Turbulent Priests (Dan Starkey 3) (32 page)

‘Mark Blundell,’ I said.

‘Whoever.’

‘Killed before Christine was even born,’ I said.

‘Yes. Thank you,’ said White, turning shut-up eyes upon me, then away. ‘Frank. It’s like this. This man. Blundell. He wanted us off the island. All of us.’

Flynn’s eyes narrowed. He leant forward, suddenly intrigued. ‘What do you mean?’

‘What I say. He wanted to move every last man-jack of us across to the mainland. For good.’

‘But why, for heaven’s sake?’

‘He said it was too dangerous to live here.’ He let it hang in the air for a moment, then half whispered, ‘Have you ever heard of radon?’

Flynn repeated the word silently. He shook his head. ‘What is it?’

White glanced up the table. ‘What about you?’

‘It’s a type of washing powder, isn’t it?’

White tutted. ‘Of course it isn’t.’ Back to Flynn. ‘Frank, this fella,
Blundell
. Long before you came back, he came
across to the island one day, unannounced, with all this equipment. Sneaked. Didn’t ask permission. Just, just . . . did it. I watched him for a few hours, then I went down to see him. He wasn’t going to tell anything, but I kept asking and he said he was doing a survey. What sort of survey, I asked, and why here? He said, not just here, throughout the whole United Kingdom, had been going on for years – just that Wrathlin had never been the top of anyone’s list. It was a snide wee comment. I didn’t like him. A superior type and nothing to be superior about. I was polite. He said it would only take a couple of days. He was looking for traces of radon. What’s that? I asked. A radioactive gas, he said. Goodness, I said, that sounds scary. He laughed. Nothing to worry about. He said it was a natural gas they like to keep an eye on. Just a wee survey. I’ll be gone before you know I’m here, he said.’ White took a deep intake of breath. He shook his head. Looked at the floor. Dramatic pause.

‘What happened?’ Flynn asked.

‘What happened, Frank, was that he scuttled away and continued his survey, and we put him up and gave him food and just made him welcome as we always do to strangers . . .’

‘Did,’ I said.

‘Do, did – shut up, Starkey, and listen.’

‘Okay.’

‘The survey went on for several days. He was a curious wee man, always kept himself to himself, but the truth of the matter is, there was an evil streak in him, and in a way
it’s as well for us that there was. He should have taken his survey, gone home and reported the findings to his superiors, but instead he couldn’t resist telling me – you could see the pleasure on his face – letting slip, almost by accident, but definitely by design, that he was getting readings that suggested an abnormally high radon presence.’

‘But . . . but . . . but . . . what does that mean?’ Flynn asked.

‘Abnormal is abnormal, Frank,’ White said drily. ‘Said he’d never come across anything like it. Claimed it was extremely dangerous. That he was seriously concerned for the population and that he would be recommending an immediate evacuation of the island.’

‘To which you replied?’

‘I thought it was a little rash. I asked why he needed to recommend such a thing. What danger was there? He said he didn’t know. He said there’d never, ever been such high readings, it was just such an incredible phenomenon that the safest thing would be to get everyone off the island until a team of scientists could investigate the situation properly. He wouldn’t listen to me, Frank. I told him we’d an extremely healthy population. I told him that if he moved people off the island, the chances were that they wouldn’t come back, that it would be the death of our whole community, but he wouldn’t listen, said he had the power to have us moved off. There was no reasoning with him.’

‘So you killed him,’ I said.

‘It wasn’t as simple as that, Starkey. We insisted he stayed for a Council meeting.’

‘Insisted?’

‘We prevented him from leaving. But just so that the whole Council could hear it from his own lips. He wasn’t happy about it, of course, being kept here, but at the same time he seemed to relish it, relished causing such an uproar. And there certainly was. But he wouldn’t listen. He’d made his mind up and that was that. Some of the boys had drink taken and it got a bit nasty. All sorts of name-calling. Childish, yes, I know, but you know how we are here, Frank. We’re proud of this wee place. It got out of hand. Someone shot him. I’m sorry it happened, but it happened. And I can’t say it wasn’t the right thing.’

‘You wouldn’t care to recall who actually pulled the trigger?’ I asked.

‘No, I wouldn’t. Blundell was beyond reasoning with. He would have killed the island without a second’s thought.’

‘He might have been saving you,’ I said.

‘You don’t understand, Starkey. This gas. This radon. I’m not saying it’s not there. I know it is. But it’s there for a reason. We just didn’t know what reason back then. We all knew something was happening. We could feel it in the air. A sense of elation. A sense of potential like you can’t imagine. All of us felt it. Such well-being. You felt it, Frank, didn’t you? You remember what it was like when you came back, there was a real buzz . . . I remember when you arrived . . . you weren’t a well man, were you? But within weeks . . .’ Flynn nodded thoughtfully, his anger now well subsided. ‘We were so content . . . but at the same time waiting,
waiting for something important to happen . . . and it was there all the time, little Christine . . . and it took you to lead us to her, and for that we will be eternally grateful. God through the might of nature had seen fit to create this, the perfect environment for his daughter to be born. This Garden of Eden. And we must do everything to protect it. Do you see now, Frank? Do you understand?
Think
about it, Frank.’

Flynn sat back in his chair and closed his eyes. He clasped his hands under his chin. ‘You’re right,’ he said softly, ‘I do need to think about it.’

White pushed his chair back and stood. ‘Take as long as you want. You’ll see the truth of what I’m saying. You’ll understand why we’ve done what we’ve done. We’ve agreed all along that there’s a new dawn coming, Frank, that it’s starting right here. It’s so vital that we do everything in our power to protect the girl, because when she comes of age the whole world’s going to answer to her.’

Father White left us in the hall. When the door closed I said, ‘Barking or what?’

But Flynn fixed me with such a look of disgust that I walked away from the table and stared out of the window. I had presumed, because of the bodies, that Flynn was now on ‘our side’, but I was wrong. He was still Father Flynn, champion of Christine and bloke who’d talked to God.

‘They killed Blundell,’ I said.

‘Shhhh.’

‘They killed the priest. The others.’

‘Will you give my head peace?’ Flynn snapped.

I shut up.

A little after noon the door into the church opened and Duncan limped in. Someone pulled the door closed behind him and locked it. Duncan had a plaster on his face but he was just as mud-grubby. ‘Howdy,’ he said disconsolately and sat on the edge of the table. ‘What’s been happening?’

I shrugged. ‘Congratulations on your single-handed stand against censorship.’

He gave a weak smile. ‘It didn’t do much good.’

‘Not the point. It’s the effort that counts. We need books. So that we can look up words like radon.’

He gave me the
what
? look.

I told him what White had told us. The priest hadn’t said those magic words,
off the record
. I kept it succinct and just short of
we’re all going to die
. His initial response was a single raised eyebrow, which is difficult, and a ‘Seriously?’

I nodded. Then he joined Flynn in some solitary thinking and I was left to my own devices for another five minutes. I could almost hear their brains whirring. I don’t know why they needed so much time. It was perfectly clear to me what was going on: over the course of many years the radon had boiled all of their brains. And the longer Patricia, Little Stevie and I stayed on the island the greater was the likelihood of our own brains getting boiled.

Eventually Duncan gave a slight shake of his head and said: ‘It does make sense, you know, if he’s telling the truth about the radon.’

I was way ahead of him. ‘He’s a priest, of course he’s telling the truth,’ I said.

From the window, Flynn tutted.

‘But it does make sense,’ Duncan continued, unfazed. ‘It explains quite a bit. Not about the murders, but about what’s been happening here.’ He patted his injured face lightly, winced, gave himself a
That was stupid
look. ‘I know bugger all about radon, but if it’s been at such a high level all along it’s bound to have affected us.’

Flynn turned from the window. ‘We’ve never been healthier, Duncan. You know that. Sure it’s no wonder Dr Finlay’s such a sad old drunk – he has nothing to do all day.’

‘I don’t necessarily mean physically, Father. Up top.’

‘But we’re not . . . well, backward,’ said Flynn.

‘Of course not!’ said Duncan. ‘We’re
forward
, if anything. I mean, think about it . . . your visions, Christine’s powers . . . even Mary Reilly – didn’t everyone think she could talk to the spirits . . . what if she could . . . I mean,
see
things, just like you did, Father, just like Christine can . . . what if it’s the radon, Father?’

‘What if it’s in-breeding,’ I said, helpfully.

Duncan snorted. ‘I know it sounds crazy . . . but is it any crazier than the Second Coming?’

I looked at Flynn. ‘Could explain a lot, Father.’

He was nodding slowly. ‘It would mean none of it was true. The . . .’ He trailed off. There was despair as deep as the ocean in his voice. His eyes studied the pock-marked wooden floor. How many heels had left their indentations
there over the years?
Lots
. I smiled, then tried to cover it. Nobody noticed. Flynn looked up at Duncan. ‘What you’re saying is that if Christine isn’t the daughter of God, then she’s some sort of a defective, a mutation caused by this gas.’

‘No, I . . .’

‘That everything we’ve done in her name has been because our minds have been altered by this
radon
. That I put it all in motion by having my visions, visions caused by this gas.’

Duncan was shaking his head. ‘No . . . Father. Not at all. I’m not saying it’s necessarily a bad thing, Father. If this radon really does enhance the power of the human mind, then the possibilities are endless . . .’

But Father Flynn was no longer listening. He stood abruptly and started for the hall door.

Duncan went after him. ‘Father?’

The priest stopped, turned. ‘Stay here, Duncan, there’s a good fella.’ Duncan stopped. ‘I’ve made a big mistake,’ Flynn said, and hammered on the door. ‘I have to sort it out.’

39

Shards of light cut through the clouds, choosily illuminating the crucial aspects of an essentially tragic scene.

Tragedy and I are old chums. We’ve bumped into each other at parties, shared a glass or twelve of beer, reminisced about the dear departed. God is a bit more of a stranger, but it was nice of Him nevertheless to cast a little light on the situation. He had an interest, of course. So did Mother Nature, oozing up from below. I hadn’t quite worked out if the two were the same, and if they were, if that made He a She, or them an It. It’s funny what goes through your head as you kneel in the dust with a gun at your head.

I turned that head slightly. Duncan was on my left. He nodded helplessly. There was still shouting going on within the church. Father Flynn’s voice, of course, and, higher pitched, Father White’s. They had been at it for a couple of hours.

The Council was in there too, jabbering. The gunmen were outside. Threatening.

Duncan seemed resigned to his fate. ‘I thought they were taking me off to shoot me last time. I look on it as having a last couple of hours to make my peace with God.’

I spat. ‘God burnt your books this morning.’

‘Not God, Starkey. You know that as well as I do.’ His hands were behind his neck. So were mine. My neck, that is. It’s not a very comfortable way to sit, but it’s more comfortable than having a bullet make its way through your head at a hundred-odd miles per hour. Duncan pulled his elbows in until they met in front of his nose. ‘But now I wish they’d get on with it,’ he added.

‘I don’t,’ I said.

Amongst other things never to have reached such a wayward outpost as Wrathlin – myxomatosis, satellite television, Lean Cuisine Tagliatelle – was a collection of old maxims, including two of particular relevance about shooting neither the messenger nor the piano player. But thus it had been ordained.

Father Flynn’s attempts to explain to his colleague the error of his ways, that Christine was quite possibly the most highly developed human being on the planet but not the daughter of God, had obviously fallen on deaf or mutated ears. Definitely red ears, in any case, because White had come storming out of their meeting and ordered that Duncan and the world’s most fearless reporter be readied for execution. It was a bargaining tool, but Flynn wasn’t in the form to bargain, which wasn’t good news for us.

Gunmen dragged us out, thrust us down, pulled us up to our knees, pressed cold metal barrels against the back of our heads. And then we had a temporary reprieve. It went to arbitration as the rest of the Council trooped in, barely looking at us as they marched past, stern-faced. Jack McGettigan, proving that there’s nothing worse than a reformed drinker, slapped Duncan on his injured face as he passed and muttered something largely incoherent but involving the word ‘pornographer’. Duncan let out a yelp.

‘What a way to end up,’ I said into the face of a cold, stinging wind. A tear or two rolled down my cheeks. I bit at a lip. I didn’t want anyone to think I was crying. I was tough, a street-hardened cynic. I’d stared death in the face before. And cried.

Duncan spat into the embers of the fire. ‘Aye. What a way to go,’ he said.

‘Shut up, will youse?’ the gunman behind me ordered, nudging me with the barrel.