A Shameful Murder

by Cora Harrison

  ‘Good, isn’t it?’ said Dr Scher. ‘I had forgotten about old Joseph Addison, studied him as a boy, of course. Clever point, though, isn’t it?’

  The Reverend Mother smiled discreetly. She, too, had forgotten about Addison. She had dug out a copy of his essays from her own school days and had read and discussed them with Eileen, presenting her with the book as a reward. At that stage she had been hoping that the girl, beating off the competition from the well-drilled boys from the Christian Brothers’ North Monastery, might gain the coveted Honan Scholarship, which would have ensured her three years of free education and living expenses at the university. However, nationalism and the rhetoric of Patrick Pearse and James Connolly had won the day. She sighed slightly and turned her attention to the present.

  ‘What!’ Patrick had sat up eagerly, colour rushing into his cheeks.

  ‘“Who decides to withhold information from the people of this city?”’ Dr Scher read on with emphasis. ‘“Who decides that the life of one poor girl was not worth as much as the reputation of her killer who committed suicide rather than face the disgrace of being unmasked and punished for his crime?”’ Dr Scher declaimed the rolling periods sonorously while Patrick, his face lit with a wide smile, nodded his head enthusiastically.

  The Reverend Mother gazed at them both with affection. They had made a good trio, she thought. Patrick, meticulous, careful and hardworking, Dr Scher with his medical knowledge and she herself, with a brain that she had feared was stagnating, had unravelled the complexities. Together they had solved the case of the body from beneath the streets and with the help of Eileen and her comrades had rescued Angelina Fitzsimon from the fate of her half-sister Mary O’Sullivan.

  It had been a good team, she thought and with a slight feeling of shame, she realized that already she was missing the challenge. She had so enjoyed using her reasoning powers working on the problems of the case and she was guiltily conscious that lurking in the back of her mind was a hope that Patrick might bring her another problem in the future.

  After all, she thought, as absent-mindedly she accepted a cup of tea from Dr Scher, St Thomas Aquinas himself said that reason in mankind was like having God in the world. Her patron saint would approve of her using her brain.