Father Dunphy moved away from the sink, took the dishtowel from Johnny, and used it to dry his hands. He draped the towel over the pot Johnny had just dried and said, “We’ll eat now. And we can talk.”
“I already ate.”
“Eat again. Tuna Terrific. Lots of tuna. Lots of Terrific.”
Johnny shook his head. “Thanks, Father, but it might cause a mild disturbance. When I came in and headed straight toward you, just about everybody waiting to eat kept saying ‘End of the line . . . end of the line.’ And I kept saying ‘Not eating, not eating.’ I can hardly go back on my word.”
“Of course you can’t. But I think I have a way of handling it.” He drew himself up and, in a purposely pompous manner, said, “As Chief Pot Scubber, I grant you a dispensation and hereby declare null and void any and all statements by one Johnny Donegan when he said, ‘Not eating, Not, eating.’” He relaxed his pose and said, “There. Satisfied?”
Johnny let out a quick laugh. “I’m honored.”
“Good. Then maybe you’ll honor me with your company while we both indulge in some spectacular tuna.”
“Happy to oblige.”
The woman serving them piled each tray with a bowl of tuna casserole, a generous helping of coleslaw, some sliced peaches, buttered bread, and a cup of coffee, black, with no sugar for the simple reason that it was not being offered by Dempsey Coates.
Places were found in an isolated, almost empty corner. The refectory table was occupied at the far end by, as heaven would have it, a man Johnny had encountered when he’d first come in, an encounter that made him feel that he might not be a welcome presence for a very particular reason.
The man had looked at him, up and down, and having observed the firemen’s insignia on his shirt, had said with undisguised contempt, “You a fireman, huh?” He had then spit on the floor not far from Johnny’s shoes.
Johnny considered mentioning this to Father Dunphy but then decided not to trouble him with the peculiarities of a man probably not in complete control of his faculties.
Father Dunphy and Johnny sat down across from each other. The man who’d spit, as if in disgust, picked up his tray and moved to a table nearer the center of the room, leaving Johnny and the priest pretty much alone in their corner. Father Dunphy took no notice of the man’s departure and Johnny figured he’d do the same. The priest was busy salting his Tuna Terrific. “I was wondering when I’d hear from you. I thought maybe you’d changed your mind. Or the lady had said no.” He offered the salt to Johnny.
“No. I mean, she said yes.’”
“Congratulations. Tell her she should come see me, the two of you. There should be some instruction even though—I mean, considering she’s sick and the time may be limited—”
The man who’d spit at him returned. “You a fireman?” he said, still more of an accusation than an observation. “You ought to be ashamed. The landlord sets fire and what you do? You go in and you drag him out. Setting fire to his own building to get us out. He’s supposed to burn. It was his fire. He made it. He made the fire. But no, you go in, and you come out. And you dragging a landlord all saved. The landlord. He supposed to be cinders. But you got to get youselves a landlord. Should be ashamed of youselves.”
“We rescue people,” Johnny said evenly. “That’s what we do. And we don’t ask questions.”
“Shame on you. You go rescue. Shame on you.” He lurched toward the men’s room, then decided to drink from the water fountain instead.
“Pay no attention,” the priest said. “And about the instructions—I mean, considering—”
Johnny put an elbow on either side of his tray and joined his fingers, making a shelter for his food. “She’s not sick,” he said.
“She’s not sick?”
“She’s not sick. Not anymore.”
“But I thought she had—”
“AIDS. But she doesn’t anymore.”
Father Dunphy put the fork full of tuna back onto his plate. “Anymore? But I thought—”
“She was supposed to die. But she’s not going to die.”
The priest looked at him. “Are you all right?”
“I’m all right. She’s all right. She’s cured.”
He picked up his fork. “She’s—But nobody’s ever been—”
“She’s cured. She doesn’t have it anymore. She doesn’t have AIDS.”
“But from what I understand—”
“This is something you don’t have to understand. Something you can’t understand. You just have to know it.”
“I see.”
“You think I’m nuts, don’t you?”
The priest, not without some determination, went on eating. “You could be.”
“I’m not.”
Father Dunphy looked down at his tray. “None of this has been easy for you—her being sick, you taking care of her, wanting to get married… It’s not difficult to see why you might—well—why you might—”
“Go crazy.”
“Or at least become a little peculiar.”
“I may be peculiar, but she’s still cured.”
“All right. She’s cured.”
“Believe me or don’t believe me. Talk to her doctor. She’ll tell you. The same as she told me. Here’s her name. The doctor. Here’s her phone number.” He put a folded scrap of paper next to the priest’s tray, as if it were a secret message being passed from one conspirator to another. “Nobody understands it. Nobody knows how it happened. But it did.”
“Maybe we should go next door, to the rectory, to my office, where there isn’t so much commotion.”
“Here’s okay. And besides, I already told you what I came to tell you.”
“Please. Let’s go to my office.”
Father Dunphy began to get up. Johnny reached across the table and put his hand on the priest’s arm. “Father, believe me. I’m not nuts. Sometimes I think I am. Sometimes I wish I were. But I’m not.”
The priest sat back down. “Her doctor—does the doctor believe…?”
“Call her. Talk to her. She’ll give you the facts.”
“Does she say how the—the cure—happened?”
“No. She says she doesn’t know. She says nobody knows. It just happened. And don’t say maybe Dempsey wasn’t sick to begin with. She was sick. She was going to die. But she’s not sick. And she’s not going to die.”
Looking at Johnny with something close to disbelief, Father Dunphy said, “Are you getting ready to tell me it was a miracle?”
“No. I’m not getting ready to say anything other than what I already told you.”
“But the idea of an inexplicable disappearance of the virus—”
Johnny held up his right hand. “The doctor herself refuses to make even a suggestion of anything in that direction.”
“As a doctor, she can’t say it, but there’s no reason why I can’t.”
“Then say it, Father.”
“It’s a miracle.”
Johnny turned his head away. Haltingly, he said, “If it is, I was the one who prayed for it. ‘Cure her!’ I was the one said it. Out loud. It’s what I prayed for the Sunday you gave me Communion—”
“Johnny—you actually believe it was your prayer—?”
“I try not to believe it, but there it is. And I don’t know what to do about it.”
“Do about it?”
“I only blurted it out. I blurted it out because a couple of times—and God forgive me for it—a couple of times I caught myself almost wanting—almost wanting her to die.”
“Oh?”
Johnny kept on. “If she died, she’d never leave me for someone else—the way she left me when we were first together. How could I—how could I even think it? But I did. And so I had to do it. I had to say it. I blurted it out, ‘Cure her! Cure Dempsey!’ I did it to tell myself I didn’t really want her to die. That, and only that.”