Elizabeth Bradley is now. She’d left not long after her baby was born. Someone, I think it was Mother Peter, had said she’d returned to Cork.
I watch Eugene move the missal, then ring the bells for communion. Taking communion is the only bit of Mass I enjoy. There’s definitely something kind of divine and sacred about receiving the host and contemplating the visitor inside my body. In fact, it’s the only time I feel even remotely Catholic. I stand in line on the left of the altar rail and shuffle forward to take communion. It’s Father Steele who places the host on my lips, and it’s I who deliberately holds his eyes for longer than necessary. I’m convinced I can see a spark of interest in his midnight-blue gaze, but I’ll dismiss it later as wishful thinking.
In single file we troop down the aisle out of church. The pace is slow, as the congregation stops in turn to be introduced to the new curate. Bridget is far ahead and I’m stuck behind Tom Donaghue, the publican, who has the lumbering gait of a big ugly bullock. Too much beer in his belly, Mrs Molloy says. Where his hairline stops and before his shirt collar starts there’s a wedge of red neck covered in angry boils.
A thick slice of sunlight pours on to Tom’s crown and as I follow him out of church I peer over his shoulder to the top of Father O’Neill’s fiery head. It’s moving up and down rapidly in time to his booming voice. The curate, I guess, will be standing next to Father O’Neill; they usually do. And if he’s anything like the others before him, he will be smiling, the smile fixed as if it had been painted on his face. But then this curate isn’t like his predecessor Father Peter Murphy, who always seemed, to me at least, to be play-acting. ‘Got a secret agenda, that one,’ I’d overheard Mrs McGuire who ran the post office say to one of her customers. She was right. Father Peter was caught with his trousers down, literally, around his ankles, his dick in the mouth of Robbie Donovan, a lad from the next parish, and him a choir boy an’ all. I’d enjoyed the scandal enormously, we all had. It had broken the monotony for a couple of weeks. The men from the Pig and Whistle had raged: ‘Jesus, Mary and Joseph, a man of God and him a slip of a lad! To be sure, the dirty curate should be horse-whipped. If I was the lad’s father sure I’d do the job meself, priest or no bloody priest.’
Mrs McGuire had spoken of her outrage to the local newspaper, and Bridget and I had been thumped around the ears by Mother Thomas for calling Father Peter ‘a dirty old poof.’
Father O’Neill had arranged for the curate to leave the parish quietly, under cover of darkness, else, so Mrs McGuire claimed, the mob from the Pig and Whistle would have lynched him. I didn’t think the men frequenting the pub on Friday nights had the strength to do much lynching, it would interfere with the drinking, but I’d kept my thoughts to myself.
My brain is aching for something to say to the curate, something interesting to grab his attention. I could pretend to faint, have him catch me, and swoon in his arms. On the other hand, I might get Father O’Neill, who sometimes has rank breath and terrible dandruff. When I reach the entrance to the church I see Father Steele surrounded by a tight bunch of people. There’s a young couple I’ve never seen before, the man thick-set with a bull-like neck, his wife a tall, painfully thin woman who looks like she’s not long for this world. She’s holding the hand of a small boy with big doe eyes and the same thin face as her. Bridget is next to them, standing awkwardly, goggle-eyed and slack-lipped, staring into the face of the curate like he’s the new Messiah.
On Bridget’s right is oul’ Mary O’Shea, a widow who owns the village store where Bridget has just started to work on a Saturday – a trial period, according to Mary O’Shea, who might or might not offer her a full-time job depending on how she works out between now and October when Bridget turns sixteen. Oul’ Mary’s clutching her rosary beads as if her life depends on it, and edging closer to the curate, beaming for all she’s worth.
It’s the first time I’ve ever seen her smile. As I get closer I can hear her crowing about her trip to Lourdes last year.
Stepping in front of Mary O’Shea, I say in a deliberately loud voice, ‘Well, Father, it’s grand to see you again and on such a beautiful morning. What did I tell you last night, Bridget?’ Before Bridget can reply, I continue: ‘I said the sun would shine on the morning of Father Steele’s first Mass in Friday Wells. True, it rained earlier, but just look at the sky now, won’t you: not a cloud in sight. The sun shines on the righteous, that’s what I say.’
‘Is that so, Kate?’ There’s no mistaking a hint of mockery in Father Steele’s voice, and suddenly it’s unsure of myself I’m feeling.
Mary O’Shea trills from somewhere behind my back, ‘Kate O’Sullivan, would you be so good as to step to one side. I was telling the good Father here about my trip to Lourdes last year. He was mighty interested, weren’t you, Father?’ I feel the tip of Mary’s finger prod violently between my shoulder blades. It hurts, and I want to poke her back to let her know just how much. ‘Before we were so rudely interrupted, that is. Honest to God, Kate O’Sullivan, you’ve got no manners. I don’t know what the good sisters teach you up there; nothing, to be sure, nothing at all. Bridget here is just the same. No respect for an old woman.’
Bridget glares. With a shrug, I reluctantly take a small step to one side. Mary eases her stout body forward and with some skill manages to edge me back a few feet. Undefeated, I stand on tiptoe, looking over Mary’s head in the curate’s direction. He glances up, I catch his eye and we exchange a knowing look. I can tell he’s feigning interest in Mary O’Shea’s prattle. His eyes smile; he knows I know. I enjoy the shared moment, and bask for another in the warmth of his smile. I watch him lean forward towards the young couple and exchange a few words I can’t catch before dropping to his knees to stroke the head of the small boy, who I assume is their son.
Bridget is also looking at Father Steele, her mouth open as if about to speak. She’s not sure what to say. I know, because she’s twisting her hair with her finger and thumb into a tight knot. She always does that when she’s nervous.
‘Father Steele, last July I organized the raffle at the church fête and we raised twenty-six pounds. I was wondering if I could do it again this summer.’
For the first time in my life I want to hit Bridget. We’d already decided that I’d do the raffle this year – she’d promised. That was, until she’d seen Father Steele, who was now smiling warmly in her direction. Not the same class of warmth as when he’d smiled at me, but then once again it could be wishful thinking on my part.
‘Twenty-six pounds, that’s grand,’ I hear him say. ‘I’ll speak to Father O’Neill. I don’t know what he’s got planned for the fête this year. What was it you raffled to raise such a grand amount?’
Peeved but smiling in spite of it, I say, ‘Two of my paintings, Father. An oil I did of the previous curate, and a watercolour of the village, and a –’
Bridget cut in: ‘A day-trip to Dublin, a truly beautiful dried-flower arrangement, done by Mary Collins who trained in all classes of floristry in London and Dublin, and a meal for two people at the Pig and Whistle.’
Not so nervous now, are we, Bridget? I think as I watch her drop the knot of twisted hair and beam like a bloody lighthouse beacon.
‘You must have been busy,’ he’s saying, still looking at Bridget. I’m seething and, though I’d never do it, I’ve the strongest urge to slap my friend hard. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t know your name.’
For one awful moment Bridget looks like she’s going to do a cute little bob of a curtsey, as if she’s being introduced to the Pope or something. Just in time she stops herself and says in a really silly little-girl voice, the one she affects when she wants something, ‘Bridget Costello, Father.’
‘It
