2004 - Dandelion Soup (13 page)

“What were they doing at St Joseph’s?”

“The talk was that they were both from wealthy families. A foreigner one of them was, from Italy. They were an embarrassment to the families, a bit on the wild side, like. The one used to lift up her skirts, show her drawers, you know, a bit gone in the head.”

“That’s disgraceful.”

“Ah no, Michael, she couldn’t help it.”

“No, I don’t mean that it was disgraceful that she pulled up her clothes. I mean the families packing the handicapped off, hiding them out of the way.”

“It made good sense, if you ask me. They used to pay a lot of money for them to be looked after, and when the parents died their share of the family inheritance went to the nuns.”

“Dear God, what sort of world do we live in? I wouldn’t put a dog in the care of that lot of old bitches.”

“Michael, you shouldn’t talk like that about the sisters. They’re good women, the brides of Christ and all that.”

“Look, Marty, I have good memories of the nuns that taught me, they were a kind lot, but that Sister Veronica and her snivelly-nosed little sidekick are two nasty bits of work.”

“Sister Veronica is a very educated woman, Michael.”

“She’s a bigoted old cow.”

“I’ve heard she comes from a well-to-do family.”

“They must have been glad to be shot of her.”

“Between ourselves and not a word, mind, I heard there was a man involved before she took the veil,” Donahue whispered.

“What? Never to God.”

“That’s what they say. A failed romance. You have to feel sorry for her.”

“I don’t Whoever the fellow was had a lucky escape, if you ask me.”

“You’re a hard man, Michael Leary.”

“I am that. Marty, can you hear singing?”

Donahue cocked his head on one side.

“I can.”

Michael Leary crossed to the window and looked out.

“Come and look at this, Marty. Thisll set the old spinsters’ tongues wagging.”

Donahue lifted the bar flap and walked across to the window.

“Dear God, Father Behenna was bad enough but would you look at the state on him.”

“As pissed as the proverbial pudding.”

And they stood side by side watching Father Daley lurching out of Mankey’s Alley and along Clancy Street towards the presbytery.

Fadraig was down on the beach looking for signs of life in the rock pools when he heard Mr Leary call out to him. He turned round, waved and smiled as Mr Leary came down through the sand dunes towards him.

“How are you doing, Padraig?”

“Not so bad, sir, and yourself?”

“Grand. Are you looking forward to the pilgrimage? It’s not long now.”

“Not really, sir.”

“I thought you’d be pleased to be going.”

“Oh, I mean I’m not ungrateful or anything it’s just…”

“Just what?”

“Ah, nothing, sir.”

“You can tell me, Padraig, I’m a good man with a secret.”

“Well, the thing is, sir, people go to Lourdes to be cured, right?”

“So they say.”

“Well, there’s nothing wrong with me, sir, I’m not a cripple, deaf or dumb and I don’t have a terrible disease or anything. I’ve nothing to be cured of.”

Mr Leary threw back his head and laughed.

“The thing is, though, Padraig, at least you’ve the chance to travel a bit You’ll see a million things you’ve never seen before.”

“I know, but look at the company 111 be keeping, Miss Drew and Miss Carmichael!”

“Father Daley seems a nice sort though. Perhaps with a bit of luck the two old biddies will find a cure for the miseries while you’re out there.”

Padraig grinned and nodded his head.

“You must take a camera with you and show me the photographs when you come back.”

“I don’t have one, sir.”

“Well, I can help you out there. I’ve a spare one that you can have. Maybe you could even do a bit of painting and drawing while you’re there. Do you do much drawing at St Joseph’s?”

“No, sir, Sister Agatha says it’s a waste of time and I’d be better off learning to paint walls and ceilings for a living.”

Mr Leary spat in disgust.

“Take no notice, Padraig; what does she know? You could maybe do some sketches and keep a scrapbook while you’re away.”

“That would be great. Sir, do you remember when I was looking at your scrapbook, you said you’d tell me the story of the lost Irish virgin.”

“Ah, now that is a very complicated story.”

“You did promise though.”

“I did indeed. Well, here goes. Once upon a time, many years ago, there was a great artist who painted a famous picture of the Virgin Mary. You can still see the painting in a museum in France. Anyhow, a few years later he was commissioned to sculpt a statue of the Holy Virgin. It was the most beautiful statue, by all accounts. The statue was based upon the painting and it was crafted in gold with jewels encrusted all over it.”

“Was it worth a lot?”

“Priceless. Anyway, the long and the short of it was that the statue was sent as a gift to the people of Santiago de Compostela in the north of Spain. It was entrusted to the care of a group of Irish monks, who set sail from Ireland. When they arrived in Spain they made their way on foot towards Santiago de Compostela, as the pilgrims did in those days. But the story has it that somewhere along the way one of the monks gave the others the slip and made off with the statue. It was never ever seen again.”

“What about the monk, sir?”

“Disappeared off the face of the earth. Never heard from again.”

“What do you think happened to the statue?”

“Well, that’s the mystery, Padraig. Nothing was ever heard of it again until a short while ago.”

“What, they found it?”

“Not the statue, no, but some jewels were discovered.”

“Where, sir?”

“That’s the strange thing, Padraig. In Paris.”

“How do you think they got there, sir?”

“God only knows after all this time. But if we were able to find out where the jewels came from, then we could be on our way to unearthing a mystery from the past.”

“Who found the jewels, sir?”

“They were sold to a pawnbroker who didn’t immediately realize their worth, but luckily he got in contact with a fellow he knew, a historian.”

“Wow!”

“Now this may be a wild goose chase but one can’t help being excited.”

“Things aren’t always what they seem though, are they, sir? Perhaps the poor old monk didn’t really steal the statue, sir. Maybe the other monks did and they put the blame on him. Maybe they picked out the jewels and melted down the statue and came back to Ireland.”

“You think he was innocent then, Padraig?”

“Could have been. They might have done him in so he couldn’t spill the beans.”

“They could have indeed.”

“Do you want to find the statue so that you’ll be rich, sir?”

“No. I expect if the statue was found then it would belong to the church. The reason that I want to find out the truth is that the monk who ran off with it was one of my distant ancestors.”

“Honest to God?”

“Honest injun, Padraig. I found out when I was researching my family tree. So you see I come from a long line of criminals, all of them probably with bad eyesight to boot.”

Padraig laughed.

“Won’t it be hard trying to find out about something that happened so long ago?”

“Undoubtedly. Impossible, I expect, but I am not a logical man, Padraig. I am a deluded romantic who also likes to think himself something of a Sherlock Holmes.”

“Perhaps I could be your Dr Watson.”

“Indeed, Padraig, indeed.”

At morning break Siobhan Hanlon cornered Padraig against the wall in the schoolyard.

“If it’s a kiss you’re after, I’ve sold out,” Padraig said.

Siobhan grinned a gappy-toothed grin.

“Well now, Mister Big-head O’Mally, it’s not a kiss I’m wanting from you, so there.”

“That makes a change. What is it then?”

“I know a secret that you don’t know.”

“What secret?”

“It’s a secret, daft arse, so I can’t tell you.”

“Well, if you’re not going to tell me, then push off and play hopscotch or something.”

Siobhan turned her back on him. She walked a few steps across the playground then turned round and said, “You know everyone says that the Black Jew has a woman in his house, well that’s not true.”

“So what?”

“He has a little child hidden there. I know because I’ve seen her.”

Padraig raced across the playground towards her and slapped his hand across her mouth.

“SHHHH! Siobhan, don’t tell the whole bloody school!”

Siobhan sniffed up the smell of his skin. Tree bark and dandelions, powder paint and pencil shavings. She tried to speak through his hand but he kept it clamped fast over her mouth and she was glad, she didn’t want him to let her go.

“If I take my hand away, Siobhan, will you promise to shut your big gob?”

Finally, in fear of suffocating, she nodded.

“Siobhan, come over here with me in the corner.”

She went with him willingly.

“Listen, Siobhan, how did you find out about the little girl?”

“It was the night of the terrible storm. I was standing by the window watching. Well, you know that glass thing on the top of his house, well the lightning came and lit it all up and I saw a little girl up there dancing around like a mad thing, like a ballerina with a squib up her arse. Honest to God, Padraig. She was leaping about like a simpleton.”

“I believe you, but she’s not simple.”

“Do you think he’s keeping her a prisoner, Padraig?”

“Don’t be soft.”

“Father Daley told Mammy that when he was in the Dark Wood he heard a child scream. Perhaps the Black Jew steals children the way tinkers do.”

“Why would he do that?”

“I don’t know. Perhaps he eats them for breakfast.”

“For God’s sake, Siobhan, who’s simple now?”

Siobhan blushed.

“Anyway, you’re not to tell anyone else.”

“Why not?”

“Because he doesn’t want anyone to know.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. He asked me not to tell.”

“When were you talking to the Black Jew?”

“Don’t keep calling him that.”

“Everyone calls him that.”

“So it doesn’t mean it’s right. Just promise me you won’t tell.”

“Give us a kiss then and 111 promise.”

Padraig sighed. Siobhan closed her eyes and a slow satisfied smile grew on her lips.

Padraig jabbed his lips against hers and then pulled away.

“And another thing, Padraig O’Mally, what were you doing walking about at nearly midnight the other night in the pouring rain?”

He slapped his hand back over her mouth.

“Shut up, for God’s sake, Siobhan, or you’ll have me strung up.”

She pulled away his hand.

“I saw you. What were you up to?”

“Looking in the horse trough to see if what they say is true.”

Siobhan’s eyes grew wider by the second.

“Honest to God?”

Padraig nodded.

“Did you see anything?”

Padraig nodded seriously.

“What did you see?”

“Can you keep a secret, Siobhan?”

She nodded vigorously, her fair curls leaping around her shoulders.

“Wait while I whisper in your ear.”

Siobhan stepped closer.

Padraig whispered.

Siobhan squealed.

“Padraig O’Mally, you dirty filthy pig! Another kiss or I’m telling.”

He kissed her a second time, a little peck, and then he was gone, off across the schoolyard, arms wide like an airplane, soaring and diving.

Siobhan put her hand up to her mouth. God, he was lovely. Couldn’t you just eat him up? When she was grown up she was going to marry him, give him a good wash and tuck him up in bed at night. She just wished that she hadn’t already been daft enough to tell big-mouth Sinead Cullinane the secret about the old Jew first.

Father Daley bit the bullet and called a meeting of the Ballygurry pilgrims at the presbytery. All three of them. He told the assembled pilgrims that there had been a slight change of plan due to an overbooking at the hotel in Lourdes. Instead of going to France the Ballygurry pilgrims would be making history. They would be sailing to Spain and there they would tread in the hallowed footsteps of thousands of past pilgrims making their way to the cathedral in Santiago de Compostela. Padraig grinned from ear to ear.

Spain! Wait until he told Mr Leary.

Miss Drew and Miss Carmichael shook their heads in dismay.

Spain!

A land of lunatics tilting at windmills.

Bullfighters in over-tight trousers and brazen-faced women wearing red dresses and black high heels tap dancing to guitar music.

But so enthusiastic was Father Daley’s speech that by the end the two women were nodding and almost smiling. Miss Carmichael thought that perhaps it would make a nice change from the drab hotel in France and maybe the food would be better. Miss Drew had never thought much of the Hotel du Lac; the eiderdowns were positively grubby and the lavatory hadn’t seen a brush or the whiff of disinfectant in years. And as for the food, it was a pile of muck.

The sun shone down brightly on Ballygurry and a soft warm breeze rippled across the ocean. Net curtains and tablecloths flapped gaily on washing lines and the smell of fresh whitewash and Reckitt’s Blue was strong in the air.

Outside Donahue’s shop-cum-pub, strings of brown and red crepe-soled summer sandals were hung up along with tin spades and buckets for the tourists who never came. White ankle socks replaced the long grey and fawn socks of winter. Flannel underwear was boxed up with mothballs, and aertex and string vests were the order of the day.

Donahue had dusted down the bottles of calamine lotion and plimsoll whitener and put flypapers out on display. Daffodils nodded gaily in the backyards and yellow poppies and bluebells transformed the Dark Wood. Frogs sang down by the tadpole pond. Apple and cherry blossom blew over the walls of Nirvana House and scattered like confetti along Mankey’s Alley.

The train puffed slowly into Ballygurry station and came to a grinding halt. Steam billowed above the platform and the enormous black and white clock whirred and clanked but the hands remained steadfastly at ten to two.