The Isle of Saints — an extract

Canice Ní Deorain always found peace atop the cliffs of Rathlin Island. From their peak, she could trace the entire coastline with her finger, watching the waters of the North Channel in their pilgrimage to the east, while those envoys of the Atlantic mirrored to the west. She passed Cooraghy Bay and the White Cliffs, saw the whole island reach out from Rue Point to Bull Point, then placed it all behind her; the Church, the Watchtower, even the home she shared with Brendan, reduced to fleeting reflections on the sea’s surface. And when she looked out over the edge, loosening stray stones into the sea below, she saw the swash of the waves as they crashed against jagged sea stacks of slate.

            These rocks soothed Canice. They reminded her that everything moved on, for, at the water’s edge of her memories, she remembered how she had walked those same cliffs as a child, hand in her grandfather’s hand, wearing a pair of oversized Wellington boots; boots which had washed up for her one day upon the shore of Church Bay—oh! how those rocks had stood tall and proud! She had thought not that they were unable to fall, but that they refused to; that they refused the very pull of the ocean itself.

            Back then, Canice had thought that she too was invincible; had believed that her life would be as endless as the surrounding seas. But now she saw those rocks as they had always been; withered and hunched, as water, time’s constant twin, continued to erode all away. Some reached almost to the cliffs themselves, their bases thin, soon to topple under their own weight. Others kept closer to the surface, safer, still slowly sinking. The will of the sea was certain, and to Canice, who had seen friends and family fade as easily as the passing of the tide, the surety that her homeland would follow the same course as herself settled her into a kind of tranquillity.

            Life had slipped Canice by, but the truth was it had been taken. Tragedy enveloped Rathlin like a shroud, with those beneath but slaves to the veil. With nobody around to hear her, and those that were little invested, Canice had come to prefer her own company, even as schoolfriends went from wedding to weaning and funerals became as commonplace as the sun.

Yet, she always took time for the one voice forever in harmony with her own. Every morning, Canice took her place upon the cliffs in order to deliver the sermon of her self to the only ear she trusted to listen: that of the sea.

            There was always her brother, Brendan, of course, whom she did love very much. But leading the Church possessed most of his time, guiding those remaining few hundred of Rathlin Island in their Catholic faith. Without him, the island would have nobody to foster their beliefs, no helmsman to navigate any approaching storm. If Canice were to voice her troubles to her brother, he would surely sacrifice all for her. She could not put herself before the island.

In truth, the Church no longer spoke to Canice as it once did. Its bell tolled like the ferryman’s, offering passage she could not take. Its steeple reached out like a whistling buoy, signalling dangers that lurked beneath. Try as Brendan might to persuade her to attend confession or Mass, he had long since noticed that the old rituals simply failed to bring her solace any more. The Church was his, and hers the cliffs.

Fifty years ago, Canice had attended confession for the last time. She had noted the dark wood of the confessional, misshapen and moulded by salt. Tucked into the far corner of the Church, no matter where the sun sat in her daily odyssey, the booth was always submerged in shadow. It had long been said among the people of Rathlin that you cannot find confession unless you first know where to look.

            Children, some long passed, some still living, and others later lost to the famine, had carved their names into the seat. As if only just retired from its seafaring days, the confessional had seeped damp. She had taken her place, trying to find comfort atop the scratched and scarred surface; had picked at a loose strand of wool from her dress before tearing it out at the root. Then, through the partition, she had seen the cloth of his vestments. His hands were still on his knees.

            Now, she supported Brendan in any way that she could, offering many twilit nights to the practice of his sermons. But when it came to her own communion, Canice felt that she could no longer attend somewhere so public—so many watchful eyes—with the Church of the Immaculate Conception so enclosed from the sea. In those fifty years, she had not stepped through those wide timber doors; she had not visited those at rest in St Thomas’s; she had avoided Cill Bhride, Cill na Bhruain and Kilpatrick. She had kept to herself and to the sea, and for the most part, Rathlin allowed her.

            So today, Canice sat atop the cliffs of Ballynagard, listening to the waves crash against the rocks. Yet, as she looked out past the docks of Church Bay, she saw something which she thought long since lost to the island. At first, the parting waves seemed to be a pod of dolphins, circling the island for food; then, a bubbling of the waters, as if a sunken wreck had shifted somewhere beneath the surface. But, no, amid the gentle churning of the sea, Canice saw a boat.

            She had seen boats before, of course, traders from her childhood; and a dozen unused currachs may still have been stored in a warehouse in Kinkeel. But since the famine passed, no trade came through Rathlin, for no trade was necessary. All that was required—livestock, farmland, waters within which to fish—had returned to them in plenty. Columban reared his cattle in the fields of Ballycarry. Gallus and his daughter loosed their nets off the shores of Doon Bay. And those items which the island held in scarce supply—the Holy texts, for instance—still remained from a time before.

            Now, the island kept the world at bay. For whatever a stranger were to bring, the world would come with them. Aside from ecclesiastical letters, compiled and cherished by Colmcille, Canice was convinced that the last thing to ever come to Rathlin Island were her pair of Wellington boots; and even those letters had begun to wane now. So, when she saw this vessel, though that was perhaps too grand a title, coming to moor at a waterfront which held little potential, her curiosity was piqued, as was her concern.

            Rising from the grasses, Canice wiped the slight fronds of bracken from the pale white cloth of her dress. She picked up her coat from the ground beneath her and wrapped it around her shoulders, protecting herself from the chill wind so often forgotten when at peace. Then, fastening the buttons one by one as she went, she hurried down the cliffs.

            The weather had been calm that day, despite the bite of the sea air, and, in truth, Canice could scarcely remember the last time that the island had been smote by a storm. They had been frequent in her youth, when her and Brendan would gather by candlelight and tell tall tales about what lay beyond the rain. But even in the long autumn and winter months of recent years gone by, the sea had surrounded her with soft stillness: a mellow accompaniment to her day-to-day life.

            Yet, when she looked out at the small wooden dinghy which was washing a stranger to shore, Canice could not help but think that the waves beneath it were harsher, more agitated, perhaps, than any of those further out. The boat was swaying in restless, syncopated motions, as if itself were seasick; as if the sea wished to cast it down, sink another ship to its depths.

            Canice checked this fanciful thinking on her behalf, it did her no good. A tempest in a teacup, that was the saying—as if the sea were any cause for concern, especially with a stranger approaching the bay. And besides, her eyesight was not what it had once been, back when she could identify all the beasts that circled the island, above and below, from the shadows they cast on the water. Now, she relied on their sounds, their shapes, her memories.

            Following the route where countless feet had trod the grass before her, Canice kept her distance from St Thomas’s, fringing the path to her left. There, on a ledge of sewn-together stone, the small church was surrounded by graves, jutting out from the soil as if the island itself had upturned. It was not used for service, nor for worship; a reminder of death, not life. But the people of Rathlin celebrated it much the same.

            They walked the stones each day, kneeling down to offer prayers to the parted. They brought flowers and planted them in the surrounding soil, entwining branch and berry and bone. On the last Thursday of every month, they congregated to share memories and mementos of their lost. They ensured that the dead of Rathlin Island lived on.

            Somewhere, Canice’s own parents and grandparents were counted among their number, lay side by side by side by side. Four times the island had flocked to say farewell, with her brother leading a hymn on each occasion. But since then, Canice had found little desire to visit them; she had found her peace and would not upset it. With three of their plots empty, only one would hear her words. And she would rather have heard Brendan’s, besides.

            A minute later, the path split in two, and Canice turned away from the Church of the Immaculate Conception. Unlike its sister, the Church had no graveyard, no lost, and was active all year round. A mosaic of glass and stone, it reached out in one uninterrupted breath. By its side, an old oak tree spread sparse branches to the sky, reaching out over the roof like a lattice. Canice climbed it, once; felt closer to God.

            From within, she could hear his words; the sermon Brendan had practiced to her the night before. Today’s was the Feast Day of St Albert, and Brendan had prepared words on science and faith. The Church was strange, in that way, an anomaly on the island; it projected the voices, the thoughts, of those within. Out in the Watchtower, Cronan swore that he had heard Brendan’s voice at night. Down in the docks, they heard him out to sea.

            “—we, God’s creations, were put on this Earth and blessed with reason so that we may guide all the other creatures of His world. We are His shepherds. As we are told in Genesis, Let them be masters of the fish of the sea, the birds of the heaven, the cattle, all the wild animals and all the creatures that creep along the ground. Every discovery born from these turbulent times only helps us to better understand our role.

            “But much as we must live by and support His Holiness’s vision, allow me now to look inwards. Our blessed island, separated and safeguarded as it is by God’s vision, has been protected from the wider world’s progress. Though our brothers and sisters find themselves challenged and confronted at every turn, we still hold dominion over our paradise.

            “The world moves forward. And for the scientists it moves towards a destructive unknown, to a cliff edge. But for us, the world moves forward by returning us to what we know to be true: our faith in His word. The—”

            The world moves forward. But remember that here, God keeps us safe. All the hymns, all Brendan’s words, Canice had heard before.

            In the summer, gorse blossoms and heather illuminated the path in a patchwork of purple and yellow. Primroses and orchids flourished further inland, by Ballynoe, bringing the whole island into bloom. Whether anybody tended to these flowers, Canice was not sure, but they seemed to flourish without any help. Even now, there were remnants of those summer souls who took longer than the rest to pass, their wilting heads bent in prayer or submission.

            A decade ago, at least, Canice used to make bouquets from these flowers, piecing together a clash of complementary and contradictory colours. She had fastened their stalks with fabrics torn from her unworn clothes, and, occasionally, Brendan’s. Someone had told her once that she should always avoid thirteen flowers, so her posies had only ever contained twelve or fourteen. She had given a couple to her brother, early on, but had never quite been sure what he did with them.

            The rest Canice had kept to herself, positioned on the mantlepiece of the parlour or scattered strategically throughout her home. For each bouquet, she picked the perfect plants to take their perfect place. Eventually, of course, they grew wanting, the sea water providing little life. Eventually, they had all withered away, and Canice could only watch this so many times.

            Shells and shingle shattered beneath her feet, bringing Canice back to shore. Refocusing her attention, she guessed that the stranger was a man, from his frame, just over six foot and well built. Though it was difficult to tell at the far end of the pier, the skin of his arms seemed pale; perhaps he was from the mainland, or one of the countries further out. As swiftly as it arrived, Canice scoffed at the notion that this could be Brendan, who had no cause to leave the island and whom she had heard just minutes ago. But then, she knew of no reason for anybody to arrive, either.

            The stranger was anchoring his boat with a flayed strand of rope, which he tied to one of the piles below. He wore a black leather travelling cloak, reaching down to just above the ankle with a hood obscuring his face. Drenched from head to foot, the droplets fell through the slits between slats and assimilated with the mass of the sea. As the stranger lowered his hood and turned to Canice, she saw that even the long seaweed clumps of his hair were dripping wet.

            “Hello!” he called out, voice faint, almost one with the water.

            “Are you lost?” Canice returned, stopping at the opposite end of the pier. “Adrift? We don’t usually receive visitors here!”

            “No, I’m exactly where I need to be, don’t you worry!” The stranger spoke with an accent that could have been Irish. He turned his back and finished securing his boat. “This is Rathlin Island, isn’t it?”

            “It is!” said Canice. “All these years and we’re still going strong, despite what you may have heard!”

            The wood beneath the stranger bowed and groaned as he approached. Canice thought that the whole pier might give way, her and the stranger with it.

            “Oh, I’ve heard many things, but doubts of the strength of this island have never been among them. Say, there isn’t somewhere warm I could stay for a while, is there? Maybe a change of clothes? I appreciate this is all very sudden, but just while I find my bearings.”

            The stranger spoke without the slightest hint of a shiver. Canice wrapped her coat tight, felt eyes on the back of her neck.

            “You didn’t bring any with you?” she asked.

            A smile stretched the stranger’s lips. “All that you see is all that I have.”

            “You poor thing. Well, there’s Cronan, at the Watchtower—just over there, you can’t miss it. That’s probably your best bet. Or, if need be, I’m sure Brendan—that’s our priest—would have some things to fit you back home. But I’m not sure—”

            “That sounds perfect.” The stranger was almost before Canice now. The silhouette of Ireland haunted his shoulder.

            “What are you doing here?” Canice asked. “You’re from the mainland, I take it? We’re entirely self-sufficient again, thank you. There really is nothing you can offer us.”

            The stranger laughed, wrung his hands together. Canice could taste the salt on his breath.

            “I’m a man of faith,” he said. “Like your priest. A pilgrim. A prophet. I’ve come to spread the word.”

            “Have you now?” Canice asked. “The word of God, I hope.”

            “Word of our origin.”

            “Well,” Canice started. “I fear it may fall on deaf ears, I tell you now. We’re no pagans in need of saving, and, yes, we know more than enough about Darwin and his sort. We’re Catholics. Happy to be so. You should count yourself lucky you said that to me and not one of the others.”

            “Why, I hope you don’t think any less of me now you know my intentions.” The stranger looked down towards the shore, avoiding Canice’s eye, seeing something else.

            “What kind of Christian would I be if I did? No, no, you can come back to ours. Brendan would want you to. I mean, look at you, you must be absolutely freezing. There’s room for all sorts, here, after all. If only for a little while, at least.”

            “Huxley,” the stranger introduced, and hesitation caught Canice. The word, the name, sat uneasy like a curse or blaspheme. “Not that one,” he added, taking her hand in his own and kissing it. The moisture, cold, clung like a new flesh.

            “Canice,” she replied, swiftly taking her hand away. “Cursed with a man’s name. I’ve never quite moved past it, I’m sure. Now, shall we get going? I doubt you want to be standing around out here for much longer, and service will finish sometime soon.”

            “I really can’t thank you enough,” Huxley said, taking his first step ashore. “It’s a beautiful island you have here, just as I’d heard.”

            “Well, don’t thank me just yet.” Canice laughed again. “I warn you now, there’s no guarantee that that boat of yours will still be there by the time you return. The sea’s not one to be easily tamed, as I’m sure you know.”

            “More than most. But don’t worry about me. I will find my way home.”

            From within the Church, one shared voice reached out to smother the sea. Fighting against the crash of the waves, the congregation could be heard singing in unison. “The day of the Lord is at hand, at hand; Its storms roll up to the sky.”

2.

It did not take long for word of the stranger’s arrival to travel the length of Rathlin Island, a gospel carried by the sea drift itself. First, it found the Watchtower, the old wooden inn on the south side of the island, overlooking the sea atop a cliff fast eroding. Here, the oaks of old had been felled to build a scaffold, fastened to the cliffs themselves and keeping the Watchtower afloat. But even that, now, was starting to rot, with the foundations moaning throughout the night.

            Though they did not admit it, the island had come to accept that its days were reaching their end. They had attempted repairs, years before; had planned to gradually replace the worst of the wood and built new supports alongside it. But the first day of work had also been the last, with Rathlin forgetting that lost soul’s name. Better left untouched became the mantra thereafter. Better left untouched, better left unsaid.

            Inside, however, the inn was as popular as it had ever been, with patrons defiantly, carelessly, sharing stories and drinks. Many of the congregation had regrouped following Mass, reflecting on Brendan’s sermon from the bottom of a glass. A few others had been there since morning, trusted to keep to themselves while the rest attended service. In the corner, Colmcille sang songs others had forgotten.

            Emerging from the back, Cronan returned behind the bar, a drink in hand for himself. He ran a damp cloth across the counter, spreading the stains more than removing them, and then dabbed the sweat from his brow. He checked the room keys behind him, as always, hung five by two and never taken. Then, he turned back to watch over his work.

            On the balcony, drinking their age away as they looked out across the sea, sat the old hermits, Kevin and Paternus. They kept to themselves and were kept to themselves, their seats long since reserved. Every few minutes the Watchtower let out a shudder, shaking their table and spilling their drinks. Neither seemed to notice, as though it was simply the island breathing.

“One hundred and fifty years,” Kevin said, not once looking away from the waves which swallowed one another in endless grace. “One hundred and fifty years and not once has a stranger come. We’ve had traders, sure, but we saw them off. But never a stranger. Not in my lifetime.”

            “The world moves forward,” echoed Paternus, his eyes instead on Ireland. “He’ll be one of those new believers, bringing science where science doesn’t belong. But we are separated. Safeguarded—”

            “Don’t repeat his words,” said Kevin. “This island has lost its way under his watch, don’t tell me you don’t see it. Blinded by the superstitions of his sister. She’s corrupted him enough as it is, don’t let it happen to you.”

            The conversation paused. Another shudder. The sea seemed to speak for them.

            “Do you remember when she was just a child?” asked Kevin, at length. “And those boots of hers washed up in the bay?”

            “It rained for a month. Every day and every night. Never seen anything like it.”

            “Monessa passed away.” Kevin took a sip of his drink, looked up to see clouds corrupted black. “Never looked at the sea the same way since. The rain’s coming.”

            Then, word of the stranger drifted west, through the open door of the butcher’s shop. Here, a metallic air of viscera seeped from the back room, fighting against that of the salt-ridden sea. A young girl, blonde, of only seven or eight years, was walking past iterative displays of cold meats; then, down a chalk white corridor where blood-rusted hooks hung from the walls.

            In the back room, a large granite slab bore the weight of a fatted calf.

            “I saw him with Canice,” said the girl, as she watched her father tear tendons and sinew with his own fat fingers. “Out by Ballygill. What’s going to happen, daddy?”

            “Canice?” Gallus asked, removing the spine with a crack. “God help us. Don’t worry,” he said, kneeling down and bringing her into his arms, keeping them distant so as not to stain her with blood. “Brendan will show us the way. Remember that here, God keeps us safe.”

            From home to home, ear to ear, word finally floated skyward, finding respite on the tallest structure of Rathlin. The lighthouse had been built from the purest white stone chiselled from the cliffs, with a red belt like a streak of searing sky. After years of discussion, construction had finally gone ahead with the passing of the famine, a symbol of the island’s restored direction. To the people of Rathlin, however, it would always be more tomb than tower.

            On the lantern balcony, Cataldus sat, every day and every night. He had lobbied for the role for years beforehand, and, with no other volunteers, was accepted immediately. In all the lighthouse’s time, no ships had seen its light; its light had seen no ships. But Cataldus saw the congregation come and go; saw the gannets flock up above; saw men stumble along the cliffs in the dead of night. And today, he had seen a boat ignore his warnings. He had seen a boat traverse waters where all else had sunk.