Turbulent Priests Part 36

*Mark . . .?'

*Blundell. Right at the end there a laughing boy. Worked for the Department of the Environment in Belfast. Remember him?'

Flynn shook his head. Looked from the corpse to me to Finaly and back. *Should I?'

I handed him the government ID card. Flynn studied it intently, then glanced back at the less healthy version. He shook his head again.

*He was killed and buried here about six years ago, if that's any help.'

*I wasn't here six years ago, Dan. You know that. I was still in Crossmaheart.'

I nodded. *So you were. That's you off the hook then.'

*I . . .'

*Joking,' I said.

The priest turned watery eyes on me. *What about the others?' he asked quietly.

*No idea,' said Finlay, nodding at the two still unidentified corpses, a little too slim now for their rotting jeans. *Who knows what the poor sods did? Wrong place, wrong time. Didn't believe. Or believed too much. Or in something else.'

*This is crazy,' Patricia said, hooking her arm through mine.

*Madness,' said Moira. She shook her head. *It wasn't meant to be like this.'

*What was it meant to be like?' I asked.

She shrugged. *It's all . . .' she began, the freezing wind causing her to hug herself tightly, *it's all been like a dream so far. Real, but not real, do you know what I mean? Just us, here, n.o.body could touch us. I didn't really have to think about what might happen next.'

*Others were doing that,' I said.

*Not like this,' said Flynn, *not in a million years. I don't understand why . . .' He shook his head miserably. *Why would anyone want to tarnish such a wonderful . . .?'

*Power,' said Dr Finlay, *and control.'

I nodded at his side. *This is the biggest thing since sliced bread.'

*But this is about Christine, innocence and love and . . .'

*Father,' I said, *it may have escaped your notice, but half the deaths in the whole b.l.o.o.d.y history of the world have been about religion. It's nothing new.'

*But it . . . felt like something new.'

*Aye, well,' said Dr Finlay.

Flynn suddenly stamped his foot in the mud. It wasn't the greatest idea, as mud flew everywhere, but n.o.body complained; the priest's jaw was now set firm and there was a new and determined look in his eyes. *Moira, we can't let Christine's name be tarnished by all this. We'll go back to town. We'll call a meeting. We'll confront Father White. Expose him. Throw him and anyone else involved in this off the island. We have to bring all of this to an end.'

He wasn't looking for a debate. He turned and strode quickly towards the Land-Rover.

*Talk about mood swings,' said Patricia. I nodded. She was an acknowledged expert on the subject.

The doctor followed him. *Frank, let's not be too hasty. There's nothing to be gained by rushing in.'

Flynn's eyes blazed with his new-found missionary zeal. *Either come with me, or stay here, Doctor.'

The doctor turned back to us and raised his palms in exasperation as the priest climbed behind the wheel. Then Patricia and I, plus the baby, hurried to the vehicle. Moira hesitated, shaking her head vaguely at the corpses.

*Father,' she called, *we can't just leave them like this.'

Flynn ignored her. He started the engine.

*Come on, Moira,' Patricia shouted as she shifted Little Stevie up onto her shoulder in order to climb into the back. *They aren't going anywhere.'

But they were. Seagulls were circling.

We decided to leave Dr Finlay's vehicle for the time being. The inside was caked with mud and little bits of rotting flesh, so we all squeezed into Father Flynn's. It was a little uncomfortable, but not as uncomfortable as having your chest shot out and the maggots holding their annual convention in your lower intestine.

Patricia told me wordlessly to hold Little Stevie. I took him. I had a little ground to make up with her. About the size of Australia. Stevie's eyes were bright and darting. I cooed at him. His ginger hair looked a little darker than I remembered, and I thought maybe there was hope for him, anyway.

*How come,' I said as Father Flynn roared towards the town, *you lot all arrived together?'

Patricia barely opened her mouth. *Like I say, I was worried. G.o.d knows why, for all the consideration . . .'

*Just tell me, would you?' I snapped.

*I am telling you,' she snapped back. *I was worried.'

*So you ran to Father Flynn.'

*No, actually.'

*You ran to Moira, then . . .'

*No, again. They came to me.'

*They just happened to come out on a social call a like at what, eight in the morning?' I glanced at Moira, and then away, just in case Patricia's mood was more to do with a sordid revelation than . . .

*Christine told us to come,' Moira said.

I sighed.

*She did,' Moira said. *She was up half the night. Couldn't sleep. Having nightmares. I didn't know whether it was an upset stomach or the end of the world. She kept saying she had to go to the hedgehog house. I didn't know what to do. I mean, you can't do every silly thing your child tells you, but then . . .'

*The Messiah, yeah, I know.'

*So I took her to Frank's.'

*Lucky it wasn't Father White's.'

*Frank drove us out. And a good thing too. Patricia was in a real state.'

*I was not.'

Christine stood in the front, nose pressed against the window, head shooting from side to side with the rhythm of the windscreen wipers. Dr Finlay sat behind her, holding her waist so that she wouldn't take a tumble as Flynn urged the vehicle along the narrow lanes.

Patricia touched my arm. *I didn't know whether to say where you were, but when you didn't come back, I thought something terrible had happened, that you might be . . .'

I lifted her chin up. *Hey. You did the right thing.'

She gave me a wee smile. A kissy-on-the-nose smile. Which I did. *Would you have done the same, Dan, for me?' she asked.

*Well, I might have given it a couple more hours,' I said.

At the edge of town, the doctor insisted that Flynn stop the car. And the priest did, but without good grace. *What?' he snapped impatiently.

Finlay spoke calmly. *Frank, I know you're angry, but are you sure it's the wisest thing to just charge in and accuse Father White like this?'

*I'm not accusing him of anything. There's nothing to prove. All the evidence is there.'

*Okay, granted. But think of it. You know as well as I do that Father White isn't responsible for those deaths alone. He had help. He didn't shoot six people dead, drag their bodies out there, and then bury them. Friends, followers, disciples, call them what you will, but he had their help, and most likely they're with him now. If they can kill six . . .'

*When I inform the Council, it will take the correct-'

*d.a.m.n the Council, Frank! Don't you think some of them must be in on it as well?'

It was an obvious thought, but one that had not occurred to him, and for a moment Flynn's new-found determination seemed to waver. His face looked as innocent as Christine's had been before discovering the corpses. *I would have known about it,' he said.

Finlay raised his eyebrows. *You think so?'

Flynn started the engine again.

I put a hand on his shoulder. *White has the capacity to kill six people. Maybe we should think about dropping the women off. And Christine.'

*He's not going to shoot Christine!'

*We stay together, Dan,' Patricia said. *Safety in numbers.'

*I don't think you should take our baby in there.'

*Our baby?'

*Yes,' I said.

*Well, if he's our baby, his place is with us.'

I turned to Moira. She shook her head. *Christine's the boss, he wouldn't dare do anything.'

I looked at Finlay. *Looks like the troops aren't falling into line,' I said.

He opened his mouth to speak, but Christine thumped the window and gave an excited little yell. She pointed.

The town was still out of sight around the next bend, but there was a very definite funnel of thick black smoke billowing up into the air above it.

37.

Father White, grinning, sweating, signalled for the school gates to be opened, then watched as Father Flynn rolled our vehicle down the slight incline.

For a few moments after he pulled on the hand-brake, all we could do was stare.

A bonfire had been lit in the yard; children, working in relays, fed the flames with armfuls of books from the schoolroom. Round about them, shouting encouragement, stood half a dozen armed men. Worst of all: Duncan, hands tied, on his knees before the fire, grubby, muddy, a nasty-looking gash on his head, the side of his face caked with blood.

*Jesus Christ,' I said.

Curling black pages swirled upward in the wind. Sparks dashed everywhere.

Flynn recovered first. He jumped angrily from behind the wheel and hurried round to confront his colleague. *What on earth is going on?' he shouted.

Father White smiled broadly. *We're burning filth, that's what we're doing!' He turned to the kids and clapped his hands together. *That's it! Pile them on! Burn them up!'

Flynn looked anxiously back at us as we climbed out. Dr Finlay came round to the front of the vehicle, shaking his head in disbelief. *You can't burn books,' he said, flatly.

*Of course we can,' snapped White, *when they're filth!'

The doctor kicked his foot into the dirt. *This isn't n.a.z.i Germany.'

*Actually,' I pointed out, *it might be.'

There was a wild look about the priest. The adrenaline had taken over, or the madness. *We're not burning school books!' he exclaimed. *We're burning this pervert's private collection! A private library of filth! Would you believe he keeps it in the cla.s.sroom where any child can be exposed to it?'

Duncan, his head hanging down, spat out a mouthful of blood. *It's not filth,' he said groggily. I'd grown to like Duncan a little bit; he didn't strike me as the type to have kiddy p.o.r.n; he was a single man on a remote island, you couldn't blame him for having some p.o.r.n even if it wasn't much more than top-shelf stuff. But somehow I doubted that White's definition of filth coincided with mine.

Flynn was becoming increasingly incredulous. *I can't believe you've done this,' he said, trying to get past White, towards the fire, or Duncan, or both. But White stayed where he was.

*He tried to stop us, Frank!' White hissed. *We came to tell him first thing, to do it quietly, without fuss, simply take them away, but he wasn't here. And then he arrived covered in mud like a pig in a poke and attacked us. He's a dirty stop-out and he got hurt. I'm sorry, Frank, but it's the law.'

Startled, Flynn's head snapped away from the fire. *What law? There's no law against books, man!'

*But there is, Frank. It's Council law.'

*What?'