Cathedral

by Nelson DeMille

  Father Donnelly looked around the chamber the way a host examines a guest room. He stared at Maureen’s sleeping figure, then turned to Flynn. “So, you blew up a sixer, did you? Rather daring, I’d say.”

  Flynn didn’t answer.

  “Well, anyway, they traced you as far as the McGloughlin farm up the lane. Good, loyal Ulstermen, the McGloughlins. Solid Presbyterians. Family came over from Scotland with Cromwell’s army. Another three hundred years and they’ll think this is their country. How’s the lady?”

  Flynn knelt beside her. “Sleeping.” He touched her forehead. “Feverish.”

  “There’s some penicillin tablets and an army aid kit along with the tea and bacon.” He took a small bottle from his pocket. “And some Dunphy’s, if you’ve the need of it.”

  Flynn took the bottle. “Rarely have I needed it more.” He uncorked it and took a long drink.

  Father Donnelly found two footstools, pulled them to the table, and sat. “Let her sleep. I’ll take tea with you.”

  Flynn sat and watched the priest go through the fussy motions of a man who took food and drink seriously. “Who was here?” asked Flynn.

  “The Brits and the RUCs. As usual the RUCs wanted to tear the place apart, but a British army officer restrained them. A Major Martin. Know him, do you? Yes, he’s quite infamous. Anyway, they all played their roles wonderfully.”

  “I’m glad everyone had a good time. I’m only sorry I had to waken everyone so early.”

  “You know, lad, it’s as if the participants in this war secretly appreciate each other. The excitement is not entirely unwelcome.”

  Flynn looked at the priest. Here was one man, at least, who didn’t lie about it. “Can we get out of here?” he asked as he sipped the hot tea.

  “You’ll have to wait until they clear out of the hedgerows. Binoculars, you understand. Two days at least. Leave at night, of course.

  “Doesn’t everyone travel at night?”

  The priest laughed. “Ah, Mister …”

  “Cocharan.”

  “Whatever. When will this all stop?”

  “When the British leave and the northern six counties are reunited with the southern twenty-six.”

  The priest put down his teacup. “Not true, my boy. The real desire of the IRA, the most secret dark desire of the Catholics, no matter what we all say about living in peace after the reunification, is to deport all the Protestants back to England, Scotland, and Wales. Send the McGloughlins back to a country they haven’t seen in three hundred years.”

  “That’s bloody rubbish.”

  The priest shrugged. “I don’t care personally, you understand. I only want you to examine your own heart.”

  Flynn leaned across the table. “Why are you in this? The Catholic clergy has never supported any Irish rebellion against the British. So why are you risking internment?”

  Father Donnelly stared down into his cup, then looked up at Flynn. “I don’t involve myself with any of the things that mean so much to you. I don’t care what your policy is or even what Church policy is. My only role here is to provide sanctuary. A haven in a country gone mad.”

  “To anyone? A murderer like me? Protestants? British troops?”

  “Anyone who asks.” He stood. “In this abbey was once an order of fifty monks. Now, only me.” He paused and looked down at Flynn. “This abbey has a limited future, Mr. Cocharan, but a very rich past.”

  “Like you and me, Father. But I hope not like our country.”

  The priest seemed not to hear him and went on. “This chamber was once the storage cellar of an ancient Celtic Bruidean house. You know the term?”

  “Yes, I think so.”

  “The House of the Hostages, it was called. A six-sided structure where six roads met. Coincidentally—or maybe not so—chapter houses are traditionally polygons, and the chapter house we passed through is built on these foundations.” He gestured above. “Here in the Bruidean a traveler or a fugitive could shelter from the cold, dark road, protected by tradition and the king’s law. The early Celts were not complete barbarians, after all.” He looked at Flynn, “So you see, you’ve come to the right place.”

  “And you’ve taken it upon yourself to combine a bit of paganism with Christian charity.”

  The priest smiled. “Irish Catholicism has always been a blend of paganism and Christianity. The early Christians after Patrick specifically built their churches on Druid holy spots such as this. I suspect early Christians burnt this Bruidean down, then constructed a crude church on its foundations. You can still see the charred foundation stones. Then the Vikings destroyed the original monastery, and the next one was destroyed by the English army when Cromwell passed through. This is the last abbey to be built here. The Protestant plantations took all the good land in Ireland, but the Catholics held on to most of the good church sites.”

  “What more could you want?”

  The priest regarded Flynn for a long time, then spoke softly. “You’d better wake the lady before the tea gets cold.”

  Flynn rose and crossed the floor to where Maureen was lying, knelt beside her, and shook her. “Tea.”

  She opened her eyes.

  He said, “Hold on to me.” He stood her up and helped her to his stool. “How are you feeling?”

  She looked around the candlelit room. “Better.”

  Flynn poured the tea, and Father Donnelly extracted a pill from a vial. “Take this.”

  She swallowed the pill and took some tea. “Did the British come?”

  The priest felt her forehead. “Came and went. In a few days you’ll be on your way.”

  She looked at him, He was so accepting of them, what they were and what they had done. She felt disreputable. Whenever her life was revealed to people not in the movement, she felt not proud but ashamed, and that was not the way it was supposed to be. “Can you help us?”

  “I am, dear. Drink your tea.”

  “No, I mean can you help us … get out of this?”

  The priest nodded. “I see. Yes, I can help you if you want. It’s rather easy, you know.”

  Flynn seemed impatient. “Father, save souls on your own time. I need some sleep. Thank you for everything.”

  “You’re quite welcome.”

  “Could you do one more favor for us? I’ll give you a number to call. Tell the person who answers where we are. Tell them that Brian and Maureen need help. Let me know what they say.”

  “I’ll use a phone in the village in case this one is tapped.”

  Flynn smiled appreciatively. “If I’ve seemed a bit abrupt—”

  “Don’t let it trouble you.” He repeated the number Flynn gave him, turned, and disappeared into the narrow passageway.

  Flynn took the bottle of Dunphy’s from the table and poured some in Maureen’s teacup. She shook her head impatiently. “Not with the penicillin, Brian.”

  He looked at her. “We’re not getting along, are we?”

  “I’m afraid not.”

  He nodded. “Well, let’s have a look at the nick, then.”

  She stood slowly, pulled her wet sweater over her head, and dropped it on the stool. Flynn saw that she was in pain as she unhooked her bloodied bra, but he didn’t offer to help. He took a candle from the table and examined the wound, a wide gash running along the outside of her right breast and passing under her armpit. An inch to the left and she would have been dead. “Just a graze, really.”

  “I know.”

  “The important thing is that you won’t need a doctor.” The wound was bleeding again from the movement of her undressing, and he could see that it had bled and coagulated several times already. “It’s going to hurt a bit.” He dressed the wound while she stood with her arm raised. “Lie down and wrap yourself in the blanket.”

  She lay down and stared at him in the flickering light. She was cold, wet, and feverish. Her whole side ached, and the food had made her nauseous, though she was very thirsty. “We live like animals, licking our wounds
, cut off from humanity … from …”

  “God? But don’t settle for this second-class Popish nonsense, Maureen. Join the Church of England—then you’ll have your God, your respectability, and you can sit over tea with the Ladies’ Auxiliary and complain about the IRA’s latest outrage.”

  She closed her eyes, and tears ran down her cheeks.

  When he saw that she was sleeping, he took the cup of Dunphy’s and drained it, then began walking around the cellar. He examined the walls again and saw the scorch marks. How many times had this place been put to the torch? What made this location holy to both the Druids and the Christians? What spirit lived here in the heart of the earth? He carried a candle to the wooden chest and studied it. After some time he reached out and lifted the lid.

  Inside he saw fragments of limestone that bore ancient Celtic inscriptions and a few unidentifiable pieces of metal, bronze, rusted iron. He pushed some of the objects aside, revealing a huge oval ring crusted with verdigris. He slipped it on his ring finger. It was large, but it stayed on his finger well enough. He clenched his fist and studied the ring. It bore a crest, and through the tarnish he could make out Celtic writing around a crudely molded bearded face.

  He rubbed his fingers over the ring and wiped away some of the encrustation. The crude face stared back at him like a child’s rendering of a particularly fearsome man. He felt dizzy and sensed his legs buckling under him. He was aware of hitting the floor. Then he blacked out.

  CHAPTER 4

  Brian Flynn woke to find a face staring down at him.

  “It’s noon,” said Father Donnelly. “I’ve brought you some lunch.”

  Flynn focused on the ruddy face of the old man. He saw that the priest was staring at the ring on his finger. He got to his feet and looked around. Maureen was sitting at the table wearing a new pullover and eating from a steaming bowl. The priest had been there for some time, and that annoyed him. He walked over and sat opposite her. “Feeling better?”

  “Much.”

  Father Donnelly pulled up a stool. “Would you mind if I joined you?”

  “It’s your food and your table,” said Flynn.

  The priest smiled. “One never gets used to dining alone.”

  Flynn took a spoon. “Why don’t they send you a … monk or something?” He took a spoonful of stew.

  “There’s a lay brother who does the caretaking, but he’s on leave.” He leaned forward. “I see you’ve found the treasure of Whitehorn Abbey.”

  Flynn continued to eat as he spoke. “Sorry. Couldn’t resist the temptation.”

  “That’s all right.”

  Maureen looked up. “What are we talking about, please?”

  Flynn slipped off the ring, passed it to her, and motioned toward the opened chest.

  She examined the ring, then passed it to Father Donnelly. “It’s an extraordinary ring.”

  Father Donnelly toyed with the ring. “Extraordinarily large, in any case.”

  Flynn poured a bottle of Guinness into a glass. “Where did it come from?”

  The priest shook his head. “The last abbot said it was always here with the other things in that box. It may have been excavated here during one of the rebuildings. Perhaps under this floor.”

  Flynn stared at the ring in the priest’s hand. “Pre-Christian?”

  “Yes. Pagan. If you want a romantic story, it is said that it was a warrior king’s ring. More specifically, Fenian. It’s certainly a man’s ring, and no average man at that.”

  Flynn nodded. “Why not MacCumail’s ring? Or Dermot’s?”

  “Why not, indeed? Who would dare wear a ring larger than this?”

  Flynn smiled. “You’ve a pagan streak in you, Father. Didn’t Saint Patrick consign the departed Fenians to hell? What was their crime, then, that they must spend eternity in hell?”

  “No crime. Just born at the wrong time.” He smiled. “Like many of us.”

  “Right.” Flynn liked a priest who could laugh at his dogma.

  The priest leaned across the table. “When Oisin, son of Finn MacCumail, returned from the Land of Perpetual Youth, he found Ireland Christian. The brave warrior was confused, sad. Oisin rejected the ordered Christian society and longed with nostalgia for the untamed lustiness of old Erin. If he or his father, Finn MacCumail, came into Ulster today, they would be overjoyed at this Christian warfare. And they would certainly recognize the new pagans among us.”

  “Meaning me?”

  Maureen poured tea into three mugs. “He’s talking to you, Brian, isn’t he?”

  Father Donnelly rose. “I’ll take my tea in the refectory.”

  Maureen Malone rose, too. “Don’t leave.”

  “I really must.” His demeanor had changed from paternal to businesslike. He looked at Flynn. “Your friends want you to stay here for two more days. They’ll contact me and let me know the plan. Any reply?”

  Flynn shook his head. “No.”

  Maureen looked at Flynn, then at Father Donnelly. “I have a reply. Tell them I want safe passage to Dublin, a hundred pounds, and a work visa for the south.”

  The priest nodded. He turned to go, hesitated, and came back. He placed the ring on the small table. “Mister …”

  “Cocharan.”

  “Yes. Take this ring.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you want it and I don’t.”

  “It’s a valuable relic.”

  “So are you.”

  “I won’t ask you what you mean by that.” He stood and looked hard at the priest, then took the ring from the table and placed it on his finger. Several new thoughts were forming in his mind, but he had no one to share them with. “Thank you.” He looked at the ring. “Any curse attached to it that I should know about?”

  The priest replied, “You should assume there is.”

  He looked at the two people standing before him. “I can’t approve of the way you live your lives, but I find it painful to see a love dying. Any love, anywhere in this unloving country.” He turned and made his way out of the cellar.

  Flynn knew that Maureen had been talking to the priest while he’d been sleeping. He was having difficulty dealing with all that had happened in so short a time. Belfast, the old lady and the abbey, a priest who used pagan legends to make Christian statements, Maureen’s aloofness. He was clearly not in control. He stood motionless for a time, then turned toward her. “I’d like you to reconsider about Dublin.”

  She looked down and shook her head.

  “I’m asking you to stay … not only because I … What I mean is …”

  “I know what you mean. Once in, never out. I’m not afraid of them.”

  “You should be. I can’t protect you—”

  “I’m not asking you to.” She looked at him. “We’re both better off.”

  “You’re probably right. You understand these things better than I.”

  She knew that tone of voice. Remote. Sarcastic. The air in the cellar felt dense, oppressive. Church or not, the place made her uneasy. She thought about the coffin through which they had entered this hole, and that had been a little like dying. When she came out again she wanted to leave behind every memory of the place, every thought of the war. She looked at the ring on his hand. “Leave the damned thing here.”

  “I’m not only taking the ring, Maureen, I’m taking the name as well.”

  “What name?”

  “I need a new code name … Finn MacCumail.”

  She almost laughed. “In any other country they’d treat you for megalomania. In Northern Ireland they’ll find you quite normal, Brian.”

  “But I am normal.”

  “Not bloody likely.”

  He looked at her in the dim candlelight. He thought he had never seen anyone so lovely, and he realized that he hadn’t thought of her in that way for a long time. Now she was flushed with the expectation of new beginnings, not to mention the flush of fever that reddened her cheeks and caused her eyes to burn bright. “You may well
be right.”

  “About your being a lunatic?”

  “Well, that too.” He smiled at the small shared joke. “But I meant about you going off to Dublin.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be. I’m only sorry I can’t go with you.”

  “Perhaps, Brian, some day you’ll get tired of this.”

  “Not bloody likely.”

  “No.”

  “Well, I’ll miss you.”

  “I hope so,” she said.

  He stayed silent for a moment, then said, “I still don’t know if we can trust him.”

  “He’s a saint, for God’s sake, Brian. Take him for what he appears to be.”

  “He appears different to me. Something odd about him. Anyway, we’re not home free yet.”

  “I know.”

  “If anything happens and I don’t have time to make a proper parting … well …”

  “You’ve had time enough over the years to say what you felt. Time wasn’t the problem. Tea?”

  “Yes, please.”

  They sat silently, drinking their tea.

  Flynn put down his cup. “Your sister …”

  She shook her head. “Sheila is beyond our help.”

  “Maybe not.”

  “I don’t want to see anyone else killed….”

  “There are other ways….” He lapsed into silence, then said, “The keys to the jails of Ulster are in America.”

  A month later, when spring was firmly planted in the countryside and three weeks after Maureen Malone left for Dublin, Brian Flynn hired a car and went out to the abbey to thank Father Donnelly and to ask him about possible help in the future.

  He found all the gates to the abbey locked, and no one answered any of the pull bells. A farmer riding by on a cart told him that the abbey was looked after by villagers employed by the diocese. And that no one had lived there for many years.

  Book II

  New York

  English, Scotchmen, Jews, do well in Ireland—Irishmen, never; even the patriot has to leave Ireland to get a hearing.