Turbulent Priests (Dan Starkey 3) (2 page)

Then her waters broke.

And the contractions came like very fast contractions.

The bouncers heard the screams first, and came running, then the assistant manager, then the manager, and they all stood squeezed in the doorway, not knowing what to do.

‘We have to get her to a hospital!’ the manager wailed.

‘No!’ Moira yelled. ‘It’s coming!’ Then screamed again.

‘It can’t be coming! You’ve only just start . . .’

‘It’s fucking coming!’ Moira yelled.

They panicked. They ran about getting clean towels and hot water. The manager called for an ambulance anyway, but the hospital was already snowed in. He called for the police but there had been a riot at an ecumenical midnight carol service and they were all tied up.

‘It can’t be coming yet!’ the assistant manager yelled, taking his cue from the manager.

One of the bouncers looked a little closer at Moira, who, in agony and beyond modesty, had removed her maternity dress and pants. The bouncer’s eyes widened. ‘I think I see someone waving at me,’ he said, and they all started to giggle, even Moira, between screams.

And then the baby came, quick as a flash, no trouble at all, and the bouncers delivered it, three ex-paramilitaries with tattoos on their tattoos, they delivered it, and were as pleased as punch.

An hour later, babe in arms, Moira sat up in her bed. There was a doctor on the way, finally, and the three bouncers cooed around her. They were all drinking champagne.

The manager and the assistant manager stood in the doorway, grinning. Everybody felt good.

‘You know,’ the manager said quietly to his assistant, ‘this is just like the baby Jesus, born in a stable.’

‘Born in
The Stables
,’ the assistant manager grinned.

‘Born to a single mum too . . .’

‘Mary . . . wasn’t a single mum.’

‘No, but she was a virgin.’

‘I don’t think Moira claims to be a . . .’

‘No, I mean, metaphorically speaking . . . there’s no husband, no father present, so it’s like a virgin birth . . .’

The assistant manager nodded, because he was an assistant manager.

‘So we have
The Stables
, the virgin birth . . . now look at our three bouncers.’

The assistant manager looked at Lenny, Jugs and Ripley Bogle.

‘They’re all hoods, right.’

The assistant manager nodded.

‘And what’re hoods called in Mafia flicks?’

‘Mafia flicks? Ugh . . .’

‘Wise guys, right?’

‘Ugh . . . right.’

‘And where are they from?’

‘Italy . . . New York . . .’

‘Not the Mafia – Lenny, Jugs . . .’

‘Oh. Just round here. Jugs is Newtownards Road, Lenny’s . . .’

‘East Belfast. All from East Belfast.’

‘Okay. Right.’

‘So the three wise men from the east.’ The manager smiled widely.

‘I think you might be stretching . . .’

‘Hold on, I’m not finished. What was the first thing she wanted after she gave birth?’

The assistant manager thought for a moment, then it came to him. ‘A cigarette.’

The manager nodded. ‘And what did she light it with . . .?’

‘She couldn’t find her lighter, so Lennie gave her his, told her to keep it, a present . . .’

‘It was a gold lighter.’

‘Gold-ish.’

‘Stick with me. A gold lighter. So after that, what did she want?’

This time the assistant manager’s brow furrowed, he couldn’t think what had been next.

‘After all that screaming and shouting . . .?’

‘I don’t . . .’

‘She wanted to fix her face. So she asked for . . .’

‘A mirror!’ He said it a little too loudly and the bouncers scowled round, then returned to their cooing. ‘But . . .’

‘Don’t you see?’ The manager tutted. ‘Look, the virgin
Moira
, comes to the city, finds no room at the inn and has to sleep in
The Stables
, she gives birth and the three wise men from the east bring her gifts of gold, frankincense and mirror.’

‘
Frankincense
?’

‘Well, I didn’t say it fitted perfectly, but near as damn it. If you ask me, what we have on our hands here is the Second Coming. Mark my words.’

The assistant manager shook his head. It was late and he was tired and his boss was a raving lunatic.

He took a deep breath. He smiled across at Moira, babe in arms, and said, ‘What’re you going to call him, love?’

‘
Him
?’ Moira said.

1

Cardinal Tomas Daley, Primate of All Ireland and the hot favourite to be the first English-speaking pope since Robbie Coltrane, glanced up from his desk. ‘You look like you’ve been celebrating,’ he said.

I nodded. It hurt. I had one of those headaches that begins in your feet. Up top the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse had tethered their restless mounts to the back of my eyeballs. The thousand curious little green woodpeckers cunningly masquerading as summer raindrops thumping at the window didn’t help.

‘My wife had a baby last night,’ I said.

‘Really?’

I nodded. It hurt some more.

‘Congratulations.’

He gave me the warm-hearted smile of a nice man with
a problem and turned perplexed eyes to the file lying open on the desk before him. He made a note. I have never felt entirely easy with people who maintain files on me. Particularly religious people.

‘Thank you.’

I’d met him before, at some press conference or other, but he plainly didn’t remember. He was fifty-four years old. Plump, mostly bald, pink-faced. He’d been cardinal for ten years. He was mostly based in Dublin these days but he’d managed to hang on to his Northern accent. He still kept a house in Belfast. He’d done his training up North. His first parish was in what he would call Derry and he was still a regular visitor. Everyone seemed to like him. He did a lot of good cross-community work, which you can file under shaking hands with Protestants, a tough enough calling.

‘Sure if you’d given me a call I could have rearranged this. You’ll be in no mood to . . .’

‘I was curious.’

And I was. My dealings with the Catholic Church are few and far between. I’d once survived for three days on nothing more than a purloined bottle of red wine and some communion wafers, but it hardly amounted to religious fervour.

‘Of course. You don’t mind if all of this stays off the record, do you?’

‘Why do all the best stories start like that?’

He smiled again. ‘I know,’ he said. ‘But you’ll understand
when I tell you.’ The Cardinal pulled at his lower lip for a moment. ‘You’re not a religious man, are you, Dan?’

In fact I’m the product of a mixed marriage. My father was an agnostic, my mother an atheist, although they still counted themselves as good Protestants. Protestantism never has and never will be about religion. It’s about property and culture and spitting at Catholics. ‘No, I’m afraid not,’ I said. ‘I was married in a Presbyterian Church, if that’s any help.’

‘But you’re not a practising . . .’

‘I was a practising footballer. There was a good church team.’

His eyes held steady on me, but it didn’t feel like he was sizing me up; it felt like he’d made his mind up the instant I entered the room. The file, of course. The only thing that had surprised me thus far was his tardiness in offering me a drink.

‘Would you say you had no real interest in religion then?’ he asked.

‘None at all, but I’ll convert to anything if the price is right.’

He nodded glumly, which wasn’t the response I’d anticipated.

‘And what of the Catholic Church? Have you any particular views on it?’

‘Nope.’

‘But you’re not anti-Catholic.’

‘Nope.’

I took in some air. Musty air. There were big leather-bound
books all around, the kind you could only pick up these days in the special offers at the back of the Sunday supplements. My head was threatening to start revolving. I was beginning to regret answering the summons. If it hadn’t been extremely polite and cautiously mysterious I wouldn’t have come at all. I had better things not to do. ‘Is all this leading somewhere, Cardinal?’

‘Yes. Sorry. Of course. I should get to the point. That’s the problem with the Church generally, too much pontificating, though Lord knows I’ve done my best . . . ahm . . . Would you say you were familiar at all with the traditions of the Catholic Church in Ireland?’

‘Nope.’

‘For example, have you heard of Oliver Plunkett?’

‘Nope.’

‘The saint?’

‘Did he take over from Roger Moore?’

‘Are you joking me?’

‘Partly.’ I smiled. He smiled wearily back. ‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘My head’s not entirely with it. Last night ‘n’ all. Oliver Plunkett. There’s a school named after him, isn’t there?’

‘Yes. Dozens of them. Oliver Plunkett was the last Catholic martyr in England. He had his head cut off three hundred years ago. It’s miraculously preserved down in Drogheda. Looks just as he did the day he died. Kind of surprised. But it’s one of the biggest tourist attractions on the island.’

I shook my head. ‘I’m sorry. I’m sure it is.’

The Cardinal picked up a folded A3 sheet from his file and
handed it across to me. ‘Do you remember writing this?’ he asked.

It was a reproduction of an article of mine from the
Sunday News
. The headline ran:
THE LONELY VIGIL OF ‘ORANGE’ FLYNN
. ‘That’s going back a couple of years,’ I said.

‘Three.’

‘That long?’

The Cardinal nodded. ‘Do you remember him, Father Flynn?’

‘Yeah. Sure. Good story. I mean, good subject. The story’s okay.’

‘It caused a bit of a rumpus at the time.’

‘Well, it would.’

I remembered it well. It had stood out from the usual round of murders and bombings. Frank Flynn had been an ordinary priest in a town famed for its extraordinary violence. In times of trouble people turn to religion, and Crossmaheart had only ever known trouble. Flynn’s was a healthy congregation – those that were still alive – but he was not a healthy priest. A bad heart. It seemed he was on the way out when he was suddenly whisked off to London for a heart transplant. There followed a long period of convalescence. When he eventually returned to his parish he was a changed man: from the shuffling, wizened, pasty-faced priest, to a vibrant enthusiast with a face as pink and sweet as a fresh German biscuit. His close encounter with death had given him an insight into life, and he lost no time in trying to communicate this to his congregation. At first they’d welcomed him, pleased
that he was returned to them and positively thriving. But then the sniping began, and for once in Crossmaheart it wasn’t via an Armalite. The word was that the dour, cynical priest that had left the town had not just been cured, but had been cured with a Protestant’s heart. His was a Catholic chassis driven by a Protestant engine. He had become the very antithesis of a Catholic priest. His congregation began to melt away. The sniping turned into scorn, scorn into hate. He was refused service in shops. He was cursed at. Spat upon. Convicted on the perfect evidence of rumour and spite. When I’d met him he’d been a lonely man in an empty church, supported only by his bishop. It had been a good article, rich in pathos, three hundred years of religious bigotry in microcosm. I’d done my research as well; and it was a Protestant’s heart.

‘As I recall,’ I said, handing the sheet back to the Cardinal, ‘he was a nice enough man, it was just that everyone hated him.’

‘Yes. He was.’

‘But now?’

‘Well, that’s harder to say.’ He sat back in his chair and pulled at his lip again. Then he began tapping his index finger between the bottom and top rows of teeth. It wasn’t a sound I needed to hear.

‘Cardinal, why don’t you just tell me what’s on your mind? There are few things in life which can’t be summed up in a single sentence. It’s a basic rule of sub-editing.’

‘Ah, if only it were that simple. The direct route isn’t
always the best, Dan. Father Flynn now, when you last met him his congregation must have been down to single figures.’

‘Single figure. Himself.’

‘Well, times have changed. In the end, though we were reluctant to do it, we moved him on. Back, in fact, to where he came from. You know Wrathlin Island?’

‘I know of it. Can’t say I’ve been there. A bit remote for my tastes.’

‘And for most people. But that’s his home. He’s preaching every week to full houses.’

‘Good for him.’

‘Yes, well, that’s the problem. He has distanced himself to a certain extent from our Church.’

‘I see.’

‘The thing is, Dan, the Church in Ireland has always been keen on its miracles. We’ve talked about Plunkett already, but to tell you the truth there’s scarcely a year goes by without some tale of a dancing Madonna or crying Christ getting the pious moving. I’m sure you’ve heard of them.’

‘Vaguely. Down South mostly.’

‘Yes. Down South. There are blessed few miracles up here. The thing is, Flynn’s gone down the same path. He’s started having visions. Making all sorts of claims. And people are falling for them. It’s just not on.’

‘What sort of claims, Cardinal?’

‘Well, that’s the thing. Madonnas and such like, you can prove them to be false, eventually. I mean, we always do, but it’s no bad thing to encourage the belief in the occasional
miracle – it does wonders for church attendance, you understand?’

‘Like a promotion gimmick in a newspaper. God’s spot-the-ball.’

‘If you like. Well, Flynn’s just taken it a little too far.’

‘Cardinal?’

‘He believes that the Messiah has been born on the island. He says it’s the Second Coming.’

2

It sat in the air for a while. The Cardinal’s serious, ponderous eyes studied me with renewed interest, his cheeks pale pinky in a slightly embarrassed flush. I held his gaze, waiting for the spark of humour to cross his face. But it didn’t come. I gave him a hint: I gave him a grin.

The Cardinal stood abruptly and moved to the window. The woodpeckers were still busy. ‘Oh, laugh away,’ he said, although I was far from it. ‘I would probably see the funny side of it myself if it didn’t affect me so directly.’ He shook his head. He clasped his hands behind his back and was silent for a few moments. Then he turned back to me. ‘The thing is, when Flynn lost the support of his congregation in the first place, I was the one who stood by him and I have done all along. Now he’s talking about splitting from Rome altogether if we don’t recognise the
validity of his claims. I’m really in a most embarrassing situation.’