About Matilda (11 page)

Saturday morning there's a gang of us playing down by the pond when Pippa comes running through the gap in the hedge. I'm nine, Pippa's ten. Her cheeks are glowing and I know she's excited because Pippa never runs anywhere. She stops where the ground is muddy in case she dirties her shoes and tiptoes along by the bushes where the ground is dry and cracked making sure she doesn't snag her cardigan on a briar.

Matilda, we're allowed out.

Allowed out? I nearly fall out of my tree. Has our mother been found? Am I going home? No. It wouldn't happen like this. Covered in mud in the Holy Shepherd and Pippa running down to tell me. I wouldn't need to be told. I'd feel it. I'd know. Before I land plop in the muck so close to Pippa I can smell the carbolic on her.

Out where, Pippa?

Outside! Gabriel said so.

To you?

Sheamie told me. And we're getting pocket money too. We can go to Kennedy's shop at the corner on Fridays and we can go to town if a big girl comes with us. I swear it's true, Matilda. She makes the sign of the cross on her throat to prove it, though that doesn't mean anything with Pippa. She wants me to go to the gate with her to see if it really is true.

I search the playground for Sheamie but can't find him. Mona is sitting in the green sheds with the older girls. Her arms are folded under her chest and I know they're talking about boys and don't want to be disturbed about gates. The
big girls don't need gates. They just sneak out the bathroom window when the nuns are asleep.

Danny is playing on the fire escape with a bunch of little girls fighting each other over who's playing with him next. The fire escape is mostly white with rust coming through. It runs up the three storeys and there's a pole on the outside running from the top to the ground holding the whole thing together. The little girls tell us Sheamie got in a fight with Mickey Driscoll and Mickey Driscoll gave Sheamie a bloody nose because Sheamie said Pele was a better soccer player than Bobby Charlton. Danny is seven and the youngest boy in the convent so the little girls love him, and even some of the bigger girls love him because he's cute. The nuns love him because he's the best little altar boy and what a pleasure it is to have such a quiet little lad amongst us. If only the rest of you were as quiet as Danny. The nuns love all the boys. The boys can let their hair grow so they'll look like boys on the outside and won't get picked on in school or mistaken for skinheads and wouldn't that be even worse. I think it's a strange world where boys have longer hair than girls even if it's not as bad as it used to be and you can nearly let your hair past your shoulder before the razor comes out.

Danny knows we're his sisters now but it doesn't really mean anything to him and sometimes it doesn't mean anything to me either and that makes me sad. He's just another kid in the convent. He hardly remembers living in our grandmother's house. I tell him I'm going up to the gate and ask him if he wants to come. He sees Doyler coming down the yard with the broom in her hand and he says, Hang on, Matilda. Give us a minute.

Doyler makes a run at him with the broom.

Get down from that fire escape. You were told enough not to be on it.

Instead of getting off, Danny climbs to the first lift and waits for Doyler who's chasing after him but before she can catch him he takes off to the second lift and waits for her again. Danny keeps it up all the way to the top with Doyler getting slower with every step. By the time she gets to the top she's bent over and using the broom to hold herself up. I don't know why she bothers. Maybe she thinks some day she'll catch him. We can barely see them from the ground but Doyler's heading for him with the broom raised ready to clobber him over the head, when he climbs out over the railing and slides down the pole leaving Doyler stuck four storeys up.

Come on, Matilda. Let's go.

Lucy Flynn comes to the gate with us but Pippa won't come past the fire escape. It's early in the morning and the bright September sun slants along the stone wall. Lucy, Danny and me lean against the wall with our faces in the sunlight and our feet in the shade. We wonder. It can't be that simple just to open the gate and walk outside. Can it?

Danny says, What if a penguin that doesn't know Gabriel said we're let out sees us? We'd get killed for nothin'.

Lucy says, So what? We gets killed for nothin' anyway. Come on, Matilda. I'll chance it if you will.

I don't know what to do. I can't ask Gabriel 'cos she'll give me a thick ear for asking pure stupid questions when she already gave everyone the answer. What if someone does see us though? They'd call the gardaíi. We'll be handcuffed and carted off in the squad car.

I peek through the rusty shutter in the gate. The road is empty. The footpath is empty. The coast is clear. The squeak when I open the wicket gate sends Lucy running away but Danny stays with me. One scruffy white sandal steps out onto the footpath. The other one has more sense. Danny is behind me whispering, Hurry up, Matilda, before a penguin comes.

The other scruffy white sandal is lifting its heel, then a car comes roaring down the street and I'm stuck, half-in, half-free. Danny is shittin' himself behind me and the driver, a man, is in front. Behind the fire escape I hear Pippa screaming at me to get back. But the car keeps going. Danny says, It must be true, Matilda. It must have been on television. We're free.

The other white sandal is so delighted it follows the first one out. Now there's a pair of scruffy white sandals on the footpath. They go in and out and in and out again tap tap on the footpath like a blind man's white stick. They don't go too far in case the penguins change their mind because the further away from the gate you are the more trouble. But all day Saturday the scruffy white sandals go in and out, and in a week they're across to the houses in Trinity Park where the kids who live there stare at us and sometimes we stare back. The next week I'm at the top of Barrack Street and by the third week I'm pissed off. There's no point going in and out the gate anymore just because I can. I need somewhere to go. I want to do something but I don't know what's out here or even if I'll be let. I never heard of anyone from the convent doing something on the outside. I'll have to ask Gabriel when we get our pocket money Friday.

Gabriel's office makes me knickers stick to me arse. It's small so there's no place to run. There's a narrow wooden table tight against the wall. On the table there's a rusty biscuit tin, without biscuits, and a glass sweet jar, without sweets. Gabriel sits at the table and studies her list of how much pocket money we get. She hands me five pence from the rusty biscuit tin and my other five pence rattles into the sweet jar. Why couldn't she use a wooden box? It had to be glass so I can see my silver five pence lying on its own at the bottom of the jar. Broken plates, cups, dishes. Curses, fights, back cheek.
Not making your bed properly. Sins, mortal, venial, deadly and a host of others all come out of my pocket money. I never know what I'm getting. Sometimes I wind up owing money and that's worse than no pocket money at all.

What's the five pence for, Mother?

She looks at me over her glasses like I've just asked the most stupid question she's ever heard and I better not ask again if I know what's good.

The missions. Offer up your misfortune, Matilda. Think of the starving babies in Africa with their bellies stuck out like black balloons and nothing in their mouths but flies and a set of teeth that's pure useless and don't be sitting there with a mouth like a salmon. You wouldn't have it long in Africa.

She knows that's not what I meant. She knows I was asking why she stopped five pence. I'm sorry for the starving black babies and everything but not sorry enough to give them me pocket money.

What did I do wrong, Mother?

You broke two dishes washing up. You were fighting at breakfast.

I didn't start it, Mother. It was Mickey Driscoll's fault. He hit Sheamie.

I don't care who started it and Sheamie can fight his own battles.

Sheamie couldn't fight his way out of a paper bag.

Fighting with boys. I never heard the like. Now shift yourself or you'll feel the back of my hand. Learn to turn the other cheek.

But everyone'll laugh at me.

She darts a glance over the glasses again but there's a smile in her eyes and I wonder if this is a good time to ask about doing something on the outside, joining something. Maybe not, but you never know when is a good time, so I ask. Gabriel
takes off her glasses and fiddles with them on the table while the sweat dries on my palms.

Something on the outside, Matilda. Like what for example? she says as if she never heard of anything outside the convent herself and she's curious to find out.

I don't know, Mother.

We'll see, Matilda.

I know by the way she says it she was hoping I'd have more to say than, I don't know, and I hate it when Gabriel says, We'll see. If I ask again I'll get a clatter on the head. I'll have to wait until she's forgotten I asked and is in a good mood before I ask again, only I never know when that is either. I'm back where I started.

Next Friday Gabriel says I get no pocket money at all for fighting again. She raps her knuckles off my forehead and nearly knocks my head off.

What in the name of Our Saviour is it with you, Matilda? Just look at yourself.

A big girl hit Pippa so I hit the big girl. She gave me a black eye but I don't care. Black eyes are great. Nobody messes with you when you have a black eye. You look dangerous. Then some sneaky girl told Gabriel I was hiding my pointy green boots inside the gate and wearing the new white sandals to school. Gabriel drags me up by the ear lobe and holds the green boots in front of my eyes.

There's the name of ten other girls written on these boots, Matilda. Not a single complaint before you got your feet in them. Explain yourself.

It's a waste of time talking to her. How do you tell someone who lives in black what pointy green boots look like with yellow socks?

The rest of my pocket money is stopped for running from
Doyler when she came at me with the razor. Pippa and me were taking the lice out of each other's hair. We caught and squashed so many lice our fingernails were red with our own blood. Gabriel said our hair was to come off but we complained that girls in school don't get their head shaved when they have lice so why should we? Doyler cut it anyway. I ask Gabriel again about joining something. After what happened to my hair I don't care, she can hit me if she wants. She doesn't. She says she'll have to see Father Devlin about things like that. He's a great man and if anyone knows such things it's Father Devlin. If he says it's safe, then we'll see.

There she goes again.

Saturday morning from my bedroom window I see Father Devlin's black station wagon park in the playground. He walks along the corridor clapping his hands and rubbing the small kids' heads. Where's Matilda? he asks because he hasn't seen me running down the stairs as he was walking past.

I'm here, Father Devlin.

By God, Matilda, look at the height you're getting. I'll have to put a book on your head.

I wonder what he'd want to put a book on anyone's head for but I don't ask because it might be a stupid question and I don't want everyone to laugh.

Will we have a little chat, Matilda?

All right, Father Devlin.

Father Devlin rubs his hands together and looks around the corridor checking for nuns because he likes to bring us to the landing on top of the stairs so he can tickle us when there're no nuns about. He sits on the floor and slaps his lap telling us to sit and I sit, even though at nine I think I'm too old for sitting on Father Devlin's lap, but priests are like nuns and you have to do what they say. And if I don't then he mightn't let me join something on the outside.

I feel his white collar biting into my neck, the roughness of his black pants on the backs of my legs. I say, Stop, because he tickles too rough. I say, Stop, like I mean it. But you always say that and you never know if you mean it or not. He grunts in my ear and says I'm a pretty girl. Stop, Father. I can smell his sweat. I can see it. It's like white rosary beads on his forehead. You're hurting me Father, let me down. His black shoes wobble on the stairs and I know he's getting tired. He stands up and wipes the sweat from his forehead with his sleeve.

Up be God, he says. You have me worn out. Wasn't that great fun altogether? Will we go downstairs to Sister Gabriel?

Yes, Father Devlin.

Father Devlin slips into the bathroom and tells me go on down. I'll be right behind you, Matilda.

Gabriel always makes tea and bakes scones for Father Devlin when he visits. She gets out her best yellow tablecloth and lays it with her best china cups. She pours Father Devlin his tea and spreads butter on his warm scones while she leaves me standing here with my tongue scraping the floor.

Do you like those scones, Father Devlin?

They are only delicious, Sister Gabriel.

He wipes the crumbs from his chin and that takes some wiping when you have a chin like Father Devlin's. He's the only person I know who has a chin wider than their forehead.

Tell me, Father, says Gabriel, have you news of that matter we discussed?

I've started an athletic club with a Mister Douglas. We'll be training Monday night at seven o'clock. How does that sound, Matilda?

Great, Father Devlin. Thanks.

Gabriel says, Now, Matilda, what do you say to Father Devlin? Isn't he wonderful?

I said, Thanks, Mother.

Well, we don't say thanks, we say, thank you. Don't we, Matilda? So I say, Thank you, Father Devlin.

Gabriel says, That's better now, and Father Devlin says, No, no, she's fine, she's fine.

I wonder why I have to say thank you to Father Devlin when in mass we say give thanks to the Lord Our God and if thanks is good enough for the Lord Our God it should be good enough for Father Devlin. Father Devlin says, Don't forget, Matilda. Monday night at the Grotto. Do you know where Our Lady's Grotto is?