The Miracles of Santo Fico

by D. L. Smith

  “Snip above the five-leaf cluster if you want a flower,” she would say and his father would laugh.

  “You love those roses more than the vines,” he would call to her from across the field.

  And she would call back, “When you have so many to tend to the vine, someone must be willing to love the rose.”

  And when the vines were rich with leaves and the thick, full bunches of grapes dragged down near the ground, at the head of each row stood a guardian rosebush bursting with flowers—each bush a different color, and each color more vibrant than the last. And he remembered that his father would come out just after sunrise and cut armfuls of cool roses and take them back home to his mother.

  “These fields are haunted,” Leo thought aloud and he knew that he had denied his ghosts as long as he could.

  Leo pushed his way through the tall weeds at the top of the hill that was the highest point on the farm and went directly to an ancient pipe that seemed to sprout directly out of the ground. At the center of the old pipe was a rusted worm screw and the other end opened over a wooden trough that pointed down the hill and became lost in the overgrowth of weeds. With a bit of searching Leo found a short length of iron bar that was designed to be levered into the top of the worm screw, and then he spent the next half hour tugging and pushing until, at last, the screw turned. Clear water shot through the cobwebs at the end of the pipe and washed down the dusty trough toward the bottom of the hill.

  Leo used up the rest of the day with a shovel in his hand, racing along ancient ditches, trying to outrun the water that rushed down the hill to the olive orchard. Once he was there, he opened this gate or he shut that gate, skillfully diverting water from one row to another, until all the rows of olive trees were islands in a series of long, thin shimmering lakes. Then the race began again as the water tumbled through a new series of ditches, across the fields, and toward the vineyard.

  At last, Leo sat on the bank of the irrigation ditch and watched the water roll by, just as he had when he was a boy. He watched the water disappear into the thirsty ground around the vines and the rosebushes. He watched the swifts dart overhead and chase the tiny insects that hovered above the water. In the afternoon, the Lombolo horses came by for a drink, but when they saw Leo sitting on the bank they kept their distance. When, after a safe minute, he didn’t wave a hat or shout at them angrily, they came to the ditch and drank. Leo watched them drink. And he watched the swifts darting and diving through the air.

  That evening Leo walked along the cliffs above the sea as he made his way back to the shepherd’s hut. He knew he was making mistakes. He was pruning the olive trees in the wrong season. His watering was washing away too much topsoil around the vines. But he didn’t care. He would do better tomorrow.

  The smoke coming from the Pizzola place could be seen all the way from the top of the north coast road. Topo was on his way to see Leo because he just couldn’t stand the pressure and this whole miracle business was making his life far too complicated. Every time he even crossed the piazza, he could see Marta watching him from a hotel window and he could swear he saw prison bars reflected in her eyes. This whole thing was Leo’s fault, but if Leo couldn’t fix things, then it was up to Topo. He had an idea. They had tried Leo’s miracles. Now maybe it was time to try one of his. Leo Pizzola wasn’t the only one who could come up with miracles.

  Topo forgot all of these concerns when he saw the great billows of black smoke rising from where he thought the Pizzola house to be. He hadn’t planned on running, but he did. By the time he arrived at the sad old house he had slowed. The house wasn’t burning, at least for the moment. The smoke came from farther down the trail, from the olive grove.

  To his astonishment Topo found Leo hauling great cart-loads of dried weeds and dead branches out from under the trees and across the path, well away from the grove. He stacked them in a pile near the edge of a large circle that he had cleared in the dry grass. Nonno stood on the bare dirt inside the circle, patiently and carefully feeding a roaring fire. He took debris from Leo’s pile and, when he judged the time right, tossed it onto the blaze. The gray dog sat near a waiting garden hose that had been laid out just in case. As Topo walked by him, the dog gave him a reassuring blink— should the need arise, he was ready with the hose.

  “Are you crazy? This is the wrong season to burn,” shouted Topo above the roar of the flames. “You burn in the fall. You could burn this whole place down.”

  “We’re being careful,” said Leo and he walked back to the olive grove. He didn’t need to be reminded he was out of season.

  Topo followed at his heels and he noticed that many of the trees seemed to be standing up straighter. They looked like olive trees again and many of the rows were raked clean. Topo liked what he saw; this was closer to the way it should be, but he was confused.

  “Why are you doing this? I thought you wanted to sell this place.”

  “I do,” Leo lied. “Do you see a lot of buyers banging on the door? Nobody’s going to buy it looking like this.”

  That made sense to Topo and Leo was content that his friend had other things on his mind and didn’t press the matter.

  “I need to talk to you.”

  Leo checked out Nonno’s supply of fuel. He could take a break for a few minutes, so they found a shady spot beneath a tree. Topo glanced around to make sure that neither Nonno nor the dog could overhear.

  “How’s the fresco?”

  “Fine.”

  “Don’t you think maybe you should move it? I mean, just while Nonno’s staying there?”

  “No. It’s fine where it is,” Leo lied again. The truth was, his heart stopped every time Nonno came in the door. It was as if the fresco howled at him from beneath the cot. In fact, every time Nonno moved around the room, Leo was sure he was going to suddenly point at the bundle beneath the bed and exclaim, “Hey! What’s that? It looks like something you stole from a church!” The fact of the matter was, Leo was working hard to not think about frescoes, or fortunes, or miracles.

  “I’ve got a plan,” Topo said, grinning slyly.

  Well . . . It wouldn’t hurt to listen.

  The plan that Topo presented, Leo thought, was exactly the kind of plan Topo would devise. It was theatrical and flamboyant—filled with drama and spectacle. It had plot, a script, a cast, and special effects—and it was really pretty good. Topo’s idea was deceptively straightforward. If the problem was that Father Elio felt God had rejected him because of some big, mysterious sin, then instead of trying to come up with things that would prove that God loved him, why not just have someone tell him that God still loved him? The miracle was not in the message, but in the messenger. It should be an angel, come down from heaven.

  As Topo dramatically described the scene, Leo felt goose bumps roll down his arms. By the time the excited little fellow reached the story’s denouement, he was having difficulty speaking because of the catch in his voice and even Leo found himself choking back a tear. When Topo was finished and they sat silently beneath the olive tree, Leo was convinced of two things: first, this was a good plan, perhaps the best—and second, if Guido Pasolini had grown up in Hollywood, he might have ruled the world.

  For the plan to work, a number of things had to happen and quickly. Topo talked about costumes and makeup, about special lighting, and a script—he would take care of all of these things. The one thing he couldn’t do for the production (and he actually called it “the production”) was cast the role of the Angel. For that he needed Leo. The Angel was critical. She had to be angelic—which was to say, beautiful. She had to be someone that Father Elio wouldn’t recognize—which was to say, someone who didn’t attend church much. And, she had to be an actress. They both knew there was only one person in Santo Fico who could possibly fit this bill.

  SEVENTEEN

  A small bell above the door rang as Leo entered and reminded him that he had been in Angelica Gian-carlo’s beauty shop before. Many years ago he had once delivered a mes
sage to his aunt Sofia, who used to have her hair straightened there when the small shop was still run by Angelica’s mother. The delivery was hasty. There would have been no need for him to hang around, since Angelica had deserted Santo Fico a couple of years earlier. But now, so many years later, he still recognized the equipment: those turquoise and pink vinyl chairs with the chrome arms, the strange sink with hoses and a depression in the front, and those stands with helmets that looked like something out of an old science fiction movie. A caustic chemical odor still hung in the air and stung his nostrils and made his head light and his stomach heavy. It smelled like something that was probably harmful if you inhaled it long enough.

  But his strongest memory of this place happened many years ago, outside, on the street. It was a thing that Leo would remember forever and yet he also knew that he would never mention it to anyone—even Angelica. He wouldn’t know what to say.

  It was November. A cold north rain had been battering the village for a week and for some forgotten reason Leo was late for school. Racing down the narrow, rain-slick streets he turned a corner and was met by an extraordinary sight. On the far side of the street a strange car was parked in front of the Giancarlo house. Any unknown car in Santo Fico was an event to be investigated, so naturally Leo slowed his pace. The small brown Fiat took up most of the street and even from where he stood, Leo could see that the back seat was loaded with luggage. A stranger wearing a dark suit and sporting a thin waxed mustache waited uncomfortably behind the wheel. Leo had no idea who he was, but he knew instantly that he hated him as much as he had ever hated anyone.

  At the door of the house Angelica and her mother stood motionless in the biting wind and stinging rain, locked in an embrace that neither of them was willing to release. They wept bitterly. At last Angelica broke away, turned to an upstairs window, and stared at the streaked glass. Leo found it odd that she would stare at a black, empty window, but as he moved down the street, he became aware of a faint figure framed there. It was Angelica’s father and the look on his face stopped Leo in his tracks. It was a face carved in stone; a face that only knew regret and it existed only to carry a pair of bottomless, anguished eyes. Leo had never seen such pain, and like a nightmare apparition, it made him think of death. He prayed he would never have anguished eyes look at him the way those eyes cried out to Angelica. But of course he did when he broke his own father’s heart.

  At last the statue face turned away from the window and then Angelica turned away too. She was climbing in the passenger door of the Fiat when she suddenly looked across the street—and there was Leo. He hadn’t realized that he was so openly, shamelessly, staring at her, but he didn’t care. All that mattered was Angelica was leaving and she was obviously unhappy. Both of these things filled the thirteen-year-old with longing and confusion, because at his age there was no difference between childish lust and love. He wasn’t sure she even knew his name, but still he wanted to run to her and take her in his thin child’s arms and protect her. And in the instant that their eyes met Leo pledged silent volumes concerning passion, acceptance, and forgiveness. Then she smiled at him. It was an adult smile of acknowledgment and gratitude for what his child’s heart had declared. A moment later, the car door slammed shut, the brown Fiat sputtered to life, and Angelica disappeared down the narrow street in a haze of exhaust.

  This was all that Leo was to know of Angelica Giancarlo’s puzzling departure. He often wondered if she remembered that day and him being there. And now he wondered what she might say to discover him standing in her beauty shop. He needn’t have worried.

  A moment later, when she swung through the sunflower print curtain that separated her small shop from the rest of the house and discovered Leo Pizzola smiling at her, Angelica’s jaw dropped and she briefly lost all power of speech. Her mind raced—What on earth was he doing here? This was a grievous breach in the etiquette of their unspoken arrangement and for an instant she wanted to run from the room, but decided instead that she must face it out. She also decided that if he said anything, even the slightest hint of their secret and unacknowledged rendezvous at the swimming beach, she would slap his face and order him out of her shop. And she would never swim there again.

  To her great relief, Leo was polite and respectful. He even called her “Signorina Giancarlo” until she demurely gave him permission to address her as Angelica. He held his hat in his hand and stood respectfully, until she graciously invited him to sit. His eyes looked only at her eyes or at the floor and she never caught him glancing hungrily at other parts of her body, like most men did. He was more than polite; he was charming.

  She did have a moment of serious misgivings when, completely out of the blue, he asked, “Do you attend mass regularly?”

  Could she possibly have misread Leo Pizzola that drastically? Was he here to convince her to repent? Maybe he wanted her to go to church with him. So she cautiously admitted to him that, no, she didn’t attend church on a regular basis . . . And yes, it had been some years since she had been to confession . . . And no, she would not say that she was close to Father Elio, although, of course, she had known him all her life and respected him greatly. In fact, she hadn’t had an occasion to see Father Elio since she returned to Santo Fico some seven years ago.

  “Our paths just don’t seem to cross,” she said with an uncomfortable giggle.

  Two people in Santo Fico not crossing paths in seven years is quite a feat, thought Leo, and he wondered if he could learn her secret.

  When Leo explained to her about poor Father Elio’s crisis of faith, it was obvious that her heart was touched. When Leo explained, in strictest confidence, the plan he and Guido Pasolini had in mind (“Who?” . . . “Topo?” . . . “Oh, Topo!”), she was inspired. And when Leo told her that they needed a beautiful actress to play the part of the Angel, she actually wept. He sat next to her on the tiny chrome and vinyl sofa for what seemed like a long time until Angelica was finally able to tell him that she would “be honored to take on the role of the Angel to save dear Father Elio’s faith.” And she meant it.

  Leo assured her that Guido . . . er, Topo was taking care of all of “the production” details and he would get a script to her that afternoon. She and Topo could discuss costumes and makeup then. Leo could only imagine how much they would both enjoy that. He told her that the “performance” would be that night in the grove behind the church, and then, after an odd exchange of bows, Leo departed.

  If anyone in Santo Fico had a crisis with a toaster, radio, power drill, or any other appliance or contrivance that particular afternoon, they would have discovered the Pasolini Fix-It Shop closed for the day. Topo was a man finally following his true calling, but what worried Leo was his friend’s sense of spectacle. What they needed was a poignant, uncomplicated little miracle. A Divine Being quietly appears in the forest and restores the simple faith of a defeated old priest. Leo feared Topo’s approach fell somewhere between Quo Vadis? and Ben Hur. He also found a few things downright confusing.

  “Why do you need all the extension cord?”

  “To plug in the movie projector.”

  “Why do you need a movie projector?”

  “To run the movie.”

  “Why are you going to run a movie?”

  “To create the unearthly light, the angelic glow.”

  “Won’t it just look like a movie?”

  “No. We use something black and white. Then we run the projector at a slow speed and blur the focus so everything’s all fuzzy. Then, I slowly wiggle my fingers in front of the lens and that distorts everything more. Remember, we’re projecting on tree branches and bushes. Nobody’ll recognize anything. I still haven’t picked what film to use. Something black and white. No subtitles, of course.”

  “Oh, of course.”

  “This needs a classic. La Strada! What do you think?” Leo thought he liked the idea better when Topo was describing it under the olive tree. He weighed his words carefully. This was, after all, Topo’s miracle
and he didn’t want to get in his way. Just because Leo didn’t understand, that didn’t mean it wouldn’t work.

  “Doesn’t the movie projector make a lot of noise?”

  Topo spun completely around and clapped his hands in the air. “Blankets!”

  “Blankets?”

  “We wrap the projector in blankets. It’s done all the time. All this stuff is done all the time.”

  Leo shrugged and nodded as if he understood.

  “Have you written anything for Angelica? She’s expecting you any time now and she’s nervous.”

  It seemed to Leo that every time he mentioned Angelica Giancarlo’s name, Topo became noticeably tense. And earlier, when he’d questioned Leo—in great detail—about his interview with her at the beauty shop, Topo had suddenly developed an uncharacteristic stutter. But now he just reached in his pocket, handed Leo a crumpled sheet of paper, and went back to digging through his film canisters. Leo read what was written and immediately felt better about the whole thing.

  “Topo, this is . . . This is . . . good. This is kind of beautiful.” Topo grunted and tore through more canisters looking for his Fellini section. “Yeah. I’ll take it over to Anga-Anga-Anga-elica’s in a little bit . . . La Strada . . . That’ll do the trick. You need to talk to Marta . . . Where’s my Fellini!”

  Going to the hotel wasn’t nearly as foreboding as it had once been. Leo still wasn’t sure what kind of reception he might receive, but Marta rarely greeted him with shocked outrage and shouting anymore. As he walked up the hill from the fix-it shop, he tried to understand why she had become so thoroughly sour. Why she felt the way she did about him was, of course, all too clear, but it was more than that. Since he’d been around her, he’d seen that it went well beyond just disdain for him personally. She was bitter about life, and that troubled him.