A Sister's Promise by Anne Bennett Read Free Book Online

Clayton turned to her now asshe burst out, ‘D’you hear that, Father? Blasphemy, and before the child too. As if I could leave a child in a home where such views are felt and, even worse, expressed. The sooner I get them both to Ireland the better I’ll like it.’
    ‘Come now …’ the priest began soothingly.
    He got no further, for what the women had said had penetrated Kevin’s brain. He had been shocked into silence when she had shouted at him, but now he said, ‘What do you mean about going to Ireland?’
    ‘Just what I say,’ Biddy almost hissed. ‘You and your sister are coming to live with me.’
    ‘Oh no I’m not! I ain’t,’ Kevin cried desperately. ‘I’m staying with my granddad, I am. Aren’t I, Granddad?’ He appealed as Stan stayed silent. ‘Tell her, Granddad. Go on, tell her.’
    ‘Ah, yes, tell me?’ Biddy mocked.
    ‘Have you no shame?’ Stan demanded of her coldly. ‘We have just buried the child’s parents. You might be holier than I am, but there isn’t a kind bone in your body.’
    ‘But it ain’t true, is it?’ Kevin cried. At the grave expression on his granddad’s face, he felt suddenly cold, afraid and lonely as he insisted, ‘Say it ain’t true, Granddad. Tell her.’
    ‘May your God forgive you,’ Stan said, picking Kevin up in his arms, ‘for I will struggle to do so.’
    Father Clayton watched Stan stride across the room and knew he was going to go somewhere quiet and explain to the child that his suffering was far from over yet. That now he had to go to some alien place with a woman he was so obviously scared of and live there until he was adult and could choose for himself. And tell him too there wasn’t a damned thing either of them could do about it. The priest felt suddenly terribly dispirited and heavy, as if his body was filled with lead.
    ‘They’re both wilful, those children,’ Biddy said fiercely. ‘Too fond of getting their own way and totally disrespectful.’
    ‘You don’t think it’s just that they are both still in shock and missing their parents, and maybe a little afraid of the future?’ the priest put in mildly.
    ‘I don’t go along with all this psychological claptrap,’ Biddy said. ‘Their parents are dead and gone, and that’s that, and it is obvious they will have to live with me. I am putting myself out too, you know? Do you think I want to start rearing children at my time of life?’
    ‘Then why do it?’ The words were out before the priest could stop them.
    Biddy stared at him coldly. ‘I would have thought you of all people would not have to ask that question,’ she said, ‘I know my duty and do not approve of my grandchildren being brought up with a heathen.’
    ‘Stan Maguire is no heathen,’ Father Clayton said quite heatedly because the woman was annoying him greatly.
    ‘I don’t see how you can say that so categorically when the man worships nowhere and neither did his son,’ Biddy said. ‘As far as I am concerned that makes him a heathen and I do not want my grandchildren brought up by one such as him. I am surprised that you are not similarly concerned. I think I need to talk to your superior about this and I fully intend to do that.’
    Father Clayton knew that Father Monahon would see things exactly as she did, and when she complained about his attitude, as he knew she would, he would be hauled over the coals himself. That in itself wouldn’t matter if anything had been achieved by his interference, but he knew it hadn’t. He sighed. Sometimes he found it difficult to follow the Church’s teaching in blind obedience as they were taught they had to, for he often found issues were not so black and white. He couldn’t help wishing that, regardless of Stan’s religion, or lack of it, the children could be left with the grandfather they loved.
    Molly had watched the altercation and knew by her grandfather’s determined strides across the room with Kevinin his arms that he was hopping mad about