The God Squad (8 page)

‘They’re a great man for to clean out the bowels, better than any bottle ye could buy.’ He laughed and I laughed too, though I didn’t understand what he meant. He asked I would be serving Mass the following morning and when I told him I would he pressed a multi-sided threepenny piece into my hand saying that it was for spending on the way back from church. He warned me in a good-humoured way not to let the nuns see the money. I agreed.

‘I better be getting on with me work before them nuns is coming after me with the cane. Now begob that wouldn’t do at all.’ He laughed loudly as we went our different directions, he into the orchard and I back to the concrete yard where there was a game of football going on. A big statue of the Sacred Heart with arms outstretched looked
down on the match. I gazed back at the statue and read the plaque underneath: ‘Suffer little children to come unto me’ with the date 1876. Then I checked my feet, trying to ensure that I was walking properly. I couldn’t be certain any more.

The only respite I had from the daily grind of St Michael’s was when I became ill. I was about seven when I contracted measles, and on seeing the raspberry-like rash covering my body, Mother Paul immediately ordered me out of the main dormitory and into a smaller room with twelve beds, which was reserved for any of us who became ill. The ‘sick bay’ was cleaner and brighter than the main dormitory. Instead of bare floorboards it had a brightly patterned linoleum. The reason for the lino became obvious as more children were ill. Many of them were so bad that they vomited repeatedly onto the floor much to the annoyance of the nuns and the dislike of the boys who were not sick and had to clean it up. Being sick had advantages: the food was better. The porridge was warmer and sweeter and somehow the bread seemed fresher. Dinner was the most improved meal of all. Instead of the usual sloppy stew, anyone who was sick was given pandy; a mixture of finely mashed potato, milk and butter, with a little salt. It was served on plastic plates instead of the usual tin ones.

I lay quietly in the small dormitory listening to the sounds from the yard as the other boys played. A bell summoned them to dinner and everything was quiet. In the stillness I
heard the sound of the train making its way into the station. The dark roller blinds were pulled down as protection from bright light. Mother Paul told us that bright light would be very bad for our eyes while we had measles. As I listened to the train’s puffing and panting I couldn’t resist going to the window and lifting one corner of the blind.

The light hurt my eyes at first, I had grown so used to the darkness, but despite that I persisted. The familiar cloud of smoke billowed into the air to be dispersed around the yard and replaced by another. The whistle sounded and the brake was applied causing the wheels to screech. The following wagons banged roughly into each other. Within minutes everything was silent as the tender filled with water in preparation for another journey. The room I was in was so close to the station and the day so still, that I could hear the driver and his mate discussing where they would go for a drink.

On the stairs I heard the dull thud of heavy boots, I knew it wasn’t a nun, because of the absence of the jangle of her long rosary beads hitting off her habit as she walked, but just as a precaution I got back into bed. John Cleary came into the room carrying a tray with a plate of pandy on it. He mimicked Mother Paul as he left it down on my bed, first puckering his mouth, then squinting his eyes and, in a squeaky high-pitched voice, saying, ‘I want to see every bit of that eaten, not a trace is to be left on the plate. Do you understand, child?’ Before he left the room he asked me to breathe on him so that he would get the measles too.

Gradually the sick bay filled with red-faced boys; some really sick, others just with a rash. It was not usual for us to have pillows on our beds; we didn’t have any in the main dormitory, and as more of us became bored just lying in bed with nothing to do, I decided on a pillow-fight. I challenged one of the boys and when he refused, stood on my bed
shouting, ‘Coward, coward,’ to provoke him. He couldn’t resist swinging his pillow at me and, as I stooped to pick up mine, he hit me and knocked me onto the floor. I attempted to get back into bed while he belted me to the encouragement of the other boys. Eventually I managed to get back onto the bed and was caught up in the excitement and anger of the fight. I gripped the corners of the pillowcase firmly and dug my feet into the mattress before swinging as hard as I could. He ducked and the pillow crashed into the iron-framed head of the bed, its light cover bursting open and the feathers floating around the room. I was left holding an empty pillowcase.

Some of the boys laughed. I panicked and asked them to help me put them back. I pleaded that if they didn’t I would get into awful trouble. Realizing I wasn’t going to get help, I rushed around the room gathering fistfuls of feathers and stuffing them into the cover they had exploded from. Those I could not collect I blew along the floor until they were underneath the beds. Mother Paul arrived into the dormitory to enquire how we were. Nervously I told her that I was feeling a bit better before adding that I thought my pillow was torn.

‘I tried to fix it,’ I said, ‘but some of the feathers fell out.’ She looked at me suspiciously, but said nothing, took the pillow and walked out of the room. I wondered if she would bring a different pillow. She did not. Once better, I was immediately doing my usual jobs around St Michael’s, polishing floors, looking after Eugene, and doing messages for the nuns. One evening as I was polishing the boots, not long after being sick, I developed a severe earache, but was afraid to say anything in case I would be accused of trying to get back into sick bay or escape doing my jobs. It was difficult to concentrate as the pain intensified. I cried as I polished the boots, occasionally rubbing my ear violently.

‘What is the crying for, Pat Doyle?’ Mother Paul asked.

‘I have a pain in my ear, Mother.’

‘You are just over the measles – you couldn’t have a pain.’

‘But I have, Mother, honest,’ I pleaded.

She admonished me, suggesting that if I concentrated more on what I was doing the pain would vanish.

‘Offer it up for the Holy Souls in Purgatory,’ she said before leaving me to finish the boots.

In bed the pain worsened. I pulled at my ear and swayed my head from side to side in an attempt to get relief. Eventually I screamed: ‘My ear, it’s killing me.’

Mother Paul ran into the dormitory.

‘Jesus, Mary and Joseph, child,’ she exclaimed, ‘what in God’s name are you trying to do?’

‘I can’t help it,’ I said.

‘You’ll get nothing for the pain until you stop that crying,’ she insisted.

‘I can’t.’

‘You better try a little harder.’

I managed to control my crying long enough for her to get some tablets, which she gave me from her hand.

‘Drink this,’ she said, handing me a tin mug containing a mixture of warm milk and porter which I found difficult to take. The taste sickened me and I was certain I would vomit.

‘I think I’m going to be sick,’ I said.

‘If you vomit, my lad, you will lie in it for the night.’

Not long after taking the tablets and the drink, I went into a deep sleep.

When I woke the next morning it was to feel Mother Paul’s hand resting on my forehead. She asked about the pain and whether it was gone.

‘Yes, Mother,’ I answered.

She took my head in her hands and tilted it to one side to look into my ears.

‘Is it any wonder,’ she exclaimed, ‘that you have earache. Those ears are filthy, absolutely filthy!’

She took some cotton wool and a tweezers from a small box, wrapped the tip in cotton wool and probed into my ear, removing the accumulated wax. Then she gave me two more tablets. They began to dissolve on my tongue. I stuck it out to show her the difficulty I was having trying to swallow them. She rushed into her room and returned with a glass of water. I drank quickly until the taste of the tablets was gone, then I went more slowly, enjoying the cold smoothness of the glass.

‘Come on,’ the impatient nun said, ‘hurry up.’

I gulped down the remaining mouthful of water. It was the first time in my life I had been given a glass to drink from.

A month or two later I was given the duties of senior altar boy for a High Mass. Throughout the week I was excited and careful not to bring any trouble upon myself which would jeopardize the chance I had so often thought about. At play time I got together with some other boys to practise serving. Walking with solemn slowness and carrying imaginary missals I rehearsed every move. I genuflected reverently, barely touching the concrete yard with my right knee as I gave the proper responses to the prayers being mumbled by another boy who was acting as priest.

In preparation for Benediction I pretended to swing the thurible. My hands swayed gently, ensuring that the imaginary instrument gave off just the right amount of incense. I rang imaginary bells, not too loud: that might annoy the Bishop. I visualized him holding the gold monstrance aloft, the white host in its centre, and I swung my thurible, head bowed in the presence of God. I had always been told never
to look at the host for longer than a couple of seconds as it would be irreverent to do otherwise. I sang the Tantum Ergo, softly to myself. Sunday would be for real. No pretending. Though I was nervous I was also excited.

On Sunday morning I got up early and dressed in the clothes which had been left out for me by the nuns, before washing my face and hands in cold water. I dried them with a coarse piece of white cloth which hurt my face when I rubbed it. So that I could receive communion, I had nothing to eat or drink.

I walked quickly through the town, weaving in and out between couples on their way to Mass. The men were dressed in their Sunday suits and their shoes shone in the early morning sunlight. The women too were dressed in their best clothes. Bright coloured dresses covered by darker coloured overcoats, with stiletto heels tapping sharply on the pavement. Most of them wore scarves, some had white or black mantillas held on by a single strand – the clip hidden in their permed hair.

The altar was brightly lit and almost overcrowded with brass and cut-glass vases containing a variety of flowers. Colourful carnations and leafy ferns lined each side of the steps leading up to it. The red carpet, cross-shaped, and held in position by brass bars looked even redder than usual. The dome-shaped brass gong stood out majestically on its white marble pedestal. The sacristan, usually clad in just a black soutane, wore a bright red one and a pure white surplice.

There were sixteen altar boys, all dressed in red and white. Just before Mass began the sacristan asked me to bring the red missal and brass stand to the altar. Positioning it carefully to the right of the tabernacle, I tidied the coloured marking-ribbons so they hung neatly down onto the white altar cloth. I returned to the sacristy and took my place at the head of one of the rows of eight boys.

The congregation stood as we walked slowly onto the altar followed by the priests and finally the Bishop. Each of the servers took his position at the bottom step as the Bishop went to the centre of the altar to begin the sacred ritual. Two priests helped as the Bishop put three measures of incense into the thurible which I held open. Once he was finished I allowed the silver lid to slip slowly into the closed position before handing it to a priest, who passed it to the Bishop. With great solemnity, the celebrant swung it gently towards each part of the altar. A blessing, or perhaps an exorcism. The con-celebrants blessed each other before returning the thurible to me. The Bishop stood before me on the highest step of the altar, as I knelt on the lowest and gently swung the thurible at him.

The organist struck a single chord and, after a momentary silence, the Bishop chanted the opening lines of a prayer before the voices of the choir filled the church with the appropriate response. He sat while one of the priests read the epistle. I watched closely waiting for the moment he would lay his hand on the altar cloth, an indication that he was nearing the end of the reading and a signal to me to ascend the steps from the side and move the missal to the Gospel side of the altar.

I lifted the missal and stand, bowed and prepared to descend the centre steps. On the second step I tripped and fell face down. I watched helplessly as the missal slid across the polished mosaic floor, its ribbons trailing like the tail of some exotic bird. The noise of the stand reverberated through the silent church. I could feel every pair of eyes on me as I got to my feet to collect the missal. Several of the priests who were con-celebrating pushed me away, discreetly whispering to me to go back and kneel in my place. There were many minutes of silence as the ribbons were replaced at the appropriate pages. I watched, disgusted
that something like this should have happened. I knew the nuns from the school would be at Mass and was certain I would be in the worst possible trouble. I prayed. Eventually I was overcome by fear and fainted.

When I came to, Mother Paul and Mother Michael were standing over me. Just as one was about to say something to me, a priest came into the sacristy. I was petrified. He stretched out his hand, placed it gently on my shoulder and asked if I was all right.

‘Yes, Father,’ I answered.

‘What happened was an accident,’ he said, ‘there’s nothing to worry about.’

As soon as he was gone, Mother Michael said, ‘You have disgraced Saint Michael’s.’