Singing for the Cardinal: An Excerpt from The Professor's Daughter

The boy's choir of St. Ignatius Prep was in the chapel rehearsing Faure's Requiem in preparation for their trip to Rome. Pinky St. Pierre had been elected to do the solo, which was something of a controversy among the boys, who were all in agreement that Ned Drake had the better voice. Since Ned's voice was changing and he really couldn't be depended on to hold a high C longer than two bars without it suddenly cracking in the middle like an egg and dropping three octaves, this idea probably had more to do with the fact that he was much better liked than Pinky. Adding to Ned's popularity were the facts that he kept a library of mint condition Mexican porn under his bed, was liberal with his stolen Marlboros, and had a bounty hunter for a father.

Pinky St. Pierre, on the other hand, was practically an albino. He could be counted on to get sunstroke during shot put, he was a day student rather than a boarder, and his face was pretty as a girl's. Also, his father was only a bank teller. Pinky was really only one wrung above the colored kid on the social ladder.

"What does your father do?" Pinky had squeaked at the colored kid from across the reject's table in the dining hall during the first week at lunchtime.

The colored kid couldn't be sure if this was an attempt on Pinky's part to be polite or a set-up for more ridicule. He pushed his glasses up the flat bridge of his nose and leveled his eyes at the smaller boy, who had made a bib of his napkin and was taking miniature bites of his rice pudding to make it last longer. Pinky St. Pierre looked guileless enough. His white-blond hair made a cowlicky corn silk halo around his head.

"He's a sculptor," the colored kid answered. "In Europe." This was one in a string of lies that had started from his mouth after the golf club incident on the day he arrived at St. Ignatius. "He makes sculptures out of ice."

"You mean like those swans they got at the fancy weddings?" Pinky squeaked, licking the rice pudding from his spoon.

"Exactly," the colored kid answered. He was starving for conversation.

"I sure do like rice pudding when they make it like this. With the cinnamon on top."

"Who doesn't?"

"It's yummy."

"I agree."

"Do you like dragons?" Pinky asked.

"Sure do," the colored kid answered. He'd never considered how he felt about dragons before.

"I hate them," Pinky shuddered. "With all my heart."

"Oh."

Pinky hadn't said anything else after that, as if the disagreement about dragons was an unbreachable chasm. He continued to eat his rice pudding in silence. The colored kid searched for something else to say.

After a moment he began, "The thing about sculpting ice is, only a handful of people in the whole world know how to do it. That puts my dad in high demand."

"Uh-huh." Pinky savored his last bite of rice pudding.

"Matter fact, a Siberian count just hired him to make his youngest daughter a playhouse all from ice, including the furniture and a itty-bitty tea set. My dad told them it would hold through the winter but come next spring the whole thing's bound to melt into a big old puddle. The count said that was okay by him; he can just hire a Japanese and turn it into a goldfish pond."

Pinky St. Pierre wasn't exactly listening. Instead, he was looking forlornly into his empty bowl.

"Here," the colored kid offered, "Eat mine. I don't want it." He was trying to lose weight. He was trying to make a friend.

Pinky hesitated.

"Go on. I don't mind."

"That's okay," Pinky said. His face registered a brief pale look of disgust.

"Go on," the colored kid tempted, pushing his bowl of rice pudding across the table.

"No thanks," Pinky...