Read Online The Confession of Joe Cullen by Howard Fast - Free Book Online Page A

think of the moment God smiled. Perhaps you heard the story when you were a kid?”
    Embarrassed, Cullen shook his head.
    â€œAn old legend. As God smiled, the smile turned into a thousand cherubim.”
    Perhaps the nicest thing that had ever been said to Cullen, and he thought of it now as he entered the shed where Father O’Healey was kept prisoner. There were two guards now on duty. They knew Cullen and made no effort to stop him, and they were not without a thread of reverence for the priest, even though he had been designated as el diablo, abogado del diablo , not to mention el comunista . They were very poor and very ordinary campesinos , and though O’Healey was of the devil, he was still a priest. Standing in front of the shed in their ill-fitting, American-made uniforms, with their old Springfield rifles — the automatic weapons were reserved for the regular army — they struck Cullen as being more comic than dangerous; and as for guarding, they hardly expected a manacled priest to walk off into the jungle. They passed Cullen through without even asking to see the contents of the brown paper bag he carried.
    Father O’Healey watched him spread the contents of the brown bag, and not without a certain amount of awe. Cullen arranged the stuff on a crate: two cans of Norwegian sardines, King Oscar brand — “The very best, for more reasons than one,” Cullen said — a package of imported Finn Crisp, ajar of Chivers dark marmalade, made of bitter Seville oranges, a Sara Lee cake with chocolate frosting, and a huge California orange.
    â€œYou are a man of miracles,” O’Healey whispered.
    â€œIf these are miracles, they come cheap, Father. Those local mothers live like kings. The bastards even got a freezer. That’s where the cake comes from and by now it’s defrosted. The sardines are important, being the whole fish. You got your calcium there and you got your vitamins from the orange and you got your roughage out of the Finn Crisp. You can’t live on beans alone.”
    â€œI have. But this? Cullen, where did you get all this nutrition stuff?”
    â€œYou mean the food? These mothers got a generator and they order anything they want from the States.”
    â€œNo, I don’t mean the food, Cullen. I mean the nutritional talk.”
    â€œOh, that.”
    â€œRight. Oh, I’m grateful. Thank you, Cullen, but one thing. If you call them mothers out of respect for me, don’t.”
    â€œMotherfuckers?”
    â€œI heard the word before. I survived. May I have the orange first? Or does a menu come with it?”
    â€œYou’re putting me on, Father.”
    â€œA little. Tell me about nutrition.”
    â€œI dated this army nutritionist in Nam. All she talked about was nutrition.”
    â€œWonderful. You pick up things, Cullen. You see things. You remember things. That’s a gift.”
    Cullen regarded O’Healey suspiciously, but the priest’s attention was on the orange, which, although handcuffed, he was slowly and carefully peeling. “Cullen,” he said, choosing his words precisely, “doesn’t it trouble you, flying the guns down here and taking the dope back?”
    â€œI was afraid you’d ask me that. I was hoping you wouldn’t.”
    â€œOh?”
    â€œDamn it, it gets tangled when a priest asks you a question like that.”
    â€œNo priest. Same question. Oscar is asking.”
    â€œThat son of a bitch Kovach got me the job. Why would he ask me? Father, does it bug you when I swear? I do it without thinking.”
    â€œI know all the words. It doesn’t bug me.”
    â€œAll right. Kovach asks me, but he knows the answer. If I don’t, someone else will do it.”
    â€œExcept that you’ve never committed a crime. This is criminal — if not the guns then surely the dope.”
    â€œI don’t know what’s a crime,” Cullen replied