CHAPTER SEVEN
Well, after a day like today, it’s not surprising nobody much feels like sitting around the bonfire and telling stories.
Sarah watched the men come back from the burial detail. One by one they slipped through the front gate and headed to the gypsy section of the compound. Their faces were somber and set. A terrible day. A truly terrible day.
Siobhan and Sarah spent it canning the last of the green beans. It should’ve been done weeks before but like so much of the work in the compound, there was always more of it than people to do it. Siobhan was good company on an otherwise depressing day. Her cheerful chatter was in sharp contrast to the mood of the rest of the compound.
“Sure, there’s not much help I can be giving you, darlin,” Siobhan said as she settled Ciara on her lap. As soon as Declan returned from the burial detail, Fiona had dropped Ciara off with Siobhan and left with him to patrol outside the compound. Sarah knew Fiona wanted to be doing more in the way of security. Probably being married to the head compound cop helped foster that interest.
“Not with our little lamb insisting on helping where she shouldn’t anyway.” Siobhan kissed the baby’s head and jostled her to prompt the toddler’s giggles. It had to be the biggest heartbreak of anyone’s life that Siobhan Murray’s own children were gone forever. Four sons. One dead as a baby. Two in the States with no contact in over a decade. The youngest in prison somewhere in England.
Sarah watched Siobhan with Ciara. Such a shame. She loved the little ones so.
Sarah stirred a large pot of green beans on the stove. She had a second batch, already cooked and cooling in a bowl of cold water. The salt she’d use to layer between the beans in the heavy stone crocks was considered valuable in this part of Ireland for its scarcity. She’d brought back a quarter ton of it.
“You and Mrs. Keenan have gotten close,” Sarah said. She handed the baby a piece of cheese.
“Pshaw,” Siobhan said. “I’ve known Maggie Keenan since we were girls. I know she’s a mouth on her, mind, but come to that, so do I.”
Sarah grinned. “I thought Mike was going to throttle the two of you last night.”
Siobhan laughed. “Aye, you’re not wrong there! Your man has a short fuse and there’s no denying it.”
“A short fuse that you know how to light, Siobhan.”
“Ah, well, I’m actually that sorry about last night, Sarah. And I mean to tell Himself so when I see him at tea.”
“I’m sure he’s over it.”
“Even so. It was disrespectful and I was wrong.”
“Are you sure you’re keeping the best company these days?”
Siobhan laughed again. “If you’re saying Maggie’s a bad influence on me, darlin’, I’ll be reminding you I know me own mind.”
“Well, I always thought so.”
“Auntie Sarah’s an imp, isn’t she, lamb?” Siobhan said to the child, but she smiled at Sarah as she spoke. “Margaret Keenan is passionate about her beliefs,” Siobhan said thoughtfully as if it had just occurred to her. “I value that in a person as I’m sure you do.”
“Mmm,” Sarah said. In her mind there was a big difference between someone who was passionate and someone who was a royal pain in the ass.
But maybe not.
*****
Mike sat on the porch with John that evening after dinner. It was cold and Sarah had opted to go to bed early with a book. Mike was tempted to join her. Sorely tempted. But he couldn’t help but feel, after a day like today when half the compound’s men had had to throw dirt on the faces of murdered families, that he needed to be visible if not available.
The visit to Ballinagh had been unproductive to say the least. Few people would talk to him and those who did said nothing worth hearing. He didn’t want to upset anyone by mentioning the slaughter found near them, but his delicate probing was met with blank stares and shrugs.
As for the poor bastard making his way to the coast in search of his daughter? Mike grimaced. Was it possible? That a plague was coming? Dear God, that’s all we need. Why hadn’t they heard anything before now? Does Dublin know? If they did, they were probably keeping it quiet for the same reason Mike was—to lessen the chance of starting a panic. He’d debated mentioning it to Sarah but she had enough on her plate with the baby and all.
That last thought made him smile in spite of the terrible day. He glanced at John who was trying to get a top to spin on the uneven steps of the porch. He appreciated the fact that young John kept him company. Mike had always made a special point not to try to take David’s place—as if he could. You only get one father in this life. If he’s a good one, as John’s was, it’s doing well enough that the memory be honored.
In many ways, John was more like Mike than Gavin was. He was bright, and he had inherently better judgment. Always had, even when he was ten years old. Yet Gavin felt no jealousy toward John for Mike’s affection. Right from the start he’d reached out to John as the brother he’d never had and for that, Mike was as proud of Gavin as if he’d taken his O levels.
“You think the men will come talk to you tonight?” John asked.
“I’m here if they need to.” Mike noticed Mickey was keeping a low profile tonight too. Probably wore himself out doing an honest day’s work. Mike hoped one of the families had fed him but he was confident that Sarah would know—and would ensure the man got his dinner.
“Where’s Gavin this evening?” Mike asked. “With Regan?”
“Pretty sure,” John said. “It’s where he always is these days.”
“What do you think of her?”
John shrugged. “She’s all right.”
She’s trouble, Mike thought. But time enough to deal with that. If he was lucky it would burn itself out before he had to.
A moment passed in silence.
“Nobody’s coming to the campfire tonight.”
“Appears not. It’s a sad day.”
“I know.”
Mike wondered if Sarah had told John about the baby. Surely not. Mike had only found out himself. Even after everything the four of them had been through together, it occurred to Mike that the child would be the ultimate glue that would finally and forever bind them as a family.
“Someone’s coming,” John said, standing up.
Mike heard the voices before he saw who it was, and the voices were angry.
“Mike Donovan!”
Barney Murdoch emerged from the evening haze from across the campfire. He was flanked by someone on each side but it wasn’t until the three were nearly in front of Mike that he could see that one was Murdoch’s daughter Regan and the other Gavin.
Shite.
Mike didn’t stand. Murdoch’s face was twisted in a mask of outrage and Mike could smell the whiskey on him from the foot of the steps. Where was he getting it? The compound’s alcohol stores were carefully guarded and meted out. But there are always ways.
“What’s the meaning of this, Murdoch?” Mike said coolly, his eyes on Gavin’s face for some hint of culpability. Gavin wrenched his arm out of Murdoch’s grip and the older man turned on the boy with his fists raised. Mike was off the steps and between them. He placed a hand on Murdoch’s chest.
“Back off,” he said tersely.
“The lad’s compromised my Regan,” Murdoch said. “I’ll have a wedding out of it or I’ll have his skin.”
“This isn’t the eighteen hundreds, Murdoch,” Mike said dryly. “You’re welcome to handle your girl any way you like as long as you don’t break our rules.”
“That means you can’t beat her, you putrid bag of bones!” Gavin said.
“Gavin!” Mike said, “Go inside.”
“I’ll do whatever I like to me own kin!” Murdoch snarled, grabbing Reagan’s arm and shaking her for emphasis. “Feck your fecking laws!”
“And you’ll find yourself on the outside looking in if you do,” Mike said breathing heavily.
“Getting sick of this fecking monarchy anyroad,” Murdoc
h said. “What are you going to do about your boy shagging my girl?”
“Nothing,” Mike said. “I’ll advise him to make better choices but beyond that, unless there’s a bairn on the way, nothing.”
“What do you mean make better choices? Are you saying he could do better than my Regan?” Murdoch was purple with rage.
“We’re done here, Murdoch,” Mike said. “Go cool off and sober up.” He nodded at Regan who was dressed in a skintight dress with a plunging neckline and cut up to her thigh. Mike couldn’t imagine where the girl had gotten such a costume in these times.
“If the neighbors report screaming coming from your cottage I won’t wait ’til morning to throw your arse out.”
“Your time will come,” Murdoch said, glowering at Mike. He backed away and pulled Regan along with him. “And I’ll be holding the stick when it does. Just wait and see.”
Mike waited until Murdoch disappeared from view around the corner of cottages. Then he turned to Gavin.
“Jaysus, Gavin. What the hell?”
“Mum was already pregnant with me when you were my age!”
“Are you telling me the lass is with child?” Mike said, his eyes glittering, his breath coming in short pants.
“No! But it’s none of your business if she was!”
“Oh really? And is it yourself who’ll care for her and the child? Provide for them? Or did you have it in mind she’d just move into your bedroom in my house?”
“I’m sick of being your lackey,” Gavin shouted.
“Shirrup, ya young eejit, you’ll wake everyone!” Mike growled.
“I don’t care, let ‘em wake!” But Gavin stomped up the stairs and slammed the front door behind him. The sound of the door banging shut seemed to reverberate for several long seconds in the night air.
*****
The next morning, Mike awoke early but for the first time in months hesitated to get out of bed. Sarah’s space next to him was vacant and he placed a hand where she should be.
“Are you awake?” Sarah opened the bedroom door and slipped in quietly with a cup of tea for him. “The camp’s still asleep. No hurry about getting up.”
“Gavin and I had words last night.”
“I know. I heard.”
“That’s all I need during all this is him acting the maggot.”
“He’s just at that age.”
“He picked a crap time.”
“They always do.”
Mike leaned over to kiss her and placed a hand on her stomach. “I’ll be needing a lass this time, if you don’t mind.”
Sarah laughed. “I’ll see what I can do but I hear girls are even more trouble.”
“Aye well, you may be right, just ask that bollocks Barney Murdoch.”
Unspoken but present between them was the memory of the daughter they’d shared for a very short time—wild, tragic Papin.
A light tap at the door made both of them turn their heads. In the year since they’d been married Mike couldn’t remember a single time one of the boys had knocked on their bedroom door.
“Yes?” Sarah asked. Mike felt her stiffen as John’s face appeared in the door.
“Are you guys up?” he said, his face a mask of concern. “I can’t find Gavin.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
Mike walked across the compound to Barney Murdoch’s place. He sent John for Declan. Gavin’s bed hadn’t been slept in. While it wasn’t unusual for Gavin to stay out late to hang with his friends—or to meet up with Regan—he’d never been out all night.
He’d never not come home.
The Murdoch family cottage was two housing rows behind the center cookfire, the last row before where the place the gypsies and bachelors had set up their tents. Both Mike and Sarah had remarked about that the families tended to group together in the center of the compound with the outer line of defense growing increasingly weak. The fact that Murdoch had moved his family, his wife and Regan, into this elaborate shed—and never worked to improve it or enlarge it—said a lot about the kind of man he was.
Mike ran up the steps of the porch and hammered the front door with his fist.
“Open the door, Murdoch!” he bellowed.
Regan answered the door with wide eyes. She had a shawl wrapped around her thin shoulders.
“Where’s yer father, lass?” Mike said, clenching his fists at his side in an attempt to keep from barging into the house and dragging the bastard out with his bare hands.
“He’s still in bed,” Regan said.
“Have you seen Gavin?”
Her eyes grew wider. “Gavin?”
“Last night. Did you see him again last night?”
She shook her head and then turned as her mother slipped into place behind her. Ellen Murdoch was a plain woman but Mike always thought she had a good head on her shoulders. He pushed the door open wider and the early morning light revealed the dark bruising under her eye. So Murdoch had relieved his ire last night on someone he knew wouldn’t make any noise.
“Gavin’s gone,” he said to Ellen. “Did your husband leave here after he came home with Regan?”
“Gone?” Ellen looked at Mike and then Regan. “No,” she said. “No one left here. And we’ve not seen your Gavin.”
Mike turned on his heel and walked away. An insane part of him had hoped that Gavin had run off with the lass. But the minute Regan answered the door, that hope died. They wouldn’t be hiding him inside, not with that mental case Murdoch in there.
Declan and John came running down the line of houses and stopped in front of Mike.
“Is it true?” Declan said, panting from his run. “Gavin’s gone?”
“There’s no way he would just go,” John said. He looked past Mike at Ellen and Regan as if hoping to see Gavin there. They closed the door.
“You think he was taken against his will?” Declan asked.
“Do a full search of the compound,” Mike said, stepping off the porch.
Declan hesitated and then turned to walk back the way he’d come.
“Da,” John said earnestly. “I’m telling you, Gavin wouldn’t just leave. We had stuff we were supposed to do today. He wouldn’t leave without telling me.”
Mike clapped a hand on John’s shoulder. He could feel the fear he’d been pushing down begin to erupt. “All right, son,” he said. “Let’s look at his room again. See if we missed anything.”
Mike ran a hand through his hair and tried to remember if Gavin had said something before the fight—anything that might hint at his leaving. But there was nothing. He couldn’t remember a single other instance when Gavin talked back to him. Last night’s display was the first.
Was it connected to his disappearance?
“Mr. Donovan?”
Mike turned to see Regan in jeans and a sweatshirt running up behind him. He and John stopped.
“What is it, Regan?”
She looked at John as if hesitant to speak in front of him but quickly made up her mind.
“I did see Gav last night.”
A rush of relief swept through Mike. “Thank God. Where? I thought your mother said nobody left the house?”
“That’s true,” Regan said, glancing over her shoulder at her cottage. “But me da was wanting some time alone with Herself, so I slipped out. I saw Gav in front of his house.”
“Did you talk to him?”
She shook her head. “I was afraid. My da…he was…”
“Are you sure it was Gavin?”
“He was wearing his favorite red plaid shirt. You know the one?”
Mike nodded grimly. Sarah had brought it back from the States the year before. Everyone knew Gavin’s red plaid flannel shirt.
“I saw him leave out the front gate.”
“You lie!” John said. “I don’t believe it.”
Mike put a hand on John’s arm. Why would the girl lie? And she was right. With that shirt, it was hard to mistake Gavin for anyone else even at a distance.
“Anything el
se, lass?” Mike asked.
She shook her head, starting to turn away and then stopped. “Maybe one more thing,” she said in a small voice.
“Yes?”
“He wasn’t alone,” she said.
*****
The Jeep was parked in the garage. It hadn’t been used in several weeks. Sarah packed a small knapsack of sandwiches for the backseat. She noticed Mike had put two rifles back there. He was talking to Declan and John outside the garage, giving instructions of what to do. She could hear John’s voice trying to insist that Mike bring him, too. She didn’t have to worry. Sarah knew Mike would never.
She put a hand on the fender of the Jeep. John and Gavin took turns starting the vehicle up regularly and driving it around. Mike tried not to use the Jeep or the bigger transport truck too much. God knows how long the vehicles needed to last them. The fact that Mike was going after Gavin in the Jeep instead of on one of the horses spoke volumes about Mike’s anxiety level.
Mike felt this was his fault. He blamed himself for the fight last night with Gavin. Why would Gavin leave? It didn’t make sense! Not sweet, compliant, easy-going Gavin. And with whom? Could Regan be believed? She swore she didn’t get a good look at the person who was with Gavin. Why would Gavin leave in the middle of the night with no backpack, no change of clothes or food?
A shadow filled the doorway into the garage. Siobhan and Margaret stood there.
“Oh, my,” Margaret said. “So this is where the transport truck is? Sure, it’s the biggest thing I’ve ever seen.”
“Hello, darlin,” Siobhan said to Sarah. “It’s only that we’ve heard the strammish. Well, it’s all over the compound. Is Himself off to find the lad?”
“That’s the plan,” Sarah said, walking across the garage to the two women. Past them she could see Mike had finished with Declan and John and was heading to the garage.
“He was taken, Sarah darlin,” Siobhan said in a whisper before Mike arrived. “You need to know that.”
Irish End Games, Books 4-5-6 Page 8