He couldn’t say it had made everything better, but it had certainly improved how he felt. There was no job to go back to in London, not that he’d actually been searching for one. The only search he’d been actively pursuing since he arrived here was over at what remained of Saint Nunciata’s.
He had hit brick walls at every turn when it came to tracking down his birth mother and as each day passed his motivation to carry on searching was waning. Of course, it might be easier if he’d told people what he was about, but it turned out it was harder to break a secret the longer it had been kept. He really hadn’t been hopeful coming here that he’d actually track down anything more than the little his adoptive parents had already told him. He was a mixed-race baby, brought to London from Saint Nunciata’s babies’ home over thirty years ago for a well-to-do Catholic couple.
He’d read too many articles online – too many children who’d met the same obstacles and too many more who’d managed eventually to penetrate the layers of bureaucracy and religious secret-keeping, only to find a frightened and bitter woman who wanted nothing to do with them. The notion that he should let sleeping dogs lie was beginning to settle on him gradually. He wasn’t sure he’d ever really been that committed to finding the woman who gave birth to him anyway. What kind of woman doesn’t go looking for the child she gave up all those years ago?
‘We can’t judge those girls by today’s standards,’ Elizabeth said softly. ‘Ireland was a different place then. I don’t expect you to understand, but the girls who ended up in the convent – well, there was no choice.’ Elizabeth had tried to explain what it was like, but the sadness that passed across her face told him far more than her words. She’d been a regular visitor to the women who had lived in the convent until it was closed. Perhaps she had known his mother? They had gone to see the old building, a sprawling grey, derelict structure that had angels at the doors and serpents in the remaining stained-glass windows.
Although it was emptied over a quarter of a century ago, there was no denying its looming presence; there was an eerie feeling of ghosts who would never fully rest. ‘For some, perhaps it was better than the alternative – many of the girls came from simple farming backgrounds. Back then, a respectable man would prefer to have a dead daughter than an illegitimate grandchild.’ She shivered then, perhaps remembering things she would prefer to forget. ‘Come on, let’s walk around the old gardens, this place isn’t going to do either of us any good.’
Dan looked once more at the building, mostly boarded up, apart from the occasional window where the storms had blown away their covers, revealing stained glass that might have been striking once. He wondered for a moment if he came back again and broke in – would there be files? ‘And inside?’
‘No,’ Elizabeth said, almost reading his thoughts. ‘This is it. They cleared out everything. Every last bed sheet was sent off to some unfortunate Third World mission; every scrap of paper was burned on a bonfire that seemed to last for weeks before they closed the place up.’
‘God.’ Dan exhaled, hating the regime that had locked down answers so firmly and cruelly from so many.
‘God? I think they lost sight of him long ago.’ Elizabeth shook her head sadly.
‘So, where has everyone ended up? I mean twenty-six years ago? They can’t all be dead and buried already, can they?’
‘Scattered to the four winds mostly,’ Elizabeth said as they turned around the back of the building. ‘In the end, the girls who were left were taken into sheltered housing. Most of them wanted to get out of Ballycove – there was nothing for them here and the notion of starting afresh seemed like the best thing for them. There was only a handful in the end, women who’d gone in years earlier and never managed to make their way out again, until it was too late.’ She pointed towards a tall black railing topped off with neat white crosses and ending with a narrow gate – hardly wide enough for two people. She pushed it in and waited for him to follow. ‘I’ve kept in touch with one or two of them, but they won’t be a lot of help to you now.’
Dan realised they were standing in a graveyard – but not a graveyard like he’d ever seen before.
‘It’s been decommissioned, now of course; all of the nuns buried in some sister convent at the other end of the country,’ Elizabeth supplied. They walked the narrow path, between two rows of identical black-painted iron crosses. Each had the name of the nun it had stood over inscribed in neat white script across its middle. The crosses dated from 1876 and bore names like Concepta, Assumpta, Benedict and Deceline – all long gone out of fashion – if they’d ever been in vogue. Each name was followed by the same epitaph – humble servant of the daughters of hope. It sent a chill through Dan; of course, it reflected perfectly the lives led by these women. They had been in service, their every thought and action dictated by a regime that held them in a sort of ante-room from everyday living. It didn’t excuse the stories Dan had read since he began his search – terrible stories of women made to suffer for one mistake. Still, something of the loneliness of the place – there wasn’t a flower in sight – diluted some of his anger towards these women who until now, he’d seen only as his mother’s tormentors.