Martha Lawson sat before the coffin of her only child as the plaintive chant rose and fell in the crowded funeral home.
‘Hail Mary full of grace, the Lord is with Thee, blessed art Thou…’ Elderly women ground rosary beads through their fingers, their heads bowed, their prayers confident. Groups of confused teenagers in grey school uniforms muttered the parts they knew, strangely comforted by the ritual, but wondering if any of it really worked. Every now and then their eyes wandered up to the oak coffin at the front of the room, closed in depressing finality. These were children used to an open coffin, grasping the hands of the dead, kissing the cold marble foreheads of grandparents or elderly relatives. Never a sixteen-year-old.
Martha Lawson leaned awkwardly against her sister, Jean, the life sucked from her face, her eyes dark and blank. She was a devout Catholic, considering every word of the rosary she was saying, because she believed – in God, in prayer, in human goodness. No killer would strip her of her faith. But she didn’t understand. She didn’t know why she was sitting here for the second time in eight years, chief mourner again, first losing her husband to cancer and now her daughter to a murderer. She stared at the coffin, unable to accept that Katie’s brutalised body lay inside. Her little baby, the lid shut on her beautiful girl. When the prayers ended, everyone moved onto the street where a hearse was waiting to take the coffin the short drive to the church.
Fr Flynn, the elderly parish priest, swept through the service. His words were hollow and weary, delivered too often. He hadn’t learned that with each funeral came fresh grief and sorrow. People began to shift in their seats. Martha was thinking about the following day, when her cousin, Michael, was flying in from Rome to deliver mass. He always found the right words.
For an hour after the short service, a steady stream of sympathisers moved up the aisle towards Martha. ‘Sorry for your troubles,’ they muttered, shaking her hand, working their way along the short row.
Tall wooden stakes burned in a line on the grass outside the lighthouse. Brendan, the photographer employed by
‘There was nothing I could do,’ she said. ‘He was hired weeks ago.’
‘I know that,’ said Joe.
‘I’ll be down there for the evening,’ she said.
The sun shone the next morning through the icy cold, offering nothing more than a talking point for awkward mourners. They moved into the small stone church at the edge of the village, filling it, then crowding into the side aisles. The bell rang, the congregation stood and Fr Michael appeared with two altar boys walking behind him. He tapped the microphone.
‘Please be seated.’ He looked up, then spoke softly. ‘When Katie was three years old, I taught her two words from a
‘Today, in the face of this terribly tragedy, yes, we can empathise with the family and friends of Katie Lawson. But more importantly, we can encourage. We can encourage people in their faith to be strong for each other, to be strong for Katie. It’s what she would want. I know that the songs chosen here today by her boyfriend, Shaun and by her school friends, are positive songs, songs of hope and support and, as I said, encouragement.’ He nodded to the small group on the balcony and Katie’s tearful replacement whose shaking voice struggled through her first solo.
Fr Michael spoke again. ‘We are united here today for many reasons: in our love for Katie, in our support of Martha and the Lawson family, Shaun, in our faith, in hope, but also because not one of us can understand why this happened. How a sixteen-year-old girl who was full of life, who had so much to give, indeed, who gave so much to everyone, could be taken away from us so suddenly. What hatred would lie in someone’s heart to make them commit such an act of cruelty and violence?’ He stopped.
The only sound to be heard through the silence was the journalists at the back, scribbling on spiral notebooks.
‘We may never know,’ he continued. Several people looked instinctively towards Frank Deegan and Richie Bates. ‘But what we do know is that we can’t let hatred take hold of our hearts. Because hatred will make us suffer. Our hearts should be love, filled with goodness as Katie’s heart was.’
Joe was the tallest of the pallbearers, stooped now to accommodate the five other men, arms over shoulders to carry the light coffin. The crowd, led by Martha, shuffled behind them. They moved through the cemetery, forced to stand along the borders of other graves, all eyes drawn to the two foot wide, six foot deep trench and the coffin that lay beside it.
Shaun found himself standing closest to the grave. He couldn’t connect the person he loved to what was happening at that moment. It suddenly struck him that her body was now in that box. She was physically inches away from him, but she was dead and in a box. He wondered what she looked like; did she fill it or was she tiny and lost in the satin pleats? He started to sob uncontrollably.
Anyone who managed to hold it together at the mass broke down in the stark reality of a coffin being lowered irretrievably into the ground and a boy’s shaking hand as he tossed a single white rose onto the polished lid.
After the burial, most of the mourners moved to the Lawson house. Neighbours had been preparing food and drinks since early morning. Anna was passing through the hall when she saw John Miller slip away from the long queue for the bathroom and push his way into the back garden. She was disgusted at what he was about to do, but at least she was the only one who saw him leave. When he came out from behind the shed, she was waiting for him.
‘What’s going on with you, John?’ she spat. ‘What have you done with your life?’
‘Jesus, I was just taking a piss,’ he said, smiling around at no-one.
His fly was undone. She nodded at it, fuming. He winked at her.
‘You need help,’ she said. He looked like he was about to say something, but he turned and walked away, weaving a crooked path back to the house.
Richie and Frank were huddled in a corner of the hallway, cups of tea and sandwiches in their hands.
‘Sorry to interrupt you,’ said Joe, ‘but—’
‘We’re not interested at this stage,’ said Frank, without looking up.
Joe was taken aback. ‘But—’
‘No, give us a laugh,’ said Richie. ‘What’s your latest theory?’
Joe stood in front of them with his map and felt pathetic. But he knew he was right about this.
‘He’s got his map,’ said Richie.
‘Look,’ said Joe. ‘Let me get this over with.’
When Joe finished his theory about Mae Miller, Richie spoke:
‘How do you know none of the other neighbours heard anything?’
‘Because I asked them,’ said Joe, knowing where this was going.
‘Stay out of it!’ snapped Richie, raising then quickly lowering his voice. ‘What’s to say Katie didn’t visit the graveyard, then walk back on her usual route past Mae Miller’s and oh – what was that again – end up buried in your back fucking garden?’
Frank winced.
‘That forest is like public land, you son of a bitch,’ said Joe. ‘And what you’re saying about where she went just does not make sense. And you know it, you stubborn little shit.’
Richie was fuming. Frank stepped in. ‘Well, whatever happened,’ he said, calmly, ‘she went past the Grants’ and Mae Miller heard a scream.’
Joe shook his head and walked away.
Frank turned to Richie. ‘You need to relax.’
‘What do you mean, relax?’
‘You’re as defensive as…as I don’t know what. That’s not the right way to carry on in a job like this. I’ll be
