A Swift Pure Cry (16 page)

Then Shell thought of Mrs Duggan, Mam's best friend: she was the obvious person to tell. But she was in the regional hospital. She'd gone there before her own baby came and hadn't come back yet. They'd said there'd been a complication, but nobody knew what.

Her only other friend was Bridie Quinn. Shell couldn't see what use she'd be, even if she wasn't up in Kilbran, as her family made out, or in America, as Theresa Sheehy claimed.

There was nobody.

Then she thought of Father Rose.

She remembered him making a bridge for her with his arm.
God Bless, Shell. Are you happy, Shell? Trust me, Shell. As I came up the hill, Shell, I saw you
. His words swirled around her head, his eyes looked at her across the shafts of church light. In haste, before she could change her mind, she grabbed Dad's big mac and dashed out. In the driving rain, she clambered up the back field and down to the village. Her head bent into the wind, her hands went numb from cold. The rain blew hard, turning to sleet. The puddles rippled iron-grey.

The village was quiet, with no life or soul to it. It was Tuesday, the usual afternoon for church confessions. She'd not been to confession for ages, not since Lent, when Father Carroll had absolved her of the usual rigmarole of sins she'd concocted.
Arguing with my brother. Not doing what Dad says. Missing class
. She said the same three sins every time, and if he noticed, he never said. Today, Father Rose might be hearing confessions instead. If so, she could go into the box and tell him everything. It'd be dark, with the metal grid between them, making his face a silhouette. He'd be bound by the vow of silence. He'd listen to her. He'd tell her what to do.

She let herself into the church. She'd not been there in weeks.

It was deserted. The wind chased itself around the four walls. The statues stared blankly down the aisles.

She put her fingers in the font and blessed herself through force of habit. She bobbed her right knee down and walked softly to the confessional box. The sinner's door was ajar. Over the priest's door was the sign.
FATHER ROSE
. She stepped into the sinner's cubicle. With difficulty she knelt down.

'Father?' she said. There was no reply.

'Father Rose?'

Nothing. She was on her own. There was no shape on the other side of the grid. Perhaps they'd changed the times of the confessions in her months of absence. Perhaps he'd given up waiting for sinners and gone off for his tea.

She rested her head on the damp sleeves of her mac and spoke.

'Bless me, Father,' she stumbled. 'For I have sinned. I've stolen two bras from Meehans'. I've gone naked in Duggans' field with Declan Ronan. Now I'm up the pole and don't know what to do.'

Ah, Shell
, she seemed to hear in reply.
That's a litany of sins, all right. But nothing God won't forgive. If you say three Hail Marys and a Glory Be and try not to do those things again, you'll be right as rain and on the road to heaven.

She felt her shoulders shaking; she was half giggling, half crying.
Jimmy's right. Only stupid people would believe in it.
She got up from the kneeler and struggled out of the box.
The whole church is a show.
Laughter threatened to erupt from her throat. She swallowed to choke it back. She didn't genuflect before the altar, but rushed down the aisle towards the door, desperate to get out. The vague incense smell, the dark shadows and eerie silent statues rushed in around her like crowds of bats. Just as she reached the back of the church, she heard the vestry door open and a brisk tread at the other end. She froze.

'Hello there. Have you come for confession?'

It was Father Rose's voice, calling out in the dark, strange and flat in the empty space.

She paused by the side door. 'No, Father,' she said without turning.

'Is that Shell, by any chance?'

A warmth had crept into the words now, the familiar
I-know-just-what-you-feel
tone he'd always had for her. She looked over her shoulder, digging her hands deep into the mac. She saw him a long way down the aisle, standing, arms folded, in a dark cassock. She couldn't make his face out in the dimness of the unlit church.

'It's been a while.'

She gave a fragile smile. 'Yes, Father. 'S only me.'

'Did you come here to pray?' he suggested, taking a step towards her.

She bit her lip. 'Pray?' She faltered as if she didn't know the word.

'Or maybe just to shelter. From the rain?'

She nodded. 'The rain. That was it.'

'Churches, Shell,' he said. His right hand flipped through the air, as if drawing back an invisible curtain. She heard him sigh. His hand dropped back to his side. 'They at least have
that
use.' The sentence rolled down the aisle towards her, with the words twisting around each other, cutting faith to ribbons. Something had slipped from him, like a mooring rope or a firm banister, just as it had slipped from her. It was as if they'd both been stranded, left in the same dark and hopeless place. She reached for the door, blindly. She couldn't turn, or he'd see what she'd turned into; she could never have lived with the shame. She fumbled for the handle.

'They do, Father,' she cried. 'They do have that use.' She hardly knew what she said or meant, but before he could answer, she'd let herself back out into the relentless cold of the day. She half ran back through the village. Nobody was about. She breathed out in relief as she climbed up the blustery hill.

The rain eased. She bent over halfway up, exhausted suddenly. When she stood upright, a pain unfolded, heavy and half-remembered.
The curse, back again
. Lemon clouds parted. A feeble sun filtered through. Her ears were hot. She panted, enjoying the last of the drizzle on her forehead. The pain curled up in a ball in the small of her back and faded away. She continued up the hill.
There is nothing he could have done
, she thought.
I'm on my own.

The wind carried a loud whooping up to her ears. She turned back. Trix and Jimmy were running towards her, waving their arms like whirling windmills. They were out already from school. She'd no idea where the time had gone. She waited for them by the copse, shivering in her mac.
I'm on my own, apart from Trix and Jimmy,
she thought.
We three. We're in this together.

Thirty

Jimmy had the air of 'We Three Kings of Orient Are' picked out on the piano. He sat there, doodling on the keys most of the evening, while Trix and Shell made some angel wings out of an old cornflakes box.

The dull pain came and went. The rain started up again. Shell lit the second bar of the electric fire even though Dad had forbidden it. It was Tuesday; there was small chance of him appearing before Friday, so he wouldn't know. She laid his mac across the kitchen door to keep out the draught and pressed the curtains up against the windowsill with oddments from around the house. Her hands were ice-cold even so.

She warmed oxtail soup, two tins of it, for tea. She drank her bowl quickly, feeling it scald her gullet as it went down. She was shivering again.

The pain came again, stabbing and definite. She leaped to her feet with it. Her chair toppled to the floor.

Trix and Jimmy stared. 'What's wrong, Shell?' Jimmy said.

She didn't answer. Her eyes seized on the holy calendar above the piano, fastening on the drapes of the Virgin's robe, following the creases.

'What's wrong, Shell?' Trix said.

She grabbed the table. 'Nothing.' She picked up her chair and sat down again, grabbing her middle. 'Nothing's wrong.'

'Nothing?'

'Nothing. Just remembered something I forgot. That's all.'

She got up and walked around the room.

'What was it?' asked Trix.

'What was what?'

'The thing you forgot?'

'What thing I forgot?'

Jimmy tapped two fingers on his forehead. 'She's gone doolally,' he told Trix in a loud whisper.

'Hurry up with that soup,' Shell said. 'It's bed time.'

'No it isn't. It's only seven.'

'If I say bed time then it's--' She stopped and dropped to her haunches. 'Bed time.'

'What about my wings?' Trix said.

'You can finish them in the morning.' The pain subsided. 'Or maybe now, if you're fast.'

Trix and Jimmy drank down their soup. They clattered the bowls into the sink while Shell cleared the table. Trix got her wings out and opened her paint box up. She filled a mug with water and dipped in the brush. Jimmy went back to the piano. He'd 'Jingle Bells' going now as well.

Shell got out the broom and started sweeping.

'You swept the floor earlier,' Jimmy said, without turning round.

'It's all crumbs again, with the two of you,' she snapped. She launched the bristles around his feet, darting them between the piano-stool legs and pedals. 'I'll sweep you up if you're not quiet.' She moved over towards the sink.

The lights flickered, grew dim and came on strong again. The wind got up hard and shrill. Time passed.
Jingle, jingle
went the piano keys, needling away on the same old note.

Holy God, it's coming again
.

She dropped the broom. 'Keep playing, Jimmy.' She rushed into the bedroom and lay flat on her bed and panted. But the pain came on regardless. She drew her knees up to her chin and rocked.
Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way
. The oxtail stew flew up her throat but just on time she swallowed it back down. A hiss was in her ears and yellow streaks across her eyes.
Oh what fun it is to ride on a one-horse open sleigh-heh-jingle bells...

'Shell?' Jimmy and Trix were standing over the bed, looking down on her.

She blinked. The pain exploded inside her into smithereens scattering into her bloodstream, then softened. 'What?'

'You all right?' Jimmy said.

Trix's lips wobbled. 'You're acting funny, Shell.'

Shell sat up. 'I'm fine.' She got up. She fluffed up Trix's hair. 'Just wanted a quick lie-down.' She went back out to the kitchen. 'Finish up those wings, Trix. Here, give me a brush.'

They did a mix of orange, white and yellow. But the green of the cornflakes packet still showed through, so they did a blue splurge over that part. They painted the grey insides bright red. Shell made a hole with a skewer and threaded through two lengths of twine in hoops for fixing the wings up to the shoulders. Trix tried them on.

Jimmy looked up from the piano. He was back on 'We Three Kings'. 'They flop.'

'They don't,' Trix said. She fluttered round the kitchen waving her fingertips.

'They do. The tips point to the floor. If you were a real angel, you'd crash.'

'Would not.'

'Would.'

'Would not.'

'Would. Crash, bang, wallop.'

'
Whisht!
' Shell screamed. It was back, hard and vicious. Her hand shot out blindly, knocking the mug of water and paintbrushes over across the kitchen table. She grabbed the back of a chair. The coloured water oozed across the neat checks of the plastic tablecloth.

She got to the sink just in time. There was no holding the oxtail soup back now.

'Ick,' said Trix.

Shell ran the taps hard, and dropped in a squat.
Ooerooooo
, she moaned from deep in her throat.

Jimmy came over from the piano stool and watched. 'She sounds just like Mr Duggan's cow,' he mused.

The pain ran off her again, like water. But she was left cold and shaken.

'Trix,' she whispered. 'Clear up that mess of paint, won't you?'

She picked up the mac from across the bottom of the door and put it on.

'Where are you going?' Jimmy asked.

'Out. Need some air.'

''S pouring.'

'Don't care.'

She got out the door and marched around the house, five times and counting. All she could see was the light on the concrete path from the kitchen windows, back and front, and the gutters and drains, sloshing the rain away into the earth.

Another one came on the ninth go round. She vomited again, into the wind.
She
was the goat coughing by the gatepost now, not Dad. Eventually the pain went.

She went back in.

'Run a bath, Trix.'

''S not bath night, Shell.'

'Doesn't matter. I'm having a bath.'

Trix ran off to do it.

'Keep playing that piano, Jimmy.'

Jimmy shrugged. He played
Star of wonder, star of night
in the gruff notes at the bottom of the piano. In the bath, the water came right up to the rim of grime that wouldn't come off. It wasn't mad-hot, but warm enough. She stopped shivering once she'd got in. Her hands and feet tingled. Trix sat on the toilet seat, watching her, as she often liked to do.

'You're wicked funny tonight, Shell,' she pronounced.

'How funny?'