The Miracle Man (29 page)

“Aha!” the voice boomed from the doorway behind Cissy. “Who would’ve believed it? A senior citizens’ vice ring in Inisbreen. I suppose it was going to be three in a bed.”

“Mrs Megarrity! I’ll have you know that I am no part of this – charade! I simply came here to talk to this – “ she waved a dismissive hand at Limpy, “ – person, on a private matter.”

The trembling Mr Pointerly, in pulling his legs up in an attempt to lend himself a degree of modesty, merely succeeded in exposing even more of his anatomy.

“It’s all a – terrible mistake,” he said weakly.

“However,” Cissy continued, as if Mr Pointerly had not spoken, “I was obviously wasting my time. I’m hardly
surprised at this one,” she jerked her head at the naked contortionist, “but you, John. I can see now why you never married.” She took a step towards the bed. “This is obviously what you wanted – as well as to humiliate me. Well, have it. God alone knows how you got it in the first place.”

She flung the envelope and it landed on the floor near the bed.

“Cissy, no! Listen to me!” Limpy managed to break free and sit upright. “It’s not like ye think!”

“Don’t ever speak to me again, John McGhee,” Cissy said, and taking up a regal pose reminiscent of that of her elder sister, she pushed her way past the Winter Cook and hurried off down the corridor.

In three strides Mrs Megarrity crossed the floor and scooped up the envelope.

“I’ll take care of this, I think.”

“Lizzie! This is all your doing!”

“You,” she said, poking the envelope at him, “had better get your backside out of here before McAllister shows up. And could I remind ye,” she said to Mister Pointerly, who lay huddled on the bed with a dazed look on his face, “that ye’ll be expected to dress for dinner tonight.”

Fergus Keane knocked on Limpy McGhee’s door and waited. In his hand he clenched a rolled-up copy of the Daily Times which he was slowly beating against the side of his leg. After a few moments, the door scraped open and Limpy said in a doleful voice,

“I’m sorry, I’m not open for visitors until – ah! it’s yerself, young Fergus. I thought it was one of them nosey gits of visitors. Come on in.”

Fergus stepped gingerly into the room and was surprised to find that it had been changed into a place which was at least reasonably suitable for human habitation if not quite a desirable residence.

“What is this, Mr McGhee?” Fergus unrolled the Daily Times and held up the front page, on which there was a photograph of Limpy below a headline proclaiming, “‘VIRGIN MARY WINKED AT ME,’ SAYS MIRACLE MAN.”

“Ah yes,” Limpy said and gave a half-hearted laugh. “I told the man that was my best side.”

“But Mr McGhee, you’ve given your story to another paper! I gave you five hundred pounds for an exclusive in the Northern Reporter.”

Despite the melancholy look on his face, Limpy managed a little smile. He nodded slowly to the young journalist.

“Well, that’s right, Fergus, my deal with ye was exclusive. Exclusive of sufficient cash. The agreement I have with the Daily Times is – well – inclusive of more cash.”

Fergus threw the newspaper to the ground.

“So, for the sake of a few extra pounds, you break our agreement? That’s great. Thank you.”

Limpy bent and picked up the newspaper.

“Did they never teach you tidiness at home? Listen, the reason I went back on our agreement wasn’t for a few extra pounds.”

“It wasn’t?”

“No, it was for five thousand pounds.” He fixed the young reporter with a steady gaze. “I had to take it, Fergus son.”

“Five – thousand pounds?” Fergus gasped. It was doubtful if the whole Northern Reporter company was worth that much money. “But, what am I supposed to do? I told my editor I had an exclusive, and he’s expecting a series of articles.” Fergus looked crestfallen. “And that five hundred pounds – it was my own money.”

“Ah, ye never went and spent yer own money, did ye? If I’d’ve knowed that, young Fergus, I’d’ve never taken it off ye. What the hell sort of paper’s that ye work for, ye have to use your own money?”

“My editor – Harry Martyn – he wouldn’t give me the money. He – didn’t believe your story.”

To the young reporter’s surprise, the old man simply shrugged and said,

“Well, he’s not the only one.”

Limpy went over to a chest of drawers which was of Victorian vintage and yet appeared to have the lacerations of a millennia upon it.

“I was going to get in touch with ye anyway. I’ve got something for ye.”

Grasping a drawer handle he pulled. The drawer did not move, so putting his foot on the front of the chest of drawers he applied both hands and tried again. For a few seconds he heaved, before the drawer suddenly yielded and he went staggering back across the room and almost collided with Fergus.

“God damned dog. Would you believe he’s pissed on that chest of drawers too?” Limpy rummaged in the drawer he had liberated. “Made all the food damp.” He plucked out a buff envelope. “I was bloody glad when them biscuits was done, I can tell ye. Here.” He thrust the envelope at Fergus.

“What’s this?”

“It’s yer money back, plus a wee bonus.”

Fergus, who had intended to demand the return of his five hundred though with little hope of obtaining the full amount, looked suitably taken aback.

“A – bonus? For what, Mr McGhee?”

Limpy, having put the end of the drawer in its place, rammed it home with a kick of surprising agility for one of his age.

“Well now, Fergus, you set me on the road to fame and fortune, as ye might say, so there’s an extra hundred in there, just as a wee token of my appreciation for what ye’ve done.”

“Oh but Mr McGhee, I couldn’t possibly take a hundred
pounds from you. I mean, you must need it yourself and I would – ”

“Ah, it’s of no account to me,” Limpy said gruffly. “Not now, not now. Not – “ he gave a little sigh, “ – not when the one object of my heart’s desire won’t even listen to my heart-rendering pleas.” Slowly he shook his head. “What’s the point, eh? It’s hardly worth going on, so it isn’t.”

“I don’t understand, Mr McGhee.”

This time, Limpy gave a great sigh, this and his depressed state serving to wring the maximum sympathy from Fergus Keane.

“Miss Cissy Garrison, resident of the Glens Hotel – and one of the finest creatures ever to set foot on this earth. That’s why I took the five thousand. I never had enough money before to – ask her to marry me.” A forlorn look came upon his face and his shoulders drooped. He could have been eliciting money from his sister, the Winter Cook. “Her and me – we go back over forty years, so we do. And now – “ he grimaced, but managed to hold back a flood of emotion, “ – just when I thought her and me was getting together at last, she thinks I’m – one of them queers. It was all the fault of that old eejit Pointerly. Didn’t you see him in here the other night at his carry on.” He bowed his head and slowly drew it from side to side. “Now Cissy never wants to clap eyes on me again – living nor dead.”

Fergus swallowed to dispel the lump that had come to his throat.

“But, that’s so unfair. That stupid old bugger Pointerly, he wants to be – ”

“Ah now, the man means no harm, Fergus. He’s lonely, just.”

Fergus took a step nearer to the old man.

“Is there – anything at all I can do to help, Mr McGhee?” Limpy gave a brave laugh.

“Don’t be concerning yourself with an old man’s troubles,
son. Away you go and write your stories.” He winked. “I’ll make sure you get enough information to keep you going – five thousand or no five thousand.”

Fergus stood outside Limpy’s closed door and gazed across the field, the damp skin around his eyes cold where the wind blew over it. Poor Mr McGhee. Probably his last chance at happiness, pulled away from him like – a rug from under the feet of a drowning man. Fergus’s fists clenched by his sides. There must be something he could do. Here he was with the great power of the press coursing through his right arm, his hand wielding the pen that was mightier than the sword. What was its purpose, if not truth and justice, the righting of wrongs, the championing of the afflicted? Oh, there was something to be done all right, and he was the man to do it. Because if that bastard Harry Martyn had coughed up in the first place, Mr McGhee wouldn’t have these coals of – well, these burning coals heaped on him. Turning quickly away, he almost tripped over Limpy’s dog, which was about to cock his leg at him. The animal looked up at him with its sleepy eyes and as Fergus aimed a kick at it, the dog neatly side-stepped and narrowly missed ripping a large piece from Fergus’s trousers with its long yellow teeth. It had been too long at the game with Limpy McGhee to be caught out by an amateur.

Fergus lingered for some time in the telephone box, kneading his hands together as he tried out various approaches to Harry Martyn. He, Fergus Keane, had been on the verge of success. A scoop, no less. A great story with all the right ingredients – religion, medicine, a lonely old man restored to full health, a stream of holy water, crowds flocking to the miracle site and the prospect of more miracles to come. Despite what Harry Martyn had said, Fergus knew it was a story that could run for months. He had discovered it and brought it to the world, and all Harry Martyn could say was that it was boring and couldn’t he get a sex angle on it. The man couldn’t
lift his mind out of the gutter. And if he had paid up in the beginning, they’d still have an exclusive, and pieces with Fergus’s name above them would be getting syndicated in newspapers the length and breadth of the country, if not the globe. It was all Harry Martyn’s fault and, God damn it, he was going to tell him so in no uncertain terms.

When the telephonist answered, Fergus said,

“Get me Harry Martyn, right away!” but on hearing the gruff tones of his editor on the line, some of the young reporter’s courage ebbed away.

“Mr Martyn – eh – this is Fergus Keane. And I must say, Mr Martyn – I’m not very happy.” Firmness, that’s what was needed. He wasn’t going to be brow-beaten by a man that didn’t know when to sign a cheque for one of the best stories that had ever appeared in a newspaper.

“Keane?” The voice fairly boomed down the line, not at all the sound of a man who was about to be put in his place. “Fergus Keane? You’re not very happy? You’re not very happy? Listen, you jumped-up ink squirter, I’m not very bloody happy! In fact I’m not happy at all. I’ve had a doctor on from this Inis-whatever-the-hell-it’s-called, who says he’s going to sue the Reporter! Sue, for Christ’s sake! Do you realise what that could do to us? Close us down, that’s what!”

Suddenly Fergus began to tremble and he had to support the telephone receiver with his other hand.

“But – Mr Martyn – I don’t understand. Sue for what?”

“What the hell d’you think? For what you wrote about him.”

“But, I didn’t give the doctor’s name in the piece.”

“He said he’s the only doctor in the area and it would be obvious to anyone with half a brain that he was the man referred to. What you wrote was, quote, ‘Garbage from beginning to end,’ unbloodyquote. I have also, Keane, had the
Bishop of Down and Connor himself on the ‘phone, demanding your immediate resignation, due to the – I’ve written it down here – the ‘totally unwarranted imputation that the Church has accepted the happenings at Inisbreen as the workings of divine intervention, and the clear implication that the Church authorities, including myself, are a gathering of gullible dockheads’. I think he meant dickheads. What’ve you got to say about that, Mr Keane who’s not very happy?”

A red flush of anger swept over Fergus’s face and neck, and he found it difficult to speak.

“I – don’t understand, Mr Martyn. It’s true! Mr McGhee’s leg was cured and other people have seen the vision and – I might’ve exaggerated a little about the doctor, but – ”

“Keane, this story’s been nothing but trouble from the beginning. I told you it would be. So, you’re off it! D’you understand? Off! I want you back here, like, yesterday!”

“But, Mr Martyn, I can’t just – ”

“Back here, Keane. I’ve got at least a month’s worth of filing for you to do.”

“Mr Martyn, I – “ Fergus gulped and took a deep breath as the brainwave hit him. “If I was to come back now, I couldn’t follow up the sex angle on this story.”

The line from Ballymane fell silent. Then at last,

“What sex angle, Keane?”

“Oh, Mr Martyn, you wouldn’t believe some of the things this Miracle Man’s been up to.” Fergus smiled. Now he was on a roll. “In fact, I’m beginning to think this is the real reason they call him the Miracle Man.”

“Really?” There was the sound of a mouthful of tea being slurped and Harry Martyn enquired in a purring monotone, “What sort of things exactly was he doing, Keane?” Then he added urgently, “If you haven’t got enough change for that telephone box, give me your number and I’ll ring you back.”

“Well, at one time he used to – oh, look, I’ve got to go, Mr
Martyn. My contact has arrived. She’s – wow! can’t imagine those two together. Be in touch soon, Mr Martyn. Bye!”

“But Keane – !”

“Call you tomorrow,” Fergus shouted as the telephone was halfway to the cradle. And then he leant back against the side of the box, looked up at the cobwebbed light bulb and trembled at the sheer brilliance of what he had just done.

Nancy Quinn was a devout Catholic, at least when she was in the chapel, at school or in proximity to any person or thing that she felt had even a vague religious connection. Amongst her possessions was a bottle of holy water from the miracle site at the Mass Rock. She had brought the water away with her after a visit to the site, where she had knelt and prayed fervently for her current desires, namely a greater understanding by her ageing mother of the dress and mores of females in their mid twenties, the demise of a teenage pupil – she left the precise method to the wisdom of the Lord – who had groped her from behind in the crush for the exit at school lunch break, and a red Porsche, most especially a red Porsche. With this last item she was prepared to offer some help, as she now felt in a good position to put pressure on Dermot to part with some of the cash that he undoubtedly had piled up in his bank account. She would not even press him for a new car. A nice second-hand one would do just as well. And as she had been called into the headmaster’s office the morning after the unfortunate incident with Father Burke and the church committee and been given her walking ticket because she was “not a fit and proper person to teach young Catholic children”, she felt that guilt should play a significant part in persuading Dermot that she was deserving of such a present.