The Brothers' Lot - Kevin Holohan [75]
Dear Mr. Madden,
Thank you for sending us your manuscript of “The Glencullen Gang Take Stock.” Unfortunately, this work does not meet our current editorial needs. We regretfully return your manuscript and wish you every success in your literary endeavors. We trust you understand that ours is but one subjective opinion and that you will persist in your search for a suitable publisher. On a personal note, I would just like to add that despite being a devout Anglican, I was greatly moved by your ‘Life of Saorseach O’Rahilly.’
Kindest regards,
D.W. Thompson-Greene
“See? See? See what they did to me? The manuscript wasn’t even opened. I glued pages eleven and twelve together at the corners and they were still glued. The bastards! That O’Rahilly shite is the only thing anyone takes me seriously for. I have hundreds of letters like that. Not any of the Glencullen Gang books. Fifteen of them I’ve written. Not a single one published! When I submitted Gold of Antrim, they suggested that I should take up teaching! They even sent back Muiris Fogarty and the Jungle of Fear. Because of that fucking Saorseach O’fucking Rahilly, I live in a pigsty and the world will never know Stephen Brennan, Private Eye, or how Patsy Nugent helped the Blackfoot Indians at the Battle of Two-Rock Canyon, or Tom Miley and the Martian Menace! Nothing! I can publish nothing! I can never escape that bastarding book! Ruined me, it did!”
Madden paused for breath, leaned over, and, with surprising adroitness, grabbed the letter from Mulvey, downed his whiskey, and tucked the bottle of stout into his coat pocket before reeling toward the door in a flurry of shouts and incomprehensible curses.
Mulvey stood up and hastily exited after him just in time to see two urchins, one suspiciously like the boy he had encountered earlier and the other smaller and stockier, making off with his handlebars, pedals, and both wheels. Beside the naked frame of his bicycle lay the barely conscious figure of Madden, who was now drooling copiously onto the cobblestones beside his face.
Mulvey shook his head sadly and walked down the hill to the village. He turned the corner just in time to see the train pull out of the station. A soft rain began and just as suddenly intensified.
“I’ll write the fecking thing myself if I have to,” he muttered, and stomped toward the station to wait for the next Dublin train. He could get off at Denmark Street Station and walk up to Werburgh Street from there. He smiled as this new plan began to take shape in his head.
“I know it is very late, but I do need to ask you some more questions,” said Father Mulvey softly. “You see, I was on the telephone with the Bishop of Spokes and Duggery and he had a few questions he needed answered before he spoke to Cardinal Russell.”
Brother Boland nodded sadly as if wishing none of this had ever happened.
“So, can you remember the night you found the statuette of Venerable Saorseach?”
Brother Boland nodded slowly.
“The bleeding one?”
Boland nodded again, barely aware of what Mulvey was saying to him. Inside his head, a distracting clamor swirled through his brain. The something wrong was out there again, inside him, all around him, growing wronger. Mulvey was not making it any better. Venerable Saorseach O’Rahilly was not making it any better.
“Can you recall hearing anything? A voice? Music? Anything out of the ordinary?”
“I have to go,” said the Brother hoarsely.
Father Mulvey watched in shock as the man’s frail frame seemed to tighten and brace before scuttling to the door. Mulvey ran to the door after him and saw him move up the stairs. Ever the intrepid Diocesan Investigator, he followed.
Mulvey had seriously underestimated Brother Boland’s speed, and by the time he got to the first landing, the man was out of sight.
Several lucky deductive leaps and one false start of bursting into the empty toilets on the second floor were required before Mulvey found his way to the top landing. From there it was easy. Brother Boland had no thoughts of