‘Hey, you!’ he said, too loudly.
The shroud turned to look at the florist, its eyes like two holes pressed in warm dough. The face of the ghost was so woebegone it froze the words on the florist’s lips.
Ronnie tried the handle of the Vestry door. The rattling got him nowhere. The door was locked. From inside, a breathless voice said: ‘Who is it?’ It was Father Rooney speaking. Ronnie tried to reply, but no words would come. All he could do was rattle, like any worthy ghost. ‘Who is it?’ asked the good Father again, a little impatiently. Confess me, Ronnie wanted to say, confess me, for I have sinned.
The door stayed shut. Inside, Father Rooney was busy. He was taking photographs for his private collection; his subject a favourite lady of his by the name of Natalie. A daughter of vice somebody had told him, but he couldn’t believe that. She was too obliging, too cherubic, and she wound a rosary around her pert bosom as though she was barely out of a convent.
The jiggling of the handle had stopped now. Good, thought Father Rooney. They’d come back, whoever they were. Nothing was that urgent. Father Rooney grinned at the woman. Natalie’s lips pouted back.
In the church Ronnie hauled himself to the altar, and genuflected. Three rows back the florist rose from his prayers, incensed by
this desecration. The boy was obviously drunk, the way he was reeling, the man wasn’t about to be frightened by a tuppenny-coloured death-mask. Cursing the desecrator in ripe Greek, he snatched at the ghost as it knelt in front of the altar.
There was nothing under the sheet: nothing at all.
The florist felt the living cloth twitch in his hand, and dropped it with a tiny cry. Then he backed off down the aisle, crossing himself back and forth, back and forth, like a demented widow. A few yards from the door of the church he turned tail and ran.
The shroud lay where the florist had dropped it. Ronnie, lingering in the creases, looked up from the crumpled heap at the splendour of the altar. It was radiant, even in the gloom of the candlelit interior, and moved by its beauty, he was content to put the illusion behind him. Unconfessed, but unfearful of judgment, his spirit crept away.
After an hour or so Father Rooney unbolted the Vestry, escorted the chaste Natalie out of the church, and locked the front door. He peered into the Confessional on his way back, to check for hiding children. Empty, the entire church was empty. St Mary Magdalene was a forgotten woman.
As he meandered, whistling, back to the Vestry he caught sight of Ronnie Glass’ shroud. It lay sprawled on the altar steps, a forlorn pile of shabby cloth. Ideal, he thought, picking it up. There were some indiscreet stains on the Vestry floor. Just the job to wipe them up.
He sniffed the cloth, he loved to sniff. It smelt of a thousand things. Ether, sweat, dogs, entrails, blood, disinfectant, empty rooms, broken hearts, flowers and loss. Fascinating. This was the thrill of the Parish of Soho, he thought. Something new every day. Mysteries on the doorstep, on the altar-step. Crimes so numerous they would need an ocean of Holy Water to wash them out. Vice for sale on every corner, if you knew where to look.
He tucked the shroud under his arm.
‘I bet you’ve got a tale to tell,’ he said, snuffing out the votive candles with fingers too hot to feel the flame.
Scape-goats
It wasn’t a real island the tide had carried us on to, it was a lifeless mound of stones. Calling a hunch-backed shit-pile like this an island is flattery. Islands are oases in the sea: green and abundant. This is a forsaken place: no seals in the water around it, no birds in the air above it. I can think of no use for a place like this, except that you could say of it: I saw the heart of nothing, and survived.
‘It’s not on any of the charts,’ said Ray, poring over the map of the Inner Hebrides, his nail at the spot where he’d calculated that we should be. It was, as he’d said, an empty space on the map, just pale blue sea without the merest speck to sign the existence of this rock. It wasn’t just the seals and the birds that ignored it then, the chart-makers had too. There were one or two arrows in the vicinity of Ray’s finger, marking the currents that should have been taking us north: tiny red darts on a paper ocean. The rest, like the world outside, was deserted.