by David Park
I remember it all. There were no customers when a motorbike stopped outside with two men on it. The engine was still running as the passenger came towards the shop. I was behind the counter looking out. He had one hand inside his black motorcycle tunic and wore a blue crash helmet – the type that encloses the whole head. A green scarf covered the bottom half of his face, so only his eyes were visible. Only his eyes – that’s all I ever saw of him. Mr Breen was standing holding a tray of oranges he had just brought from the back.
Suddenly, the man pulled a gun out of his tunic and I thought we were going to be robbed, but he never spoke, and as he raised the gun and pointed at Mr Breen, his hand was shaking so much he had to support it with the other one. It was then I knew he hadn’t come for money. The first shot hit Gerry Breen in the chest, spinning him round, and as he slumped to the floor the oranges scattered and rolled in all directions. He lay there, face down, and his body was still moving. Then, as I screamed an appeal for mercy, the man walked forward and, kneeling over the body, shot him in the back of the head. His body kicked and shuddered, and then was suddenly and unnaturally still. I screamed again in fear and anger and then, pointing the gun at me, the man walked slowly backwards to the door of the shop, ran to the waiting bike and was gone. Shaking uncontrollably and stomach heaving with vomit, I tried to turn Mr Breen over on to his back, but he was too heavy for me. Blood splashed his green coat, and flowed from the dark gaping wound, streaming across the floor, mixing with the oranges that were strewn all around us. Oranges from Spain.
They say help arrived almost immediately. I don’t know. All I can remember is thinking of the old woman’s words and hoping it really was the end of the world, and being glad and asking God to drown the world, wanting it to rain for a thousand years, rain and rain and never stop until all the blood was washed away and every street was washed clean. There were voices then and helping hands trying to lift me away, but no one could move me as I knelt beside him, clutching frantically at his green coat, begging God not to let him die, praying he’d let Gerry Breen live to build his ark and bring aboard the fruit of the world. All the fruit of the world safely stored. Oranges from Spain, apples from the Cape – the sweet taste of summer preserved for ever, eternal and incorruptible.
A Note on the Author
David Park has published a book of short stories, Oranges from Spain and four novels, The Healing, The Rye Man, The Big Snow and, most recently, Swallowing The Sun. He was the winner of the Authors’ Club First Novel Award, the Bass Ireland Arts Award for Literature and has twice been given The University of Ulster’s McCrea Literary Award. He lives in County Down with his wife and two children.
By the Same Author
Swallowing the Sun
The Big Snow
Stone Kingdoms
The Rye Man
The Healing
Oranges from Spain
The Truth Commissioner
The Light of Amsterdam
First published in Great Britain by Jonathan Cape in 1990
Copyright © 1990 by David Park
The moral right of the author has been asserted
This electronic edition published in 2012 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
eISBN 978-1-4088-3625-5
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