The Year We Sailed the Sun Page 9

  Hyacinth blinked his rheumy brown eyes and made a sort of wheezing sound.

  I heaved a small sigh. I don’t know how anybody could have heard it; I hardly heard it myself. But the half-a-nun rested her pitchfork. “Now, now, none of that, Julia.” She put a hand on my shoulder. “There’s no need to be worrying. They’ll take good care of them, I promise you. Your sister and your brother.”

  I fought down the lump that brought to my throat. What was she now, a mind-reader?

  She studied her boots while I wiped my nose. And then she speared another forkful of hay and plopped it into the stall. “I’ll tell you what we’ll do, girls. We’ll put Saint Hyacinth on the case. There’s not a worry in the world you couldn’t hand right over to him. You only have to ask, that’s all. He’ll have the entire family patched up in—oh, no, no, I don’t mean the horse!” she added, seeing the look on my face. “Saint Hyacinth. The miracle worker. You’ve heard of him.”

  “No, Sister.”

  “The patron saint of those in danger of drowning?”

  “No, Sister.”

  “The Apostle of the North? The Confessor of Crakow? Saint Ceslaus’s brother?”

  “No, Sister.”

  “Ah, well, that’s all right.” Sister Bridget went back to her hay-pitching. “You’d know him if you had a bit of Polish in you, like Betty and me. Isn’t that so, Betty? We’re both Brickeys, you see, Julia. Betty’s father was my brother Harry—well, sure, you knew that already, didn’t you? It’s no secret. Your father and he were friends, you know. And a fine brother he was, too, no matter what you’ve heard. Brickey was Brickowski, of course, back in Poland, before our grandfather came to America. And then he settled in St. Louis and married my grandmother—she was a Walsh from County Mayo, and his sister married a Cullen from County Kildare, and later another sister came over and married a Doyle—ah, sure, they’re all our cousins, and now . . . well, you know, half the Kerry Patch is kin to the other half. So here’s our granny, you see, on the Irish side of the family, wearing the green and playing the harp on Saint Patrick’s Day, while over on the Polish side here’s our grandpa—our Dziadzio—always swearing by Saint Hyacinth. He used to say that he had cured him of his liver trouble on twelve separate occasions. Of course it killed him in the end, but not until he was nearly ninety. Don’t be chewing on that hay straw, Betty. And even when he was an old, old man, if we asked him loud enough, he would tell us the story.”

  “The story?”

  “The miracle story.” Sister’s eyes danced. “Oh my, it was marvelous. He’d wait for the darkest night of the year, or a rainy day like this one, when the wind was howling—do you hear that now? And then he’d sit in his creaky old rocker by the stove and put a finger to his lips—like this—and we’d gather close around him. And the clock would tick, and the fire would crackle, and just when we’d be wondering if he’d fallen asleep, he’d say three words real low and whispery: Chop . . . chop . . . chop . . . and our blood would start runnin’ cold. Remember, Betty? Ah, no, what am I thinking? You weren’t even born yet. It’s the light in here, that’s all. When it catches you that way, you look just like your daddy.”

  Betty grinned at us through the hay dust. Was that what Two-Bits Brickey looked like? If that was a gangster’s face, I’d start eating hay myself. And what in the world did he ever do to get himself murdered on the church steps? The whole Patch knew his name, of course, but what did that have to do with Papa? Maybe Sister was thinking of someone else—

  Chop . . . chop . . . chop . . . Betty’s left hand stabbed the air, while her right hand tugged on the half-a-nun’s sleeve. Chop . . . chop . . . chop. . . .

  She was asking for the story.

  “Well, all right, if you insist,” said Sister Bridget, with a bogus sigh, as if she wasn’t dying to tell it anyway. She sat right down on a bale of hay and tucked her legs under her like any five-year-old, and patted the straw beside her, so we’d do the same. “If you promise it won’t give you nightmares. Do you hear me, Betty? I know how you love it, but you can’t be getting all keyed up. This happened a long, long time ago, a million miles from here. And there’s a happy ending, remember?” She leaned in closer and closed one eye. “At least, for some,” she added. And then she dropped her voice to a whisper:

  “Chop . . . chop . . . chop . . . From miles away you could hear the sound of the battleaxes falling, as the bloodthirsty Tartars came chopping right and left, and the heads began to roll. Like a cursed wind out of hell they came, leaving nothing but corpses in their wake, making straight for the ancient town of Kiev, on the bank of the River Dnieper.

  “ ‘Heaven help us!’ cried the terrified townspeople as they huddled in their houses, trembling. ‘Deliver us from evil, O Lord!’

  “And still the hoofbeats thundered and the drums pounded on, and flaming arrows rained against the great wooden gates, and the skies grew dark with smoke and blood, as the Tartars breached the walls.

  “Chop . . . chop . . . chop . . . ‘To the church!’ cried the quivering townspeople. ‘The Polish priest will help us!’ And they ran with all haste to find the holy man, who wasn’t a full-fledged saint yet, being alive and all, but had traveled far from home to preach the gospel in this godforsaken city. ‘Save us, good Hyacinth! The bloodthirsty Tartars are upon us!’ And he looked up in surprise from the altar, where he was saying Mass, as usual, so rapt in his prayerful worship that he hadn’t heard a thing.

  “But now his kind heart filled with pity. ‘Fear not,’ he said. ‘We’ll go to the river, just as soon as I’m done here.’ And the townspeople rolled their eyes at one another, being far less saintly than he was, and also having noticed on the way to the church that the river was having its annual spring flood. But Hyacinth never wavered. He finished the Mass as always, right down to the last Deo Gratias (which the altar boy just managed to squeak out before he bolted for the door), and then he took up the sacred ciborium with the Blessed Host, to guard it from the terrible Tartars, and began to lead his flock to safety.

  “But just before they left the church, he heard a sweet voice calling to him: ‘Hyacinth, my son, why dost thou leave me behind? Take me with thee and leave me not to mine enemies.’ So Hyacinth turned around, of course, to see who it was had spoken, and lo and behold, there was no one there at all—not a regular mortal, anyway—only a statue of our Blessed Mother Mary, with the Holy Child in her arms. And the statue was twice as big as Hyacinth, and at least three times as heavy; no earthly power could have lifted it. But to him it was light as a feather. He picked it up as if there were nothing to it, and led the astonished townspeople to the river, with the Tartars right behind them, still up to their old tricks, jeering and drooling and waving their baleful blades.

  “Chop . . . chop . . . chop . . . And sure enough, when they came to the riverbank, there was the mighty Dnieper in full flood, raging and tumbling and carrying off entire trees and houses. And the poor put-upon townspeople grew discouraged. ‘We shall die now,’ they sighed, and kissed one another goodbye, and asked Hyacinth to give them the last rites quickly.

  “But the saint only smiled, and beseeched God’s blessing, and our Mother Mary’s blessing, too, and set her down on the bank beside him for just a minute. And then he stretched out his hands over the wild white waves. ‘In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost,’ he commanded, ‘be . . . thou . . . STILL!’

  “And all at once the river was still—as calm as a summer millpond—and then not only still but as hard as stone: a great silver ribbon of rock beneath his feet. And Hyacinth led the jubilant townspeople to the other side, where they rejoiced exceedingly.

  “But as for the bloodthirsty Tartars, when they ventured out to chase the crowd, the river became soft, soft, softer. It sprang to life once more. It woke with a vengeance and dragged the marauders away, shrieking and wailing, until they disappeared for all eternity in its thundering depths.

  “And even today, they’ll tell you in Kiev, whe
n the sun is shining brightly on the Dnieper, you can still see the good saint’s footprints on the quiet blue water.

  “But if you’re ever by the river at midnight, in the light of a bloodred moon, it’s the Tartars you’ll hear complaining, sniveling and moaning and gnashing their mossy teeth. And all around you in the darkness, everywhere and nowhere, there’s the sound of the battleaxes falling.

  “How’s that go again, Betty? Ah, sure—Chop . . . chop . . . chop . . .”

  “That’s it to a T, Bridgie,” said a deep voice from the open door behind us. “You tell it as well as the old man himself.”

  If I’d jumped any higher, I’d have knocked the roof clear off the place. But Betty and Sister Bridget were already turning around and smiling at the intruder. The intruders, that is. There were two: the policeman in front—Officer Doyle again? Was there any place he wasn’t? And Father Dunne just behind him, closing his big umbrella.

  But then he’d promised he’d come.

  Chapter 14

  I was off the bale so fast, the barn spun. “Is Bill— Did you see—” But before I could get the words out, Betty had run past me to Officer Doyle and was hugging him around his big blue-coated middle.

  “Well, now,” said the policeman, smiling down at her. “And how’s my best girl?”

  Betty grinned up at him with her slyest, crookedest grin, then commenced rifling through the pockets of his patrolman’s jacket.

  “Ah, no, Betty,” said Sister Bridget. “Go easy there; don’t be greedy. Uncle Tim’s not made of jelly beans.”

  But Betty had already found a purple one, and then a yellow, and popped them both in her mouth. And then she saw me looking and popped the first one out again, and offered it to me.

  “No, thank you all the same,” I said.

  The half-a-nun’s lips twitched. “That’s very generous, Betty. But she doesn’t want to spoil her appetite; isn’t that right, Julia? It’s only half an hour till dinner. Have you had your dinner, gentlemen? I’m sure Sister Maclovius would be honored if the two of you—”

  “Did you see Bill, Father? Did he wake up? Is he all right?” I knew I was interrupting, but I couldn’t help it; once my voice got unstuck, the words poured out on their own.

  “He’s been better,” said the priest. “He’s black-and-blue all over, and lost a good bit of blood, and his left arm’s fractured in two places. Still, he’s a tough one, that brother of yours. They say it took three orderlies and the head nurse to hold him down for the morphine, when he opened his eyes and saw where he was.”

  My heart leapt. “So he is awake?”

  “Well, he was, till they gave him the medicine. He was sleeping like a baby when we left him just now. But you don’t have to worry, Julia. They never built the hospital that could keep Bill Delaney for long.”

  I should have said, “Thank you, Father,” but it wouldn’t come. A sob came welling up out of my chest and strangled me all over again.

  “You see, Julia,” said Sister Bridget, “what did I tell you? He’ll be out of there in no time. Whole as a fish, fit as a fiddle. And then—” She stopped and looked from the priest to the policeman.

  And then what? I wondered. Why was everyone so quiet?

  “And then all of this will be behind him,” she finished. “Isn’t that right, Uncle Tim?”

  Officer Doyle cleared his throat. “I wish it were as simple as that, Bridgie. It’s the juvenile court judge who has the final say in cases like these. But he’s a good man. A fair man. Unlike some I could name. He’ll take all the circumstances into consideration.”

  Dear God. We were talking about judges?

  The officer was looking at me now. “And that’s where you can help us, Julia, if there’s anything you might be able to tell us—anything at all—about what happened yesterday. You’d be helping us to help Bill, you see, and the other boys, too. For their own protection.”

  Mickey, he meant. Mickey, his son. He wanted me to help him find Mickey. He didn’t care a whit about Bill or the other boys.

  It was only Mickey that mattered, wasn’t it?

  Sister Bridget knew it just as well as I did. She put a hand on the officer’s shoulder. “You don’t have to worry about Mickey, Uncle Tim. He can take care of himself.”

  Pop the Cop shook his head. “They fancy themselves a gang, there’s the rub. No one gave them a thought when they were only a bunch of wild kids. But since this harebrained stunt with the car—no, Bridgie, I’ve got to speak frankly. I know she’s only a child, but she was there; she needs to hear the truth. You understand what I’m saying, don’t you, Julia? The streets aren’t safe for these boys anymore, after the hornets’ nest they’ve stirred up. Bill’s one heck of a lot better off in the hospital than out of it. Don’t they know there’s a gang war in the works already? They’ll be trapped, that’s what, between the Rats and the Nixie Fighters. What in the world were they thinking?” Officer Doyle took off his police hat and ran his fingers through his gray hair, as if it was paining him somehow. “The D and Ds, for God’s sake, thumbing their noses at Thomas Egan himself! I’m sorry, Father Dunne; I know the tune he’s singing these days. We’ve all heard about his generous contributions to the widows and orphans. But d’you ever think who made ’em widows and orphans in the first place? This is a dangerous man, Father. He’d just as soon shoot you as look at you, if you get in his way.”

  “Or have one of his mugs do it for him,” Sister Bridget muttered. “The almighty Mr. Thomas Egan.” She picked a straw out of one of Betty’s braids. “I hope he chokes on his own spit.”

  “Ah, now, Sister Bridget,” said Father Dunne.

  The half-a-nun blushed. “Excuse me, Father. Of course the boys were foolish. But great gobs, after the damage that man has done . . .” She broke off there, and drew Betty closer. “You know they only thought they were Robin Hood and his Merry Men, stealing from him who’s robbed us all blind.”

  “Careful, Bridgie,” said Officer Doyle.

  “So we lock them up, is that it? For their own protection?”

  The cop’s jaw was set. “If that’s what the judge says.”

  “And what if he says Boonville, Uncle Tim? You know the hard types they have there.”

  “Don’t you hear what I’m telling you, Bridgie? There are worse things than Boonville, believe me. The farther from St. Louis these boys are, the safer they’ll be.”

  “It’s a reform school, Sister Bridget. It’s not a jail,” said Father Dunne. “The state doesn’t mix juveniles with hardened criminals.”

  Sister Bridget heaved a sigh. “God bless you for your faith, Father. But are you acquainted with the O’Banion brothers?”

  Officer Doyle had turned to me again. “I’m asking you once more, Julia. You could be saving these boys’ lives. If Bill ever mentioned a place, a name, if there’s anything at all you can tell us . . .”

  I shook my head. Watch out for the con. . . . “They’d rather be dead than locked up.”

  “Then they might get their wish,” said Officer Doyle, looking me straight in the eye.

  I must have made a gasping sound.

  “NO,” Betty said, quite clearly. She stepped between us and pushed the policeman away, taking him by surprise, so he wobbled a little.

  “It’s all right, Betty,” said Sister Bridget, pulling her back. “No one’s trying to hurt Julia. They’re only talking to her, you see? So they can find your cousin Mickey. You remember Mickey, don’t you? Well, of course you do. He gave you your dancing shoes.”

  The creases in Betty’s brow smoothed over a little. She stuck out a slippered foot, to show us. But then she latched on tight to my left arm, just the same, and hid her face from her uncle.

  Officer Doyle cleared his throat again. He tucked a braid behind Betty’s ear. Then he studied his cop hat, dusted the brim, and put it back on his old gray head. “Well,” he said, “I suppose that’s all for now.”

  “You won’t be staying for dinner?” asked the half-
a-nun.

  “Thank you, no. But of course if Father Dunne—”

  “No, no, thank you, Sister,” said the priest. “My boys will be waiting. Please give our best to Sister Maclovius.”

  “I will,” said Sister Bridget.

  Hyacinth gave a loud snort.

  Betty raised her head.

  “Well, now,” said Officer Doyle, giving her a wink, “look who’s puttin’ in his two cents. Hello there, Hyacinth, old fella. Did you think I was ignoring you? Don’t tell me you’re lookin’ for jelly beans too?”

  Betty laughed out loud, forgetting her grudge. Then—tugging me with her—joined the cop by the stall, where he was petting the horse.

  “Not the Hyacinth?” said Father Dunne.

  “The one and only,” said Officer Doyle. “You wouldn’t know it to look at him now, would you?”

  The one and only what? I wondered.

  But Father Dunne was already at the barn door, opening his umbrella, and Officer Doyle was just two steps behind him.

  “Anything at all, Julia,” he said again.

  And then he and the priest both lifted their hats to us and walked out into the wet.

  Chapter 15

  But I didn’t know where Mickey had gone, and I didn’t give a rooster’s rip, neither. He’d run out on Bill when he was knocked cold and bleeding; I hoped he’d gone to the devil.

  Two nights later, in the newspaper Marcella had fetched from the trash pail, still reeking of the fish heads Sister Genevieve had wrapped up in it the day before:

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  CAR THEFT BUNGLED

  OUTSIDE BALLPARK

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