“Then he was responsible for his own actions.”
“He was, of course. But I don’t think it would ever have crossed his mind to start something with me if I hadn’t pushed and pushed and pushed. He wasn’t the type. He was a good man; I believe that now. And eventually, once the excitement of what we were doing began to calm down, he broke it off with me and begged me not to tell a soul, and of course, young as I was and foolish as I was, I took the greatest umbrage and said I was having none of it, that I was not going to be dropped by him, not after he’d had his fun. But he was adamant and one day he just started crying in front of me again, saying that the person he was turning into was not the person he had ever wanted to be. He said that he’d taken advantage of me, of my youth, because he was weak and he wished that he could go back and change it all. He begged me to forget everything, wanting everything to go back to the way it had been before, and I don’t know, but something about his upset told me that I had done a terrible thing. And I cried too and we hugged each other and we parted as friends and we swore that we would never speak of what had taken place between us and that it would never happen again. It was over, that was what we agreed. And I think, if events hadn’t conspired against us, then we both would have stood by that. It would have ended. And in time, it would all have been forgotten. Just a terrible mistake that we’d made years ago.”
“So what happened?” I asked.
“Well, you happened, of course,” she said. “I found that I was going to have a child. And back then, in the country, there was no greater disgrace than this. I didn’t know what to do or who to confide in and in the end my mother found out and she told my father and he told the priest and the next day that bastard stood on the pulpit of the Church of Our Lady, Star of the Sea, and denounced me to my family and all our neighbors as a whore.”
“He used that word?”
“He did, of course. Sure the priests ran the country back then and they hated women. Oh my God, they hated women and anything that had to do with women and anything to do with women’s bodies or ideas or desires, and any chance that they had to humiliate a woman or bring her down, they would take full advantage of it. I think it was because they all wanted women so badly and they couldn’t have one. Except when they did, of course, on the quiet. Which was going on too. Oh, Cyril, he said some terrible things about me that morning! And he hurt me. If he could have, he would have kicked me to death, I believe that. And he made me leave the church in front of the whole parish and he threw me out and disgraced me, and me only sixteen years of age and not a penny piece in my pocket.”
“And Kenneth?” I asked. “Did he not help you out?”
“He tried, in his way,” she said. “He came out of the church and tried to give me money and I ripped it up in his face. I should have taken it! And in my childishness I blamed him for what had happened, but it wasn’t all his fault, I see that now. I have my share of blame to take. Poor Kenneth was terrified that someone would find out that he was the father and of course he would have been ruined if anyone had. The scandal would have killed him. Anyway, I took the bus to Dublin that same day and found myself living with Seán and Jack until the night when Seán’s father came up to kill the pair of them and he nearly managed it too. How Jack Smoot survived I will never know. And that was the night that you were born. Seán was lying in the living room, his body growing cold, and Jack was lying next to me in a pool of his blood that intermingled with my own as you came screaming into the world. But I had a plan, you see. I’d arranged the plan months in advance with the little hunchbacked Redemptorist nun who helped girls like me. Fallen girls. The plan was that she was going to take the baby away from me when it was born and give it to a family who wanted a child of their own but for whatever reason couldn’t have one.”
I looked down at the table and closed my eyes. That was my birth. That was how I had come to Dartmouth Square, to Charles and Maude.
“The truth is,” she continued, “I was just a child myself. I could never have taken care of a baby. We wouldn’t have survived, either of us, if I’d held on to you. And so I did what I thought was right. And I still think I was right. So I suppose if we’re going to have any future together, Cyril, you and I, then that’s what I have to ask you. Do you believe that I did the right thing?”
Goleen
The Church of Our Lady, Star of the Sea, was bathed in sunlight that afternoon as we arrived. We walked slowly and silently up the path together, making our way toward the graveyard, and I stood back as she began to walk around the stones, reading the names of the dead.
“William Hobbs,” she said, stopping at one and shaking her head. “I remember him. He was in school with me in the early forties. He was always trying to put his hands up girls’ skirts. The master used to beat him black and blue for it. Look, it says he died in 1970. I wonder what happened to him?” She stepped away and looked at a few others. “And this is my cousin Tadhg,” she said. “And what must have been his wife, Eileen. I knew an Eileen Ní Breathnach back in the day. I wonder did he marry her?” And then, stopping at a particularly ornate stone, she stopped and put a hand to her mouth in fright. “Oh Good Lord,” she said. “It’s Father Monroe! Father Monroe is buried here too!”
I came over and looked down at the inscription on the marble. Father James Monroe, it said. 1890–1968. Beloved parish priest. A kind and saintly man.
“No mention of his children on the headstone, of course,” she said, shaking her head. “I bet the parishioners denounced the women who bore them as they lowered him down. The women are always the whores; the priests are always the good men who were led astray.”
To my surprise, she knelt down by the side of the grave. “Do you remember me, Father Monroe?” she asked quietly. “Catherine Goggin. You threw me out of the parish in 1945 because I was going to have a child. You tried to destroy me but you didn’t. You were a terrible monster of a man and wherever you are you should feel shame for the way you lived your life.”