A Fine House in Trinity

by Lesley Kelly

  And this reminds me of Meikle, and what’s just happened and this time I really do start crying, humiliating myself in front of the two lassies. This sets Marianne off again, and Dr Murray sends her off to get a cup of tea.

  ‘I don’t suppose I can persuade you to talk to anyone?’

  I think I get the inference. ‘About my drinking? I’m not drunk at the moment.’

  She nods. ‘I know. And that’s what worries me. I can understand you arriving here with mysterious cuts and bruises while under the influence, but from my experience of Friday night in A and E,’ she tilts my head back for another look at my cheek, ‘I’d say someone had cut you.’

  Good-looking and smart.

  ‘No, no, I just…’ I can’t think of a single reasonable explanation.

  ‘You could talk to the Police.’

  We both look at each other. I can feel the blood still dripping down my neck.

  ‘Just a thought. I’ll get the anaesthetic.’ She turns to leave and then stops. With a smile she says, ‘You take care, Mr Staines.’

  I think I’m in there.

  1988

  My mother’s second death was a good deal more permanent than the first. Colin suffered the most from it. The poor laddie spends years wondering where our Ma got to, and why we weren’t allowed to contact her, and then when she finally does get in touch with him… it’s just as well Col had God to fall back on.

  It took Col a good couple of years to tell me the full details of what happened and some of it I had to piece together for myself. But we can both agree that it started in the run up to Colin’s eighteenth birthday. Over the past few years he had become quite settled in East Kilbride. He’d got a group of friends that he’d made through the church, although no girlfriend yet as far as I was aware. I hadn’t seen much of him since I’d left home, so we’d kept in touch mainly by letters and through Florrie, as my dad and I weren’t really talking. In our limited contact Col and I were getting on pretty well, although much to my annoyance the lanky wee bastard had reached the dizzying heights of being 6’ tall.

  Dad and Col had a nice wee flat, and Dad had a second job driving a taxi of an evening; Col was off to university in the autumn so Dad was trying to make a bit extra to see him set up. When the phone rang at eight o’clock at night, my brother was in the house on his own. He didn’t recognise my ma’s voice.

  ‘Is that you, Joseph?’

  ‘No, this is Colin.’

  He could hear what he thought was a woman crying at the other end of the line, and his first thought was that something had happened to Florrie.

  ‘Is it Florrie? Is it bad news?’

  The crying stopped. ‘It’s Mammy, sweetheart. It’s your Ma.’

  Colin put the phone down on the hall table while he thought. He wasn’t good at dealing with complex emotional issues. He had an unconditional offer to study maths at Glasgow University in the autumn; give him a set of numbers over a disappearing mother any day. Momentarily he wished he had a pen and paper so he could do a graph of his feelings, with one arm measuring how pleased he is to hear from her, and the other arm measuring how pissed off Dad is going to be.

  ‘Colin, darling?’ said the phone. He picked it up again.

  ‘Aye, Ma?’

  ‘How are you, son?’

  ‘I’m OK. How are you? Where are you? Are you in East Kilbride? And where have you been living?’ Col had eight years’ worth of questions he wanted answered. Ma chose to ignore them.

  ‘I know it’s your birthday soon, son – can I take you out to celebrate?’ Col had to think about this for a moment. He would obviously have to meet her without telling my dad, but he wasn’t entirely sure he could cope with all this on his own. Curiosity overcame him, and, not being the most exciting of eighteen-year-olds he suggested they go to the cinema.

  Dad didn’t suspect a thing. Col’s birthday fell on a Saturday, and keen as my dad was to mark the occasion, he’d also got the offer of covering a taxi shift, and Saturday night was good money that he didn’t want to miss out on. He assumed when Col said he’d be going out anyway that it would be with some of his friends, and wee bro didn’t say otherwise.

  All the way into town on the bus Col worried about the evening. What if he didn’t recognise her? What if she was three sheets to the wind? Worst of all, what if she didn’t turn up? He didn’t think he could bear that. But when he got to the cinema she was standing there, smaller, thinner, and greyer than he remembered, but unmistakeably Ma.

  They went for a pizza before the film, and had a great time reminiscing about when we were wee (I have to admit to a moment’s jealousy when I heard that). Ma didn’t have a glass of wine with her meal, going instead for the fizzy water option. Col was too polite to mention it though he was dying to ask if she was off the booze. There were a couple of tearful minutes when Ma started talking about how she’d let us all down, but Col steered the conversation back to the positive – and probably on to God, if I know my wee brother.

  Ten minutes into A Fish Called Wanda, Ma was getting a bit agitated. Col kept asking if she was OK, until the people behind him kicked the back of his chair and told him to shut up. Ma whispered to Col she was going to the toilet. When she wasn’t back half an hour later he was a bit worried, but he wasn’t the kind of laddie to make a fuss, especially one that involved the Ladies’ toilets.

  The film ended and John Cleese and Jamie Lee Curtis rode off into the sunset, but Ma still hadn’t reappeared. Col hung around in the corridor outside the Ladies’ toilets in an increasing state of agitation until the cinema staff started to take an interest in him.

  ‘Can I help you, sir?’ said an usher who was about two years older than him, and was putting all the sarcasm he could manage into the word ‘sir’.

  ‘Eh…’ Col wasn’t quite sure how to put this. ‘My ma went into the toilets about two hours ago and she hasn’t come back.’

  The usher didn’t look impressed. ‘Two hours ago and you’re only looking for her now? It must have been a good film.’

  ‘A Fish Called Wanda.’

  The usher nodded solemnly, as if this did justify Col’s tardiness, and shouted over to an usherette.

  ‘Julie – take a look in the Ladies’ bogs for us. This chap’s lost his mother in there.’

  Julie the Usherette wasn’t in the toilets for very long. The door flew back open and she ran out looking more than a little pale.

  ‘There’s a pair of legs sticking out of one of the cubicles.’

  ‘Shit,’ said the usher.

  ‘I think she’s dead,’ said Julie.

  ‘Shit’ said the usher again and ran off, Col assumed, to phone for an ambulance.

  Two other usherettes came running up to see what the excitement was, and Julie repeated her story.

  ‘Poor you! Finding a dead body like that – it must have been dreadful.’ They whisked her away in a blur of sympathy through a door marked ‘Staff only’. Nobody noticed Colin. He was left on his own wondering what to do – should he go in and see Ma, or wait for the ambulance? He used the time to think of another graph: one arm with how much he didn’t want to see a dead body, and the other with how much he had to see for himself that Ma was really dead.

  He pushed open the door and walked slowly into the bright lights of the Ladies’. The usherette was right. In the second last cubicle there was a pair of brown Clarks shoes sticking out in the ten to two position.

  ‘Ma?’ said Col tentatively.

  She didn’t answer and Col couldn’t bring himself to touch the legs, so he went into the next stall and balanced on the toilet seat in order to get a view into Ma’s cubicle. He looked down and saw her lying there, her skirt and her face both twisted at the same unnatural angle. Ever the maths student, he admired the symmetry of her death.

  He was still standing there when the medics turned up. They did their best, but it was no good. Ma had had a heart attack and no amount of medical intervention could disguise the fact that this ti
me she was really dead.

  My father, of course, was under the impression that Col was out with a bunch of God-fearing teenagers, and he wasn’t even aware that Ma had reappeared. When he got a hysterical phonecall at the taxi firm at 12 o’clock at night, it took him a while to grasp the situation.

  ‘Ma’s dead,’ said Col, and burst into tears.

  My dad wasn’t quite sure how to react to this; he was under the impression that both Col and I realised that she wasn’t technically dead, just dead to us as a family. He knew that Col had always been the sensitive one, but he thought he was bright enough to understand the situation.

  ‘Actually, son,’ he said in as soothing a tone as he could manage, ‘Your mother is still alive.’

  ‘No, she’s not,’ said Col, ‘I’m at the hospital.’

  Shit, thought my dad. Col’s finally worked out what’s going on, he’s flipped, and he’s been sectioned. It must have been the worst few moments of my dad’s life.

  Serves him right.

  The funeral was in Edinburgh, where Ma was from. It was an even smaller affair than her previous imaginary burial. My father, as next of kin, had ended up paying for the funeral so pretty much every expense had been spared. The only luxury he’d coughed up for was an announcement in the Scotsman, in case Ma’s family wanted to attend. Let’s be charitable and say that they weren’t Scotsman readers, because they didn’t make an appearance.

  So, it was just Dad, Col, Paula and me. Paula was pregnant again, much to the annoyance of her father. It was typical of Paula to make the best out of a situation. To her way of thinking, getting pregnant at eighteen wasn’t a disaster, it was ‘a good opportunity to get having kids out of the way’ so she could get back to having a career. She was hoping for a boy and I was hoping for a miracle that allowed me to actually support all four of us.

  The Church was cold. There weren’t enough of us to act as pallbearers, so Dad had the undertakers wheel Ma’s coffin in and leave it down the front for us all to stare at while we waited for mass to begin. It wasn’t a pretty sight. Dad had ordered the cheapest coffin the funeral parlour had on offer, and he hadn’t splashed out on any flowers, so all she’d got in the way of flora to see her into the afterlife was a ‘Ma’ made out of white carnations, which Col and I had gone halfers on. I looked round the church in the hope that someone else was going to turn up. Paula was taking up two seats to herself, and we’d parked the wee one’s buggy at the end of the pew. But despite spreading ourselves out as much as possible we didn’t take up more than one row in church. Not a great reflection on my mother’s life.

  Father Power did his best to construct a positive eulogy out of the barbed comments that my father had given him. There was a lot of talk about sheep returning to the fold, and merciful Gods. I started wondering if Ma was given the last rites when she was lying on the floor of the cinema bogs, and whether she was still practising by that point in her life anyway. I made a mental note to ask Col after the service; I was sure Col wouldn’t have made it through a whole meal without asking her if she was a regular churchgoer. He couldn’t spend two hours with a complete stranger without asking them that.

  Father Power was lingering over the challenges of my mother’s life when we heard the door of the church open. We were all so surprised that we gave up any pretence of listening to him and all five of our heads swivelled round to look at the newcomer.

  It was Lachie. He hadn’t changed over the past few years. A bit fatter, and he’d lost the goatee, thank God, but recognisable. Even from the other end of the church I could see that he was wearing a suit that would be way out of my price range. It looked like he was working in the family business.

  ‘Who’s that?’ whispered Paula.

  ‘An old pal of mine, I suppose.’ It wasn’t really the time or place to try to explain Lachlan Stoddart.

  Father Power broke off from the eulogy and coughed politely. We reluctantly turned round to listen.

  Lachie mooched up to me at the end of Mass. He was kind of subdued.

  ‘Sorry to hear about your ma.’ If he was bearing any grudge about me disappearing off without a goodbye he was keeping it in check, for the duration of the funeral at least.

  I put my hand out and shook his. ‘My ma and I weren’t that close in the last few years, you know, but your ma’s your ma, right?’

  He nodded.

  I couldn’t stop myself trying to find out if he knew about Guthrie and Shirley. ‘You still seeing that Shirley lassie?’

  He shook his head. ‘Naw – ended a few years back. Bitch stole some money off my old man and I never heard from her again.’

  So that was the cover story. I nodded slowly. ‘Shame but – she was a nice looking lassie.’

  ‘Aye.’ There was a bit of a pause and I wondered if I should ask after his folks, but he got there first. ‘Did you hear my ma and dad split up?’

  ‘No, no, I didn’t know that. Sorry to hear it.’

  ‘Yeah, well.’ He looked me in the eye for the first time in the conversation. ‘Fancy coming round to mine later?’

  Maybe it was the stress of the day, or maybe it was me reverting to being a stroppy seventeen-year-old and wanting to piss my dad off, but whatever the reason I heard myself say: ‘Sounds good.’

  ‘Was that Guthrie Stoddart’s laddie?’ My father wasn’t looking too happy at this.

  I nodded. Dad and I had barely said two words to each other since I got back. He was probably still pissed off that I hadn’t written to him once in two years. If Paula hadn’t made the effort to let him see his granddaughter, he wouldn’t have been able to find me for the funeral.

  Dad scowled at me. ‘I didn’t think you were palling around with him these days. You’ve no invited him to the reception have you?’

  I shrugged and Dad could barely contain his irritation.

  ‘The Stoddarts are bad news. Even you must know that.’

  ‘Can we maybe discuss this when I’m not burying my mother, Dad? Though it is nice to have been invited to at least one of my Ma’s funerals.’ I’d been dying to use that line all day. He walked off in disgust.

  I looked toward the pub, where my pregnant wife and wee brother were sitting surrounded by sandwiches and sausage rolls for twenty, and at Lachie’s figure disappearing into the distance.

  ‘Lachie! Wait up!’

  Saturday

  We get into a taxi outside A&E.

  The driver turns round. ‘Where to?’

  Marianne and I look at each other. I wonder whether Father Paul or Liam has the bigger grudge against me. I’m coming down on the side of Liam being the marginally better bet when Marianne tells the driver to head to the Priest’s House. I’m a little hurt and turn on the sarcasm.

  ‘I wouldn’t want to be a burden to you, Marianne.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Stainsie, but I just need to get my head round everything that’s happened tonight.’ She looks like she’s going to cry. ‘And I don’t want Liam to see you looking like that.’

  ‘Fine,’ I say and we spend the rest of the journey in silence.

  I get the taxi driver to drop me off a couple of streets away from the Priest’s House. I find a discreet doorway and light up a fag, then scroll through my phone’s address book.

  ‘Danny?’

  ‘Yeah.’ He sounds tired, and I feel bad about wakening him. I know he needs his beauty sleep.

  ‘It’s me, Staines.’

  ‘Oh, aye.’ He suddenly sounds more awake. ‘Have you got something for me?’

  ‘Eh, no, sorry.’

  ‘Then what the fuck are you wakening me for?’

  I have a drag on my fag while he abuses me. ‘Aye, Danny, the thing is, can you remember the very first person to tell you that it was me that done Mrs Stoddart in?’

  There’s a silence then he laughs. ‘Well, this is a coincidence. The very first person to grass you up has just been back on the phone to remind me of his suspicions a mere two hours ago. What’s going on, Staines?
’

  I ignore his question and put one of my own. ‘So, Danny, who was it?’

  There’s a pause, then he confirms my suspicions.

  Father Paul’s watching the footie highlights when I go in.

  ‘I should have had that key back off you, Stainsie,’ he says, without turning round. He’s not looking quite as murderous as he was last time I saw him. I walk in front of the TV so he can get a proper look at me. He stares for a minute then picks up the remote and turns the football off.

  ‘So, what happened to you?’ he says quietly.

  ‘You want me to start at the beginning?’

  He nods. ‘Aye.’

  ‘Well this idiot priest got me involved in something that was nothing to do with me and pretty much ruined my life.’

  Just for a second he looks guilty, then he comes out fighting. ‘Nothing’s ever your fault is it, Stainsie? Working for the Stoddarts – not your decision? Going to Newcastle – not your decision?’ He picks up the Coke can he’s been drinking from, squashes it and throws it in the direction of the bin. It rolls round the edge of the basket then drops in. ‘Never refused a drink ever – not your decision?’ He squashes up his fag packet and throws it after the Coke can. Another direct hit; the man could be playing for the Boston Celtics if he wasn’t a priest. ‘You and Mick are two of a kind, aren’t you? Every mistake that the pair of you have ever made has been due to someone else.’

  ‘Aye, that’s fair comment, Father, but what about the mistakes I didn’t make but everyone seems to think I did, like you know, murdering Isa Stoddart? Any idea why everyone thinks that?’

  He squirms in his chair. Busted.

  ‘Why did you tell Danny Jamieson that I killed Mrs Stoddart? You knew that I didn’t.’

  He’s run out of things to throw in the bin. He goes to stand up, then sits back down again and looks at me. ‘All this has got a bit out of hand, hasn’t it, Staines? I mean, I just dropped a few hints to people that you might have had something to do with it, and then suddenly everyone on the Scheme is talking about it as if it’s Gospel.’