Himself(25)

Mrs Cauley frowns. ‘What, to Quinn?’

‘That’s what I thought she meant at the time. But why go to him when she must have known that he wouldn’t lift a finger for her? He’d just arrived in town, you see, and was courting popularity. Still is, the weasel.’

Mahony blows smoke up to the ceiling. ‘Orla wasn’t talking about Father Quinn.’

Bridget points her fag at him and nods. ‘You’re the sharp one. It took me half a day to work that out.’

Mrs Cauley looks at her. ‘How do you mean?’

‘Tell her, Mahony.’

Mahony taps his ash into an empty teacup. ‘She was going to the father, my father, for help.’

‘Just so,’ says Bridget.

Mrs Cauley whistles through her teeth. ‘And did Orla tell you who Mahony’s father was?’

Bridget purses her lips. ‘She didn’t. She wouldn’t. And I don’t have a clue. She always told me that she hadn’t even told the man himself. But I believe on that day she took a chance and enlightened him. Then she asked for help.’

Mrs Cauley scowls. ‘You never told me that, Doosey.’

‘You never asked.’ Bridget takes a long drag on her cigarette and exhales slowly, evenly.

Mahony nods. ‘Did you tell anyone else who she was planning to meet that day?’

‘I didn’t. The next day I went up to her house and her mother told me that Orla had gone out the afternoon before with baby tucked under her arm and the clothes she was standing up in and she hadn’t seen her since. I checked the house and not a stitch was missing. If Orla had left town she’d taken nothing with her, no coat, no nappies, no money, nothing.’ Bridget purses her lips. ‘I went straight down to the station to report you both missing to Jack Brophy.’

‘And did the guards investigate?’

‘If they did, Mahony, it was half-arsed. By then a few people had started saying that Orla had been seen leaving town, getting on the 3:15 to Ennismore with her baby and a suitcase.’

Mahony speaks softly. ‘And do you think she got the bus out of town?’

‘She couldn’t have. The bus to Ennismore didn’t run that Tuesday. The driver was having an abscess drained.’

Mrs Cauley raises her eyebrows. ‘Are you sure?’

‘I was the one doing the draining.’ Bridget screws her fag out roughly. ‘When I asked around, no one could recall precisely who had seen Orla leave.’ Bridget looks at Mahony with a pained expression. ‘In the days that followed I ran all over town searching for you and your mother. Some people agreed that it was strange for a young girl and a baby to disappear into thin air. But then, they said, look how wild she was, she probably upped and left with the tinkers.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me all this at the time?’ murmurs Mrs Cauley. ‘Why didn’t you come to me?’

Bridget smiles at her. ‘I hardly knew you. Besides, you were already unpopular enough; you’d only been in town for five minutes before you had them hopping with your bloody plays.’

‘Even so.’

‘What could you have told me, old woman? You who had hardly even met the girl.’

Mrs Cauley shrugs and glances at Mahony. ‘So you were the only one asking questions at the time?’

‘Everyone was so relieved that Orla was gone that they didn’t want to bother themselves with the how or the why of it. With Father Jim out of the picture it was as if the town no longer had a care or a conscience.’ Bridget turns to Mahony. ‘Father Jim Hennessy had been a friend to your mother. Now he would have raised hell to find out what happened to her.’

Mrs Cauley frowns. ‘Father Jim died only weeks before Orla disappeared.’

‘He did. God rest him.’ Bridget nods. ‘So the gloves were off. And then Father Quinn came slithering into town. He’d hardly unpacked his cassocks before Orla was God only knows where.’

‘Now there’s a set of coincidences,’ murmurs Mrs Cauley.

Bridget stands up, hooking her monumental handbag over her arm. ‘I’ve nothing more to say here. Come up to the house, lad, when you can. I’ll be waiting for you.’

Mrs Cauley gestures to the card on the table. ‘Will you copy down that sentence? We need a handwriting sample to help us with a piece of evidence.’

‘Am I a suspect then?’

Mrs Cauley laughs. ‘I was hoping you’d be on our side, give us a hand with the investigation.’

Bridget nods. ‘If I can help I will of course. But I’ll scribe for you some other time, Merle.’

At the door she turns to Mahony with a smile. ‘Welcome back, son. You’ve been a long time coming home.’

Mahony pushes back in his chair and lights a fag. ‘Is she a good sort?’

‘She’s a sort,’ says Mrs Cauley. ‘She’s clever, but she’s mad stubborn too. Doosey will help us all she can, but she’ll do it in her own time and in her own way. I believe she was one of your mother’s few friends.’

‘There’s something she’s not telling us.’

‘There’s always something Bridget Doosey’s not telling you. That one’s deep enough to make a well look shallow.’

‘Do you think it was her that brought me back? Could it be her handwriting on the photograph, I mean?’