Detective Brennan put up his window. ‘I don’t know what the feck the super’s going to say. She was dead set on catching him red-handed throwing horses off a cliff. Still, if you can charge him under section 17, that might give us some leverage.’
‘You’d best call Michael O’Malley and Kevin Corgan,’ said Detective Dooley as they drove out of Spring Lane towards Ballyvolane. ‘Tell them they can go back to Kilmichael and collect their horses, and thanks for the loan of them, like.’
‘Oh, they’ll be well pissed off about that,’ said Detective Brennan. ‘They were hoping to see the last of those old nags and make a bit of a profit out of it, too.’
‘The more you want something, the less chance you have of getting it, that’s what my nan used to say.’
‘Mine, too, or something like that,’ said Detective Brennan. ‘She always dreamed of marrying Christy Ring, and what did she get? My dipso of a grandpa. Mind you, he may not have been Cork’s greatest hurler, my grandpa, not like Christy Ring, but give him ten pints of Murphy’s, point him at an open window, and he could hurl with the best of them.’
30
Katie was buttoning up her red duffel coat when Detective Dooley called her to tell her what had happened.
‘So Fearon found out somehow that you were the law?’ she said. ‘Oh well, there was always a risk of that. But good, yes, it may be second-best but we can charge him with extortion. I’m on my way now to the Bon Sauveur Convent to talk to the mother superior, but as soon as I get back we’ll go up to Spring Lane and pull him in. Jesus, you almost have to feel sorry for them sometimes, these poor eejits like Paddy Fearon, don’t you?’
She was already on her way along the corridor when Eithne from the Technical Bureau stepped out of the lift and came towards her, waving a black plastic folder.
‘Eithne, what’s the story?’ asked Katie. ‘How did you get on with that ugly fellow’s face?’
‘I’ve done that, ma’am. I’ve just given a copy to Detective O’Donovan, and I have one here for you.’
She unzipped the folder and took out a full-face computer image of the man in the hoodie who had dumped Sister Barbara’s body into the fountain.
‘Holy Mary,’ said Katie.
‘No, he’s not pretty, is he?’ said Eithne. ‘He may not look exactly like that in real life, but the software is very good at extrapolating facial structure – like it takes into account that one side of your face is not a mirror image of the other.’
‘All right,’ said Katie. ‘I’m on my way out now, so if you could leave that on my desk.’
‘This is not really what I came to see you about,’ said Eithne. She brought out a sheet of paper in a transparent plastic cover. ‘We’ve been examining the note that Roisin Begley was supposed to have left under her pillow.’
‘Supposed to have left?’
‘Superficially, you’d think that she wrote it. But – look, this is the note and this is a page from her biology notes from school.’
‘They look the same to me,’ said Katie.
‘Well, at first sight they do, I agree. There’s distinct similarities, like the way the gs and the ys have that sharp-angled tail, and the is have the long mark, the fada, rather than dots. But the as and the es are formed in totally different ways – you see how Roisin almost goes around them twice – and all of her writing in her schoolbook has a measurable left-leaning slope to it, which the note doesn’t.’
Katie looked more closely at the two samples of handwriting. Eithne was right. At a glance, they seemed to be almost identical. But apart from the differences in some of the letters, it was apparent that whoever had written the note had been pressing much harder, as if they had been writing slowly and carefully. Copying, in fact.
‘I’d stand up in court and testify that Roisin herself didn’t write this note,’ said Eithne. ‘There’s no DNA on it, and no fingerprints, but it was written with a blue liquid ink pen that we couldn’t find in Roisin’s bedroom and that’s another indication that it was written by somebody else.’
‘But somebody who had access to Roisin’s bedroom, and to her schoolbooks,’ said Katie.
Eithne said nothing. Katie handed back the note and the handwriting sample. ‘Thank you, Eithne,’ she said. ‘I’ve been putting off paying a visit to the Begleys, but it looks like I’ll have to now.’
* * *
As she parked outside the Bon Sauveur Convent, Detective Inspector O’Rourke called her. He was on his way back from Dublin and wanted to tell her that he made all the arrangements for RMR to bring their ground-radar equipment down to Cork tomorrow.
‘I’m catching the three o’clock from Heuston so I’ll be back at five-thirty. There’s a couple of things I need to talk to you about that I can’t do over the phone.’
‘Now you have me worried,’ said Katie.
‘Well, it’s best that you know what’s going on,’ Detective Inspector O’Rourke told her. ‘How’s it going generally? Did Dooley catch Fearon chucking his horses off the cliff?’
‘That all went pear-shaped. The Travellers found out that Dooley was a cop. I don’t know how, but it’s not a total disaster because we have a plan B. I’ll give you the SP when you get back. I’m just off to talk to Mother O’Dwyer. We’ve identified the flying nun and she used to be a member of the Bon Sauveurs.’
‘Mother O’Dwyer definitely said that she wasn’t, didn’t she? How about that? We have the flying nun and the lying nun.’
‘That’s true. Take care, Francis. I’ll see you later so.’
Before she went into the convent building, Katie walked around to the garden to see what progress the search team was making. Seven or eight reservists were still carefully raking through the flower bed and sifting the black peaty soil through riddles, while another three had started on the vegetable garden. They had dug up scores of potatoes and winter cabbages and piled them beside the wall.
The technical experts had erected a large blue nylon tent which completely sheltered the septic tank. The triangular entrance flap was tied back and as she walked across the grass Katie could see the technicians in their white Tyvek suits with masks over their faces, kneeling beside one of the open access ports. They were lifting the bones out of the septic tank with an Unger pick-up tool, which had rubber-covered claws to prevent the bones from being marked or damaged. As they were retrieved, the bones were laid out on a groundsheet and the technical experts were making every effort to reassemble them as individual skeletons.
Bill Phinner was there and he was wearing a Tyvek suit, too, and had obviously been helping. He never looked particularly happy. He always reminded Katie of Peter Cushing when Dracula’s ashes start to come back to life, pinch-faced and anxious. Today, though, he seemed to more serious than ever.
‘How many so far?’ she asked him.
He snapped off one of his latex gloves and ran his hand through his thinning grey hair. ‘Eighteen so far. Of course, that has to be an estimate. The way they’re all jumbled together, we can’t be sure whose skull belongs to whose vertebrae, or which ribcage is which. But when we’re finished we’ll be able to work out how many exactly were disposed of here, and at least we’ll be able to give their remains something that the nuns never did, and that’s a respectful burial.’
‘How many more have you found in the garden?’
‘Three in the flower bed, but that’s only a guess because we haven’t located all of their skeletons yet. None in the vegetable garden so far. The mother superior was giving us a hard time because we’re digging up all their vegetables and what are they going to do for food over the next few months? I politely suggested she went up to Dunne’s Stores like everybody else, like it’s only up the road, like.’
‘Well, they’re bringing the radar scanners down tomorrow, so if there are any more to be found, we’ll find them.’
Bill looked down at the tiny skeletons laid out in three rows, not all of them complete. Some were still missing legs or arms and two of
them had no skulls. ‘What a way to end up, eh? Just because their mothers weren’t married. I hope there’s a playground for them up in heaven – although I very much doubt it.’
‘Bill!’ said Katie, laying her hand on his shoulder. ‘I didn’t realize you were so sentimental!’
‘Oh, I’m not sentimental at all, ma’am. I’m bitter, if you must know. I’ve probably been in this job too long, but I can never come to terms with what human beings are capable of doing to each other, the weak and defenceless most of all. Look at them. They were so little, they never even found out what they were supposed to have done wrong.’
‘Bill, you’re going to make me cry in a minute.’
Bill looked at her and gave her a weary smile. ‘No, I’m not. You’re harder than that, Detective Superintendent Maguire. And you’re in this job for the same reason I am. So that the scumbags who hurt innocent kiddies like this don’t get away with it.’
Katie nodded but didn’t say any more. She didn’t need to, the children’s skeletons laid out on the groundsheet spoke for her.
‘Sir!’ called out one of Bill’s technicians. They had brought up another small skull and Bill said to Katie, ‘I’ll see you after, ma’am,’ and went over to take a look at it.
* * *
Mother O’Dwyer was sitting at her desk with a Bible in front of her. Sister Rose showed Katie into her study and as she did so, Mother O’Dwyer stood up. The deep lines around her mouth made it appear as if her lips had been sewn together by headhunters.
‘Good afternoon, Detective Superintendent,’ she said, and her voice was precise and cold. ‘Is it too much to hope that you have come to tell me that you have almost finished ravaging our gardens?’
‘I’m afraid we still have a lot more to do, Mother. We did advise you that we were thinking of bringing in ground-radar scanners to see if there were any more bones buried under the lawns. They should be here and starting work tomorrow.’
‘I see. You do understand that you have shattered our lives? Our peace, our tranquillity, our ability to meditate? We have done nothing but devote ourselves wholly and completely to God and the service of others, but you have even dug up our cabbages.’
Katie said, ‘May I sit down? I have something serious to ask you.’
‘I told you the last time you were here, I have been instructed by our legal adviser to say nothing to you at all. Mr O’Cathaín or one of his representatives should be in touch with you shortly.’
Katie pulled the bucket-like chair around and sat down anyway. ‘My detective showed you a post-mortem picture of the nun who was found dead in Glanmire. You said that you didn’t know her, but it was recognizably Sister Mona Murphy, who used to belong to this congregation. In one of the photographs we borrowed from you she is standing right next to you. There’s no question at all that you knew who she was, so why did you lie to us?’
Mother O’Dwyer didn’t answer, but went back to her desk and sat down. She laid her hand on the open Bible and stared at Katie as if she didn’t understand what she was doing there, or as if Katie had asked her a question in a foreign language.
‘Mother O’Dwyer?’ said Katie. ‘I really need to know why you didn’t tell us the truth.’
‘I was afraid,’ said Mother O’Dwyer. She sounded as if she had barbed wire in her throat, to try and catch her words before they came out.
‘You were afraid? Afraid of what? The sooner we find out who’s been killing these sisters, the better it will be for everybody.’
‘Will it? Is that what you think?’
‘Of course it will,’ said Katie. ‘You don’t want any more sisters to be murdered, do you? And whoever did this, you want to see them punished, don’t you?’
‘Sometimes it is better to die than tell the truth,’ said Mother O’Dwyer.
‘Oh, really? And under what circumstances is that?’
Mother O’Dwyer was silent for almost half a minute, her lips tightly pursed, but Katie didn’t ask her any more questions because she could sense that she was carefully thinking of what she was going to say.
‘I knew it was Sister Mona as soon as I heard about it on the news,’ she said. ‘And then when Sister Barbara was found, mutilated as she was, I was absolutely certain.’
‘Go on,’ Katie coaxed her. ‘Certain of what?’
‘I was certain that somebody was taking their revenge on the sisters of the Bon Sauveur, and that more might be killed.’
‘And why did you think that?’
‘Because of the abuse that was inflicted on Sister Bridget, and the way that Sister Mona and Sister Barbara were tortured. It could only have been done by somebody who knew each of them intimately.’
‘Why?’
Mother O’Dwyer was highly agitated now. She stood up and went to the window. Outside, she could see the blue nylon tent and the reservists digging up the gardens. She lifted her hand as if to bless them, or as if she were commanding them to stop. Katie stayed where she was and waited for her to answer.
‘As you probably know, Detective Superintendent, many sisters are devoted to one particular saint and see in that saint’s experience their own path to divine ecstasy. Some see their way to Jesus in the miracles that their chosen saint might have worked. Some see it in their martyrdom. Some see it in both, for many martyred saints worked miracles before they went to meet their maker.’
Again, she was silent for a long while, and then she said, ‘Sister Bridget was passionate about the Immaculate Heart of Mary. She believed that if she lived as the Blessed Virgin had lived, with a pure and forgiving heart, she would eventually reach God.’
‘All right...’ said Katie. ‘So, what you’re suggesting is that whoever suffocated her and then used the figurine of the Immaculate Heart of Mary to violate her, there was a strong possibility that they knew that.’
‘Exactly. As for Sister Mona, her spiritual ideal was Saint Gemma Galgani, known as the Lover of the Cross.’
Katie shook her head. ‘I’m afraid you’ll have to enlighten me there. Who was Saint Gemma Galgani?’
‘Just a simple girl who worked in the kitchen of a wealthy Italian family about the beginning of the twentieth century. But because of her great love of Jesus she would often pause in her work to contemplate the large crucifix that hung on the kitchen wall. It aroused such a passion in her that it made her heart beat faster, and one day she cried out, ‘Let me come to you, I am thirsting for you!’
‘I see,’ said Katie. ‘And then what?’
Mother O’Dwyer turned away from the window. ‘The Corpus on the cross came to life, and His right hand detached from the cross, and with a loving look in His eyes He beckoned Gemma to come to Him. Gemma rushed over to the crucifix and flew up in the air so that Jesus could embrace her. He pressed her lips against the wound in His side, so that she could drink His blood, and all the time she remained floating in the air – “as if resting on a cloud”, according to her biographer.’
‘So she flew, this Saint Gemma? And her killer made sure that Sister Mona flew, too.’
‘That was what convinced me more than anything,’ said Mother O’Dwyer. ‘If Sister Bridget had been the only one, I would have certainly had my suspicions. But then there was Sister Mona, and now what was done to Sister Barbara really confirms it.’
‘We’ve given out hardly any details about Sister Barbara except that her hands and feet were mutilated.’
‘That was enough. Sister Barbara was devoted to Saint Anastasia, who was a healer and an exorcist. She was martyred in the third century under the persecution of the Roman Emperor Diocletian. She was tortured by having her fingers and toes cut off and her breasts burned with red-hot irons, but she refused to deny her faith. Some legends say that she was beheaded, others that she was drowned.’
Katie didn’t say anything immediately. Although the Garda press office had released some details of Sister Barbara’s condition when her body was found in the fountain, they had held back the information that her
breasts had been branded. So Mother O’Dwyer’s suspicions about the murderer could very well be correct, and he or she was somebody who had known all three nuns intimately.
‘What I want to know is, why didn’t you tell us any of this before?’ Katie asked her. ‘I’m not saying that it could have prevented Sister Barbara from being abducted, but it could have helped us a great deal in narrowing down our list of possible suspects.’
‘I’ve told you!’ snapped Mother O’Dwyer, as if Katie had forced her into giving so much away. ‘I was afraid. I shall confess my cowardice, and I shall beg the Lord for absolution, but I was afraid, sorely afraid – and I wanted to protect the good name of the Bon Sauveurs, and the diocese.’
‘What were you so afraid of, Mother?’ Katie asked as gently as she could.
Mother O’Dwyer’s eyes were crowded with tears. ‘It was the way we treated the young mothers that we took into Saint Margaret’s, and their babies, too. At the time, we sincerely believed that we were doing right by those girls, showing them how sinful they had been and guiding them back to the path of righteousness. We believed that we were doing our best for the children, too, even though they had been conceived in acts of immorality and were born invested with their mothers’ shame. If we hadn’t been so strict with those children, Satan would have claimed them for his own – which, of course, they were.’
‘What about the children you sent for adoption?’ asked Katie. ‘I thought you believed that they belonged to God and that was why you could take them away from their natural mothers and give them to somebody else.’
‘Some of the children behaved well and grew up healthy; it was clear that God had smiled upon them and accepted them. It was those children we sent for adoption, so that they could be raised in a God-fearing family and not be tainted by the sinfulness of their conception.’
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