Chapters (43)
- Pronunciation
- Prologue
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-one
- Twenty-two
- Twenty-three
- Twenty-four
- Twenty-five
- Twenty-six
- Twenty-seven
- Twenty-eight
- Twenty-nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-one
- Thirty-two
- Thirty-three
- Thirty-four
- Thirty-five
- Thirty-six
- Thirty-seven
- Thirty-eight
- Thirty-nine
- Forty
- Acknowledgments
Donna couldn’t bring herself to speak, her sobbing baby clutched tightly to her chest. She nodded, and her father’s eyes briefly found Fin’s, lingering for just a moment. Somewhere behind them was a recollection of all those beliefs asserted on a drunken night when they had fought in the rain, and again on the windblown cliffs in the cold light of the next morning. Blown away in the pulling of a trigger. Then they returned to the man he had shot dead, where he lay among shattered glass and ornaments in a pool of his own blood. He screwed his eyes closed to shut out the sight of him.
“God forgive me,” he said.
Forty
Forty
I don’t know what’s going on any more. My ears are still ringing and I can hardly hear a thing. Something terrible happened, I know that. They’ve sat me down here in the kitchen, out of the way. There’s all sorts of people through there in the next room, and that damn dog just never stops barking.
There are blue lights and orange lights flashing out there in the dark. I heard a helicopter earlier. I’ve never seen so many policemen in my life. And that man who came to talk to me at Solas. I only remember him because of his widow’s peak. Made me think of a boy at The Dean.
I wonder what the minister’s doing here. I saw him earlier. He looked ill, not a well man. I feel sorry for him. Hasn’t the gumption of his father. A fine, God-fearing man he was. Damned if I can remember his name, though.
That woman’s coming into the kitchen now. I know I know her from somewhere. Just can’t think where. Something about her makes me think of Ceit. Can’t quite think what.
She pulls up a chair and sits down opposite me, leaning forward to take both of my hands in hers. I like her touch. She has fine, soft hands, and such lovely dark eyes looking into mine.
“Do you remember the Sacred Heart, Johnny?” she says. But I don’t know what she means. “They took you and Peter there after that night you both got trapped at the cliffs. You broke your arm, remember? And Peter had pneumonia.”
“There were nuns,” I say. Strange, but I can see them in that yellow half-light of the ward. Black skirts, white coifs.