The Living

by Léan Cullinan

  We cuddled up together in the corner of the sofa, my head on his chest, he stroking my hair with a gentle rhythm that began to send me to sleep. Time enough to find out all his secrets when he was ready to tell me. This was good enough for now.

  ‘You going home, then?’ I asked, but he knew I was joking. We stretched ourselves upright and headed for the bedroom.

  IT WAS THURSDAY evening, and I was packing for Belfast: bustling around my flat, gathering my belongings, ironing my concert dress, ticking off my mental list of what I’d need.

  It had been a good day. Paula had arrived back at work in great form from her holidays, bearing airport chocolate from Gran Canaria. Between her and George, all seemed to be forgiven.

  Our last rehearsal before the trip had gone rather well. Everybody had worked hard, and Diane had been pleased with us. We’d finished with a rousing run-through of John White’s ‘Rocky Road to Dublin’, and Diane had sent us home to get a good night’s sleep.

  We were catching the train to Belfast tomorrow afternoon. I’d bring my suitcase to work in the morning and leave early to go and meet the others at Connolly Station.

  I had the radio on, a soothing sea of well-modulated talk in the background. Ten o’clock news. And after the reports of the latest government pronouncement, ongoing trade union unrest, the freshest economic outrage, came an item about the Belfast peace summit. Tensions were running high, it appeared. Language had become heated; the subcutaneous enmities were being unwrapped, flaunted like feather boas around old ladies’ wattly necks.

  And all of a sudden, I realized: this was us. This was our summit – Carmina Urbana would be singing on Saturday to these warring delegates.

  I paused, iron in hand. Denise used to slag me in school for never knowing anything about what was going on in the world. ‘Who’s the US president?’ she’d ask, and I’d say ‘George … Washington?’ to annoy her.

  The reporter in Belfast was declaiming earnestly about how tight the security was around the meeting, how there had been some trouble already with protests, threats, an incident in which one of the catering staff, suspected of having connections with Republican dissidents, had had to be fired.

  And I began to weave a little story about how the choir would be the perfect way for a terrorist to get in – who would suspect the entertainers, after all? Something Shakespearean in that. You would join up, attend rehearsals, go to the gig, and there you would … I stopped. I wasn’t quite sure what you would do after that. Plant a bomb, I supposed. Or would that be just too last century?

  I shivered a bit and looked around the dusky room. Nobody lurked in the corners.

  GEORGE CAUGHT ME just as I was leaving work the next day. My first thought was that he had misunderstood my request for permission to leave early, and I felt the beginnings of a leaping panic as I tried to think of ways to persuade him to let me go.

  ‘Come in here a minute, Cate,’ he said, beckoning me into his office. ‘Now, you’re off up to Belfast, I believe you said.’ He stood with his back to the door and spoke at about half his normal volume.

  ‘Yes, we’re all going up together on the Enterprise.’

  ‘I won’t keep you long, so.’ He paused, eyes beady. ‘I want to ask you something. Are your … ehh, admirers still on the scene?’

  I frowned at him.

  ‘I mean the men in that car.’

  ‘Oh!’ I said, and tried to stop my eyes widening in horror. I’d never told him about the laptop.

  ‘Are they still around?’ George asked.

  I’d never told him any of it – about the break-in, about my midnight escape, about Matthew going through the Bell Books company laptop with a fine-toothed comb …

  Well, I couldn’t get into it all now. There wasn’t time. ‘No,’ I said firmly. ‘I haven’t seen them in a while.’ Why, of all things, did it suddenly feel like I was covering for Matthew?

  ‘Grand job,’ George said. ‘They must’ve moved on to fresh fields and pastures new.’ He rubbed his chin and took a breath. ‘Right, then. I want to ask you a favour. Now. Say no if it’s a nuisance, but it’s just, something’s come up, and it would be a huge convenience to me if you could help me out. I have a friend in Belfast – Nicky Fay – he’s a county councillor. He has a document for me and he doesn’t want to trust it to the e-mail. He’s a bit funny that way, like some others we could mention. It’s … well. It’s a document he wants me to have, as corroboration for part of the MacDevitt book, funnily enough. He thinks it’ll change my mind about something. So, would you be willing to meet him and bring it back with you?’

  ‘I … well … I don’t know…’ I started to stumble, trying to think of a reasonable way to extricate myself. George watched me intently. ‘Yeah, sure, I suppose,’ I heard myself saying. ‘How do I get in touch with him?’

  ‘I have his phone number. How are you on numbers? Do you think you could learn it by heart? I’d rather not write it down, just in case.’

  ‘Should be OK,’ I said, at sea.

  ‘All right.’ He recited the number, twice.

  I repeated it back to him, then hummed it in my head. Nothing I recognized, but I was fairly sure I’d remember it.

  ‘Find a public phone, if you can at all,’ George said. ‘Try not to use your mobile.’

  ‘OK.’ I was well out of my depth.

  WHEN I GOT to Connolly Station I found the choir assembling beside a large pile of bags. I positioned myself with a clump of other altos and made small talk. The train wasn’t for half an hour, and the queue hadn’t yet begun to form. Joan handed me my token for our group ticket.

  Matthew wasn’t there yet. I went and bought a coffee.

  Shortly, without announcement, a queue began to coalesce at the sign saying Enterprise. We finished up our drinks and headed over to join it.

  Matthew still hadn’t shown up, which was driving Diane mad, because on our group ticket we all needed to go through the barrier together.

  ‘Where’s your bit of trouser, Ms Houlihan?’ Here was Tom, ever tactful.

  ‘I’ll just give him a call,’ I said, blushing – but when I tried, my call went to voicemail. I left a message that I hoped sounded jaunty rather than snappy.

  Diane spoke to the guard, who said we could all go through, and she could wait for Matthew. He was the only one of us who wasn’t there.

  By now I was a-jangle. I hadn’t heard from Matthew all day, and although I knew I was indulging my annoyance, my thoughts turned to a list of nasty, worrying things that might have happened to him. My conversation with George hadn’t helped – it had brought all the sinister stuff back into the foreground. What if someone were trying to prevent Matthew from getting to the concert?

  Silly. I could think of no earthly reason why that would benefit anyone.

  I walked down the platform with the others, glancing every few seconds over my shoulder to where Diane still stood waiting at the ticket point. We found our carriage and piled in. Joan and Val nabbed one side of a four-seat group and nodded to me to come and join them. I put my bag up on the overhead shelf and sat down, dithering over saving the fourth seat for Matthew.

  ‘Did you manage to contact himself?’ Tom asked, leaning over from the other side of the aisle.

  ‘No, his phone’s off.’ I was irritated now at my jitters. He’d show up. He wouldn’t just let us go off without him. ‘If he misses this train there’s another one later on,’ I said.

  I had my coat on the empty seat. Nobody asked to sit there.

  Everyone chatted about their days at work, their journeys to the train station. I didn’t join in. I was still looking out the window, back along the platform, to where Diane was waiting for Matthew.

  And then there they were, the two of them, Matthew loping towards the train with Diane maintaining a dignified trot beside him. She wore a big, tight smile.

  They were looking in the windows of the carriages they passed, and eventually Matthew caught sight of me. He and Diane shuffl
ed down the aisle of the carriage. Anja had saved a seat for Diane. Matthew arrived at our group of seats as the guard’s whistle sounded outside, and leaned down on the table, puffing with weariness that seemed unfeigned. The train began to move.

  ‘What happened to you?’ I said, as kindly as I could.

  Matthew gestured for time to catch his breath, and levered himself into his seat. Settled, he heaved a short, rasping sigh. ‘I was supposed to meet my supervisor at twelve, and he never showed up,’ he said. ‘Then at two o’clock I get a call to say he’s in his office, and I didn’t feel I could say no, because we really needed to meet. So by the time I left I was dead late.’ He sounded as though he’d run all the way from the bus stop.

  The train began to move, and we all continued to bat a selection of standard topics back and forth. I closed my eyes and let it wash over me. I was happy to be getting out of Dublin for a couple of days. Matthew squeezed my hand under the table. I returned the pressure.

  We got to talking about stage magic. Tom had an uncle who used to do children’s parties. ‘He did mine a few times,’ said Tom, ‘and there was always this older girl with gimlet eyes shouting out the secret before the trick was over.’

  ‘It must take some nerve, though,’ said Joan.

  ‘It’s a performance,’ Val said. ‘Like a lot of things.’

  ‘You’d need such dexterity,’ said Joan.

  Matthew said, ‘Well, a lot of it is just deception. Putting people off the scent.’

  I looked at him, eyebrows raised. ‘Speaks the expert?’

  ‘Well, no, obviously not,’ said Matthew. ‘But from what I’ve seen, it’s all about distracting people at the crucial moment. Like the three-card trick. I saw a man doing it in London a few years ago – only it was eggcups and a pea, not three cards.’

  ‘But that is just about dexterity,’ I said. ‘They flick the pea under a different cup at the last second.’

  Matthew shook his head. ‘Not this man. I watched him for ages.’

  ‘I take it you weren’t had,’ Tom said.

  ‘Oh no,’ said Matthew. ‘I was just watching. He was getting people to bet. And after I’d seen him win a few times I worked out how he did it. And it wasn’t about flicking anything,’ he added, turning to me. He was animated, edging forward in his seat the better to command our attention, gesturing to illustrate his story.

  ‘OK. He starts off slowly, shows you the movements, shows you the pea, shows you how easy it all is. Then he speeds it up a bit, and you guess where the pea is, and you’re right. And by this stage he’s got your interest, and then he talks you into betting. Say five quid, or two if you’re not so sure.

  ‘So you agree to the bet, and he does the trick – and he moves a lot quicker this time – and then he asks you to say where the pea is. And you’re pretty sure, because you haven’t taken your eyes off him for a second. So you pick a cup, and he slaps a five-pound note out on the table. And of course, you think you’ve won. But then he gets all stroppy and asks where your money is. And he refuses to lift up the cup you’ve chosen until all the money’s on the table.’

  ‘Aha,’ Val murmured, nodding.

  ‘And of course, now he’s winning, because he’s confused you. He’s accused you of wanting to cheat him, and you feel bad, because that’s what you were thinking about him. It was amazing – you could practically see it happening in people’s faces. So you take out your wallet and you find a fiver and you put it on the table. And you’ve pretty much got to take your eyes off the cups in order to do that – and that’s when he makes the switch.’

  ‘Fiendish,’ said Tom.

  ‘Quick as lightning,’ Matthew said. ‘I missed it the first few times. Then when I came back the next day he recognized me and wouldn’t take any bets until I’d gone. Nerves of steel, and a perfect memory for faces. I remember thinking he’d have made a brilliant spy.’

  When we got to Belfast Diane insisted on personally herding everyone into taxis outside the train station. I sat in the middle of the back seat, between Joan and Matthew, and saw very little – the daylight was already gone.

  The hotel was not far. Shallow steps led up to an imposing entrance in glass and chrome. The lobby was large and bright, dotted with tubs of leafy plants. Diane bustled to the reception desk to begin the process of checking us all in. The choir had commandeered a group of sofas, set in a square round a low table. Cases and rucksacks were banked at the corners. I followed Matthew and Tom over and found a seat.

  ‘It’s a lot swankier than I expected,’ said Val, looking around.

  ‘It’s not the choir that is paying for this, is it?’ Anja asked.

  ‘No, not at all,’ said Joan. ‘The organizers are putting us all up. Gosh, you don’t think Carmina Urbana would rise to this, do you?’

  Diane came back with a pack of electronic key cards. She winked at me as she handed me one. ‘Double,’ she said, honey-voiced.

  Our room was spacious and bright, with a white-tiled, windowless bathroom and a small balcony overlooking the hotel’s inner courtyard. It was quiet – sounds muffled by the thick carpet and curtains. The bed was enormous. I unpacked my concert clothes and hung them up.

  Matthew stepped out on to the balcony. I brushed my hair. I didn’t know what to say. We were a couple in a hotel bedroom. It was too strange. I went out to the balcony, where Matthew was leaning on the railing, looking down.

  ‘Matthew,’ I said, in my best Mrs Robinson voice. ‘Matthew, I want you to know that I’m available to you.’

  ‘Shh!’ said Matthew, whirling round, and my insides crumbled. He pointed to the balcony above, and went on in a whisper, ‘They’ll hear you!’

  I rushed back into the room, over to the other side of the bed, where I sank down to a crouch, nursing the sting. I didn’t want to talk to him. I wanted to go home. He followed me in. ‘Sorry,’ I said.

  He didn’t seem to notice. ‘What time is rehearsal?’

  ‘Seven o’clock, at the Waterfront. Dinner at half five.’

  He went to his bag and took out his music.

  It was all wrong. We hadn’t done enough to prepare. We were stumbling over our lines like the worst sort of amateurs. There wasn’t time to sort this out before we had to go for dinner, either. Matthew paged through his music, the suggestion of a hum buzzing about his lips. I fished out the novel I’d brought and couldn’t read it. I kept looking over at him; he kept not meeting my eye.

  ‘What’s up with you?’ I asked at last, fighting the panic.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said, distractedly. ‘I’m just going over this bit of the Daintree.’

  He, of all people, surely didn’t need extra note-learning at this stage. He must be in a mood. I left him to it, went out on to the balcony. It had started to drizzle, tiny drops skimming by on the wind. The sky was dark. The uplighting in the courtyard had come on. I watched the rain racing in the dim beams.

  SECURITY AT THE Waterfront was tight – metal detectors and bag scanners – and we had to wait ages for our sound check. We were the last choir to have access to the auditorium, so we were stuck in a tiny, airless room until nearly quarter to eight. Diane shifted into her bright and breezy mode, which did not recommend itself to me or, as far as I could tell, to anyone else in the choir. ‘Come on,’ she said after a while. ‘Let’s make use of the time, at least.’ She took us through our pieces, despite numerous mutterings that everyone knew them backwards, that singing them in this space was no use – that the purpose of this exercise was to accustom ourselves to the acoustic of the venue, to organize the logistics of walking on and off stage, to see where we’d stand.

  ‘We can’t just sit here doing nothing,’ was Diane’s response. I wanted to kick her.

  In fact, it turned out we didn’t know the music as well as we thought. The room swallowed our voices, and we couldn’t keep in tune. But the singing gradually calmed me, despite everything. I was putting minimal effort in, not pushing myself in the least, and somehow the
deep breathing, the control, the rising and falling phrases, made me loosen my grip on my irritation.

  At last there was a knock on the door, and a suitably apologetic young man led us to the stage entrance.

  It was a bigger auditorium than I’d ever sung in before. It was like a vast bowl, with seats stretching outwards and upwards in drifts and tiers. Two technicians in tight jeans and hoodies climbed impossibly high ladders to fiddle with overhead lighting and microphones. The stage was mostly occupied by the orchestra’s seats and music stands, with stepped platforms behind them for the choirs. The platforms had chairs on them – apparently we’d be on stage for the entire second half, which would build up to the grand finale of our epic peace anthem. For our own individual section we’d be standing on the stage itself, right at the front. We huddled together, conscious of how few of us there were.

  Diane’s heels echoed smartly on the wooden surface. She was in charge. She waved us to where she wanted us, then flapped her hands at us to adjust the positioning and make sure she could see each of us properly. ‘Pick a landmark, OK, so you can line yourself up tomorrow night,’ she said.

  We started singing again, and it went a little better. We were still making stupid errors, the sound was strained and the tuning precarious, but we were more confident than we had been in the airless room. Diane went down into the centre aisle to gauge how we sounded. ‘This acoustic is super!’ she announced. ‘I can hear every little mistake!’

  That got a laugh. My stomach began to unknot.

  We started into ‘Danny Boy’, just the backing at first, trying to get the tuning right. Diane was frustrated, but mostly hiding it well. Eventually, she said, ‘We’re not going to get it any better tonight. Let’s give it a bash, Matthew.’

  I turned to give him a thumbs-up. He was looking white, and when he started to sing it sounded bad. There was none of the breadth of tone that he normally seemed to produce without trouble. He was pushing – trying to increase his volume by increasing the pressure. The result sounded painful and rather sharp.

  I imagined what it must be like, thinking that you have to fill a hall like this with just your voice. I didn’t envy him.