‘Cup of coffee?’ I said with a smile.
‘Love one,’ she replied.
We sat in the bar as the coffee machine did its business. She was an easy conversationalist and within five minutes I learned she was from a small town called Ballaghaderreen in County Roscommon (spot on, I thought, mentally patting myself on the back), she came from a large family; one brother was a priest, another a doctor, and two others worked in local government. And she was staying with her grandfather two streets away. None of which told me much about her.
‘Have you worked in a pub before?’ I asked at last, trying to steer the conversation into more formal waters.
‘Sure. I used to pull pints in my uncle’s pub in Ballagh.’
I walked over to the bar and beckoned her across. ‘Get behind there and pull me a pint of Guinness.’
‘Are you going to drink it?’
‘It’s a bit early for me. I just want to see how you handle a pump.’
She went to the other side of the bar. ‘Then I’ll just pour a half, seeing as how it’s going to be wasted.’
I smiled. I liked her attitude. I think I decided there and then to give her the job.
We both stood at the bar, staring at the perfectly pulled Guinness as it settled in the glass. ‘When can you start?’ I asked.
‘Whenever you like.’
‘I could use a hand this lunchtime.’
‘Lunchtime it is then.’
And lunchtime it was.
I wouldn’t say that Siobhan Egan’s presence behind the bar caused a great influx of new customers, but over the weeks I noticed a handful of fresh faces, and quite a few familiar faces making their return after a noticeable absence. The most significant to these was George Feeney and his crew.
George Feeney was a local businessman of note. He ran a haulage company off the Shillington Road, and if his gold and navy blue liveried lorries were perhaps not so familiar on the streets and motorways as say Eddie Stobart or Omega, it was not for want of trying. Feeney was aggressively ambitious and had put two smaller local haulage firms out of business with a mixture of undercutting and intimidation. He was also something of an entrepreneur, owning sizable stakes in several nightclubs.
He had a reputation as something of a ladies man, and was often seen squiring a succession of pretty young things around town, whether in his gold and navy Bentley, or his bright red Ferrari.
Getting Feeney back, along with all his drivers, was significant because I had barred the lot of them two years previously. It was when a rivalry between Feeney and another haulier was at its height, and that rivalry had spilled over into violence. When that violence had taken place in the public bar of the White Hart I decided enough was enough and banned them.
There was certainly no apprehension in Feeney’s manner when he came swaggering in one Sunday lunchtime. He was with his foreman, Pat Brennan and a couple of his drivers, one of whom I recognised. Feeney nodded to me. ‘Bernie,’ he said, with a grin.
If there’s one thing I hate more than a barred customer trying to ingratiate his way back into my pub, it’s being called Bernie. ‘You’re barred,’ I said without returning his grin.
His grin slipped a little, turned into an uncertain smile. ‘After all this time, Bernie? Surely not. Surely you won’t deprive a pillar of the community of a chance to buy his colleagues a drink.’
I was cleaning a glass at the time. I threw down the tea towel and was about to go around the bar and physically eject the man when Siobhan stepped forward.
‘Of course not, Mr Feeney, what’ll you be having?’
My jaw dropped and for a moment I was speechless. Finally I said, ‘Siobhan!’
She grabbed my hand under the bar and squeezed it. Her eyes, when I met them, assured me she knew what she was doing. I shrugged, letting the tension of the moment flow from my shoulders. If there was one thing I had learned since Siobhan started at the White Hart it was to let her have her head. From what I had seen of her so far, she was more than capable of doing not only her job but mine also.
‘But the first sniff of trouble, Feeney, and you’re out. Understand?’ I said.
The big grin had returned to his face. ‘Understood, Bernie.’
‘And another thing, the name’s not Bernie, Bern or any other derivation. It’s Bernard.’
Feeney nodded seriously. ‘Understood, Berni... Bernard.’ He said it like that, emphasising the second half of my name – making me sound like a bloody Yank.
I shook my head and went up to the other end of the bar to serve Clancy who was arguing with a young married couple about the potato famine. I wanted to stop him before he whipped out his eye with a cry of, ‘That’s what the fecking famine cost me!’, because I could see he was about thirty seconds from doing so.
Later I tackled Siobhan about serving Feeney and his cronies. ‘You undermined my position,’ I said.
She nodded.
‘I could have over-ruled you and made you look stupid.’
She nodded again.
‘Why did you take it into your head to serve him then?’
‘Because you were cutting off your nose to spite your face. Feeney and his men could bring the White Hart a lot of business. ‘
‘I didn’t know you knew him.’
‘Everyone knows George Feeney and it’s stupid to turn that away, just because of an old grudge.’
‘So I’m stupid now am I, as well as being incapable of making a valued judgement about whom I serve and who I don’t?’
She lowered her eyes and went out the back. When she came back she was wearing her coat. There was still the cashing up to do and the tables to clear. ‘Where are you going?’ I said.
‘Making myself scarce. That is what you want? Just pay me for the day’s I’ve worked, excluding today. You can send the cash round to my grandfather’s.’
I stood there like an idiot, my mouth opening and closing like a belligerent cod. ‘But... but I don’t want you to leave.’
She was half way between the bar and the door. She stopped but didn’t look back at me. ‘I thought that’s what you were getting at,’ she said.
‘Look, stay... please. The regulars have just got used to you. They hate change.’
Finally she looked around at me. She was smiling. ‘Okay,’ she said lightly and shrugged off her coat.
I went to bed that night feeling a mixture of relief, confusion and anger. Relief because I had salvaged the situation with Siobhan and persuaded her to stay on; confusion because I was not sure I’d given her signals that I wanted her to leave in the first place; and anger because I now had George Feeney back in my pub, and from the interest he was taking in Siobhan tonight, and from the way she was responding, I realised that it was only a matter of time before the Bentley had a new occupant in its passenger seat.
And the thought of Feeney and Siobhan becoming an item bothered me immensely. Part of it was jealousy, and I didn’t try to deny it to myself. I had been single now for far too long, and I had started to take more than a passing interest in my new barmaid. But there was something else troubling me. Something far more elemental. It was something I could not pin down to my own satisfaction, but the combination of George Feeney and Siobhan Egan seemed to me to be ill fated or, for want of a better word, cursed.
Perhaps I should explain that. I come from a long line of, what my grandmother liked to call, feelers. She wouldn’t have it that we were psychic – that was too scientific for her – and she wouldn’t entertain the possibility that this power had anything to do with witchcraft. So she called it feeling, and us feelers. In essence it meant we were sensitive to certain stimulus, and prone to extra-sensory flashes.
I have also found it a frustratingly random power, exhibiting itself when you least expect it and, when you need it most, disappearing like fog on a summer’s day. Siobhan certainly fooled it until the very last moment.
Now it had nudged me and warned me about Siobhan and Feeney, making my scalp prick
le at the same time. But I could do nothing about it but wait and see how things panned out. I certainly couldn’t say anything to Siobhan, and I didn’t intend to talk to Feeney at all, so as far as I was concerned he could take his own chances with it.
‘This pub needs music,’ Siobhan said the next day. She made a habit of doing this; plucking ideas out of the air and presenting them to me. Last week she had suggested we serve filled baguettes at lunchtime. So the next day I put them on the menu and they sold out within thirty minutes. So I trusted her instincts.
‘What kind of music? Disco? Live band?’ I asked
‘Something traditional. Jigs and reels. But modern too. Electric instruments.’
‘And should it be every night?’
‘Great heavens, no! Perhaps once or twice a week. Make a feature of it. Friday nights would be good... and Sunday lunchtimes.’
I nodded thoughtfully. The pub had a music licence, so that didn’t present a problem. Finding a band might though. I didn’t fancy sitting listening to an endless procession of hairy rockers murdering U2 songs. ‘I’ll ask around. See if I can get some recommendations.’
‘Good,’ she said. ‘It’ll certainly brighten the place up.’
I winced slightly at that. I had no idea the place needed brightening up.
The first person I spoke to about it was Danny Kelly who ran a small club in the Kings Cross area. He too thought it was a brilliant idea and gave me the name of a Harry Green, a booking agent who supplied bands to pubs and clubs in the London area. After a couple of phone calls I had lined up a band for the following Friday. Green sent me through a homemade cd of the band in action, and when Siobhan came in to work that morning I had the thing playing in the bar.
The effect on Siobhan was instantaneous and dramatic. The piece of music itself was an air, played on fiddle and uilleann pipes. I didn’t recognise it myself, but Siobhan certainly did. She was barely seconds through the door, and had just taken off her coat when she went across to one of the speakers and put her ear to it.
‘The Lass of Glenshee,’ she said, sat down heavily on a chair and cupped her face with her hands. I realised with a shock she was crying.
‘Hey,’ I said rushing over to her. ‘That wasn’t the intention. This is the band I’ve booked for Friday night. I thought it would make you happy.’
She took her hands away from her face and covered my hand with both of hers. ‘But it’s beautiful, Bernard. That’s why I’m crying, because it’s beautiful and brings back so many happy memories. This was the music I used to listen to as a child in Ballaghaderreen. Myself and Mâire, my sister. We knew all the songs.’
‘I didn’t know you had a sister. You’ve never mentioned her.’
‘She died,’ Siobhan said, staring down at the table and biting her lip.
‘I’m sorry.’
‘It’s okay. People die. It’s part of life. But hearing this tune, just for a moment, brought her back to me.’
Just then the telephone rang. I swore.
‘Go on, answer it,’ she said.
‘Will you be all right?’
She smiled at me wanly. ‘Go on, I’m fine.’
It was Harry Green, the booking agent, ringing to ask if I’d had a chance to listen to the cd. ‘I’m playing it now,’ I said, and held the telephone receiver in front of the speaker. ‘Hear that?’
Green said he had and rang off. I looked back to Siobhan, but she was busying herself with the vacuum cleaner, and I cursed Green and his phone call. He had interrupted something important. I could feel it.
The next day I received a shock. I was unloading the van after a trip to the cash and carry when a car roared past me; so close the back draught made the van rock. It was Feeney in his Bentley, Siobhan at his side. I felt sick.
That evening when she arrived for work she noticed my coolness towards her. I’d decided earlier in the day that I really didn’t want to work side by side with her this evening, so I called Charlie, my head barman, and, with the promise of two evenings off in lieu, got him to cover for me.
I had my coat on and was half way out the door when Siobhan caught up with me. ‘Bernard? Bernard! Is there something wrong?’
I glanced down at her hand. She was holding on to the sleeve of my coat. She saw the expression on my face and let her hand drop.
‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘Look, have I done something wrong?’
‘It depends on your point of view. I just hope you know what you’re getting yourself into. And I hope you realise just what a nasty piece of work George Feeney is.’
‘Do I hear my name being taken in vain?’
I spun round. Feeney was standing on the pavement, a supercilious smile spread across his lips. I clenched my teeth and my fists and pushed past him without another word and without looking back at Siobhan. She had made her choice and now she could make the best of it. I would give her her notice tomorrow. Selfish, yes, childish, yes, petulant, ill-tempered and jealous, yes, yes, yes, and more besides. I was wounded, and like any wounded animal I was lashing out.
I’d taken the evening off, but had nowhere to go. I walked down by the river for a while and watched the Thames getting on with its life. I passed a couple of pubs and they looked warm and inviting, but far too good-humoured to suit my mood.
I had a sudden thought and cursed out loud. I would not be able to sack Siobhan tomorrow. Tomorrow was Friday and was the first evening the White Hart would thrum with the sound of live music. I had my full compliment of staff booked for the evening, including Siobhan. I was expecting it to be busy... very busy. My feelings and my actions would be put on hold, at least until Saturday.
The cold was knifing its way through my overcoat and I started to shiver. This was ridiculous. Exiled from my own pub by my own bloody mindedness. One day I would have to grow up. I passed the cinema. It was showing a Bruce Willis film amongst others. That would do to kill a couple of hours. I paid for my ticket and sought solace in the companionable darkness.
It was ten thirty when the film finished and I found myself back on the street. It was surprisingly busy this time of night. The kebab shop had a queue to the door, and the burger van was doing steady business, peddling its own brand of salmonella in a bun. I took a slow walk back towards the pub, but a few streets away took a detour to the street that contained the house Siobhan shared with her grandfather.
I stopped outside number twenty-four and stared up at the curtained windows. There was a blue flickering light escaping from a gap in the upstairs drapes and I guessed that Siobhan’s grandfather was tucked up in bed, watching television. I envied him his simple life. I also envied him his closeness to his granddaughter.
I had taken the evening off in order to get away from Siobhan, and had spent the entire evening thinking about her. ‘Damn it to hell,’ I said under my breath and traipsed home.
As I reached the door of the White Hart it opened and Feeney staggered out, followed by Pat Brennan who had a blousy woman hanging on his arm.
‘Bernard!’ Feeney said, fanning my face with drink fumes. ‘A music night – what a great idea. We’ll be there tomorrow evening, strong of voice and with a song in our hearts, won’t we, Pat?’
Pat Brennan sneered at me, and the woman he was with giggled and belched. I pushed past them without a word.
‘Tomorrow night it is then,’ Feeney called after me and laughed.
Siobhan was still behind the bar, but the towels were over the pumps and the lights behind the bar were dimmed. She looked across at me, an uncertain smile playing on her lips. I scowled back and started collecting glasses from the tables.
By the time everyone had left and I threw the bolts on the door I was feeling very depressed. I was also feeling very apprehensive about the music night – my grandmother would have been proud of me – convinced that something unpleasant was going to happen.
The band arrived at five that evening in a beaten up blue Ford Transit. They were very young but very polite, calling me Mr
Flynn at every opportunity, and being as accommodating as possible. I realised with something of a shock that this gig was a big deal to them, a fact confirmed by the guitarist who told me that this was the biggest gig that Green had so far been able to secure for them. I figured they needed a new agent if this was the best he could get them, but kept my mouth shut and listened while they did a check to get their sound balances right.
I sensed someone beside me and looked around to see Siobhan standing there, listening to the music, tapping her foot in time to the jig the band were using for their sound check. ‘They’re very good,’ she said to me.
‘They are.’
‘Are you still angry with me?’
‘No.’
‘Good.’
‘Yes. Yes I am still angry with you.’
‘Oh. Because of Feeney.’
‘Because you’re making yourself look cheap.’
She nodded her head slowly. ‘I see.’
‘Do you?’
‘I’m not, you know.’
‘Not what?’
‘Cheap. And tonight George Feeney will find that out.’
I looked at her sharply ‘What do you mean?’
She took my hand. ‘I want to thank you, Bernard, for giving me the job, for letting me work at your pub. I feel I haven’t been fair to you but, after tonight, I think everything will become much clearer.’ She reached up and kissed my cheek – her lips felt cool – and then went to busy herself behind the bar. I stood there for a few seconds more, a chill slowly spreading out from the centre of my stomach. That was goodbye, I thought, and felt unutterably sad.
By nine o’clock the pub was filling nicely. By ten it was heaving. It was as if the residents of the area had been starved of entertainment for years. The band was playing its collective heart out and each new song was top and tailed with cheers and applause. I looked round for Siobhan. I wanted to tell her what a great idea this was, but she was on a break. I looked across to where the band were playing and saw her, shouting something into the ear of the fiddle player. And then someone waved a ten-pound note under my nose and I was back to pulling pints.
Falling Into Heaven Page 9