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
It was getting dark by the time we arrived in the west coast port of Oban. It was a pretty town, with the houses painted in different colours, and a huge fishing fleet berthed at the quayside. The first time I’d seen the sea. The bay was ringed by hills, and a vast stone cathedral stood on the shore looking out over waters turned blood-red by the setting sun.
We spent the night in a house not far from the cathedral. There was another priest there. But he didn’t speak to us. A housekeeper led us to two rooms up in the attic. Tiny rooms with dormer windows in the slope of the roof. All we’d had to eat all day were sandwiches on the train, and a bowl of soup when we arrived. I could hear my stomach growling as I lay in bed, keeping me awake. If Peter heard me, it didn’t affect him. He slept like a baby, as he always did. But I couldn’t get Catherine out of my mind.
I waited until after midnight, when all the lights went off in the house, before getting quietly out of bed. For a long time I stood at the door, straining to hear the slightest sound, before opening it and slipping out into the hall. Catherine’s room was just a few paces away. I hesitated outside her door, listening to what sounded awfully like stifled sobs coming from the other side of it, and I had a feeling of sick anticipation rising from my stomach. She was a real hard case, was wee Catherine. If something had reduced her to tears then it had to be bad. I had never seen her cry once in the year I’d known her, except for that time in the moonlight on the roof of The Dean. But I’m sure she didn’t know I’d noticed that.
I turned the handle and ducked quickly inside. Almost immediately the bedside light came on. Catherine was sitting up in the bed, her back against the headboard, knees drawn up to her chest, and a hand mirror from the dresser raised up in her right hand like a weapon. Her eyes were black with fear, her face the colour of the sheets.
“For God’s sake, Catherine, what are you doing?”
Her relief at seeing me almost overwhelmed her. She allowed her hand to fall to the bed again and let go of the mirror. I could see her lower lip trembling, her tear-stained cheeks catching the light from the lamp. I crossed the room and slipped on to the bed beside her, and she turned her face into my shoulder to choke off her sobs, her arm across my chest, holding on to me like a child. I slipped my arm around her shoulder.
“Hey girl. It’s okay. I’m here. What can be so bad?”