The Sister(163)

‘The course of your life changed years ago, and it’s taken all this time to find your way back. You have a lot of catching up to do. It is why coincidence grows around you every day, why synchronicity dogs your footsteps. Part of you always knew. Your grandfather knew. Why do you think he taught you the things he did? You are slowly remembering. It is why you chose your profession. It is why you dream the way you do. You are coming out of the coils, ascending the rope toward your destiny.’

Miller took a sip of his tea. It tasted exactly as his grandfather used to make it.

‘Can I ask a couple of questions?’ He didn’t wait for an answer. ‘You’re not just avoiding people who want their palms read without an appointment.’ Miller scrutinised her face. ‘You’re hiding here, aren’t you?’

Her eyes wavered almost imperceptibly as she glanced over his shoulder to Rosetta, who nodded her approval.

‘To answer one of your questions, we are not hiding, but we don’t want to be found. The Catholic Church has been trying to persuade me for years to return to the fold. I don’t need the hassle. And now there are people looking for us, or more particularly, for something they believe we have.’ She paused, her curious smile deepened. ‘To answer your other question, Vera is a part of me that is long past, to use that name you'd have to have known me back then. When the Church employed me, I was Sister Verity, and when I left them to work for the poor, I became known as The Sister. Just call me Sister, that’ll be fine by me.’

Lifting his tea to his lips, Miller met her gaze. He hadn’t asked the second question, he’d only thought it.

For a minute, they sat in silence.





Chapter 134



Stella stood at the side of Ryan’s bed as he drifted in and out of consciousness, watching over him. His breathing shallow and low in his abdomen, she had to stare intently to check it was still moving. He looked peaceful. Occasionally, the skin of his eyelids revealed movement beneath, as if his eyes watched something on the big screen of his mind. She wondered what he dreamed about.

Miller had passed on Ryan’s wish that he should be left to die. She knew she wouldn’t be able to stay and comply with his wishes. She had to go. ‘Good night, Doctor Ryan,’ she whispered, and quietly shut the door behind her.





His memories unfurled one after another. In his dream, he couldn’t control them, couldn’t prevent them rolling out, and all seemed to focus on failure. Could he have done things better? He felt miserable and dejected, just as the whiskey priest made famous by Graham Greene did in his final moments facing the firing squad, knowing with crystal clarity that he could have achieved so much more.

What was it all for?

His good eyelid opened with reluctance. He was alone; he thought he caught a whiff of Gracie’s perfume.

What was it all for?

His strength ebbing; he scrawled two messages on his pad and then signed them. With nothing else to hand, he placed them in a faded old envelope.

His mood changed. The line between consciousness and dreams blurred. Giddy and light on his feet, he moved, but he wasn’t walking; freed from the constraints of friction he travelled fast towards an unknown destination, he was afraid. You know at the end you don’t see your whole life flashing by, but if you’re lucky, you get to make some sense of it. Bruce Milowski’s words from years before flashed into his brain. Although they were advanced for such a young boy, he never gave them a second thought. Here, he paused, and sense came. They weren’t the boy’s words, they were his grandfather’s. Satori...so this is what it feels like. Self-doubt washed away; he bathed in a shimmering and ethereal light. This is it, Ryan, your faith tested, your soul naked. A hand slipped through the crook of his arm and hardly daring to hope, he turned. It’s Gracie!

She’d come to meet him. Leading him on, she held on tight to his forearm and leaned her head against his shoulder. ‘I’ve been waiting for you, Mr Ryan,’ she said.





Miller continued to drink his tea in small sips, his telephone buzzed from the depths of his pocket.

He retrieved it and glanced at the display. It’s Stella.

‘I should take this,’ he said.

‘That’s okay,’ she affirmed. ‘Ryan’s dead, by the way.’

It took a moment for what she’d said to register.

‘Hello, Stella.’

‘Oh, Miller, it’s Ryan. He just died.’

He calmed her the best he could from the end of the telephone, and gave her instructions about what to do, who to call. ‘No, listen…don’t worry. If you need to talk, I’m right here…only a phone call away. I’ll be back soon. No, I’m not sure, could be tonight, more likely tomorrow, in the afternoon. I will. I’ll—’

Stella interrupted, blurting out, ‘I need to see you.’

Her words carried an urgency that took him aback. ‘See me? What for?’

‘There’s something I need to ask you and something I want to tell you.’

‘Look, Stella, I can’t talk now.’

‘No, not now, tomorrow, when you get back. Come round.’

‘Okay.’ He couldn’t imagine why she wanted to see him. ‘I’ll call you—’

The phone cut off. No signal. He shrugged his shoulders. ‘I lost the signal.’ Ryan’s words came back to haunt him. See if you still have your cynicism, after you’ve met her. The idea she might have had something to do with the signal loss entered his head.