David Dickinson - Death on the Holy Mountain

Father O’Donovan Brady had made Cathal Rafferty tell his story of the strange goings-on in the Head Gardener’s Cottage three times. He made copious notes. He wrote the names of the two participants in a small black book in large capital letters. He knew he would return to reread this material over and over again in the days ahead. He gave Cathal ten shillings with instructions to keep watching. Cathal, after all, was carrying out the work of the Lord. Then Father Brady poured himself a generous glass of John Powers and sat down to plan his campaign.

Central to this strategy was the Protestant parson, the Reverend Giles Cooper Walker, the man who had read the prayers at the concert party at Butler’s Court. Ordinary Protestants, the Father had been taught at theological college, were little better than heretics. Protestant clergymen were worse, much worse. The priest wondered if he should consult with his bishop about the move he was planning, actually calling on the rector and, much more difficult, being polite to him, something he knew he would find much more taxing. Nevertheless, he told himself, unusual times need unusual measures. Our Lord would never have succeeded in His mission here on earth if He had carried on according to the ancient principles of the Pharisees. It was time to seize the hour and tackle the vicar in his own quarters. So it was that at eleven o’clock a few days after Cathal’s visit Father O’Donovan Brady was knocking on the front door of the Protestant rectory, a handsome early Georgian house with roses blooming in the small front garden.

The two men were as different in appearance as they were in religion. The Catholic was short and round. The Protestant was tall and very thin, as if he didn’t have enough to eat. Father O’Donovan Brady was ministered to by his striking twenty-three-year-old housekeeper. The Reverend Cooper Walker was ministered to by Sarah, his wife of fifteen years, who might not have had the bloom of youth of the housekeeper but was still a handsome woman, regularly admired by other clergy at diocesan conferences. The Catholic had no children. The Protestant had three, two boys and a girl, who were only a trouble to him when he contemplated the expense of educating them and bringing them out into society. Father Brady had never left Ireland, indeed he had only once visited the north where his visit accidentally coincided with the parades of Orangemen on 12 July, where hatred of Catholics was a central feature of the proceedings, and left him determined never to return to such a place again. The Reverend Cooper Walker had been attached to a parish in Oxford for a time – he had been a noted theologian in his youth, and his professors had tried with all their might to persuade him into an academic career, but Cooper Walker turned them down, saying his version of God called him to the service of real people in what he naively called the real world rather than that of the saints and sinners of the second and third centuries AD. Among the rich of North Oxford and the poor of Jericho the Reverend Cooper Walker had seen the pain caused by unhappy marriages, the damage that could be done by a love that went wrong or alighted in the wrong place. Father O’Donovan Brady’s God resembled Moses on top of the mountain, tablets in hand, entrusted by a fierce and unforgiving God with the salvation of his people, however harsh the punishment. The Reverend Cooper Walker’s God resembled Christ feeding the five thousand and saying blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth.

The two men had never met before. Father Brady struck the Reverend Cooper Walker as rather coarse, with a crude but effective faith. The Reverend Cooper Walker struck Father O’Donovan Brady as a Protestant intellectual – both words of extreme condemnation in his book and, taken together, virtually the same as heretical – who would be prepared to argue for tolerance rather than rigour, for forgiveness rather than punishment, for turning the other cheek rather than inflicting the wrath of a jealous God. The Catholic Church in Ireland, Father Brady felt, would never have reached the position of authority and power it held today if it had had truck with doubt or uncertainty.

In spite of their differences the meeting went well, the two men of God circling each other like boxers at the start of a fight, each reluctant to enter into what might be dangerous territory. Sarah Cooper Walker fed them with tea and some of her special scones that always did well at church fetes and harvest festivals. Surprisingly quickly, they agreed on a plan of campaign to be put into action the following Sunday. Their methods might be different, but the message would be the same. As Father Brady walked back to his house, past the queue at Mulcahy and Sons, Grocery and Bar, and the drinkers already assembling outside MacSwiggin’s, he felt he had scored a notable victory. He had brought the Protestants, even if only for one occasion, into the orbit of the true faith. The Reverend Cooper Walker had too subtle a mind to think in terms of victory or defeat. He thought of the words of the Bible and felt he had little choice.

Mass in the Church of Our Lady of Sorrows in Butler’s Cross began at eleven o’clock. Father O’Donovan Brady had processed up the nave and genuflected. The Father kissed the altar and the congregation rose.

‘ In nomine patris et filii et spiritus sancti . In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.’ Father Brady felt oddly nervous as he began his service.

‘Amen’ said his congregation.

‘ Gratia Domini nostri Iesu Christi et caritas Dei, et communicatio Sancti Spiritus sit cum omnibus vobis . The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.’

‘ Et cum spiritu tuo , and also with you,’ came the response.

There was always a large congregation at Mass at eleven o’clock on Sunday mornings. At the front Pronsias Mulcahy sat in his pew with his wife at his side. She was a formidable woman in her late forties, Mrs Mulcahy, dressed as ever on Sundays in a dark blue suit that had once been fashionable for a slightly younger clientele. Sylvia Butler and Young James had spotted her once months before wearing this same suit on her way to the service. Sylvia had nudged James in the ribs and pointed to the grocer’s wife. ‘Would you say that was mutton dressed as lamb, James?’ Young James carried out a lightning inspection. ‘No, I would not,’ he had replied quickly, ‘I should say that was mutton dressed as mutton.’

Behind the Mulcahys was a platoon of Delaneys, the solicitors, and the Delaney wives, all growing over time to look remarkably like their husbands. For the only time in the week MacSwiggin’s Hotel and Bar was closed while the owner and his wife heard the word of the Lord. O’Riordan the bookmaker and his wife were there in their Sunday best, bets forbidden on the Sabbath. The agricultural machinery man Horkan was there in a new suit that was slightly too large for him, and his wife in a spectacular hat. Behind the Catholic aristocracy was a great throng of servants from Butler’s Court, farmers, blacksmiths, farriers, stable hands, horse dealers and small tenant farmers, most of them working land that belonged to Richard Butler in the Big House. All the children had been sent to the Church Hall for instruction in Catechism and Commandments.

‘There is a green hill far away,

Without a city wall,

Where the dear Lord was crucified

Who died to save us all.’

The Protestant congregation in the Church of St Michael and All Angels were singing a hymn written by one of their very own. The green hill far away was the work of a Mrs Frances Alexander whose husband went on to become Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of all Ireland. The few, the very few in the church that day gave it their best.