The Good Priest Read Online Free

to Lady Lindsay,’ a low voice interjected. Elizabeth Templeton helpfully pointed at a group near the gate, the square body of the rota-organiser obscuring many of the slimmer frames of her companions.
    â€˜Right. I’ll catch her the now,’ Mamie Bryce exclaimed, moving off and determined to corner her quarry before anyone else did. Past experience suggested that she would be a much softer target than the priest. She had crumbled instantly over the hoovering.
    â€˜Thanks, Elizabeth,’ Father Vincent said, smiling broadly and showing his even white teeth, ‘but she’ll be back, you’ll see.’
    Elizabeth simply nodded by way of reply, and he added as an afterthought: ‘How’s Michael doing?’
    Michael, her only child, suffered from attention deficit disorder and Tourette’s syndrome, and these had ensured that she had not had a good night’s sleep for many years. The last two decades of her life had been spent explaining the world to him and him to the world. The boy’s father could not cope and had left them both, seeking solace for his loss in other arms.
    â€˜Not as well as I’d like,’ she said. ‘As you know, after that silly incident with the motorbike, his card’s been marked. He still hasn’t found a job. Whenever anything happens here that community policewoman comes straight to my door, determined he’ll be involved.’
    â€˜You mean Effie?’
    â€˜Is that what she’s called? So far it’s been nothing to do with him, and he’s infuriated at the injustice of it, so he argues with her and things go from bad to worse.’
    â€˜Where’s he now?’
    â€˜He’s spending the night with his dad; they’re going together to the rugby at Murrayfield tomorrow afternoon. So I’ve no worries for the moment. I know exactly where he is for the next forty-eight hours. He’ll love it. He needed a man’s hand in his life, but he’s had precious little of it. And you, how’s life with you?’
    â€˜Fine,’ he said, sounding suddenly and uncharacteristically guarded. Mamie was approaching them, and oncein range, she slipped in front of Elizabeth and exclaimed loudly, ‘Ronnie says that you’re to sort it out. It’s favouritism. I told her that I’m not putting up with it. She said I’d a brass neck. You’re to decide who’s to do the big vase this week. So, is it to be me or Ann-Marie?’
    â€˜You,’ he shot back, annoyed at the interruption.
    Re-entering the empty and echoing church, the squeaking noises made by his new rubber-soled shoes on the parquet flooring sounded shrill, like a gathering of angry mice. So, for the fun of it, he started to take exaggeratedly large strides, placing his feet gingerly on the floor as if it was made of thin ice. Filling the ensuing silence, his tummy let out a loud rumble. With only five minutes to go before the confession hour, there had been no time for the cup of tea and slice of fruit cake that had filled his imagination so recently. Mamie’s furious rant had seen to that. Still, in the face of her barrage he had not relented, and if she resigned from the rota so be it. Catherine Forbes might volunteer, others too; plenty of them had been put off by Mamie’s involvement. No doubt it would prove an empty threat like the last time.
    Now seated in the confessional, he leaned back against the wooden panelling, luxuriating in the silence after the woman’s tirade. How wonderfully peaceful it seemed. He tried to stretch out his short legs but was unable to do so, due to a collection of broken vases, brushes and hoovers that had appeared from nowhere. The place now seemed to be being used as an overflow broom cupboard. Perhaps it was part of the vendetta between the various cleaningfactions? Some point or other was probably being made by someone about something. Was he simply being caught in the