by Tom O'Neill
Maire had been all the more surprised on spying the thin foreign man still hunched there as she wandered back overhead the next day to see what was going on at a pond on the other side of the hill. And there he was again the next evening. And so he remained for three days. She allowed that either he was a fool providing the height of entertainment for Daghda or it was no high spirit that this man was talking to. From the tidy cut of the farmstead she guessed this one was no fool.
In the following days Fada had heard others, thrushes and robins mostly, chirping about misfortune befalling the little horse up at Matha’s place. She recalled that the gentleman farmer’s cants had included something about a horse. So she suspected the connection. And not ten minutes back, when she saw Matha heading out aimlessly from the home with rotting thatch, wearing nothing but a few torn garments wrapped around him, her cold heart had melted a little for him. She flapped slowly over across the sky and landed about fifty paces in front of him. She stood on one long leg as she watched him approach.
‘Where are you going?’ she asked when he was twenty yards away.
He was taken by surprise. Not only at such talk coming from the beak of a heron, but because he was not used to anyone talking without first greeting or bidding you good health. Whether they meant it or not.
‘Good health to you ma’am, but I don’t know,’ he answered quietly.
‘Well I hope you brought plenty of food because it can take a long time to get there,’ she said.
‘You are right, madam,’ he said. ‘And you don’t have to tell me I’m foolish for going because I know I’d be foolish in someone’s mind whether I stayed or went.’
‘I wouldn’t waste my precious time to stop here and call you a fool. There are plenty who can tell you the obvious. I thought you might like to know that I heard a certain foreign farmer, a neighbour of yours, praying in curses for that horrible mule of yours.’
‘Oh, thank you for your advice. I am sure there is a mistake though. There is nobody in this valley with the power of calling spells, good or bad. That man is merely a farmer. Thank you anyway for being such a kind person.’
Old Maire was impressed by young people with manners, though she never set an example. She decided she would like to tell him more so as to extract more compliments. She said, ‘Farmer indeed. You harmless git. Listen, I can’t give you anything to make the ugly nag better. But I can tell you that he sent the horse’s life to the seven furthest fields of this country. That I know because I heard him. And I can tell you that to draw them back, you will need but one small clay bowl. That I know because I am the best woman I ever heard of to store information.’
‘Thank you so very much, lovely, wise, elegant creature,’ said Matha. ‘Is there any possibility at all that you would know where I can get this bowl?’
Maire fluffed up the feathers on the back of her neck. ‘Every possibility. It is in the possession of a woodsman who lives at the southern foot of Sliabh na mBan. So go on now for I’m finished.’
Yet she turned her other eye at him and continued talking: ‘If you don’t mind me asking, how long do you think you’ll survive before you make a bony unsatisfying meal for the Mac Tíre clan? Everywhere you’re walking near the forests or through bracken their sly yellow eyes will be observing. Allowing a little time to pass before tearing your guts and face from you, in case they be accused of being hasty eaters. They pride themselves on their manners you know.’
A shiver went up Matha’s back at the thought of the Mac Tíre and their appetites. He knew as well as anyone why people gathered sheep and goats in behind safe thorny enclosures at night. And why nobody wandered alone near the edge of heath or forest from dusk. It was not without cause that the wolves were allowed to call themselves Mac Tíre, sons of the country.
‘They have a preference for tender youngsters you know,’ she said callously. ‘Fresh meat walking alone. Better yet, without spear, sickle, or anything at all that might scratch their tatty fur. Are you not afraid?’
Matha could say nothing he was so afraid. He’d heard from travellers that much of the countryside had the shade of trees and bushes; that there were few paths that didn’t go through or near Mac Tíre hideouts. And here he was, he realised, without a companion, a hatchet or even a good sharp stick.
Then she looked at him again. She must have mistaken his silence for secrecy. She inspected him with each eye alternately for a few minutes and eventually said in a less mocking voice, ‘Excuse me. Nothing stays hidden from me. Who are you really? I see you are one of those with no reason to fear the Mac Tíre.’
Matha had no idea what she meant. His fear of them went beyond reason.
She flopped off in her slow ungainly way without giving or receiving a parting word and Matha was left more alone than he had ever been.
Chapter 2
BITE MARKS
Dark stood alone in absolute darkness. It took him many minutes to realise where he was: in the rath, which was more silent than ever. No trace remained of the fire or of the stink of the Fear Dearg. He was breathing a freezing dew. He made his way out through the thorny cordon. Something scurried away through the rushes in the open bog.
An unpleasantness descended on him. He patted his pockets again as if there would be answers among the store of pocket knives, lighters, string, and pens that accumulated in there. For want of something better he took out his phone and back-lit it. Still not telling the hours.
The feeling grew more intense. He could only call it foreboding. He didn’t care to start wondering why the Old Man had chosen to share the particular tale that he had spun. Why had he not just let him have the simplicity of some ferocious battle?
As he stepped heavily across the bog he tried to focus his worries back onto the more mundane. What if Kevin had emerged from his java blog and found himself all alone in the house? He would have panicked. He would have tried to do all the right things, phone all the right people.
As he crossed the hedge onto solid ground he started to run.
But inside, all was in order. The same ‘Huh?’ came from Kevin when Dark called him. He put the television on just in time for Connie’s return.
‘Why have you the coat on?’ asked Connie. ‘Are you cold?’
‘Not so much,’ said Dark, aware that his face was probably red.
Connie nodded and didn’t pursue it. He had other things on his mind. It was Wednesday night and within ten minutes he was showered, hair kind of combed down, in his black jacket, grabbing his keys, and too embarrassed to say where he was going. There was not much he didn’t tell Dark, so there was no doubt that he was going to Cork city. As he had done every Wednesday for seven weeks. Since Dark’s mam had taken on the late lectures that meant she had to stay in Cork on Wednesdays. But Dark pretended not to notice. He didn’t want them to ask him what he felt. He was not the one they should be asking. What would Seán McLean have felt about it?
Dark sat in Connie’s armchair not watching the television and trying to sort out too many thoughts. It was maybe one in the morning when Kevin came through saying the connection was down and he was going to sleep. Five minutes later came his snoring. That would be one good thing about his going. Dark might get some sleep.
Georgina was restless.6 Dark stayed in the smooth leather recliner with the television on, and eventually his thoughts faded into some kind of dreamless sleep.
He woke to light through the east-facing skylight.
The wind-up clock on the dresser put it at seven o’clock when he heard the suspension of the old jeep squeaking familiarly; picking its way down the potholed lane, bringing Connie home. Connie padded as quietly as he could through the kitchen, softly whistling Back in Black. He came back through again in his yard clothes without turning on lights. In his efforts to wake no one, he still did not notice Dark sitting in his lazyboy as he went out to look at the animals. Dark’s unhappy restlessness resumed.
An hour later, in full sunlight, everything seemed perfectly
normal again. He was having cereal with Kevin and Connie. Pumpkin was waiting at his ankles for whatever he might drop to her. When Dark mentioned that they’d be taking Kevin back home when they went on their trip to town, Connie stared for a minute. He scrutinised Dark’s face. Dark was afraid Connie was going to ask outright: Why? Or mention the sound system in the barn. But Connie looked away again, clearly deciding to say nothing. Dark appreciated that.
After Connie went to milk the cows, Kevin came with Dark on his calf-feeding rounds.
‘There are times too, though,’ he said, ‘that I actually could see how a person could really like this place.’
Dark didn’t respond.
The Red’s truck arrived in the yard. He had his high boots on. He always came for the Thursday and Saturday trips to the co-op. A stop at the bookies or the amusement arcade on the way home was the price he put on good behaviour in the shops.
As Kevin came out with his rucksack, Connie’s phone rang. Connie shouted into the little Nokia as though the person he was talking to was far up the Mullahareirk mountains. She was of course. It was Queenie, another of his friends. Queenie had long grey hair and a leather coat down to her ankles. She never missed the card games on winter evenings. Connie liked joking around with Queenie. He would be on this call for a while. He saw that Dark was anxious, not wanting Kevin to be here any longer than Kevin wanted to be here. He threw the keys of the Queen Mary to Dark and bundled himself into the passenger seat.
The Queen Mary was Connie’s thirty-year-old Land Cruiser and Dark was relatively good at driving it.
Kevin looked at Dark with new anxiety as he climbed in the back with The Red. Dark felt Kevin’s uptight gaze on the back of his head as he started the engine. He said, ‘It’s okay, Kev, we’ll go the back roads.’
‘Oh right! Best avoid the main road,’ said Kevin, trying to sound sarcastic. It didn’t suit him. Obviously he didn’t yet realise that roads could exist which were even less main than the twisty road from Mullet to Connie’s farm.
The Red wasn’t pleased. ‘Yeah,’ he grumbled, ‘give the keys to a lanky city buck who doesn’t even have a license while the experienced truck man has to sit in the back.’
Connie was laughing into the little Nokia, relaying The Red’s gripes to Queenie.
‘Actually, he has a point,’ said Kevin. ‘Why don’t you let him drive? What if you get caught?’
Kevin seemed to think that there was an obvious binary choice, a clear right and wrong, to every situation. It was not that Dark himself never thought about such things. It was just that in his own life, it seemed choices were not always between good and bad. Sometimes they were between bad and worse. He had experienced The Red’s driving. That was much worse.
Connie had not let The Red drive them since the last conversation with Helen on the subject. ‘How could you entrust Arthur’s life to someone so dangerous, so feckless?’ she had asked. ‘Or your own for that matter?’
‘But The Red is full of heart,’ Connie had said, trying to joke his way around it.
‘What’s that got to do with it?’ Dark’s mam was not having it. ‘Look in his eyes. He’s a ... He’s borderline psychotic.’
‘Which of us is perfect?’ said Connie.
But he was trying really hard to pay more attention to what Helen said to him these days. So Dark was the one who got the keys today. Though he was pretty sure his mam would not have liked that much better.
Connie directed with his left hand, taking them up into the hills and onto a desolate road with heather on either side and grass in the middle. The jeep squeaked along for miles of twists and dips. Dark glanced in the rear-view and saw Kevin’s eyes looking straight back at him with a kind of petrified gaze. As he wondered again about Kevin’s thoughts, he failed to notice that they were approaching the main road from Rockchapel to Mullet. They shot across the intersection, causing a brown car to brake and swerve, and came to rest half way up a convenient laneway which met the road on the other side.
Connie was still on the phone so there was nothing for Dark to do but reverse back to the main road and set off again. It would be time enough to swap places with Connie when they got to the outskirts of the town.
He had hardly settled on this thought when there came the whine of a siren. In the rear-view, the blue flashing lights were right behind.
‘What now?’ he said to Connie.
‘Lose them,’ said Connie.
Kevin groaned.
‘Only messing there, friend,’ said Connie. ‘The Mary has less acceleration than a tractor.’
Dark stopped. The garda car also stopped, but the garda himself didn’t get out immediately. The back window was dusty and Dark got a little tense as he couldn’t make out what was happening. They waited for at least a minute.
‘The other guy,’ said Kevin, finally finding his voice, ‘the other guy has completely vanished.’
‘He is suspicious of police,’ said Connie.
‘Why?’ Kevin was unable not to ask. He looked pale. ‘And how did he go without me noticing?’
‘He believes they may have a grudge against him.’
That was only partly true. The Guards were alert to certain roguish nocturnal activities which bore The Red’s glove print. For example there had been a series of incidents in Greystone Manor. Incidents that had people whispering, in at least partial truth, that Saltee had displeased the little people. Things such as the doors of Saltee’s ‘free range’ piggery opening no matter what locks were put on them, letting his pigs range freely; round bales rolling downhill of their own accord; and, for some reason, strimmers and saws being moved. That was a tell-tale crime for anyone who knew The Red. He had an unusual fixation on two-stroke engines. Gadgets would be rearranged just enough for the obsessively tidy Saltee to realise someone had got in again despite all his security beams.
Saltee did not of course blame any little people. In every complaint he made at the garda station, he named Connie as the suspect. That was a little unfair, though not entirely. Firstly, Connie could have stopped The Red by simply telling him to stop. The Red listened to nobody else. But Dark had the impression that Connie got too much enjoyment from seeing Saltee arrive in the yard and hop from one leg to the other in a rage, saying, ‘I know, I know everything. I’ll have you soon, you great oaf!’ Not only did Connie not tell The Red to stop, but he had gone with him on at least one occasion. Dark knew this because he had been there too. That occasion was after Dark had found a three-legged badger bleeding to death in the bog. When he told Connie, the three of them went across the river. And sure enough, The Red, who had extraordinary vision at night, found the gin trap near badger sets in Saltee’s woods. Dark had used the bolt cutters and Connie a sledge. The resultant mangle was left draped over Saltee’s fence, in case he might doubt interference.7
Whatever his reasoning, The Red had now disappeared. The others sat staring straight front, each thinking his own things. Eventually the knock came on Connie’s side and he smacked Dark on the thigh as he let the window down. ‘See, I told you everything would be grand!’
Dark let out a breath he didn’t realise he had been holding in. It was only Jim Curtain. He was the sergeant at Mullet Garda Station but also one of the regulars in Connie’s house, staying late most nights. Connie let his window down.
‘The McLeans are not set on making my life easy,’ said Jim Curtain, amused with himself and his siren.
Dark got out of the driver’s seat and came around to the side of the car, but Curtain wasn’t finished with Connie. He remained leaning in. ‘I have yet another complaint about a trespass.’
‘Well, Jimmy boy,’ said Connie. ‘What has you out and about? Is the heating broken in the station?’
Jim Curtain refused to be distracted. ‘You know, Con, I can’t go on mislaying all the complaints that Mr Saltee brings to the station.’
‘Nothing to do with me,’ said Connie. ‘No need to worry. I was in ... away ... last night.’
‘How did you know it was last night then?’ said Curtain quietly.
‘Was anything taken? Or damaged?’ asked Connie.
‘He says the pigs were let out and ate his daffodils,’ said Curtain, very seriously.
‘I doubt it,’ laughed Connie. ‘That man couldn’t grow daffodils.’
‘I’m serious, brother, I’m very worried about what will happen unless you take a step back from this conflict with that guy. I get a bad feeling about him.’ Jim Curtain was still looking very serious. ‘And by the way, in case you don’t know, for some fecked-up reason one of his hedgecutters was taken from the shed and left in the middle of his driveway. What is all that about?’
At the mention of the hedgecutter, both Connie and Dark glanced towards the back of the jeep. Curtain only then noticed Kevin. The garda blushed. He went back to being the policeman for the benefit of the solicitor’s son. ‘Okay, driving lesson over,’ he said, pulling Dark’s ear. ‘Don’t let me catch you again.’
He walked around the car for an inspection of the lights and tyres, most of which were not right. As he did, he noticed the body in the back and again forgot to be a garda, letting out a laugh as he opened the back hatch. ‘Come out, you scut, it’s only me.’
The Red didn’t stir from where he was lying on the empty calf nut bags in the boot. But he released a ring of cigar smoke that shimmied towards the roof.
Just then a weasel ran across the road up ahead. Though you weren’t supposed to call it a weasel, Dark remembered Connie saying once.8
An old man on a bicycle came up to them and stopped. Unusually, he was not someone that Connie recognised. He took a Woodbine out of his wrinkled lips as he looked first at Connie and then peered in the back. He said, ‘Glory be to God, they walk among us.’