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A small greyish-brown dog is scampering around the misty, murky churchyard. She probably has a bit of corgi in her, almost definitely some Yorkshire terrier, maybe there’s a bit of Bedlington in there somewhere and possibly something a little spaniel-like about her face; her name is Suzy, and she is part of the menagerie collected over many years by Father Dougal McGuire.
She presses her nose to a pile of freshly-fallen leaves that has drifted against the crumbly old stone gatepost, seeking the rat that she caught a whiff of a few feet away. Yes, it came this way – not long ago, within the last couple of hours but before this current bout of drizzle started. She rootles further under the heap, snuffling to the left and the right. There was something else here too amongst the background aroma of decaying plant matter and wet soil, an animal smell that she doesn’t recognise... the leaves scatter as she excitedly plunges into their midst on the trail of the mystery animal, and are swept up by a strong gust of wind. They are whipped round into a vortex between two tall, lichen-spotted gravestones and rise in a column several feet off the ground, momentarily taking on the form of a human figure before bending, twisting and disintegrating. Suzy dashes over to greet the apparition, but finds only a few yellowed leaves tumbling across the muddy grass.
She shakes her head in puzzlement, her ears clapping together, then trots off to tell her master about her adventure. He’s been at the epicentre of some very confusing goings-one for the past couple of days; lots of visitors had been gathering in the house, some familiar and some strangers. They all seemed sad, some of them cried. They wore black clothes. They moved around the big wooden box that appeared on the dining table, all repeating those hand movements that they do in church – up and down, then side to side. They talked quietly to Master, then looked inside the box.
The contents of the box were a puzzle. It looked like a person – specifically, the elderly woman who used to make the food, the one who’d disappeared suddenly a week or two prior – but it didn’t smell like her, or even like a human. It smelled more like the cleaning cupboard than anything else. It was cold and quiet and didn’t move at all. Whatever it was, it was something very special. Master and the old priest and some of the visitors stayed up all night sitting around it and burning candles, and shooed the cats away when they tried to jump on it. It was all very weird and slightly troubling to a little dog. She just stayed by her master’s side with her chin resting on his shoes, sure that he would keep her safe throughout any further developments.
Then this morning, Master put on his special long swishy clothes. Some more people came and carried the box out of the house, up the lane and into the church. It was a great walk, lots of people to say hello to, loads of things to sniff and yap at, plenty of muddy puddles to splash in and multicoloured leaves blowing everywhere. Then she was left to entertain herself in the graveyard whilst Master and the other people sat together in the church; When that was finished they took their box down to the far corner and huddled together for some more talking and crying. But Suzy was only keeping half an eye on them, she was much more interested in the local flora and fauna.
Now the crowd is breaking up; some of them are moving towards the gate, some are standing around in twos and threes sharing umbrellas. She scans the scene for her own particular human. The wind is too erratic for her to pick up his scent, but she spots him a way down the gravel path walking slowly towards her. The old priest is bobbing along leaning on his shoulder, which is not unusual. Suzy thinks Dougal looks like home and love and warmth; small and rounded, as you might expect of a man who has spent all his adult life in a job that involves more free food than heavy lifting, although in the face he looks considerably younger than his fifty-three years. She scampers towards him, scattering gravel as she races along the path. She takes a running jump into his arms, smearing mud and drool over his funeral robes. He laughs fondly as he sets her back down on the ground.
“Hey Suzy, guess what I just did?”
Her stubby little snout splits into a smile and her tongue flops out. She doesn’t have an answer for him.
“I did a whole funeral by myself, and got it all right. Didn’t I, Ted?”
“You did so,” sighs Ted, “I think we’ve cracked it. Only took – what, thirty years?”
“Ah now, Ted!” says Dougal, looking modest, “It’s because I had you as a teacher.”
He says nothing, only smiles benevolently as they make their way back into the building. Dougal has some tidying up to do as Ted rests on a pew. The light streams through a stained glass window depicting the empty tomb on one side and Jesus showing his wounds to Doubting Thomas on the other, projecting the image onto the backrest behind him.
Ted, in contrast to his companion, has become strangely thin and white in recent years, like a pencil sketch of his younger self. Gone is the nervous energy and internal conflict of long ago; he radiates serenity as he watches over Dougal as an advisor and confidante. Something changed after the failed trip to America, and something else changed when Jack died, then Bishop Brennan retired, and Dick Byrne moved away. There was only Craggy Island itself to contend with after that, and, well – it’s not all that bad really, is it? Not when you get used to it. Not when it starts to feel like home, when you become a part of the place, when you realise that you really will be here forever and ever and ever, and that’s alright. He spends his time very much at peace these days; his only worry is, how Dougal will get along on his own. There’s the new housekeeper, of course, but it’ll take a long time until he stops hiding from her and asking who she is and what she’s done with the real Mrs. Doyle. And the steady stream of third housemates, none of them have ever left any lasting impression. What would become of him, if he was alone in the world?
“Well, that’s everything done now,” says Dougal as he sits down beside his mentor, “I can’t wait to get home and see what Mrs. Doyle’s making us for tea.”
“Don’t you remember, Dougal?” says Ted, kindly and patiently.
“Did she tell us what she’s making?”
“What were you just doing? What were you doing outside?”
Dougal looks blankly at Ted, until he is distracted by Suzy hopping up into his lap and licking his face.
“It was a funeral, wasn’t it?” Ted presses on.
“Yes! You said I did it just right, all by myself.”
“You did, well done. Now – I’m sorry, but - that was Mrs. Doyle’s funeral, Dougal.”
“Oh – oh no, Ted!” He stares in horror, clinging to the little dog for moral support.
“I’m afraid so. She had a stroke last week, didn’t she? We went to the hospital with her, didn’t we, but there was nothing they could do. You gave her last rites, Dougal. Do you remember that?”
“But Ted, I thought it was someone called Joan that we buried today! I was calling her Joan all the way though. Oh God, do you think anyone noticed? Will she still go to Heaven, Ted?”
“Dougal – Dougal. Don’t worry. That was her first name. She was called Joan Doyle.”
“Ah was it? Well, that’s a lucky coincidence there, isn’t it, Ted?”
“It is, isn’t it.”
Time was when Ted would have been incredulous that anyone could not know the given name of someone they’d lived with for three decades, but now he just smiles and shakes his head at silly old Dougal and his funny little ways. If there’s a way of doing something wrong, this man will find it. Same as ever.
“Do you think she is in Heaven, Ted?” Dougal asks, breaking a short pause.
“Of course she is, Dougal. I bet she’s up there now, making tea for all the angels.”
“Do angels drink tea, Ted?”
“They’re going to have to, now Mrs. Doyle’s with them.”
“Heh, yeah. She did make a nice cup of tea, didn’t she Ted?”
“She did, Dougal, you’re right there. She took her duties very seriously.”
The two priests and the dog sit quietly together for a minute or two. Suzy rests her chin on Dougal’s lap, and he bends her ears this way and that.
“Y’know Ted,” says Dougal after some thought, “I’m a bit sad about Mrs. Doyle. I know she was really old and she wasn’t in pain for very long and everything, but it’s going to feel weird in the house without her there. It’ll be like, if all the doors suddenly disappeared or something. Or if there were no chairs. But if the doors and chairs used to make the dinner and clean up and everything. And if they used to talk to us and watch the football with us and – do you know what I mean, Ted?”
“I know what you mean, but maybe don’t put it like that at the wake.”
“Do I have to go?”
“You do, I’m afraid. But you’re better at that sort of thing than you used to be, aren’t you? And I’ll be there, and there’ll probably be a few people you know there too.”
“Who’s going, that we know?”
“You wrote the invites, Dougal. Can’t you remember?”
“Err... No.”
“Well, there was Cyril McDuff and his family, Sister Assumpta, Noel Furlong, Father Jessup...”
“What did I invite them for? They’re a load of eejits.”
“You wrote to everyone in the address books, like I told you. And everyone who was still alive and hasn’t moved away said they’d like to come, didn’t they?”
“Is anyone I like going?”
“The bishop said he’d try and make it. You were good friends with him at one time, weren’t you?”
“Heh, I still can’t believe they made old Damo Lennon a bishop! He’s more fun than Len though.”
“It’d hard to be less fun than him.”
“He was like a huge giant scary monster that ate all the fun until there was none left.”
“He was. I did enjoy kicking him up the arse that time though.”
“Ah Ted, that was great! I loved how you just went and kicked him up the arse, like he was a big bishop-shaped football. What happened afterwards though, Ted? Didn’t he find out or something?“
“Y’know Dougal, I can’t remember. There’s a lot of things from that sort of time that seem a bit hazy now. Maybe not hazy, more... insignificant. As if it’s not really my job to remember.”
“Oh no, Ted – it’s not supposed to be my job, is it? I don’t think I’d be very good at it at all. I’d get sacked on day one. You’d be way better than me, Ted.”
“Don’t worry about it, Dougal,” says Ted with a gentle smile, “if no-one remembers, it doesn’t matter.”
“Ah, right. That’s OK then, Ted.”
Another contemplative silence. Ted turns to lie full-length on the pew, arms folded across his chest. Suzy hops down to the floor, where she rolls over and Dougal rubs her muddy belly with his toe. Her tongue flops out of her mouth as she smiles up at him and wiggles her stubbly little body left and right, paws flailing.
They are disturbed by the sound of the door opening. Dougal and Suzy both stand up sharply, alert and on guard. A petite middle-aged woman in a black suit approaches, her heels click-clacking loudly on the stone floor.
“I’m not disturbing you, am I, Father?” she asks, her voice apologetic and a little tearful.
“Um... Well, err...” Dougal falters, and looks to Ted for guidance.
“Say no,” said Ted softly, “ask her to come and sit down.”
“No, no,” says Dougal, “Will you come and sit down?”
Ted smiles and gives him a thumbs up; the woman does not seem to see him at all.
“Ah no, Father, I won’t be staying long. I just wanted to say what a lovely service it was that you did for my Aunty Joan. I’m her niece, Jenny.”
“Of course, Jenny,” Ted mouths to Dougal, “she told us all about you, she was very fond of you.”
Dougal repeats his lines, slightly puzzled as he can’t specifically recall Mrs. Doyle ever mentioning any nieces at all; but he trusts Ted to know what to say at times like this.
“She thought highly of you too, Father. Whenever she came to visit she’d say how lucky she was, how much she enjoyed working for you all... I’m sorry...” she takes a tissue from the pocket of her jacket and dabs tears from her eyes.
“She’ll be pouring tea for all the angels in Heaven now,” says Dougal, of his own accord.
Ted cringes, but Jenny manages a poignant smile.
“That’s right, she will so!” she says, the words twisted and squeezed between her tears.
“Sure, she’ll be having a great time up there,” the priest continues, “with an infinite number of people to drink her tea for all eternity. She’ll have a golden teapot and a tray with little wings on it.”
“She never let anyone go without a nice cup of tea, did she?” says Jenny, who has composed herself a little.
“Yeah. Even if they didn’t want one.”
“I’m afraid I’m going to have to dash for the ferry,” she says, nodding and laughing a little as she folds away her tissue, “I just wanted to come and meet you at long last, and say thank you for giving her a good send-off. I know some people are still a bit squeamish about humour at funerals, but I thought it was very fitting. She liked a good laugh, didn’t she.”
“Haha, um, I didn’t do it all myself...” Dougal falters, unaware that there had been any humour in his service at all.
“Yes, the eulogies were lovely as well. Anyway, I must get off now. See you again, Father.”
“Ah right, OK, um, go in peace and, you know, all that kind of thing.”
She smiles and shakes his hand before clip-clopping on her way.
“Was that alright, Ted?” he asks apprehensively; he still occasionally falls back into fear of the old priest’s disapproval.
“It wasn’t too bad. You seem to be muddling through pretty well these days, in your own way.”
“You’re not going to leave me, are you, Ted?”
“I’ll be with you as long as you need me, Dougal.”
“Right so,” says Dougal, with a heavy sigh, “I’d miss you though, Ted. If you weren’t here anymore, I’d be the only one left. Now Mrs. Doyle’s gone...”
“I’ll be with you as long as you need me.”
“Do you promise, Ted?”
“Of course I promise, Dougal!”
“That’s alright then, Ted.”
“Anyway, you’d better go home and get yourself changed – and give that dog a bath. You can’t turn up at the wake covered in mud.”
“You’re right there, Ted. She loves a bath.”
“She does.”
“You’ll be at the wake, won’t you?”
“Just like I promised.”
Dougal nods and smiles in reply, and turns to leave; Suzy, who heard the word ‘bath’ and is thrilled by the idea of splashing about in warm water, skips around his feet whipping her skinny little tail and yapping.
“Dougal?” says Ted, sitting up and turning to face him with eyebrows raised.
“What is it, Ted?”
“Isn’t there something you had to do while you were here?”
“Erm...” He furrows his brow as he wracks his brain, but only ends up shaking his cluttered head.
“My flowers, Dougal!”
“Oh! Right, yeah. Sorry Ted, I forgot.”
He hurries back down the aisle to the altar, watched by the befuddled dog. Hidden behind the altar cloth is a bouquet of alstromerias, yellows and oranges, wrapped in golden-brown tissue paper. He lifts them gently and carries them like a baby.
“Come on Suzy,” he calls to his companion, “let’s go and put these flowers on the grave.”
The little dog puts the ‘bath’ business from her mind and trots along behind her master. He leads her back out into the now-deserted churchyard, where the grey clouds and spotty rain are in the process of clearing and giving way to shafts of copper-tinged sunlight. The wind is still blowing as hard as ever, flinging leaves around almost aggressively. Suzy reacts in kind, jumping and diving as she tries to catch her crumbly brown assailants.
Leaving her to her game, Dougal makes his way back down the hill towards the freshly-decorated grave of Mrs. Doyle. Several floral tributes sit in rainbow-coloured piles on top of the mound of soil, their petals and ribbons fluttering in the breeze. In amongst them lie her favourite woolly hat, a Eoin McLove doll knitted by a friend, her rosary and at least five teapots.
But Dougal gives it only a cursory glance as he walks on by; he also walks by the second-newest grave, and the three plots after that. At last he stops at a fairly large headstone in speckled grey granite that reads:
Father Ted Crilly
Priest of this parish 1989-2021
‘Just resting’
Followed by his dates of birth and death.
Hitching up his billowing vestments to kneel on the damp grass, Dougal removes the desiccated stalks of the flowers that Mrs. Doyle left there a month or two ago and replaces them with his own offering.
Poor old Ted, he hadn’t been keen on that epitaph. Being remembered forever as the embezzler of charity funds? He’d find out who chose it and be a poltergeist to them, he’d said. But of course, he never did.
It had taken Dougal a long time to really understand that only he could see Ted’s ghost. Mrs. Doyle and the congregation had been very concerned when he apparently had conversations with thin air, or mentioned having seen the late priest recently; they’d thought that he must have been taking the bereavement and sudden increase in responsibility very badly and fallen into some kind of psychosis. There was talk of bringing the bishop over to have a serious conversation, maybe even a doctor. Eventually he’d learned that his continuing friendship with the deceased was one of those things that are best kept secret, like how he became a priest or the events that led to him being washed up on Craggy Island.
He calls and whistles for Suzy as he turns away and begins the walk home, but she does not respond. He stops to wait for her as he reaches the gateway, a lonely figure as he calls again and scans the graveyard. The sound of running paws and a little yap causes him to look towards the church, but then another movement in the corner of his eye catches his attention; an elderly woman, small and stooped and clad in shades of brown, is extending an arm towards him as if offering something.
“Mrs. Doyle! Are you going to stay around a while too?” he asks hopefully, turning to greet the spirit.
But it wasn’t Mrs. Doyle that flickered on the edge of his vision. It was only another collection of leaves eddying and lifting between the tall gravestones, and now they are dispersing, diminishing, disappearing into the sky.