by Calinda B
Musty air drifted from the gap. Lassi squinted, finding an opening about a half of a meter deep.
“More dead cats in there? A cat crypt?” Thinking a flashlight might best serve her exploration, she climbed off the end table and picked her way through the clutter to the kitchen. There, she rummaged in a junk drawer for a flashlight. “Dammit. I suppose Great-Aunt Roberta could see in the dark. The gloom of night was no doubt her preferred time.”
A candle lay in the back of the drawer, along with a box of matches. She pulled both free and hurried back to the front room.
She lit the candle and held it in front of the opening. Inside sat a small box, surrounded by cobwebs and dead spiders. Oddly enough, no dust could be seen on the box itself. It took some careful maneuvering to pull it from the hole in the wall. After blowing out the candle, she settled on the floor with her treasure.
“Wow, this looks ancient.”
Turning the oilskin leather wrapped box over and over yielded no clues as to how to get it open. Her finger grazed a slit along the side. She held up the box to inspect it, then picked up the utility knife from the floor and slid the knife under the edge. Peeling the leather free revealed a hinged lid. Her heart began to pitter-patter. Using her fingertips, she pried the stiff-hinged lid open, hoping for lost jewels or maybe old coins to fund her Barbados dream. Instead, the contents consisted of paper so old it might crumple when she touched it. Her spirits sank.
“You can’t stop a girl from hoping,” she muttered.
Gingerly, she plucked one of the parchment pieces from the box. She did her best to unfold the brittle document without damaging it, then held it up. The handwriting was meticulously small and difficult to read. The words “Strongbow,” and “Waterford County” were all she could make out.
“This is Waterford County, but the name Strongbow isn’t ringing any bells. I know a Jonny Strongman back in Dublin, and strong, he isn’t. More like a wimp. I beat his ass in arm wrestling.” Strongbow...She tapped her temple with a cellulose paste covered finger. I can’t exactly Google the name. No wi-fi out here.
Liam O’Donnell’s offer to serve her some pub grub swirled through her mind. She carefully set the box next to the couch, out of the way of footsteps. A shower first, and a trip to town for a meal seemed promising. She intended to pick the brains of the locals about the name Strongbow, as well as feed her growling stomach.
After her shower, she donned jeans and a long-sleeved, slub jersey and left the front placket unbuttoned down to her cleavage. Since it never seemed to stop raining in this village, she shrugged into her raincoat and jammed her feet into her Wellies before departing.
She practically ran the entire way from the cottage to downtown. Thirty minutes later, she opened the creaky blue-painted door to the Laughing Rat. Even though it was storm-cloud dark outside, she had to pause for her eyes to adjust to the gloom of the interior. Dim lighting, dark, worn-wood booths, and smoke-grimed mirrors surrounded her. The walls, bare of adornment, were covered with a century or more worth of soot and smell. The pub atmosphere fueled the depression she experienced being in Ballyna-numbing. Everything seemed cramped and weighted. Even her footsteps dragged as she clomped across the dirty tile floor toward the bar. Each footstep echoed through the space, bouncing off the walls.
The handful of people who were inside the pub, were hunched over the tables, not looking at anyone else but their dining or drinking companion—if they even had one. No one even turned his or her head to watch her pass.
A chill spiraled up her spine as she reached the vacant bar. She was used to friendly bartenders offering a wink and a flirt, but, behind this bar counter it looked like a tomb. Water drip, drip, dripped into the sink from the leaky faucet. Glassware settled into the plastic tub resting near the sink, creating a sudden, tinkling clatter. She plopped on one of the barstools, and rapped her knuckles on the counter to get someone’s attention.
A few seconds later, Liam emerged from the back, through two swinging saloon doors. The smell of greasy food swirled around him as he approached.
“Lassi!” he exclaimed.
“Hey, Liam.” She placed her forearms on the counter and pivoted in her black-topped seat back and forth.
He sauntered toward the bar-top and placed his palms on the dingy wood. “What can I get for you? Guinness?”
“Sure, that would be great.” The lingering headache from last night’s drinking chimed in with a hearty, temple-stabbing, “yes!”
“Anything else?” He leaned closer, invading her personal space. His gaze darted to her cleavage and back to her face like a ping pong ball.
She drew back and tugged at the placket of her shirt, trying to draw it together without looking too obvious. “A burger and chips would be nice.”
He called over his shoulder, “Penny, love. Fix Miss Finn a burger and chips, would you, darling?”
A loud clang, like a pan being dropped, came from the back.
“Did you hear me, love?” He kept his roaming gaze on Lassi while directing his voice toward the kitchen.
“Aren’t you wondering if I’m all right?” Penny’s sharp-edged voice called back.
“Well, are you?” His eyebrows pinched together yet his attention still lingered on Lassi.
“Yes.”
“Good. I figured you would have yelled if you weren’t, so where’s the problem?” He stabbed his thumb over his shoulder and shook his head. “The wife’s not feeling her best today. She drank one toast too many last night.”
“I understand.” Lassi nodded.
Liam pivoted and crouched, giving her a full view of his bald pate and the crack in his butt. He opened a small refrigerator door. When he rose, he held a frosted glass. He sidled toward the tap, poured a perfect pint of Guinness, and held it out to her.
“What do I get for handing you this Guinness, girl?” He tilted his head toward her, puckering his lips.
Lassi’s brow wrinkled. “I don’t know. A thank you and a few coins?”
“Try again. It’s on the house if you give the right answer.” He pinched his lips harder, in an unappealing sphincter shape.
“You’re the one who should worry, Liam O’Donnell.” Penny stormed from the back. She still wore her frumpy black dress. Her salt and pepper hair had fallen free from her messy bun and hung in her eyes. She tossed her head toward Lassi while fixing her gaze on her husband. “You’ll get your burger and your Guinness, at normal price. He’ll get his ass spanked, that’s what. Now mind your manners, Liam, and leave the girl alone.”
His head pivoted toward his wife. “I’m only having a bit of fun with her.”
“Well, stop it.” She fixed her small-eyed gaze on Lassi. “How are you today? Are you getting things sorted at the cottage?”
“Slowly.” She made a couple more back and forth swings on her stool. “I found something mysterious. Do either of you know anything about the name Strongbow?”
Penny’s eyes slid toward Liam.
He did the same.
They both exchanged a subtle shake of the head.
Penny turned on her heel and headed toward the kitchen, calling, “Sorry, dear, I need to see to your burger.”
Lassi frowned. “Is that a yes or it’s a town secret?’”
He lifted his hand and waved it about. “There are myths everywhere in Ireland, you know that. The name Strongbow is associated with one of them.”
He brought his attention to somewhere behind her shoulder.
She turned to see what he looked at. Nothing appeared out of the ordinary. No customer beckoned for him.
She turned back to face him. “Let me guess,” she said with a smirk. “You had a vision just now requiring your full attention.”
He frowned. “Goodness, no. Only seeing if anyone needed anything. I’d best make my rounds.”
He scurried out from behind the counter and headed toward the booths, leaving Lassi to wonder.
She sipped her pint.
“Hey,
girlie.”
She twisted in her seat toward the gravelly voice.
An old man sat at a booth, hunched over an empty mug of Guinness a couple of yards away. Foam still clung to the sides of the glass. His palms pressed the table on either side of the mug, as if to prop himself upright.
“Are you talking to me?”
He tossed his head toward the other side of his booth. “Come and talk to an old man. I’ll tell you more about the name Strongbow.”
Her attention perked. After grabbing her pint, she made her way toward his booth. She slid in opposite him and said, “What can you tell me?”
She studied his wrinkled old face as she waited for an answer. If Ballynagaul had a mascot, he could be it.
Red-lined eyelids pulled away from his rheumy gray eyes. His scraggly white hair wisped around his forehead, like the fog she’d seen this morning. The skin of his face sagged, the same way everything seemed to sag in this village. His head hung from his neck like a vulture’s.
She shook her head. Ballynagaul seemed more affected by gravity than any place she’d ever been in her life—not that she’d traveled much. But if she had, she knew it could never be as depressing as Bally.
“The name’s Aengus.” He extended his gnarled hand to her.
“Lassi Finn.” She shook it, noting the papery, dry skin.
His eyes narrowed. “Finn, eh?”
“That’s right. The last of my line.” Sadness pricked at her chest.
“I see.” He nodded, inclining his head to the side and studying her, as if calculating some great mystery. “That might change things around here.”
“How so?”
“Have you seen the tree?”
“Tree? What tree? What does that have to do with change?” She blinked.
He pointed toward the door. “Across town. Near your Roberta’s place, God rest her soul.” He made the sign of the cross over his chest with a trembling hand. “It’s called Strongbow’s tree. That’s where she’s buried.”
He whispered the last sentence in a dramatic stage voice.
“That’s where who’s buried? Mrs. Strongbow?” She lifted her Guinness and took a hearty swallow.
Footsteps scurried in their direction. Liam stopped abruptly in front of their table. A white cloth hung across his shoulder.
“Don’t be filling her head with tales, Aengus.” He lifted the old man’s empty glass mug, tugged the white cloth free, and began wiping the table. Dark stains lined the armpits of his yellowish-white shirt. “I assume you want another?” His eyebrows rose and fell.
“Yes, please,” Aengus answered. “And she asked about the legend. I’m merely telling a tale, is all.”
“Yes, but some tales are better left in their graves,” Liam said. His face paled. “I mean left untold.”
“She looks like a bright lass. She can tell fact from fiction, I’m certain.” He flashed her a slow-eyed wink.
She smiled at him. I like this guy.
Liam’s gaze slid from Aengus, to Lassi’s cleavage, and back to Aengus. “She doesn’t need her head filled with nonsense.”
Aengus stretched his mouth wide in a kind of smile. “Thank you for your advice, Liam. Now fetch me another pint.”
With a nod and a glare, he hustled away.
“Who’s buried at Strongbow’s tree?”
“The bones of a lass who lived here long ago.” He tipped back his head and closed his eyes, as if he knew her. When he opened his eyes, an expression of deep sorrow lined his face, dragging his mouth into a downward curve. “She was a beauty, much as yourself. Her hair was like gossamer angel wings. Silver like the moon, same as yours.”
“Mine leans toward red.”
Aengus squinted at her. “Well, yours is the shiny copper penny equivalent. Anyway, when she sauntered in the room, rainbows trailed behind her. Her eyes shone like stars in the sky. You couldn’t keep from looking at her. People tried to cut locks of her hair to make trinkets and whatnots, cast charms and love-spells and the like.”
Lassi tried to picture crowds of people trying to cut locks of her strawberry hair and shivered. “Did she have a name?”
“I call her Oonagh, like the Queen of the Fairies.” He shook his head, and his facial skin quivered.
Lassi’s eyes furrowed. “What does the legend call her? Mrs. Strongbow?”
Aengus continued spinning his tale. “And Oonagh was in love with Aardan, a poor peasant lad who subsisted on potatoes and grubs.”
Lassi wrinkled her nose. “Potatoes and grubs?”
“Times were hard back then. We had the English to contend with.”
“Right, right. Eight hundred long years of oppression. My history teacher used to make us repeat the phrase before we could enter his classroom.” She hefted her Guinness, said, “To Irish persistence,” and took another swig.
Aengus nodded.
Liam stalked toward their table and placed Aengus’s pint on the table with a thwack. “Here you are, old man. Drink up.” He leaned his hip against the table, facing Lassi, then crossed his arms over his chest. “He’s not still nattering on about dusty old stories, is he?”
“Why don’t you ask him yourself, since he’s right next to you?” she said.
“I can think of other things to talk about,” Liam said, adding a leer.
“Then find someone else to talk about other things,” Lassi said. “I want to hear what he has to say.”
“Liam!” Penny called.
His head pivoted. “What?”
“I could use some help.”
Liam pressed his lips together and strode away.
Aengus lifted the Guinness in his trembling hands and took a long swallow.
“So, Oonagh? Aarden? Potatoes and grubs?” Lassi prompted. Her stomach grumbled and growled. She turned toward the kitchen doors, hoping Penny would emerge carrying her food.
“Right.” Aengus set down his half-empty mug. “Their love was true and wonderful. They longed to escape and be together.”
Penny backed out of the kitchen bearing a food-filled platter. Silverware fell from the platter and clattered on the floor.
“Liam!” she called.
“What?” His voice sounded far away.
“Get some silverware so the girl can eat her supper.” She pivoted and marched toward Lassi, a frown on her face.
When she stood before the table, she said, “Here’s your food.”
She placed the white ceramic plate in front of Lassi.
Lassi’s tummy let out another growl as she eyed the burger which lay nestled between lettuce and a tomato slice. The chips were this side of burnt to a crisp.
Penny propped her hands on her plump hips. “Can I get you anything else?”
“Catsup would be nice. And a napkin.”
“Liam’s bringing utensils once he gets around to it.” Her head turned toward the kitchen. “Liam! The girl wants her silverware.”
“I’m coming,” he hollered.
“I asked for catsup.” Lassi pressed her lips together.
Penny fixed her attention on Aengus. “I hear you’re filling her head with tall tales. Ballynagaul is a tourist destination. We can’t have fright spread through the village. Besides that, you can’t go twisting fact with fiction. We all know you lost your first true love.” She cast a kind-eyed gaze his way.
Oh, so, he’s making up the tale. Lassi picked up her burger and took a bite. Mmm. Heaven.
“This has nothing to do with that.” Aengus fixed Penny with a glare. “So, the Strongbow story. Her cock-sucking father, Darragh O’Malley, made her marry a bastard. Now, Darragh had a problem with the drink, as well as a carpentry problem. It seems he couldn’t plane true unless he was half in his cups. He never forgave Oonagh for living when her mother died giving birth to her. He once told Oonagh he wished she had died and her mother had lived, or both of them had died so he could at least ‘start afresh.’”
“Gah! He sounds horrid.” Lassi stuffed another bite of
the burger in her mouth.
“Right. He was. And he needed money, what with the drink and all that, so he married her off. The bastard ran her into the ground and murdered her. The girl was turned into the Dearg-Due.”
Lassi held off from taking another bite. The burger sat poised in her hands. “Wait. Dearg-Due? What’s that? And who are we talking about? You or someone long ago named Oonagh who loved Aarden?”
Penny gave a crisp shake of her head. “So, now you’ve named her Oonagh. Her name was Maggie. It was Maggie and Conor, a nothing kind of lad, who were in love. And she wasn’t murdered. She committed suicide. God rest her soul.” She crossed herself and looked toward heaven.
“It’s as good a name as any.” Aengus’s neck wattle shook as he spoke.
Liam pushed through the saloon doors. His foot landed on the fallen silverware and he slid forward, waving his arms. “Fecking shite. Pick up after yourself, woman!” He stalked toward the table, wielding silverware like a weapon and catsup like a trophy. “Here.”
He shoved them toward Lassi.
“Napkin?” Lassi smiled sweetly at him.
He glared at Penny and said, “Napkin for the lass? Are you hard of hearing?”
“I thought you’d bring one,” Penny countered. “Go on now and make yourself useful.” She shooed him away.
He turned and stormed off.
Lassi took another bite of the burger. As she chewed, she twisted the top of the catsup free, turned it upside down, and batted it with her palm. A few drops of catsup dripped on her chips.
The door to the pub opened, revealing a shaft of light surrounding a black clad figure.
“Looks like the rains are letting up,” Penny said with a nod. She squinted at the new customer. “Is that you, Father Ward?”