by Pat Mullan
41
It had been a long day in the west and Ed was glad to get back to Dublin. Tom Buckley dropped him close to his apartment at Ballsbridge Gardens. He’d texted Maria on his mobile earlier and she knew he was tired. They’d planned to go out for dinner but Ed didn’t think they had the energy. They compromised and agreed to go out, to the little Italian place around the corner, simple and quick but always excellent. A bottle of red and some spaghetti Bolognese and he’d been nourished for the evening ahead, one that he planned to spend with The Creatures of Habit.
At the restaurant Ed filled Maria in on his trip to St. Curnan’s and his strange discovery in Father Bernard Flaherty’s room.
“I’m going to read as much of it as I can tonight. I need to get inside his head. I need to see what makes him tick.”
“I’ll help if you want me to. Might be good to get another perspective.”
“That’s great. But I don’t want to impose it on you.”
“Are you kidding? Don’t you know by this time that we’re in this together?”
Ed laughed, “Well, if I don’t know by now I must be losing more brain cells than I thought.”
They finished the wine, paid the bill, and walked back to the apartment. Ed rummaged through the stuff he’d acquired from Father Flaherty’s room. Two books, a folder of documents, and the diskette containing the manuscript of Creatures of Habit.
“Why don’t you take these documents and books. See if you can find anything of interest. I’ll load this manuscript on my laptop.”
Maria brewed a pot of strong Bewleys coffee while Ed inserted the diskette containing the mysterious Father Flaherty manuscript into his laptop. He transferred the file to the documents section and then clicked open. A word document, it appeared on his screen in an instant.
“Coffee. Careful, don’t spill it.”
“Damn, that’s all I need. Destroy the evidence.”
Maria retreated to a comfortable place in the living room, under a reading lamp, and placed the documents and books on the coffee table in front of her.
Ed stared at the title page and then moused to the next page. The manuscript opened, starting in the first person. The writer did not identify himself but he was writing a form of memoir, starting at the age of six. Ed wondered if anyone could truly remember what happened to them at six. He decided to browse, knowing he’d go back and read it from the beginning. But he wanted to get a sense of it at first. To his surprise, three pages later, the work changed to the third person and the omniscient writer started his story in the seminary with a tale of deception. Told calmly and dispassionately, it held even more fascination because of that. Browsing ahead, ten pages later, it switched back to the first person and continued the memoir it had commenced. Paging through the hundred and seven pages, he found that the entire work alternated between the first person memoir and the third person storyteller. But he noticed a striking difference about fifty pages into it. Flaherty had started to refer to himself in the memoir as The Avenger. It seemed to ramble and become repetitive and the third person storyteller lapsed into rants and rages. It was obvious that this author’s mind had deteriorated the further he’d gone into the story. He decided to print it all because he never could read a book from a computer screen. Making sure he had a full load of paper in the printer, he clicked print, got up and went over to join Maria.
She was so deep into the documents that she didn’t notice him at first. When she did, she started excitedly, “I can’t believe this. I never knew this. You’ve got to read this. It’s unbelievable!”
“Aren’t you going to tell me what it is?”
“OK, I thought that all the abuse in the church was something recent, the result of bad priests in a modern world. That’s naïve for sure. Listen to this: ‘a significant majority of the clergy had been practising such behaviour for decades; a homosexual collective within the priesthood viewed it as a religious rite and a rite of passage for altar boys and young priests.’ And it says here that ‘this has existed within the church for centuries’ and ‘it was the topic of Pope Benedict XIV’s apostolic constitution, Sacramentum Poenitentiae in 1741’”
“I suppose I could do with an education myself. Although what you’re reading confirms Joe Brosnan’s stories of the Lavender Mafia. If it’s been around for centuries, it must exist as a secret society within the church. If Opus Dei is the church’s right wing secret society, then the Lavender Mafia must be its left wing secret society.”
“But, from my reading here, it goes deeper than that. Much of it is based on paganism. Look at Ireland. Look at even the simplest things here. The holy wells with all the bits and pieces of cloth that people tie on nearby bushes. The water they take home in bottles, believing that it’s some kind of cure for all ills. That’s all paganism from the days before Christianity. We kept it all and integrated into our Christian practices. The same thing has happened all over the world, especially South America and Africa.”
“So what are you saying about these priests …”
“Here, look at this. I’ll read it to you: ‘homosexuality, especially boy/man love was practiced among the pagan religions, from the Romans to the Shinto temples of Japan and to the Yucatan in Central America.’ And here again, ‘it was a common practice among the Gentiles during the time of the Apostles.’
“Are we saying that this behaviour has been practiced for decades and that these people believe that it’s some kind of a religious rite?”
“Well, they’ve certainly used that defense in the past. But it’s been hidden, underground for years. It was always there but nobody talked about it. If anyone became a victim, to go public would be a cause of shame. To accuse a priest would be tantamount to heresy. The liberal mores and open sexuality of the sixties has brought it out into the open. Looks like Father Flaherty has steeped himself in this stuff.”
“Yeah, you should see the book he’s been writing. If you could call it a book. It’s seems to be part personal diary and part research paper, and then it seems to drop off into a raging diatribe where he begins to refer to himself as The Avenger.”
“A portrait of the killer, then?”
“Looks like it. But I want to go back and read it from the beginning. It’s printing out right now.”
“It’s going to be a long night.”
It did indeed become a long night. Ed’s eyes couldn’t see the page any more and he knew it was time to quit when he found himself reading the same paragraph again and again. He looked at the bedside clock. Two am! Then he looked across at Maria. She was already gone, sleeping peacefully with a book open between her hands. He gently took the book away, turned off the light and called it a day.
42
Ed Burke decided that it was time to pay another visit to Father Michael Nugent. He needed to know more about this Father Bernard Flaherty and he hoped that Father Michael might have some insight into the man. After all, he rationaized, they were colleagues on the teaching staff at St. Curnan’s. And he’d be curious to get Father Michael’s reaction to Creatures of Habit.
Father Michael Nugent stood in civilian clothes outside the main gate of St. Curnan’s as Ed Burke pulled up in his car. He rolled down the window and said, jokingly, “I almost didn’t recognize you without your uniform.”
“Maybe I should dress like this more often,“ said Father Michael as he climbed into the passenger seat, “now that I’m a target.”
“You’re looking well. A full recovery?”
“Oh, a twinge here and there and a hip that still bothers me. But I’m bouncing back. The physiotherapist’s been doing a good job.”
“Thanks for taking the time to see me.”
“I’ve got the time. I’m only on part-time duty yet. Besides, I’m not straddling the fence any more. I realized after they tried to kill me that I have to take sides.”
“Tom Buckley tells me that you submitted a signed witness statement about the events of the night that Terry died. And you named
Father Roland Cormack. That’s puts you in conflict with the pontifical secret, doesn’t it?”
“I see no sign that the church intends to investigate any of this. So I’m going to follow my conscience.”
Ed reached behind him with his left hand, grabbed a carrier bag and handed it to Father Nugent, “Take a look. I found that in Father Flaherty’s room.”
Father Michael looked at him quizzically, opened the bag and pulled out about twenty pages of the manuscript, Creatures of Habit. As the car cruised along at forty miles an hour on the two-lane country road, he started to read. By the time Ed pulled the car into the lay-by, he’d started to read it for a second time.
“Bring it with you,” said Ed, as he pulled a hamper out of the back and carried it across to the benches places strategically for the tourists to view the Irish countryside. No tourists today. The season had only commenced and the place was empty, as they had hoped. They had chosen to meet away from the public eye. Given the hunger for any scrap of news by the media, their meeting would easily have made the front pages of next day’s newspapers.
“I’ve got ham and cheese or cheese and ham. Brown or white bread. Take your pick. Diet coke for me. And sparkling water for you, I think.”
“A gourmet meal. And to think that I’ve been critical of the food at St. Curnan’s”
They said nothing for awhile, ate their sandwiches and enjoyed the view. Eventually, Father Michael said, “That manuscript explains a lot.”
“How do you mean?”
“The anger. Father Bernard’s anger. He was always angry at something. He was manic. Up and down. When he was up, he was angry. When he was down, he was morose.”
“And this man was allowed to teach kids!”
“No, no, wait a minute. He was a genius at math. And a fine teacher. He never abused that privilege.”
“But the anger …”
“Most of the time he controlled it with his physical activity. He was a good athlete when he was younger, field, track, long jump, you name it. Here, if he wasn’t on the handball court he was out running.”
“Was he close to anyone?”
“Nobody. He was a real loner.”
“But he was angry enough to kill.”
“I can’t believe that.”
“The guards found evidence that he’d been at Cong Abbey the night that Monsignor Fallon was murdered. And it took a strong man to truss up the monsignor and haul him down to the river. And Bernard Flaherty was strong enough.”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, he’s missing. And you’ve read his manuscript. What do you think?”
“It explains a lot. He was taking his anger out on the church when he wrote that”
“Because he was he abused when he was a kid?”
“I’d say he never got over that. And it seems to have continued in college. And the attempts in the seminary as well. I know he writes some of it in the third person, as thought he wasn’t writing about himself. You can feel the anger simmering under the surface in these stories.”
“It’s a huge indictment of the Church, isn’t it?”
“It’s scary. It shows how anger is festering throughout the church, among my fellow priests. Anger at all the abuse, at the failure to talk about it, at the great silence.”
“And it’s driven him to kill. We know he was mentally unstable, in and out of psychiatric care over the years. On medication.”
“But how can you be 100 percent sure that he’s the killer. The person who killed our President climbed up the outside and came over the wall. Why would Father Bernard do that? He was already here.”
“What if he wanted to point the finger away from himself. What better way? You said he was clever.”
“But what about DNA?”
“What about it? The guards didn’t find anything on the rope that McCafferty hung from. And there was nothing special about the footmarks where he climbed the wall. Yeah, they found some of his DNA, hairs in the President’s office. But they found some of yours there as well. And other faculty members. We should expect to find his DNA there!”
Father Michael wiped the mayonnaise from the corner of his mouth, stood up, walked over to the refuse bin and dumped his empty bottle and sandwich wrapper. When he came back, he said, “You met me to see if I could tell you anything about Father Bernard. It seems to me that you know more about him that I do.”
“All I know of him is in that manuscript. We want to find him and stop him. I was hoping you might have some idea where he went. The guards are scouring the country for him but no luck. We need to stop him before he kills again.”
“I’m afraid I can’t help you. I don’t even know if he had a family. As I said, he was a real loner.”
“I think maybe the Archbishop and everyone in power are breathing a sigh of relief. The world has discovered a madman to blame. And Terry’s death and young Carty’s suicide will become yesterday’s news.”
“That’s sounds cynical. They’ve got a Commission of Investigation underway in Dublin. And a garda detective has been appointed as a ‘priest support coordinator’”
“Window dressing! That’s all. It’ll be as ineffective as the Tribunals that’ve been investigating corruption for the past ten years. Didn’t I hear that the Archbishop is planning to go to court to prevent this Commission from opening what he calls ‘sensitive’ church files?”
Father Michael had no response. A mist had worked its way down the valley, obscuring their view, and now the first raindrops began to fall. Typical Irish weather, thought Ed, makes me miss the eternal sunshine of Florida. They picked up the last remnants of their lunch, binned it, got in the car and drove back toward St. Curnan’s.
Ed parked his car in the staff parking area and walked Father Michael to the front door of the school. They parted and Ed stood for a minute looking out over the sweeping lawns in front and the majestic stand of oak trees fronting the perimeter wall. Boys hurried back and forth between classrooms that were housed in two wings of the school. Gathering his thoughts, he turned around and started to walk towards his car when he saw the boy standing still. Watching him. As he got closer he recognized the boy. Patrick Clarke! Clarke moved suddenly, ran towards him and shoved a brown paper bag in his hand. He didn’t speak a word, turned and ran away again.
Ed opened the bag and looked inside. A mobile phone lay on the bottom.
43
Ed Burke was worried. If Monsignor Fallen had been killed because he got Father Roland Cormack to Rome, then maybe anyone associated with Father Roland may be considered a target. He felt that he should warn Lord Desmond Cormack. He knew that Tom Buckley had been to see him but that would probably have been a procedural gardai visit.
So he’d made an appointment to see Lord Desmond and now stood facing him at Castle Cormack.
“Father Roland carries an important family name.” Lord Desmond Cormack stood at an angle, so as not to block the light from the nearest window. The painting was old, the kind of portrait one would expect to find in the National Gallery. A tall man graced the canvas, attired in the robes of the Church with his archbishop’s hat crowning a face, unmistakably a Cormack one.
“Impressive.”
“Yes, Mr. Burke, impressive indeed. That, of course, is our own St. Roland. I’m sure you must know the history.”
“A little. But I must admit I’m sketchy on it.”
“Seventeenth century. Three centuries have passed since he was killed.”
“He was exceuted, wasn’t he?”
“Executed! A fancy word for murder! He was murdered. They took him to London, tried him for treason, then to Tyburn where he was hung, disemboweled, and quartered.”
“What were the charges?”
“Lies! Trumped up. That was a time when Catholics were persecuted by England. In the 1670’s, King Charles II stepped up the persecution and St. Roland had to flee. He hid out in the mountains, in hovels in the snow and the rain. But they weren’t satisfied with
that. They wanted him dead. He was still a threat. So they made up these lies that he was in league with the French and that he was planning to overthrow the government. All lies! “
“It’s hard to believe a time like that.”
“We shouldn’t forget. The Church didn’t. The Pope canonized him in 1970.”
“And Father Roland must feel the burden of inheriting the name?”
“Burden? There’s no burden. Only pride. Father Roland knows that he must live up to the name. That’s why this whole business is too shocking for words. It can not be countenanced! Never! Do you hear that, Mr. Burke? Never! It’s persecution of a more vile and insidious kind. Revisiting us again. Testing us. But we will not fail the test. Cormacks do not fail!”
With that, he turned on his heel and took off down the hall. Uninvited, Ed followed him down the oak-lined hallway hung with more ancestral paintings. He’d left his office door open and Ed followed him through. The room light remained dim, as he remembered from his previous visit. Strong light bothered Lord Desmond so he kept the curtains partially closed.
As though he knew that Ed was right behind him, he swivelled his tall frame around and faced Ed, looking down at him imperiously.