by D. L. Smith
Leo spent the rest of that day wandering the halls of the museum, but he wasn’t interested in the paintings and statues anymore. He spent his time questioning everyone he could about the possible value of a work of art. Mostly he wanted to know how much a fresco by Giotto might be worth if it somehow happened to fall off a wall. By late afternoon he had made the guards nervous enough for them to suggest that it was time for him to go. And it was. He had learned all he needed.
Now, sixteen years later, sitting in the stifling stone hut and staring into those enigmatic plaster eyes that seemed to see something just over his shoulder, Leo was again plagued by “could be worth a fortune.” He used his sleeve to wipe away the torrent of sweat that drenched his forehead, and when he looked down he discovered a dirty stain he’d just left on the arm of his linen jacket. The suit was ruined. He shouldn’t have worn it yesterday morning. Was that just yesterday morning? He took off the tired jacket and thought of the little tailor shop off State Street. He’d had a date with someone and needed something nice. Who was she? Women’s faces catalogued through his mind like a Rolodex. It struck him as odd that he could remember the face of the tailor that sold it to him. He could even remember who was tending bar the evening he strutted into the Chop House wearing his new linen suit for the first time, but he couldn’t remember the face of the woman on his arm. He couldn’t remember any of their faces or their names. There had been lots of women. Why couldn’t he remember them? He remembered his suit. To hell with it. With what they were going to get for the fresco, he could buy a closetful of linen suits.
Topo had actually raised a couple of good questions and so he tried to put his weary mind to some productive use. It was obvious that two things were going to be difficult. The first was finding the right person to handle the transaction. He knew guys who knew guys in Chicago—or maybe he just knew guys who said they knew guys. Once, in a bar, one of these marginal underworld guys, known as Sally Bones, was pointed out to him. Leo was disappointed to discover a small, nervous little fellow who probably dealt in cheap watches and fake jewelry. Leo thought Sally Bones looked like Topo after too much coffee. But to find a real fence in Italy, one who understood great art—because this was, no doubt, great art—they would probably have to go to Firenze, maybe even to Roma.
The other touchy part was going to be finding out how much to ask. Should they sell them individually or as a set? They might even want to break them up a bit more. A couple of quick shots with a hammer and they have twice, three times as many little Giottos. Leo rejected that idea immediately. Also, how much is an original, undiscovered Giotto fresco worth on the open, or in this case the unopen, market? The original estimate of “could be worth a fortune” was now a bit too vague. When it came time to actually talk to someone, Leo would have to have some reasonable figures in mind. Of course, yesterday at the hotel he’d done pretty well with, “Oh, whatever you think is fair.”
A harsh pounding on the front door sent him spinning out of his chair. It rattled everything in the room, most especially his fragile brain. It seemed as though the pounding might shatter the door and he almost called out angrily to Topo, but Topo would be home by now. And even if it were Topo, he would never pound on Leo’s door with such ferocity. Thoughts buzzed around his fuzzy brain like fireflies, flashing in all directions at once and all too quick to grasp.
The painting! Saint Francis was resting comfortably on the cot, staring at something just beyond Leo’s shoulder. The pounding began again, even more insistent, and suddenly, for the first time in his life, Leo knew where Saint Francis was looking and what he was thinking. The angelic saint was staring just beyond his shoulder at the door of the hut and he was thinking, “Why don’t you answer the door, stupid!”
“Just a second!”
Leo rushed to the cot, laid the broken face of the saint flat, and threw a sheet over it.
When he opened the door and poked his head outside, the midday sun blinded him like a beacon, but Leo still almost made out the shape of Marta’s hand an instant before it cracked across his cheek. The slap stung, but what genuinely hurt was banging the side of his head against the hut’s stone wall trying to dodge her well-aimed palm.
“You rotten son of a bitch!”
Leo stepped outside and closed the door. Everything considered, he correctly appraised the situation remarkably fast.
“What the hell’d you do that for?”
“You know what I did that for, you rotten son of a bitch!” Marta telegraphed her next roundhouse right and Leo was able to dodge this one. Confronted with the fury of Marta’s rage, armed as she was with truth, and possessing the tenacity of an avenging angel, Leo chose the only safe course of action—lie as though your life depended on it.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he denied indignantly—maintaining his most sincere look of hurt bewilderment.
Marta’s fury encompassed everything. It was that ridiculous look of innocence on Leo’s long face, of course, but it was also dark years of disappointment, unspoken fears for her girls, a lifetime of hollow loneliness, and now the pain she felt from Uncle Elio. Everything swirled together and her brain crackled with electric blue flames. Leo watched a sort of madness enter her black eyes, as she screamed at him in tones that made him think his head was locked in a tightening vise. The sound made his teeth hurt. It seemed to Leo that Marta’s fingernails were growing longer the closer she swung her claws toward his eyes. She struggled to express herself, but all that came out were spurts of shrieks and horrible sounds that, in better times, probably had some relationship to speech. At last, after pawing her feet in the dirt and sputtering like a demented coffeepot, she suddenly doubled her fist and hit Leo in the stomach. Strangely enough, this seemed to calm the moment as Leo bent over gasping for breath and Marta danced in small circles clutching the wrist she feared she had just broken.
When Leo was finally able to breathe again his aggravation with Marta became pointed and he dared to face her defiantly.
“What’s the matter with you? Are you crazy? I don’t know what you’re talking about!”
Marta had determined that her wrist probably wasn’t broken and she struggled against an impulse to kick him, but remained calm enough to speak.
“The Mystery! You stole the Mystery!”
Leo’s jaw dropped almost to his chest and he stuttered in amazement, “Some . . . somebody stole . . . the Mystery?” He knew he’d overdone it.
Marta hissed through clenched teeth, “You stole it, you rotten son of a bitch!”
“Hey! Don’t call me that. You knew my mother. That isn’t nice to her memory. You shouldn’t call me that.”
He was right. Leo’s mother had been beautiful and kind and Marta had loved her like her own.
“And wouldn’t she be proud of you now. Stealing from the church, you . . .”
She wanted to call him a bastard, but that cast aspersions on his mother and his father.
“You think I stole the Mystery from the church?”
“I know you stole it.”
Leo walked to his hut, threw open the door and stepped back contemptuously. “Would you like to take a look for yourself?”
His heart pounded. If she went inside he was dead. She would have no qualms about sending him to jail if she had a chance. But Leo’s bold stare and his belligerent challenge unnerved Marta and for a moment she doubted herself. If he had the fresco, would he offer to let her search for it? The dark room just beyond the opened door seemed shadowed and forbidding to her. There was something unexpectedly dangerous in this moment that Marta found unsettling. Her brain was telling her to just go inside the little pigsty, retrieve the fresco, and prove Leo Pizzola to be a liar up to his teeth. But there was something else in her heart, more mysterious and sinister, telling her to beware.
Leo had counted on her apprehension. He tested his advantage just a little.
“Well? Come on in.”
“Does it smell as bad as you?”
/>
“I didn’t steal the painting.” And he pulled the door closed with a secret sigh of relief.
“I saw you take it.”
Leo had been prepared to play this game as far as possible, but there was something in her quiet, controlled tone that told him she had just pitched a third strike. He managed to clear his throat with, “You saw me . . . What does that mean?”
“I saw you and Topo carrying the pieces out of the church.” Leo gazed out to sea and the moment hung in the air like one of the low clouds on the horizon. He was struck by how quiet everything was. There were no gulls crying loudly as they circled over the cliff. There were no cicadas screaming from the thistles in the fields. At this particular moment even the breeze stopped swirling around them; everything was still and his dream was over. He was tired and all he wanted was sleep.
“Okay. Fine. You saw us. Call the police.”
“I’m not going to call the police.”
“Okay. Fine. Don’t call the police. I’ll take it back to the church tomorrow.”
“You won’t take it back to the church tomorrow.” “Okay! Fine! I won’t take it back tomorrow. I’ll take it back to the church this afternoon!”
“You won’t take it back to the church at all!”
“Okay! Fine! I won’t . . . ! Would you tell me what the hell you want?”
“I want you to undo what you did!”
She hadn’t really understood what she hoped to accomplish or even why she’d come here until this moment, but suddenly she knew. Leo had created this grief and he would fix it. How could he have been so selfish? Was he just pretending that he didn’t understand?
“Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”
But Leo’s dumb stare said it all—he honestly hadn’t the least notion. And so she told him about finding Father Elio sitting alone in the church, staring at that blank wall. She told him of the old priest’s tears and guilt, of how he blamed himself for the desecration, of how he felt that God was punishing him because he hadn’t been a good enough priest or steward or something. God had taken the Mystery away from the village because of Father Elio’s sin, whatever that meant. Father Elio knew this was a sign that God had abandoned him and it would take a miracle to restore God’s love to his life. And she told him of the old man’s determination to atone with an act of contrition—fasting and praying until God forgave him. This was as much as Marta could tell before anger took away her voice again and tears blurred her eyes.
Father Elio was a bigger fool than he had imagined, Leo thought to himself. Still, he didn’t like the notion of the old man sitting around blaming himself and not eating.
“How long is he going to fast?”
“As long as it takes.”
Leo understood. The old fool was going to starve himself to death. No wonder Marta had attacked him.
“I told you I would bring it back.”
“He doesn’t want it back! He can’t stand the thought that anyone from Santo Fico would steal the Mystery. He prefers to believe that God took it.”
“But when he sees that a person took it—”
“He knows a person took it, damnit! He’s not an idiot! Hell, in his heart he probably knows that it was you who took it! Don’t you see? Somebody from the village taking the Mystery is just another proof that his life has been a failure. In his mind, you’re just doing God’s will to punish him. Don’t bring it back! I mean it!” She shoved her finger into his chest like a dagger and her voice became an ominous whisper. “If you bring it back, I will call the police.”
Leo looked around for something to kick. “What the hell do you want me to do?”
“I want you to undo what you did. Make Uncle Elio know that God forgives him . . . and that He still loves him.”
“How the hell do I do that?”
“Make a miracle,” she said simply.
Even Marta was struck by the innocent sincerity of her demand. She might just as easily have requested that he close the door, or stir the soup, or tie his shoe. But as soon as she said it, she knew that a miracle was exactly what she wanted, and now expected—or else.
Leo swallowed hard. He had heard her correctly and she meant it. He could see that she meant it. She expected him to make a miracle.
“How?”
“I don’t know. You’re the clever one.”
She abruptly turned and started back across the meadow, but she stopped. She stood for a moment with her back to him before slowly returning to face him. This time her voice was soft and sincere and she chose her words carefully.
“Leo, there’s a lot . . . a lot of grief between us . . . you and me. Some of it . . . I don’t know, maybe I . . . I don’t know. But I tell you this from my heart— If Uncle Elio dies because of this, if he dies thinking that he’s been deserted by God, I’ll . . . I’ll do something.”
She pointed her finger at him again and Leo understood that he had just received a threat more dangerous than anything he’d ever faced before. She would do something and it would be terrible.
“You make a miracle.”
Then she turned again and headed back up the trail. Leo called after her.
“What should I do with the painting?”
Marta shrugged and called over her shoulder, “Throw it in the sea for all I care. I never want to see it again.” And she was gone.
The first thing Leo did was open the door and all the shutters of the hut. There was no need to hide in the sweltering dark anymore. As far as Marta was concerned the fresco belonged to him. “Throw it in the sea for all I care,” was what she said. The only witness to his crime never wanted to see it again. The treasure was once more his and this time with a crumb of backhanded approval. The sea breeze quickly filled and refreshed the room.
Leo went to the cot and pulled back the sheet, studied the panel for a moment, and for the first time in his life, he no longer cared what the saintly face was thinking. It didn’t matter anymore. He placed the panel on the table in full view for anyone who happened by and then he collapsed on the cot. No one would happen by. He’d already had his visitor. And as he lay on the cot, enjoying the moments before sleep, he thought of Marta and her miracle. He knew it was going to be a challenge, but it was one he would gladly face. One miracle equaled one ticket out of Santo Fico . . . and wealth. He had no idea what he would do, but how hard could a miracle be, anyway?
Within minutes Leo was sound asleep and dreaming of Chicago, and baseball, and the cool green grass of Wrigley Field.
THIRTEEN
By 1:30 of the next afternoon, Leo felt as if he had already performed a major miracle and any subsequent miracles would be child’s play. He spent the morning keeping Topo from either killing himself or going to the police and confessing to every unsolved crime in Toscana.
As Leo explained to his guilt-ridden accomplice, it was God who had destroyed the wall, not them. “After all,” Leo argued, “if we hadn’t saved the painting, it would have been crushed; gone forever.” So it was only logical: If God was going to destroy the painting, then God must have no more need for it. And if that was the case, shouldn’t people be allowed to take advantage of what God no longer wanted? Wasn’t Topo’s own home and shop a testament to that sort of scavenger logic? On the other hand, spiritually speaking, perhaps God had a greater purpose in mind. Perhaps He wanted the painting to join the rest of the world so people everywhere could appreciate it. And, if either of these possibilities were true, could it not also be possible that God had intended for Leo and Topo to arrive at the church exactly when they did, precisely so they could rescue the painting? Hadn’t they both prayed fervently for a long time that they should be allowed to escape Santo Fico? Who was to say that this was not the answer to their prayers? Did Topo really want to stand in the way of God’s divine will?
By the time Leo was done with him, Topo was not only convinced of the soundness of both Leo’s logic and theology, but was thinking that the town should be told of their good deed. The
y might receive a reward, or at least a testimonial, but Leo quickly persuaded him that this was perhaps going a bit too far. Then, once he felt that Topo was reasonably comfortable with the situation, it was time to move on to the more difficult task. He told Topo about his confrontation with Marta.
If Leo regarded Marta Caproni Fortino’s strength of will with respect, Topo was absolutely cowed by it. He always had been. It wasn’t that Marta had ever done anything to Topo, other than to occasionally give him a push or a solid punch in the arm when they were children. No, he was terrified of her potential—perhaps because she was a woman; perhaps because she was so remarkably beautiful; perhaps because she possessed those unknown dangers that he found so frightening and exciting.
When Leo told Topo that Marta had seen them leaving the church with the Mystery, and of Father Elio’s reaction to the disappearance, and that Marta had threatened them with prison, he wasn’t sure if his friend was going to cry or faint. Leo saw reflected in Topo’s panicked eyes all the horrors he imagined awaiting him behind the cruel iron bars of prison. But by the afternoon, Leo began to make real progress. A major hurdle was Topo accepting that they weren’t going to be thrown into a Siena prison for the remainder of their natural lives and that they were actually going to keep the painting, sell it, and make a fortune. The seeds Leo had planted in the morning hours establishing God’s will on this subject finally blossomed in the afternoon and Topo even began to show small signs of enthusiasm about creating the proper miracle that would restore Father Elio’s faith.
