wholly humiliated himself. His speech was clear and strong, and he doled out Communion like an old hand.
Father Tim smiled encouragingly after the closing prayer, and when he rose from his chair he whispered in Matthew’s ear;
“Alright Father, let’s go shake some hands.”
After the procession, the two of them flanked the exit and pumped hands, exchanged blessings and well wishes. Tim was glad to see most of the people funneling towards the new priest. They were talking to him. Good. You never could tell with Catholics. Sometimes a priest rubbed them the wrong way, particularly if he wasn’t an old Irishman or at least their color. He had worried a bit that a Flip would put them off and he’d wind up doing Saturday confessions the same as always. But this boy would work out fine, and he’d be back at the track next weekend.
The old sanctified biddies hobbled up last as always and put out their withered claws for him to touch. He usually champed at the bit to get out of here, but watching them fawn over the ‘handsome’ young Matthew was entertaining. The final approval of the old reliables.
But the last of the old women ignored Matthew and stood expectantly before him, a newspaper clenched in her bony fist, her face drawn down in a disapproving grimace that was petrifying to behold in such a lined and sagging face. The smear of wine red lipstick on her pursed lips was like an angry lesion, and the snow white knit cap atop her head shone like a terrible halo.
“I know what you’re up to,” said old Ms. Ladhe.
He raised his eyebrows, the genial smile still on his face.
She shook the paper in front of his face.
“Michael O’Bannon,” she hissed. “Read in the Mass yesterday morning and dead only that evening.”
His eyes widened, and the stupid smile faltered into a toothy grimace.
“What are you talking about, woman?”
She pointed the rolled up paper at him like a sword and fixed him with a strange glare.
“May your Blessings be less,
May your troubles be more,
And nothing but sadness come through your door!”
She spat on the ground in front of him and turned away in a huff, limping out the door and down the steps with surprising alacrity for one who had professed such infirmity only a few days ago.
Father Tim watched her go and barely mastered the trembling of his bones. How could the old woman possibly know what he had done? He glanced down at the ugly splotch of snotty saliva at his feet and recoiled from it as if from a fire.
Father Matthew came over, a concerned look on his brown face.
“Father Tim? Are you alright? What was that about?”
He fought to keep the tremor out of his voice, the quiver from his smiling lips and stammered, shrugging to hide his trembling;
“Oh Mrs. Ladhe. She had a problem with the Mass, same as always.”
Behind Father Matthew, the other old reliables craned their turkey necks and eyed him curiously like pigeons looking for a sign of bread crust.
He waved the young priest off.
“I’d hoped to share dinner, Father, but I’m feeling a bit under the weather. I think I’ll head home early.”
“Of course, of course.”
As Tim stalked to the sacristy, he heard Father Matthew call cheerily;
“And don’t worry about tomorrow’s Mass, Father. I’ll be just fine.”
In the sacristy he tore off his vestments and flung them in a heap in the bottom of his closet, then fell to one knee and tore them away, snatching up his lock box with Tuan’s knife. He threw on his coat and stood in the doorway for a few seconds thinking furiously.
How could she know what he was or what he had done? Was it possible she was talking about something entirely different? His gambling? Had he only imagined her accusation? Given it more meaning than it had. He thought furiously.
No, his mind screamed at him. Michael “O’Bannon. She had said it outright. The name of a living man read in the Mass. She knew.
No one had ever known. Not even Mrs. Villalobos who compiled the list of the dead for him every morning ever commented on his occasional additions. Probably she had assumed they were personal friends of his.
And she had lain a curse on him, plain as day. What had she said?
Nothing but sadness come through your door.
Was she a witch of some sort? Why couldn’t she be? If there were men like him and his Uncle Patrick in the world, didn’t it stand to reason there could be opposite numbers?
That was when he made up his mind.
He had to read her name in the Mass tomorrow. Choke the hex off at its source.
He ran from St. Brigid’s to the Blue Line. His knee bounced anxiously the whole ride, and he nearly killed himself throwing himself down the stairs to the street.
He walked cautiously after that. What if that was her hex working on him?
He went steady and carefully to the bodega.
It was closed. No note on the door, but he got from a boy smoking outside that someone had died in the family.
He walked around to the back alley in his desperation, thinking he might be able to jimmy the back door and….and what? Pull a roaster from the cooler? No live chickens passed that back room. They came on a truck. There was nothing in the shop. Nothing he could use.
He rode the train back home.
He thought about Mary Ladhe. Where did she live? Even if he knew, so what? He couldn’t very well go to the woman’s house and strangle her in her kitchen.
But he knew someone who could.
At home he rang Peachy Muldoon.
“Fadder, that you?”
“Peachy, I’ve a favor to ask you.”
“I told you if I heard anything about the stakes I’d tell you, right?”
“It’s not about the stakes, Peachy. I need you to do something else for me.” He lowered his voice, even drew the blind. “What would it cost me, Peachy? That is, if I were to hire you to do a job.”
“A job?”
“I won’t pull any of that old times’ sake crap on you. I’ve got my share from O’Bannon. I’ll give it to you if you want.”
“Fadder, don’t say that. Er….who’s Michael O’Bannon?”
“I didn’t say his first name, you…” Father Tim sighed, regained himself.
“Look Fadder,” said Peachy. “I don’t know what you heard, but I don’t do them kinda jobs no more.”
“Peachy, please. It’s an old woman. No trouble at all. Mary Ladhe. Her name’s Mary Ladhe. All you gotta do is find her…”
The phone went dead.
He dialed Peachy again. Got a busy signal.
He stood by the window.
He needed a sacrifice. It was getting dark. On the corner, under the streetlamp, a black kid maybe ten years old waited for the bus, bobbing his head to something piping through his ear buds. It was late. Nobody on the street. Too late for a kid like that to be out alone. They listened to their music so loud, these black kids. You could come right up on them and they’d never know.
Not a black rooster, but…
He went to open the lock box, but found in his haste he’d left his keys in the sacristy.
It took him a half hour to break the box open with a hammer and get at the knife. By the time he did the bus and the black kid had come and gone.
He sat in his bed with the knife and stared into the shadows of his room, waiting for some flock of black winged sluagh to come smashing through his window clamoring and screeching for his soul. He tried to doze, but would snap awake, hearing the hoofbeats of the headless Dullahan coming to claim him, realizing with a hollow chuckle that it was only the steady tramp of his own blood in his ears.
But he didn’t sleep.
The next morning he trudged off to St. Brigid’s exhausted and feeling foolish, wondering if he’d dreamt the entire encounter between himself and Mary Ladhe.
Father Matthew was there already with coffee and Dunkies.
“I found your keys on the table, and your vestments hanging out of your closet, Father,” he said. “Are you alright?”
“I’m fine, Father,” he said. “Will you be alright to lead the Mass today?”
“Yes, I think so,” said Father Matthew. “I have everything I need.”
“Mrs. Villalobos, she gave you the intercessions list?”
“Well I have the list, yes…”
“Good,” Father Tim said tiredly, going to his closet. “You’ll be fine.”
Mass was a blur. He sat in the chair and blinked bleary eyed at the stupid faces of the congregation. He was getting old, for one night without sleep to do him in so badly.
He moved his mouth for the responses, aped the rising and kneeling mechanically, muttered through the First Reading. It was like his altar boy days. Six thirty Mass, barely awake, going through the motions. He had been tired the day he’d dropped the Host too.
He let Father Matthew do the lions share. Read the Gospel, lead the choir, sing. He nearly fell asleep during the young priest’s homily, but it must have been a cracker because the people laughed and were all smiles when they rose for the intercessions.
Father Matthew prayed for America.
“Lord hear our prayer,” said the respondents.
He prayed for the unbelievers, that they might come to know the love of God.
“Lord hear our prayer.”
He prayed for the indigent and the sick, the suffering and maybe for aborted babies and their mothers.
“Lord hear our prayer.”
He prayed for the recently departed, rounding it off with;
“…and for Timothy O’Herlihey, we pray to the Lord.”
Father Tim’s eyes snapped wide open in disbelief.
And the first person he saw, sitting in the front pew, staring right back at him with a smug and portentous smile on her desiccated lips, was Mary Ladhe.
He rose trembling from his chair.
“You bitch!”
His roaring voice boomed over the microphone clipped to his robes and the collective intake of breath that burst from the people in the pews was infinitely more aghast than the one that had driven him from the Church when he was eleven.
He ignored it. Stomped across the marble floor and to the podium, eliciting more gasps as he reached up and tore the list from Father Matthew’s fingers.
There was the list of the dead, in Mrs. Villalobos’ hand…except for the final name, penciled in a broad, bold hand.
His own.
She had intercepted the list somehow, wrote in his name, and given it to Father Matthew herself.
The blood pounded in his ears, boiled in his head and face, coloring him a bright pink.
He gnashed his teeth and flung the paper down, tearing away his stole and vestments as he jumped down the steps and clambered over the communion rail. The mic squealed and whined and cut off as he ripped it free and flung it down.
People were getting up from their seats, looking fearful, amused, bewildered, drawing their children back, crossing themselves.
He locked eyes with Mary Ladhe as he stalked past her down the center aisle. She alone was unperturbed, and sat primly in her seat, a slight smile on her face, eyes unflinching from his.
He had to get out of her sight. Had to get out of this church. It was hot in here. So hot. His face was burning up. His head. His chest was tightening. There was a sharp pain in his left wrist.
Was this how it would come?
No. He had to get air.
He ran pell mell down the center aisle, burst through the doors and staggered down the steps.
The bus that struck him out of his shoes carried him twenty feet like the coyote in the cartoons, his face mashed like a waffle against the grill. The horn blaring in surprise at his sudden appearance in the street sounded to him like a blaring trumpet blown by the lungs of a wrathful archangel.
Who knew? Maybe that’s what it was.
#
Father Matthew kept his hand clamped over his mouth as the coroner wagon pulled away from the curb. He didn’t want the people gathered in front of the church to see his curling lips. He had to be strong for them.
He wondered though, if anyone would pick up Father Tim’s bloody shoe, and if tomorrow the long trail of blood on the street would be washed away. He wondered if he should get a hold of the janitor or maybe do it himself to spare the schoolchildren coming home in a few hours the sight.
A small, but firm hand clutched his elbow and he looked over to see Mrs. Ladhe looking at him, her blue eyes brimming with compassion.
“I’m so sorry, Father Matthew,” she said, “it’s a tragedy. And on your first day too.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Ladhe,” he said, patting her dry, bony hand. “I’m only worried about the…I worry the children will see something they shouldn’t.”
“You’re a good priest, Father Matthew,” said Mrs. Ladhe. “But Mrs. Villalobos told me she rang Eladio and he’s on his way to clean things up. You needn’t worry.”
“Oh thank God.”
“Why don’t you come over to my house for dinner? You don’t want to go home and cook for yourself now.”
“I could never impose. I should stay and help Eladio.”
“Ah, it’s a good priest you are. Well, do as you see fit. I’ll have a plate of leftovers waiting for you in the sacristy in the morning. Fresh roast chicken,” she said, smiling.
“Thank you, Mrs. Ladhe. That’s very kind of you.”
She turned then, and hobbled off down the street, the lights of the squad car and ambulance splashing the bloody street in alternating blue and red.
Johnny Two Places
Mark Mellon
Tall and thin, the black mambo dancer swayed in the spotlight. Twelve almost naked chorus girls kick-stepped behind him, dazzling beauties all. Chico Orquitez and his twenty-three piece orchestra played swinging Afro-Cuban jazz full tilt from the dais, rhythmic, loud, insistent. The mambo dancer flashed a dazzling grin at the dancing guests and sang in a clear, fine tenor, “Prestame tu caballo.”
The dance floor held over a hundred couples, dressed to the nines, mostly Americans with money to burn. More guests sat at tables and marveled at the glass ceiling and the gourmet cuisine. A world-class casino adjoined the nightclub, open twenty-four hours, closed only for Xmas. The Colonia Privada, the swankest joint in Havana, a fixture on the tourist circuit for everyone, great and small, from celebrity to nobody.
Johnny sipped his scotch. Five percent of the Colonia was his, drinks, gambling, whores, drugs. At least ten thousand American every week, regular as clockwork. All his, tutto. The thought was so delicious and fresh it was still hard to digest.
Flora Lane, that night’s hot, stacked blonde, leaned over and squeaked delicious, hot breath into one ear. “Johnny. What’d you say your name was in Italian again, hon?”
Johnny smiled and gave her a whiskey-scented kiss. “Giovanni DueLuoghi.”
Flora threw back her head and laughed with a great display of clea
vage. She gulped down more champagne. “No wonder you’re called Johnny Dew. That’s too hard to say. What’s it mean?”
“Forget it, kid. Drink up. After the show, I show a’ you my place. She’s by Varadero beach.”
Flora shot him a significant look and giggled. Johnny flashed back an honest, open wolf’s leer.
“Hey, if it ain’t Johnny Dew. My favorite asshole and new partner.”
Connubio slammed a beefy hand onto Johnny’s shoulder. His square, bald head was only inches away from Johnny’s, bad teeth bared in a sneer.
“What’s this you got with you? Another comare? Che uomo, this guy.”
Connubio wedged his bulk into a chair. He turned over a clean tumbler and poured himself scotch from Johnny’s bottle.
“Hey, bring some ice over here,” he yelled over the music. “Ain’t you going to introduce me?”
“Sure. Flora Lane. Flora, meet Pete Connubio.”
“Pleased to meet you.” Connubio enfolded Flora’s delicate hand in a meaty paw. “What brings you to sunny Habana, honey?”
“I got off the Mariposa yesterday. I’m here for a week and I ran into Johnny at the track today. He offered to show me around. Isn’t that too funny?”
“Oh, yeah, that’s a riot. A regular Jackie Gleason gut-buster. I suppose Johnny told you what a big deal hotshot he is.”
“He told me he’s a businessman and that he owns part of this place. Isn’t that great? Are you an owner here too, Pete?”
“Oh, yeah. You bet I am, honey. A lot more than the young Sicilian here.”
“Why talk a business? Let’s have fun. Capisci, Pietro?”
Connubio glared at Johnny, but before he could say anything, an old black woman tugged at Johnny’s sleeve. Frail and bent, a glittering tiara made from paste perched at an odd angle on her gray head. She clutched a pack of greasy, worn cards in one hand.
“Tell fortune, Señor? Only twenty-five cents.”
Connubio scowled. “Who let you back in again, you goddamn crazy old bat? Swear to God in Heaven above I’m going to fire that doorman. Get the hell out of my joint right now.”
He raised his drink to throw it at the old woman. Johnny put a hand to Connubio’s wrist.