The Life (15 page)

Peter kept his eyes closed, but he was smiling as he remembered her anger. He had understood a lot sooner than she realised that his colour was the main bone of contention with the women around them. She had been abandoned by her
family because of him, and he loved her for keeping him and loving him like she had.

Peter turned his attention back to the Mass, aware that they were being watched; everyone around them was more interested in
them
than the actual baptism. His appearance had guaranteed a lot of the guests turning up – not for Daniel, but because they wanted to keep in with Peter.

His mum had been right, as bad as Daniel was, this was about more than the two of them. It was about Lena, and the lads, little Tania, and his own Imelda too. It was a real family affair and Ria was over the moon; she loved little Tania dearly.

Peter looked at his own daughter, and her swollen belly. He would be back in this church soon, welcoming his first grandchild into the Catholic faith. He hoped his Imelda calmed herself down sooner rather than later; he could already feel Delroy’s irritation towards her and, in all honesty, he could understand the man’s feelings. Delroy had more than proved his loyalty and Peter had slowly changed his tune about his son-in-law. Now he saw him as a man he could trust. In fact, he saw a lot of himself in Delroy. And Imelda was far too insecure for a man like him. His Ria, who he worshipped, had always had the sense to turn a blind eye when necessary, she knew he would always come home to her. But his Imelda was so aggressive and so insistent about working in the business, all to keep an eye on her husband.

Peter sighed. The Mass was ending at last. He just wanted it all over now.

As the family filed out of the church after the ceremony, Daniel caught up with his brother. ‘I appreciate you coming, Peter, I know you didn’t want to.’ He was smiling as he said it.

Peter didn’t answer him, letting the anger at his brother’s stupidity wash over him. Daniel clearly believed that his attendance today meant they were once again back on track. He still thought that he could do whatever he wanted and that, if he acted contrite, Peter would welcome him back with open arms.

Peter Bailey stared into his brother’s face, and he saw the handsome man he had loved, the blue eyes so like their mother’s, the genuine affection for Peter in them, and the total lack of comprehension at the situation they were in.

‘I came for Mum, Lena and Ria.
You
don’t ever make any kind of contact with me again, Daniel. You baptised
your
baby today all the time knowing you fucking murdered a child. I know, Daniel, that you planned that. You knew you were going to kill that little boy, you knew he was the apple of his father’s eye, you
wanted
Alfie to know his boy would die with him. That’s you all over, Daniel. You’re a vicious, wicked cunt. Now, leave me
alone
. I can’t look at you without seeing that little child, bloodied and dying and innocent. You get off the coke, and you sort your fucking self out, but you don’t come near me, you hear?’

Theresa was drunk as a lord, and she knew that it was the only way she could get through this day. Peter and Daniel, her boys, her
babies
, were now further apart than ever.

She could see her Daniel’s distress. She hated what Daniel had done, but in her drunken haze she couldn’t help blaming Peter.
He
should have monitored his brother,
he
should have looked after him. How could he not have known that Daniel was a few sandwiches short of the proverbial picnic?

She sipped her whisky, watching as Ria and Lena fussed over little Tania, and her grandsons laughed and joked with each other. At least
they
were still getting along. But what would the fallout from all this be? What would be the future of the Baileys? She sighed, wondering how the feck her sons had come to this, standing as far away from each other as possible, yet more aware of each other than either of them would ever care to admit.

Lena was lying in bed with her daughter, but she was unable to sleep. She didn’t know where Daniel was. Today had just proven how drastically wrong the situation between him and his brother was. They’d all tried to act like nothing was amiss, but the tension had been impossible to ignore.

She hugged Tania, felt the warmth of her child’s fragile body and knew that, no matter what happened in the future, she had to protect her little girl. She had to make sure she never knew the truth of her family’s lives. Lena was her daughter’s only real cushion against the Life, and she was more determined than ever that Tania would never have to be a part of it in any way. She was an innocent, and Lena would move heaven and earth if necessary to make sure she stayed that way. As her mother, it was all she could do. After all, if she didn’t protect Tania from the Life, who would?

You lost the plot again, where you are now ain’t clear,

It’s a misty morning memory, the road that took you here

Alabama 3, ‘You Don’t Dance To Techno Anymore’
Album:
Exile on Coldharbour Lane
, 1997

Shoot me up

Every damn day with a hypo full of love

Alabama 3, ‘Hypo Full Of Love’
Album:
Exile on Coldharbour Lane
, 1997

We can’t wait, can’t hesitate, they’re picking the padlocks at the gate

Smell the violence, blind suckers on the side of silence

Are smiling, giving the eye

Alabama 3, ‘The Night We Nearly Got Busted’
Album:
Exile on Coldharbour Lane
, 1997

1987

Father Brendan Murphy watched warily as Lena Bailey crept into the church with her husband. She had the grace to be ashamed even though she was too loyal to admit to anything that might show her husband in a bad light. She deliberately overlooked all the talk about him. In a way, he admired her for it; she took the Catholic sacrament of marriage seriously, and he had to give her credit for that. But knowing what he did about this man meant he loathed being in his company. He knew he had no choice about this meeting, but that didn’t mean he was looking forward to it. He was, Christ forgive him his sin, dreading it.

Daniel Bailey was a hard man – that was common knowledge – but it cut no ice with him. Father Murphy had been a boxer in his day, and seen his fair share of hard men. He had grown up in Dublin, the son of a bare-knuckle fighter, a drunkard and one of the hardest men he had ever come across. Michael Murphy had been a legend in his own lifetime; if only he had had the brain capacity to use the money he had earned sensibly, he could have been a man of means. Instead, he had squandered his hard-earned cash in the nearest pubs, buying drinks for the hangers-on, slipping money to anyone with a hard-luck story.

His mother, God love her and keep her – Father Murphy blessed himself then, as he always did when he thought of
her – had been drawn to an early grave trying to raise eight children. Along with feeding them and cleaning for them on a pittance, she had worked tirelessly to make sure that they were good Catholics and decent men and women. He had entered the priesthood, having known from an early age that it would eventually become his calling, but he had returned home and looked after his mother and sisters after his father’s untimely death. The drink had taken him quickly in the end, and it had been a relief to them all.

His older brothers had gone to America, never to be heard of again, his younger brother was doing life for murder, and his sisters were all married with families – and problems – of their own. Good women, but laden down by the men they had settled for, and wondering why they had not listened to their mother instead of taking the first men who had shown any interest in them.

He knew the cut of Daniel Bailey all right and, even though the man worshipped in his church, knelt for Communion at his feet, and made his Confession regularly, he knew he was a fraud, a liar and, worst of all, a hypocrite. Daniel Bailey was the worst kind of liar because his lies were rooted in fact, and he used that to keep a decent woman beside him, even though, these days, so the rumours went, his own children were not so easily fooled.

Father Murphy was a man of many sides. He had learned years ago that there were plenty of sinners inside the church itself, from the vicious gossips, who stood cleaning the altar while destroying someone’s reputation, to the drunks, the gamblers and the wife-beaters, who confessed their sins, and who he knew would be back within the month, confessing the same sins again. He knew the women who were having affairs, knew the young ones who were promiscuous, or were taking
drugs. He tried his best to be a good priest, a good man, not to be too judgemental.

But Daniel Bailey made his skin literally crawl. He had joined the parish six years ago, replacing Father Mahoney, who had been moved elsewhere – he never knew exactly why. Not long after, Daniel Bailey had come to him, and confessed to the murders of a man and his child, and Father Murphy had never been able to forgive him. He had done his job, had given him a good act of contrition; after all, as he was forever reminding himself, he was only the go-between, the emissary of God on this earth. It was not his job to judge anyone, but he couldn’t help how he felt.

Daniel, he knew, only went to Confession to appease his wife, not because he ever felt any kind of remorse for his actions, and Brendan Murphy the man, not the priest, had known that from the off. Daniel Bailey looked at him with what bordered on defiance at times, knowing that they shared a terrible secret – a secret that he could never reveal. It felt as if Daniel believed he had something over Father Murphy; he acted as if they were in league somehow, as if his confession had given Bailey the upper hand in their relationship and, in many ways, it had done just that. Because Daniel Bailey had known instinctively that his confession had not only shocked Father Murphy, but had also disgusted him to his very core.

As a priest, he was not supposed to let anything he heard in the confessional colour his relationship with his flock and, until Daniel Bailey’s bombshell, he had never felt this kind of repugnance for a parishioner in his life. His own brother had once confessed his sin of murder to him, and he had been genuinely sorry for his actions, had understood the enormity of what he had done. He had taken a man’s life in a bar fight – drunk and belligerent, he had beaten a man to death, hit him so hard the
man had never even regained consciousness. A terrible tragedy for all concerned, and he was serving a life sentence for it.

But this man came to him regularly, and confessed to all sorts of violent behaviour, sharing his hatred in the privacy of the confessional, and Brendan Murphy knew that he
enjoyed
telling him. This was East London, and he had heard his fair share of villains’ Confessions over the years. He wasn’t a man who dwelt on people’s situations, he was only there to hear them confess, and assure them that, as long as they were truly sorry, they would be forgiven. Bailey, though, saw it as some kind of game, as a way to demean him, and everything that he believed in, and thereby assert his own authority over him. Daniel Bailey was a bully of the worst kind, because he enjoyed it.

Lena was a regular at early morning Mass; she made sure the boys attended at least once a week, and she met up with Ria Bailey, Peter’s wife, along with Peter himself, and their own children.

Now Peter Bailey, Father Murphy had a lot of time for, which was strange inasmuch as he knew he was just as big a villain as his brother. Peter Bailey was not a man to cross unless you were on a death wish of some sort, but, for all that, he was a different entity entirely from his brother. Whatever Peter Bailey might be, he wasn’t a hypocrite.

Father Murphy knelt before the cross of Christ for fifteen minutes, knowing that Daniel would not dare to interrupt him at prayer, and enjoying the fact that keeping him waiting was making him angry.

Standing slowly, he blessed himself once more and, forcing a smile on his face he turned to Lena and said as brightly as he could, ‘Sure, Lena, I forgot you were coming.’

Daniel Bailey watched as his wife practically bowed in reverence to the priest, and he had to fight the urge to punch
him as hard as he could in the face. He knew this man drank with Peter, visited his brother’s house regularly, and worked with him closely for charities. Peter had given the money needed for a boxing club and for a trip to Lourdes for the poorer parishioners, had seen to it that the people who couldn’t afford it had been able to go and pray to God to ease their suffering. All bollocks, as far as Daniel was concerned. His brother did it for personal gain, no other reason. Saint fucking Peter, his mother’s golden boy, and all round fucking good guy. When
he
gave money for the various causes – and he gave serious money – no one said a fucking word about it! Except Tania’s school that is – the nuns there knew which side their bread was buttered on. Tania had been Mary in the Nativity play, he had made sure of that.

But this ponce here looked down on him. At least Daniel’s presence unsettled him, that was something. Unlike Lena, he wasn’t enamoured of the Church – he saw it as another fucking business, a scam. But his mother and his wife saw it as a way of life, and he understood that he had to swallow because of that. He knew how to play the game, and at least this man afforded him some pleasure in as much as he got the satisfaction of taunting him with his presence.

He held his hand out and, smiling, he said pleasantly, ‘Good day to you, Father, we are so looking forward to our little Tania’s Communion.’

Father Murphy shook the man’s hand, and prayed that this meeting would be over quickly.

Lena beamed with happiness; she loved to see her husband in the church, it helped calm the fears she had for his eternal soul. Father Murphy understood her feelings, she was convinced of that. She knew that he was a man who saw a lot more than he let on, and was willing to go the extra mile for the people in his
care. He was a man not only of good values, but also of discretion. He heard her Daniel’s Confession regularly, and knowing that helped her sleep at night.