Daisy Quinn stood at her window that night, watched the lights extinguish in number nineteen and then slipped into her own bed. It had been a long and tiring day and she was exhausted.
The bishop had arrived as promised and had brought with him all manner of activity to the Priory.
Daisy couldn’t help thinking that she had never in her life heard the sister talk so much in one day nor with as much agitation as she now did. She had always liked Sister Evangelista, who had been an efficient but kind Reverend Mother.
Daisy knew what had made the sister mad. It was the photographs in the drawer. Daisy had seen them too, lots of times.
She was sitting outside the sister’s office, when she heard her on the phone to the bishop, asking him what she should do.
‘I have already called the police, of course I have. These pictures are the devil’s own work and surely they must have something to do with his murder. How can they not? Bishop, ye need to get here, fast.’ Daisy heard the sister lower her voice even further as she hissed, ‘They include one of our own children, taken in his office, so help me, God, it is a depraved picture. Ye will not believe it or understand what I am talking about until you see for yourself.’
Again, there was a long silence before the sister replied.
‘Yes, Bishop. I will say nothing to the police until you get here and see the pictures for yeself, but what will I say to the police? I will always protect the Church, Father, yes, Father, I will, Father. I have to speak with you, though, urgently.’ Her voice dropped even further to a rasp. ‘I will send them to the Dohertys’. Daisy says the father spent a lot of time there and I swear, as God is true, the daughter Kitty is pregnant, but I’ll not tell the police that, now, shall I?’
Daisy heard the sister replace the receiver and let out a big sigh, just as the police car pulled into the drive. Daisy peeped through the door and saw the sister wiping her eyes on her hankie, just as both doors of the police car clicked shut.
An hour later, when the police had left, Daisy boldly and nervously asked her own question.
‘Can I stay here, please, Sister, at the convent?’
‘Stay here, Daisy? Are ye mad, girl? The bishop will need somewhere to stay. He has to be looked after. Do you think it would be proper for him to stay at the convent, now?’
Crestfallen, Daisy looked down at her hands folded in her lap and replied with a voice loaded with sadness, ‘No, Sister.’
‘No indeed, Daisy,’ said Sister Evangelista. ‘Now, off ye go back over to the Priory, there’s a good girl, Daisy, and I will pop back myself later with the bishop.’
Daisy was in the Priory kitchen, peeling potatoes for the bishop’s supper, when he and the sister rushed in through the front door.
There had been a great deal of banging of doors, and of drawers and cupboards opening and closing.
The sister had brought the convent car, a Morris Traveller, to the front and she and the bishop ran in and out, loading up the back with one box after another.
Daisy couldn’t help noticing how anxious they appeared and that there was little conversation between the two. They were very brisk with Daisy, shouting at her to go away when she went into the room to offer them tea.
Before the sister left, they told her that tomorrow the bishop would be receiving the police at the Priory and that they might want to ask Daisy questions, like the ones the sister had from time to time since the other day, and hadn’t Daisy found that all very easy now?
Well, the truth was, she hadn’t.
Daisy’s head was hurting with the amount of questions she had been asked today and she thought it was funny no one had asked her any that she could answer without breaking the rules. Daisy saw a lot of what went on outside the Priory, but no one had asked her about that.
Whilst the sister and the bishop banged and clattered about the Priory, Daisy made the bishop his supper, and dusted and aired his room.
Later that evening, when the bishop returned from mass, the police were waiting for him. After they left, he had asked for his supper to be served in the small sitting room, on a tray in front of the fire, which Daisy had lit for him, with the television news on very loud.
When she entered the room with his tray of hot lamb scouse and steamed jam pudding and custard, he did not even look at her, fixing his gaze on the television screen. He said, ‘Thank you, girl.’ He said thank you, girl, often.
Just as she always had every meal since Mrs Malone had died, Daisy ate her dinner alone, in the vast basement kitchen at the big wooden kitchen table.
The bishop thought Daisy hadn’t seen the bottle of whiskey on the floor, hidden down by the side of his chair, with the glass half full of the amber liquid tucked behind it.
He was wrong. Daisy saw everything.
As she nestled into her pillow and closed her eyes, Daisy heard his footsteps climbing the wooden stairs, slowly and heavily, towards her room on the top floor. The bishop was so fat, he struggled up the four flights, but Daisy knew he was coming to her and with every step she flinched.
She had thought that maybe, tonight, she would be safe.
As always, he sat on the edge of her bed whilst he struggled to catch his breath and, once recovered, he began to speak.
‘Girl, the police will be here tomorrow and I am going to tell them that you are simple, do ye understand?’
Daisy nodded, but she didn’t speak. She never spoke when he was in her room and he never called her Daisy, always ‘girl’.
‘If they ask you questions, girl, questions such as, has anything been removed from the Priory, you say no, nothing has. Do you understand?’
Daisy nodded.
‘And if they ask you did any men ever visit the Priory you say no. Do ye understand that?’
Again, Daisy nodded.
‘And as Father James told you, girl, it would be a grave sin to tell anyone what takes place in this room, even the police. You know that, don’t you, girl?’
The bishop stopped talking and looked at her for a long, long time, as though a battle raged inside his head. Then, with a look of anguish, he pushed back the blankets covering Daisy, just as he always did.
7
AS TOMMY OPENED the back gate he could see Maura through the kitchen window, standing at the sink; on her face she wore a tense and warning expression. His heart sank. Something was wrong.
The first thing he saw as he came in the back door was Howard and Simon, sitting at his kitchen table, each with an enamel mug of tea.
‘Evening, Mr Doherty,’ said Howard, as Tommy removed his jacket and hung it on the back of the kitchen door.
Tommy didn’t speak but touched the peak of his cap in acknowledgment and looked over at Maura.
‘That cuppa for me, love? What can I do for ye, gents?’ With a smile that took every effort, he looked at both men and beamed.
When Tommy finally closed the front door on Howard and Simon, he and Maura peeped through the parlour window nets and waited for them to drive away.
A group of children had gathered around the car. Howard and Simon stopped and spoke to Little Paddy. Tommy watched as Howard raised his hand, waved a greeting and exchanged pleasantries with Molly Barrett, who was standing on her front step, hairnet in place and arms folded, chatting to Annie O’Prey.
As Maura and Tommy looked up and down the road, net curtains furiously twitched back at them.
‘Look at that hard-faced Deirdre knocking on Sheila’s door,’ hissed Maura to Tommy. ‘When did you ever see that slattern out on the front street pretending to look for her kids? They wander loose and free from dawn to dusk, without a crust in their belly, and suddenly she’s all Mary good-wife, finding any excuse to see why the coppers are at our house. The nosy fecking bitch.’
‘Hush,’ Tommy replied. ‘Don’t let the children hear ye. We did all right. They have bloody nothing. I gave exactly the same story I have before. They have nothing, Maura.’
He put his arm round Maura’s shoulder.
Deep inside, he was truly worried as they observed their neighbours, people he thought of as his friends, openly gossiping in the street. He no longer felt safe.
There had to be a reason the police had called again at Tommy’s house. Something had put a spring in their step and a note of confidence in their voices, leading them straight to his door.
Maura knew Tommy was trying to protect her, but she was too canny to be fooled. She had to act fast. They had to spirit Kitty away from here and as quickly as possible.
Maura returned to the kitchen, wrote Kathleen a note and called Harry down the stairs to take the message across the road right away.
Maura didn’t want to be seen outdoors. She knew she wouldn’t make it far before a nosy neighbour called her across for an inquisition.
She could hear Peggy already shouting over the back wall, ‘What did the police want, Maura? Getting mighty friendly with you and Tommy, they are now,’ as she walked back into her own house. Peggy was a harmless friend, but Maura knew that even her idle gossip could be dangerous.
Later that evening, Jerry stepped into Maura’s kitchen, just as she put the bread dough onto the side of the range to rise. Tommy had settled down in front of the television and opened the paper on his lap for a night-time read. He had decided it was time to make an effort. Having learnt to read only a few years ago, he didn’t want to forget. It was one of the few things he had in his life to be proud of.
He leant forward and shifted the cinders around in the fire with the poker as he motioned to Jerry to sit in the chair opposite.
‘Hello, Jerry, what’s brought ye over here, mate? Has Alice whipped ye with her tongue then?’
Tommy began to giggle. He always laughed at his own jokes before anyone else did.
In months gone by, Jerry would have burst in through their kitchen door, cracking his own jokes as he came. But that was before.
When Kathleen had told Jerry Maura wanted him to pop over to the house, his heart had sunk. He felt sick and couldn’t eat his supper. As soon as it was dark, he made his way down the entry to number nineteen. The sooner he knew what was wrong, the better. There had been too many nasty surprises of late. Kathleen promised she would follow him a few minutes later.
‘Hello, Tommy.’ Jerry lowered himself into the chair and held both of his hands out in front of him to warm before the embers, which had begun to glow with the heat. ‘Apparently, Maura wants to talk to me.’ Jerry rubbed his dry, crackling hands together, looking from one to the other.
Tommy looked surprised and glanced over at Maura as she took down from the press the tea caddy and the best, large, earthenware, blue-striped cups.
‘Well, ’tis a mystery to me, Jer. Maura, do we want to talk to Jerry?’ he said.
Tommy tilted his head to one side as he spoke, as though trying to see around Maura, to pick up a clue from her face.
‘Aye, we do, but both of ye just sit while I make us a cuppa, and wait for Kathleen. We need to talk.’
Maura still hadn’t turned round to face Tommy. She didn’t dare. Without realizing it, she was allowing time for Jerry’s presence to settle in the room.
‘Well, this sounds serious altogether,’ said Tommy, standing up and tipping the last of the coke from the scuttle onto the fire.
Maura felt calmer than she had earlier. Jerry was like a brother to her. In fact, he was closer than her own brother. She genuinely loved Jerry. They both did. Just by being here he had made the atmosphere lighter. She was glad she had asked Kathleen to send him over.
For a few moments, in hushed and whispered tones, the two men talked about the visit from the police.
‘It is all just guesswork, Tommy,’ said Jerry, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees and his hands clasped together, as if in prayer. ‘No one saw us, no one was there, we are safe. You can’t hang a man on the back of guesswork.’
Jerry had spoken the word no one else dared to. Hanging.
‘No one would think hanging good enough for the murder of a priest, Jerry,’ said Tommy, his eyes filling with tears of fear.
Jerry saw the distress on Maura’s face. There was a moment of silence, until Jerry deftly moved on to a lighter subject, one guaranteed to alter the mood of the room. Football.
Tommy handed Jerry the Echo. The Liverpool football team manager, Bill Shankly, was all the talk in the football world.
‘He’s a Scot, a Celt. He will never stop being a problem for Everton, mark my words,’ said Tommy.
‘Aye, so everyone says,’ Jerry replied.
Maura was pleased they were discussing football. She loved to hear the two of them natter. It made her feel warm inside. If Tommy was happy chatting football, she was happy. That was how it worked with them both. Maura took as much pleasure from Tommy’s enjoyment as he did from hers.
It worked both ways. Each felt the other’s pain and pleasure.
Or so Maura had thought.
The depth to which each had sunk into their own private world following the priest’s murder had surprised her and added to the trauma. At the time when she needed Tommy the most, they had been the least able to communicate.
Touch, not talk.
Neither wanting to hear the other’s opinion.
No analysis. The answers to unspoken questions burnt inside them, too painful to articulate. The knowledge and silence creating a vacuum.
But they had survived the first shock. The aftermath. The adjustment. Now they had to survive the second tsunami. As it rolled towards their kitchen, Maura took one of the hard-backed chairs from the table and dragged it over to the fire.
Jerry and Tommy looked at Maura. She was behaving strangely. Both felt their hearts sink as they waited for her to speak and they jumped when Kathleen burst in through the door.
‘Thought it less obvious if we walked over separately,’ said Kathleen. ‘Molly Barrett’s curtains have been twitching like a feckin’ ferret all day. What did they want, Maura, what did the police have to say?’
‘All the same questions we have been asked before,’ said Tommy. ‘They have nothing new.’
‘Right,’ said Maura, feeling much stronger now that Kathleen had arrived. ‘I have to tell ye something and, Tommy, ye must not kick off, because Kathleen has the answer to the problem and I need ye to be strong. We all do, especially Kitty.’
Tommy’s eyebrows knitted together. He lifted his backside up from the chair ever so slightly and, picking up the dark-green, flattened cushion on which he sat, slipped his newspaper underneath, for reading later.
‘I’m ready,’ said Tommy.
‘I knew it,’ Jerry said. ‘As soon as Kathleen said you wanted me over here, I knew something was wrong.’
Tommy was suddenly fearful. He felt the change in the atmosphere and wanted time to stand still. He didn’t think he could cope with anything else on top of all that had happened. Things were improving. Moving forward. Getting better. Why couldn’t it stay that way?
He felt resentment brewing inside towards Maura. A feeling that was a stranger to the man who thought no ill of anyone.
He didn’t want Maura to speak.
The coke in the fire was by now a red glow. They waited.
Maura took a deep breath. She spoke the words.
‘Kitty is pregnant with the priest’s child.’
She had said it. The words were huge, the biggest she had ever spoken, filling the room and polluting the air they breathed.
Before Tommy or Jerry could react she added, ‘Before either of you think of gobbing off with an opinion, hear what Kathleen has to say, because she has more sense than all of us put together, so she does.’
Tommy couldn’t have given an opinion. He was in shock. His bottom jaw had dropped and there it remained, gawping. Jerry rubbed his hands through his hair and was the first to speak.
‘The fecking bastard. He’s still here tormenting us. The fecking bastard.’
Maura didn’t know where she found her strength. It ca
me from nowhere and surged up in her. As she began to speak, she hardly recognized her own voice.
‘Before either of you say another thing, I have children upstairs, and the baby is asleep and I will not let her be woken. They are not going to hear either of you raise your voices and they are not going to know what is going on, just because neither of you two can control yourselves. Do you both understand?’
For a split second, Tommy wasn’t quite sure what had shocked him most. The news that Kitty was carrying the dead priest’s child, or the fact that Maura was laying down the law when, as Kitty’s father, he was more than entitled to kick off. He instantly understood why Maura had asked Jerry to come over.
‘Whilst Kathleen explains, I will take some money from the bread bin and buy four bottles of Guinness from the Anchor. Not a word until I get back. I want no argument over this, it is too important.’
Neither man spoke. Jerry watched Maura as she put on her coat and fastened her headscarf over her curlers. The back-door latch clicked shut and Jerry listened to her feet tip-tapping over the yard.
Not for the first time, he admired her. She would fight for her family and here she was, laying the law down in her own kitchen to calm the two men she was closest to.
Tommy tipped his head backwards, stared at the ceiling and let out a large sigh.
His eyes focused on a stain that spread outwards from the light bulb in the centre. Within a dark-brown outline, shaped like a perfect cloud on a summer’s day. The type you see drawn in the children’s books from which Kitty had taught Tommy to read.
He remembered the first book they had read together. Janet and John. When he had told his five-year-old princess that he had never really attended school and had spent all of his childhood with his father, helping him with the horses, she had set her goal: to teach Tommy everything the sisters had taught her at school.
‘Come on, Da, up,’ she used to say to him when it was time for her to go to bed.
They had decided that it would be their secret. Sometimes, if he was tired after a hard day, he would make an excuse but she would stand there, one hand on her little hip and the other pointing up the stairs, her face set into what Tommy called her school-marm expression.
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