Confessional. Part 42

'Just past Annan.' She had a thick Glasgow accent. 'Dumfries next. Are you a Catholic?'

'I'm afraid so,' he said warily. The Scottish Lowlands had always been traditionally Protestant.

That's lovely. I'm Catholic myself. Glasgow-Irish, Father.' She took his hand and kissed it. 'Bless me, Father. You're from the old country.'

'I am indeed.'

He thought she might prove a nuisance, but strangely enough, she simply turned her head and settled back in her seat. Outside, the sky was very dark and it started to rain, thunder rumbling ominously and soon the rain had increased into a monsoon-like force that drummed loudly on the roof of the bus. They stopped in Dumfries to drop two pa.s.sengers and then moved on through streets washed clean of people, out into the country again.

Not long now. No more than fifteen miles to his dropping-off point at Dunhill. From there, a few miles on a side road to a hamlet called Larwick and the Mungos' place, a mile or two outside Larwick in the hills.

The driver had been speaking into the mike on his car radio and now he switched over to the coach's loudspeaker system. 'Attention, ladies and gentlemen. I'm afraid we've got trouble up ahead just before Dunhill. Bad flooding on the road. A lot of vehicles already stuck in it.'

The old woman in front of Cussane called, 'What are we supposed to do? Sit in the bus all night?'

'We'll be in Corbridge in a few minutes. Not much of a place, but there's a milk stop there on the railway line. They're making arrangements to stop the next train for Glasgow.'

'Three times the fare on the railway,' the old woman called.

'The company pays,' the driver told her cheerfully. 'Don't worry, love.'

'Will the train stop at Dunhill?' Cussane asked.

'Perhaps. I'm not sure. We'll have to see.'

Lag's Luck, they called it in prison circles. Danny Malone had told him that. No matter how well you planned, it was always something totally unforeseeable that caused the problem. No point in wasting energy in dwelling on that. The thing to do was examine alternatives.

A white sign, Corbridge etched on it in black, appeared on the left and then the first houses loomed out of the heavy rain. There was a general store, a newsagents, the tiny railway station opposite. The driver turned the coach into the forecourt.

'Best wait in here while I check things out.' He jumped down and went into the railway station.

The rain poured down relentlessly. There was a gap between the pub and the general store, beams stretching between to sh.o.r.e them up. Obviously the building which had stood there had just been demolished. A small crowd had gathered. Cussane watched idly, reached for the packet of cigarettes in his pocket and found it empty. He hesitated, then picked up his bag, got off the coach and ran across the road to the newsagents. He asked the young woman standing in the entrance for a couple of packs of cigarettes and an ordnance survey map of the area if she had it. She did.

'What's going on?' Cussane asked.

'They've been pulling down the old grain store for a week now. Everything was fine until this rain started. They've got trouble in the cellars. A roof fall or something.'

They moved out into the entrance again and watched. At that moment, a police car appeared from the other end of the village and pulled in. There was only one occupant, a large heavily-built man who wore a navy-blue anorak with sergeant's stripes on it. He forced his way through the crowd and disappeared.

The young woman said, 'The cavalry's arrived,'

'Isn't he from round here?' Cussane asked.

'No police station in Corbridge. He's from Dunhill. Sergeant Brodie - Lachlan Brodie.' The tone of her voice was enough.

'Not popular?' Cussane asked.

'Lachlan's the kind who likes nothing better than finding three drunks together at the same time on a Sat.u.r.day night to beat up. He's built like the rock of ages and likes to prove it. You wouldn't be Catholic, by any chance?'

'I'm afraid so.'

'To Lachlan, that means antichrist. He's the kind of Baptist who thinks music is a sin. A lay preacher as well.'

A workman came through the crowd in helmet and orange safety jacket. His face was streaked with mud and water. He leaned against the wall, 'It's a sod down there.'

'That bad?' the woman said.

'One of my men is trapped. A wall collapsed. We're doing our best, but there isn't much room to work in and the water's rising.' He frowned and said to Cussane, 'You wouldn't be Catholic by any chance?'

'Yes.'

The man grabbed his arm. 'My name's Hardy. I'm the foreman. The man down there is as Glaswegian as me, but Italian. Gino Tisini. He thinks he's going to die. Begged me to get him a priest. Will you come, Father?'

'But of course,' Cussane said without hesitation, and handed his bag to the woman. 'Would you look after that for me?'

'Certainly, Father.'

He followed Hardy through the crowd and down into the excavation. There was a gaping hole, cellar steps descending. Brodie, the police sergeant, was holding people back. Hardy started down and as Cussane followed, Brodie caught his arm. 'What's this?'

'Let him by,' Hardy called. 'He's a priest.'

The hostility was immediate in Brodie's eyes, the dislike plain. It was an old song to Cussane, Belfast all over again. 'I don't know you,' Brodie said.

'My name's Fallen. I came in on the bus on the way to Glasgow,' Cussane told him calmly.

He took the policeman's wrist, loosening the grip on his arm, and Brodie winced at the strength of it as Cussane

pushed him to one side and went down the steps. He was knee-deep in water at once and ducked under a low roof and followed Hardy into what must have been a narrow pa.s.sageway. There was a certain amount of light from an extension lamp and it illuminated a chaos of jumbled masonry and planking. There was a narrow aperture and as they reached it, two men stumbled out, both soaked to the skin and obviously at exhaustion point.

'It's no good,' one of them said. 'His head will be under the water in a matter of minutes.'

Hardy brushed past and Cussane went after them. Gino Tisini's white face loomed out of the darkness as they crouched to go forward. Cussane put out a hand to steady himself and a plank fell and several bricks.

'Watch it!' Hardy said. 'The whole thing could go like a house of cards.'

There was the constant gurgle of water as it poured in. Tisini managed a ghastly smile. 'Come to hear my confession, Father? It would take a year and a day.'

'We haven't got that long. Let's get you out,' Cussane said.

There seemed to be a sudden extra flow of water; it washed over Tisini's face and he panicked. Cussane moved behind him, supporting the man's head above the water, crouching over him protectively.

Hardy felt under the water. 'There's a lot moved here,' he said. 'That's where the inflow of water helps. There's just one beam pinning him down now, but it leads into the wall. If I put any kind of force on it, it could bring the lot in on us.'

'If you don't, he drowns within the next couple of minutes,' Cussane said.

'You could be in trouble too, Father.'

'And you,' Cussane said, 'so get on with it.'