Turbulent Priests (Dan Starkey 3) (3 page)

‘I presume you’ve ruled out the possibility of it actually being the Messiah.’

‘Well, of course I have.’

‘But he must have some evidence?’

‘Evidence? This is the Catholic Church, man, we don’t need evidence. We need faith, we need belief, we need trust. Since when has evidence ever been a requirement of a religion?’

‘But he must be basing . . .’

‘On visions. On drug-induced visions.’

‘Drugs?’

‘He takes drugs for his heart. They must be affecting him. Or maybe they’re not. I don’t know. All we know is that he’s gone doolally and we need to do something about it before his poison reaches across from the island.’

‘You’re that worried about it?’

‘Yes, unfortunately. I know it sounds a little far-fetched, but I think we’ve all seen what a sudden outbreak of fundamentalism can do in the Middle East. It’s a vicious, virulent plague and I really wouldn’t like to see something similar happen here. Unfortunately there’s no inoculation against it. It’s early days yet, mind, early enough to nip it in the bud, before the McCooeys really take hold.’

‘The what?’

‘Yes. Sorry. The McCooeys.’ He gave a little shrug. ‘I know. The movement has to be named after someone. And the particular family involved happens to be called McCooey.’

I tried a little shrug as well, which was dangerous in my condition. ‘Why not just excommunicate Father Flynn?’

‘Daniel, have you any idea how rarely people get excommunicated from the Church? Have you ever heard of an IRA gunman or a Mafia assassin being excommunicated? Daniel, if Hitler were alive, and Catholic, he’d be on double secret probation. No, excommunication is out of the question – besides, in a roundabout way it might serve to legitimise his claims. What I’m looking for, Dan, is someone who can go in there, take a close look at what he’s up to, and report back to me.’

‘Which is where I come in.’

The Cardinal nodded.

‘Why me?’

‘Flynn has spoken very warmly of you. He very much appreciated the article you wrote on him – hundreds of people contacted him when it appeared, people from all over the world. I thought if you were to go over to Wrathlin, investigate what was going on, interview him if you like about what he’s up to these days, then maybe you might get a little more out of him than we have so far managed.’

I shook my head. ‘I don’t entirely follow your reasoning. I mean, why not go yourself? Send a bishop. Send a priest. Send someone who can argue the bit out with him. Someone who can disprove the fact that this kid is the Messiah.’

‘Daniel, we did send someone.’

‘And?’

‘He didn’t come back.’

‘Jesus. Excuse me. But . . . he was murdered?’

‘Worse,’ the Cardinal said grimly, ‘he was converted.’

The city centre was jam-packed with shoppers. The ceasefire was good news for everyone but journalists. ‘Armistice’ Maupin, the French peace broker, was taking all the credit, but he’d failed to realise that even terrorists grow up.

I parked the Fiesta under the watchful eyes of a security guard in the grounds of the Royal Victoria Hospital. I checked my dank hair in the mirror, then reached into the back and lifted a brown paper bag. I climbed out of the car, locked up and pulled the collar of my black sports jacket up against the rain and walked quickly towards the maternity wing.

I took the stairs three at a time, but hesitated when I reached the swing doors to the wards. I peered through the clouded plastic window. I could just make Patricia out, half a dozen beds down on the left, sitting up, her head nodding at someone. I cursed under my breath and turned away. I followed the corridor on up to the incubator room and stood at the window for a while looking at the rows of tiny pink bodies.

I couldn’t make out any of the names and could only guess which one was at least half a Starkey, and that only by marriage. I’d left the hospital the night before in a daze, for once not caused by alcohol. No one had prepared me – nor Patricia, for that matter – for the blood and the pain and the screaming and the mess. It wasn’t like it was about life at all, but avoiding death. The fact that a baby was produced
at the end of it seemed almost irrelevant. When he’d come he’d barely registered on me in the few seconds before he was taken to an incubator – more purple than pink, a shrivelled simian awaiting evolution.

One of the babies, closest to the window, had a hint of Patricia’s scolding eyes. Another, nearer the back, was already sprouting her dark hair and thin-lipped pout.

A nurse tagged my arm. ‘Father?’ she enquired.

‘Husband.’

A hesitant smile.

‘Starkey,’ I added quickly.

‘Ah, yes! The little fighter!’

I nodded.

‘Can you see him?’

I nodded vaguely in the direction of the pouting baby.

The nurse tapped lightly on the window. ‘Such lovely red hair,’ she said, pointing elsewhere, ‘like he has a little rusty head.’

I nodded some more.

‘Isn’t he lovely?’ she beamed.

‘Delightful,’ I said, and turned back to the wards. As I reached the doors again they swung open.

‘Ach, hiya, Dan, how’s it goin’?’

Patricia’s father smiled up at me. He’d shrunk since I’d last met him. Within a year. Shrunk with age. Shrunk with living in a retirement community on the windy north-west coast. Shrunk with having his wife die on him. Shrunk with waiting for death.

‘Hiya, John,’ I said, ‘you’re looking well.’

‘Did I see you looking through at us a minute ago?’

‘Aye.’

He nodded. ‘You went up to look at the kid.’

‘Aye.’

‘Lovely kid.’

‘Yeah.’

He put his hand out to me and we shook. ‘I know how it is, son,’ he said.

‘Thanks. I thought maybe you were, y’know,
him
.’

He squeezed my hand a little tighter, then let go. ‘Aye, I know.’

‘How is she?’

‘Tired. Irritable. Same as ever.’ He patted my arm. ‘I’m sorry to rush on, but I’ve a train to catch.’

‘I could give you a lift if . . .’

‘Nah, never worry . . . away and see your wife.’

I smiled, we shook again, then he moved stoop-shouldered and stiff towards the stairs. I watched him negotiate the top flight, then pushed my way into the ward.

Patricia saw me immediately. She gave me a half-smile half-grimace which said it all.

I smiled at the woman in the next bed, and her visitor, then stopped at the foot of Patricia’s bed and raised a hand in salute. ‘Hail Caesarean,’ I said.

The half-smile didn’t develop much. ‘Hello, Dan.’ Her voice was weak, her face wan.

‘I come bearing gifts.’

I moved along the side of the bed, bent and kissed her lightly on the lips, then handed her the paper bag.

She crinkled her eyes in mock delight. ‘Thanks,’ she said. She gave the bag an exploratory shake then set it down on the bed. ‘Sit,’ she said.

I pulled up a black plastic chair. ‘Open it.’

‘I’ll look later, I’m just . . .’

‘Go on, have a look . . .’

‘Dan, I . . .’

‘Just take a look . . .’

She tutted. She opened the bag and peered inside. She lifted out an egg, examined it for a moment, then replaced it and removed a handful of monkey nuts.

‘Hard-boiled eggs and nuts, huh,’ I said.

‘What?’

‘Hard-boiled eggs and nuts, huh.’

‘Dan . . .’

‘Hard-boiled eggs and nuts, huh.’

‘Dan!’

‘You don’t remember?’

‘I don’t remember what?’

I puffed out my stomach, shook my head petulantly. ‘Hardboiled eggs and nuts, huh!’

‘Dan!’

‘Laurel and Hardy! Hard-boiled eggs and nuts, huh! Stan goes to see Ollie in hospital, he has his leg up in plaster, he brings him hard . . .’

She dropped the bag on the bed. ‘Jesus, Dan, why do you
always have to be different? You couldn’t just bring me a bunch of flowers or grapes, could you? It always has to be something funny. Something witty.’

‘You used to appreciate it.’

‘I used to appreciate a lot of things.’

We glared at each other for a charged half-minute.

‘I thought we were doing okay,’ I said.

‘Yeah.’

‘I thought we were going through our second honeymoon period.’

‘Aye, honeymoon cystitis.’

I slumped down in the chair and stared moodily ahead. Sometimes I genuinely don’t love Patricia at all. It doesn’t last very long, but it does happen. I looked across at the couple beside us. I could see now that she was cradling a baby in the folds of her voluminous nightie. The man caught my eye and smiled. I nodded.

‘He hasn’t been then?’ I said.

‘Who?’

I shrugged. ‘I saw your dad.’

She nodded. ‘He brought some clothes. Of indeterminate colour. He wasn’t sure whether it was a boy or . . .’

‘It doesn’t much matter, does it?’

‘I suppose not.’

‘Insofar as nothing much goes with red hair.’

‘Dan . . .’

‘You might have warned me.’

‘How was I supposed to know?’ she snapped, then
grimaced. ‘It doesn’t show up on a bloody scan. Tony hasn’t got red hair.’

‘It’s in his DNA then. From flared jeans to flawed genes.’

‘Does it really matter?’ she hissed. Her face had acquired a little more colour. ‘Jesus, Dan, I’ve just come through the most horrendous twelve hours of my life, pain you couldn’t begin to comprehend, then you turn up here, stinking of beer, you give me a bag of eggs and nuts and start moaning about the colour of his hair, and all the time I’m still in fucking pain and that fucking wee tyke is still in there fighting for his life! Jesus Christ, Dan!’

I counted to ten.

It didn’t work.

‘Better dead than red,’ I said.

She screamed and threw the hard-boiled eggs and nuts at me.

3

She had no idea what I was going through.

In the hospital café I got myself a Diet Coke and a Twix. I sat at a table and stared at a bare wall. There was spilt tea and sugar on the table and I’d an elbow in it before I realised.

She really didn’t have any idea of what I was going through, although it should have been bloody obvious. But she was right as well. I’d no idea what she’d gone through either. I’d only had to watch and worry.

The other visitor from Patricia’s ward set a cup of coffee down on the table and slipped in opposite me. ‘You’ve still got some eggshell in your hair,’ he said.

I brushed my head. A couple of brown fragments fell onto the table. ‘Thanks,’ I said.

He was a big fella. He’d a dark stubble. A knitted blue jumper over a white buttoned shirt. He hunched up his shoulders and
leant forward, resting both elbows in the tea and sugar. He lifted them sharply. ‘Fuck,’ he said, wiping at them.

‘I did that too,’ I said.

‘You think they’d . . .’

‘Aye, you would.’

Bending his elbows had pushed up his shirt, revealing half of an IRA tattoo on his lower arm. I was going to suggest laser surgery or an IQ test, but decided against it. We nodded at each other for a few moments, then I rolled my eyes upwards and said: ‘Sorry about all that.’

‘Never mind, son. Sure I’ve seen it all before.’

‘Not with hard-boiled eggs and nuts.’

‘You’d be surprised. It’s our seventh. Sure women are like that sometimes. Funny things happen when they have babies. It has something to do with the chemicals in their heads. You just have to remember to try and hold on to your temper. It just makes things worse. Give her time to cool off, then take her up a cup of tea and a bar of chocolate. A wee row. It’s not the worst thing in the world.’

It wasn’t the worst thing in the world. But it was part of it. The worst thing in the world hadn’t even bothered to come and visit his son.

Once, long ago, I had an affair. It didn’t work out. Patricia had one in revenge. It didn’t work out for her either. We got back together, more in love than ever. But she was pregnant with his child. And he wanted to provide for it. I wasn’t earning much money. He was. Patricia said he had certain
rights as the father of the child. I said, has he fuck. But he remained a shadowy presence in our lives. I thought she was still in love with him.

‘Hello again,’ I said.

‘Hello.’

‘Is it safe?’

‘Of course.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘I’m sorry too.’

‘I shouldn’t have been so insensitive.’

‘It doesn’t matter.’

I took her hand. ‘Are you very sore?’

‘Someone ripped my bits open with a scalpel.’

‘It’s sore, then.’

She nodded.

‘Tony hasn’t come then?’

She shook.

‘Do you want me to give him a ring?’

‘Leave it, Dan.’

We fell to silence for a little while. I looked at the woman in the next bed. They’d taken her baby away and she now lay flat on her back, snoring gently. At peace with the world.

‘This morning I had a private audience with the Primate of All Ireland,’ I said, as if it were a regular occurrence.

‘What?’

‘Aye. Cardinal Daley.’

‘Dan?’

‘Just thought you’d like to know.’

‘You interviewed him for the paper, you mean?’

‘Nope, he interviewed me.’

‘Dan?’

I clasped her hand in both of mine. ‘Darlin’,’ I said, ‘you know all I’ve ever wanted to do is write my book. Get away somewhere and write my book. You know that’s been my dream.’

Patricia nodded hesitantly.

‘And you know I’ve applied for every grant under the sun, but they’ve always turned me down.’

She nodded again.

‘Well, Cardinal Daley administers an award on behalf of Cooperation North . . . you remember them?’

‘Of course, yes . . .’

‘It’s for writers, new writers, it allows them to go away . . . and the thing is . . . he’s offered it to me. At last someone thinks my writing is worth something . . .’

‘Dan, that’s wonderful . . . I really mean it . . . but we’ve just had . . .’

I squeezed her hands a little tighter. ‘But don’t you see . . . you can come with me, love. So can the little one. That’s the beauty of it. For as long as we want . . . away from Belfast . . . our own little cottage, money to live on, peace and tranquillity . . . the perfect environment to bring up ba . . .’