Himself(35)

‘Do you now?’

‘I smell a big cringing rat in a dog collar. Quinn is blocking us; he wants you out of town.’

‘Maybe.’ He pulls up a chair for her.

‘We’re upsetting the old order, Mahony.’

‘But does he have that much influence? To call the lot of them out of the play?’

‘Not at all, but sheep will cleave to a weasel if they’re frightened by a wolf. Quinn is using Orla to get Mulderrig behind him.’

‘Do you think?’

‘With you here, and the play keeping you here, Orla will have retribution. Many of them were shook up by Mary Lavelle’s premonition, that much is clear, and Quinn will jump right on the back of that. Fear, guilt and superstition, Mahony, it’s a fine way to steer the herd. It always has been.’

‘Well, time will tell. Is it tea you want?’

She nods. ‘Go on then. We’ll wait a while and see if anything turns up.’

Mahony tucks a blanket around her legs and goes into the kitchen. Miss Mulhearne is sitting on the draining board revealing a good inch of stockinged ankle. Mahony can see the piles of cups and saucers through her. She throws her arms girlishly around her knees and gives Mahony the kind of smile that makes her beautiful.

Mahony presses open a book. Amongst the empty cake tins and the rinsed milk bottles, behind the leggy wooden dryer and under the cobwebbed window, he reads poetry to a dead spinster. Miss Mulhearne stretches out the length of the serving hatch with her cardigan unbuttoned and her smile blissful.

As Mahony reads, rain sheers across the half-open window and with the rain comes the smell of the wet earth rising. Outside the window the bushes beat time with their wet branches to the rise and fall of his voice, although the wind has abated now; she’s holding her breath to listen.

Mahony reads, paying no mind to the wakening world.

Father Quinn pulls up a chair and waits, watching Mrs Cauley sleep. She has the same subterranean look as a bog corpse he once saw in a museum. She could easily have been spat out by some remote wetland, her body preserved by its dark juices. She’s an archaeological find from another time, her skin as brittle as vellum and stained with age. She has a seedy string of pearls around her neck rather than a hangman’s rope. And no doubt her stomach would give up a very good last meal, not a caked smear of gruel.

Father Quinn studies his enemy closely. He could crush her with the span of just one hand. But instead he arranges an expression of charitable concern on his face. ‘Mrs Cauley?’

Mrs Cauley feigns bleary-eyed surprise. ‘Bless you, Father, for coming to me in my hour of need.’

‘Michael told me that you sent for me.’

‘I did, Father, tell me, where are all the people? Why are they not here? They’ve never let me down before.’

‘Well, Mrs Cauley, and this is a delicate matter, but I have been made aware that the village has a few concerns regarding your production.’

‘What concerns?’

Mrs Cauley is surprised by just how many teeth one man could have in his head as Father Quinn looks at her and smiles.

‘I think you should consider changing your leading man, Mrs Cauley. Mulderrig is a little wary of strangers.’

Mrs Cauley smiles back at him radiantly. ‘Mahony is not a stranger, Father. He was born here and he is fully entitled to return to the place of his birth. Not least to solve the mystery of his mother’s disappearance.’

Father Quinn looks around himself, moistening his top lip to a wetter sheen with several erratic sweeps of his tongue. ‘Orla Sweeney did not disappear, Mrs Cauley. She left Mulderrig of her own free will.’

Mrs Cauley leans nearer. Her voice is no more than a murmur. ‘Neither of us believes that old chestnut now, do we? Look, Father, one of your flock must have confessed a little something or other. There’s a reward posted, did you know that?’

Father Quinn raises his eyebrows.

‘Unofficially, of course. Think of it more as a demonstration of gratitude from a rich old lady. All I’m asking for,’ she says, with a roguish glint in her eyes, ‘as a hitherto loyal friend to the church, is a few small nuggets of information.’

Father Quinn frowns.

Mrs Cauley unleashes a winning smile. ‘And of course I keep my sources confidential, Father. As you know yourself, I’m very discreet.’

An expression of complicated disgust flickers over Eugene Quinn’s face. He surges up from his chair. ‘I’ll not be—’

‘Sit down, please, Father.’

The priest takes his seat, levelling a look of impotent fury at the old woman.

Undaunted, Mrs Cauley continues. ‘Oh, I know all about the sacrament of penance and confessional seals and all that jazz. Just pop the name on a bit of paper and post it to me. Or type it. Or better still, cut the letters out of a newspaper like a blackmailer in an Agatha Christie.’ She drops her voice to a whisper. ‘You see it doesn’t count if you don’t say it out loud.’

Father Quinn shakes his head in disbelief.

‘Then bang bang, you’re on target for a new roof or a spanking new organ, a trip to Honolulu or whatever it is you want.’ Mrs Cauley taps the side of her nose. ‘And it’s all between you and me, Father. All I need is a name.’

Father Quinn looks at her incredulously. ‘Mahony has put you up to this.’