Irene saw Bridie glance back at her before raising the potty above her head.
She threw the stinking contents straight into Sister Agatha’s face. It took a few seconds for the others to grasp what had happened, as the putrid mixture clogged her stubby eyelashes, ran down her face and stained the pure white yoke of her habit. Her pale face turned purple with fury under the stinking mess. She raised her right hand high above her head, the leather belt swinging into action behind her.
But Bridie Flanagan was ready. Years on the streets of the Gorbals had taught her to be quick. She tightened her fist round the handle of the heavy-based chamber pot and, with a single blow, smashed it into Sister Agatha’s face. The noise of her bones breaking could barely be heard for her cries. Her nose burst open and blood poured from the wound. It ran bright red down her chin as her stubby yellow teeth loosened in her gums. A grotesque grimace of pain tore across her mouth, and internal bleeding seeped under her skin, across her broken cheekbones. She fell to the floor, both hands cupped round her nose and mouth.
Bridie Flanagan shoved her clear from the double doors, then slammed them shut behind her. One of the other girls rammed a mop through the handles, locking it fast from the inside.
Irene Connolly sat up on the bed, while Bridie, Sally and the three others stood in a huddle, saying nothing. Just staring, their mouths hanging open in shock at what had happened. Trembling with fear and disbelief. Bridie Flanagan clutched her chest, panting. Grabbing at her throat, pushing her heart back down as it tried to escape from her mouth.
Irene was the first to laugh. A snigger escaped from her nose in disbelief. She hugged her arms round her bruised ribs to stop the pain as the giggling rose from her belly. The others looked on in stunned silence, believing for just a moment that she really was crazy. Then they too joined in. Tears streamed down their skinny wee faces as their screams of hysterical laughter drowned out Sister Agatha’s cries on the other side of the door. On the other side of reason. The euphoria intoxicated them. They held hands and danced round and round before flopping onto the empty beds. It was Sally who threw open one of the windows. The cold night air breezed in as she hung her body out, screaming and yelling for everyone to hear. There were eight beds in the room. All empty, except for Irene’s. She pulled the blankets up tight round her neck and watched as the others stripped two of the beds bare and dragged them over to the open window.
‘You got any matches on you?’ Bridie asked one of the younger girls, who pulled a small tin of tobacco from the leg of her knickers.
‘Aye, I’ve a few.’
‘That’s enough,’ said Bridie, striking them off the stone floor and holding them to one of the bare, soiled mattresses. As the flames took hold, she got it onto its side and hurled it out of the third floor window. Fanned by the air, it turned into a fireball as it hit the ground.
‘Right, gi’ us a hand with this.’ It only needed two of them to ease the metal bed frame out of the same window.
By the time they were setting the second mattress alight they could hear the clangs of support on the pipes and radiators throughout the building as the other Magdalene girls banged shoes, keys, spoons and whatever else came to hand.
The second burning bed was soon joined by lighted paper, curtains, clothes and in some cases other mattresses, all thrown from other windows of the ancient house.
Thick black smoke filled the clear Maryhill night air. The bells of Glasgow North Fire Brigade clanging towards Lochbridge House could be heard for miles. Sally tucked her knickers into her skirt and climbed out of the window.
‘What the hell are you doing?’ Bridie grabbed at her ankle, pulling her back inside.
‘Them firemen’ll put out the fire and break down the door. They’ll get us out.’
‘Aye, so?’
‘They’ll no’ be able to catch me if I’m up on the roof.’
‘Good girl, Sally,’ Bridie laughed as she released her grip on Sally’s skinny wee legs. She leaned her back on the windowsill and gave the others a running commentary as the wee thing scaled the drainpipe. She never faltered, never hesitated, her wiry frame as agile as a monkey’s as she clawed her way up.
Within seconds, Sally heaved her body up onto the tiles on the roof. Others cheered as they watched. A few were brave enough to join the solidarity, and Sally reached down her hand to help them up the last few inches to take their place beside her.
Bridie and the other three lassies in the bedroom shoved Irene’s bed over to the window to let her see for herself.
‘Oh God, what’ve we started?’ she exclaimed, staring up at Bridie with a mixture of fear and admiration as hot tears sprang to her eyes.
Bridie winked back at her. ‘It’s not what we’ve started, hen, it’s what we’ve finished.’
*
Three days it lasted. Three days when the world sat up and took notice of the plight of the girls trapped in the Magdalene Institute. Three days that proved to be the most exciting and happiest of Irene Connolly’s miserable life.
Journalists came from miles around to hear first hand the stories of the lassies yelling from the roof top, shouting out of the windows about their treatment. For the locals it was better than the Glasgow Fair. Every day they’d put food into the buckets that hung out of the windows and were hoisted up to feed the protesters.
By the third day, it was over. By the third day, Glasgow City Council had decided to close the doors of the Magdalene Institute. And by the third day, Irene was strong enough to join the others who ran up Maryhill Road to celebrate their victory. Lagging behind, and held up, she was helped along between her two best pals: Bridie Flanagan and Sally.
She never did find out Sally’s second name. It turned out that Sally herself didn’t even know it.
35
Glasgow, 2000
Oonagh ignored Davies’ warning and gave him a five-minute head start before following him to the South Side. She flicked through the buttons on the radio, but there was nothing in the news that gave her any clue as to what had happened at St Patrick’s. Too early, she guessed.
Instinct kicked in and she made a call to the newsroom at the studio to tip them off. Her mind raced, trying to figure out who it was. She called Tom. There was no reply. A sinking feeling took hold of her chest and the dark oppressive clouds overhead matched her mood as she took the Kinning Park exit off the M8 and into Pollokshields.
That was when she saw Mrs Brady in the distance, struggling up the road. Heavy plastic carrier bags with gaudy red letters on the side banging against her legs. The stretched handles digging into the flesh on her hands. A thin drizzle of rain clinging to her face. Her handbag hanging diagonally over her shoulders, an umbrella neatly rolled into a special slot designed to make life easier. But she’d need to put down all four bags to get it out. And anyway, she didn’t have a spare hand to carry the umbrella.
It was difficult to tell what age Anna Brady was. Oonagh suspected no one had ever cared enough to ask her, and she didn’t have any one to tell.
Oonagh sounded the horn and pulled up alongside her. She leaned over and opened the passenger door. ‘Mrs Brady… Anna, get in, I’ll give you a lift home.’ It seemed to take the woman a couple of seconds to register who was behind the wheel.
Oonagh was used to people tripping over themselves in a bid to charm her. ‘Oh, it’s you,’ was all Anna Brady said. Her voice was flat and lifeless. She blushed slightly.
Oonagh flicked open the boot from the inside, then got out to help load the shopping. Anna Brady struggled and fumbled as she took each bag from her. Oonagh ached with pity when she saw the deep red marks they’d left on her hands. She probably did this trip two, perhaps three times a week.
‘It’s all right, love, I’m fine.’ She seemed annoyed at Oonagh’s pitying look as she put the bags in the boot.
‘How’re you feeling, Mrs Brady?’
Despite Oonagh opening the passenger door, she got in the back.
‘Fine, dea
r, can’t complain.’
No you can’t really, can you, there’s no one to listen, Oonagh was tempted to say. But didn’t.
She drove to the chapel house. Sacrificing the scoop she was leaving behind at the church to satisfy her curiosity.
A siren wailed in the distance. Mrs Brady said nothing else for the remainder of the journey and spent the time staring straight out of the side window. Clutching the cheap scuffed leather handbag on her lap. It wasn’t long before they were home, a few minutes at most.
Oonagh pulled up at the back of the house and collected the bags from the boot. They shared the load and Oonagh followed Mrs Brady up the stairs and straight through to the kitchen.
‘Thank you, dear,’ was all she said as she put the bags on the table. She didn’t move, didn’t make any attempt to put the shopping away.
‘Can we talk some more?’ Oonagh asked. ‘Not if you don’t want to though. Not if you don’t feel…’ She let her words trail away. ‘I might be able to help,’ she added. Though doubted that she could. What could she – or anyone for that matter – do?
They sat at the bare wooden table. Anna Brady opened a tobacco tin and rolled a thin cigarette. Oonagh pulled a packet of fags from her own bag. ‘Here, have one of these.’
Anna Brady licked her lips slightly and weighed up her best option. ‘Okay.’ Her nails were bitten down to the quick, and she tugged her sleeve down over her wrist as she reached to accept Oonagh’s offer.
‘Is Father Tom here?’ Oonagh asked.
Anna Brady shrugged her shoulders and looked into the middle distance. ‘Dunno.’
*
Jack Cranworth was standing, and leaned across the desk as Davies walked into the interview room. ‘Right, I want to speak to my lawyer. Who the hell do you think you’re dealing with?’
Davies put his hand on Cranworth’s shoulder and pushed him back down onto the wooden chair. ‘Ach, sit down and dry your eyes. I can’t be arsed with your spiel just now. And, just for the record, I have every right to keep you here.’ He looked at his watch, ‘for six hours at least. And before you start bleating on again, no, you can’t see your lawyer.’
‘That’s fucking illegal. I know my rights.’
‘Really? Well in that case you’ll know I can stop you speaking to your brief if I believe it might hamper this investigation. If I decide to charge you – and there’s every reason at this stage to believe I will charge you – then you can speak to your lawyer. But only then. Okay?’
‘Charge me? With what?’
Davies ignored him.
‘I’ll have your job for this, you bastard,’ Cranworth said.
‘My job? Aye, very good.’
Davies switched on the tape machine and spoke into the microphone which was perched on an upturned empty cassette box. He went through the usual routine – time, date, people present – before turning his attention back to Cranworth.
‘Right then, do you want to tell me what you were doing in St Patrick’s?’
Cranworth folded his arms and looked at the wall. ‘I was meeting someone.’
‘Who?’
He shook his head.
‘Want to tell me what your connection to Charles Antonio is?’
‘Charles who?’
Davies looked at his watch. ‘Are you going to play games for the remaining… let me see… five hours and fifty-eight minutes, or can we just get this sorted out now?’
‘I really don’t know who you’re talking about.’ Cranworth seemed to think on. ‘Oh, the fat man who fell from the balcony?’ He shook his head. ‘Never seen him before in my life.’
‘Oh, right. Just happened to be in the same place as the guy who by all accounts slashed your girlfriend and left her for dead, before himself meeting a mysteriously sticky end? Do us a favour, pal.’
Davies was growing weary. Tired and weary. He hadn’t eaten since the previous afternoon. The burning sensation low in his chest was threatening to turn into a full-blown, crippling attack of indigestion. He rubbed his hand between his ribs and grimaced as he let out a sigh.
‘Heartburn?’ Cranworth watched him with mock concern. ‘Better watch it. I’ve seen it all before. Patients think they have indigestion, turns out to be a heart attack. Can take you out just like that.’ He snapped two fingers.
‘Really? I’m surprised you deal with cases like that. I thought you just killed helpless wee weans in your line of work.’ He looked back at the tape machine. ‘Shall we?’
Cranworth leaned back on the chair’s wooden slats. ‘Do you honestly think I followed this Charles Antony—?’
‘Antonio,’ Davies corrected.
‘Yes, right, Antonio. Do you think I followed him to a church full of children and killed him?’ Cranworth raised his eyes and tutted as he shook his head. ‘Honestly, if you think this was some sort of revenge killing, then don’t you think I’d be just a tad more discreet? I’d hardly do it in a church, then hang around waiting for your lot to arrive.’
‘Naw, you’re right.’
‘What?’
‘You’re right. I don’t think you killed Charlie. Poor bugger just slipped and fell. Just an unfortunate accident, that’s all.’
His last remark had the intended effect. Cranworth slammed both palms onto the table. ‘Then why the hell am I here?’
Davies leaned forward and spoke into the machine, recording that the interview would be stopping for a short break. He was already fishing out the cigarettes from his pocket as he made his way towards the door, leaving Cranworth alone with McVeigh.
It was only one cigarette, but it made his indigestion worse. The seed of an ulcer gnawed the inside of his gut. He felt he ought to eat something, and sent out for a roll and fried sliced sausage, which he wolfed down, feeling the instant gratification that only a roll and square sliced could bring. He marvelled at how a nation responsible for the television, the bicycle and penicillin had also invented a sausage shaped perfectly to fit neatly inside a roll. It had been his saviour on many a Sunday morning after a particularly heavy Saturday night.
He wiped the grease from his lips with the back of his hand before going back to the interview room and asking the policeman at the door to organise three coffees. Davies sat down, switched on the machine and started exactly where he had left off.
‘Why were you in the church?’
‘I told you, I was meeting someone.’
‘Who?’
‘I can’t say. It’s…’ he paused, ‘it’s a personal matter.’
‘Rubbish! You went there to meet Charlie Antonio.’
‘Good God, man, I don’t even know who he is… Was.’
‘Isn’t it true you hired him to kill Oonagh?’
Cranworth looked genuinely worried for the first time since the interview had begun. No, not worried; scared. Frown lines were etched deep into his brow. He picked at the top of the empty polystyrene coffee cup and shook his head. ‘No, it’s not true. It’s not true.’ His voice was little more than a whisper. ‘I want to go to the toilet.’ He stood up to leave. ‘I assume I’m allowed that much?’
He grabbed his jacket from the back of the chair. Davies pulled it from him. ‘Aye, once you’ve been searched, of course.’
He went through the jacket pockets and gestured to McVeigh to frisk him.
‘This is outrageous, I emptied my pockets when I came in,’ he said as McVeigh ran his hands up the inside of his trouser leg.
‘You’re lucky it’s not a full cavity body search. Could yet be.’ Davies opened the door. ‘Right, Mr Cranworth here wants to go to the loo. Stay with him the whole time.’ The policeman outside the door nodded as Cranworth stepped outside.
‘You’re breaching my human rights,’ he said to Davies as he passed.
‘Aye? Think this is bad, wait until you slop out in Barlinnie for a few nights.’
*
Davies grew concerned when, after ten minutes, neither Cranworth nor the policeman had returned from the toilet.
‘See what’s keeping them,’ he said to McVeigh as he looked at his watch. At which point the door opened. Cranworth walked in first, the policeman at his back, pinching his nose between his thumb and finger while fanning his face with his free hand. ‘Sorry to take so long, boss, your man had a wee dose of the Tex Ritters.’
‘Fucking barbaric,’ Cranworth muttered, as he passed the two men. He put both hands on the chair before gently lowering himself onto it.
McVeigh’s bottom lip quivered and his nostrils flared as Davies told him to put the tape machine back on again.
‘What’s so bloody funny?’ said Cranworth, staring directly at McVeigh.
‘You having the skitters and smelling like a rat’s arse,’ replied Davies, clicking the top of a pen with his thumb. ‘Still, look on the bright side. Means a full body search is out of the question.’ Davies made sure he remained straight faced. ‘Right, back to business. What do you know about Charlie Antonio?’
‘Nothing. As I’ve already told you.’
‘I thought you’d got rid of all your shite in the lavvy. Now once more, why were you meeting Charlie Antonio?’
‘For God’s sakes, man, you’ve got to believe me. I’d never even heard of Charlie Antonio until today.’
‘How much did you pay him? Charlie must have thought his luck was in this week. Just goes to show you what money can buy?’
‘How many times do I have to tell you I had nothing to do with this?’
‘Look, pal. You maybe didnae stick the blade in yourself, but that doesn’t mean to say you’re not responsible. Jesus Christ, Cranworth, you’ve got guilt written all over you, mate.’
Cranworth shook his head, over and over again. Davies folded his arms and said nothing. The only sound came from the clock on the wall as Cranworth stared trance-like at the table.
Fifteen minutes ticked by before Cranworth finally spoke.
‘You’ve got it wrong. I loved her, why would I want to do anything to harm her?’
The Lost Children Page 18