For Your Sins: previously published as Joseph's Mansions

by Richard Pitman

  For Your Sins

  A Frankie Houlihan novel

  By Richard Pitman and Joe McNally

  Please note, this book has been re-titled for this edition; it was first published in print with the title Joseph’s Mansions

  Dear Reader,

  if you are following the Eddie Malloy series, Eddie does not appear in this book. For Your Sins is the first book featuring Frankie Houlihan. Eddie and Frankie are featured working together in Bet Your Life.

  Also by Richard & Joe

  Warned Off

  Hunted

  Blood Ties

  Running Scared

  Bet Your Life

  Copyright ©2013 by Richard Pitman and Joe McNally

  First published in Great Britain by Harper Collins, 2001

  This edition published in 2013

  All rights reserved

  Authors’ note

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either a work of the imagination of the authors or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  1

  A black Mercedes pulled away from the main gate of Leopardstown racecourse and headed for Dublin.

  The car was driven by Brendan Gleeson, a gambler who was seldom lucky and often drunk. His rear-seat passengers were his boss Kelly Corell, a gangster at the top of his game, and a young English scientist, David Hewitt.

  The windows of the Mercedes were tinted dark green. They were bulletproof. The underside of the car was reinforced against explosives. Mister Hewitt did not know this. Nor did he know that Kelly Corell’s right hand, the one he was shaking as they said farewell at the airport, had dried blood lodged below the signet ring he wore. Corell had not been as thorough as he usually was when cleaning up after slitting the throat of rival John O’Rourke in Corell’s cellar games room that morning.

  Hewitt got out of the car and said, ‘It’s been a pleasure meeting you at last Mister Corell. I’m so excited about working on this project with you. Thanks for the opportunity.’

  ‘Ah, you’re very welcome Mister Hewitt. It’s a privilege for an entrepreneur like me to be able to support you. You’d not even be ruling out a Nobel Prize if you pull this one off, I’d think, eh?’

  Hewitt laughed nervously. ‘I’ll settle for the professional satisfaction Mister Corell. It will be long and difficult; I don’t want to build your expectations too high.’

  ‘Time is something we have plenty of, and money too. Let me know when you’ve found the ideal property and I’ll get my lawyers onto it.’

  ‘I will, I will. My current project won’t be completed for six months. You’re sure that’s okay?’

  ‘Don’t be worrying now. I’m an investor that takes the longer view for the bigger return.’

  ‘That’s such a novel thing to hear these days Mister Corell. You’re a breath of fresh air, indeed!’

  ‘Good man. Good luck.’ Corell closed the door and returned Hewitt’s goodbye wave. He smiled as he nudged Gleeson. ‘I’m a breath of fresh air, Brendan, d’ye hear that!’

  Gleeson looked at his boss in the mirror, unsure how to respond. ‘I did, Mister Corell.’

  Corell sat back, laughing. ‘A breath of fresh fuckin’ air! Get me home before I piss meself.’

  Gleeson checked his mirrors and pulled away.

  2

  At the same time as Corell’s car was travelling through Dublin, a field of steeplechasers thundered down the Cheltenham hill toward the third last jump, an obstacle notorious for ending dreams and sometimes lives.

  A beautiful and famous young journalist, Kathy Spencer had chosen this race to make her debut as an amateur jockey on a horse called Zuiderzie. As the black fence loomed closer, Miss Spencer was losing control of her mount. Here is how she described in her globally syndicated column what happened next.

  My arms had been tiring gradually since we’d jumped the fifth-last and my legs, God, my legs! My thighs felt like my stretch marks had been laced with acid. I’d been training for six months for this, riding a saddle-less bike up hills, doing innumerable boring squats in the gym, running across sand dunes with a heavy backpack, and now my legs were getting their own back on me. The ache spread to my knees and ankles. I’d been perched in these stirrups for around seven minutes wrestling with this big chestnut thoroughbred and I realized as we came to the fence that Zuiderzie was winning the bout.

  My weakening fingers let the reins slip through and he stretched his head further to take advantage. The hill increased his momentum. They tell me we were travelling at about thirty miles an hour. It felt like seventy. No windscreen here to dull the screaming gale, no brakes or steering wheel. Just half a ton of hard-trained muscle, flaring nostrils sucking air, veins filled, head bobbing, mane flying, doing what he loved, what every gene in him had been bred to do over thousands of years. And twenty strides from the big black birch fence, so stiff and broad I could have walked along the top of it, I accepted that I’d lost control.

  Everything I’d been taught about trying to ‘see a stride’ (pick your point of take-off) and getting him organized for it was useless to me. My exhausted muscles couldn’t deliver. I was aware now of those around me, hard-faced, half-starved jockeys who risked their lives regularly. Victory at Cheltenham was very sweet to most of these guys and they seemed to crowd me now, surround me in this mass of colour and sound, breaking what remained of my concentration.

  Then we hit.

  Zuiderzie took off far too late and slammed into the fence. I felt for an instant as though I’d been frozen in time. Then the momentum caught up with me and I felt myself catapulted skywards. It seemed a long time before I crashed. My brain desperately recalled the lessons of the past six months. Don’t land on your head. Tuck it in as you approach the ground. Try to land on rounded shoulder- blades and start rolling immediately into a ball. There’ll be other horses jumping just behind you, make yourself as small a target for their hooves as possible…

  It had all seemed so practical and achievable sitting sipping coffee at the kitchen table. Come the day, I simply didn’t know which way up I was until my back thumped into the life-saving lush turf, pounding the air from my lungs and slamming my helmeted head so hard on the ground that I lost consciousness.

  When I opened my eyes, a priest was leaning over me. Last Rites were my first thought and I thanked God I had no children or husband to grieve and rage at my selfishness. Then, in the sweetest Irish accent I’ve ever heard, the priest said, ‘Are you alright?’

  I nodded.

  ‘‘Twas a purler of a fall,’ he said.

  I smiled. ‘I haven’t heard that word for ages,’ I said.

  He looked vaguely puzzled. ‘Purler?’

  ‘Purler.’ I mimicked his accent. I saw from his face, framed against the sky, that neither of us was sure that I wasn’t in the first stages of delirium. He blushed. I said, ‘Do you like swaddling?’

  ‘It’s OK. Haven’t done it for ages myself.’

  ‘The word, I mean! It’s one of my favourite parts of Christmas; you get to hear the word “swaddling”.’

  He nodded. ‘I think you’ll be needing some treatment, Miss.’

  ‘I think you might be right,’ I said.

  The priest’s name was Frankie Houlihan, a Dubliner, who’d caught the racing bug from his father. The sport was his sole pastime since he’d been moved to his parish in England.

  When the first-aiders scooped her up in a stretcher, she asked Frankie to come with h
er in the ambulance.

  ‘I’m fine, thanks,’ he said. ‘I’ll walk back for the fresh air.’

  Kathy turned her head, which now housed a jackhammer ache. ‘I want to say thank you properly.’ Frankie hesitated.

  ‘In a vertical position …’

  Frankie smiled now.

  ‘…without a funny hat on.’

  He shook his head slowly. The stretcher-bearers stood at the open door of the ambulance looking at Kathy, then at Frankie. She said to him, ‘You’re keeping these guys waiting.’ Still smiling, he moved forward and followed them into the ambulance.

  3

  It was a week before Kathy Spencer saw Frankie Houlihan again. She had come to his church to hear him say morning mass. When everyone left she sat silently in her pale blue dress, willing him to come back out the door which led to the sacristy. And he did, he came out singing softly, a song she didn’t recognize. He didn’t look her way but genuflected and went up to clear the altar in readiness for evening mass.

  Coming back down the red-carpeted steps, he saw her and stopped. And smiled. She felt she should walk up the centre aisle to him but she was suddenly uncertain, nervous, her confidence slipping away. Afterwards they’d laugh about the noise his shoes made as he’d walked toward her. He’d changed into old crepe-soled comfortable shoes immediately after mass and they peeled themselves pore by pore from each polished rubber tile, the sound echoing in the vastness.

  She was close to the end of the pew. He stopped. ‘Hello again.’

  ‘Hello to you, Father Frankie.’

  They looked at each other; Kathy’s instincts that she wanted this man to love her grew stronger. Frankie was aware only that, as with the first time, he was completely comfortable with her. Although this feeling was new to him, he had no reason to suspect that it was one he should worry about. His height, his athlete’s frame, dark hair and fine features had made him the target of many girls as a teenager but he had never felt strongly for anyone other than his family members.

  Kathy said, ‘You’re looking down at me again. You’re always doing that.’

  Frankie smiled. ‘How’s your head?’

  ‘Fine. They kept me in overnight for observation and -’

  ‘And you were out next morning after a hearty breakfast at Cheltenham General.’

  ‘You saw it in the papers?’

  ‘I did. I recognized the smile, which was about all I could see of you last week under that hard hat.’

  ‘Saved my life that hat did.’

  ‘Ahh, I think that oul’ head of yours might have survived without it.’

  ‘This “oul’ head” as you put it has only been on my shoulders for twenty-eight years, I’ll have you know.’

  Frankie feigned surprise. ‘And where did you keep it before then?’

  ‘You’re very forward, Father, considering we’ve only met twice.’

  ‘Now, I’ve never been accused of that before! ‘

  The banter continued over tea in the chapel house, with Frankie too naive, maybe, to think that Kathy’s surprise arrival meant anything more than she said it did; to say a proper thank you to him. He walked her to her car that day assuming that when he closed the door he would never see her again. Only as her BMW disappeared through the gates did the slight twinge of regret at her going give any warning of what lay ahead.

  Come spring, they were seeing each other twice most weeks, always away from the church. He hadn’t yet been to her home. Neither had said anything about their feelings. Kathy was happier than she had ever hoped to be, simply being with him. Although she wanted him to tell her how he felt, she recognized that it wasn’t necessary.

  That autumn, on a glorious October day by the banks of the South Oxford Canal, without breaking his stride or turning to look at her Frankie said, ‘I’m thinking of leaving the priesthood.’

  They walked another ten paces before she replied, quietly, ‘It’s a big step, Frankie.’

  It had been almost a year they had been friends. Still they’d said nothing more intimate to each other than ‘I enjoy your company’ and ‘You make me laugh’.

  Frankie said, ‘Tis. It’s been in my mind for a while now.’

  She knew the tortures he must have gone through and the thought of his pain hurt her. She longed to hold him and sympathize but she could not break their unspoken agreement. Whatever weight of argument Frankie had built to justify leaving or not leaving, she could not risk adding a single gram to it. The decision had to be his alone.

  She prepared herself for what she knew he’d say next. They were still walking, hadn’t broken stride. In the same even voice he said, ‘I want to spend the next month praying every day for God’s guidance.’

  ‘That’s OK. I have my winter project to prepare for.’ She worried it had come out a little too pat, too hurried.

  ‘I won’t be able to see you,’ he said.

  She thought she detected a slight tremor in his voice. She said, ‘I understand. I’ll pray for you too.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  4

  Frankie made his way through Dublin’s streets on foot. He’d arrived by air an hour before. On past visits, he’d always hurried to his family. This time his first destination was Holy Cross College.

  The archbishop’s house, a square mansion of granite, was in the grounds of the College. In the final half-mile as he closed on the meeting place, Frankie kept up the rhythm of his step and had to resist the urge to swing his arms like a sergeant major. Marching on, head up, his way of steeling himself, of keeping his mood confident. He needed to speak to Archbishop Mahoney secure in the belief he’d now formed; it was vital, in his mind, to accomplish what he’d come for. There was no room in him for nerves, for self-doubt. He’d been all the way along that tortuous path, spent dark nights in his own Gethsemane.

  Frankie turned off Clonliffe Road to go through the shiny black metal gate, beyond which the entry to the house lay. He fixed his eyes on the door and as he walked the rich brown block paving, the door opened and Archbishop Mahoney himself stood in the doorway dressed the same as Frankie, smiling and slowly raising both hands straight in front of him, tilting his small, almost bald head to the right, his eyes twinkling with genuine warmth and affection. He put his arms around the young priest he’d ordained eight years previously and said, ‘Francis, Francis, welcome home!’ and Frankie rested his head briefly on the old man’s left shoulder, smelling the soap on his skin, battling his emotions, his sudden need to weep. The Garden of Gethsemane came to his mind once more. His image of himself this time was as Judas.

  The archbishop led him along varnished floors of old knotted boards, past paintings of the saints hanging below ceilings of varying heights, in rooms whose difference in size would have been plain to a blind man listening to acoustic effects in the voices of the pair as they moved through the house. The room they sat down in had walls the colour of the reeds carried on Palm Sunday. The big pale green chairs that held them faced each other across a wide hearth backed by a tall marble mantelpiece, above which hung a life-size painting of Pope Pius XII.

  The deep sills of two arched windows held fat pink vases filled with fresh flowers. Their scents perfumed the room. Dusk was falling. Six sets of candle-shaped lights burned around the walls, casting a glow, which Frankie thought made the old man look even more serene. The archbishop sat with his hands together in his lap, legs crossed at the ankles. His black shoes shone but Frankie noticed a tiny tear in the right one, just on the fold of the instep. He looked up slowly. All the small talk had been disposed of on the journey to this room. It was time to say the words he had rehearsed so often that he imagined the letters in them to be worn at the edges from the millions of times they had tumbled around inside his head.

  He sat forward, elbows on knees, hands clasped loosely and said, ‘Archbishop, I have news for you that you would not be expecting to hear. I have decided to give up my vocation. I have decided to leave the formal ministry.’

 
; The old man’s smile never changed. He nodded slowly. ‘You used the word “decided” twice, Frankie. You are a man who’s very definite about what he’s going to do.’

  ‘There is no need for me to explain to Your Grace how much thought and prayer I have given to this in the past months. Your Grace will know me well enough to be aware of that.’

  ‘How many months?’

  Frankie steepled his fingers then flattened them to join his hands. ‘Almost nine, Archbishop.’

  They sat looking at each other. The temptation came to Frankie, as he’d known it would, to fill the silence with heartfelt explanations and pleas for understanding and forgiveness, but saying nothing, maintaining the dignity, was what he had prepared so hard for. Any gushing now of the pain of all this, of his sorrow and deep sadness, would only serve his own selfishness. The archbishop would know everything Frankie had been through. He’d been eighteen when he’d first met the old man who sat across from him The archbishop knew him better than his own father had.

  For half an hour, they talked. The archbishop asked her name, what she was like. He tried gently but firmly to get Frankie to reconsider, to seek counselling. Frankie held out against the pleas.

  The old man gripped his shoulder. ‘Human love changes, Frankie, as people get older. It can fade. God’s love is constant.’

  ‘I know, Your Grace,’ Frankie said quietly.

  He sighed. ‘You know, but you won’t change your mind?’

  ‘No, Your Grace.’

  The archbishop stood up and walked to the mantelpiece to look down at Frankie. ‘You’ll give them some time to find a replacement, Frankie?’

  ‘Of course, Archbishop.’

  ‘Three months?’

  ‘Three months will be fine, Your Grace.’

  There was a silence. For the first time Frankie looked away from the face of the older man. There was no relief in him, only sadness. The flower scents hung heavy. It was almost dark beyond the arched windows. The bare fireplace seemed as cold and empty as his heart. He felt a light touch on his forehead and looked up. The old man smiled and ruffled his hair. Frankie wept.