The Miracle Man (31 page)

“Jasus McGonagle!” Dan Ahearn said when Limpy brought him and Pig Cully out the side door of O’Neill’s pub, “that’s one helluva vehicle, McGhee. You could get half a dozen of sheep in the back of that bus.” He clapped his hands together and shook his head in amazement. “Tell me this, now. Would she be hard on the fuel?”

“Oh, easy enough, Dan, easy enough,” Limpy told him, as
if from a lifetime of automotive experience. “She’ll do me rightly for a runabout, so she will.”

“Damn me, a runabout! It’s yerself has the style, McGhee.”

With cap down over his eyes and hands thrust deep into his trousers pockets, Pig Cully was inspecting the old Ford. He gave one of the wings a kick and a shower of rust fell to the ground.

“How much did ye pay for her, McGhee?” he demanded.

“Five hunnerd,” Limpy told him, with a shrug of indifference.

“Ye were robbed, McGhee. It’s got terminal tinworm. A feckin’ pile of rust on wheels.”

“Ah now, I wouldn’t say that, Cully,” Dan Ahearn said. “I wouldn’t say that at all.”

“She’s damn all of the sort, Cully. I know a class vehicle when I see one,” Limpy said, and patted the fading paintwork. “And once I get this thirst off me I’ll take the two of yez for a run in her. Then yez’ll know what a motor vehicle should be like.”

In O’Neill’s snug, Limpy ordered pints of stout and whiskies for the three of them and insisted on paying, an action which met with no resistance from either Cully or Ahearn. When young O’Neill brought the drinks in, a rare honour in the pub, Limpy asked him,

“Are there any of them newspapermen in the bar, son?”

“A whole rake of them, Mr McGhee. Been there since opening time. Drinking like there was no tomorrow, so they are.”

“Good business for ye, son, good business. That’s because I’m what’s known as a commercial asset.” Limpy did not quite know what a commercial asset should feel like, but he knew that it felt a lot better than his previous status had done. He stuck out his chest beneath the old suit he had taken to wearing and assumed an air of importance. “Don’t ye be letting on to
them I’m in here, son. Even a public figure has to have a bit of privacy now and again.”

Pig Cully grunted and said “Jasus,” under his breath.

“Is that your vehicle out there, Mr McGhee?”

“It certainly is, son. Just purchased today. D’you like her?”

“Oh, she’s some machine, Mr McGhee. That’s the kind of thing I’ll be getting one of these days. By Christ it is,” he added, showing that, out of earshot of the Mother, he could be just as much a man as any of them.

“Ach, yer mother wouldn’t even let ye buy a kiddie car, O’Neill,” Pig Cully told him. “She has ye under the thumb good and proper.”

The young man’s face went red and he banged the glasses down in front of Pig Cully.

“We’ll see about that, Mr Cully, so we will. We’ll bloody well see about that,” he said and stalked out of the room.

When Limpy had downed his stout and whiskey in double-quick time and ordered the same again all round, he leant on the table, eyed his two companions and said,

“Boys – I’ve got an announcement.” He cleared his throat. “I’m planning on throwing a party.” He looked from one to the other to see their reaction. Dan Ahearn seemed a little confused by this and turned for guidance to Pig Cully, who slowly lowered his front chair legs to the floor and pushed back his cap to reveal his little piggy eyes.

“A party, McGhee? What for?”

Limpy leant back in his chair and took on what he supposed was a regal air.

“To celebrate my good fortune, of course – and to have a bloody good time. A good-going party, boys, with plenty of music and drink and grub. I’ll be paying. What d’yez think?”

At the sound of the magic phrase “I’ll be paying”, Pig Cully’s interest noticeably quickened and there was a slap as Dan Ahearn’s hands came together in confirmation.

“I think ye might just have something there, McGhee. A party, eh? When were ye thinking of having it?”

“Saturday night, Cully. At your house,” Limpy said.

“At – what?”

“At your house. There’s not enough room in mine to swing a cat.”

Dan Ahearn said,

“Now there’s a thing I never rightly understood. What for would anybody be wanting to swing a cat?”

The other two men ignored him.

“Well, maybe ye’ve got a point, McGhee.” Cully’s face took on a lascivious look. “Some of us might be wanting a bit of privacy before the night’s out, ye know what I mean? So, who were ye thinking of inviting to this party, then?”

Limpy glanced at the other two men and suppressed a smile.

“Oh – anybody that’s seriously interested in having a good time. I’ve been going over her in my mind, so I have.” He leant forward and jabbed a finger on the table-top. “And I tell yez, I’m going to have the best damned party ever seen this side of Ballymane.”

“And I can invite anybody I want?” Pig Cully inquired, his interest now thoroughly aroused.

“Ye certainly can – as long as it’s female.”

“Well then,” came the reply, “I’ll be inviting – Peggy May.”

“That, my friend,” Limpy said, “is your purgative. And what about you, Ahearn? Ye want to come to the party of a lifetime – food, drink, women, dancing? Could ye stick the pace?”

Despite being in his early fifties, Dan Ahearn’s experience with women was largely confined to his sister and his late mother. The thought of being in close and lengthy proximity to eligible females appeared to be more than he could take in at one sitting. He grimaced and his big bony hands kneaded each other.

“Jesus McGonagle,” he said softly. “A party – with women?” He shook his head at the enormity of the thought. “By jeez, that’s a big one, boys. I’ll need to do a bit of thinking on that, so I will.”

“Well don’t be thinking too long on it,” Pig Cully told him, “otherwise Saturday will’ve come and gone.” He gave one of his squeaking laughs. “D’you think he’ll need a few tips, McGhee? ye can bet he still thinks it’s for stirring his tea with.”

“Not after Saturday night, he won’t. I tell ye, boys,” the little man slapped his hand on the table, “she’s going to be one hoor of a party!”

The following morning, Father Ignatius Loyola Burke knelt in the front pew of the otherwise empty church of Saint Patrick and Saint Brigid in Inisbreen, his breviary held open before him, head inclined upwards towards the large cross that hung over the altar and his lips moving in silent prayer. Outside, a stiff breeze that had blown up the glen from the sea swayed the trees back and forth, throwing moving shadows on the stained-glass windows. The silent prayer on the priest’s lips rose to a murmur then fell again, while at the back of the church the door-latch rattled as a gust of wind blew over and around the tall gravestones that crowded near the entrance like eager catechumens. The priest’s lips stopped moving and slowly his head was lowered until he sat staring at the blurred pages before him. He gave a long sigh, and the shoulders that were normally held well back sagged beneath his black soutane. The words of the breviary, prayer of any kind, had suddenly fled his mind and his face contorted into a mask of anxiety.

It had all seemed so straightforward when he had first learned that he was to be a parish priest, albeit in a place called Inisbreen that he had never heard of and that did not even appear on some maps. Here was the opportunity to make his mark, and before he had even got to Inisbreen he had begun
drawing up plans as to how he was going to organise everything from the Legion of Mary to the bingo sessions. He had seen enough in his previous two parishes, witnessed the poor management of affairs by lackadaisical parish priests, to have learned how it should be done properly. All he needed was a parish of his own. And now he had one. Yet somehow things didn’t seem to be working out quite the way he had imagined. Matters were arising of a type that he had never encountered. He could always call on advice from the bishop, but he was reluctant to do that, and in any event he was dubious about the quality of such advice. He must show that he had the skill and resolve to succeed on his own, but that was proving to be more difficult than he had anticipated.

The major problem, of course, was these people. They were a different breed from those he had been used to in the South. Up here they didn’t take too well to being told what to do and they had more of a tendency to talk back, to question every aspect of his parish management, but not so far – thank God – the teachings of the Church itself. It must be the Scots blood in them, that rebellious – almost Presbyterian streak, he shuddered – that characterised the type the world over. That business about the graveyard was a typical example. It was a disgrace, and he had told them so from the pulpit in unequivocal terms the second Sunday he had been there. The place was overgrown like a jungle, so that a man would nearly need a guide to lead him to a grave. Oh, they had told him that every now and again they “had a go” at it. And the very next week – quite coincidentally, of course – they had done just that, a horde of them descending on the place one Saturday morning, men, women and children with scythes and sickles and rusty shears, hooking and hacking indiscriminately until he feared that he would have to go out with a sack to gather up severed hands and feet. When they had finished, it had looked worse than before they had started, with bare patches in some
places and chopped-off clumps of grass and weeds in others. The answer, he had told them, was to have professionals come in and do it properly, but all they could say was what was that going to cost and who was going to pay for it.

And that was only half the problem with the graveyard, for it was almost full, and with the river on two sides, the road on another and the adjacent farmer unwilling to part with any land, he was at a loss to know what to do. Of course, suggestions were not in short supply. These had ranged from a ban on burials and a switch to cremation – this from a farmer who offered to sell him what he called “a beautiful wee incinerator at a giveaway price” – vertical burial, which would have the added advantage of requiring only very small and therefore cheaper gravestones, and from one old woman, who no doubt had a vested interest, the idea that a series of novenas should be said, asking the Lord to suspend all deaths in the parish until a solution could be found to the problem. So, how had the Canon handled problems like these, which must have been around for years? Was it possible that the wily old man had after all known just a little about running this parish?

Now, to add to his burdens, there was this so-called miracle, and it looked as if that was going to turn out the worst of all. When he had met McGhee that first night, seen how he walked naturally and heard about his life-long affliction, it was obvious that something remarkable had happened. The lady in white and the subsequent appearance of the stream seemed to confirm it. And there had been other signs. People who had apparently been cured of minor ailments. No woman with an issue of blood, it was true, but one who had claimed the overnight cure of boils on her buttocks. Everything pointed to a miracle. But how had he been supposed to know that McGhee might not be a Catholic? The man couldn’t possibly be the subject of a miracle on a Catholic site if he didn’t believe in the basic tenets of the Faith. Father Burke thought that perhaps
he should’ve smelt a rat – or rather a cat – when the old woman had claimed a miraculous cure for the mange in her ginger tom. As much as he hated to admit it to himself, it was becoming increasingly plain to him that the whole thing was a fake, either at the hands of McGhee or someone else.

He had invested a lot of time and effort in it, had drawn up plans, and had even managed to persuade the Bishop that it was genuine. If it ever got out that it was a hoax, his career in the Church would be ruined and he would be a laughing-stock in chapel houses the length and breadth of Ireland. In a few short weeks he had gone from a state of mild depression at the thought of coming to Inisbreen, to euphoria at the opportunity afforded him by the miracle, and now he was back to depression again. He stood up abruptly and shrugged as if to throw off his unwelcome thoughts. He had planned to go directly from the chapel to Ballymane, where he could perhaps cadge a lunch at the chapel house before conducting his afternoon’s business in the town. Now a kind of depressive torpor had overtaken him and he did not feel up to it at all. What he needed was to go home, lie down in his room and have Mrs McKay bring him up some tea and biscuits. That had always made him feel better, even as a child, when his mother would come up with cake and a glass of milk and stay a while to stroke his forehead and tell him how proud she was of him and what an illustrious future he had in prospect, in contrast to that waster of a father of his.

During his drive to the chapel house, Father Burke was engrossed in further thoughts of failure that only served to deepen his gloom. By the time he had put the car in the garage, let himself in the front door and hung up his coat, he had more or less decided that his only way out was to give up the priesthood entirely. It wasn’t so difficult when he thought about it straight out like that. He would simply leave Ireland quickly and for good and go to some remote South American
country, where he could live the life of a peasant and where his mother would never find him.

“Mrs McKay, whenever you’ve got a minute, would you get . . . “ The young priest stopped and stared. Then he looked away, blinked and slowly returned his gaze to what had brought him to a dead halt in the doorway of the kitchen. On the table, which had been set for one, were the remains of what must certainly have been a sumptuous meal. In one corner was an empty soup bowl flanked by three vegetable dishes containing what remained of sweetcorn, broccoli and asparagus tips. The skins of two baked potatoes propped each other up on an adjacent plate. In a casserole dish the chicken bones and ruby-coloured sauce suggested a coq au vin, while the plate behind it showed the last vestiges of a mammoth slice of Black Forest Gateau. Worse was to come. In the middle of the table was a wine bottle – Chateauneuf du Pape, he could read it from where he stood – and it was completely empty. In the ashtray there was further cause for horror where two cigarette butts had been extinguished. And finally, beside the pepper and salt cellars – the best silver-plated ones from the china cabinet – was an empty brandy glass, held in the hand of the sleeping Mrs McKay whose mouth and legs were both wide open.