The Ballymara Road

by Nadine Dorries

  ‘Get away with ye,’ she laughed. ‘Ye love it when I mess yer hair up now. Where’s yer mate then? Little Paddy?’

  ‘He’s coming over now. His mammy has sent him with the pram to fetch a bag of coke. He will be back in a minute.’

  Sometimes Kathleen wondered if Maura and Tommy were handling things the best way. Since Kitty’s death, Harry always seemed to be hiding in a book.

  When the girls had finished babbling, Maura sat next to Kathleen with her own cup of tea.

  ‘Well, sure, that’s got them two going and our Angela laughing and, God knows, that isn’t easy. She works miracles, that Harriet.’

  ‘Tell ye what, Maura.’ Kathleen’s face lit up as she carefully placed her cup back on the saucer. ‘Why don’t ye take the mop out and let’s get the others in. This Rose Queen is big news. We had better start planning. Where are we going to find the frocks for this lot for a start? It’s time for a pow wow.’

  For a moment, Maura didn’t respond. Over the past six months she hadn’t banged on the wall once for her neighbours to meet in her kitchen for a natter. She wasn’t sure if she was ready for rapid chatter and street gossip.

  What did any of it matter? Their Kitty was dead, drowned. Who cared a fig about gossip? She looked sideways at Kathleen.

  ‘Go on, love,’ Kathleen urged her gently. ‘Knock on for Peggy. They have all been patiently waiting and, sure, aren’t the best days any of us have ever had been spent in this kitchen? We have solved more problems and had more laughs than most people do in their whole lives, sitting round your table. Everyone has been worried sick about you, Maura. Knocking on would be a sign to them and I think they deserve that.’

  ‘Go on, Maura.’ Kathleen put her hand on Maura’s arm. ‘Time to take the next step and this Rose Queen, ’tis a God-sent opportunity now.’

  Maura sighed, knowing Kathleen was right. She walked over to the back door, picked up the mop and, as had always been the tradition, banged the handle against the wall that adjoined Peggy’s kitchen, with three loud thumps.

  The children fell silent. After a moment that seemed to last forever, they all heard it, Peggy knocking on her wall three times for Sheila. Moments later, Maura’s neighbours began trotting down her path, chatting to each other, their heads full of bobbing curlers, balancing babies on hips, with cigarettes half smoked in one hand and their babies’ bottles in the other. Each one walked over to Maura and hugged her.

  They had been waiting patiently for Maura to let them know when she was ready. Now, they couldn’t keep the smiles off their faces. Maura had turned a corner and they were turning it with her. Every single one of them breathed a sigh of relief when the Nelson Street mops once more began knocking.

  ‘Enough of that,’ shouted Nana Kathleen from the sink where she was in the process of filling the kettle. ‘There’s tea to be drunk and who has brought the biscuits?’

  ‘I have, Kathleen,’ said Deirdre above the chatter. ‘I have a bag of broken which I got from the tin, in Keenan’s.’

  ‘And I’ve brought a brack, I made one extra today,’ said Sheila, taking her plate to the press. ‘Shall I run and fetch Annie?’

  ‘Do you know, that’s not a bad idea, Sheila. Aye, ’tis is a grand idea. The more the merrier.’

  And with that, Sheila was back out of the door and across the entry to fetch Annie, back to where the beating heart of the four streets traditionally rested. In Maura’s kitchen.

  As they settled round the table, the chatter was so loud, Kathleen would have to shout to be heard. She breathed a deep sigh of relief. It felt as though she had been holding her breath for months and, for the first time, she could relax.

  Suddenly there was an unfamiliar, tinkling sound. Little Harry looked up from his book and, catching Nana Kathleen’s eye, he smiled. It was the sound of Maura laughing. A sound they had all forgotten.

  17

  AFTER HER MEETING with Sister Evangelista, Daisy walked down the convent steps with a confidence and self-assurance that had been wholly absent during the time she had worked as the dead priest’s housekeeper. Sister Evangelista had insisted that Daisy stay with them in the convent guest room, until her brother arrived to collect her. As she reached the bottom step, Daisy spotted Harriet rushing down the Priory driveway.

  ‘Morning, Daisy, love, isn’t it a glorious day?’ Harriet shouted across to her as she turned and almost ran down Nelson Street in the direction of Maura Doherty’s house.

  Daisy waved across the road and smiled. Although it was early, the river already shimmered in the bright sunlight. From years of observing how the river responded to the weather, Daisy could tell that today would be a scorcher. She liked Harriet. It was a very strange feeling seeing her run out of the house that had been Daisy’s prison. She had arrived at the Priory as a young girl not knowing that it was the place where her childhood would be stolen.

  Daisy had been nervous about her meeting with Sister Evangelista. Once she had finished her breakfast with Alison and the nuns, she had taken out Maggie’s note and read it again. It told her exactly what she had to say and to whom she had to say it. This morning, it had been Sister Evangelista’s turn.

  Although the school was empty, with the children at home for the holidays, Sister Evangelista had been working in the school office.

  ‘Morning, Daisy, come on in,’ she said as she pulled out a chair next to her desk. ‘I’m just preparing the lessons for next term as I want to visit Ireland myself. It is time I had a little break.’

  Sister Evangelista had been alarmed to discover that whilst they had thought she was lost, Daisy had been held like a prisoner at the new convent near Galway. Sister Evangelista knew the Reverend Mother well, as Sister Theresa was related by blood to the bishop. Like the police, Sister Evangelista had plans to pay a visit to the convent personally and discover just what had been occurring.

  She wanted to find out for herself who had told the police officer to take Daisy to St Vincent’s and why. There were many hidden secrets still to be uncovered and she should know; she was probably hiding the very worst.

  ‘Sister, I have something to say.’ Daisy sounded very serious.

  Sister Evangelista looked at Daisy, slightly amazed. This was the girl who would never say boo to a goose. Who would ever have thought it? Such a transformation.

  Daisy continued, ‘Sister, you and I, we found photographs in the priest’s desk that were very bad.’

  ‘Aye, we did, Daisy, but they are burnt now and that is all over.’

  ‘Well, they weren’t all burnt, Sister. There are some in the safe in the cellar and I don’t think it is all over. If it was, I wouldn’t have been taken to the convent, would I? There was a reason I was taken there—’

  ‘What safe?’ Sister Evangelista interrupted Daisy.

  Sister Evangelista felt the return of a familiar feeling of panic that she was sure she would never shake off. Every night before she went to sleep, she often wondered: was this the effect of shock? Would she spend her remaining years looking over her shoulder, jumping each time a telephone rang or a door slammed? Her life until recently had been one of serenity and devotion. The most serious problem she ever had to tackle was a severe outbreak of nits at the school.

  Since she had opened the desk drawer of the dead Father James and found it stuffed full of those disgusting photographs, nothing had been the same. As she closed her eyes at night, the images of schoolchildren once entrusted to her care swam before her eyes. It took prayers and tears to wash them away.

  ‘The safe in the wall in the cellar,’ Daisy said. ‘Father James asked me to put a cardboard box of photographs in it. He kept them in there for a man called Arthur. He didn’t like the dark, did Father James. At night he always liked the landing light to be left on. Down in the cellar, it is very dark, so he always sent me instead. I had the notion he was scared.

  ‘There were some big flat round tins as well, with films in. Sometimes Arthur used to come to the Priory to coll
ect them and sometimes he brought them to the father. Quite often, the two men who worked at the hospital came. You remember them, Sister, they came to the convent one night when the bishop sent them to collect me. ‘But you know, Sister, it wasn’t only Father James who was a bad man, it was the bishop too. I have to tell the police about that now. But I also have to tell them about the photographs in the desk drawer, the ones which you burnt.’

  Sister Evangelista felt as though she were falling.

  ‘No, Daisy,’ she whispered. ‘Do you realize what that would do? I am not fond of the bishop any more than you are, now, but he would be arrested and I might be as well. God only knows what would happen to the church and the school. Haven’t I always taken care of you, Daisy? I think the best thing is if we keep all this to ourselves and make sure those two hospital porters get their come-uppance. But, please, keep it just between us about the bishop and Father James. Let us keep as our secret the photographs we found in the desk.’

  ‘I can’t, Sister.’ Daisy’s voice sounded stronger than she felt. ‘I can’t, because although you have been good to me since the father died and you are a good and kind Reverend Mother, you haven’t always done the right thing. For years I was stuck in that Priory with Father James doing to me the same things you saw in the photographs, and the bishop too. And you want me to keep that just between us? I can’t do that, Sister. I can’t. I have to tell the police everything. That’s what Maggie told me I had to do.’

  Shocked, Sister Evangelista was unable to speak. Her life had been sent out of control with her future spinning away from her.

  ‘I will also give the police the key to the cellar safe. I took it with me, because Father James told me to never let anyone have it and to always keep it hidden when he wasn’t around. Maggie told me, that now that he is dead, I don’t have to do that any more.’

  ‘Who is this Maggie?’ Sister Evangelista almost screamed the words.

  ‘She is the person who looked after me and smuggled me out of the St Vincent’s convent and got me back home. She told me I was no more simple than she was, Sister. Maggie said I only couldn’t speak very well because no one ever spoke to me and I thought I was simple because everyone told me I was. Maggie said, if people didn’t use their brains and keep their wits about them, everyone would be simple. Maggie told me, no one should keep secrets with the devil himself. If we don’t tell the police, Reverend Mother, that is what we would be doing. That’s not the right thing, is it? You should meet Maggie. You would really, really like her.’

  With that, Daisy stood up and, with her head held high, she walked out of Sister Evangelista’s office.

  18

  ‘IS HE STILL sleeping?’ Mrs McGuire leant across and whispered to Mary.

  She was sitting next to her daughter in the back seat of a taxi, travelling from the airport to Galway. The bags piled between them were now full of wet terry-towelling nappies and everything a baby could possibly need on a journey from Chicago to Galway.

  Alice travelled in a cab following on with the remainder of the bags.

  A large carrycot was wedged into the front seat and was also full of baby accessories. As she spoke, Mrs McGuire craned over the pile of bags to take a peep at the baby lying on her daughter’s lap. He had slept for almost the entire journey.

  Having had a blood transfusion before they left for Ireland, the sickly boy had transformed into a jolly pink bundle of joy.

  ‘Aye, he is, but not for long, I reckon. He will have me awake all night now,’ an exhausted Mary replied.

  With a sigh, she gently ran her thumb across the latest dark bruise to appear on his leg. The gesture alone spoke volumes.

  ‘Look, Mammy, he’s dying in my lap. This bruise, it tells me so.’

  Mrs McGuire pushed a bag aside and slipped her arm round her daughter’s shoulders, her own gesture of concern encompassing both her daughter and her baby.

  Mrs Mcguire was delighted they were returning home, even though, given the circumstances, that feeling had to be wrong. This made her feel guilty, which was the default position for every self-respecting Roman Catholic.

  If the child had not been as sick they would never have attempted the journey whilst he was so young and it would have been a very long time before she set foot once again in her village on the outskirts of Galway.

  However, Mary had insisted Mrs McGuire came too. She would find it hard to travel to Ireland alone with Dillon. If she had to travel to find his birth mother, they would do it together.

  Mrs McGuire still knew her way around every back kitchen in every house in her village and, despite the many years she had spent in Liverpool and Chicago, Galway was the only place that truly felt like home.

  ‘That’s the thing about home,’ Mary had explained to her. ‘No one is anonymous. The chances are, someone we know will know someone who knows the people we are looking for and that’s why I need you, Mammy, because, sure, don’t you know half of the people in Ireland anyway.’

  Every sensible person they knew in Chicago had tried to persuade Mary to leave the baby behind. She had refused to budge.

  ‘He has been ours for only a few months and I have waited my whole life for him. I will not be parted from him for a day. God in heaven, he will have forgotten who his mother is if I leave him.’

  Henry gave up trying to stop Mary from doing what she wanted to do. ‘Jesus, she’s like a woman possessed,’ he had said to Sean as they stood in the garden, watching the new gardeners prune Henry’s conifers. Henry didn’t trust anyone to do anything he couldn’t do himself. He might be a rich man now, but if he had had the time to do his own garden, he would have done.

  ‘Ever since the baby has been sick, there has been no talking to her. She’s driven, so she is. She will do whatever it takes to make him better and I for one am not standing in her way.’

  ‘I wouldn’t try, Henry,’ Sean had replied. ‘She is her mother’s daughter. Nothing you can say will make a ha’p’orth of difference. Da would vouch for that if the poor man were still alive.’

  Henry nodded in agreement as he lit two cigarettes and handed one to Sean.

  ‘I’m glad Alice is travelling with Mary and Mammy to Ireland. I think it will take the three of them to manage the baby and all the luggage. I would feel better if she were with them.’

  Sean agreed. Maybe Alice herself needed a break. They had been arguing a great deal of late. Sean was finding it impossible to say or do anything to please Alice. It felt as if everything had become an effort. Every single day at some point they would have the same argument and the last time had been just hours ago.

  ‘Get your hands away from me,’ Alice had said as she stormed out of bed. ‘I am not falling for that. I know what your plan is. I have an appointment at the doctor’s office today and I’m asking him for the new birth control pill. It takes a month to work and then I am safe. Until then you can keep your hands to yourself.’

  As the bathroom door banged shut, Sean lay on his back and remembered Brigid, who had done everything in her power to make him happy. The images of his daughters’ faces swam before his eyes as tears prickled. He wished it was he who could have travelled home and kept Mary company because, if it had been possible, wild horses wouldn’t have kept him from visiting his children. For the first time, Sean realized he was a wealthy man. He had all he had ever dreamt about and yearned for, but without a loving wife and children to share it with, what did any of it mean?

  He turned his head towards the bathroom door.

  An en suite bathroom. Who had ever heard the like? He imagined the expressions on his children’s faces if he could show them around Mary’s house, how beyond excited they would be. He could see Emelda and Patricia bouncing up and down on his king-sized bed, jostling each other as usual to be picked up first. Then he saw the deep blue eyes of his baby, looking up at him trustingly from the pram as he had bent down to place a kiss on her cheek the morning he had left her, for the last time.

  He all
owed his tears to flow, because he knew that to see them all again was a dream that would never materialize.

  As the taxi bumped along the uneven road, Mrs McGuire looked out of the window at the familiar countryside. She had already sent a letter on ahead to her daughter-in-law, Brigid, and her grandchildren, to let them know she would be visiting as soon as she arrived in Ireland. Neither her son, Sean, nor his mistress, Alice, were aware of this but, as far as Mrs McGuire was concerned, no one would keep her away from her own granddaughters, certainly not her son’s fancy bit on the side.

  ‘Are you sure you don’t want to come with Alice and me to the convent tomorrow, Mammy?’ asked Mary in a whisper, careful not to wake the sleeping baby.

  ‘No, Mary, ye and Alice go. I have friends I want to catch up with and I have the taxi booked to take me. No point me coming all this way back home now and not saying hello to my friends, is there? That would just be a waste of a visit now. Ye and Alice, sure, that’s enough to be dropping in on the nuns unannounced.’

  ‘Well, if you are sure, Mammy. I don’t want ye to think I don’t want ye with me.’

  ‘Sure, child, why would I think that? Just because my blockhead of a son thought I shouldn’t visit my grandchildren? I know what’s going on in his head all right. He doesn’t want me carrying tales to Brigid and the girls about him and Alice. He should have stopped the boxing years ago. I swear to God it sent him mad.’

  Mary looked out of the back window of the taxi. Alice was now following closely behind them in the second taxi.

  ‘Are you off to see Brigid, Mammy?’ Mary had seen right through her mother’s story of visiting her friends and knew exactly what she was up to.

  ‘I am, Mary, and nothing ye or anyone else can say is going to stop me. I almost brought those girls up. Your brother broke my heart, leaving them all like he did and landing us with that harlot back there.’ This with a backwards nod towards Alice.