‘It’s our turn to have the Station. It’s an honour to have it, and we won’t have to have it again for a few years,’ Brigid said glumly, shoving her brogues into her half of the wardrobe she shared with her sister. They had half a rail each in the musty, mothball-scented, old-fashioned mahogany wardrobe. The left-hand side was Brigid’s. Always a higgledy-piggledy mess. Shoes in a heap on the bottom shelf, her camogie stick sometimes straying into Imelda’s territory, much to her younger sister’s annoyance. Imelda’s part was arranged neatly. Clothes hanging in order of length, shoes paired side by side. Magazines in a neat pile on the bottom.

They slept in a brass bed with a long bolster pillow and a patchwork quilt their aunt had made. Brigid liked the cheerful quilt with the blue, navy and white squares. It brightened up the room, darkened by small windows and elderly mahogany furniture. Imelda’s side of the double bed was always made immaculately, sheets stretched, the woollen Foxford blanket straightened neatly under the coverlet. Brigid’s side of the bed was always lumpy where she left the sheets as they were, pulling the quilt over the blanket not caring whether it was rumpled or not underneath.

‘I don’t know what the fuss about the bedroom’s for,’ Brigid observed crossly, cursing when a pile of books fell to the floor. ‘The neighbours won’t be coming up here.’ Imelda didn’t answer. She was studying her spots in the oval mirror on the windowsill. Brigid shoved the books under her side of the bed. Out of sight was out of mind.

She heard the sound of voices downstairs, then her mother laughing, and guessed it was their neighbour, Patsy, from across the field. The neighbours always mucked in when there was a Station being held, no matter who was hosting it.

The custom of the Station, an old tradition from Penal times – when it was forbidden for priests to say Mass in public, so they were forced to hold it in people’s homes – was still practised in every townland and parish in the country. Imagine not being able to go to Mass in a church. Imagine having to attend Mass at a Mass Rock, out in the open, no matter what the weather, Brigid mused, glad she’d never had to stand outside in a howling gale and lashing rain to practise her faith. Irish Catholics had been persecuted in those terrible times. She shouldn’t be so grumpy about it being their turn to offer up their home to the service of God.