Soon the bogs and meadows of the Midlands gave way to fields of dancing barley and everywhere cattle idling on great green squares. Then came the water, Loch Rea, mile after mile, silver, rippling to the wind. And then Claremorris and the Nephin Begs, purple apogees atop a massive fence. A little later, out of this tapestry Mweelrea shot up, sovereign and welcoming. His heart skipped.
After Westport the train headed west, past rocks and islands being battered by surf. And like a sailor saved, a prodigal forgiven, he found a new belongingness taking hold.
Then Aranroe train station re-entered his reality, one difficult year after he’d first been here. He stepped down onto the flagstone platform. The old bowing bench, still unpainted, sat empty, no William to admonish or entertain him. Somehow it didn’t feel right to go in search of the old man.
‘Dia is Mhuire dhuit.’
A voice calling. From behind him. He couldn’t turn.
‘Dia is Mhuire dhuit.’
The voice took form. A woman, approaching, wearing William’s de Gaulle cap, middle-aged, chaotic charcoal mane, magenta face.
‘Don’t speak Gaelic. Sorry.’
‘Can’t say I do myself, ha-ha. A few words I collected,’ the woman said. ‘Impresses the tourists like mad, especially the Germans. And no better way to shame the Brits; pay them back any way you can; that’s what I say. You look lost; you’re American, are you; do you know where it is at all you are?’
‘No. I mean yes, I do know. I’ve been here before.’
‘You look lost to me. Was it looking for William you were?’
‘Is he here?’
‘Well, he is, you could say, and he isn’t. Isn’t his spirit all over the place, looking at us this minute, I wouldn’t doubt. And where else would he be, and him looking after his trains going on sixty-one years.’
‘You mean, he passed away?’
‘In a way he did, but away couldn’t be far for himself. I’d wager he walks about here all the time, and sits next to his old stove inside. He’s here alright, for his trains, and all his friends.’
‘Sorry to hear . . . When did he pass away?’
‘Christmas day. In the chapel after Mass he left us, the morning of his eighty-ninth birthday. He planned it that way, I’d say, natural as it was. He was like that. Did everything his own way in living, so why not in dying.’
‘You knew him, knew him well, I mean?’
‘Well as any daughter knows her father – ’
‘Your father?’
‘Didn’t we live under the same roof these last twenty-eight years, since the mother died. Now there was a woman for you, the mother; she’d have sixteen cows washed and milked before you’d – ’
‘Sorry, I’m not being rude but I need to check into my B&B; they might rent the room to someone else.’
‘Not at all they won’t. Tons of rooms this time of year. So, tell me, who is it you’re here to visit: man or woman? You wouldn’t be one of them agricultural fellas from Boston?’
‘No, nothing like that. Just like this part of the country. The mountains.’
‘Sure that isn’t what’s in you at all. Who is it, tell me? Romance, I’d say; that’s why a lot of them come, for the matchmakers, find a nice Irish cailin. And sure why not. I’m not spoken for myself, if you follow me, and me half past fifty and never been kissed, if you can believe that.’
‘Have to hurry, or I’ll be late.’
‘Aren’t you a nice man now, nice pleasant young man. You’re married yourself, you are?’
‘Soon to be. Soon. Very soon.’
‘You’re spoken for so. Lucky divil.
‘Would you know the Quins, from Clare Abbey?’
‘And who wouldn’t. It’s Lady Leonora you’re here to see so. Could look like that meself if I had her money. Fine woman. Still, if I was in your shoes, I’d be careful, if you don’t mind me speaking my mind.’
‘You see her around?’
‘Can’t say I do these days. She’ll be here the day after tomorrow, for certain. First day of September. Nearly every evening of a September she waits here for somebody off the late train from Dublin. A body that never gets here. Poor soul must be lonely, like the lot of us, I suppose. And that’s all I have to tell.’
Outside the station the earth posed for him, at peace, almost people-less, white-cotton clouds in a pale-blue sky, the dropping fuchsia of Aranroe Hill a carpet of crimson and scarlet bells. Out of everywhere poured memories. Up in the distance, Clare Abbey lorded over the land. One half-mile in the opposite direction sat the village, its few thatched roofs shining in the sharp light of the day. And thirty feet below, the green ocean raged, infusing the air with spray and scent.
Yes, he affirmed, standing at the low stone wall bearing the carved letters of Aranroe. He closed his eyes, listened to the water, relished the wind whipping through his hair. He was ready this time, really ready, he reassured himself. Whatever it demanded.
‘Grand day, sir, sorry to be disturbing your rest.’
Tony jumped.
‘Could I be dropping you somewhere to your liking?’ said a large rotund man with floppy hair and an apologetic smile. ‘Paddy McCann, sir. McCann’s taxi service.’ The man spoke with a softness that belied his size. ‘This is me right here.’ He nodded toward a tired yellow station wagon with a removable roof sign.
‘You know Greyfriars; it’s a B&B hostel-hotel?’
‘Certainly, sir, not too far away at all. Not a farmhouse in these parts I couldn’t take you to.’ The man’s generous face stretched and swung with his words. ‘I’ll look after those for you, no problem,’ he said, reaching for both bags.
Tony grabbed his backpack ‘Just the one,’ he said, stepping back from his duffel bag.
‘Here for a bit of climbing, sir? Grand bit of weather we’re having for it.’
‘Looks good, Mr – ’
‘Paddy – that’s how I’m known far and wide. Now, before I run you up to Greyfriars could I interest you in a little tour of the village, and maybe a short hop up to see Loch Doog? Everything’s within two or three or four or at most five or six miles of where we’re breathing God’s holy air this minute. Tons of history all over: druid stones, Celtic crosses, round tower, St Colm’s well, even the oratory where St Brendan said his last Hail Mary before discovering America over a thousand years ago in a goat-skin boat. Will we give it a go?’
Tony accepted, smiling covertly at the man’s manner of speaking, which seemed reminiscent of an old time that he as a city kid had heard only in films or on the radio.
‘I’m not a tourist, Paddy,’ he said.
‘Sure aren’t we all tourists, in a sort of a way, here on a short visit.’
After stopping by Greyfriars B&B he resumed his liaison with Aranroe. The taxi cruised through the narrow streets around the village, slowing occasionally so that he could savour particular remembrances. Leaving Aranroe, they weaved through farmlands to the east then circled around the loch. Everywhere wild hedges divided roads from fields and ditches, and hugged stone walls. At notable spots Paddy recounted local folklore or struggled through tales of supernatural happenings, which usually imprinted a terror in his face and caused his jowls to puff and tremble. The bumpy roads bounced his bulk about the seat, yet he managed still to exchange waves with almost every person who came into view, even some whose presence he seemed to anticipate.
‘Well, here we are: back safe and well, thank God,’ Paddy said as the taxi cruised along Market Street in the centre of Aranroe village. ‘Anything else I can show you now, sir? Still a couple of hours brightness in the day.’
‘You can forget the sir, Paddy. It’s Tony. What about castles?’
‘The very thing! Why didn’t I think of that. Americans go mad for the castles. Ah, Holy God; there, I did it again. You told me you’re not a Yank at all. Anyhow, I can run you up to Murrisk Castle, seventeen miles from here. Or Rockfleet Castle, ten miles beyond that. And I’ll tell you something now that most pe
ople never hear. Both them castles belonged to Queen Granuaile, in the 1500s. The Pirate Queen, they called her. Came from just down the road from here. High Queen of the whole of Ireland. Tough woman to live with, I believe, not the type to go for the groceries or cook you a nice omelette. And not the best-living woman either. But she robbed the English blind and not one of them could catch her. Queen Granuaile. Distant relative of me own on me mother’s side, from the O’Malley-Melia clan. So there y’are now, you’re with royalty.’
‘Very impressed. I’ll take your word for it. What about Clare Abbey?’
‘Top of the hill. We could take a run up but it’s not one of them castles you can tour around; more a hotel and golf course for well-to-do people, lots of foreigners.’
‘You know the people who own it?’
‘I do. Do a bit of business up there, run the guests wherever they want to go. Sometimes Mr Quin himself – Charles, that’s the owner – I drive him down to Galway; has a private plane there. You know Mr Quin, you do?’
‘Never heard of him.’
‘Free to speak me mind so. Between yourself and meself and not another soul, he’s a bit of a troubled man. But isn’t that how most of them poor millionaires are. Helter-skelter lives brimmed up with problems that people like ourselves never need to bother with. Should never stop thanking God we’re not like that.’
‘You know Leonora then, Leonora Quin?’
‘Miss Lenny, Charles’ daughter, grand girl altogether. Doesn’t drive anymore. Not since; well, what I mean is not now, so I take her around, places, wherever she wants.’
Tony recorded Paddy’s poorly concealed stumblings.
‘Gorgeous woman altogether.’ For a moment, Paddy’s thoughts seemed to drift. ‘Different from most people. Littlest bit unusual. Never the same since the war, God bless her.’
‘War? What war? And what do you mean – unusual?’
‘Gulf war, would have to be.’
‘You said unusual?’
‘I wouldn’t be saying anything against her good self, y’understand. But times I’ll be driving her, telling her all kinds of stories, make her forget what might be ailing her, and she wouldn’t be with me, be thinking her thoughts, much more important things I suppose. Sad things, by the look of it, sometimes.’
‘Married?’
‘I am. A good wife and two disobedient teenagers.’
‘I meant Leonora.’
‘Ah, no, no, never married. Told me herself. Plenty of chances, you can be sure, a woman like that. If I can put a word in your ear, and I don’t mean to poke me big nose into your business, but if you’re keen on the lady – and what man wouldn’t be – you’re bound to bump into a nasty lump of a bucko they call Boxer Dunne. Acts like he’s her chaperone.’
‘I know him.’
Paddy’s mouth fell open. ‘Friend of the lad, you are?’
‘Far from it.’
‘Thanks be to God again. Thought I put me big foot in it that time.’
‘Not friends. And not going to be.’
‘Nothing lost for that. The bucko’s a bully, nothing more. From Dublin, a jackeen. And the mouth on him.’
‘I’m a jackeen too, Paddy, remember? But that’s alright.’
‘Ah, no, no. You might be from Dublin but you’re a different cut of a man. I could tell the minute I laid eyes on you. Always know a gentleman. Were you saying you want me to run you up to the Abbey? I won’t be charging you a penny extra, I’m heading up there anyway.’
‘No. It’s late. I’ll get out at Greyfriars. Look up at it from there. Tomorrow.’
* * *
In the ensuing hours he submerged in contemplation, foraging for certainties, rejecting old frauds and self-deceptions, planning his next move and the fallback for when it failed, as life had taught him it would. Now mature, and free, could he think his way past trouble, he asked, outsmart danger? But the biggest question kept intruding: Why hadn’t she called him, ever, or written back to him? Maybe she never got the note he left for her a year ago. Maybe she did. But he was certain he’d seen honesty in her eyes, unless he was a fool and blind, heading into more serious trouble.
He’d psych-up his fight energy just in case, the old thrill he now feared; it felt like instinct, dulled but not dead. Ready for Boxer Dunne, or whatever else. He sensed he might need it, hoped he wouldn’t. Just days since Rip Wundt went down in Arizona, seven years since Shift Commander King Kong Yablonski died naked and roaring; both big men, just bulk; like so many others, no skill. The adrenaline was tingling now; it had always been this way, he thought, a drug in his veins. Could he ever not enjoy it?
He could no longer afford a street mentality, he thought, it could lose him the freedom he’d won back. But failing with Lenny wasn’t going to happen; he wouldn’t let it. This was his time, a new life, new place, and no alternative he could imagine. The caution he’d heard from Paddy didn’t change a thing. And of Boxer Dunne he had no fear, but also no need to prove anything. Charles Quin, though, something about him felt threatening.
It was past ten. He stretched out, sank into the bareness of the room, which took him back to the seventies, a world that was fascinating to him, when being poor, desiring nothing but pennies, had the feel of being rich, which he was. The flight from Los Angeles to New York, then New York to Dublin, had been long. But here he was, at last, back in Aranroe. Nineteen-ninety-four, twenty-eight years of age, breathing Irish country air, ecstatic that Lenny, though she wouldn’t know it till morning, was so close that his exhilaration might reach her. What was she doing, he wondered. Lying alone in her bed desiring Tony MacNeill? Feeling him next to her? Feeling for him what he was feeling for her? Tomorrow, he would not be dispossessed, stood up or scared off.
* * *
It was 10.30am, after a night of little sleep. His shaking hand gripped the receiver. Like a diviner’s rod his index finger sought each of the numbered holes in the chrome dial. He was calling, he explained, for Ms Leonora Quin; it was urgent and confidential. In that case, the receptionist responded, he should be dialling Miss Quin’s private number: 66038.
He stared at the telephone. This was going to be different, he told himself, minder or no minder. Maybe now the pain was over and there was such a thing as luck, or God, after all.
After aborting two attempts, he picked out 6-6-0-3-8.
‘Hello.’
The voice! It came too fast, halted his breathing.
‘Hello, who is it? Hello.’
It was a heart beating across darkness. And it broke his courage. No words came, not a syllable would breathe out of him.
‘Hello, hello. I can hear you breathing. Who is it?’
All at once it tore through him, what he had gone through in the year since he’d heard that voice. Now he didn’t belong in her world. Eva’s words returned: double-killer, ex-con, gas pumper, car polisher, loser.
‘I’m still waiting. Are you going to talk to me?’
The self he had re-invented, had believed in, was paralysed, a sham, hopes trapped in a heart that couldn’t speak.
‘Can’t wait forever. Hellooo-oo.’
He smashed the receiver down. Fool, no fucking guts, he cursed. He deserved nothing. On the street he had it every time, could always perform. But her world was different: fancy, false, not for him. He dropped back onto the bed, fighting his thoughts. He’d held his own, he told himself, in the housing projects at fifteen, sixteen, seventeen; in prison, every day up against scum; he’d learned well that you paid for guts, he had paid; the price for fear was always higher. Here, as Joel would tell him, he needed to defeat fear, not make excuses for failing. He sat up, dialled again: 6-6-0-3-8.
‘Tony?! Tony MacNeill? Is it you?’
‘Lenny. Hi, how are you? Hi.’
‘Tony! I felt it was you. I just felt it. Where are you? You’re not here, in Ireland?’
‘Just down the hill.’
‘Oh, my God. You serious? You can’t be.’
‘I
am. Are you able to get away, today, I mean right now?’
‘Yes, yes. God, it’s so good to hear your voice. I can’t believe it. I really can’t. Where have you been, where? Twelve months.’
‘Twelve months,’ he repeated. But now it felt like he had looked into her eyes just yesterday, and in a sense, he had, in each of the yesterdays.
‘I did write to you,’ he said. ‘One note and five letters. But don’t think about that now. Can you get to the Beehive Bar at eleven-thirty? It’s a really nice day; I thought we could sit outside, have lunch, if you’d like.’
‘Like?! Like?! Of course, I’d like. Half-eleven I can be anywhere you say. This is so wonderful. I am so excited. I’m just, I’m – ’
‘Have you got transport?’
‘I’ll walk. It’s a lovely day, a lovely day.
‘Okay. Great.’
‘I can’t believe you’re here, Tony. I’m, I’m shocked, nicely shocked.’
‘I can’t believe it either. I’ll see you at the Beehive, eleven-thirty, forty-five minutes from now. You will definitely be there, right? At 11.30?’
‘Be there? I can hardly wait. Do you look the same?’
‘The same? Pretty much, I guess. See you real soon.’
As he put down the phone the world bloomed again. The fear and failure of minutes earlier seemed juvenile, crazy. From his backpack he extracted the small box he’d placed there weeks earlier and had opened a dozen times since. He inspected its contents and slipped it into his back pocket. Time to spare; no way he could sit around in his present state of mind. He’d walk to the village. Maybe sing along the way to the green Atlantic, songs he’d sung silently in American prisons, songs his father sang: The Foggy Dew, She Moves Through the Fair, The Old Bog Road. At the end of the hill he’d turn right at Concannon’s Bar, into Kells Road, and there, on the right, at the Beehive Bar, Lenny Quin would be waiting for him.
The walk took less than fifteen minutes, taking in a stop at the newsagent’s for a packet of Silvermints, the Holy Communion of kissers, as his sisters used to call them. Near the end of the hill he slowed. How would he greet her, he pondered. Throw his arms around her and kiss her? On the lips? Sounded good, but no. Place his arms gently on her shoulders, maybe a light hug? A kiss on the cheek? Offer his hand, hold on to hers as she had done to him when they met? Better wait, see what she does, take his cue from her. After all, though the thought seemed incredible, he’d been in her company just once. Out of their whole lives, all their combined years on earth, they’d shared only fifteen minutes. Intense minutes. And before today he had talked to her by phone just one time, when he sensed the upset and confusion in her, the day she was to meet him at the Horslips Hotel. No, he should play it cool, like the year just gone hadn’t been a year obsessed, of frequent despair, and worse at times. But none of that mattered now. He could hold it together; he always could.
On the Edge of the Loch: A Psychological Novel set in Ireland Page 6