by Tana French
Do ye never go to the pub? Sam asked.
I wasnt sure what he was asking. Sam knew exactly what I did with my time. According to Frank, he got into work at six every morning to go through the tapes. This made me itch, in small unreasonable ways, but the thought of bringing it up itched even worse. Rafe and Justin and I went to the Buttery on Tuesday, after tutorials, I said. Remember?
I meant your localwhats it called, Regans, down in the village. Do they never go there?
We passed Regans in the car, on our way to and from college: a dilapidated little country pub, sandwiched between the butchers and the news-agents, with bikes leaning unlocked against the wall in the evenings. Nobody had ever suggested going in there.
Its simpler to have a few drinks at home, if we want them, I said. Its a walk to the village, and everyone but Justin smokes. Pubs have always been the heart of Irish social life, but when the smoking ban came in, a lot of people moved to drinking at home. The ban doesnt bother me, although Im confused by the idea that you shouldnt go into a pub and do anything that might be bad for you, but the level of obedience does. To the Irish, rules always used to count as challengessee who can come up with the best way round this oneand this sudden switch to sheep mode makes me worry that were turning into someone else, possibly Switzerland.
Sam laughed. Youve been up in the big city too long. Ill guarantee you Regans doesnt stop anyone smoking. And its less than a mile by the back roads. Do you not think its odd, them never going in there?
I shrugged. They are odd. Theyre not all that sociable, in case you havent noticed. And maybe Regans sucks.
Maybe, Sam said, but he didnt sound convinced. You went to Dunnes in the Stephens Green Centre when it was your turn to buy food, am I right? Where do the others go?
How would I know? Justin went to Marks and Sparks yesterday; I havent a clue about the others. Frank said Lexie shopped at Dunnes, so I shop at Dunnes.
What about the newsagents in the village? Anyone been there?
I thought about that. Rafe had done a cigarette run one evening, but he had gone out the back gate, towards the late-night petrol station on the Rathowen road, not towards Glenskehy. Not since I got here. What are you thinking?
I was just wondering, Sam said, slowly. About the village. Youre up at the Big House, you know. Daniels from the Big House family. In most places nobody cares about that, any more; but every now and then, depending on history . . . I was just wondering if theres any bad feeling there.
Right up into living memory, the British ran Ireland on the feudal system: handed out villages to Anglo-Irish families like party favors, then left them to use the land and the locals however they saw fit, which varied just as much as youd expect. After independence the system collapsed in on itself; a few faded, obsolete eccentrics are still hanging in there, mostly living out of four rooms and opening the rest of the estate to the public to pay the roofing bills, but a lot of the Big Houses have been bought by corporations and turned into hotels or spas or whatever, and everyones half forgotten what they used to be. Here and there, though, where history scarred a place deeper than most: people remember.
And this was Wicklow. For hundreds of years, rebellions had been planned within a days walk of where I was sitting. These hills had fought on the guerrillas side, hidden them from stumbling soldiers through dark tangled nights; cottages like Lexies had been left hollow and bloody when the British shot everyone in sight till they found their one cached rebel. Every family has stories.
Sam was right, I had been up in the big city way too long. Dublin is modern to the point of hysteria, anything before broadband has become a quaint, embarrassing little joke; I had forgotten even what it was like to live in a place that had memory. Sam is from the country, from Galway; he knows. The cottages last windows were lit up with moonlight and it looked like a ghost house, secretive and wary.
There could be, I said. I dont see what it could have to do with our case, though. Its one thing to give the Big House kids hairy looks till they quit coming into the newsagents; its a whole other thing to stab one of them because the landlord was mean to your great-granny in 1846.
Probably. Ill look into it, though, on the off chance. Anythings worth checking.
I thumped back against the hedge, felt a quick vibration through the branches as something scurried away. Come on. How crazy do you think these people are?
A brief silence. Im not saying theyre crazy, Sam said eventually.
Youre saying one of them might have killed Lexie for something that a completely unrelated family did a hundred years ago. And Im saying thats someone who at the very least needs to get out a whole lot more, and find himself a girlfriend who doesnt get sheared every summer. I wasnt sure why the idea got up my nose so badly, or for that matter why I was being such a snippy little bitch. Something to do with the house, I think. I had put a lot of work into that housewe had spent half the evening stripping the moldy wallpaper in the sitting roomand I was getting attached to it. The idea of it as the target of that kind of focused hatred made something hot flare up in my stomach.
Theres a family round where I grew up, Sam said. The Purcells. Their great-granda or whatever was a rent agent, back in the day. One of the bad onesused to lend the rent money to families who didnt have it, then take the interest out of the wives and daughters, then throw them all out onto the roads once he got bored. Kevin Purcell grew up with the rest of us, not a bother, no grudge; but when we all got a bit older and he started going out with one of the local girls, a bunch of lads got together and beat the shite out of him. They werent crazy, Cassie. Theyd nothing against Kevin; he was a grand young fella, never did that girl any harm. Just . . . some things arent OK, no matter how long you leave them. Some things dont go away.
The leaves of the hedge prickled and twisted against my back, like something was moving in there, but when I whipped around it was still as a picture. Thats different, Sam. This Kevin guy made the first move: he started going out with that girl. These five didnt do a thing. Theyre just living here.
Another pause. And that could be enough, all depending. Im only saying.
There was a bewildered note in his voice. Fair enough, I said, more calmly. Youre right, its worth a lookwe did say our guy was probably local. Sorry for being a snotty cow.
I wish you were here, Sam said suddenly, softly. On the phone, its too easy to get mixed up. Get things wrong.
I know, Sam, I said. I miss you too. It was true. I tried not tothat kind of thing just distracts you, and getting distracted can do anything from wreck your case to get you killedbut when I was on my own and tired, trying to read in bed after a long day, it got difficult. Only a few weeks left.
Sam sighed. Less, if I find something. Ill talk to Doherty and Byrne, see what they can tell me. Meanwhile . . . just look after yourself, OK? Just in case.
I will, I said. You can update me tomorrow. Sleep tight.
Sleep tight. I love you.
That feeling of being watched was still pinching at the back of my neck, stronger now, closer. Maybe it was just the conversation with Sam getting to me, but all of a sudden I wanted to know for sure. This electric ripple from somewhere in the dark, Sams stories, Rafes father, all these things pressing in on us from every side, looking for weak spots, for their moment to attack: for a second I forgot I was one of the invaders, I just wanted to yell Leave us alone. I unwound my mike sock and tucked it into my girdle, along with my phone. Then I switched on my torch for maximum visibility and started walking, a casual, jaunty stroll, heading for home.
I know a variety of ways to shake off a tail, catch him in the act or turn the tables; most of them were designed for city streets, not for the middle of nowhere, but theyre
adaptable. I kept my eyes front and picked up the pace, till there was no way for anyone to stay too close without breaking cover or making an awful lot of noise in the underbrush. Then I did a sudden swerve onto a cross-lane, switched off the torch, ran fifteen or twenty yards and squished myself, as quietly as I could, through a hedge into a field left to run wild. I stayed still, crouching down close against the bushes, and waited.
Twenty minutes of nothing, not a pebble crunching, not a leaf rustling. If there was actually someone following me, he or she was smart and patient: not a nice thought. Finally I eased myself back through the hedge. There was no one on the lane in either direction, as far as I could see. I picked most of the leaves and twigs out of my clothes and headed home, fast. Lexies walks had averaged an hour; I didnt have long before the others started worrying. Over the tops of the hedges I could see a glow against the sky: the light from Whitethorn House, faint and golden and shot through with whirls of wood smoke like mist.
* * *
That night, when I was reading in bed, Abby knocked on my door. She was in red-and-white-checked flannel pajamas, her face scrubbed shiny and her hair loose on her shoulders; she looked about twelve. She closed the door behind her and sat down cross-legged on the end of my bed, tucking her bare feet into the crooks of her knees for warmth. Can I ask you a question? she said.
Sure, I said, hoping to God I knew the answer.
OK. Abby tucked her hair behind her ears, glanced back at the door. I dont know how to put this, so Im just going to come straight out and ask, and you can tell me to mind my own business if you want. Is the baby OK?
I must have looked gobsmacked. One corner of her mouth twisted upwards in a wry little smile. Sorry. I didnt mean to startle you. I guessed. Were always in sync, but last month you never bought the chocolate . . . and then when you threw up that day, I just figured.
My mind was racing. Do the guys know?
Abby shrugged, a little flip of one shoulder. I doubt it. They havent said anything, anyway.
This didnt rule out the chance that one of them did know, that Lexie had told the fathereither that she was having a baby or that she was having an abortionand he had flipped out, but it went some way towards it: Abby didnt miss much. She waited, watching me. The baby didnt make it, I said; which was, after all, true.
Abby nodded. Im sorry, she said. Im really sorry, Lexie. Or . . . ? She raised one eyebrow discreetly.
Its OK, I said. I wasnt sure what I was going to do about it, anyway. This sort of makes things simpler.
She nodded again, and I realized I had called it right: she wasnt surprised. Are you going to tell the guys? Because I can do it, if you want me to.
No, I said. I dont want them knowing. Info is ammo, Frank always said. That pregnancy could come in useful sometime; I wasnt about to throw it away. I think it was only in that moment, the moment when I realized I was saving up a dead baby like a hand grenade, that I understood what I had got myself into.
Fair enough. Abby stood up and hitched at her pajama bottoms. If you ever want to talk about it or anything, you know where I am.
Arent you going to ask me who the father was? I said. If it was common knowledge who Lexie was sleeping with, then I was in big trouble, but somehow I didnt think it was; Lexie appeared to have lived most of her life on a need-to-know basis. Abby, though; if anyone had guessed, it would be her.
She turned, at the door, and gave that one-shouldered shrug. I figure, she said, her voice carefully neutral, if you want to tell me, you probably will.
* * *
When she was gonequick arpeggio of bare feet, almost soundless, down the stairsI left my book where it was and sat there listening to the others getting ready for bed: someone running water in the bathroom, Justin singing tunelessly to himself below me (Gooooldfinger . . .), the creak of floorboards as Daniel moved quietly around his room. Gradually the noises wound down, grew softer and intermittent, faded to silence. I turned off my bedside lamp: Daniel would see it under his door if I kept it on, and I had had enough private little chats for one evening. Even after my eyes adjusted, all I could see was the looming mass of the wardrobe, the hunch of the dressing table, the barely there flicker in the mirror when I moved.
I had been putting a fair amount of energy into not thinking about the baby; Lexies baby. Four weeks, Cooper had said, not quite a quarter of an inch: a tiny gemstone, a single spark of color slipping between your fingers and through the cracks and gone. A heart the size of a fleck of glitter and vibrating like a hummingbird, seeded with a billion things that would never happen now.
When you threw up that day . . . A strong-willed baby, wide awake and not to be ignored, already reaching out filament fingers to tug at her. For some reason it wasnt a silky newborn I pictured: it was a toddler, compact and naked, with a head of dark curls; faceless, running away from me down the lawn on a summer day, trailing a yell of laughter. Maybe she had sat in this bed just a couple of weeks ago, picturing the same thing.
Or maybe not. I was starting to get a sense that Lexies will had been denser than mine and obsidian hard, built for resistance, not combat. If she hadnt wanted to imagine the baby, that tiny jewel-colored comet would never for a second have flashed across her mind.
I wanted, as intensely as if this were somehow the key that would unlock the whole story, to know whether she had been going to keep it. Our abortion ban doesnt change anything: a long silent litany of women every year take the ferry or the plane to England, home again before anyone even notices theyre gone. There was no one in the world who could tell me what Lexie had been planning; probably even she hadnt been sure. I almost got out of bed and sneaked downstairs to have another look at the diary, just in case I had missed somethinga tiny pen dot hidden in a corner of December, on the due datebut that would have been a dumb thing to do, and anyway I already knew there was nothing there. I sat in bed in the dark with my arms around my knees, listening to the rain and feeling the battery pack dig into me where the stab wound should have been, for a very long time.
* * *
There was this one evening; Sunday, I think it was. The guys had pushed back the furniture in the sitting room and were attacking the floor with a sander and a polisher and a certain amount of machismo, so Abby and I had left them to it and headed up to the top spare room, the one next to me, to pick at the edges of Uncle Simons hoard. I was sitting on the floor, half covered in ancient scraps of material, sorting out the ones that werent mainly moth holes; Abby was flipping through a huge pile of fugly curtains, murmuring, Bin, bin, binthese might be worth washingbin, bin, oh God bin, who bought this crap? The sander was humming noisily downstairs and the house had a busy, settled feel that reminded me of the Murder squad room on a quiet day.
Whoa, Abby said suddenly, sitting back on her heels. Check this out.
She was holding up a dress: robins-egg blue with white polka dots and a white collar and sash, little cap sleeves and a full skirt made to fly up when you twirled, pure lindy hop. Wow, I said, disentangling myself from my puddle of fabric and going over to check it out. Think it was Uncle Simons?
I dont think he had the figure for it, but well check the photo album. Abby held the dress at arms length and examined it. Want to try it on? I dont think it has moths.
Go for it. You found it.
Itd never fit me. Look Abby got to her feet and held the dress against herself. Its for someone taller. The waist would be down around my arse.
Abby was maybe five foot two, but I kept forgetting; it was hard to think of her as small. And its for someone skinnier than me, I said, trying the waist against mine, or wearing a serious corset. Id burst it.
Maybe not. You lost weight when you were sick. Abby threw the dress over my shoulder. Try it.
She gave me a
quizzical look when I headed for my bedroom to change: it was obviously out of character, but I couldnt do much about that, except hope she would put it down to self-consciousness about the bandage or something. The dress actually did fit, more or lessit was tight enough that the bandage left a bulge, but there was nothing dodgy about that. I did a quick check to make sure the wire didnt show. In the mirror I looked breathless and mischievous and daring, ready for anything.
Told you, Abby said, when I came out. She spun me round, retied the sash in a bigger bow. Lets go wow the boys.
We ran downstairs calling, Look what we found! and by the time we got down to the sitting room the sander was off and the guys were waiting for us. Oh, look at you! Justin cried. Our little jazz baby!
Perfect, Daniel said, smiling at me. Its perfect.
Rafe swung one leg over the piano stool and swept a finger up the keys in a great, expert flourish. Then he started to play, something lazy and tempting with a sideways swing to it. Abby laughed. She gave the bow of my sash another tug, tightening it; then she went to the piano and started to sing.