Sister Agatha stopped at the doors of the chapel and flung the girl inside. ‘Take off your night shirt and lie on the floor.’
‘Oh, no! No more, please.’ Exhausted, Irene pulled the wet, blood stained garment up over her head and stood dripping wet and shivering in front of the altar, her thin arms trying to cover her exposed naked body, a statue of the Blessed Virgin and Christ the Saviour on either side.
‘Lie down.’ Sister Agatha’s voice came out in shallow panting gasps as she licked beads of sweat from her top lip. ‘I said, lie on the floor.’
Irene got down on her hands and knees before curling up in a foetal position.
‘Not like that. On your belly. Stretch your arms out in the shape of the cross.’
She let out a cry of pain as she eased her bruised and battered body onto the stone floor. Arching her back upwards, hoping her arms and legs would take most of the strain, trying to protect her tender weeping breasts and distended stomach.
Sister Agatha’s heel dug into the small of her back. ‘All the way down.’
Irene let out a groan as her knees and elbows gave way.
‘Now, you will kiss the floor and beg Jesus for forgiveness.’
The last of the bile escaped from Irene’s mouth as her lips pressed against the stone floor.
Sister Agatha called out of the door and someone came running.
‘Sister Bernadette, watch her; make sure she stays here all night. She must learn humility. She must learn obedience. We must help her become clean once more.’
‘Oh, but Sister Agatha, she’ll freeze to death in here.’
A hand was held up to silence the young nun. ‘It is not for us to question the will of God, Sister Bernadette.’
Sister Agatha walked out of the door; the garments of the Sisters of Mercy flapping like wings behind her.
The freezing concrete burned into Irene’s body. The stone floor pressed hard against her protruding hip bones and tore into her breasts. Her salty tears stung the cuts and scratches on her face.
Sister Bernadette knelt beside her. Irene could hear quiet, sympathetic sobs as the nun prayed, and could see rosary beads entwined in fingers.
Eventually Sister Bernadette lay down and tugged the edges of her black robe over Irene’s naked body, in a futile attempt to give her a wee bit of warmth and comfort. She was too terrified to do anything more.
22
Glasgow, 2000
Father Kennedy’s naked body lay on a marble slab as it was ceremoniously cleansed by two nuns wearing protective plastic aprons and gloves. A priest stood by; ready to lift the single white linen square that covered his withered penis to allow the pair to clean underneath. Then they packed his mouth with cotton wool to fill out his sagging, emaciated cheeks, and stitched the insides of his lips closed before dressing him in a white cassock that had been cut up the back to save them pulling it over his head.
He had been dead for almost a week. By the time they’d finished with him, he looked better than he had done in years.
*
Oonagh stood under the shower and let the jets of hot water scald her until every last trace of the hospital was washed away. It had been almost lunchtime by the time she’d got home. Both officers had insisted on coming inside with her, just to check everything was as it should be. She’d got the impression this was as much for their benefit as for hers: to avoid any hysterical call outs later. The back window had been securely locked by their colleagues the previous night after it had been checked for fingerprints. There were none, of course; wiped clean.
Her creased t-shirt and jeans lay on a heap on the bathroom floor.
Both had been grabbed out of the tumble drier in the kitchen by some well-meaning cop, to give her some dry clothes to wear on her return home from the hospital.
By the time she turned off the shower her whole body glowed red and looked as though it had been polished. Her face was pink and flushed, with white goggle rings round her eyes; she looked as though she’d spent too long under a sun bed.
She wrapped a huge white towel around herself and rubbed her wet hair with a hand towel. In the bedroom everything was as it ought to be.
She picked up the picture of herself and Jack from the side of her bed. It was in an antique silver frame, her in a red evening dress, him wearing his tuxedo. It had been taken the night they first got together. The only photograph of them as a couple.
As she put it back on the dressing table she saw it. A book of matches from The Rogano. She picked it up. Written on the inside was ‘Missing you already, C!’ with two kisses underneath. She felt sick. That bastard Antonio. She’d known it wasn’t some kid chancing his luck. She’d been the target for this job, not her house. This wee break in had Charlie’s name written all over it. Jesus, he’d probably been sitting in his parked car as she’d run out into the street, hysterical, in her bare feet, screaming as she phoned the police. It was the sort of sick joke he would play.
Anger welled up inside at the thought of him creeping through her home, picking up the picture of her and Jack. Well, that secret was now well and truly out in the open. But that was the least of her worries at the minute. In fact, she couldn’t care less.
She rested her elbows on her knees and dropped her head into her hands, furious that she hadn’t recognised Charlie’s handiwork the previous night. Then she ran downstairs to the kitchen and looked in her bin – the pregnancy kit was gone. The wee shite had obviously just put two and two together and chanced his arm with that phone call, and like a fool she’d fallen straight into his trap.
She decided against telling the police. The book of matches proved nothing except that he was a twisted wee shite. If asked, he could say he’d slipped them into her bag when they’d bumped into each other the previous day. And then she’d have to go into details about meeting him and their chat about Tom, and that would open a whole can of worms she could do without right now. She could handle this one on her own.
Back upstairs she fumbled through her bag, pulled out a diary and flicked to the back page, running her fingers down a list of numbers. She picked up the phone and dialled. A woman answered.
‘5182’
‘Oh hello, can I speak to Charlie please?’
‘I’m afraid he’s not home at the moment. Can I take a message?’
‘Yes, just tell him The Stupid Bitch called,’ she screamed, before slamming down the receiver. The sound of the key in the lock made her jump.
‘Zat you in, Oonagh?’ The voice bellowed up the stairs and Oonagh’s heart sank even further. She had completely forgotten about Susan. Wednesday was her day. Usually Oonagh kept well out of the way to let her get on with things. She’d known her half her life – she’d cleaned her mum’s house since forever – and when Oonagh had moved out she’d just sort of followed her.
Oonagh leaned over the banister. She was in no mood for company and needed a couple of hours to herself. ‘Susie, shit, sorry to muck you about, is there any chance you can come back tomorrow?’
‘Naw, ah bloody cannae come back the morra,’ she yelled, ‘ah’ve got an appointment wae a psychic. She wiz in the Sunday Mail last week and now there’s a six month waiting list.’
‘Well, what about later this afternoon – in a couple of hours, say? About three-ish? I’ll pay you from just now.’
She weighed up her options. ‘Aye, well, I suppose,’ she muttered, going back out of the door.
Oonagh went downstairs to her office. She still had a few things to tidy up with her script and wanted to get it out of the way. It was the first time she’d been in the boxroom since the previous night and the screen saver that had scared her senseless in the dark now rolled by like a bad joke.
She scooped up the photographs that lay scattered on the floor and tidied them into a box file alongside a large bundle of press clippings of Father Kennedy. She fingered them absently. There was a particularly dull one from a free newspaper of him outside St Patrick’s with local school kids
during some fund raising event, but most of them were of him leading groups of demonstrators protesting outside abortion clinics across Scotland. They even had their own minibus for the trips. Oonagh pictured them making tea and sandwiches for their big days out.
She’d almost closed the box when something caught her eye and made her heart skip a beat.
She called Tom first, then made a further two calls before getting dressed.
23
Glasgow, 2000
Her face was pressed hard against the wooden floorboards.
Her right arm was wedged underneath her body and her head throbbed. A blinding white light danced behind her eyes. Twisting even a fraction sent pain shooting down her right shoulder all the way to her hip. She couldn’t see much.
Cat sniffed around and nuzzled her face. His presence was initially reassuring until Oonagh realised he was lapping up a sticky mess pooled on the floor beside her head. She felt sick.
‘Jesus Christ, Oonagh. What happened?’ She heard Tom run toward her and felt him shoo Cat away from her head. She managed to open her eyes just a fraction. From the plugs and cables and skirting board she realised she was lying at the bottom of the stairs.
She tried to answer him, but her tongue was thick and the effort made her head spin. She wanted to gag.
‘Hang on, Oonagh. I’ll get help.’
Her mouth tasted of metal.
‘Tom, am I dying?’ she managed to whisper.
‘Don’t be daft.’
‘Give me the Last Rites.’
‘Oonagh, stop it. It’s more important we get you some help.’ She detected rising panic in his voice.
‘Please…’ She clutched at his jacket. ‘It’s… it’s… important.’ She heard her own voice crackle. Tom bent his ear to her mouth. ‘It’s not a bad gig,’ she whispered, ‘getting me back into the fold.’
She felt him make the sign of the cross on her forehead, then press a paper tissue hard against her neck.
Tom’s voice came out in gulps and sobs as he began his ritual, but she couldn’t hear him. All she could hear was her dad…
*
‘Honest tae God, Oonagh, it’s true.’
‘Oh, come on, Dad, a leprechaun. Come off it.’ But this was one story he never backed down on, one he’d stuck to all his life.
*
He was just ten years old, and had been queuing in Phoenix Park for hours to see it, a newly washed jam jar under his arm and his threadbare jumper tied round his waist. There was no hint of the scar on his chin from the tram accident. That was at least two years off.
It had been captured by some fella in Dublin, who’d kept it in a box.
The word was out and it was turning into an event of biblical proportions, with a huge trail of people willing to pay for a single glimpse of the little man. People had travelled for miles to witness the star attraction.
He would stand for days if he had to. The only thing that mattered was in that tent. The dark grubby blankets – thrown over a rope supported at either end by a tall pole buried into the ground – had become for him a mystical tent from the Far East, made from colours he’d seen only in the sky after a storm.
‘Don’t look into his eyes, they’ll burn right thro’ ye for sure,’ came the advice of his chum. ‘I hear he’s over a thousand years old, with a crock of gold worth over a hundred pounds.’
‘A hundred pounds? Sure, we could live like kings for the rest of our lives on that.’
The chattering was non-stop. But for the ten-year-old boy with the jam jar, nothing mattered except seeing the living proof of everything he held sacred and holy.
At last their time came. In they went. Two at a time: her dad and his pal.
Oonagh stood behind them unseen, excitement building in her chest. All her life she’d secretly wished she’d been with him on that day, to see what he’d seen. To know for sure whether what he said was true.
It was pitch black at first. Their eyes took a few seconds to adjust and take in the surroundings.
Two men were inside with them. One seated on a wooden chair, the other standing by a box on top of a table, with a curtain draped over the top.
‘Gee’s yer money,’ said the one on the chair. Oonagh’s dad handed over his jam jar in payment, while his pal placed a farthing into the man’s palm. ‘Right,’ the seated man nodded to his partner in crime.
The curtain was pulled back. And there it was.
In the box sat a little man, over a thousand years old, his grey wrinkled skin storing a millennium of knowledge and secrets. The two boys stared in wonder, mouths gaping at the sight. It was still as dark as night in the tent, but they could see him as clear as day. The leprechaun was right there in front of them.
‘Janie-mac, can yis see it, can yis?’ Oonagh’s dad didn’t answer his chum. His eyes were as wide as saucers. He gulped and nodded, rendered speechless by the sight.
Oonagh looked over his shoulder. There, slumped against the back of the box, was a tiny Capuchin monkey dressed in a green knitted waistcoat and trousers. On his head was a hat made from an old sock. His grey skin shone through where his fur had been attacked by mange. Yellow matter wept from his half shut eyes; there were sores all over his body. His little five fingered hand reached up to wipe the sticky tears from his eyes before smoothing over his head like a weary old man. His lips were parched dry and cracked.
*
The story would change in detail now and again. Sometimes the admission price to see this phenomenon would be a ha’penny, sometimes a farthing, occasionally it was merely the jam jar, but her dad never faltered in his conviction that a leprechaun had been captured in Dublin, and he’d been one of the few people in the entire world privileged enough to see it.
A lump grew in her throat. All these years and it had been a monkey. A bloody monkey.
She was back across the table from her dad, the bottle of brandy between them.
‘Honest tae God, Oonagh, I saw it with my own eyes.’
This time, instead of laughing, she reached across and stroked his hair.
‘I know you did, Da, I know you did.’
*
The front door banged against the wall as it was flung open.
Oonagh felt Tom’s grip loosen and her eyes close.
‘What the hell’s goin’ on here?’ A woman was running into the hall and then there was screaming. That wasn’t a good sign.
‘Oh God, Oonagh, what the hell’s happened. What’ve you done, pet?’
‘I just found her like this.’ It was Tom. ‘I’ve called an ambulance. It’ll be here any minute.’
Oonagh felt Susan’s hand on her, warmer but rougher. Something more substantial than a tissue was pressed against her neck.
‘She hates wet paper,’ Susan snapped at Tom. ‘For Christ’s sake, where’s they paramedics?’
‘They’ll be here soon, don’t worry.’
Something soft was placed beneath her head.
She could hear her own breathing.
‘What happened?’ Susan was asking. ‘Did she fall or something?’
‘I don’t think so. I just came in and found her like this, I think she’s been stabbed.’
‘Stabbed!’
No! Stabbing happened in street brawls…
‘And from what I can see she’s got a gash on the back of her head too. Maybe she banged it on the stairs as she fell,’ added Tom.
‘Stay with us, Oonagh.’
Tom was rubbing her hand, stroking her hair. As long as she could feel him touching her she would be okay.
‘Could you no’ pray or something, is that no’ whit your mob’s good at?’
‘Sorry,’ asked Tom, ‘are you a friend of Oonagh’s?
Sirens blared outside. Comforting amid the mayhem.
More shoes. A faint green blur. She hoped to God it was the paramedics and not just a visit from the Celtic Supporters Club.
‘Right, let’s see what we’ve got here. What’s happened, what�
��s her name?’
She tried to speak. Nothing came out.
‘Oonagh. It’s Oonagh,’ said Tom, ‘I don’t know what happened, I just found her like this.’
‘Don’t worry, we’ll take it from here.’
*
The emergency team had all the information required: female, mid thirties, stab wounds and possible head trauma. But in the ninety seconds it took for the ambulance to drive the quarter of a mile to the Western Infirmary, Oonagh O’Neil had a spontaneous abortion and began to haemorrhage.
24
Glasgow, 2000
The interview room measured no more than eight feet by eight feet. It had no windows and stank of stale coffee. Brown splashes stained the walls, next to burn marks left by countless cigarettes over the years.
Tom examined the table in front of him and tried to read some of the graffiti gouged into the dark, dirty wood.
Eventually the door opened and Davies walked in with a tape recorder under his arm. Tom thought he looked shattered as well as dishevelled. As he approached, he could see his eyes were red.
A uniformed policewoman carrying a cardboard tray with three steaming polystyrene cups followed Davies. ‘Coffee?’
‘Ehm, do you have any tea?’
She rolled her eyes, tutted and let out an exaggerated sigh as she made her way back to the door.
‘Sorry…’ Tom muttered.
She carried on walking without turning.
‘A wee word, Father.’ Davies pulled out a chair, swung it round and straddled it.
‘I didn’t realise this was your division?’ said Tom. As though it was any of his business.
‘Don’t tell me where I can and can’t work! A friend of mine gets butchered in her own home, you’re found crouching over her like a creeping Jesus, and you’re telling me it’s not my division!’
Tom interrupted him. ‘I didn’t know Oonagh was your friend.’
Like his coffee carrying colleague, Davies ignored him.
‘Folk around you are dropping like flies. First Father Kennedy, now…’ his voice faltered ‘now Oonagh. So of course it’s my bloody business.’
The Lost Children Page 12