An odd set of coincidences in May 1976 made me, a journalist newly sent by The Guardian to Belfast, a regular supper-table visitor at St Dominic’s Priory, on Haverstock Hill, north London, writes Anne McHardy.It happened just as Malcolm McMahon was considering leaving his managerial job with London Transport’s bus division to become a Dominican.Everything I saw then of Malcolm suggested he was a thoughtful and intellectually rigorous man. But he was also hugely practical, a fixer, respectful of tradition – someone ready to be relaxed about interpreting rules when necessary, sensitive to the most difficult in their time of need, regardless of convention.St Dominic’s was home turf to Malcolm from the time that his family moved with his two brothers from south London,