by John Domini
“It’s the scippatori,“ she said at the priest’s first decent pause “Our scippatori, that’s what you’re saying. The two you’ve been hiding are the guys who hit Jay.”
Cesare may have raised his eyes, Barb couldn’t be sure. His back was to the balcony doors, and in the shadows, his face was another map of disease. In any case he hardly had a chance to nod before Jay erupted. The wife didn’t catch every word, as she studied the new plague-map above her, but she knew what her husband was saying. Hey, how long, how could you—what is this? The former lineman took hold of Cesare’s arm again. He shook the old priest and looked about to do worse before, good Papa, he shot a glance at Paul. Not that this made him any less threatening. The Jaybird went for a height advantage, firing questions with his heels off the ground.
“You had the guys? In your church, you had them? You had both those guys, and I mean. You just sat there.”
You could see kitchen grease under Jay’s fingernails. And for all the priest’s experience with unhappy wives, he didn’t know what to do about a husband. He flinched and responded in single syllables.
“How could you?” Jay asked. “How can a man just sit there?”
Barbara might’ve seen Cesare on his deathbed, but she’d never seen him so at loose ends, the fractured Jesuit Dominican. He stuttered as he tried to get into details. The two clandestini had showed up at his door the night of the mugging. Scrawny, in cheap jeans and T’s, and one of them bruised deeply under his eye, both clandestini nonetheless brimmed with a naive certainty that the Church could wash them clean. At each word they spoke, Cesare had heard the echo of his own emptiness. He’d heard how his soul had become a husk, pitted by years of neglect and baked in the Mezzogirno. After that it had taken the priest a couple of days, talking further with these two, before he was convinced that they had in fact…they had, in fact…
“Hey,” Jay said. “Don’t stop now, buster. What’d they tell you?”
“Quite,” said Cesare. “They told me, yes, that’s it, quite.”
Scowling, Jay once more seized the old man’s arm.
“They told me,” the priest repeated. “It was confession.”
The Jaybird rocked back, hands at his sides. He and Barbara got it at once, how deeply the sacrament mattered to Cesare, fractured and in need of a splint. Confession must’ve been the man’s primary mode of communication with the two refugees, and now when his faith was still trembling from the effort of resurrection, the sanctity of his priestly rituals meant everything. How could he violate the clandestini‘s trust? Cesare bit his tongue, making a show of it, so that even with the shadow you couldn’t miss the wet red muscle bulging between his teeth. Barbara didn’t see why he had to do that, especially not staring down at Paul the way he was, but she admired the man’s backbone. Aurora too grinned a bit, something more than polite.
“Come on.” Jay reined in his tone. “Cesare, all due respect. I mean.”
Then there was the eleven-year-old, all eyes, drawing his knees to his chin as he stared at the priest’s tongue.
“Hey, Mr. Paul,” said Jay. “Hey guy. You know. What you did was good.”
The priest startled and turned, dropping his face into his hands.
“Everything else, it’s mixed up. It’s for grownups, it’s mixed up. But Mr. Paul, big guy, what you did—you know. That was good.”
The next breath of out Cesare sounded choked, a sob. At that, Aurora spoke up. “Cesare,” she said, “honestly. You must realize that the only person in this room who was ever interested in your soul, absolutely and truly interested, was myself”
Barbara looked up from Paul, then on second thought let the woman talk.
“Your Aura was the only one who cared,” she went on. “I did, absolutely. ‘To live to err, to fall, to triumph’—that’s Stephen Dedalus, as I’m sure you know. And had anyone asked, I’d have said old Stephen was talking about you and me.”
Jay and Paul had turned to the old woman as well.
“Now, honestly, Cesare. In the name of my caring, quite genuine while it lasted, I have to ask whether there isn’t something you can do.”
The priest, his fingers slipping beneath his eyes, gave the beginning of a nod.
PAUL had the heightened sympathy levels; he began nodding too, waving a hand at the old man. “He, the priest, he, it w-wasn’t so bad, what he, he did. Help, helping those guys, h-hiding them. It wasn’t so bad, because if, if h-he, he, if he helped them, he, he knew, then w-we weren’t in a-any danger. The family.”
The boy pointed out that the scippatori had been ashamed of what they’d done. They’d been frightened “a-about going to Heh, Heh, Heh, to H-Heh—”
“Okay,” Jay put in. “Maybe they weren’t such a threat, those two. But at this point, that’s all I’ll give the guy.”
“See but, see but they a-already got rid of the papers. Like, the pass, passports.”
“Paulie,” Barbara said, “this is very nice of you, but can you see—”
“Hey. Look at it the other way around. Those two took our stuff, they took it and they made some money off it.”
“A-and they, they got h-h-hit, for it. One, one of them w-was banged up.”
“Cesare?” Aurora asked. “Have you come up with something, after all? Some nice piece of Jesuitical logic?”
The black figure at the center of the room had pulled himself together. He extended an arm in blessing for the boy on the sofa, beaming with uncomplicated gratitude for another long moment. But then Cesare asked if anyone had noticed where he’d left his shoes.
“I believe you’ll find then beneath one of the dining-room chairs.” Aurora drew her lips into a hard red knob. “Are you going somewhere?”
“I am,” the priest said, “and I hope your son and his wife will come with me, don’t you know. I hope they’ll accompany me up to the church.”
Jay whipped round, frowning, but Cesare went on unruffled. “I know more than I can say, but I believe I don’t have to say it, in order for you to know it.”
As the old man turned towards the dining room, you could see his face better, its color. Barbara looked first to him, then to the Jaybird, and what could she show her husband except the prickly understanding that they had no choice? What, when the priest was prey to such wild moods? They couldn’t be sure what Cesare would feel like in another hour, whereas they could be sure about the kids. They’d stay put—for Paul’s sake if not for the parents’—and they’d have the grandmother with them. Barb could see at once how it would work, how it had to work, the lesser of two evils. The risk in the teenagers’ work with the gypsy was outweighed by the threat from the two outlaws who’d nearly killed the boys’ father.
Jay however looked dubious. He returned to Cesare, bent over in one of the head-of-table chairs, on the other side of the open double-doors to the dining area.
“If you’ve got something at the church, I guess I want to see it.” The husband kept his voice businesslike. “I mean, that’s the plan, right? Something at the church?”
The old man nodded without straightening up.
“Okay.” Jay lifted his chin, impressed. “Okay, we look at that, and you’ve still got your sacrament. Good plan.” The Vice President of Sales. “But after that, it’s like I say. Everything’s got to be on a new basis.”
The priest’s head came up while one foot waggled into its loafer. He declared that parents needed to see what he had for them; they needed to “understand the forces arrayed against them from the start, here.”
Jay frowned again, puzzled, grumbling. Barb wondered about the police. That was the last thing she needed, today, another visit to the precinct station.
“But beyond that,” Cesare said, “I don’t see that I’d need to have any more dealings with your family whatsoever.”
Aurora clucked her tongue and put her back to the man. It took her a moment to notice Paul, but when she did, the woman cocked an eyebrow, playfully.
In fact the elev
en-year-old seemed the main concern, at the moment. Barbara bent to his ear, whispering a word or two. Best if the boy joined the others without additional rumpus; best if, after the things he’d seen already, he didn’t have to deal with either of the evils, lesser or greater, now facing his Mom and Pop. The middle child didn’t move, however, until Aurora made him an offer.
“You know, Paulie,” the grandmother said, “we don’t usually have all you kids together. We so rarely get an afternoon like this one, with everyone in one place. What do you say if we round up the others and put on a show?”
Just like that, the boy was ordinary again. Ordinary for a Broadway Baby, anyway: “With, with songs?” Paul asked, eyes shining.
“Oh, with songs, certainly.” The way Aurora nodded, she and Paul must’ve discussed the possibility before. “Songs and dances too, for the fairy-folk.”
“Well, well m-maybe not Chris. Chris, h-he can handle the music. H-he can, h-he can download the music, w-whatever we need.”
At the mention of the computer, the computer and her teens, Barbara tightened her hold on the middle child’s arm. Couldn’t let him go yet. Aurora didn’t fail to notice, and she caught the mother’s eye—was it the first time since they’d been yelling at each other? Quietly, so the men wouldn’t hear, she told Barb not to worry.
“Really now,” Aurora said, “we’re not so different, you and I. The children’s safety, and life of decent abundance—honestly, isn’t that all we’re hoping to achieve?”
“See,” Barbara said, “it’s hard to hear someone like you talking about ‘decent abundance.’ That’s a hard word to take, from a woman in golden velvet.”
“Oh, now.” Aurora was smiling again, but gently. “And this from a woman with five finished rooms in her basement.”
“What? Are you saying my utilities room is finished?”
The grandmother put a hand to throat, chuckling.
“As for Jay’s workshop, the kids were getting in there. Once that started, we had to put down carpet.”
“Barbara, indulge me. We’re not so utterly different. Let us say, neither one of us has so much in common with an abandoned child from Mexico.”
Barbara dropped her gaze. “I would say, when it comes to abandoned children, there’s no one who has a clue.”
Which seemed to take care of their business at home. Barbara let go of Paul, meanwhile telling the mother-in-law what she needed to know regarding Chris and JJ. “Just keep those two from sneaking away with the laptop, okay?” She didn’t have to get into the details, though she didn’t want to think about how much Aurora knew already. But there was no point doing something drastic either, like taking the machine with her when she left for the church. The boys could hardly erase Romy from their files. Soon enough the mother was running her fingers one last time through Paul’s hair, telling him to have fun. She caught a few words between Jay and the priest, and they too were finishing up. So long as you understand, Father, we can’t take long…like I say, some family business here….
As Paul picked his way around the coffee table to his grandmother, Barbara saw again how she might coexist peacefully with this woman. Peacefully, usefully—but before Barb could work out something for back in Bridgeport, maybe some help with the Saturday driving (the girls at one soccer field, the boys at another), here in Naples she had to allow the old playgirl one last dig at her momentary boyfriend.
“Oh, and Cesare.” Aurora paused between the two men, with Paul under one bright kimono-arm. “Always remember, this great revival of yours began with me.”
The old man’s prominent nose seemed to droop still lower.
“Do remember. The journey back to God began with your Aura.”
Naturally Jay and Barbara needed to check on the others, too. The girls and the teens had just finished a game of Life, and as the mother looked over the setup, it seemed like the most American thing she’d ever seen. At the center of the game board rose a plastic mountain ringed by a highway. Around it coiled suburban-style loops of road, decorated with futures so bright and various that just to look at them was like surfing through a 100-channel cable lineup. And somehow Aurora couldn’t have fit in more neatly, though it was Hindu yoga that kept her so spry, and though her shimmering clothes came from Persia and Japan. The widow settled down beside the board, tossing off a quick joke in a Noo Yawk bray. She assured the kids that their “nice old priest” was feeling much better, and breezily explained he going to “run a quick errand now with Mom and Pop.” Meantime the woman was picking up the game, she hadn’t forgotten her promise to Paul, sorting swiftly through the cards for good luck and bad.
A couple of scruffy types, perhaps clandestini, idled in the shade of the stoop as the Lulucitas emerged with their priest. But these were European, or as Euro as the golden-brown Romy. Perhaps a couple of Khazars, they might’ve been the beggars the police had stopped to check, earlier. In any case Barb knew what to do. She raised an open hand and, as she spoke her blessing, made sure they saw her lips move.
Also she dealt with her bodyguard. The young chowhound would’ve preferred to take the car, though it meant a roundabout of one-ways. Barbara had to insist, glancing up the stairs and thinking again of her mother-in-law, her trim flexibility. Here’s Neapolitan yoga, Aurora: the stairs. The security officer sighed mightily, combing the curls from his eyes with pudgy fingers. But the air on the hilltop wasn’t so heavy, so sulfur-rich, as down by DiPio’s clinic or Whitman’s studio. Besides, the gunman had Cesare to inspire him, a man in his seventies all but jogging uphill. The priest would wait for the other three at the top of each flight, his long face blazing with revival.
Barbara’s own face must’ve gone purple, because she kept talking. She filled Jay in on everything she’d learned that morning about the gypsy and the late Lieutenant Major; earlier, during the ride from DiPio’s to the Vomero, the husband had only gotten the shorthand. And more than that, the mother came to think she’d filled in a quake-wide gap in her own grasp on what had happened. As she climbed, she put it together, the news from her boys and the news from her priest. The two who’d come out of nowhere to gun down Silky Kahlberg—they must’ve been the two scippatori from the first day downtown.
“Romy was saying,” she huffed. “Guys from off the street.”
As the Jaybird took it in, he started climbing two stairs at a time.
“And a bandanna,” she went on. “Blue like the first day.”
“Guys felt guilty.”
“Felt contrition. Seeking absolution.”
“Plus Paul, hey. A holy child. To those two”
“Plus one was queer.”
This was only a guess based on a guess: the gypsy’s surmise about one of Silky’s killers. Nonetheless a gay clandestino would fit the scheme of things, as it was emerging there on the Vomero stairs. The aerobics hadn’t made Barb and Jay that dizzy. The husband got the connection, having sussed out the liaison’s sexual preference in his first week up at the Refugee Center. “See what he wanted. Nice boy-toy. Price of a pizza.” Jay understood that, for the former scippatori, the gaydar would’ve been part of the surveillance system. Part of tracking the family, seeking an opportunity to atone for what they’d done to the family, since the NATO man would’ve bragged to his sex partners (while of course giving away nothing they could use against him) about the systems he was jerking around.
“Silky’s boys,” Jay said. “They could’ve said something. Talked to our two guys.”
“This city. Always somebody talking.”
At last they reached the church, another Naples church with a cellar full of surprises. A person didn’t need to go downtown to find a Sotterraneo. The priest rushed on to the rectory but Jay and Barbara allowed themselves a breather in the narthex. Wonderful, the cool, the dim. The wife tugged at her armpits and the husband swabbed his neck as they eyed each other in a wheezing double-check of their sudden detective work. You think, Jaybird? Does it add up, Owl? Two homeless illegals had someho
w first gotten a bike, then gotten lucky. Yet after that they’d suffered such pangs of remorse that eventually, in a perverted attempt to make amends, they’d committed murder. Their victim had been more of an inveterate bad guy than either of them, but nevertheless a figure of daunting status, an American officer.
The husky bodyguard came in off the church steps, with a melodramatic exhale. That and the petulant look he shot his two charges was enough to stop Barbara’s second-guessing. How far off the truth could she and her husband be? Anyway less than a month ago, outside these same weighty blonde doors, the police had snatched her. They’d snatched her and the children, and they’d taken their sweet time about letting her know what had happened to Jay. But neither then nor now had the authorities came anywhere near the real danger to the Lulucitas. Strangers had been privy to the moves they were making and the ways they were hurting, since the first blow to Jay’s head. For all Barbara knew, the blessing she’d given five minutes ago, the vagrants outside the palazzo, could’ve been another source of information for the family’s addled scippatori.
The mother turned and headed into the sanctuary. As soon as they reached the pews the bodyguard took a seat, sinking down and spreading out.
“Jay,” Barb growled as she marched on, “I’m angry. I’m still angry.”
“I hear that. Fucking can’t get past that first day. ‘Scuse me.”
Barbara, slowing down, gave him half a smile. She suggested, more gently, that they appeared to have figured out most of what had been going on.
The Jaybird nodded. “Next couple cases of pasta should about fill the truck.”
Beside the splintered altarpiece, the rectory door, they passed a crucifix. When Barbara paused to genuflect, the husband did the same, then ventured to guess that Cesare had some of the late Lieutenant Major’s counterfeits.