2004 - Dandelion Soup (41 page)

“She killed herself, Nancy. Drowned herself in the Giant’s Cakehole.”

“Dear God!” uttered Nancy. “Are they sure it wasn’t an accident?”

“It couldn’t have been,” Padraig said. “She was always warning us to stay out of there when the tide was on the turn.”

“That’s tragic. Do you think she’d lost her mind?”

“I don’t know, Nancy, I mean she was always a bit different, a bit mad in a nice way, but I don’t think she was simple at all. She just didn’t want to be at St Joseph’s, but they wouldn’t let her out.”

“How do you mean, Padraig?”

“She wasn’t allowed out in the daytime and they used to lock her up at night in the attic.”

“Dear God, why?”

“So she wouldn’t be able to escape. If she escaped they wouldn’t get the money,” Padraig said..

Nancy and Donahue stared at Padraig in disbelief.

“What money, Padraig?” Nancy asked.

“Are you pulling our legs?” Donahue said.

“No, she told me once that when she died, St Joseph’s would get a lot of money from her family.”

“Well, God rest her poor soul,” said Nancy.

“Ah, God, she must have been put in the convent by her family, against her will. I’d heard they used to do that sometimes, and St Joseph’s would have got a pay-off when she passed away,” Donahue said, remembering the two old women from years back.

“Anyhow, how did you get here, Nancy?” Padraig asked, sniffing.

“Rosendo brought Brother Francisco and me down in the donkey cart. The two of them have gone back to Santa Eulalia but Rosendo is coming back here tomorrow.”

“Rosendo is her fancy man, Donahue,” Padraig said, brightening up.

“Don’t be so blunt, Padraig.”

“Pot calling the kettle black!” laughed Nancy.

Donahue whispered, “Look, here come the gruesome twosome,” as the two postulants came shuffling in from the kitchen bringing baskets of bread and jugs of coffee.

“They give me the willies, those two, peeking at you from under those wimples. Especially that younger one; I wouldn’t trust her as far as I could throw her, snooping about the place!”

The door opened then and Solly and Father Daley came into the room.

“Where’s Dancey and Mr Leary?” Padraig asked.

“Dancey is still asleep and Michael is trying to telephone the Villa Castelo,” replied Solly.

“It’ll be the parting of the ways after breakfast,” Father Daley said as he sat down. “You lot off to Benita and us on our way to Santiago de Compostela.”

“When do you actually leave for home?” Solly enquired.

“We sail from Camiga in three days’ time.”

Padraig looked down into his lap and surreptitiously wiped a tear away.

Michael Leary came into the dining room looking down in the mouth.

“What’s up?” Donahue asked.

“Bad news, I’m afraid. I’ve just spoken to a chap on the telephone called Carlos Emanuel.”

“Who the hell is he?” Donahue interrupted.

“He’s a servant at the Villa Castelo. Anyhow, the news is that Isabella Martinez died two days ago.”

“Damn!” Solly ejaculated. “Is there no other member of the family there that we could speak to?”

“He passed me on to her sister, a woman called Augusta, a right frosty old bat. She said quite emphatically that she knew nothing of anyone called Dancey Amati and neither did she wish to.”

“Well, that’s us scuppered then,” Donahue said sadly.

“Father Daley, Isabella Martinez was the woman Brother Bernardo was talking about,” Padraig said.

“I don’t remember that, Padraig.”

“I do. He said that Santa Eulalia was owned by an old woman, and that was her name, Isabella Martinez.”

“Ah, you’re right, I fancy. That was who Brother Francisco was off visiting, giving her the last rites.”

“Where do we go from here then, Solly?” Leary asked.

“God only knows. Back to Ballygurry?”

Donahue slumped in his chair and sighed heavily.

“Bloody hell, I was just beginning to enjoy myself,” he muttered.

All conversation was halted then by an ear-piercing scream that came from the kitchen.

“I told you those two are never bloody right,” Donahue said. “Like a pair of frigging banshees about the place. Will we go and see what’s going on in there before they wake the bloody dead?”

Before anyone had time to move, the two postulants burst through the door followed by the most peculiar and ancient-looking man that any of them had ever seen.

The bright-eyed little man made a low bow to the open-mouthed audience.

“I am Muli,” he said. “The Nubeiro.”

“Pleased to meet you. And I’m the Queen of bloody Sheba,” Donahue snorted.

Padraig, who had been watching the two hysterical nuns, turned round, saw Muli, jumped up and ran across and hugged him.

“Do you know this peculiar article, Padraig?” asked Donahue.

“Muli is the one who saved my life when Brother Anselm was after me!”

“He doesn’t look as if he could punch his way out of a paper bag. He’s all skin and bone.”

“I believe that I am in the midst of pilgrims?” Muli said, looking round with interest at the assembled group.

“Not exactly,” Leary replied.

“If not holy pilgrims then those who are seeking for the answers to something, am I right?”

There was a great deal of nodding and nudging while the postulants cowered together in a far corner of the room.

“I believe,” said Muli, “that you all hold a piece of a puzzle in your hands but without the help of each other you cannot solve the puzzle. Now, Padraig here, I know, has been trying to solve the puzzle of the lost Irish virgin.”

Donahue sniggered.

Leary kicked him under the table.

“Well, if you find her, Padraig, save her for me.”

“Ever since Mr Leary told me about the statue I’ve been searching all over the place for it, but I haven’t nearly solved the puzzle yet, Muli,” Padraig said with disappointment.

“But you have unearthed some clues, yes?”

“I suppose so.”

“Tell us what you do know, then.”

“Well, I wondered at first if the Blue Madonna down in the hamlet below Santa Eulalia was the lost statue. It was very old for a start, but when I checked it out it was made of stone and the lost statue was made of gold.”

“So it wasn’t the statue that you were looking for?”

“Nope. But I noticed one night when I scrubbed my nails that some of the blue paint I’d scraped off the statue was the same colour as the blue paint on the fresco in the Great Hall.”

“There wasn’t a fresco in the Great Hall as far as I remember,” Leary said.

“That’s the funny thing, the monks found it by accident when they were scrubbing the walls. It’s really beautiful and yet Brother Anselm wanted them to paint over it again. Isn’t that an odd thing for someone who loves art to do?”

“He’s not right in the head, though, is he?” Father Daley said.

“Anyhow,” Padraig continued, “I wondered did whoever paint the fresco also paint the statue all those years ago, on account of the colour being the same?”

“What would that prove?” Leary asked.

“Well, that they could be about the same age.”

“Anything else?” Muli asked.

“Yes. Nancy gave me a clue.”

“Did I?”

“You were humming ‘When Irish Eyes are Smiling’.”

“Oh yes, and I was surprised that you didn’t recognize the tune.”

“Well, I did recognize the tune,” Padraig replied. “It was just that it made me think of something else.”

“I’m lost already,” Donahue sighed.

“Well, you see, some of the monks painted in the fresco had blue eyes and some of them had brown. Most of the people over here in Spain have brown eyes. I wondered, like, were these blue-eyed monks in the fresco the ones from Ireland who brought the statue here to Spain?”

“And were they?” Solly asked.

“Well, I don’t suppose we’ll ever know for sure, but Nancy pointed out that one of them did look a little bit like Mr Leary. And, you see, I knew that it was one of Mr Leary’s ancestors who had been accused of stealing the statue.”

“Is that right Leary?”

Leary nodded and smiled.

“Anything else, Padraig?” Muli prompted.

“The three-legged dog. There’s one at Santa Eulalia called Quixote and there was one in the fresco. I asked Brother Bernardo why there were so many three-legged dogs in Spain.”

“And what did he say?” asked Donahue.

“Well, he said that there had always been three-legged dogs at Santa Eulalia, and that got me to wondering if the dog in the fresco was an ancestor of Quixote. The same way that I wondered if the squinting monk was an ancestor of Mr Leary’s.”

“Go on, Padraig,” said Michael Leary, who was fascinated.

“Well, the strangest thing of all was that Muli was in the picture too.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Donahue laughed with derision. “I mean he looks bloody ancient but he can’t have been hanging around for hundreds of years.”

Muli smiled at Donahue and his eyes twinkled gaily as he said, “There have, like three-legged dogs, always been Nubeiros hanging around at Santa Eulalia.”

Donahue shook his head and grinned.

“Thafs about all I found out about the Irish virgin, but there were a lot of things that didn’t seem quite right at Santa Eulalia.”

“What sort of things?” Michael Leary asked.

“Well, there was a mark on the wall in the refectory where a painting had once hung. Brother Bernardo said that it was where one of Brother Anselm’s paintings had hung, but it had been stolen about ten years ago.”

“What’s odd about that?” Donahue said.

“Well, if you’ve ever seen any of Anselm’s paintings you’ll know that only a halfwit would steal them, because they’re awful. That was strange, because Anselm was supposed to have been an artist himself, wasn’t he?”

“Thafs right, I remember you saying that he’d studied in Paris,” Father Daley said.

“So why were they so bad? And even stranger, there’s a painting on the wall by someone called Luciano and it’s brilliant. Surely a thief would have pinched that if he wanted tp make some money? Mr Leary has a painting by him back in Ballygurry that he calls his pension, but he told me that he’d never sell it.”

“He might have to now his job’s gone, though,” said Donahue.

“Never,” said Leary emphatically.

“No one spoke for a while until Michael Leary said, Talking of Luciano, one of his paintings turned up in America last year out of the blue.”

“How do you mean out of the blue?”

“Well, he was quite a prolific painter in his time and yet very few of his paintings have been found since his death.”

“Did it sell for a lot of money?”

“Thousands,” Leary said.

Muli turned his attention next to Solly Benjamin.

“And you, sir, I believe that you have travelled many miles with your companions to try and solve another mystery.”

“That’s correct. As most of you here know, I was sent a child, a little girl called Dancey, who arrived at my house in the dead of night.”

“That would be the night that you had the peculiar dream about the dwarves and nuns?” Muli enquired with a grin.

Solly looked at Muli in disbelief.

“Yes, it was,” he stammered, but he didn’t elaborate. “Anyhow, she was sent to me by someone whose identity I don’t know. I have been trying to find out where she came from and who sent her, and today we were going to Benita to follow up a clue.”

Muli looked steadfastly at Solly.

“But the news has reached you that Señora Isabella Martinez is dead?”

“How did you know that?”

“Ah, I hear things on the wind, my friend.”

Solly shook his head and then said, “Padraig, what was it you said earlier about the monk studying in Paris?”

“Just that Brother Bernardo said that Brother Anselm was an artist before he became a monk and that he studied in Paris.”

“Madame Mireille!” Solly cried.

“What about her?” Donahue asked.

“I remember she said that Isabella Martinez used to bring a man with her to the shop sometimes. She said that he was her brother and he was an artist too. Madame Mireille said that the way he and Isabella looked at each other made her think that he was her lover not her brother!”

“Good God! You don’t think it could be Brother Anselm, do you?” Leary asked.

“Why don’t we ask him outright?”

“Because,” said Father Daley, “he’s locked up and half out of his mind.”

“Padraig, do you remember the photograph?” Leary said excitedly.

“What photograph, Mr Leary?”

“The one in my scrapbook, which was taken outside the café. Remember, the one of the pregnant girl and Brother Anselm!”

“I do. Blimey, do you think that she might be Dancey’s mammy then?”

“Maybe,” said Leary quietly.

“That doesn’t help us know where the mother has gone, though,” Solly said.

“But Anselm must know who the girl is,” Leary added.

“Maybe the dirty old sod is Pepita’s father,” posed Donahue.

“Who’s Pepita?” Father Daley asked.

“Pepita Amati is Dancey’s mother. Señora Hipola told us her name,” Leary said.

Suddenly a voice spoke out.

“I think I may be able to help you with some of your questions.”

“Who the hell are you?” demanded Donahue.

“My name is Peregrino Viejo, the Old Pilgrim.”

There was a sudden silence as everyone turned to look at the tall, striking man who must have come quietly into the room some moments before he had spoken.

Padraig said, “I’ve seen you before outside the church in the square with the fountain. I still have a lovely blue scarf that you left behind.”

The man smiled at Padraig and said, “Ifs funny, you know, because I was sure that you and I would meet again one day.”

“What did you mean you could help us? I don’t see how you can, sir, unless you can tell us where we can find the girl’s mother?” Solly said impatiently.

“I’m afraid I can’t tell you that, although I would hazard a guess that she’s long gone from these parts.”

“Come on then, man, spit out what you do know,” Donahue urged.

“I found the child Dancey abandoned up near Santa Eulalia. She was in a terrible state, terrified and barely able to speak. But she managed to tell me how she had become separated from her mother. They were playing a game of hide and seek. Dancey was told to close her eyes, and count to a hundred. When the poor child opened her eyes there was no sign of her mother. She had been abandoned.”