“You brought her,” said Mrs. Paz.

“Sure, why not?”-a question that had a real answer, which they both knew.

“Thank you,” she said, and Paz had to keep from gaping. It was the first time his mother had ever thanked him for anything.

The grandmother and the child moved through the crowd, greetings and cooings arising in their wake. Paz followed, bemused, feeling the removal of a weight he had not realized he was carrying. The child was no stranger to praise, but her immediate family was small, and praise was associated with accomplishment. She had not ever received a flood like this, and he saw her shyly blossom. Paz got the feeling that the members of theilé had been prepped for this by grandmotherly boastings. And why not? he thought; she’s had a rough life, this is a small enough pleasure to give her. His mother seemed to have transformed herself into an entirely different woman from the stern field marshal of the restaurant and his childhood home. Not for the first time he wondered why she had not raised him in Santería. Apparently age was no barrier, as the many children here proved. Again he suppressed resentment.

They approached the sanctuary, a tent of yellow and green silk partially enclosing a squat cylinder covered with satin brocade in the same colors-thefundamentos, or sacred ritual symbols, of Ifa-Orunmila. Dozens of candles in glass holders burned around this shrine, and the floor was covered with layers of yams and coconuts. Amelia was allowed to deposit a yam and then taken to see the cake, a huge wedding-style confection of many tiers, on which was inscribed in icingMaferefun Orunmila.

“Is that a birthday cake?”

“Yes, in a way,” said Mrs. Paz. “It’s the day we celebrate and give thanks to Orunmila. See here, it says ‘thanks be to Orunmila,’ in Lucumi.”

“Could we eat it?”

“Later, dear. First we have to see ourbabalawo. Now, he’s a very holy man, so when we meet him, we bow and say ‘iboru iboya ibochiche.’” They practiced this a few times and then pushed through a thicker crowd to where Pedro Ortiz, thebabalawo, sat on a simple caned chair. Mrs. Paz and Amelia dropped to their knees and said “may Ifa accept the sacrifice” in the modified Yoruba language called Lucumi by Cubans. Mrs. Paz introduced Amelia to thesantero. Paz watched from a short distance. Ortiz was a slight cordovan-colored man with a thick head of black hair just starting to go gray and large dark eyes that seemed all pupil. He embraced both Mrs. Paz and Amelia and then looked over the heads of his followers directly at Paz, who understood that thebabalawo knew pretty much what he was thinking. It interested Paz that he had expected this and was untroubled by it. Yes, weird stuff happened, weird stuff would continue to happen. It was a permanent part of his life, and it looked like it would start to be a part of his daughter’s life, too. His mother was beckoning him. Ortiz rose and shook hands. No bow was apparently expected from the great quasi-agnostic. Mrs. Paz said, “He has agreed to throw Ifa for Amelia. It’s very important, but you’re the father, and so you have to agree.”

“Um, right. What’s going to happen?”

“Just agree, Iago!” she said sharply.

“Okay, Mamí,” he said. “Your show. I trust you.” As the words came out, he found that he actually did.

Ortiz led the way into a smaller room in the back of the house. In it were vases full of tropical blooms and trays of fruit, and there were depictions of theorishas on the walls: Ifa in his guise as St. Francis, Shango as St. Barbara, Babaluaye as St. Lazarus, and the rest. In one corner was a life-size statue of St. Caridad, the patroness of Cuba, and along one wall was a large mahogany cabinet, thecanistillero, repository of the sacred objects. The only other furnishings were a folding bridge table with a round wooden box in its center, and four straight chairs. Ortiz sat in one of these and waited while the others sat. Ortiz looked into Paz’s eyes and said, “We don’t usually ask Ifa to tell the future of children, you know. Their future is so little formed that it would be disrespectful to ask. In a way, their little spirits are still held in the hands of their ancestors, such as yourself and Yetunde here.” Here Ortiz smiled briefly at Mrs. Paz, who nodded when she heard her name-in-religion. “And of course the child’s mother. So, what I will do is throw Ifa for you yourself, asking if there is anything that needs to be done or not done for the child’s sake. It’s difficult to make such a reading, but I have agreed because of the love and respect I have for Yetunde. So, now I need you to give me five dollars and twenty-five cents.”

“Oh-kay,” said Paz, “five and a quarter. Here you go.” He handed the man a bill and a coin. Ortiz wrapped the coin in the bill using a complex origamilike fold. He opened the box on the table and took from it a chain made of eight curved pieces of tortoiseshell connected by brass links, and an ordinary drugstore notebook and pencil. The wordopele floated up from memory. Paz had seen one of these before but never in actual use. Ortiz pinched the currency and coin around the center of theopele and pressed this to Paz’s forehead, breast, hands, and shoulders, and then did the same to Amelia. He placed the money in the box, and after a low humming incantation that proceeded for some minutes he raised the chain and let it fall with a small tinkling clatter on the table.

Thebabalawo studied the line of the shells, observing which had fallen concave side up and which ones concave side down. This, Paz knew, is how Ifa speaks to men. Ortiz made marks on a sheet of paper torn from the notebook, a vertical stroke for concave-up and a circle for concave-down, two columns of four marks. He studied these, frowning, looked sharply at Paz, frowned more deeply, studied Amelia. Finally he uttered a soft grunt and asked Paz if he had a dog.

“A dog? No, we don’t. We have a cat.”

Ortiz shook his head. “No, it would be a large dog, or…something. Are there neighbors with such an animal?”

“There’s a poodle down the block. Why are you asking this?”

“Because…hm, this is very strange, very strange. I have been doing this for forty years and I don’t recall theorisha ever sending this. You know, all this was born in Africa and there are some things that happen in Africa that don’t happen here. The locusts don’t come and eat our crops. We don’t give cows in exchange for our wives. Very strange.” He stared at theopele as if he hoped it would change itself into another shape.

“But it involves a dog?” Paz asked.

“Not really. But what else could it be? Here we have no lions. Lions don’t carry off our children here in America. But here it is, ‘the oldest child is taken by the lion.’ That’s how the verse goes.”

“You could do it again,” Paz suggested after a moment. There was a peculiar cold chill in his belly, and without thinking he reached out and grasped his daughter’s hand.

But Ortiz shook his head. “No, we don’t mock theorisha. What is given is given. But it’s certainly a great puzzle. I will have to pray about this, and make a sacrifice, too. Oh, and that is another peculiar thing. There is a sacrifice required.”

“You mean an animal, right?”

“No, the oracle speaks about a human sacrifice, but it’s not definite. The verse reads ‘who is so brave as to sacrifice the dear one?’ When such things appear, we always take it to mean a spiritual sacrifice, a purification. But, as I say, in forty years, this has not been told to me. There are very many figures, not only two hundred fifty-six from the one throw, as you see, but changing with the days and the seasons. Not allbabalawo know this. Come back and see me again, and may Orunmila give us more light then.”

The three of them walked out of the room, and an elderly woman passed them going in. A long line of people had formed, like that outside the toilets at a theater, all chattering softly in Spanish, waiting to know the future. Paz felt a ferocious anger displacing the fear from his mind, together with whatever small scraps of credulity he had so carefully assembled. After sending Amelia off to where they were serving cake, he directed it at his mother.