The Girls' Book of Priesthood

by Louise Rowland

  ‘We all know about you, Margot,’ spits Gwen, throwing the scrubbing brush into the sink, slivers of wet biscuit flying off its bristles. ‘Thought you’d get away with it, did you?’

  ‘What are you talking about, Gwen?’ Her voice is trembling.

  ‘Gwen, please, if you don’t mind,’ snaps Pamela. ‘Allow me to handle this. It has been brought to my attention, Margot, that you have been involved in – how shall I put it? – an inappropriate relationship while serving your title here at St Mark’s.’Margot looks up at the locked window above her head.

  ‘I don’t––’

  ‘Please don’t waste my time by trying to deny it. You’ve been spotted with him all over the parish.’

  ‘She even brought him here on Easter Day,’ hisses Gwen. ‘Can you imagine? In this holy place?’

  ‘You’re not serious, Gwen?’ says Pamela.

  ‘No, no, that’s true, I didn’t do that.’ Margot’s eyes are stinging; she’s finding it hard to breathe. ‘Crying over spilt milk,’ sneers Gwen.

  ‘It gets worse.’ Pamela holds up her hand to block any more incursions from Gwen, whose face is now right next to Margot’s, sweaty with indignation. ‘As a magistrate, I always insist on being appraised of all the facts in any infraction of the rules.’ Margot’s head hangs like unplucked fruit. ‘Your,’ – a small moue of distaste – ‘boyfriend is still married, I gather.’

  The loathing in Gwen’s eyes is bottomless. Margot wouldn’t be surprised if she spat at her, but instead she takes a step back, wiping her arm against her forehead.

  ‘I had such high hopes of you, Margot.’ Gwen lowers her head. ‘We welcomed you into our hearts. You and I were friends.’

  ‘Yes, Gwen, we––’

  ‘But you’re just like all the rest of them, with your make-up and your earrings and your waxing.’ Flecks of spittle land on Margot’s cheek. ‘Likes you all smooth and silky, does he? After you’ve downed a bottle of champagne together?’

  ‘Gwen, I must insist that we retain a––’

  ‘You were so young and pretty, such a lovely change from all those men. I’d have done anything to help your mission here. Anything. I loved you, Margot.’

  Margot starts to sob.

  ‘Gwen, I must please ask you to desist from—’

  ‘You’re just like all those Page Three girls. Disgusting that a floozy like you should be ministering at God’s table when you’re—’

  ‘Gwen, that’s enough!’ screams Pamela, grabbing a fistful of Gwen’s kaftan and pulling her sideways, away from Margot.

  Gwen’s face is purple, the mole on her cheek shivering.

  ‘Women have no place at the altar,’ Gwen shouts, straining out of Pamela’s grip. ‘St Paul was right. And Roderick. And Fabian.’

  Pamela somehow manages to manhandle Gwen out of the kitchen and slams the door behind her.

  The only sound is the dripping from the tap and Margot feverishly trying to control her tears.

  ‘You do realise the severity of your situation?’ Pamela asks. ‘“Engaging in conduct unbecoming and inappropriate to the office and work of the clergy”’ quote, unquote.’

  A huge crash from outside startles them both. The next moment, rain starts streaming down the glass, punctuated every few seconds by flashes of lightning and more thunder.

  ‘Jesus spoke out against adultery in the Sermon on the Mount, as you, of all people, know. Adultery with a parishioner? I can’t think of many graver infringements of canon law, other than embezzlement of church finances. Or murder.’

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ Margot whispers.

  ‘Of that, I have no doubt, now that you’ve been caught pretty much in flagrante. But it’s not just me you should be apologising to. So many people have a stake in your career, Reverend.’ Pamela lets out a huge sigh. ‘All of us here who were involved in the decision to take you on, against wiser counsel from many quarters. Your principal at theological college. Most of all, the vicar. Did you never once think of him?’

  Margot’s throat is raw from gulping back the sobs.

  ‘We’re all tainted by association.’

  Tainted. Here it is at last.

  Pamela takes out a small notebook and flicks open a page.

  ‘I must tell you that under the provisions of the Clergy Disciplinary Measure, if a lay person – anyone at all – makes a complaint to the registrar of the diocese, your case would automatically come before the archdeacon at a provincial tribunal. There’d be no oral warning or letter of caution beforehand. And that, quite honestly, would be that.’

  Margot’s knees finally fail her and she sinks down onto the tiles, slumped against the dishwasher. The archdeacon, the eyes and ears of the bishop. The removal of her licence, probably for ever. Everyone she knows aware of her disgrace.

  Pamela reaches down to her with a glass of water, merciful at last.

  ‘And Jeremy?’ Margot asks, her voice small.

  Pamela straightens her shoulders.

  ‘As your incumbent, he wouldn’t be part of any investigation, fortunately, though he may be called as a witness.’ Pamela pauses. ‘If it gets that far. You should get up off the floor, Margot. You’re in clerical clothes, remember. For now.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘The vicar? He doesn’t know anything about this.’ She pats her hair. ‘Yet.’

  Margot starts to haul herself up as the door slams open.

  ‘Too much alcohol again, Reverend?’ The spite spits out of Fabian like hot fat.

  ‘Thank you, Fabian, but this is a private discussion if you don’t mind.’

  He scowls at Pamela, shoots Margot a look of unalloyed venom and leaves, slamming the door hard.

  ‘Too many cooks,’ mutters Pamela.

  ‘Who was it who told you?’ she whispers.

  ‘As I said, you’ve been seen together all over the parish, Margot. I would have thought that, as curate, you’d have been aware that people watch you and notice what you do, even when you’re not wearing your collar?’

  Margot closes her eyes.

  ‘What should I do now?’

  Pamela picks up the glass from the floor and rinses it. ‘I suggest you take some time out to consider your own position.’

  ‘I don’t need to.’

  Pamela stands appraising her, hands on her hips.

  The air hums after the brutality of the storm.

  Pamela gives a curt nod.

  ‘Out of your hands now, I’m afraid.’ She clears her throat. ‘And, frankly, out of mine. I’ll pray for you, Margot.’

  At this moment, there’s one person she need to speak to more than any other. The one person who would understand.

  ‘Where are you? Please call me. This is a total emergency. Please, please call me back. I need to speak to you badly.’

  It’s Margot’s fault. All of it. From the moment she sent him that first text. The inevitability slicing through every moment they’ve spent together like dormant strains of a lethal disease.

  She’d always known the risk. Acutely understood where the boundaries lay. Did she think no one would see them? Margot Goodwin, public property number one?

  And yet, something was uncorked that day at Somerset House. His insouciance, his laughter – his love – somehow reached through all the layers and plucked out the real her. Her time with him has felt pure and good. Blessed.

  But just because she wanted it so badly didn’t make it right.

  She falls into a claustrophobic half-sleep before being jolted awake by the alarm an hour later. For a few moments, she forgets the horror of the previous day; the recollection hits her like a wrecking ball.

  She pulls herself out of bed on autopilot.

  Come, follow me.

  She slumps onto the chair.

  I have failed You on every count. Through Your grace, help me to do what I have to do today. Help me not to hurt him.

  He always gets in to work by seven thirty. It’s been a running joke between them
, the early-bird prize.

  She holds her breath as she walks through the playground. She exchanges a few words with the receptionist, who points out the direction without looking up,

  The corridor taps out the drumbeat of her footsteps like a death march.

  In, out. Unseen, undone.

  She owes him this.

  ‘Christ, Margot. You startled me.’

  He scrapes back his chair and stands.

  ‘You look dreadful.’

  He walks round the desk towards her.

  ‘Gogo? What’s wrong?’

  Her resolve is already fading. She steps back from him and keeps her eyes trained on the floor, on a paper clip on the rug beneath his desk.

  ‘We’ve got to stop seeing each other.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  He moves towards her.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  She can’t let him hold her.

  ‘Please come here, Margot.’

  She shakes her head.

  ‘I mean, have I done something? Because, you know, I don’t always know. It’s a bit difficult to—’

  ‘Someone’s reported us.’

  Felix turns away and rubs his hands through his hair. Out in the corridor, a vacuum has been switched on.

  ‘It’s my fault, Felix. I knew how dangerous it was all along.’

  He wheels round again.

  ‘You’re five minutes away from being ordained, for God’s sake. You’ve proved to them all you can do the job.’

  ‘Someone reported us to the PCC.’ She’s trying to stay calm but the expression on his face threatens to disarm her.

  She walks towards the wall. Look back now and she’s lost.

  ‘Vicars and priests are allowed to fall in love, right? This is 2017, not the Salem Witch Trials.’

  He’s chopping the air with his hands, trying to reason away two thousand years of precedent.

  ‘It’ll probably go all the way to the archdeacon.’

  ‘Wait, it was that prick who assaulted you, wasn’t it?’

  ‘It’s all my fault,’ she says again, barely audible. ‘I should never have dragged you into all this.’

  ‘Stop it, Gogo. You didn’t drag me into anything. It’s been the most amazing—’

  She’s out of the room and down the corridor before he can stop her. He won’t come after her, she knows that. He wouldn’t risk being seen by half the school racing across the playground in pursuit of her.

  She rushes towards the gate, eyes blurred, praying that she doesn’t slam into Cyd as the final humiliation.

  Early-evening sun is slicing into the medieval study, throwing dark shadows into the corners.

  ‘Let me be quite clear, Margot. I’m not angry or incandescent or any of the other blood-splitting states you might have been expecting. It’s not my job – or style – to be judgemental. I am, however, bloody furious that you didn’t talk to me about all this weeks ago. The whole point here is supposed to be the trust and honesty between us. This is supposed to be your safe house, remember?’

  Hadley leans back, arms crossed, wearing an expression Margot has never seen before. She hangs her head in defeat.

  Walking here, past the porter’s lodge and across the courtyard, every step had rung with menace. The perfect green square highlighting on her own inability to respect the boundaries, the ancient stone implacable in its judgement. We had such high hopes of you, Margot. You’ve betrayed us all.

  ‘Let me tell you something.’ Hadley walks over to the window and pushes it open further, encouraging the scent of new-mown grass to pour in. She perches on her desk, next to Margot. ‘Ten years as a criminal attorney and twelve as a priest have taught me to unlearn everything I thought I knew about human nature.’

  She sighs. Margot’s spirits fall even lower.

  ‘So tell me. How would you describe your decision to sleep with a parishioner during the most vital year of your career to date, when so very much hangs on your ability to make it through all the hoops intact? A married parishioner, no less. Chuck me some adjectives here.’

  Margot looks down at her hands. A bell is ringing in the chapel outside.

  ‘Ready when you are.’

  ‘Stupid,’ she whispers.

  ‘Yup.’

  ‘Reckless.

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  ‘Dangerous.’ Margot swallows.

  ‘That’ll do it.’

  ‘Selfish.’

  ‘OK, I think we can stop there.’

  Margot glances back up.

  ‘You know you screwed up, Margot. That’s why you didn’t call me. Because you knew you’d done something off the scale of risky and you couldn’t face admitting it. As you said, stupid, stupid, stupid.’

  Margot can’t think of anything to say in return.

  ‘Look, you meet a guy you’re really into. No problem there. Sex in a loving, trusting, respectful relationship. No problem there, either. For me at least, though, as you’re well aware, many of our evangelical brethren wouldn’t agree with me. Our high-church brethren as well, come to that. To be honest, that’s between them and their consciences.’

  Hadley reaches behind her for her coffee.

  ‘But a married guy in the congregation? A few months before you’re due to be priested? Neither smart nor, to be brutally honest, that helpful to the cause of the clergy sisterhood. Never hand the enemy ammunition, Margot. Unfair as it may seem, women are still seen as the custodians of goodness, and judged on our sexuality, earning ourselves every epithet from virgin to harlot in the process.’

  Margot pulls a crumpled tissue out of her handbag. Hadley pushes forwards a box of lavender-scented Kleenex. Followed by a tray of Belgian chocolates.

  ‘I’m so sorry.’

  Hadley places her hand on Margot’s arm.

  ‘If you love this guy, then I get it. So will God. The heart goes where the heart leads. We both know that.’

  ‘Really?’ asks Margot, her voice hoarse.

  ‘Being a rounded human being makes you a better priest, Margot. Take it from me. People identify with our flaws in the way they wouldn’t – can’t, even – with a paragon. Why do you think they call it a curate’s egg? Most of us are a seething mass of insecurities, no matter how together we seem on the surface. No one’s perfect and I don’t believe God wants or expects us to be. That includes you, Margot. And me. It’s about following the Divine will and living with integrity. Though, having said that, if people knew what many priests were really like, they wouldn’t come to church.’

  Hadley bursts out laughing.

  ‘You’re something of a George Herbert buff, if I remember, aren’t you?’

  Margot nods. Hadley reaches for a book from her shelf, festooned with brightly coloured tabs.

  ‘Quick-ey’d Love, observing me grow slack

  From my first entrance in,

  Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning,

  If I lack’d anything.’

  They both fall silent.

  ‘The principal at Wilhurst used to say that your daily life is as much a sermon as any of the words you preach,’ says Margot.

  Hadley nibbles at the walnut on top of her caramel.

  ‘Mmm, these are insane.’ She smiles. ‘The most important relationship is between you and God, Margot. Whatever happens between you and St Mark’s.’

  Margot shivers at the implied danger.

  ‘God never turns away, no matter what you do or who you love. As for your parish, well, let’s wait and see. We have no choice but to be honest. Everyone loves crisis mode. Gives them the chance to show how charitable they are. But we all need grace and humility and none of us is God, even the magisterial members of your PCC. “When I am weak, I am strong.” Nine times over, we ask for forgiveness in the liturgy, remember? Grace is a gift.’

  Hadley closes the lid on the chocolates with an air of finality.

  ‘So, tell me, what do you think would be the best thing to do now?’

&
nbsp; Margot hesitates, dreading hearing the words out loud.

  ‘I’ve stopped seeing him.’

  Her eyes fill up again.

  ‘O-K.’ Hadley reaches again for Margot’s hand.

  ‘So how about this? Why not put him … what’s his name, by the way?’

  ‘Felix,’ Margot whispers.

  ‘Felix. Lucky or successful. Nicely chosen. OK, so why not put Mr Lucky and Successful on the back burner for a while, as it were? Just until you’re priested and have done your first Mass and settled in. If he cares enough, he’ll wait. After that, you can review, the two of you together. How does that sound?’

  ‘I think he’d probably rather be rid of me and all my baggage.’ She swallows. ‘Or “your bloody Church and its medieval take on life”, as he put it one time.’

  Hadley chuckles.

  ‘Right. Well, if he does care enough, he’ll also be prepared to put up with the medieval bit.’ She smiles. ‘Though if he’s anything like Brad, he’ll have a good old whinge from time to time. Do you know, he was even interviewed as part of my application process? Incredible.’

  Margot looks over at the family photo, wiping her eyes.

  ‘When was the last time you had a break?’ Hadley asks. ‘Not counting the weeks off after Christmas and Easter.’

  Margot can’t even remember.

  ‘Thought so. Disappear off for a few days. Go and chill somewhere. Try and clear your head. You owe that to yourself. And to me and your poor incumbent, frankly. And for goodness sake, enough already with the self-torture. It’s usually male curates who unload their guilt trips with me.’

  ‘But surely I can’t go anywhere right now?’

  ‘Take it as an order from your spiritual director. I’ll speak to Jeremy.’

  Hadley smiles. Job done.

  ‘And now, time for us to say a prayer together. God has a path for you, Margot, even if it feels like it’s got more roadblocks than the M25. Remember what we know about Divine Providence: there’s always a Plan A and a Plan B. You’ve made it this far, Margot. Hold on for the last push. You can do that for me, right?’

  Margot gives a tiny nod.

  ‘Let’s just pray that none of your hyperactive parishioners decides to fire off a green-ink email.’