Page 97 of Hidden Daughters

Ann continued slowly, her voice trembling. Breaking.

‘The nuns usually got the smallest child to climb inside and extract the offending article. They picked on this wee girl. She was a wisp of a thing. Anyway, on this particular day she was taking too long in the machine. The poor mite was terrified. Wide-eyed. Her whole body was one long tremor when she crawled out with her knee bleeding. The nun roared insults at her, the girl shook her head frantically and made the mistake of talking back and then the nun whipped her across the face with the large crucifix of her rosary beads.’

Lottie felt nauseous. ‘That’s horrific. What did you do?’

‘I did nothing. We were all frozen like useless statues and did absolutely nothing. We were terrified.’

‘I can understand your fear.’ Lottie thought there was no way she could fully appreciate the horror of what they’d experienced.

‘The worst thing was… No. I can’t bring myself to speak of it.’ Tears were streaming down Ann’s face like torrential rain. Unstoppable. She grabbed Lottie’s arm and linked her, leaning her head against her shoulder. ‘The murders this week, I think they have to do with what happened in the laundry back then. I really believe that.’

‘Why is that so?’ Lottie waited for Ann to elaborate, for the woman’s tears to abate.

‘Because… because I heard the victims this week were scalded with boiling water. Is that true?’

‘I’m not involved in the investigation. I can’t say.’

Ann pulled away from her. ‘Oh for God’s sake. I know it’s true. Denis told me, and he heard it from the superintendent.’

‘Okay, okay.’ Lottie reached for her, but Ann marched ahead. She caught up. ‘I’m sorry, Ann. Please continue your story.’

‘It’s not a frigging story! It’s the truth. It’s my life. My old life. I was sent there because my mother died and my father hadn’t the will nor the means to rear me. It was the same situation for that wee girl.’

‘What was her name?’

‘The nuns gave us new names, usually saints or angels. We only knew her as Gabriel.’

‘What became of her?’ Lottie asked, though she wasn’t sure she wanted to know. She recalled Brigid Kelly mentioning that name too.

‘The nun was shouting. The poor thing was in hysterics, getting blood from her face all over the sheets wrapped around her. Then… Oh my God, I can’t go back to that moment…’

‘Please, Ann. It might help me save someone else.’

With a deep, troubled breath, Ann exhaled what she’d seemed hesitant to utter a moment ago.

‘Then Robert appeared.’

‘Robert Hayes?’ Lottie scrunched her brows in confusion.

‘Yes. The very one. The devil incarnate. Huh.’ Ann swiped at her tears, and a steely anger flashed from her eyes. ‘He was some sort of deacon then, but he became a priest afterwards. Bastard. He worked at the convent and also at Knockraw. He wanted to know what all the commotion was about. I believe he understood what was going on. And as if he was possessed by the devil himself, he pushed the nun out of the way, saying he knewhow to sort the errant girl. He threw her in, slammed the drum door shut and turned the dial, and the machine roared into life.’

No longer just nauseous, Lottie felt she wanted to be physically sick. ‘Oh my good Lord God.’

‘The good Lord did nothing to help. None of us did. Robert didn’t even wait to see his handiwork. Just strode out as quickly as he’d arrived. Another nun, a young novice, was standing there open-mouthed with shock, like we all were. She did her best to turn off the machine, but she twisted all the wrong dials. It seemed an age before she got it to stop. When it did, the silence was unbearable, a deathly quiet that I will never forget. The first nun backed away, fell to her knees and prayed. The fucking old bitch. As if that was going to save poor little Gabriel.’

‘What happened to the child?’

‘What do you think happened? She was bruised, bleeding and blistered. A wee slip of a thing couldn’t survive that. She died shortly afterwards. They didn’t even call a doctor! Her body was taken out and buried somewhere, probably in the grounds, and we weren’t allowed to mention her or the episode ever again.’

Lottie kneeled in the sand at the edge of the sea and splashed her face with cool water. She sensed Ann kneeling close to her and welcomed the physical presence by her side.

‘What has this to do with Bryan O’Shaughnessy?’

‘He abandoned her. He never looked for her. You see, I believe that wee Gabriel was his innocent little sister.’

Both of them were silent as Lottie drove back to Ann’s shop. Shocked was too light a word for what she felt after what she had heard.

Outside the cabin, she idled the engine. ‘How did you keep going in the convent, after what happened?’

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