Bronx Noir

I tested the statue’s angle of repose, and it stayed leaning against the wall. I hopped off the table, exhaling an unfortunate oomph as I hit the hard floor. I was no longer young. But I heard no sounds of alarm. The light was almost nothing here, though my eyes had adjusted. I reached under the tilt of the statue’s base and found the key, scooping it back and pocketing it. I wanted to leave the statue where it was and get out fast, but that would be foolhardy in the extreme, as I’d forgotten gloves and my prints were all over the patron saint of this benighted parish. I crept back up onto the table, repositioned the statue, and rubbed it over with my shirt sleeve, hoping I’d erased everything I touched. I was careful descending from the table this time, managed to move it back to its place by the door and retrieve the fallen bulletins. I placed them back on top, in no particular order of language, the Babel of parish news.

I still saw no one, and apparently no one had seen me. I’d been planning this moment for so long—pictured myself à la Shawshank on a Mexican beach whiling away my twilight years.

I crept toward the chancel. I hadn’t heard the door shut, but the priest must have gone home, perhaps through the sanctuary door that connected to the rectory. I hoped the lock hadn’t been changed—another point we’d never considered—and then that purloined key fit easily in the slot. As I turned it, the door swung open and the lights went on ablaze.

I squinted. Before me was Father Farrell. And Bella, a look of menacing satisfaction on her face.

In my shock, all I could utter was a stupefled, “What are you doing here?”

“We could ask the same of you,” Bella said. “Father Farrell, this is my brother Davey, long lost and now returned. Father Farrell’s fairly new here, Davey, and probably would have noticed you at mass earlier. Luckily, I gave him a call as to what you were probably up to, and my hunch proved, as you can see, correct.”

I started to turn.

“And don’t try leaving. The police are on the way.”

“My money.”

“Oh, I know why you’re here. But even if you’d managed to get in, you wouldn’t have found it. Do you think you were the only one who knew about that trick drawer, you and Jimmy? You think you were the only altar boys, and only altar boys knew about that hiding spot that the priests had nailed shut? You think altar boys are sworn to a vow of silence? You think we schoolgirls knew nothing about your filthy ways? Hah. You didn’t live in a vacuum, Davey, though for all you noticed about what was going on around you, you could have. Just because you didn’t talk to anyone didn’t mean people didn’t talk about you, or about the church, or about anything that went on there. Your secrets. Brother. You thought you’d had it over everyone, didn’t you?”

“You said the money hadn’t been found.”

“So I did. So I lied. So, in your words, ‘sue me.’ We found it soon after you were sent away. I told the cops where they might look, and your little stash was history.”

“So you planned it. All afternoon. Pretending to be nice to me.”

“You never did see the obvious, Davey. Always too smart for everyone. You think Danny wouldn’t talk? You think Ma was feebleminded by your Prodigal Son returns act? You think no one but you knew the score? Too many books and not enough sense. You thought you kept things close to you, but you were like a bad movie. You always wanted the easy way out.”

“That was my money.”

“Never. Father, do you hear this?” The priest was silent, uncomfortable, a bit ashamed, I felt, to be witness to a sister selling out her brother, her only surviving brother just returned from years away, unseen, unloved. Father Farrell’s head tilted; the sound of sirens grew closer.

“In my own home. You betrayed me.”

“It was never your home, Davey. You said that yourself. You couldn’t wait to leave. Your home is far away now, and has been for a long while. You took us for fools. Now you can go and stew on it once again, and figure out where you went wrong.”

I shook my head at her. I would not let her win. The police arrived and I submitted to the handcuffs as if I were a Pentecostal penitent in the arms of rebirth. I looked away from Bella, and at the priest. Maybe I’d seen the light, or at least I could make do with what I had. “I will espouse you the right of justice,” I told him, keeping my eyes on his horrifled face as the cops led me out to the car. “I open myself to a God who loves me.”

NUMBERS UP

BY MILES MARSHALL LEWIS

Baychester