The Rosary Garden

by Nicola White

  They looked at each other for a few seconds. Weighing the idea.

  ‘Sister Bernadette,’ said Swan, ‘where would you say her accent was from?’

  ‘I’d say Tipperary,’ said Barrett.

  ‘Could it be east Clare? It’s soft, though.’

  ‘It could be Clare,’ said Barrett.

  ‘If the nun was from the Buleen area, maybe she knew your Peggy Nolan already. Did your girl have hair like a “conker”?’ Swan asked Considine.

  ‘Yeah, dark-reddish. She was the right age, too.’

  A phone was ringing downstairs. Swan raced down the steps. When he got to the office, Mother Mary Paul was holding out the receiver to him. T. P. Murphy was on the other end.

  ‘You’ve got the nun?’ asked Swan.

  ‘You little bollix,’ replied Murphy. ‘A complete wild-gooser. And now I’ve got the RUC on my back. They insisted on accompanying me to Newry, and now they want me to fill in a stack of forms, threatening me with cross-border infringement. It’s going to take me hours to get home.’

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘She wasn’t there at all. The priest who finally deigned to break his silence said she phoned last week to cancel. You owe me, big time.’

  Damn. Where had she got to? Mother Mary Paul had no answers for Swan. Considine and Barrett were waiting in the hallway.

  ‘Barrett, stay here until it’s secure and empty. Make sure forensics are coming, even if it’s tonight. Gina, I want you to put out a call for Sister Bernadette, but we also need to get the team to trace all the Peggy Nolans you can find, just in case your one’s too good to be true. Then come join me as soon as you can.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Buleen, of course! Wherever the hell it is. Oh, and give that girl with the short hair a tenner – no make it twenty. I’ll see you right.’

  On the doorstep Monsignor Kelly was pacing and smoking – an expensive-looking brand with a gold band around the filter. He threw down a long butt as Swan emerged and came forward to shake his hand. Cufflinks in the shape of crosses.

  ‘Bit of a mix-up with your officer here,’ said the monsignor, as if they were old friends temporarily kept apart by a harsh world.

  ‘Sorry about that – thing is, I’ve got a lot on, so perhaps we could catch up later.’

  ‘Is everything all right?’

  ‘Smashing, Father. Lovely place they have here, beautifully kept.’

  Monsignor Kelly looked relieved, grateful.

  ‘My officers are taking a few statements from the nuns and residents, so Garda O’Malley here can keep you company till that’s finished.’

  ‘But it was you I needed to speak to.’

  ‘No can do, Monsignor.’

  Swan set off down the front steps. At the bottom he turned back.

  ‘Must take a good lot of donations to keep a place like this in the style, eh? Regular donations. From couples.’

  Monsignor Kelly’s determined smile dribbled off his face.

  ‘But as I said to the Reverend Mother, we’ll talk later, eh? After I’ve seen the adoption board.’

  Swan went to the office to keep on top of the paperwork, then headed home. He couldn’t see the end of it yet, but he was starting to see the beginning. Peggy Nolan could have known Sister Bernadette of old and persuaded the nun to help her, to let her stay at Percy Place without telling anyone else. She delivers the child there, with the nun’s help, because the nun knows nursing, but three days later someone – one of them – beats the baby to death. The nun sneaks her away. Bernadette knows the Rosary Garden well. It’s her idea to bury the child there, but for some reason it gets left in the shed.

  But why – why kill it?

  At home Swan poured himself a finger of whiskey, searched out a couple of clean shirts, underwear, razor. He had hoped, without too much hope, that Elizabeth might be there. The only sign of her presence was a small sheet of paper torn from a notebook, the left edge frilled where she had ripped it from the spiral. Auntie Josie had taken another dip, it said; she was needed there, it said. With luck, she’d be back tomorrow.

  He made some calls and packed his things in a briefcase, sat on the bed for a time. He might as well sleep now and leave early, than navigate in the dark. And he didn’t want to go away, with things so strained between Elizabeth and himself, without doing some little thing to thaw the ice, though he wasn’t sure what.

  He woke before dawn, relishing the idea of driving the empty roads west as the sun rose behind him. He made a cup of coffee and fed the cat, stood looking at Elizabeth’s note on the table as he supped. He washed his cup and put it on the draining board, then turned the note to the blank side and wrote quickly:

  It’s not just there you’re needed. I need you. I’m sorry for my coldness. We’ll do as you want. I love you,

  V

  He stared for a moment at his hokey words. She’d think he’d gone mad. Fuck it.

  He left the note on the table and ran out the front door before he could change his mind.

  27

  Father Philbin’s homily didn’t mention Joan’s time in Damascus House. He also avoided anything particular to the circumstances of her death, but opted instead for generalised gravitas and veiled allusions to ‘a young life snuffed out in its prime’ and ‘which of us knows the time and the place of our calling’. Under this roof, in these circumstances, there could be no question of Joan having had a conscious role in whatever slip or fall took her into the river’s flow. If her death was suicide, they would not be having this mass; therefore it was not suicide.

  The church was already packed when Ali arrived. Many more than at that Sunday mass Una had dragged her to when she first arrived. A little over a week ago, but felt like so much longer.

  As she took her seat, an uneasy silence reigned among the congregation, torn here and there by muffled coughs. Finally the moan of the organ washed down on their heads and she turned to see the small coffin being carried in on the shoulders of six men, one of whom was Ivor. His hair was combed back and flattened with some lotion or oil that darkened it. His expression was full of effort. She looked down at her hands as he came level, couldn’t bear the chance that their eyes might meet. It seemed unbelievable that Joan lay inside that box. All through the mass she berated herself for her role in freeing Joan from Damascus House, and again for making her angry outside the dance. It would be easier to think it an accident – join in the church’s version – but she just could not.

  A choir of reed-voiced pensioners struggled into the sweet first lines of ‘Bring Flowers of the Fairest’. The coffin was hoisted once more and the men stepped it back down the aisle. Ivor was on the opposite side of it now, screened from view. After the coffin came Joan’s mother, the thin woman who had pressed the medal on her, not knowing she’d need all of Mary’s compassion for herself. A ruddy-faced man in a tight black suit walked in line with her, presumably Joan’s father. They didn’t touch or lean on each other, staying as far apart as the aisle would allow.

  Ali joined the rest of the congregation in following the coffin as it was carried down the street, an empty hearse driving behind the crowd. The graveyard was the new one – a field at the edge of town with two and a half rows of shining stone tablets adorned with wreaths, small statues and domed displays of plastic flowers. Most of it was plain mown grass awaiting the dead to come: many of those in this crowd, no doubt. Her mind was turning morbid. Ahead she could see the two mounds of earth that marked the hole where the procession would end.

  The women of Buleen gathered close around the grave, murmuring Hail Marys together, a decade of the rosary. The men were scattered to the periphery by some invisible force, many solemn with clasped hands, observing the backs of the women, others starting to chat in low voices, just like they were attending any village occasion – the perpetual banter. A soft, sieved rain billowed down the valley, but few took shelter under umbrellas. Coat shoulders darkened. Ali hadn’t even a jacket to protect her, wa
s soon soaked through in her black cardigan and skirt. She moved into the crush of bodies for shelter.

  She caught sight of Roisín and Una on the other side of the crowd, but otherwise didn’t know many people there. Joan’s family came from Ennisbridge, two miles up the road and a world away. On the opposite edge of the graveside she recognised Peggy Nolan’s pale-blue mac. The woman beside her shared her umbrella, holding the big black wing of it low over both their faces. Dr Nolan stood several paces behind them, straight as a soldier.

  Ali wondered how well the Nolans had known Joan. She thought of Dr Nolan on that Christmas Day, the present in his hand, the daughters in their good coats. Had he been brought into the secret of what had been found? She vaguely remembered the two Nolan girls sitting side-by-side in the living room, obediently bored. Their father out of the room, possibly with Joan.

  The first note of a laugh broke through the air and was immediately stifled. Ali wheeled round to see Davy looking down at the ground, kicking a stone away. The fellow beside him had a guilty hand near his mouth, and his eyes checked the crowd. They couldn’t keep quiet for ten minutes; always the jokes, always the bit of crack, even here. She turned back to the gathering at the graveside and noticed that a few of the women were also looking over to Davy and his crony, among them Peggy Nolan, whose placid face was unusually alive, eyes burning as she looked at the boys. Ali thought of Peggy standing at the edge of the dance floor in the marquee, that same still attention. At that moment the woman beside Peggy lifted the umbrella that hid her face.

  It was just for an instant.

  The woman’s eyes met Ali’s and the umbrella dipped down again. She was wearing her veil as usual, looked no different than when she stalked the corridors of St Brigid’s, but Ali’s first shocked thought was: Antoinette Nolan.

  It was as if two different photographs – one of Peggy’s prim, dimly remembered teenage sister and one of Sister Bernadette – had been superimposed and found to be identical. Sister Bernadette was who Antoinette Nolan had grown up to be: the colouring, the posture, the pale hand that still rested on Peggy’s shoulder, all so vividly obvious now. Peggy had said her sister was in Dublin; that was all. She didn’t say she was a nun.

  The prayers ended and the crowd loosened, moving back from the grave as two men with shovels approached the hole. Ali pressed forward through the shifting bodies towards the spot where Sister Bernadette and Peggy had been standing, but when she got there, they were gone.

  Most mourners had regrouped around the Dempsey family, queuing to shake hands and express their sympathies. Ivor was standing beside his father, his tallness marking him out. Ali was tempted to leave, but the right thing was to pay her respects, to let him know she had shown up. She pulled her damp cardigan around her and pressed into the mass of bodies once more.

  She was an arm’s length away from Ivor before he noticed her, his eyes locking onto hers as he reached for her hand, pulling her close.

  ‘You. You’re here.’

  ‘I’m so sorry—’

  An old man pushed in beside her and started to talk into Ivor’s face. He was saying how Joan was in a better place now, and Ivor was answering, but his fingers held Ali’s firmly, keeping her close to him. On the other side of Ivor stood his mother, her eyes bloodshot, her expression congested with grief. A woman was talking to her, head nodding sadly, yet Joan’s mother suddenly turned, as if Ali had called her name, and looked straight into her eyes, then down to where Ivor’s fingers were entwined with hers. Mrs Dempsey’s mouth opened and it seemed some accusation was about to come, but no noise came from her throat.

  Ali tried to pull her hand from Ivor’s, but he wouldn’t let go. The old man finally moved on and Ivor bent his head to her ear.

  ‘I couldn’t find her,’ he said, his voice cracking.

  He released her hand and she sank back into the crowd. She had no right to be upsetting these people. No right to push herself into their lives. If she hadn’t agreed to take Joan on that stupid picnic … hadn’t brought up the lost baby … Tears blurred her view as she hurried down the wet path to the cemetery gate.

  She walked away from the town, over the bridge and out towards Caherbawn. The rain blew off. She didn’t want to go back to the farm, she wanted to go somewhere she could be alone, where she could try to forgive herself. A beam of sun caught the tops of the trees beyond the farm and she remembered the ruined cottage, the place where Joan had been full of hope and Ivor had smiled his gold-flecked smile.

  28

  There wasn’t a living creature to be seen on the streets of Buleen. Swan finally spotted the blue Garda sign over one of the doors on the main street. The station was locked. A handwritten note said that Garda Fitzmaurice would be back after the funeral.

  He walked along the wide pavement, peering at the few sad shops until he came to the doctor’s surgery. Dr Nolan was not in residence – another door locked against him. It must be a popular funeral. Then Swan remembered the Hogan girl becoming distressed about the woman who had drowned herself. That must be it. A tragedy would always fetch a crowd.

  Patience, he told himself. Garda Fitzmaurice had confirmed by phone that Peggy Nolan was in Buleen with her family. Where else would she be? – there was no reason to think she’d fly the nest. And, no, there was no sign of a baby.

  Swan walked all the way down one side of the street and up the other. He noted the press of cars around the ugly pink church.

  That was all the patience he could tolerate. He needed a phone. In the comfortable-looking hotel, he asked for the use of a room. The German proprietor showed no particular surprise, just walked him upstairs to a high, simple bedroom whose two windows overlooked the main street. With this view, he’d be able to see Garda Fitzmaurice return. Swan picked up the telephone and leaned against the window casing.

  Barrett was in the office. He said Sister Bernadette had not been located yet. He also said that Considine was on her way, that she would arrive at two o’clock at Birdhill.

  ‘Birdhill?’

  ‘There wasn’t a car to spare. Kavanagh’s on an efficiency drive – he told her to get a train and you could pick her up from the station …’

  ‘How the hell would that be efficient?’ Swan said.

  ‘It wasn’t me who told her!’

  ‘Just tell me how to get to this Birdhill place. Never heard of it.’

  Swan hung on the line while Barrett consulted a map. Down in the street, men in sombre clothes gathered outside a pub. The funeral aftermath. He leaned closer to the glass, looked sideways. The cars were leaving from outside the church. Below him, a dark-clad figure appeared around the corner, arms wrapped around herself, hair bedraggled.

  Swan cursed, hung up and ran downstairs. He arrived on the pavement in time to touch her shoulder as she passed.

  Ali Hogan jumped at the contact, and the face she turned to him was full of fear.

  ‘Aren’t you supposed to be in Dublin?’ he said.

  ‘Have you come to get me?’

  ‘Get you for what?’

  ‘I don’t know …’

  Clots of cobweb adhered to the sleeves of her cardigan, and the front of her skirt was streaked with mud and grass stains.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  She looked down at herself, started to wipe ineffectually at the stains on her skirt.

  ‘I – I was in the woods. There’s an old cottage – I think I found something. Will you come with me?’

  ‘I’m waiting to meet up with someone.’

  ‘Oh.’ She didn’t seem curious about what had brought him there, caught up in her own drama.

  ‘What was it you found?’

  She shortened the distance between them, looked full into his face and said, ‘I think it’s a grave.’

  The Garda station was still closed, Considine wasn’t due for an hour and a half.

  ‘Is it far, this place?’

  ‘Not very.’

  ‘I’ve a car near here.’
<
br />   ‘It’s just a walk.’

  Swan followed the girl over an old bridge and out of the town, towards scattered houses and patches of woodland. He should have insisted on the car.

  ‘Does your mother know you’re here?’

  An impatient nod. He took in her black clothing. A car came towards them and they stepped onto the grass verge.

  ‘Were you at the funeral?’

  ‘Yeah.’ She stepped back onto the tarmac and walked off at a lick. Swan hurried after, regretful now about this country detour, unsure how to manage the girl.

  She led him up a rough track that cut through pine woods, then along a path to where the remains of a cottage stood in a mossy clearing. It looked like it had been abandoned long ago. A few jagged stubs of beam were all that was left of the roof, and the walls were starting to fall in.

  Swan followed Ali across the derelict threshold. The girl stood in the middle of the space and started to talk.

  ‘This was where Joan brought me the day she got out – so I came back to remember her, because we were happy that day, and I was looking at that hut that she said Ivor built and I noticed there was a bit on the end that was planked up, and I don’t know why, but I thought I’d have a look and the planks came away …’

  As she spoke, Swan walked over to the bit that she had described as a ‘hut’. It was just a lean-to of corrugated iron and wood cladding resting against an end wall. The kind of thing you would build to shelter a few sheep or some fodder.

  One end was open, and a filthy mattress lay inside, as repulsive as a carcass.

  ‘They used to stay here, the two of them, Joan said, when there was trouble at home. It was their place, so she must have made the grave too, don’t you think?’

  Swan stooped and made blinkers with his hands, to see better into the dark. Beyond the head of the mattress was a wall made of short lengths of horizontal planks. He stood and cast his eye over the outside of the shelter. Sure enough, it was longer than the space he had just looked into. Ali waited for him at the other end.