JOAN OF ITALIA

Chapter 21 A Miracle for Marghareta

As the nearest relative and the discoverer of the body, Joan had to stay in Naples overnight to take care of legal matters. Her husband of course stayed with her, and Marghareta agreed to stick around in case Joan needed an interpreter. Joan hoped that she wasn't jeopardizing the Italian girl's job.

Unfortunately the only hotel they could find on short notice was one of the old-fashioned types that lacked private baths. Thus, the next morning, Joan donned a hotel-issue bathrobe over her underwear (she hadn't brought pajamas) and walked out to the shared bath.

She met Marghareta coming out, and the other was in a bad mood. "Are you here to pee, or to take a full bath?" she demanded.

"Uh, both," said Joan, "but I can postpone the latter if--"

"We need to talk."

"Right."

In the bathroom Joan did her business, then fished her cell phone out of the bathrobe pocket. The parents would of course have to know that they had found, and lost, a relative of Helen's all in a day, but she and Luke would have to get their stories straight. How account for the perfect timing? Was it safe to mention the blessings? But both Luke and Grace had their cell phones turned off, for some reason. Joan shrugged, and decided to proceed to Marghareta's room.

Marghareta was wearing jeans and a bra, and apparently didn't mind being seen in that sate, so anxious was she to get down to business. "I had a dream last night. I dreamt that was in an American city named Atlanta, in a private art gallery. Some millionaire was showing off a painting to me, the Caravaggio of Jezebel. I learnt a lot about the millionaire, I learned how to appeal to him if the situation came up again, and it will."

"Sounds like a very pleasant dream," Joan said evasively.

"But it was NOT a dream. It was far too clear and detailed. For example, all of the characters talked a funny form of English--"

"Southern accent, yeah."

"I didn't know about southern accents, so why should I dream them? This was a vision, Joan."

"If you say so."

"'If I say so?' You know a lot more than that, Joan."

Joan sighed. "Yeah, but you're not going to believe me."

"Try it."

"OK." Joan took a deep breath. "About three years ago, I started having encounters with strangers. They'd give tell me to do some weird task -- and I'd do it, and the result was always good ripples, either for me or somebody else. When I asked how they knew what would happen, they said they were God."

"God? Il dio?" repeated Marghareta, as if thinking she had misheard the English.

"Yeah."

"รจ pazzo!"

"Yeah," said Joan, guessing what it meant. "But it kept happening over and over, so what else could I think? And it's not just me. After about two years I learned that there was a guy named Ryan Hunter, who used to work for God but got sour about it. Shortly after that God had me confide in Luke and Grace, and started giving THEM instructions. She told Grace to learn to ride horseback, and you saw the result of that. And yesterday I learned that I had an aunt with some connection of her own. Maybe it runs in my family."

"You're jumping to conclusions," said Marghareta. "Somebody calls himself -- herself -- God, and you immediately think American God, Jesus-loves-me and all that. If it happened to me I would think of the God of Dante's Inferno or Verdi's Dies Irae, and I would try to hide. But I don't believe in that God at all. And I refuse to believe in a benevolent God, because he would not let my parents die."

"Yeah. Well, you've got company. My brother doesn't deny that it's God; he's seen enough unexplained events. But the bunny valence thing bothers him; he's convinced that God is going to double-cross us in the end, treat us as expendable. That's why the Joan of Arc story bugs him so much. But from my point of view, the experience has been too good to be bad, in spite of some setbacks. I've learned to respect knowledge, to forgive a wrong, and I won a circle of friends that I love."

"Still, it doesn't sound like the traditional God."

"OK. I knew I wouldn't convince you, so can we cut the conversation short? I still need a bath; I stink like a horse, and I'm not used to walking around my nightclothes."

"Very well. Go."

----

Joan and her friend were distracted later that morning by a practical matter: where to bury Aunt Maria. The village churchyard was one logical place, but as the Cavallos had not attended the church for decades, and not requested Last Rites, the priest wanted assurances that she had died "in the faith". That was an awkward question for Joan, who didn't want to be questioned about the woman's final speeches. The alternative would be to fly her to the States, probably to be buried beside her brother in North Carolina. That meant talking with some other people.

Luke's and Grace's cell phones were still off.

In late morning Joan finally called Arcadia, in spite of the time zone difference. Her Mom was bewildered to be awakened in early morning to learn that she had found and lost an aunt during a single night. Her Dad was, furthermore, puzzled about the timing. Joan had an answer ready, and it didn't even require much faking. "Yeah, the police here wanted to ask about it, too. But it was pure dumb luck, that we showed up while she was dying. Please don't you start--"

"Sorry, darling, I know you're under tremendous pressure. I'll call the Cavallos. Jonathan probably counts as next-of-kin and can make the decisions. Keep in touch."

"Thanks, Dad. We'll be seeing you guys by Sunday, if I don't get stuck here."

Eventually the local officials let them go, and Joan started driving Adam, Marghareta and herself back to Rome. At the start she once more tried calling Luke and Grace on the cell phone, with no better results. What the hell were those two doing?

Marghareta had sensibly remained silent, except for interpreting, during the tangle with officialdom. But in the privacy of the car she spoke up.

"I think I've made sense of what you've told me."

"Oh?"

"It looks like I have to accept a supernatural force, considering what my vision, but I do not think it is the traditional God. Plato wrote a theory about the universe. The world was invented by a "demiurgo", an imperfect spirit. Since it was imperfect, there were flaws in the creation -- disease, suffering, cruelty. But there was another spirit who wanted to help. It couldn't just wave a magic wand and fix everything, it didn't have the power. But it could enter the world and do some tinkering, often with the help of human allies. There are lots of names for the second spirit, one of them was Logos -- Wisdom or Knowledge. I think you've been dealing with the Logos, trying to fix the flaws in the Demiurgo's work."

Adam spoke up unexpectedly. "It's weird, because from time to time I thought there was an outside force helping me with my art. I didn't think "God" until Jane told me, but I sometimes thought of it as an angel. Now it sounds like your Logos has been doing it."

"It is an interesting idea," said Joan, "but it means that he has been lying to me all along. He always said that he COULD fix things immediately, because he's all-powerful, but didn't want to interfere with free will."

"An all-powerful and benevolent deity would have saved my parents' lives," said Marghareta bitterly. "I refuse to believe that."

Joan thought of Kevin, of Judith, of the assault that blighted her mother's life for years. She had a lot to think about.

-----

When they got to the hotel, Joan marched to her brother's room before even getting her own. Her knock was answered by Grace, looking even odder than usual: dressed in a bathrobe at 1 PM, her hair in more than normal disarray, and looking rather exhausted.

"What the hell have you been doing?" demanded Joan. "I've been working my ass off, dealing with family matters, and where was Luke?"

"Um, Luke and I came to an understanding. I'm staying in Rome with SEEDS and eventually going to the Third World. Luke will go back to the States and accept Harvard. So we were saying goodbye."

"That took you all morning?"

Luke's voice cut in. "The way we were doing it, yeah."

Joan looked in. Luke was still in bed, without his glasses. He didn't seem to be wearing a shirt or pajama top, or maybe anything. The crutches he was using to accommodate his broken leg had fallen some distance from the bed.

"Oh!" exclaimed Joan, catching on and turning red. "Um, I'll leave you to your, um, saying goodbyes---" She shut the door herself.

"Che meraviglia!" said Marghareta. "All morning? Wait 'til Michel hears about this. Go and do likewise---"

TBC