Flesh Wounds (29 page)

‘I’ve been there myself,’ he said softly, the studs of his boots crunching as they crossed on to concrete. ‘I think most of us have, at some point. You ask for absolution from something higher because you hope that will give you permission to forgive yourself. Are you a believer, officer?’ he asked.

Catherine shook her head. Saying no seemed wrong somehow, diminishing, and she resented the way it was phrased, not specifying what she may or may not be a believer in.

‘Didnae think so,’ he replied with a wry smile, almost conspiratorial. It was as though he didn’t bloody believe it either. ‘When somebody like me talks about a higher power, I know that turns some folk off. But I’m closer to your position than you’d imagine. I think we all have a need to believe in something greater than ourselves, and to make our lives a contribution to that. Some might call it God. You might call it the greater good.

‘But what I take from it, what I know, is that the greater good needs you to cut your guilt loose so you can get on with making a contribution. It needs you to forgive yourself.’

They were nearing the pavilion: a grand, Victorian-sounding word for a dull, seventies-built grey concrete box. It was time for the money shot.

‘Brenda Sheehan’s AA sponsor told us that the last time she saw her, she seemed happier, less burdened. She said she had made her confession. Father McGhee, I realise that it’s supposed to be confidential, but I need to know what she told you.’

She braced herself for the self-righteous bit about violating the sanctity of the confessional. Instead he fixed her with a curious look, scrutinising and almost relieved.

‘I can’t do that,’ he replied, politely apologetic.

‘But she’s dead, Father,’ Catherine argued. ‘And if anything she told you might be in any way related to what brought that about—’

‘You don’t need to sell me justice, officer,’ he interrupted, that strange look still glinting in his eyes. ‘I’m as pragmatic as they come. But you weren’t hearing me earlier. I already told you: Brenda Sheehan was not one of the zero point one per cent, remember? I can’t tell you what she confessed because there’s nothing
to
tell. If Brenda made the kind of confession that liberates a soul, then she didn’t make it to me.’

With that, he walked off towards the changing rooms, leaving Catherine in no doubt that he was telling the truth. It was that look of something close to relief: when she told him they were here about what Brenda might have confessed, he understood that he wasn’t going to be compromised or conflicted, because he knew he couldn’t help them.

She watched him unlock the door and was moved to start after him before he disappeared inside. She trotted up the short flight of steps, leaving Laura down on the concrete.

He heard the sound of her shoes on the stairs and turned around.

‘Father, for what it’s worth, I wanted to say I admire what you’re doing, you know, as a priest getting involved with the football team. I don’t see a lot of feel-good rehabilitation stories in my average week, but that doesn’t mean I don’t think it happens.’

‘So you believe in redemption?’

‘Some days that’s harder than others, but I try.’

‘You and me both, hen.’

She was walking back down the stairs when she heard him call after her.

‘By the way,’ he said, his foot keeping the door from closing. ‘I didnae join the team because I’m a priest.’

It took her a moment to suss what he meant, then it all fell into place.

‘What was that about?’ Laura asked.

‘That’s no shepherd,’ Catherine replied.

‘What?’

‘I’ll tell you another time.’

She found herself at the chopping block once more upon another cool, clear morning, the first real frost of autumn underfoot. It was early November, hoar coating the edges of the brown leaves scattered untidily about the place, one more job nobody had time enough to do. They were piled up like snowdrifts against the wooden wall of the stables, its doors bolted and locked. Demetrius had been sold months back, another luxury they could no longer afford. The sacrifice was lessened by the fact that nobody liked going into the stables any more, and Lisa hadn’t ridden him after that horrible day.

She placed a short log on the block and hefted the axe two-handed, splitting the firewood with a practised stroke. She wore only a T-shirt despite the cold, knowing that it would be enough once she got swinging. It might be the warmest she felt all day, given the temperature inside the house, where the central heating remained steadfastly off, every drop of oil an extravagance. The wood she was chopping was for the living-room hearth, but that was only ever lit at dusk, leaving the house chilly all day.

It helped to be busy, keeping her hands occupied as a means of distracting her mind, and when that was impossible, at least it passed the time while she waited for news. She got into a rhythm: placing, swinging, splitting. Sometimes this kind of exertion helped work out her frustration. This morning she could feel it having the opposite effect, as though it was instead summoning up more anger as her arms unleashed harder and harder strokes until she felt tears run down her cheeks. She stopped to wipe them away and blow her nose, looking back towards the empty house.

Dad had been doing three people’s jobs since he was forced to lay off Donald and Michael, no longer able to pay them due to a sharp recent increase in overheads. They weren’t the only farm to have this problem, they knew. There had been whispers and allusions in certain circles: that was why on that first day her parents had grasped so quickly what it was all about. There were rumours and stories, yes, but nobody admitted that it had happened to them. Money was tight, they just said. These were hard times. Fear and shame kept it secret. They seldom even gave it a name. When it was referred to at all between farmers, it was done so obliquely and briskly, like they were hurrying past a road accident, and there was no question whatsoever of it being mentioned to anyone outside of their own four walls.

The first Saturday of each month, he would come by to collect: the cadaverous grey man in the BMW. The younger man in the polo-neck had only returned once, replaced after that by a squirrelly looking wee guy always dressed in a tracksuit top above a pair of jeans with a tartan-effect pattern through them. They had been trendy for a few months about two years before, but had by then reached the final, irredeemable phase of the fashion cycle whereby they were practically the uniform of the style-oblivious. He was restless and fidgety, constantly sniffing and flipping his too-long greasy side-shed away from his right eye. She reckoned he might as well have the words ‘
SNEAK THIEF
’ embroidered on his tracksuit top, instead of
FILA
. Any plain-clothes store detective who didn’t stick to this chancer from the second he entered their shop should be sacked for negligence.

He didn’t just collect, though. On each visit Cadaver would announce an increase in the rate for their ‘protection’. He was bleeding them dry as ruthlessly and rapidly as a beheaded chicken over a bucket.

Through a combination of wounded pride and desperate bloody-mindedness, Dad was nonetheless determined that the girls continue their education, despite their demands to be allowed to find full-time work or to just stay home to help him run the farm. Lisa had gone on to university, as planned, but remained living at home while she attended Glasgow. Lisa maintained that it was all the same to her, but she still kept her acceptance for Cambridge in her bedside drawer, a memento of the other life she could – and should – have had.

There was no vet school and no Laurel Row any more, school fees being out of the question. She had failed to get the grades she needed in her Highers, though she did fare better than she initially feared given the state she was in around the time she sat the exams.

Now she was in sixth year back at Calderburn High. The UCCA guide showed that there were some vet schools down south that would take her if she got an A in her Higher physics re-sit and at least a B for SYS chemistry, but how could she realistically think about going away to uni when Lisa hadn’t been able to? How, in fact, could she think about the long-term future at all? There didn’t seem to
be
a long-term future any more, only an on-going struggle to make payments that went up every time the grey man visited. She knew they couldn’t go on like this, yet she kept asking herself where it would end.

An unmistakable pointer towards the answer presented itself when Dad collapsed while cleaning out a feed-trough. He had looked very pale the previous morning, having worked through a very heavy cold during the week, in the face of constant entreaties from Mum that he should be in his bed. She winced to think how long he may have lain out there – and in what condition he would ultimately have been found – had it not been for the vet, Harriet Chambers, who spotted him from where she was working in the dairy shed.

They endured an aeon of not knowing in some grotty hospital waiting area, purgatory with plastic chairs, and when they did finally get to see him he was behind glass, a tube in his mouth. His eyes were open but glazed, unfocused. This was due to sedation, a doctor assured them. His signs were stable, they were getting fluid into him and would maintain observations overnight. It was a polite and well-intentioned invitation for them to go home and get some rest.

She barely slept, though more than Mum, no doubt. Everyone was awake before dawn, even the normally unrousable Lisa, all impatient for information. There had been no phone calls in the night, at least; she understood that no news was good news, or at least not extremely bad news.

Despite her aching need to see him, to be there to hear whatever the doctors had to say, she also knew she had a duty – a very important duty – to remain behind.

‘There’s a thousand things needing done,’ she told her mum.

Mum knew she was right. Nothing stopped because Dad was in hospital. In fact, the workload had just multiplied.

‘We’ll go in shifts,’ she said. ‘Lisa can drive home later to spell me and I can go up in the afternoon. I’ve got my licence now, remember.’

‘Of course,’ Mum nodded. She had passed her test over a month ago: teaching her to drive being yet one more task her dad had taken upon himself rather than fork out for a third party. It was no doting indulgence, though; it was imperative that all of them were able to fetch supplies, and even taking the tractor to the top fields required a stretch along the open road and therefore a licence to do so.

Satisfied that she had enough for tonight’s fire, she was carrying the wood inside to the living room when the phone rang.

It was Harriet Chambers, phoning to ask if there was any news and to say that in her hurry yesterday she had left a bag in the dairy shed recess. She told Harriet the situation and said she’d keep her posted. She offered to drive the bag over later, but Harriet said it wasn’t urgent; she’d come by on Monday morning to pick it up.

She tramped back outside feeling deflated, trying to block out a pessimistic thought that this had been merely a precursor to a far worse instance of getting her hopes up only to be let down. However, the phone rang again before she had got halfway back to the dairy shed, and this time it was Mum.

‘It wasn’t a heart attack,’ she said, able to name that fear for both of them now it could be discounted.

‘But how is he?’

‘He’s asleep just now. The tube’s out. He’s on the mend. Well, the staff say it’ll take a while, but…’

‘What was wrong?’

‘Exhaustion, the doctor said. He’s got a viral infection which brought matters to a head, but it’s mainly just, you know…’

‘Overwork,’ she said, her relief that it wasn’t a coronary already fading. An infection had precipitated his breakdown, but there were no antibiotics for his true ailment.

‘The doctor says he needs rest. Weeks, he’s talking about.’

‘He’ll need to write a prescription for battleship chains.’

Mum gave a quiet little laugh, but they both knew it was no joke. He needed to rest, but he couldn’t and he wouldn’t.

‘Oh, God: there’s something else. I forgot, with all that’s going on; just remembered when I was talking to the doctor.’

‘It’s okay, Mum. I know. First Saturday of the month. That’s why I volunteered to stay behind.’

‘Why didn’t you say something?’

‘Because I knew you would wait around here when you needed to be up there by his side.’

‘Your father never wanted either of you to have anything to do with—’

‘I know. But we’re big girls, Mum.’

She heard a crackle on the line as her mum sighed in resignation.

‘The envelope is—’

‘In the drawer in the kitchen, the one next to the cutlery. I know. Lisa and I both know.’

‘You girls know so many things you shouldn’t have to.’

There was an insistent beep on the line.

‘My money’s running out. I’m about to get cut off. When he turns up, don’t let him in the house. Just hand over the envelope.’

‘Don’t worry, Mum.’

‘Lisa will be coming home after and you can come u—’

The line went dead, a click and a moment’s silence followed by the dialling tone.

She went back out to the dairy shed to resume her cleaning-out, feeling like she just wanted to lie down somewhere. She decided she’d best retrieve Harriet’s bag while she remembered. The lack of sleep and the efforts she had already exerted that morning were starting to sap her muscles, the thought of the second milking around teatime enough to make her want to cry. There was just so much to do. Even if by some Herculean effort they could hold things together while Dad recuperated for a few weeks, they’d just return to the start of the cycle, and what then?

You’ll work yourself into an early grave
. Mum used to say that to Dad all the time, back when it was just an expression. She hadn’t said it for months, though. Too close to the bone.

The bag was on a shelf in the recess, as Harriet had said. It was sitting open, a pair of rubber gloves beside it. The vet hadn’t even begun her first examination when she saw Dad collapse outside.