by Oliver Sands
‘Sorry, Dervil. I’m sorry.’ Breeda slunk down in her seat and tried to slow her breathing. Oona leaned forward between the front seats.
‘Bree, what’s happening at Saint Colmcille’s?’
‘Oh, I’m just checking on Nora. Seeing if she’s OK. You know, with her arm and all …’
Breeda looked straight ahead at the church spire. The bloody thing looked no nearer than a moment ago. Her foot jabbed involuntarily at a phantom accelerator on the floor.
‘Poor Nora. She’s lucky you’re still talking to her, though, after everything.’ Oona rubbed her hand on Breeda’s upper arm, then sat back.
Breeda made a noncommittal noise. In front of her eyes the wipers swooshed rhythmically, and she now thought of Nora’s spare room – the springy mattress, the eerie crucifix above the bed, the sepia toned picture of Saint Brigid on the far wall. And her thoughts turned to what lay behind that picture of Saint Brigid. She remembered the concealed safe with its dark cavity full of bundles of bank notes and a framed seascape rumored to be worth something.
The Range Rover continued its journey up the soaked street towards the church. Breeda shifted in her seat. In the small space between her belly and her chest a slow and steady tugging apart was taking place. She turned her gaze to the drenched street and tried to push down the rising tide of panic. Her thoughts returned to the pub in London, two days before. She remembered sitting with her father in front of the fireplace, and how she’d experienced a sweet sense of release as she’d steadily fed the flames of her own pent-up anger. Her tongue could still taste the whiskey chasers that Mal had insisted on ordering for them both. And she could see them now, father and daughter, staggering slowly back amongst the evening commuters towards Mrs Bennett’s yellow front door. And somewhere in her muddy memory, Breeda could remember relishing the act of telling Mal all about the dodgy insurance policy, and Nora’s hidden safe with its greedy little hoard of contents.
A crack of lightning flared around them and lit up Saint Colmcille’s straight ahead.
‘Dervil, turn right!’
Breeda grabbed at the wheel and the car bounced over the lip of the roundabout.
Oona screamed, and Aidan lunged into the space between the front seats.
‘What the hell? Derv - pull over!’
‘Dervil – please. Drive.’
Breeda glanced at Dervil and saw the shock of fright on her face. But in that split second Dervil also seemed to catch the desperation in the eyes looking back at her. She put her foot down and the tyres ploughed up a cascade of water.
When they rounded the corner a moment later the color drained from Breeda’s face.
Outside Nora’s house sat a familiar white van.
Chapter 40
Breeda stood on the top step and pushed her shoulder against the solid black of the front door. It didn’t budge. Near the Range Rover, under a large golf umbrella, Aidan and Oona watched on. Breeda cast a glance at the white van, rain bouncing in bright sparks off its roof, then turned back to the front door and crouched down. Her wet hair lay plastered to her skull and she swept it back from the side of her head as she pressed her right ear tight to the letterbox.
Against the noise of the storm, from somewhere inside the house, came Nora’s voice, muffled yet defiant.
‘—got what you came for. Now get the hell out and don’t ever come back here.’
A thunder of footsteps cascaded down the stairs. Breeda straightened up and took a step back.
‘Shut up or I’ll break the other one.’
The front door swung open. Mal Looney’s face came to an abrupt stop inches from Breeda’s. Behind him, in the hallway, Nora stood breathless and unkempt, holding the cast on her broken arm. Spotting Breeda, her face faltered briefly, then found a tight smile.
‘Breeda!’
Breeda turned her attention back to her father. His eyes had softened, but a cool wariness now claimed his face. His backpack hung over one shoulder.
‘Dad? What’s going on? What are you doing here?’
A staccato of thunder cracked overhead. Breeda looked from her father, to her aunt, then back to him. His eyes seemed to have noticed her familiar yellow coat, and for a moment he stood entranced, lost in some old private memories. She lifted her hand towards his shoulder, but it stopped, suspended, unable to traverse the final few inches of air.
‘Dad?’
He looked back at her face now but held his tongue.
‘Your father and I were just having a quick catch-up. Weren’t we, Mal?’ Nora’s voice was strained with a cheery chumminess, and when Breeda looked at her aunt she could see her rubbing at the little crucifix at her neck. The two top buttons of her blouse were undone. Her eyes were red and puffy.
Mal Looney cleared his throat and shuffled the backpack on his shoulder.
‘Listen sweetheart, I’m sorry, but I just got a phone call. I need to get back to London.’
‘But you just got here?’
‘Yeah, I know. But it’s Mrs B. She’s had a fall.’
Mal looked over Breeda’s shoulder and noticed the couple sheltering under the umbrella. Now Nora spotted them too.
‘Breeda, let your father run along, and come inside for a nice cuppa. You’re soaked through. Come on …’
Nora wafted her good hand towards Breeda, beckoning her in out of the rain and away from prying eyes. But Breeda didn’t move. She closed her eyes and waited for it all to settle. It could all still be fine. They were telling her the truth, weren’t they? Mal had just popped over to see his long-lost sister-in-law and had just received an urgent phone call from London.
Breeda kept her eyes closed, then surprised herself, as the words came, slow and clear.
‘Dad, what’s in the backpack?’
She opened her eyes now. He was looking out beyond her, shifting on his heels, readying to leave.
‘Listen, Love. I’ll call you in a few days. Maybe arrange another visit, yeah?’
He had started down the steps now, and as Breeda turned she noticed the opening at the top of his backpack. A familiar edge was jutting out. She grabbed it firmly, and as he descended the middle step she pulled sharply upward. He spun quickly, but she had it aloft, her mother’s painting, half-stuffed in one of Nora’s old pillowcases.
He sprang up the steps and made a grab for it, but Breeda held it back behind her and kept him away with her other hand.
‘Dad, what the hell?’
‘That’s mine! Give it to me, Breeda. Give it to me now.’
He had squared up to her with clenched fists, a determined fire in his eyes. Over his shoulder Aidan bolted up the path, closely followed by Oona.
Now Nora tugged at Breeda’s sleeve, half-pleading, half-screaming.
‘Just give it to him and he’ll go. Please, Breeda. Good girl.’
‘Dad, please tell me this isn’t the reason you came back …’
He straightened up now.
‘No sweetheart, I wanted to see you, honest.’ He shot a withering look back at Nora. ‘I’m only taking what I’m owed. And God knows this one has made enough money out of me, haven’t you?’
Breeda glanced back at Nora and had to drop her gaze to the floor.
‘I’m so sorry, Aunt Nora. This isn’t what I wanted.’ Breeda closed her eyes and whispered to herself, ‘God, what have I done?’
She forced herself to look back at her aunt. Nora was attempting a forgiving smile, her eyes brimming with fresh tears as she clung to the banister with her one good hand. Breeda had never seen her look so wretched.
‘No harm done, Breeda. It’s fine. Let him go and you come in and get dry.’
Breeda shook her head, confused at Nora’s lack of protest.
‘No, it’s not fine, Nora. It’s anything but fine. Stupid, naive, clumsy Breeda. I just wanted … I just wanted answers. I wanted the truth and I had no one to give it to me.’ At this she gave Nora a pointed look, then turned back to face Mal. ‘And now …’ She looked at
the painting in her hands, saw him eyeing it, preparing to pounce ‘… And now I’ve got the truth right in front of my own eyes …’
Mal folded his arms across his chest, then winked towards Nora. ‘Oh, I dare say you’ve got most of the truth, my girl. But I reckon old Nora could fill in a few gaps.’
Breeda frowned at her father. She placed the painting down carefully inside the front door, far enough from his reach, and waited for him to elaborate. Behind her Breeda could hear Nora’s breathing coming in short, sharp little gasps. She had turned her head away from them and was clinging with her failing strength to the banister.
‘Nora, what does he mean?’
Mal sneered from the top step.
‘Go on, Nora. Tell my girl the real reason you wanted me gone from Dunry. Tell my darlin’ daughter why you made me disappear from her life …’
Nora was keening now, and Breeda watched on helplessly as the eerie sound echoed up the walls. She was suddenly terrified of where this was going. From outside came the sound of gravel crunching underfoot. Breeda and Mal turned. Oona and Aidan still stood under their umbrella, but now Myra Finch was scurrying up the path in a yellow plastic poncho, a face on her like a boiled beetroot. She went to push past the stranger on the doorstep, then stopped short when she saw the state of Nora. Her hand came to her mouth and she turned silently, her eyes searching theirs for explanation.
Mal seemed only too happy to have a larger audience.
‘Should I tell her for you, Nora? Well, Breeda, it turns out there wasn’t just one person in the family who disregarded the sanctity of marriage. Ain’t that right, Nora?’
He had walked into the hallway now, his wet boots leaving brown smears across the black and white tiled floor. With his every approaching footstep Nora’s body appeared to fold in on itself. By the time he spoke again, she had shrunken into a curled-up ball at his feet.
‘See, Nora paid us a visit one evening when your poor mother – God rest her soul – was in hospital getting her stomach pumped …’
Breeda could make out an urgent stream of whispers coming from the shape on the floor.
‘Please stop. Please stop. Please make him stop.’
Breeda wanted to go to Nora. Her hand reached out, a desperate need to soothe her aunt. But her feet were rooted to the floor, and she stood frozen, waiting. Whatever was coming, however painful it would be, she needed to know.
Mal continued. ‘After you went up to bed that evening, Breeda, your aunt took another whiskey – to warm her up from getting caught in the rain – and before you know it, well, let’s just say it’s the devout ones that make the most noise.’
Beyond the front door the rain seemed to have suddenly stopped. Breeda reached a hand to the wall, the tiles below her feet stretching and warping in her vision. An image spasmed into Breeda’s mind, a patchy memory of looking up from the telly to see Auntie Nora scuttling in from the dark street and shaking raindrops off her jacket. The memory had been a happy one. Breeda’s Dad had come back early from London that day and as he’d entered the living room Breeda had remembered the lovely sound of the ice cubes clinking in his favourite tumbler.
‘Stop lying, Dad. Just stop it!’
Nora’s body was shaking on the floor, and now Breeda did rush to her side. She knelt on the tiles and gently smoothed the waves of grey hair, trying to ignore the faint flare of deja vu. From his standing point above them Mal’s voice continued.
‘After that she wanted me gone cos she couldn’t bear to look at my face. Every time she saw me she was reminded of what she’d done.’ Mal started to clear his throat and for a dreadful second Breeda expected a gob of spit to land on Nora. ‘Not so holier than thou, after all, are you Nora Cullen?’
Breeda bent closer to her aunt.
‘It’s OK, Aunt Nora. He’s a liar. Just breathe.’
But beneath Breeda’s fingertips, Nora’s face had turned slightly towards the tiled floor. Breeda’s hand froze.
‘Aunt Nora—’ Breeda’s heart pounded and her words came raspy. ‘Aunt Nora … is he telling the truth?’
Nora’s wrinkles deepened as she squeezed her eyes shut. Breeda watched and witnessed a single tight nod. She pulled her hand back from the grey curls, the touch now too intimate. But she forced herself to lean in, and lowered her voice.
‘Did he force himself on you? Aunt Nora, did he rape you?’
The words felt odd, coming from niece to aunt, and Breeda watched as something seemed to break within the woman on the floor, something deep and brittle and irreparable. A tiny patch of pale papery skin above the old woman’s clavicle was pulsing wildly. Nora turned her head with effort, and the little rheumy blue-grey eyes cracked open and found Breeda’s. Her words were almost spent before leaving her lips, the saddest whisper barely able to take flight.
‘He didn’t force me.’
The eyes closed again, the shame too much, and as hot tears escaped, Breeda watched a small series of tremors pass in waves through Nora’s body, a valve released, a secret well tapped at last.
Breeda put her hand to Nora’s hair once more and tried to quieten the hurried stream of apologies she gasped. She understood it all so clearly now: Nora’s constant need for control and order, her church work and her tweed suits, her compulsion to be seen as a pillar of the community and her months of self-exile behind the high walls of the Dunry convent. It was all an ongoing attempt to put distance between that foolish woman from one night many years ago and this unblemished stoic version today. All of Nora’s deceit and manipulation – burning the birthday card, faking the heart attack, putting the house on the market – all of it was powered by an abject terror that this day, this moment, might come into existence. The whole stinking lot of it had been driven by shame and guilt, and Breeda had been dragged along for the ride.
Breeda rose to her feet and turned towards the front door. Mal had stepped back to get a proper view of the scene unfolding before him. A vengeful smile flitted briefly across his face, and Breeda felt a twitch come to her fists. In her head a roaring noise had started up and she inwardly cursed it. She didn’t want the blackness now. She needed to be present, to witness this scene through to its messy conclusion. She watched Mal’s expression change, the smirk replaced by a look of unease. Myra had turned. And now Oona and Aidan were staring into the hallway. They stood watching her, and she realised the noise wasn’t just in her head. It was coming up and out – primal and urgent – and now it carried her forward. Her hands smashed against his chest and face, and she battered and flailed and punched. Her eyes blurred – her own tears here now – and she watched his hands rise to protect his face. She thrashed and pushed and drove him backwards. And as he missed the top step and stumbled backward, she caught in his face a glimpse of surprise – something vital and candid – a flash of his younger self. He hit the ground in a messy backward sprawl, startled, impressed. Breeda watched him from the top step, her shoulders heaving, and raised a shaking hand to wipe her mouth.
Behind Mal on the wet gravel the backpack had given up its contents. Three thick rolls of fifty Euro notes had tumbled onto the path behind him and he remained blissfully unaware. Breeda readied herself to feel another sting of disappointment. But none came. He had used up all his credit and nothing he could do now could disappoint her further.
In the background Myra Finch was fussing over Nora on the floor. Aidan and Oona had moved to stand either side of Breeda. With their umbrella down Mal could see their faces for the first time. It took him a moment, and Breeda found herself savoring the etch of confusion on his face, as he clambered awkwardly to his feet for a closer look.
‘Well, I’ll be … You must be Adam.’
Mal’s right hand, wet and grazed from the gravel, extended up towards his son as he reached the first step.
‘It’s Aidan.’
Aidan looked out beyond his father and kept his hand resolutely down by his side. Breeda saw the apple rise and fall in his throat, and understood that
this moment would never be repeated, father, son and daughter, same place, same time.
Mal’s hand hovered for an awkward moment, as he sized up the situation: Malachy Looney had no friends here. The same hand made a sudden move to reach in behind Breeda’s ankles. She watched as it grabbed the painting.
‘I’ll just take what’s rightfully mine.’
In one smooth motion Aidan’s hand swung up and grabbed his father’s throat. The painting toppled back to its resting place as Aidan lifted him up and launched him back down the steps. Mal was prepared this time, his feet keeping him upright, but when he came to a stop he noticed the banknotes on the path. He looked towards Aidan, then Breeda, a flash of embarrassment in his eyes, before he stooped and stuffed the rolls back into the backpack. He zipped it up and stood, then looked over his shoulder at the white van.
This is it, Breeda thought. Two weeks of crazy had led to this moment, and now here it was, approaching the dysfunctional finish line. Breeda felt Oona’s arm link around hers. At the same time Aidan’s arm rested on her shoulder. The three of them looked out, Breeda in the middle, ready now.
‘You know what, Dad? Less than two weeks ago I thought you’d died when I was a girl. And finding that birthday card turned my world upside down. I fought to find you. I lost my home. I risked my sanity …’
Oona’s free hand rubbed at Breeda’s forearm.
‘I’d have gone to the edges of the earth for you—’ She heard the crack in her voice and knew more tears weren’t far off. ‘I really would. And the thing I wanted more than anything in the world was for you to be alive, and to make things right between us. But this mess…’ Breeda glanced at Nora, then turned back to her father. ‘… this mess was never mine to fix in the first place.’
He was watching her, the rain soft in the atmosphere around him, a distant shaft of oystery light stark against the murky sky. The fight seemed to leave his body as Breeda’s words seeped in. He suddenly looked miserable, standing in the drizzle, clothes soaked and backpack hanging, an abandoned boy on his first day at boarding school. Behind him, from the Range Rover, Dervil emerged. She closed the driver’s door quietly and observed the scene from the pavement.
