This time Fi couldn’t hold back her laughter. “Oh come on, Gerry. Next thing you’ll be telling me you saw Tony Soprano hanging around with his mates outside the butcher’s. This is Ballycashel.”
His eyes narrowed and she watched him carefully. Gerry Reynolds wasn’t the kind of guy you wanted to annoy; not if you could help it. It had been so ridiculous that she hadn’t been able to resist, but what if Gerry wasn’t just a wannabe thug? What if he was one of those gangster guys from the telly; all ruthless fury behind their tracksuits and runners?
To her relief, his features relaxed and his lips seemed to twist into a smile. At least, that’s what Fiona thought it looked like—there was no way to be sure underneath the luxuriant moustache that was his trademark around the town.
“That’s funny,” he said after a while. “You’re funny. Ah, great show that. That Soprano fella was a pure genius.”
This time Fiona had more control over herself. “I suppose you could say that, yeah,” she managed, before biting her cheek and turning to focus on the already meticulously arranged spirit bottles.
WHEN SHE WAS FINISHED, she noticed with alarm that Dec’s strange companion had gone to the toilet and Gerry was now sitting in the free stool beside Dec. She stood watching them, hand hovering towards the button under the counter. Of course, the flaw in their system was that Marty usually closed the hardware shop at six or seven. They had never given it much thought seeing as the whole thing had been designed to keep her parents happy rather than as a foolproof security system.
She watched them for a few moments, ears perked to hear any raised voices. She reached over past the bowl of quartered lemons and pulled her smartphone closer.
She swiped to unlock the screen, tapped 1-1-2 and paused. Rolling her eyes when she realised she had no other choice, she cleared the screen and instead scrolled through her contacts until she came to the entry for Ballycashel Garda station. She couldn’t exactly call the national emergency number and tell them Gerry Reynolds was going off, but one mention of his name to the Gardaí in Ballycashel and there’d be someone over within minutes. How effective they’d be at stifling any trouble was another story.
Fiona was just about to sneak into the tiny office and call the guards when Gerry stood abruptly and stormed from the bar without so much as a nod in her direction. She stared after him before turning to Dec.
“What was that all about? What did he say to you?”
But Dec was uncharacteristically closed off about the encounter. And before she could push the matter, the doors opened and a group of young women walked in, all decked out in pink sashes and tiaras. They might as well have rang a gong and yelled ‘ding-ding-ding’ as far as Fiona was concerned: hen parties were big business and they didn’t often venture to Ballycashel. Fiona plastered on her widest smile and moved to where they were clustering.
“Hello, ladies! Where’s the blushing bride? Ah, how could I miss you with those furry handcuffs and obscene toys? Let me get you a Baby Guinness on the house; get the party started.”
5
MRS MCCABE WASN’T JUST REVERED in her family for her roast dinners. She cooked a top-notch Full Irish breakfast too. Fiona was in dire need of it that morning. The hen party had been a good bunch of girls and she had found herself enjoying the craic and joining them in a round of shots too many. Coupled with the fact that she’d eaten nothing but a cheese toastie all day meant she was suffering the ill-effects now.
“That’s one way to drive your own bar into the ground,” her father said without lowering the day’s paper from his eyes.
“What is, Dad?” she asked, voice hoarse and low like a fifties screen siren.
“Drinking your own profits,” he muttered.
“I’m not drinking my profits,” she protested weakly. “It was a hen party. I had a few shots with them to get the buzz going. My takings from last night were more than the previous two weeks combined. And that’s accounting for the three or four shots I had myself. How do you know anyway? You’ve had that paper glued to your face since I came in.”
“I can smell it,” he said, shuffling the paper closed and karate chopping it in the middle to fold it. “And the voice on you. You sound like those ones on the 1580 phone lines.”
Across the table, Ben snorted. “You’re a fan of them, Dad? I have to say, I’m surprised. I thought you were a man of better moral fibre than that.”
Fiona laughed. “Does Mammy know?”
“Ah, lookit,” Francis snapped, reaching in the pocket of his dressing gown for his phone. The kids had chipped in and got him an iPhone 6 for Christmas and though he lamented it frequently, he was hardly ever off it. “I’ve seen the ads. I was only making an observation. An assumption. Ye can check the phone bill if ye want.”
Ben glanced at Fiona and shook his head ruefully. “Probably rings them on the mobile so we can’t trace it.”
“Would ye stop!” Francis bellowed.
The table fell silent. Their father was notorious for not being able to take a slagging and they knew when to stop pushing him.
Fiona leant her head back against the wooden chair and indulged in a fantasy where she left the bar closed for the rest of the day and curled up on the couch watching old movies with Rex, the family dog. It was far too tempting. She had already opened the bar at seven that morning and made coffee for the handful of people who came in at that hour. Business was definitely up since she had started baking scones to display in baskets on the bar, but it was hardly booming.
“That smells divine, Mam,” Fiona said, trying to stop her mouth from watering. She couldn’t remember the last time she had called over for breakfast—there was always something else to be doing around the bar.
“You’d hope so,” Mrs McCabe said, carrying two heaped plates out to the table and then disappearing back to the kitchen for more. “I’ve been slaving over the cooker for hours.”
Fiona felt a twinge of guilt. “Ah, sorry, Mam. I offered to help and you said you were grand.”
“Don’t mind her,” Francis said without looking up from his phone. “I told her I’d be happy with porridge and she looked like she was about to have a heart attack.”
“Sure I was worried about my good saucepans. You’d burn the bottom out of them sooner than you’d stir anything.” She dropped another two plates on the table. “He’s always stuck on that phone,” she muttered as she walked away.
Silence descended over them once all six of them had plates in front of them. The table was usually more crowded, but Colm and Enda had been browbeaten into escorting their granny and a group of local pensioners on their annual pilgrimage to Lourdes.
Fiona stared at the plate wondering what to try first. It was heaped high with rashers, sausages, black and white pudding, beans, grilled tomatoes and mushrooms, and Mrs McCabe’s hash browns. She had fallen in love with the American diner variety the first time she went to visit Mike in Philadelphia. Fiona had never been to the States, but when she did visit she’d be getting the name of that diner and going there to thank them for their contribution to the McCabe family’s wellness (and waistlines).
“Tell me you don’t make these from scratch every morning,” Fiona said, scooping up another forkful and carefully pressing it against the yolk of one of the perfectly fried eggs. The oozing yolk made her feel a little queasy once more.
“Would you go way outta that! Do you think I’m made of time and chained to the kitchen?”
Fiona froze, fork hovering mid-air over her plate. “Well, you’re always telling us how bored you are and I’ve rarely seen you out of the kitchen.”
Mrs McCabe threw her head back and sighed as if she was in pain.
“You asked!” Fiona cried. “Didn’t she?” She looked around at her siblings and father for support, but found none. They were all too busy eating and her father was hunched over, staring at his phone.
“He’s seriously never off that thing, is he?” she asked, realising that the only way she was go
ing to get out it was to direct her mother’s hostility at someone else.
“Tell me about it,” her mother said, still frosty. A moment later, though, she leant forward, unable to resist the urge to have a dig at him. “At least he turned it on silent, though. For a few weeks there, all you could hear was the national anthem every time he got a text message.”
Ben laughed. “Sure who would the aul boy be texting?”
“They’re all at it,” Mrs McCabe said with a shrug. “Him and the lads, texting each other night and day about the horses and the dogs and the state of the economy and God knows what else.” Her eyes narrowed as Ben’s words sunk in. “Why? What’s so strange about him texting? I hope you’re not suggesting that we’re too old.”
Fiona smiled serenely at her brother’s discomfort. There was one cardinal rule in their house: never make any reference whatsoever to their mother’s age. They would never have even known it if it wasn’t for the time that Kate was rooting in their parents’ wardrobe and came across the marriage certificate, complete with that secret date of birth. Kate had made the mistake of telling their aunt Philomena about it. Mrs McCabe hadn’t forgiven them for months.
Their father, of course, couldn’t care less about his age. They’d been referring to him as the auld boy since way back when he must have only been in his forties.
No, Ben’s problem was that he mentioned his father’s age in front of his mother, who happened to be eight months older than her husband (something which had scandalised and shocked the McCabe children on that rainy day in the nineties).
“Ah, Mam, I wasn’t talking about you. It was him.”
Mrs McCabe wasn’t having a bar of it. “You call him old, you call me old.”
“Ah, now, lookit,” Ben said, clearly not so worried that he couldn’t find the time to pause and polish off another slice of toast. “What’s age only a number? If I was to meet the two of ye on the street, it wouldn’t even cross my mind that the two of ye could be close in age. I wouldn’t have a bar of it! No, I’d peg you for the younger woman; the glamorous second wife maybe.”
Fiona watched as her mother began to thaw, a smile threatening to break through her pursed lips. She wasn’t surprised—Ben had always been a charmer. Even when he was in secondary school, he’d had the young female teachers wrapped around his little finger. The guy could have been a top salesman if he’d applied himself—they all said it and had done for years.
Fiona might have called him out for waffling, but she was in no mood to see her mother in bad form. Instead, she changed the subject.
“What’s the plan today, Ben?”
He shrugged. “Nothing much, now. I might call over to Billy and see what he’s at.”
“Is he not working?”
Ben shook his head. “No. He took holidays. They were meant to be going to Fuerteventura but then his girlfriend’s leave got cancelled. Sickener. But it means he can play Playstation with me instead of floating around in a pool full of children’s wee, so happy days for him I suppose.”
Fiona baulked. Ben had never shown any desire to leave the country or to get a job, and she sometimes had trouble relating to the way he judged things offhand when he had never even bothered to try them out. “I’d say there’s more to Fuerteventura than urine-filled swimming pools. Isn’t there beaches? Walks you can do?”
He shrugged. “No idea. Never asked him. Sure why would you want to go to the beach?”
“Um, to swim in the ocean? To sunbathe?”
“If I wanted to sit around in water I’d have a bath. And isn’t sunbathing dangerous?”
She rolled her eyes. “More dangerous than having six pints a night at Phelan’s washed down by a kebab from the chipper?”
Her father cleared his throat. “Is that the pot calling the kettle black?”
“Dad!” she hissed. “You can’t compare me having a few shots one night to Ben and his alcoholism! Sure he can’t even describe himself as a functional alcoholic because he’s too dysfunctional to get a job or a place of his own or—”
“Why would I get a place of my own?” Ben asked, looking wounded. “Mam and Dad love the company. And I’d only be throwing money away on rent. We’re not all like you, getting the run of the pub and then driving it into the ground with your silly notions. You’re not in Dublin now!”
Fiona rolled her eyes and dropped her fork, looking regretfully at the white pudding she hadn’t yet had a chance to sample. “First of all, I’m paying rent. Dad’ll tell you. Second of all, I’m quite happy to take criticism from anyone who’s got the drive to go out there and work hard for themselves. I’m not prepared to take it from my unemployed twenty-six-year-old brother who’s never worked an honest day in his life!”
“Fiona!” her mother gasped. “How can you say such a thing to him? Isn’t he trying?”
“Trying? Is that what he’s telling you?”
“Ah come on now. He finished school right when the economy was going down the toilet. What chance does he have? He’s looking for work every day.”
“He is in my eye. Unless Playstation is looking for testers.”
“Quit it,” Ben said, looking hurt.
Fiona sighed. “Sorry,” she said. She meant it too—they had the kind of love-hate relationship that meant she struggled to hold back from tearing into him, but God help anyone who said a bad word about him in front of her. “I’m just worried about you. I don’t like to see you wasting your life away when you could be doing something constructive.”
“Like working in an office all day? Or studying for some useless degree that’ll cost me thousands but won’t get my foot in the door of a job?”
She winced. “There’s no need to be so cynical. Why not give it a try and then judge how you like it?”
Her mother patted her arm. “Your sister has a point, love,” she whispered. “It’s not going to hurt you if you—”
“Jesus, Mary and Joseph!” Francis McCabe cried, so loud that all you could hear for a second afterwards was cutlery clattering onto the plates around him.
“What is it, Francis? Don’t be yelling like that—you’ll give me a heart attack so you will.”
He looked up, red-faced. “Dec Hanlon. He’s dead!”
Fiona rolled her eyes and leant down to massage her temples with her fingertips. “Ah for God’s sake, Dad. What’s he even done? Are those aul lads from Phelan’s winding you up about him and me? I swear there’s nothing going on and if there was it’d be none of your business.”
She closed her eyes and wished she could be transported back to the pub. She was in no mood for a lecture about Dec so soon after the last one. She knew well that her father didn’t like him, and it didn’t matter: she had no interest in him as anything more than a friend.
For once, her mother stuck up for her. “She’s right, Francis. Don’t be giving her a hard time. She can see who she wants. And he’s a good lad anyway. I don’t know why you have such a bee in your bonnet about him. What did he ever do to you?”
Their father’s silence made everyone look up. It wasn’t like him to back down from an argument. He was sitting rigid, staring at the screen of his phone.
“What is it, Dad? You started it with your empty threats about him.”
“Ah, Francis,” Mrs McCabe weighed in. “What’s the poor lad ever done to you?”
Finally, he looked up and stared her straight in the eye. Fiona couldn’t read the emotion in his face but she was sure of one thing—it wasn’t anger she was seeing. “I wasn’t threatening him, Fi. I was reading this message from Finbarr.”
“What are you on about?” she asked, half-laughing. She didn’t like the look on her father’s face. He seemed… uncomfortable about something. And why would her father’s doctor friend talk about Dec? He lived in Newtownbeg and they only knew him because of their father. “Now Finbarr is threatening him?”
He shook his head and put his phone away. Then he reached up with both hands and wiped his face as if he
was absolutely shattered after a long day’s work. “No, love. Dec is dead. They found him down at the lock. They have to wait for the pathologist but someone called Finbarr when they couldn’t get a hold of Dr Grimes. Finbarr reckons he’s been dead since last night.”
6
FIONA UNLOCKED the door that led up to the flat above the pub. Her parents had insisted that she was welcome to stay around, but she just wanted to be alone. Her mother was on the phone to anyone who would listen about how it was a terrible miscarriage of justice, while her father kept referring to Dec as if he was her tragic boyfriend.
She couldn’t listen to it anymore. She wasn’t a tragic widow, but he had been her friend. She just wanted to mull it over in peace. She ran up the stairs, growing lethargic before she’d even gotten to the top, and threw open the door that led to her little flat.
It wasn’t much. When her father had run the pub, the rooms had been used as storage for extra crisps and other snacks from downstairs. There was no way their family of nine could have lived in the cramped flat. Those were different times—she remembered the pub being crammed with people every night of the week when she was a child in the nineties. It was different now in all the pubs. They were only really busy on special occasions.
When she had taken over the pub, she’d had to clear out boxes upon boxes of total clutter to even make a path through the mess. Who knew her parents were such hoarders? She had had no idea. Their house was kept immaculately clean and tidy. The flat above the pub was a different story. Buy and Sell magazines from the early nineties onwards, boxes of old glasses and other promotional rubbish from the breweries, an assortment of tools whose function she couldn’t figure out. She had even found a stack of gundog guides from the eighties.
She threw herself on the couch and looked around. She had done a good job with the place with the help of her siblings and friends. Thinking about them made her think of Dec. She hadn’t seen much of him in recent years, but he’d been around for most of her childhood.
Apple Seeds and Murderous Deeds: An Irish Mystery Page 3