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Show my father's house/ 16 Danny for wanting to kill my ducks. But deep down I knew who was to blame. It was the first time I had seen my father do something hateful in the name of God. To cheer me up my father and mother took me along when, in the late afternoon, they went for Brother Musser. "You must be quiet, darling. Brother Musser still hasn't recovered from his stroke," my mother whispered as my father helped the older man down the steps of his stately red-brick house. Brother Musser has a soft white crown of hair, a stiff white moustache, and big shining eyes. Earlier, my mother explained that my father made the small hole through his ear to cure the cancer that once grew there. My father had mixed up an old Indian remedy in a bottle lid and dabbed it on Brother Musser's ear, where it burned through skin and flesh. My father threw the bottle lid away, and the cancer never came back. With an hour before dinner, there was time for a short drive into a nearby canyon to see the autumn leaves. "How I love the mountains this time of year!" my father exclaimed. "They lift a man's soul to the clouds." We climbed a narrow highway with no guardrail along the cliff edge. My father was paying more attention to Brother Musser than to the road, craning his neck and nodding toward the back seat. "Mama, what if Daddy drives off the cliff?" I whispered. |