Read Online The Last Season by Roy Macgregor - Free Book Online Page B

altar. She had on a new dress, cotton, floral pink, a sheer purple scarf around her neck, a skull-fitting red hat and big winter boots. Not dressed as well as some of the Vernon girls, but as Danny had already said, you throw out the wrapping and keep the present. She looked delicious. I saw her eyes calculate as she stepped up the three stairs to the rail, a quick glance at me — nothing in it — and then a long drink of Danny, followed by a sweetly holy curtsey to the black Madonna. When she knelt and came forward, hands cupping to receive Father Schula’s bread, I could see past the buttons to the white lace of her brassiere. I could almost see Danny’s palm print.
    At collection time Danny and I were sent to receive the take from the four sidesmen. Both of us held a huge black-felt-lined golden tray for the men to place their wooden plates on to be returned to the altar for the blessing, while Father Kulas stared to the heavens in silent thanksgiving. When we bowed I detected Danny’s left hand move ever so slightly, almost imperceptibly, but not so little that I did not see the ten-dollar bill being crumpled into his fist. When Father Kulas took the trays and we returned to our positions, Danny reached inside his cassock for a hanky and safely deposited the money, replacing the hanky, after a flamboyant but definitely dry blow, into the other pocket.
    â€œHow could you?” I asked later in the basement.
    â€œHow could I resist?” he said, laughing.
    â€œIt’s stealing from the church,” I said, furious with him.
    â€œAh, bullshit it is. How’s the Pope going to miss a tenner?”
    â€œYou won’t say that if you end up in hell,” I said very righteously.
    â€œI’ll tell you where Danny Shannon’s going. Straight to heaven.” He kissed the bill. “This here’ll take me to the Renfrew show with sweet little Lucy.”
    The bill kissed for luck, he then stuffed it into his jacket pocket and kept it rammed there as we pushed through the choir stragglers, up the stairs and through the priest’ line. Danny went first, and both Father Kulas and Father Schula seemed to awaken visibly when they saw who was next in line. The procession stalled completely, leaving the sidesmen, linen women and entire choir to wait and simply gawk as Danny yakked on about hockey in Vernon and lied about school and built up his chances in the big time. You’d have thought he was the Bethlehem Star himself, not a third-stringer; yet when it came to me I was welcomed, patted, shaken and yanked quickly through and out into the cold punch of the parking lot and the careful-not-to-swear shouts of men looking for booster cables. Uncle Jan had the Chevrolet waiting, purring with heat. Poppa was razzing him for letting it idle for two hours, saying it had cost him a quarter of a tank of gas, but Ig was cheering for the radio and Sophia, Jozefa and Batcha all seemed asleep.
    I got stuffed in back with the women, with no one to talk to all the way back. It was a half moon and too cold for cloud. I remember how the birch stand on this side of the creek ran over the window so it made me imagine a zebra, and almost instantly I thought of bear, the shadows making me damned glad I wasn’t taking this road on my feet, alone, as I had previous Christmases.
    How, I wondered, could Danny have shaken hands with the priests using the very hand that had stolen from the church? Part of me felt they should have known, that they should have at least treated me with a little more of the respect I had always been careful to return. But for whatever reason they never seemed to feel comfortable around me, or me too much around them. Unlike Danny. His right hand had moved from Lucy Dombrowski’s boob to the communion chalice to a dip in the collection plate to the priests’ congratulations—and he probably hadn’t washed it once in all that time. Me, I believed. I prayed. I