‘Most people call me Ali.’
‘So I will too, Ali, I will too.’ Mary slipped her hand through the crook of Ali’s arm and set off through a sofa-filled lounge. ‘It’s a bit public here, isn’t it? Let’s try the bar. Michael?’
Mary didn’t even break stride or turn round. One of the reception staff, still pink with merriment, simply drew close behind them, a dog to heel.
‘The bar’s open, isn’t it?’
‘We can open it.’
‘Good man.’
They settled onto a leather bench in a corner of the panelled room. An island bar took up most of the floor, a wooden command centre armed with upturned bottles. The air smelt faintly of ashes and stale beer.
‘This is fine,’ Mary declared.
‘Grand,’ agreed Ali.
A big, embarrassed-looking lad in a dicky bow appeared behind the bar counter and started to switch on lights.
‘Can I get you ladies anything?’
‘I was just going to have a coffee,’ said Mary, ‘but it’s so hot, I don’t know. What do you think, Ali: gin and tonic?’
Ali agreed, even though she hardly ever drank gin, associating it with the juniper tang of her mother’s lips when she kissed her on her return from a party or the pub.
Mary fished about in her handbag. She brought out a tiny tape recorder and a gold compact, which she flicked open with one hand and circled in front of her perfectly made-up face. She tipped her chin up and rolled her glossy lips back to reveal an even row of small teeth.
‘You look great,’ Ali said, and Mary threw a smile at her.
‘Bless you, but you should see it first thing.’ She snapped the compact shut and threw it back in her bag, then turned her full attention on Ali.
‘What happened at St Brigid’s is important,’ she said. ‘Very big. There’s going to be a lot of attention paid to this case. Even the British papers will be writing about it—’
The boy appeared with their drinks and put a small dish of peanuts in front of Ali. Tiny ones with their skins on, lathered in salt. Ali smiled. Mary caught her expression, misunderstood it.
‘No flies on you,’ said Mary. ‘What does she want from me? you’re asking yourself. Well, I have a question for you.’
Ali met Mary’s eyes, facing up to her challenge. This was worse than the police. But exciting too. If someone saw them together – imagine. She took a sip of her drink. It tasted clean and sour.
‘How often do you hear the voice of a girl your age on radio or television?’
Ali shrugged.
‘There’s a lot talked about young people – your lack of respect, your promiscuous behaviour – but who gets to hear your voice? This case will be chewed over by doctors and bishops and government ministers, all men of course, but you were on the spot. The mother could be another schoolgirl. I want to hear what you have to say.’
‘I don’t know that I’ve anything to say. I just happened to be there.’
‘Maybe you think you’ve nothing to say because all your life people have told you to listen, not speak.’
‘Maybe …’ Something stirred inside Ali, some obscure part of her spontaneously inflating. She had a vision of people applauding, rising from their seats. She took a big gulp of gin.
Mary’s hand reached for her little recorder, fingered a button on it.
‘Do you mind?’
Mary O’Shea was as famous as you could be in Ireland. She had a show on the radio, a Sunday newspaper column and The Late Late Show wouldn’t go near the subject of women’s rights without Mary in the studio. Even Ali’s mother, who approved of very few people, loved Mary. She’d shout, Go get ’em, girl! at the radio when Mary lured some old reactionary out onto the gangplank of his own absurdity.
‘The thing is,’ Ali began, ‘the policeman – the detective – said I wasn’t to talk to anyone.’
Mary’s brows lifted a centimetre, she widened her smile. The Dictaphone went back in the bag.
‘Not a problem. The recorder’s just handy – I’m desperate at shorthand. I wouldn’t print anything against your will, or anything that would harm the case. I am scrupulous about that kind of thing. Did I tell you I went to Brigid’s myself?’
‘The nuns mention it all the time.’
‘Probably as some kind of dire warning about condom-waving feminists.’
Ali laughed. ‘Just a bit.’
‘I hear Mary Paul’s in charge now. She was the bane of my youth. She taught me history in second and third year … most of the oppressed or massacred “didn’t help themselves”, I seem to recall.’
‘She doesn’t teach now. Too busy imposing the rules.’
‘Was she there yesterday?’
‘Not in the garden, well … yes, in the garden later. They were all there at the reception, the nuns.’
Ali started to explain why they were at the school, and Mary asked if she could take notes at least. Ali suddenly couldn’t think of a reason why not. When she got to the part where she entered the shed and saw the baby, Mary asked, ‘When you saw it, what did you feel?’
The gold Biro hovered an inch above the page. The brown eyes skewered her.
Ali paused. ‘I thought it couldn’t be real.’ Her face felt hot. ‘Fitz was in a state. I wanted to get us away from the shed.’
‘And now?’
‘Now?’
‘How has it left you?’
She could see an image of herself as the photographer had posed her that morning: wistful, misted in sadness. But that wouldn’t do for Mary. Mary would want her to be tougher.
‘I feel angry.’
Mary stopped writing.
‘How d’you mean?’
Ali shrugged, she hardly knew what she meant. ‘The way things are … this country.’
‘Ah.’ Mary sat back against the upholstery and smoothed the material of her skirt over her thighs. ‘Did you get Sister O’Dwyer for sex education?’ she asked.
‘No!’
‘That’s what we got. She handed out booklets and made us read them in silence; it was
