The Good Priest (3 page)

Now, open-mouthed before him, she fixed him in the eye, frowned, and unsubtly inclined her head towards the empty pew from which the child's crying had emanated. She had let him know many times before that she did not approve of babies in God's house. ‘Something,' she had said in her loud, martial voice at their last meeting, ‘must be done.' Meeting her eyes with his own ones of forget-me-not blue, he ignored her mime and, adopting a beatific expression, shut her up by laying the host on her tongue.

As she moved away, head bowed modestly and unable to berate him, he found himself faced with Elizabeth Templeton and, seeing her, he had to make a conscious effort to stop himself from smiling. It would not be proper to do so here and now, and it would likely disconcert her. But the sight of the librarian invariably made him feel happy, and that feeling was difficult to hide. She usually came only to Sunday Mass. Today, he had not expected to see her.

Over the years he had considered the effect that she had upon him and puzzled over it, but he still could not work out exactly why he was so susceptible to her. It was not
as if she was a conventional beauty; on the contrary, she was as big-boned as an ox, big-bosomed too, and stood a good six inches taller than him. Her clothes reflected her personality; large, generous and free-flowing.

But her appearance did have a part to play in the attraction; he recognised that. Whenever he looked at her face he knew that whatever expression it showed would be entirely genuine. Like a young child, she appeared to be incapable of dissembling. Nothing was produced for effect. And while such a trait could, at times, be slightly alarming, it also meant that when she did smile, the warmth of it set the world alight and him with it. Sometimes he would borrow books from the library just to see her.

As she was still unaware of his scrutiny, eyes downcast, he allowed himself the luxury of gazing at her for a moment longer. She had such a generous, upturned mouth and fine, high cheekbones. He knew, with an unshakeable conviction, that his high regard for her was fully reciprocated. Alone in his house, when he was unable to get to sleep, he sometimes amused himself by wondering how his life might have panned out if he had taken a different path. If, instead, he had married her, and become a partner, a Writer of the Signet in some dusty Edinburgh firm. In his mind's eye he had created a whole life together for the pair of them. It was all too ordinary, too dull for most people, but to him it was exotic beyond compare.

As she opened her hazel eyes in surprise, seconds having passed and finding that nothing was placed in her hands, he said quickly, ‘The body of Christ', as if by gabbling the words the delay could be made up.

While he was speaking to one of his parishioners after the service, Mamie Bryce edged the startled pensioner out of the way, accosted him and tried to revisit the telephone conversation of the night before.

‘Mamie,' he said reproachfully, looking at her and at the retreating back of Mr Munro.

‘Veronica's not answering her phone, Father,' she said, ignoring his implied rebuke, ‘but it's not right that I do the brass lamps myself week in week out. Either you or Veronica will have to sort this out, for once and for all.'

Faced with all the woman's pent-up annoyance he found himself, momentarily, at a loss for words. How could those blessed brasses be so important? Elizabeth must be somewhere nearby, and he did not want to miss her. Maybe he should just give in to Mamie, tell her to leave the matter with him to sort out? No, she would still refuse to move and her demands would multiply, become more strident.

‘I told you last night, Veronica's in charge,' he said implacably.

‘And she's over there, Mamie, talking to Lady Lindsay,' a low voice interjected. Elizabeth Templeton helpfully pointed at a group near the gate, the square body of the rota-organiser obscuring many of the slimmer frames of her companions.

‘Right. I'll catch her the now,' Mamie Bryce exclaimed, moving off and determined to corner her quarry before anyone else did. Past experience suggested that she would be a much softer target than the priest. She had crumbled instantly over the hoovering.

‘Thanks, Elizabeth,' Father Vincent said, smiling broadly and showing his even white teeth, ‘but she'll be back, you'll see.'

Elizabeth simply nodded by way of reply, and he added as an afterthought: ‘How's Michael doing?'

Michael, her only child, suffered from attention deficit disorder and Tourette's syndrome, and these had ensured that she had not had a good night's sleep for many years. The last two decades of her life had been spent explaining the world to him and him to the world. The boy's father could not cope and had left them both, seeking solace for his loss in other arms.

‘Not as well as I'd like,' she said. ‘As you know, after that silly incident with the motorbike, his card's been marked. He still hasn't found a job. Whenever anything happens here that community policewoman comes straight to my door, determined he'll be involved.'

‘You mean Effie?'

‘Is that what she's called? So far it's been nothing to do with him, and he's infuriated at the injustice of it, so he argues with her and things go from bad to worse.'

‘Where's he now?'

‘He's spending the night with his dad; they're going together to the rugby at Murrayfield tomorrow afternoon. So I've no worries for the moment. I know exactly where he is for the next forty-eight hours. He'll love it. He needed a man's hand in his life, but he's had precious little of it. And you, how's life with you?'

‘Fine,' he said, sounding suddenly and uncharacteristically guarded. Mamie was approaching them, and once
in range, she slipped in front of Elizabeth and exclaimed loudly, ‘Ronnie says that you're to sort it out. It's favouritism. I told her that I'm not putting up with it. She said I'd a brass neck. You're to decide who's to do the big vase this week. So, is it to be me or Ann-Marie?'

‘You,' he shot back, annoyed at the interruption.

Re-entering the empty and echoing church, the squeaking noises made by his new rubber-soled shoes on the parquet flooring sounded shrill, like a gathering of angry mice. So, for the fun of it, he started to take exaggeratedly large strides, placing his feet gingerly on the floor as if it was made of thin ice. Filling the ensuing silence, his tummy let out a loud rumble. With only five minutes to go before the confession hour, there had been no time for the cup of tea and slice of fruit cake that had filled his imagination so recently. Mamie's furious rant had seen to that. Still, in the face of her barrage he had not relented, and if she resigned from the rota so be it. Catherine Forbes might volunteer, others too; plenty of them had been put off by Mamie's involvement. No doubt it would prove an empty threat like the last time.

Now seated in the confessional, he leaned back against the wooden panelling, luxuriating in the silence after the woman's tirade. How wonderfully peaceful it seemed. He tried to stretch out his short legs but was unable to do so, due to a collection of broken vases, brushes and hoovers that had appeared from nowhere. The place now seemed to be being used as an overflow broom cupboard. Perhaps it was part of the vendetta between the various cleaning
factions? Some point or other was probably being made by someone about something. Was he simply being caught in the crossfire? Tomorrow, he would convene a summit and, if necessary, knock some heads together.

Without thinking, he nudged one of the vases to one side with his foot, appalled when it toppled over with a loud crash. The noise was quickly replaced by complete silence once more. Sitting back, relishing the quiet, he basked in it until something told him that it was wrong. All wrong. Hell's bells! Where was the music? Without it, the making of confession became a public act rather than a private one, the penitent's words easily audible to those in the nearby pews. Others, further away too, if they strained to hear hard enough. The whole thing became more like
The Jeremy Kyle Show
than one of the blessed sacraments. Peering out of his door, he saw that the church was still empty, and hurried into the sacristy in his squeaking shoes. In seconds the building resonated to a Latin chant intoned by an all-woman Bulgarian choir.

‘You just try and do your homework when your mum tells you, eh?' he said to the child, yawning silently. The tediousness and predictability of the sins on parade were acting as a soporific on him. So far there had been three mumbled accounts of using swear words, a brace of ‘entertaining' bad thoughts, their content remaining unspecified despite a little prurient prodding by him, and one young woman's confession of lying to her spouse about her use of birth control. It was like being pecked to death by
ducks. The sharper stab of some more inventive sinner would be almost welcome, wake him up at the very least.

The girl left and was replaced, quickly, by the next penitent. The newcomer was breathing heavily, every inhalation and exhalation audible until, suddenly, he wheezed, gasping for air and making a strange hollow, crackling sound. Instantly, the priest knew who was sitting behind the grille. He sighed wearily, having been expecting just such a visit. His friend, Barbara Duncan, had tipped him the wink that there had been a spate of thefts from washing lines in Sandport. Apparently the thief had been very selective, pilfering only ladies' pants, bras and tights. Inevitably, given the man's record, George Lumsden's name had been on her lips, on most people's lips. If only, Vincent thought, George had a little more grey matter encased in that strange, bullet-shaped skull of his, he would realise that such a haul could only be taken from the same place once, if he valued his liberty. Everyone in the town knew of his weakness; gossip was, after all, the lifeblood of the place. One missing Wonderbra and he would be the prime suspect. But, unless he was apprehended, that is all there could be, suspicion. But, after this latest confession, Vincent would know. If anyone had their finger on the pulse of the place it was him.

Later that same evening, he looked along the packed supermarket shelf, yearning to pick up a couple of bottles of the Saint-Émilion Grand Cru. But on seeing the price of them, he turned to the Lussac-Saint-Émilion, a poor substitute but drinkable. With over half the month gone,
woefully little of his salary remained and there were only a couple more anniversary Masses still to be said. Worse, the McKinnons were notoriously late payers and, unfortunately, the Cockburns had not a bean between them. A baptismal fee was a possibility, but that could not be relied upon nowadays. Half the infants practically walked to the font, and a few could have made their own responses. The Argentinian Cabernet Franc might be a good compromise – it was both on offer and well-rated.

To his disquiet the woman at the till, a Baptist married to one of his flock, gave him a wink as he began stowing the bottles into their carrier bag. Disconcerted, he resolved to avoid her in future. He could feel his cheeks reddening, blushing from the neck upwards. But, he reminded himself, the only vow he had given was one of celibacy, not abstinence from
all
the other good things of life. So he was not some sort of rogue as no doubt she fondly imagined. Alcohol was not forbidden to him. Trying to get across that he had nothing to hide, he looked her straight in the eye as he opened his wallet. She winked at him again, three times, and he relaxed, realising that she had a facial tic.

‘Will that be all, Father? Of the drink, I mean,' she said in a whisper, wrong-footing him again, and grinning conspiratorially at him.

‘Well … for tonight at least,' he replied, joining in with her, smiling too, amused at the thinness of his own skin.

As he was walking up Station Road, humming under his breath, he saw a pack of youths ahead of him in the Sands car park. They were noisy, drinking. Feeling the biting
cold for the first time, he zipped up his navy anorak and quickened his step. Some of the group were seated on the low stone perimeter wall that ran along the pavement. A couple more stood immediately below the street light kicking a glass bottle between them, and one sat astride a green plastic rubbish bin, drumming his legs against it. In order to avoid them he would have to cross the road, which had suddenly become unusually busy. Briefly, he closed his eyes It had been a long, tiring day. He was not in the mood to return their quips, deflect their rude, adolescent banter. But somehow he had to get past them.

As he continued onwards, putting one foot resolutely in front of the other, a cider can bounced into the gutter beside him and a girl, an unlit cigarette in her pouting mouth, marched straight up to him. The sound of glass breaking filled the air, followed by a stream of angry swearing. He could feel himself tensing. Just as he was about to collide with her, she jinked to one side, laughing at the near-miss that she had engineered. She had been so close he could smell the alcohol fumes on her breath. Determined to get away and avoid any more of their attention, he hurried on. A missile hit his back. Someone had hurled a full can of Tennent's lager at him. On impact, he staggered slightly and the carrier bag that he was carrying hit his lower leg. The bottles inside it clinked loudly as if to raise the alarm. Instantly, the boy on the rubbish bin sprang off it and stood in front of him, blocking his path.

‘Aye, aye. Bit of an alky are we, Father?'

‘No,' he replied, stunned by the blow, rubbing his back with his hand, feeling the bruised muscle below his
ribcage through his shirt. He recognised the boy, became aware that he knew his parents. He had buried his great-grandfather less than two months earlier.

‘No. No, Thomas, I'm not,' he repeated crossly, sidestepping the youth, trying to continue on his way but finding his path blocked by another of the group. This boy, dressed in a hoodie, skinny jeans and trainers, towered over him. His face was unnaturally pale, peering from his hood like a sickly monk. Every time the priest moved to the side he mirrored his movement, making progress impossible.