Free An Angel In Australia by Tom Keneally Page B

plural, so that even torpid Bert and hostile Ross, without their knowledge, were encompassed in the rite. ‘ Benedicat vos omnipotens Deus, Pater et Filius et Spiritus Sanctus .’
    â€˜Feel better already,’ said Mrs Flood, opening the bright eyes she had kept closed for this prayer, her marvellous smile in place. ‘Thank you, Father Frank.’ With the generosity of that smile she had beguiled first Bert, and then lean Ross Trumble. She who had the power to leave them with nowhere else to go, exactly as she had left Darragh with nothing else to do except depart.
    He told all of them it had been a pleasure to meet them, that he would remember Mrs Flood at Mass, and then Ross Trumble was solemnly leading him back up the hall. The tall,fair-haired brick worker opened the door with his undamaged hand and then blocked the exit.
    â€˜Look,’ he said, ‘I can’t call you “ Father ”, so don’t expect it.’ He waited a while as if he half-hoped for a strong chastisement from Darragh.
    â€˜I can’t make you do anything, Mr Trumble.’
    â€˜Okay, Frank, listen. You’re just another feller to me, you see. You seem a fair enough bloke which makes it all the more bloody outrageous that you should come here with your “I’m Father Darragh” and your “Let me give you a blessing”, and all the rest of the bag of tricks.’
    â€˜It’s what I was put on earth to do,’ Frank asserted. He still hoped it was true.
    â€˜Yeah, and you might be sincere about it. But I bet you live pretty well. Better than us.’
    Darragh could do nothing but fall back on his common malehood and shrug. ‘I get paid barely thirty shillings a week.’
    â€˜Yeah. But all’s found for you by the believers, isn’t it? And you whack on about God and redemption, but really you’re put here on earth to keep the workers in their place. To offer them heaven instead of justice.’
    â€˜I’ve heard all those arguments, Mr Trumble.’
    â€˜I think they’re pretty good arguments, Frankie boy.’ He was breathless with anger, Darragh noticed. ‘I mean, God doesn’t need marriage, but the banks certainly do. One little two-person mortgage after another. Do not fornicate outside the marriage because you’ll buy the second woman a dress or a jewel, and that’ll get in the way of bank repayments!’
    Frank said with an ironic smile which invited Trumble into the joke as well, ‘I never knew that. That I was a bank employee.’
    Trumble wouldn’t concede. ‘You’re as much a bank’s man as any copper. Look, I know what you’re here for. You’ve heard the gossip and you’re chasing us up. You think if you hear her confession you can make her split up with me. All of us out in the kitchen knew what this was about. So to me you’re just a bloke who tries to stand between a man and his woman. And according to tradition, that’s a bloody dangerous place to stand.’
    Darragh, edgy with anger, nonetheless decided to resort to equivalent frankness. ‘Come on, Ross. The way you’re living isn’t natural.’
    â€˜It’s natural as hell to me. I’m warning you, you’ve got no special protection just because you happen to wear a dog collar. You ought to wake up to yourself!’
    Darragh had always surmised that one day there would be threats of this nature. He had imagined that they would be easier to brush off than this one was. His arms and legs, ready to fight if needed, felt heavy with alarmed blood. His mouth was dry, and he felt foolish and negligible.
    â€˜Are you going to let me out of the door?’ he asked Trumble. ‘I’ve got other duties today.’
    â€˜You poor young bastard,’ said Trumble, and stepped aside at last.
    Darragh walked out, down the steps, across the garden, and took exact care closing the wire gate, as if that