Page 19 of The Elements

On the day the police showed up at our front door, I was awake and dressed early, ready for a hair appointment booked for nine o’clock.

The doorbell rang shortly before eight and, when I answered it, I was confronted by two Gardaí, one in plain clothes, who introduced herself as Sergeant Kilmartin, and the other in uniform.

I froze when I saw them—it brought me immediately back to the day two of their colleagues had shown up at the hotel in Wexford—and my thoughts immediately turned to Rebecca, who had already left for college.

“What?” I said immediately, desperate for an answer to a question I hadn’t even asked yet. “Is it my daughter?”

“No, it’s nothing like that,” said Sergeant Kilmartin, shaking her head quickly. “Please don’t worry, we’re not here to deliver bad news.”

“Oh, thank God,” I replied, allowing myself to breathe again, but it only took a moment for me to wonder why, if that was not their purpose, then what was it?

“It’s Mrs. Carvin, isn’t it?” she asked, and I nodded.

“That’s right, yes.”

“Is your husband at home?”

“He’s upstairs,” I said. “Getting ready for work. Can I help you with something?”

“I’m afraid not, no. We need to speak to him. Do you mind if we come in?”

It was framed as a question, but in the moment I understood that I was not being given the option to refuse, and so I stood out of the way to allow them into the hallway.

The senior officer looked tough and determined, while the junior appeared more apprehensive.

From the kitchen, I heard the kettle turning off as it came to a boil and, a moment later, the toaster popping.

Pointlessly, my mind drifted to a pot of jam I’d bought at a farmers’ market a few days earlier that I’d intended on opening with my breakfast. Anything, perhaps, to stop myself from questioning why two officers might be standing before me.

Stepping around them, I closed the front door and we stared at each other awkwardly until Garda Chen—his name was printed on his lapel—piped up.

“Perhaps you could call your husband down, Mrs. Carvin,” he suggested, and I nodded before shouting up to Brendan, telling him there were some people here to see him.

I heard him emerge from the bedroom, no doubt surprised that someone might be calling at such an hour, but he only made it halfway down the stairs before stopping.

The moment he saw the Garda uniform, he visibly slumped against the bannister.

That phrase one reads in books suggesting that the blood drains from a person’s face when confronted by something horrific was proved wrong, for in Brendan’s case, the opposite happened.

Rather than paling, his cheeks grew inflamed, as if he had been surprised while committing some vulgar act and was mortified by his exposure.

“Mr. Carvin,” said DS Kilmartin, looking up and introducing herself and her colleague, just as she had done to me. “Could you come downstairs, please?”

Brendan took the rest of the stairs slowly, his head bowed.

“Mr. Carvin,” she repeated when he was facing her, and she glanced quickly at her watch.

“It’s 8:04 on the morning of March twenty-third and I am placing you under arrest on the suspicion of sexually abusing a minor.

You are not obliged to say anything unless you wish to do so, but whatever you say will be taken down in writing and may be given in evidence. Do you understand what I’ve just said?”

I looked, open-mouthed, from the two Gardaí to my husband and back again, before emitting something that sounded like an inappropriate laugh.

I felt as if I was in a television drama, the words she had used being so familiar to me.

Somehow, it surprised me that people actually employed them in real life.

“Brendan,” I said, turning to him now, but he wouldn’t catch my eye.

Instead, he continued to stare at the carpet, no doubt understanding immediately that, as of two minutes ago, the life that he had previously led had come to an end and that only ignominy and public disgrace lay before him. Before all of us.

DS Kilmartin turned to Garda Chen, nodded at him, and the young man stepped forward, producing a set of handcuffs, which he attached to Brendan’s wrists, and my husband accepted them without a word of protest.

“Brendan,” I repeated, my voice rising now. “Brendan, what’s going on? What’s happening here?”

“It’s a mistake, Vanessa,” he muttered, shaking his head. “A misunderstanding, that’s all.”

And yet I knew that it wasn’t, because if it was, he would be behaving with more outrage and surprise, rather than submitting himself in such a docile fashion.

“What is it you think he’s done?” I asked, turning to DS Kilmartin, even though I had heard her words perfectly. “Sexually abusing a minor? What minor? Who?”

“Mrs. Carvin, I’m sorry, but I’m not at liberty to reveal that information to you,” she replied, not sounding sorry in the slightest.

“But you can’t just—”

“We need to take your husband to the station now for questioning. You’re welcome to follow if you wish, but I’m afraid you’ll have to remain in reception, which doesn’t have many facilities, and I expect your wait will be rather a long one, so I’d advise against. I imagine that Mr. Carvin will be detained for most of today as we continue our inquiries.

” She nodded toward Garda Chen once more, and he promptly opened the front door and walked out, preceding Brendan, who trailed him like a dog, content to be led on his walk.

The detective sergeant followed, while I stood in the doorway, blinking in the early-morning sunlight, bewildered by what had just taken place.

As they put my husband into the back seat of their car, the postman wandered up the drive and handed me a letter, looking from me to the departing vehicle in curiosity.

I glanced down at the envelope in my hand and could feel through the paper that it contained my new debit card, which I’d been expecting for the last few days.

Uncertain what else to do, I returned inside, removed my old one from my purse, cut it up with the kitchen scissors, and replaced it with the new before sitting down and replaying the entire scene in my head.

I’m not sure how long I sat there, trying to process it all, but I suspect it was quite some time.

I only snapped out of my daze when my mobile phone, which was sitting on the table before me, rang.

I picked it up and looked at the screen.

An unfamiliar number came up but no name, and thinking that it might be someone from the Garda station apologizing for what they’d done and inviting me to collect my husband and bring him home, I answered it.

“Mrs. Carvin?” said a voice on the other end.

“Yes?”

“Richie Howling here, sports correspondent from the Irish Times . Do you have a moment to talk?”

I frowned. Why on earth was a reporter from the Irish Times calling me? How had he even got my number?

“Not really,” I said. “What is it you want?”

“We’ve received a report that Brendan’s been arrested on suspicion of abusing some of the young girls in his care at the National Swimming Federation. Do you have any comment to make?”

I held the phone away from my face and stared at it as if it was my mortal enemy, before trying to locate the button to end the call, but my vision had grown blurry now, and I couldn’t seem to find it.

“Mrs. Carvin?” he continued, his voice echoing through the empty room. “Mrs. Carvin, are you there? This is obviously going to be a major news story and I thought it might be helpful for you to get out front of it all and—”

I managed to hang up then, before throwing the phone away from me, like a hot coal or a grenade.

The rest of the day went by in free fall.

Feeling that it would be a mistake to drive, I walked to the Garda station on Terenure Road West, where, as promised, I was left sitting in a stark waiting room with posters on the wall relating to domestic violence, cybersecurity, and lost dogs.

To their credit, the Gardaí on duty, recognizing my confusion and distress, displayed some sympathy toward me, keeping me going with mugs of hot tea while expressing regret that they couldn’t answer any of my questions.

Finally, almost eight hours since she’d shown up at my front door, DS Kilmartin appeared to inform me that Brendan would not be permitted to return home that evening but would be held in the cells overnight before further questioning the following morning.

“But it can’t be true,” I said, beseeching her to explain to me how something like this could happen. “Brendan would never…” I found the words were lost in my throat. “Who would say such a terrible thing about him?”

“I’m sorry, but I can’t tell you that.”

“Well, whoever it is must be mad in the head.”

“We’re investigating, Mrs. Carvin. That’s our job.”

“But you can’t keep him here on the word of a disturbed child!” I protested.

“Actually, over the course of the day, more than one complainant has come forward,” she told me in a tone that seemed rather pleased to be able to pass on this information.

“How many?” I asked, disbelieving.

“Two more. So far.”

It would be eight, of course, by the time the case came to court, and these were only the eight who chose to make their voices heard.

“But that’s not my husband,” I protested. “It’s not. He’s… he’s a father… he’s—”

“That’s what we need to determine,” she interrupted, glancing at her watch, and I hated her for the contempt she was showing me.

She seemed tired and, unlike her colleagues, unwilling to dispense any compassion toward me.

She didn’t accept my incredulity, and this was a sensation I would grow accustomed to over the year ahead.

The feeling so many people had that if he was guilty, then I must have known about it all along.

“Has he admitted anything?” I asked.

“Not at all,” she replied, with a snort of a laugh. “He claims he’s innocent.”

“Well, then,” I said, as if that brought the matter to a close. “What more do you need?”

“I’d advise you to go home,” she said. “I won’t have any more information for you tonight.”

I tried to protest, but she wouldn’t be persuaded and, eventually, I had no choice but to leave.

When I opened the doors of the station and stepped out onto the street, I was astonished to see a scrum of news reporters and photographers standing there.

I glanced behind me, wondering who they were waiting for, but then the flashbulbs went off.

When they started shouting my name, I realized they were waiting for me.

I couldn’t reply to their questions because the whole scene was simply too brutal and terrifying for any words.

Instead, I threw myself into their center, pushing forward and forcing them to make way for me, before practically flinging myself into the road in front of a passing taxi that had its lights on, and, fortunately, it stopped for me.

When I arrived home, Rebecca was sitting in the dark in the living room. I turned the lights on, and we stared at each other for a long time. Her expression was entirely unsympathetic.

“Did you know?” she asked, and I shook my head.

“Of course not,” I said. “How could I have? It’s not true anyway. It can’t be true. And who told you?”

“It’s all over the fucking news!” she roared, frightening me with her anger. “A friend pulled me out of a lecture to show me what people were saying on Twitter.”

And then she stood up and approached me and, for the first time, I realized that she had grown to a height where we could look each other directly in the eye.

“Emma,” she said.

I frowned, wondering why she was changing the subject.

“What about Emma?” I asked.

“Emma,” she repeated, and, finally, I lost my composure for the first time that day.

“What?” I screamed, spittle flying in my daughter’s face. “What about Emma? What are you talking about, you silly girl?”

And now I felt the room begin to swim, and I might have collapsed had Rebecca not reached out to steady me. It had been half a day since the doorbell had rung, and this had never crossed my mind.

“No,” I said, my voice low as I shook my head, unwilling to concede for even a moment that what she was suggesting might be possible.

“No, he didn’t. He wouldn’t. He couldn’t.

No, you’re wrong. He’d never do such a thing to his own daughter.

He loved her. Why would you say such a thing?

What’s wrong with you? What in God’s name is wrong with you? ”