Free The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse by Louise Erdrich

his oxygen so that he suddenly snapped back to consciousness.
    “Ah, bene, bene, ” he declared, gazing happily at Father Jude. “And when does the inquiry into the life of Leopolda begin?”
    Father Jude, whose mission it was to impart the news of the inquiry, a most highly secret undertaking entrusted to him by eminent Catholic authorities, was taken aback. The route to sainthood was exhaustive and the proceedings highly confidential. Not only was he having trouble adjusting to Father Damien’s instant recovery, but the old priest behaved as though he knew in advance his visitor’s commission. In a way, this was irritating. Never before had Father Jude’s assistance been required by Church authority at such exalted levels, never before had he imagined, even, the type of trust that was abruptly bestowed on him by reason of his lifelong proximity to the people and places now in question. What was for him an awesome and unexpected undertaking, however, seemed for Father Damien entirely expected.
    “A lay Catholic, a professor of sorts, has introduced the subject. She has written a great deal on Sister Leopolda but from, you understand, an academic standpoint. We are looking now for firsthand and thoroughly witnessed fact.”
    Father Damien took this information to himself with prideful glee. Father Jude was nonplussed at such enthusiasm.
    “And who will form the council, do you think?” Father Damien now inquired in the bright tones of a younger man. As though he was still involved in the machinery of the Church, he began to speculate aloud. Some of those whom the old priest named were dead or married. Still, he was not so entirely out of touch as his feeble appearance would excuse. The old one named several eminent scholars, Jesuits who were known as investigators, and he inquired shrewdly after the opinions of Bishops Retzlaff and Kelly, Archbishop Day, and the status of any petitions or people’s acclamations. In addition, he asked whether proofs had yet been furnished of Leopolda’s intercessions and gave his opinion that the most delicate points would rest upon the singular question of her mode of existence.
    “By which you mean . . .” Father Jude gazed into the fairy-pale face, the white hair spread in a flossy halo, the great uncanny eyes.
    “Her daily example.” Father Damien raised one finger in the air. “Did she lead an exemplary existence? Was she fair, was she honest? Did she give up her foodstuffs, her blankets, her comforts to the poor? Did she have any bad habits, tipple unblessed communion wine? Smoke?” Here Father Damien gave a dry cruel laugh that surprised Jude. “Had Sister Leopolda indulged herself in some area she might have sinned less forcefully in others . . . ? Yes, yes! If only she had smoked!”
    Father Damien held up two fingers in a V.
    “I don’t smoke,” said Father Jude.
    “Well then, look, neshke . . . I only have one on special occasions.”
    Early on, Ojibwe words and phrases had crept into Damien’s waking speech and now sometimes he lapsed into the tongue, especially in his frequent confusion over whom he was addressing.
    “Neshke! Daga naazh opwaagaansz!” He gestured again at a small tin box set on the tilting plastic lawn table. Father Jude opened the box, removed a cigarette from a package, lighted it for the old priest, and then sat down patiently to wait as Father Damien breathed in the rank, dry heat. As he intermittently drew quiet puffs and gazed into the fractured halos of moving branches, he spoke.
    “Now tell me”—Father Damien’s lips pursed in a calculating bud—“what would be the most, let us say, effective time to reveal what I know of this departed nun’s character?”
    Father Jude attempted a reply, but the side-to-side jolts of Father Damien’s mental processes were wearing. Father Damien disregarded the other priest, smoothed his cassock thoughtfully around his knees, adjusted his eyeglass lenses along his nose, and continued