The Confession by Greg James

Author:Greg James [James, Greg]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: GJA Publications Ltd
Published: 2020-01-31T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty

The storm calmed the following morning but didn't dissipate completely, rain and wind continued throughout the day. Down at the small dock, fishermen discovered their boats hammered into scrapwood floating on the churning sea. The ferry was cancelled until further notice. It was clear no-one would be going to or from Inish Gealach for the time being.

David looked out through his bedroom window at the deluge; how it turned the world into a smudged, dissolute realm.

There was a small form moving across it and, for a moment, he thought it was Jacob, the black goat, come to call again. But, as it resolved, he recognised it as a child walking across the landscape towards the parochial house. He dressed himself and went downstairs; unsure why he stood waiting in the hall for the knock at the door he knew was coming, or why he kept his eye upon the ornate bronze crucifix hanging from a nail on the wall. Was he expecting it to move, quiver, run with fresh blood? It didn’t. It hung there undisturbed as there was a knock on the door and David opened it. Two blue-brown eyes, framed by water-ragged hair, looked up at him, “Hello, are you the new priest?”

“That I am. Father David Maguire. Pleased to meet you.”

“My name’s Aoife Auchterlonie. I think I’m possessed.”

There was a pause.

“Right. I see. Well, come in and have a seat.”

David led the girl into the front room. She took a seat on the sofa.

“Can I get you anything, Aoife, before we have a chat?”

“A tea please, Father.”

“Of course, it's rather cold out, isn't it?”

He fixed her a tea in Mrs Kelly’s absence. As he presented it to her, he noticed uneven red stains on her fingernails. “How'd that happen then?” he asked.

Aoife smiled at him, “I was trying to make them prettier.”

Was that some redness on her teeth as well?

He sat down and watched the girl sipping tea from the chipped mug. She looked fine to his eyes but there was something off he couldn't quite put his finger on. “So, how’s your mother?”

Best to talk around what she’d said when she arrived. She was a child and might just be acting up a bit.

“Mam’s at home, asleep. I bandaged her leg and put some Germolene on it. I think it should heal okay, but I’m too scared to go to Doctor O’Malley.”

“Why?”

“Because he might take me away from Mam. I'm not ill. I'm just possessed.”

The girl's calmness was unsettling. “What makes you think he’d do that, take you away, I mean?”

“Because I’ve done things that mad people do, and I’m not mad. It's the voice inside me that makes me do the things. Sometimes it does or says things and I can't stop them from happening.”

“Did you come to me for confession a while back?” David asked.

Aoife smiled at him. It was a smile that could’ve belonged to Siobhan. For a moment, he saw his daughter’s dark hair, freckles and glasses flicker across his vision to rest over Aoife’s features.

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