The Miracles of Santo Fico Read Online Free PDF Page A

light, if he were to simultaneously smile and wiggle his nose, one would swear he had just smelled cheese.
    But at this exact moment, sitting in the shadows at the end of the bar, what Topo fancied he smelled was money. And why not? Wasn’t he one of the originators of “The Tales of the Miracle and the Mystery”—much on a par with Leo Pizzola and Franco Fortino? In fact, if pressed, Leo Pizzola would have to admit that much of the original scheme had come from Guido’s head. At least some of it . . . Or at the very least, a little of it. Yes, when it came to boldness and clever ideas, he and Leo were cut from the same bolt of cloth. That fact was proven, even now, by the birth of the excellent idea floating around inside his head.
    How could he have predicted what terrible events this excellent idea would help to set in motion? How could he anticipate that such an innocent little thought would ever contribute to him becoming a criminal—a master thief? Who could foresee such a harmless notion bringing such a world of trouble?
    Right now, it seemed to him that his simple little plan was an excellent one, tried and true. How could he have been so shortsighted? Hoping for a free lunch! What had he been thinking? Where was his brain? Leo Pizzola was back! It would be like old times!
    Topo pushed himself away from the bar, grabbed his hat, and was out the door. He knew what he had to do. He had to find Leo Pizzola—and quickly.

THREE
    A s he raced down the gravel slope of the coast road north of town, Topo strained to keep his body at least one step ahead of gravity. Nobody could say that Guido Pasolini failed to recognize opportunity when it landed in his lap, and he tried to calculate how much profit there was to be made from his scheme. Unfortunately, he had no idea how much to charge. This was an area where Leo Pizzola shined—at least he used to. Of course, Leo was bound to be a bit rusty after so many years.
    Topo arrived at an unassuming break in an old stone wall that bordered the road. The gap in the wall had probably once housed a handsome gate, but now it was just a broken spot in the undergrowth. He tried to make the turn, but his speed had finally combined with gravity to create an unanticipated inertia that carried him straight off the road. Like some runaway torpedo, Topo shot across a sea of brown thistles, accidentally kicking over a “FOR SALE” sign that had been crudely painted in red letters. The makeshift sign disappeared into the weeds, but Topo couldn’t worry about it now. His short piston-legs ripped through weeds and leapt over low cactuses and jagged boulders. Finally managing to slow himself, he turned back onto the rutted dirt lane and scurried on toward the Pizzola family’s pastures by the sea.
    Not far from the road and up a sloping meadow, buried in the shade of a grove of cork and linden trees, loomed the ghostly figure of a once admirable house now fallen into dreary disrepair. Topo thought the dark weathered stains on the plaster walls and the branches of neighboring trees twisting themselves into the terra-cotta roof tiles gave the place the look of an abandoned old woman with her makeup smeared and her hair tangled—and she seemed sadly confused by her loveliness lost.
    He panted down a road that bordered neatly planted rows of muted green olive trees. Their gnarled branches were wild and unpruned and Topo thought of how annoyed old Signore Pizzola would be to see this. The branches should be heavy by now, weighted down with fruit bursting with oil and juice. But these branches bore only a slim scattering of tiny, rock-hard olives—not worth the effort to harvest. He passed a neglected vineyard whose scant purple berries struggled against the weeds and baked under an uncaring sun, and he kept his eyes on the path, trying to ignore the dying vines. It angered him to see the vineyard going the way of the olive grove and the house.
    Puffing across a dry field inhabited by stray