Immaculate Heart by Camille Deangelis Page A

dark.
    Then there came the knock at the door, and Síle put her hand to my cheek in the second before it opened.
    *   *   *
    Brona decided not to come down with me to the pub that night, and it was just as well. “So you met Síle Gallagher,” Leo said musingly. “Fair play to ya, lad! Some led me to believe they defend that place with swords and cannon fire.” He drained his pint glass and smacked his lips. “What didja tell them?”
    â€œSaid I was an old friend.”
    â€œSure, that’s true enough,” Paudie said.
    â€œAnd when you went in to see her—what did you say?” Leo asked.
    â€œWe talked about a lot of things. She’s very … playful,” I said lamely. “She knows how to put a person at ease.”
    Leo tittered like a nine-year-old girl. “And what sort of things did ye talk about?”
    â€œHer adventures in India. Her artwork. Her family. That sort of thing.”
    â€œYou didn’t ask her about the apparition?” Paudie asked.
    â€œThere wasn’t time.”
    I didn’t look up from my pint, but I could feel Leo smirking at me. “You got there and forgot why you’d come, isn’t that it?”
    I tried to suppress a grin, and failed. “Pretty much.”
    â€œShe’s the sort makes you forget yer own name,” he said. “I may be an old man, but I’m young enough yet.”
    Paudie rolled his eyes. “Will you be seein’ her again?”
    The old men looked at me. Leo tossed back his head and laughed.
    *   *   *
    The next tape was labeled Declan Keaveney, 8 February 1988 . In that room in my mind, the boy in the black-and-white newspaper photographs came to life: the surly turn of the lip and the anywhere-but-here posture, his hair in greasy black spikes, handsome and callow. I saw him dressed in a thermal shirt, army boots, and the leather bomber, and he tapped his foot on the hardwood floor and settled and resettled himself in the chair as if fidgeting could get him out of the interview any faster. Father Dowd asked him the same basic questions about the apparition, and his answers essentially matched Tess’s, though they were not so willingly given. When the priest asked him to interpret what he’d seen, he became even less cooperative.
    Â 
    FATHER DOWD
    Do you feel blessed?
    Â 
    DECLAN
    I don’t. I don’t feel any different.
    Â 
    FATHER DOWD
    You saw a vision of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and you don’t feel any different?
    Â 
    DECLAN
    (irritated at having to repeat himself)
    I don’t feel any different.
    Â 
    FATHER DOWD
    Don’t you see? This is a chance to do some good in the world, lad. To be somebody.
    The young man rolls his eyes as the priest is talking.
    Â 
    DECLAN
    I’m already somebody.
    Â 
    FATHER DOWD
    And are you already doing good in the world?
    Â 
    DECLAN
    Probably not by your standards, Father.
    The priest heaves a sigh, and just then he looks at least ten years older.
    Â 
    FATHER DOWD
    (sternly)
    If we’re to see this through, we need your cooperation.
    Â 
    DECLAN
    How do ya mean, “see it through”?
    Â 
    FATHER DOWD
    Why, bringing Our Lady’s message to the world.
    The priest pauses, for emphasis. But it’s like the boy’s bricked an invisible wall across his desk and nothing can get through it.
    Â 
    FATHER DOWD (CONT’D)
    You have been called, Declan.
    Â 
    DECLAN
    It was Tess who told you. Not me.
    (smiles mockingly)
    You can say it, Father: you’re surprised she appeared to me at all. That I’m the dodgy one, the one who wasn’t supposed to be there.
    Â 
    FATHER DOWD
    I can say this much, Declan: I’d never presume to know what’s going on up in that mind of yours.
    Â 
    DECLAN
    You’re not denying it, Father.
    Â 
    FATHER DOWD
    Remember Our Lady, Declan. Remember her message. It goes beyond all our petty opinions and