Turbulent Priests (Dan Starkey 3) (23 page)

‘You could commandeer the ferry.’

‘Yes. And drown.’

I grinned. ‘Yeah, I know how you feel. Will the police on shore not be worried about not hearing from you?’

He shook his head. ‘Not a bit of it. Sometimes they don’t hear from me for months. It doesn’t worry them. I run the whole show here, and they’re quite happy to let me do it. I mean, who else would, but someone born and bred here?’

We looked at each other in silence for a few moments. He seemed a decent kind of a spud, but a decent spud under pressure. He was having to deal with things way outside the
remit of a lowly island copper. He was being asked to be at once a moralist, philosopher and lawmaker, a fearsome trinity.

‘So there’s no way of getting in touch with the outside world?’ I asked.

He shook his head slowly.

‘Isn’t there a radio up by the bird observatory?’

It was out before I thought about it. There was a moment ary look of surprise in his eyes which quickly settled into a steady gaze. ‘And how would you be knowing that?’

I shrugged. ‘I heard.’

He reached into the open drawer. Instead of the gun he took out a small black dictaphone tape recorder and placed it before me. It looked remarkably like my tape recorder.

In fact, it
was
my tape recorder.

‘I recovered this at the murder scene.’

‘
Murder
scene?’

He was nodding slowly. ‘Is there anything you want to tell me?’ he said.

Sometimes you can hear your heart beat louder than The Clash at full volume. This was one of those times. I scrambled for words. ‘I forgot the satellite dish . . .’

‘
Fuck
the satellite dish.’

‘Okay.’ We looked at each other. I had a decision to make. He was a McCooey, albeit a wandering one. If he was any sort of a policeman he’d have listened to my interview with Moira, then checked with her when it was recorded. He
would know that it had happened on the day Bill had died. So I’d been up there and not volunteered the information. Suspicious or what? Yet he had not sought me out for questioning. I had come to him. So possibly he knew something about Bill’s death which absolved me. Or he could be lazy, or slow. Where was I going to run to anyway? Wrathlin was an open prison. So now he had me he could arrest me, then send me for trial up at the church, with Christine as judge and jury. Should I act dumb? Should I tell all?

He was there in front of me and he seemed more normal than most anyone else I’d met on the island. He
cursed
. He seemed mildly cynical. He was law and order, yet he was as trapped on this island as the rest of us.

I’m not good at making decisions. I mean sometimes I am. Murtagh drummed his fingers on the table and said, ‘If it helps, I know you were being chased.’

‘What?’

‘Tell me what happened up at the bird observatory.’

‘I . . .’

‘The truth. I know most of it already.’

‘But who . . .?’

‘Dan, tell me what happened or I’ll throw you in a cell.’ He thumbed upstairs. ‘With
her
.’

I told him.

He nodded. We sat in silence for several moments. ‘Do you want to tell me what’s going on?’ I asked eventually.

He shook his head. ‘Too much,’ he said.

‘But . . .’

‘But nothing. Take your tape recorder. It would be good if you could say a few words on Mary Reilly’s behalf.’

‘But aren’t you going to . . .?’

‘No.’

‘You believe what I . . .’

‘I do. Now leave it. Don’t ask me anything else. When the opportunity arises, get off the island. That’s my advice, Mr Starkey. Take your wife and child and get off the island.’

‘Do you know who . . .?’

‘Leave it.’ He stood abruptly and unhooked a set of keys from a hook on the wall. ‘Now, you run up and see her now if you want. She’s handcuffed to the bed, so she won’t harm you if you don’t get too close.’

‘Permanently handcuffed?’

Murtagh nodded. ‘I know it’s hardly straight from the International Convention on Human Rights, but I only have the one cell and the lock on it wouldn’t fox a reasonably bright four-year-old. And before you ask, she doesn’t get a chance to stretch her legs because there are people out there who want to stretch her neck.’

‘How does she . . .?’

‘Piss? In the pot. It’s not very pleasant for either of us. But that’s the way it is.’

‘What about her mental state?’

‘She’s like Greenland. Big and empty. She’s been quite upset. She didn’t want to make a statement. She was quite brassy when I first saw her at Dr Finlay’s, but then someone threw a brick at her as we were leaving and I think that surprised
her. God knows why. It didn’t hit her. Nearly broke my fucking foot. Ooops. There I go again.’

He led me up the stairs and unlocked the cell door. As he pushed the door open he whispered, ‘Word seems to have filtered out, so try not to mention crucifixion. It sets her off.’

28

I had already observed two sides of Mary Reilly. The first, perched rosy-cheeked on her bike, placid, happily reading the Bible; the second, minutes later, cheeks aflame, bearing down upon an innocent child, seemingly intent on murder. Now there was a third: doe-eyed, colour-drained, straggle-haired, scared.

She looked fearfully up from the bed as the door opened, then shrank back against the headboard as I entered. Murtagh locked the door behind me. I leant back against it. The heavily barred window gave a view of the harbour. The grey box room contained just the bed, a chamber pot, and a copy of the Bible, which lay open on the quilt. Mary’s right hand was handcuffed to the metal bedframe. The skin was red-raw at the wrist.

‘That must be sore,’ I said.

She looked down at the handcuffs, then gave a little nod. She began to massage the skin.

‘Do you remember me?’

She looked up, nodded quickly again. There were no obvious physical signs of damage from the collision.

‘Your mother asked me to come and see you.’

When she spoke her voice was as timid and high as a little girl’s. ‘Mum?’

‘She asked me to see how you were.’ I pushed myself off the door and stepped slowly towards the bed. As I sat on the end of it she cowered back even further. ‘It’s okay, Mary. I’m here to help you. Is there anything your mum can get you?’

‘Why isn’t she here herself?’

‘She’s not allowed, Mary. The Council won’t allow her.’

‘But why?’

I shrugged. ‘I don’t really know. I think they think you’re bad.’

‘I am bad.’

‘You know that?’

She nodded sadly. ‘Of course. I tried to hurt a wee girl. Of course I’m bad. What else could I be?’

‘Why did you do it, Mary?’

‘I was told to.’

‘Who told you?’

‘The man.’

‘What man?’

‘The man.’

‘What man, Mary? What’s his name?’

‘He has no name.’

‘What does he look like?’

‘I don’t know. Just a man.’

‘Where did you meet him?’

‘Somewhere.’

‘Somewhere on the island?’

She shrugged. ‘I don’t remember.’

There was a dreamy quality to her answers, but the vagueness didn’t strike me as deliberate. There was genuine confusion in her eyes.

‘Mary,’ I said as gently as I could, ‘in a couple of hours you’re going to be asked a lot of questions up at the church, about what happened. It’s important that you tell me anything you can, so that I can speak up for you. Do you understand?’

She nodded slowly. ‘They don’t like me, do they?’

‘Mary, it’s not that . . .’

‘They’re going to hurt me, aren’t they?’

‘If you tell me what . . .’

‘He said they were going to hurt me.’

‘Who did?’

‘The Father.’

‘Father Flynn?’

She shook her head. ‘The other one. He said they were going to punish me for what I’d done.’ Suddenly she began to take great whooping breaths and tears began to course down her face. I patted her shoulder. ‘They’re going to hurt me!’ she cried.

‘They won’t . . .’

‘I want my mum!’

‘Mary, dear, I can’t . . .’

She fell forward and buried her face in my chest. For a moment I held my hands up and away from her as she heaved against me. I’m not a touchy-feely person at the best of times and the thought of embracing an eighteen-stone nuthouse would not normally have appealed to me, but there was something touchingly helpless about her outburst. I let my arms fall. I hugged her. ‘It’s okay,’ I said.

‘I’m scared,’ she cried.

‘I know.’

‘He said I was the Devil’s work and I’d have a Devil’s punishment.’

‘He’s just trying to scare you.’

‘He’s said he’d . . .’

‘Mary . . . Mary . . . will you tell them that you’re sorry?’

She nodded.

‘Will you tell them that you believe in Christine? That you realise that you were wrong and that all you want to do now is pray and ask for forgiveness?’

‘I will.’

‘Do you promise me?’

‘I do.’

‘Good. Then I’ll have a word with them all, and we’ll see if we can’t get it all sorted out. Is that okay?’

She nodded again against my chest. ‘I don’t want to go there,’ she whispered.

‘I know you don’t.’

‘Can you not go there for me?’

‘I’ll be there with you.’

‘Will my mum be there?’

‘She will.’

‘Will she hold my hand?’

‘If you’re good, and you tell the truth, she’ll hold your hand when you’re finished. Is that okay?’

I unclasped my arms then and she sat back. She pulled her free hand across her face. ‘I’m sorry for crying,’ she said. She let out a little chuckle. ‘I’m so silly sometimes.’

‘It’s natural.’

‘I will tell the truth. I’ll be good.’ She shook her head sadly. ‘I don’t know what came over me. I’m just scared.’ She rubbed at one eye with a knuckle. ‘I don’t really remember any of it.’ Her voice was lower now, more adult as the words began to spill out. ‘How I got to the church, how I came to be riding down that hill so fast . . . I remember you jumping out in front of me . . . and then waking up in Dr Finlay’s . . . and all those horrible people shouting at me and throwing things and screaming and throwing and screaming . . .’ Tears began to drip down her face again. ‘They were like . . . like wild animals . . . I could see their teeth . . . all bared and sharp . . . I don’t know what would have happened if Constable Murtagh hadn’t been there . . . all those people, people I’ve known for years . . . I’ve told their fortunes . . . and made them lunch . . . and gone to their homes and then suddenly they’re all screaming at
me as if I was the Devil himself . . .’ She pulled suddenly at her lip; her eyes were wide, begging. ‘I’m not the Devil, am I? I’m not some . . .’

‘Mary, I’ve never seen anyone less like the Devil.’

‘Not even when I was coming down that hill . . .’

‘Not even.’

‘You will help me, then?’ I nodded. ‘And you’ll tell Mummy I’m all right, and that I don’t need anything. But you’ll get her to come all the same, to look after me when it’s all over?’

‘I will.’

‘Thank you. I’m sorry I’m so much trouble.’

‘It’ll be okay, Mary.’

When we were going back down the stairs, Murtagh said: ‘She’s a Space Cadet, isn’t she?’

‘Bonkers,’ I agreed.

29

The sun was just pushing its face through the fast-dissipating mist as I emerged from the station and walked back along the sea front. The vigilantes nodded wearily as I passed. ‘All sorted,’ I said.

At the junction I turned up the hill towards the church. Halfway up I stopped at Dr Finlay’s surgery to ask him if he would speak on Mary’s behalf, tell them she had a split personality or bad mood swings or was largely harmless apart from isolated murder attempts, but he wasn’t in. Mrs McTeague squinted up at me. ‘I’ve no idea where he is,’ she said, true to form.

It was a little before 9 a.m. when I reached the churchyard. Although the trial was still an hour away people were already milling about the yard, hush-talking in little weedy clumps. Half a dozen of them had gathered about the doorway and
were staring intently at something. Curious as ever, I wandered over. One of them looked up sharply as I approached. He murmured something and the rest turned towards me. Two I recognised as members of the Council: Carl Christie the Credit Union man and the ex-publican Jack McGettigan. I nodded.

‘Morning, Dan,’ said Christie. He angled his head back towards the door. ‘Did ye see this?’

He stepped back. A mess of blue-paint graffiti adorned the hall door:
FREE MARRY RILY
.

I resisted the temptation to smile. ‘Jesus,’ I said, almost as thoughtlessly, then added quickly, ‘would not be amused.’

They nodded in agreement, and then, almost as if it was choreographed, they shook their heads in disgust.

‘Jackie Lavery came to open up this morning, found it,’ one of the men I didn’t know said. Slim fella, ginger eyebrows beneath a tweed cap. A face as well. Hungry-looking. ‘It was still wet.’

Jack McGettigan pointed further down the door. ‘Ye see that too?’

I gave it a closer look. There was more writing, smaller, smeared across the bottom of the door. I screwed up my eyes. ‘What’s it say?’ I asked.

McGettigan knelt down beside it. ‘Says nothing. Just letters. Jackie started cleaning it up this morning, then thought better of it. You can just about work it out.’ He ran his finger up the remains of the letters, tracing them out
through the smear. ‘A, F, L, R. AFLR. Whatever that means. Any ideas?’

I shook my head. ‘Somebody’s initials, I presume.’

‘I was thinking maybe it was an anagram,’ Carl Christie said. ‘Y’know, a clue.’

I studied the remains of the letters for a moment, but nothing coherent came to mind. ‘Going from the spelling above, it’s not beyond the bounds of possibility that we have a dyslexic vandal called Ralf at work. Know anyone called Ralph?’

There wasn’t anyone called Ralph.

I left them scowling in the doorway. There was now a steady stream of people coming through the gates. Whole families. It might have been the biggest thing to happen on Wrathlin for years, but for the little matter of a Messiah being born. Amongst the new arrivals was Father Flynn, chatting happily with a young couple. As I approached, they thanked him and turned away, hand in hand. We both watched them for a few moments.