The Rosary Garden by Nicola White (best books to read now TXT) 📕

‘You said in your statement that the child was naked when you took it from the bag?’

‘I found something to cover her with, something to hand. I didn’t want people – the girl was with me – to see it.’

He was tempted to press her harder about handling the child, but he didn’t have enough of the whole picture yet. See the place it was found, locate the mother: those were the pressing things.

Sister Bernadette was adamant she knew of no girl or member of staff being pregnant.

‘It can be hard to tell.’

‘I’m not a naïve woman,’ said the nun. ‘I see plenty of the world.’

Swan was tempted to let the other girl go home too, so he could get to the convent, but Munnelly said her recall was particularly good. Swan looked through the pages of her statement and conceded. He asked one of the female Guard to come with him to the interview room.

Alison Hogan was drawing some kind of diagram when they entered. The sweet diligence of her face was at jarring odds with her bird’s-nest hairdo. She was dressed like some kind of vampire shepherdess.

She blushed as he introduced himself to her, put a hand over her drawing.

‘I was doing a sketch of the shed for the officers,’ she explained. ‘I’m good at maps.’

Eager to please, despite the hairy get-up. Another nice middle-class girl. Good at things.

‘May I?’

It was a bird’s-eye view of the shed, with neat lettering pointing out features: ‘door’, ‘bench’, window’. There was a little oval shape in the centre: ‘basket’. In the middle of the oval was an X. No word for it.

‘Sister Bernie – she shouldn’t have moved it, should she?’

‘How’s that?’

‘You’re supposed to leave things as you found them. That’s what they do on television.’

‘Indeed they do.’ Swan smiled and laid her statement on the table, turned a couple of pages. ‘You say the baby was wrapped in a white cloth. Sister Bernadette and your friend say it was in a paper bag.’

‘It was in a brown paper bag, but there was something white wrapped around the baby – inside the bag.’

‘What kind of cloth was it?’

‘Just cloth-cloth,’ said Ali. ‘You know. Like a sheet or something.’

‘How much time passed between you and your friend leaving the shed and you coming back with Sister Bernadette?’

‘Not sure. Two minutes. Three?’

‘Could there have been someone else in the garden – someone you didn’t see?’

The girl’s eyes widened.

‘I don’t know … maybe …’

‘I don’t want to put anything in your head. No one you saw?’

‘No.’

Swan continued to scan the statement. There was a thin plastic cup of water by the girl.

‘Do you mind?’

She shook her head and he took a sip from it. It was stale, with an aftertaste like pencil lead.

‘When do I get my bag back?’

‘The bag you say the nun took the scarf from?’

‘Yeah, it’s got a lot of stuff I need.’

‘Not for a while. Sorry.’

The girl pursed her lips.

‘Do you get on well with the nuns?’

She shrugged. She was going quiet on them.

Swan turned to the woman police officer, a sensible-looking sort, with thick black hair pulled back in a knot.

‘She’s been a great help, hasn’t she?’

‘Good enough to join the force, I’d say.’

‘I’m sure Ms Hogan has even loftier plans than that. College, isn’t it?’

‘Well …’

‘What are you going to study?’ asked the officer.

‘Law.’

Swan and the policewoman shared a smile.

‘No offence,’ explained Swan, ‘but some solicitors are a great trouble to us.’

The girl looked upset.

‘I’m sorry, you’ve had a dreadful morning. Why don’t we let you get back to your mum and dad?’ He went to give her hand a pat, but she flinched away from him.

‘I don’t have a dad. He died.’

‘I’m sorry to hear that.’

‘He was a solicitor.’

‘Ah.’

‘I’ll just go and see if there’s someone waiting for you,’ said the Guard.

Swan walked the girl towards the reception area. She was taller than he had realised, eyes on a level with his own.

‘We may need to talk to you again, Alison, and in the meantime I’d be obliged if you kept the details to yourself, eh?’

The girl asked if there was a toilet she could use. Swan flagged down one of the station Guards for directions and said he’d meet her at reception. The flock of nuns had departed. Only two people sat on the line of orange chairs: an ample woman in an unusual tweed garment and a floppy-haired young man hunched in concentration over a tightly folded newspaper.

‘Anyone here to meet Alison?’ Swan offered.

‘I’m her mother,’ the woman said, pressing an anxious hand to her chest. ‘Deirdre Hogan. Are you in charge?’

Swan claimed he was.

She rose and came towards him, her layered wrap swirling about her. The garment was held together by a Celtic brooch the size of a saucer. Mother and daughter obviously shared a taste for exotic costume.

‘Is it true about Ali finding a baby?’ she asked in a low voice.

‘Well, she was one of the people there. We just needed a word with her.’

‘Is she all right?’

‘She’s been very calm, actually – very grown-up. You should be proud.’

This didn’t soothe the woman. She looked round quickly at the young man, before taking a step closer to Swan.

‘It’s not fair …’ she said.

‘What’s not?’

‘Once would be bad enough. But twice – it’s beyond sense. You see, it’s happened before.’

4

Ali woke sweating from a dream. She’d been on her knees in the Rosary Garden, trowelling through sooty clay while Sister O’Dwyer stood over her, crying, begging her to come to the chapel, that prayers would start soon. Ali tried to explain that she had to find something first. She looked down at her trowel and there was half a worm on it – a white worm as big as a finger – writhing, blindly searching for its lost half.

The morning light leaked through her thin curtains. She was telling herself it was just a dream when she remembered what wasn’t a dream, and images from the day before flooded her mind.

Ma