‘Francis,’ she cried. ‘Francis, come in quickly, you’re drenched.’
She stepped backwards, beckoning them into her new mobile home. In the narrow space he kissed her lightly but she brushed him off, concerned only to give them warmth and shelter. It was all still there: the crowded bookcase, the cast-iron stove, the faded paintings and the row of photographs from the old caravan.
‘Look, he remembers you,’ she said as the dog came over, brown eyes looking inquisitively up into his. Katie remained in the doorway, uncertain of herself. The old woman didn’t bother with introductions. She pushed the girl towards the seat and, opening the iron stove, began to pile twigs and small pieces of wood inside. The dog whined and licked his hand. He stared at Katie over the woman’s bent back, trying to reassure her. She straightened up and turned to them.
‘Now we’ll have warmth. First a cup of coffee, then we can talk.’
She handed Hano the kettle to fill and, smiling at Katie, led her into the bedroom at the end of the mobile home. Hano could hear their voices as he ran the tap. The dog lay down again on the rush mats. A white cat stretched luxuriously and eyed him from a cushion in the window. He ran his fingers down the spines of the old books, staring again at the rack of photographs above the window. The light filtered through a slender red shade above the small table. When he stood beside the jet of flame at the cooker he was in shadow. A black cat climbed in the small open window, balanced on the frame and sprang on to the table. She shook herself, spraying drops over the piles of paper, yawned and then padded her way into the corner. He bent beside the dog who turned on his stomach, raising his legs to be rubbed. The old eyes stared at him with extraordinary sadness. As Francis rubbed him the eyes turned to look towards the woman’s door, low sounds coming from the animal’s throat. The kettle began to boil. He found the cups and filled them, the scent of coffee filling his nostrils, making him dizzy. But he waited, wanting to share the first taste with her.
The door opened and Katie emerged in an old jumper and jeans belonging to the woman. The dog rose and went towards the woman, pressing his paw against her leg and staring up as if to tell her he had not been unfaithful.
‘He knew,’ she said. ‘He woke me an hour ago. He was whining. I knew something was wrong.’
‘I had nowhere else to go,’ Francis said. ‘I wasn’t even sure if you’d still be here, if you’d be…’
‘You can say the word. I’m not afraid of it. I only hope the animals die before me.’
‘Deep down I never thought of you as dead,’ he said. ‘Somehow…I think I would have known; you would have given me a sign. That doesn’t make sense, but…You don’t know what I’ve done. If they find me here you’ll be in trouble. I shouldn’t have come to you, but…I don’t just need shelter, I need to tell someone. I don’t know anybody else it would make sense to. I’ll go then.’
‘Sleep now,’ the woman said. ‘Eat some food and then sleep. Whatever you’ve done nobody will find you tonight. Tomorrow we can talk.’
The dog, looking carefully back at the woman, came to lick his hand. Cait sat beside the open stove, her bare feet held up close to the flames. Hano knew there was no need to explain anything. Nobody in that caravan would be his judge or jury.
CHAPTER FIVE
Wednesday
It was the oldest dream, the dream Pascal Plunkett had displaced. Hano dreamt it again as fresh as if it had never occurred before. Walking in slow motion beneath the trees towards the low branches which framed the ruined house. The curious stillness as though life had stopped. He knew it was a dream this time before he stooped beneath those branches, knew that the figure would emerge through the wild foliage that covered the slope leading down to the basement. And he knew too that he had dreamt it often before, that at this point in the dream he had always begun to struggle. But this time he didn’t fight against the dream. I’m no longer scared, he thought, I’m no longer running; whoever you are that has haunted my sleep for years I know you are a friend.
A man’s head and shoulders began to emerge from the cellar, the features indistinct, a hand raised in greeting. And Hano felt himself lifting from the ground, letting himself float, allowing the heat to penetrate his limbs. His body turned like a plane in a spin, buckling in the intense warmth, seeing the forest below him, the tops of the trees, the roof’s broken slates flashing into view. The heat was drenching through him in waves and he knew that he was not alone. There was a presence floating close to him. Momentarily they soared together before the figure rose and Hano fell away. He was alone now, drifting awake, still soaked in the surging heat, gradually recognizing the outline of the dark caravan, the eyes of the cat in the corner.
He would never know the dream again: it was fulfilled. He felt no sense of loss. He heard the slurp of a dog’s tongue at the water bowl, felt Katie’s limbs like toast against his. He said his own name, Francis, understanding for the first time that he was just himself alone. The caravan rocked in the tide of the wind. He turned over on the narrow bunk, carefully so as not to wake her. Still bathed in sweat, he slept.
I keep wondering, was it a first ring or the silence which woke me? It was so rich, completely swamping the world. I lay a moment breathing it in, imagining the street outside: the chrome of cars glistening in the Saturday morning light; the blue tar of the carriageway sloping down towards the city. It was too early for punters to loiter outside the bookies, too soon for the women to push plastic bags of washing to the launderette in old prams.
I lay for a moment savouring the euphoria of the night before. The faint aftertaste of whiskey burnt my throat; my limbs were suffused with sleepy warmth. The weekend lay before us, like the ones of a year before. Three cross doubles decided over breakfast; the click of snooker balls where sunlight shafted through the skylight of some dusty hall; prowling the Fifteen Acres in search of a football match. Each memory came back as though it could be reclaimed.
I had turned to drift back to sleep when the doorbell rang. I ignored it and had curled into the warmth of the sheet when it rang again. Curiosity overcame me. I thought it must be you.
I reached for my jeans and stumbled into the living-room to open the window and look down.
Nobody stood at the door. The road was bereft of traffic. Old papers blew along the pavement past a brown stain below the window where somebody had pissed coming home the previous night. I had taken my head in when a noise from across the street made me look back. A skinhead was bent over Shay’s car, trying to force the door handle. I shouted at him and he looked up briefly but continued working the iron bar. As I roared again Shay came into the room.
‘It’s the middle of the shagging night, Hano,’ he said. ‘What are you at?’
‘Your car,’ I said. ‘Shay, there’s some bastard at your car.’
One moment he was behind me, leaning over my shoulder, so close I could feel the warmth of his skin, the next moment he was gone. I turned as I heard his boots on the stairs and was about to follow when I saw the skinhead raise his right hand, look towards the corner and let it drop swiftly. The front door opened, and Shay was already on the roadway, wearing only his jeans and that old pair of battered black boots, when I heard the car engine rev up. It must have happened in seconds but watching from that height it all seemed to occur in lengthy individual stages.
First Shay was running towards the Triumph Herald, a solitary figure in the still morning. Then his head turned as he heard the engine approaching from the right, and his body shifted till he was facing the oncoming car. His hand reached out to point towards the driver: his face changing from surprise, through a momentary grin of recognition, into sudden realization. And then he was somersaulting like a ballet dancer, shoulders first, on to the bonnet of the car, legs rising behind and turning in a full circle to land on the concrete behind the car. His head hit the ground last of all, at an odd angle to his neck, bounced once and lay there, twisted and still.
I knew the car before it had even appe
ared. Not only knew the engine’s roar but instinct told me it was the BMW which Justin Plunkett had bought from his uncle. I knew every inch of it, could feel the leather grip of its steering wheel. Before looking across I knew that the skinhead would be gone. I heard another car start on the carriageway. Then I was staring down at Shay and at Plunkett, none of us moving and it seemed we could have stayed that way for hours, only the three of us left in the world, locked in those postures. Suddenly a woman screamed from a doorway down the street and, like a flock of startled crows taking off, every doorway came to life.
I closed my eyes and Shay’s body somersaulted again through the air, his head hitting the ground at that angle, the half-smile of recognition still on his face. When I opened them Justin Plunkett had left the car and was racing back to kneel beside Shay, lifting him up in his arms and crying. I was still detached from the scene below, in shock, still believing somehow that I had only to reach my hand back to touch Shay’s skin, warm as it leaned against my shoulder. Then I saw Plunkett’s fingers slipping something into the pocket of Shay’s jeans just before the crowd reached them. People were still running, still shouting. The noise stopped and a silent circle formed around the couple on the ground. Though nobody could have called one in that time, a squad car turned off the carriageway and glided to a halt before the crowd who parted to let the policemen through.
I found myself running down those stairs and out into the brightness of the morning, scrambling my way through the people until I reached the centre of the crowd. Justin Plunkett was talking to the officers, his face ashen white.
‘Just at that corner. From nowhere he came. He looked half-crazed like he was coming down from drugs or something. Good Jesus, what could I do? I tried to swerve but it was too late, he just ran straight out.’
I know it was the worst thing to do but I wasn’t thinking anymore. My first punch caught him on the side of the head and as he went down I kicked him in the face before I was lifted from behind and thrown against the side of the squad car.
‘Murderer!’ I screamed as he knelt on the ground holding both hands to his head. ‘You murdered him, Plunkett. Murdered him because you couldn’t control him, because you’re afraid of him. Afraid he’d tell the world you’re a pimp and a pusher! But I know! And I’ll tell it, every fucking bit of it! You bastard! Bastard!’
Then I was in the back of the squad car that was driving off at high speed, one policeman holding me down and punching me on the head whenever I tried to speak, and the other radioing for a second car and an ambulance to go to the scene. At the station the officer held me by the hair until we were inside and I was pushed into an empty room. It had no windows, just a table and two plastic chairs. I sat and buried my head in both hands, started to cry with loud choking sobs that seemed almost to convulse me. I didn’t hear the door open and don’t know how long the detective was standing over me until he touched my shoulder.
‘Your friend?’
I didn’t look up.
‘You know he’s dead, don’t you?’
I nodded, searching my pockets for a handkerchief and when I couldn’t find one, using my palms to dry my eyes. I was in my bare feet and wearing only a pair of jeans.
‘Murdered,’ I said.
‘So you claim. It’s a big word, murder. Do you know what it means? It doesn’t just mean to kill but to kill with intent. A traffic accident is not murder.’
I recognized the detective who sat down on the other chair. He was the one who had brought Shay to me that night two months ago. His hairline was receding and, in the glare of the light, he looked even older, well into his forties, but policemen who’ve seen too much always look older than their years. There was a vague taste of blood in my mouth and when I put my hand up I realized that I was bleeding from a cut over the eye. He handed me a packet of paper tissues.
‘We’ll have that seen to in a moment,’ he said. ‘You were pretty hysterical, you know, had to calm you down. I’m going to take a statement from you, but if you’re claiming murder I want you to understand what you are saying.’
His eyes looked as tired as my father’s had those last evenings when he had struggled home from Plunkett Motors. I decided to trust him and made a statement, leaving nothing out. On the gravel I could hear the motor cycles coming and going. A single bird began singing somewhere nearby. It could have been no more than half-nine but in that room without light there was no time. Once or twice he interrupted to clarify a point, but otherwise he just wrote down what I said carefully and clearly. He read it back to me in full and passed it across the table to be signed. When I did so he read through it, sighed and shook his head.
‘I’ll get coffee,’ he said, and returned with two paper cups, having left the statement with somebody outside.
‘Justin Plunkett is in the next room,’ he said. ‘His statement says he was simply driving home from his uncle’s house where he had been staying overnight. This skinhead, you’re saying he just vanished into thin air. Two of your neighbours claim to have heard the crash and been at their doors in seconds. Both of them say the street was totally deserted.’
‘They were too busy gawking at the body.’
He smiled for the first time.
‘You have a point.’
He began to question me again about the dates of flights to Amsterdam, arrangements I knew about for payment, the details of Shay’s final conversation with Justin Plunkett. There was something unreal about the interview. Shay was dead and yet life was going on as usual. Already I was discussing him in the past tense with a man taking careful, professional notes.
‘Why do you hold the biro like that?’ I asked.
‘The tendons are severed,’ he answered matter of factly, gazing down at the scar on the back of his hand. ‘It was a drunk on a pub roof one night. He kept saying he was going to jump. I’d talked to him for an hour till he seemed to have calmed down. I took my eyes away for a moment and he tried to bring a slate down on my skull. I just got my hand in the way on time. Tell me about the Health Studio beside Murtagh’s.’
Somebody rapped on the door. I didn’t turn round when he opened it, only heard the whispered voices and the noise of the door closing. The voices rose in argument in the corridor. Where was Shay’s body now I wondered? Had his family been told? Shay had invented bizarre stories about his parents – that his mother was into leather bondage and his father wore a mouse outfit around the house. The only time I had ever called on them they were timid and normal, mystified by the eldest son they worshipped who rarely came to see them. I could imagine the ban garda calling, declining the obligatory offer of tea, and the silence which would never leave that house when she had left. The detective returned. This time he didn’t sit down but leaned against the door. I turned around in the chair.
‘Will I go on about The Clean World Studio?’ I asked.
He didn’t reply for a moment, just stared at me until I lowered my eyes and turned back to face the table.
‘We’re not discussing The Clean World Health Studio,’ he said. ‘Let’s get this clear for your own sake, Hanrahan, we’re discussing a traffic accident. I suggest you make another statement, this time restricting yourself to the facts about the accident and nothing else.’
‘I’m happy with the statement I made,’ I said.
He stepped forward. Instinctively I ducked, expecting a blow. When I looked up he was resting both hands on the table in front of me. His fingers were brown from nicotine. I had presumed he was just beginning duty. Now, looking at his eyes again, I realized he had worked all night.
‘Hanrahan,’ he said in a low voice. ‘I’ve got your word against that of the son of the Junior Minister for Justice and two independent witnesses. You say Shay was on nothing. What’s this they found in his pocket?’
The small plastic bag he placed on the table was filled with white powder.
‘Plunkett planted it. I told you I saw his hand in Shay’s pocket in the statement.’
‘
I don’t have your statement. It’s away being typed.’
‘It will be in it when it comes back.’
Even as I said the words doubt entered my voice. The sentence that began as a statement had become a question he didn’t answer.
‘You’ll find nothing in his blood stream. You’ll see…the coroner’s report at the inquest…
‘The inquest won’t happen for weeks,’ he said. ‘The newspapers come out in a few hours. Listen, I have your word Francis, and nothing else. Pascal Plunkett claims his nephew was in his house at a campaign meeting from six o’clock yesterday evening until he left this morning. Two election workers claim he was with them all evening Thursday. All you have is words. Give me a witness, give me anything.’
‘It’s all there. Raid the Health Studio. Raid his apartment. Round up the girls who were in the factory on Thursday night. Shay said there must have been thirty of them.’
He sat down. For the first time he looked uneasy in himself. He spoke in little more than a whisper.
‘We’re dealing in the possible here. There is a general election in two days’ time. What judge is going to sign a warrant for that raid? You seem a nice lad. I’m sure your friend was too if he could only have learnt to stay out of trouble. In a week’s time it could be a very different situation.
A new government always likes public inquiries, show trials, so to speak, dirt on their predecessors to keep the heat off themselves. I’m not forgetting what you told me and I’m not discounting it, but you could be in a lot of trouble if you start making wild allegations in the next two days, and not even I could save you then. There’ll be an inquest soon. You will have your chance then. For the next few days it might be wiser not to be around.’
‘Fuck you,’ I said, ‘I’ve made a statement and I’m sticking to it.’
The Journey Home Page 31