He was, he realized, happy. Or as happy as a man might be who had a beloved brother missing. In moments like this when he landed on some island of contentment, it reminded him how life moved on. Like water, passing around a rock in a river, life was inexorable and would simply keep going. Joy would be felt and sorrow, too. Just now though, any sort of happiness felt like a blasphemy. The guilt hit him like a brick in his chest and for a second he couldn’t breathe. He could hear his brother’s voice in his head suddenly, as clearly as if the man was standing next to him.
“Sometimes the world we believe we live in is just an illusion. Things change, people we love die, an’ suddenly ye have to bid farewell to the world you thought ye lived in.”
Not yet, my brother, not yet, he said inside his own head. He was not ready to say goodbye to that world in which his brother might still be alive.
And then he took a breath, and got down to work.
Chapter Thirteen
The High Cost of Truth
IT WASN’T YET LIGHT when she set out for Noah’s farm. The distance from her home to Noah’s wasn’t great in terms of real miles, but it was vast in terms of atmosphere. When she crossed from County Down into County Armagh, heading down the Silverbridge Road toward Crossmaglen, her tension notched up a little and she could feel her shoulders start to inch up toward her ears. This wee bit of land, this small green mountainous beauty, was a world unto itself. South Armagh was beautiful, but it put a shiver of cold silver in her blood every time she visited it.
Pamela left the car at the mouth of a walking path that was very near to Noah’s land, and then cut away through the woods bordering the path. She was going in on foot, so as not to alert any of the various security forces that were watching Noah’s farm at any given time. He knew to expect her, so hopefully none of his guards would take her walking onto his land as trespass. She was familiar with the farm, as she had been there a few times to visit Kate, admittedly only when Noah was absent.
She had left the children snug in their beds, as Deirdre was visiting for a few days. She didn’t think she could have stood anyone else for company just now, but she found a comfort in Deirdre’s presence. Despite the fact that Casey and his mother had been estranged for a very long time, she still felt that outside of Pat, only Deirdre felt the loss of Casey as sharply as she did. Deirdre didn’t expect her to talk or pretend to a strength that she did not feel.
It was a chilly morning. The sun was pinking up the horizon already though, and it looked like a fair day might lie ahead. It was a relief to be away from the house, away from the ever ringing telephone. She felt like there was an invisible chain that bound her to the thing. Every time it rang her heart went mad in her chest, and she would start to pray as she dashed to answer it. She didn’t know what to pray for because some information had a cost that was far too high. There was always the fear that a voice might one day tell her that her husband was gone and no more returning. She had more than one hundred entries in the notebook she kept by the telephone, each one a meticulous record of the phone calls—sometimes just people who were praying for her, praying for her husband, a few phone calls from Constable Severn, kindly and well meant, but utterly useless. Others far more sinister, promising that they had information, knew where Casey was, or what had happened to him, could take her to his body all for a tidy sum of money. Constable Severn had told her that this was all too common, “They’re like lice that scuttle in at the scent of vulnerability.”
Deirdre had chased one away the evening before. It wasn’t the first time the woman had shown up at the house. She was a middle-aged grandmotherly looking sort who had, at first, seemed rather harmless. Pamela had been willing to hear anything she had to say, grasp at any thread the woman offered her and the woman seemed to have credible things to relate, as she somehow knew small details of their life. But somewhere deep inside, Pamela knew she was using the tidbits of information to stay in denial about what a charlatan the woman was.
She skirted the wood that edged Noah’s fields, thinking about David Kendall, the British agent who had been her friend, and whose life Noah had spared for reasons still unknown after a firefight of epic proportions had taken place on his land. David had died at the hands of an evil man just a short month later, and considering the manner of his death, or what she knew of it, it might have been better if Noah had killed him on that fateful bloody day. She crossed herself reflexively, the way she always did when she thought of David, praying that he was at peace and that he knew how much he was missed.
She stepped from the wood, and walked across the fields. She knew which one the bull lived in and avoided it with great care. The ground was gilded with a light layer of dew, every cobweb in the grass strung with diamond drops glimmering in the first light of day. She stepped with confidence and tried not to look around too much, she needed to appear like she belonged here. It was a beautiful piece of land, nicely situated, but knowing some of what had gone on here over the years gave it a dark aspect in her eyes, and she always had a feeling of foreboding when she was here.
She caught a glint in the corner of her eyes, a small dance of light from the hedgerow that grew thick along the drive into the farm. It was odd that there should be light reflecting out of such thick shrubbery, and yet being that it was Noah’s farm, not really odd at all. She would have thought the British security forces or Special Branch, whichever unit was watching Noah at present, would have learned a bit more subtlety over the years. Personally, she wondered that they were foolhardy enough to come onto his land in this way.
Proximity to the border, a lack of a Protestant population and the hilly landscape as well as a deeply rooted sense of rebellion had made it the de facto independent Republic of South Armagh. British soldiers feared the posting to Forkhill or Crossmaglen more than any other posting in the world. Their living quarters had been compared to submarines they were so heavily mortar-proofed. The soldiers weren’t allowed to sit outside, ever, and they always had to be on high alert, forever aware that in this territory they were the ones whose freedom was severely circumscribed. One Captain of the Parachute regiment had compared it to being a target on a conveyer belt, going round and round, just waiting to get knocked down. In South Armagh it was never a matter of if, only when.
Noah opened the door as she stepped into the yard. He seemed to have the radar of a bat in the night sky. He tilted his head, indicating she should follow him into the house. She walked behind him through to the kitchen, where it was blessedly warm, the old room glowing as the sun flooded in, more gold than pink now, over the deep windowsills.
He turned to look at her. “Might I ask what the reason is for ye creepin’ through the shrubbery just past dawn?”
“I know this whole area is under heavy surveillance,” she said. “So I thought I should come in on foot as circumspectly as possible.”
“Usually we meet on yer land,” he said, leaning back against the counter, arms crossed over his chest. She swallowed, wondering if he suspected her of spying on him in some way.
“My mother-in-law is staying with me for a few days and I thought it best if she didn’t know about us.”
He nodded and turned away from her. “D’ye want somethin’ hot to drink? It’s cold an’ ye look half blue.”
“That would be nice,” she said, clutching her sweater more tightly around her.
“Ye can sit,” he said gruffly, “I’ll not lash ye to the chair an’ pull yer fingernails out if that’s what ye’re worried about.”
“I’m not worried about that,” she said with some asperity.
“Good, because I’d not do that to a woman, I’d take yer toenails instead.”
She laughed, caught off guard by his black humor. At least she hoped it was humor. She sat down at the scrubbed wooden table. It held a jug of milk, a small pot with sugar and a bottle of tick medicine for sheep.
Noah handed her a thick blue mug filled with the delicious scent of strong coffee. She warmed her han
ds on the mug gratefully as she was still chilled through from her tramp through the woods. She put in a little cream and a half teaspoon of sugar.
“I think you have company in your hedges today,” she said quietly, voice half muffled by the coffee cup. The coffee was surprisingly good. It wasn’t a staple in most Irish households and so it was a rare treat for her to have it.
“Aye, I know,” he said, apparently unconcerned with spies roaming his land at will. “They like to take cover in the blackthorn hedges. They set up with their camouflage an’ nettin’ an’ are near to invisible as such, except to the dogs an’ cows, an’,” he smiled, “the long sticks we use to beat down the bushes.”
“I don’t imagine they take kindly to that,” Pamela said, taking another swallow of the hot coffee.
“I don’t give a damn what they take kindly to, as ye well know. I’m not a fool. I know given the chance, they will kill me without provocation. I’ll have to be that wee bit more careful about my business and movements. I’m pretty certain I’m under a new set of surveillance.”
“New?”
“The latest intelligence splinter, I suspect,” he said, “there have been rumors that the SAS might be movin’ in soon.”
“The SAS?” she echoed. The Special Air Services was serious business.
“Aye, they’ve been here in dribs an’ drabs before, attached to other units an’ the like, but never sent in full force. If they are, it’s because they mean to step up the battle with the IRA.” She wondered if she only imagined the slight relish in his tone at such an idea.
“Does it worry you?” she asked, curious, for the countryside was fairly bristling with army personnel these days and there was a heightened tension that prickled along a person’s skin even when out for a simple walk.
Noah shrugged. “Those bastards are used to shootin’ first and askin’ questions later, so we’ll all have to be on our toes around here if they truly are sendin’ in a squadron. Somethin’ tells me they might be waitin’ for just the right provocation to put them in.”
Seeing him here in his own kitchen, which was surprisingly cozy and clean given that he was a bachelor for all intents and purposes, threw her off a little. He wore a neatly-pressed blue shirt that matched his eyes and a pair of navy colored dress pants. His hair was freshly trimmed and his face clean-shaven. He looked preternaturally alert considering the somewhat unholy hour. Mind you, he was a farmer and well used to rising with the dawn.
“I have news for ye,” he said.
She was suddenly nervous, the queasiness she had managed to quell all morning flooding through her stomach. She wished she hadn’t drunk the coffee now.
He sat down across from her and she felt the force of the man’s authority. He had long been used to command and wore it as a second skin. She wondered if anyone had ever penetrated past that layer with him, beyond his sister and long-lost parents.
She realized he was watching the expressions that crossed her face, as if he could see her every thought. She flushed under the scrutiny of those gentian eyes. He looked considerably less frightening today, but it would never do to lose sight of who and what this man was.
He smelled clean, of soap and hay and something else, something amber in tone. Being that he had roughly a couple hundred pigs, a flock of sheep and a great number of cows, it was no small feat, she thought, for him to appear so clean and well-dressed. He had hired laborers, some of whom lived on the property, still she knew he did a fair amount of the work which was necessary to keep a farm this size not just ticking over, but running like a well-oiled machine. Not to mention his smuggling network and his position as the godfather of the South Armagh PIRA.
“Look, I want ye to understand up front what I am about to tell ye is merely hearsay. I would ask ye this as well—are ye certain ye want to know? Because we all believe we know the people we love, but do we really? There are some nasty surprises to be found along the pathway of another man’s life. So, if it’s information that changes the way ye knew yer husband, the way ye remember him, do ye really want it?”
She wanted to blurt out ‘yes’, wanted him to just say whatever it was he had to say, and not ask her permission to do so. She felt irrationally angry at him. She knew it was shoot the messenger syndrome, but that did little to lessen her anger.
“Yes, I have to know. I think knowing has to be better than this never-ending wondering.” She wasn’t certain at all, actually, but she had to hear whatever it was he had to say.
Noah eyed her shrewdly, as if he knew she was lying in part. She wished the damn man would just get on with it.
“I think he killed someone.”
She wasn’t sure what she had been expecting, it wasn’t this though. There was a small echo of dismay deep inside that told her she had half suspected it could be something of this nature.
“Who?” she asked. Her stomach was cramping and she put her hand to it, not wanting to break down in front of this man.
“The men who attacked ye in yer home—at least one of them was killed. Word is your husband did it. If that’s so, it’s only what the bastards deserved, so ye need not feel any sorrow on their part.”
“Oh, I don’t, believe me, I just—I didn’t know and if he disappeared because of something he did to protect us…” she trailed off. Her body hurt and she felt disconnected from it at the same time. It wasn’t shock, but rather another set of stones to be put into place in the wall of stubborn denial behind which she lived, scant as their shelter was proving.
“Maybe I’m wrong, Pamela. I didn’t know yer man well, it seems to me, though, that he would not think it a waste of his life, did he die protecting those he loved.”
Unfortunately this was true, but what the bastard hadn’t thought about was how she would survive without him; how she would raise their children alone, how she would sleep in a cold bed for the rest of her life, how she would feel as if she could never draw another breath without pain, and if the day came when she could manage any of those things, it would hurt even more. The salient point of what Noah had said suddenly sunk in.
“You said one of them, but there were two.”
“Aye, there were. It’s the one that’s left that says yer husband killed his friend. I’ll be honest, Pamela, I’m not just that sure I believe him. Mind, he was adequately persuaded to tell the truth, but it may be that he doesn’t know the truth in its details.”
Her mouth went dry. She was quite certain she didn’t want to know what Noah meant by ‘adequately persuaded’, however she had lived here long enough, and had measure enough of this man to understand it would not have been pleasant and that he would not have stopped until he had the information he wanted.
“Thank you for telling me,” she said. Every word was an effort, like it had to be pushed through a dam of ice to make it to the surface of her lips.
Noah shook his head, blue eyes dark. “Do not thank me for bad news, it’s ill luck to the both of us to do so. Just take it for what it is, information that might be true or might not be.”
She nodded, unable to say anything further. She needed to go, needed to get away where no one could see her. He offered to drive her back to her car, but she said no and managed to get out of his house without a further word spoken between them.
Outside, she walked off toward the tree line, beyond the north field. She didn’t even care if the entire British Army was taking pictures of her from the shrubbery. Let them, let them watch her through the sights on their goddamn machine guns.
She managed not to get sick until she was well within the tree line. Then she threw up bile, hot and acidic, because there was nothing in her stomach other than a few swallows of coffee. She sank down to her knees, the frost and damp ground soaking her jeans immediately. She didn’t care, nothing mattered right now other than the fact that Casey might have killed someone and if that was so, and she knew it might well be, then it was also likely he had been killed in retaliation. What the hell had he been thinking?
And yet, she knew; she understood. She had been there after all, the afternoon those two men had invaded their home. She remembered all too well the terror, the fear they would rape her, hurt her child, both the one in his bed up the stairs and the one in her belly, for she had been five months pregnant with Isabelle at the time. She knew their neighbor Lewis, who’d once killed for a living, had told Casey he should have shot both men then and there that day. In a country where blood was common currency, it made sense to her in a terrible way.
She took one shaky breath and then another, her head still pressed into the tree trunk. She felt like most days she kept her head just slightly above the waters of a silent, heavy sea, one that was intent on dragging her down into its depths, and that she had to fight every minute to keep breathing. And in the midst of that strange, silent sea in which she knew she might well drown, there was now a wire of anger, bright and crimson, to which she could grasp. She touched it in her mind and felt it steel her spine.
She got up, brushed off her knees and kept walking.
Chapter Fourteen
‘Should Time Dissolve This Prison’
THERE WAS AN EMERALD shimmer to the woods as she entered them, spring had sprung in all her forty shades of green and the woods were wet and flush with the sound of birds about their business. It wasn’t the most obvious spot for a clandestine meeting, she thought bending to disengage her pant leg from a low thorn bush.
The approach was made through Father Jim, much as that must have galled the man who made said approach. She returned his phone call at the appointed time from a payphone in Belfast. She had raised an eyebrow at his suggested venue, but agreed nevertheless. He was a scary man to be certain, but she knew he had no reason to hurt her. To give him credit he was straying pretty close to the borders of South Armagh in order to meet up with her. This was a gesture of faith on his part, so she tried not to curse too loudly at the undergrowth through which she had to wade.
In the Country of Shadows (Exit Unicorns Series Book 4) Page 13