Alligator Bayou - Donna Jo Napoli [64]
I gulp. “Have you seen a giant snapper?”
Cirone doesn’t answer.
I push myself up on my elbows. “Tell me.”
“Stay down or you’re going to get us both in trouble.”
“Did you go back to Alligator Bayou? Did you go with the boys without me?”
“Loggerheads sell for a dollar fifty apiece. A giant one sells for two dollars.”
Where was I? Where was I when Cirone was out hunting turtles? “How much did you make?”
“Five dollars. But split among the four of us.”
“Still, a lot.”
“Don’t be jealous. You hate the swamp.”
That’s not the point. “What else have you done without me?”
“It don’t matter.”
“It does too. I met them first.”
“So?”
“So they’re my friends first.”
“That ain’t how it works and you know it. Friends is like teeth; ignore them and they go away.”
“Who taught you to say that?”
“Ben’s mamma.”
Cirone’s been in Ben’s house. I want to punch something. “I haven’t acted unfriendly.”
“Come on, Calo. Who’d you spend time with at the Fourth of July picnic?”
Patricia. If I have to choose between the boys and Patricia, she’s my choice. But I don’t want to choose. “Can we all do something together? Maybe tomorrow night?”
“Tomorrow?” says Cirone. “I’ll ask the others.”
“Thanks.”
Wednesday supper is like a party. Frank Raymond is here, but that’s no surprise. When he showed up with me on Sunday and raved about the spaghetti, Carlo insisted he come back every night. The first tomatoes from our own garden were in the sauce that night—so good.
Tonight Father May is here, too. That makes it a party. It turns out Frank Raymond knows a lot about the Catholic religion, though he’s Lutheran. And Father May likes to drink wine, whether it’s part of the Mass or not. Supper so far has been a long discussion about popes and the method for choosing the next one. Pope Leo XIII is almost ninety years old, after all.
My uncles don’t talk. Probably they stopped listening, since the conversation is fast and in English. Cirone and I don’t talk, either. Cirone keeps yawning. I have to work to keep my own mouth shut.
Frank Raymond turns to Cirone. “What do you think of all this?”
“I don’t,” says Cirone.
That was rude. I kick him under the table.
“What about you, Calogero?”
“The cardinals will do a good job choosing someone else.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“They always do.”
“Hmm.” Frank Raymond looks at Father May. “If the cardinals always did a good job choosing a new pope, do you think that would constitute a miracle?” He laughs.
Father May doesn’t laugh. “The nature of a miracle is no joke.”
Frank Raymond’s face goes serious. “What is a miracle, Father?”
My uncles come to attention. The English word miracle—so close to our word miraculu—is dear to them.
“A wonder. A power given to a human by God, to show His grace.”
“Is having a baby a miracle?” asks Cirone.
I blink at him. “What a dumb question. A mouse can have a baby.”
“You really think it’s dumb?” Frank Raymond folds his arms on the table and leans toward me. “It’s life where there wasn’t life before.”
“Calogero’s right,” says Father May. “A mouse can do it. A cockroach can do it. It’s natural. A miracle isn’t natural. It must be divine. It must be something that happens only through the grace of God.”
“Dead.” Carlo speaks slowly and deliberately. I know it’s because he feels odd saying an English word, but the effect is that it feels like a pronouncement from on high. We all look at him. “Dead…then alive.”
“Right,” says Father May. “Raising the dead is a miracle.”
“Water, wine,” says Giuseppe. This may be the first time I’ve ever heard him speak English.
“Turning water into wine,” says Father May. “That’s right. That’s a miracle.”
“Hmm,” says Frank Raymond. “That makes me think of what Spinoza said. He called miracles violations of nature.”
Father May stands, his mouth open in shock. “Spinoza was a Jew.”
“So?”
Father May looks from Frank Raymond to me. “Has he been teaching you heretical ideas?”
“He’s a good teacher. We don’t talk about God.”
“A good teacher who does not talk about God?” Father May’s voice rises. “That’s impossible—a contradiction.