“We can’t do nothing,” Beatriz said.
“Look, all of you. A Soria’s darkness spreads like nothing you have seen before.” Antonia’s voice was ironclad. “I forbid all of you from going to find Daniel. Over my dead body!”
To understand Antonia’s response to Beatriz’s suggestion, you must know the story of the last time darkness came to Bicho Raro. None of the cousins except Judith had been born yet; it was only a few years after Antonia had come to live with Francisco. There were more Sorias and fewer pilgrims at Bicho Raro then; the pilgrims back then seemed to be swifter about vanquishing their darkness and heading back on their way. The Soria siblings at that time were as close as Daniel and Beatriz and Joaquin were.
It was 1944, and the world was at war. Even if you had not gone to enemy territory, the enemy could come to you. In Colorado Springs, twelve thousand interned German prisoners of war harvested sugar beets in work camps. Trinidad housed another two thousand Germans. Tiny Saguache kept two hundred prisoners of war within their high school. Even Bicho Raro was not exempt: A branch work camp operated in the sugar beet field ten miles away, and on a clear day, the sounds of Germans singing as they worked could be heard in the grazing pastures above the houses.
The prisoners, separated as they were from ordinary life, were the source of much curiosity and contention. The government promised these young German men were the answer to the labor shortage in Colorado, but the Germans did not look like they belonged, with their fair, easily burned skin and their pale hair, nor did they sound like they belonged, with their marching, deliberate syllables. They did not dress like they belonged: Prisoners of war were allowed to wear their uniforms if they wished, and most of them wished, although their khaki shorts grew increasingly improbable as the year marched toward winter.
And winter was dark that year.
Winter in this part of the country was a frozen place. Temperatures plummeted in the desert and snow heaped over the memory of the scrub. Nothing moved. Survival happened by having a warm hole to wait in; if you had not built or found one by the time the blizzards hit, folks relayed the ending of your story with tears and a beer.
Unlike much of the world, Bicho Raro was enjoying a time of prosperity due to the previously mentioned windfall from Elizabeth Pantazopoulus. So although it was bitter outside, and claustrophobic inside, there was plenty of food and comfort to be had.
It was a grim evening when a strange pilgrim came to Bicho Raro. It had been snowing for the entire week, and it was still snowing then, the bored snowfall of a sky that cannot think of anything better to do. It was neither light nor dark—just gray. Everyone was inside when the owls began to make a commotion. They lifted from roofs, sending snow coughing down to the ground, and launched themselves in the direction of the newcomer. He was still trudging a half a mile off, but the owls went straight to him and doubled back to Bicho Raro, and then back to him again, half-mad with the promise of the darkness and the miracle.
Antonia Soria was the first out to greet him when he stumbled into Bicho Raro. She had made it only a few yards into the knee-high snow when she stopped; it had become clear to her that he was one of the Germans. She didn’t see much more than his uniform before she went back into the house for Francisco and a gun. She was joined by others: the oldest brother, José, and also Michael and Rosa Soria and their curious sister, Loyola, who was Daniel’s mother, and gentle Benjamin, who was Daniel’s father (and the current Saint). Loyola was very pregnant at this time with Daniel and should not have been out in the cold, but she did not take many steps without Antonia; the two had been the very best of friends since Antonia had come to live at Bicho Raro.
“Bitte,” the German said. His knees were knocking together with the cold, and they were bright red. He was wearing his uniform shorts, and the snow had soaked right through his socks and pressed up against his bare knees for miles.
Antonia raised the shotgun warningly.
“Bitte,” the German said again. This was because his arms had a child in them. The child’s face was the same color as the German’s knees, the ugly red of too much cold. Because he spoke very little English and no Spanish, there was no way for the German to tell the Sorias how he came to be holding the child. He was barely a child himself.
“Where did you escape from?” asked Francisco, but of course the German didn’t understand this, either. The owls were sweeping low and desperate around him as he staggered close, not looking at the shotgun, and offered the child to Michael.
Now, it must be said that it is a funny thing to be able to perform miracles. Having the ability to help someone does not automatically go hand in hand with the ability to know when it’s the right time to help someone. One is left looking at strangers who are clearly in need of aid and wondering if the Saint can merely attend to their needs, or if the Saint is required to ask the would-be recipient first.
The German clearly needed a miracle.
It was not as if they could ask him, though. No one there spoke a lick of German.
Benjamin weighed his responsibility in the matter and the level of earnestness on the German’s face, and made the decision that because the German had been kind to this child, Benjamin owed him kindness as well. He performed the miracle.
At once, the German let out a small cry of surprise, put down the child in his arms, and transformed into a large-eared kit fox. Benjamin had anticipated this, or something like it. What he hadn’t anticipated was that the miracle would also operate on the child the German had brought—Benjamin had not considered it would be possible for such a small toddler to have darkness in him. But the child’s hands began to turn into dragon scales, and as they did, the child roused from his stupor and, in fright, began to cry.
What does it mean to interfere with a miracle? It is not rightly known what counts as helping pilgrims to heal themselves. It is not the indirect care of providing a roof over their heads, as they did at Bicho Raro, or the direct care of providing food for their bowl. But it was sometimes the indirect kindness of allowing a pilgrim to play a card game with you, or the direct kindness of offering advice. Better to keep one’s distance, the Sorias had decided, than to try to predict what might count as interference.