He could still remember his first ever trip to Dublin when he was twelve years of age. Ireland were playing the Spaniards in a World Cup qualifier and his daddy had managed to get some black market tickets off a tout. They had taken the train with Martin Fahey and his father; had packed ham sandwiches and a plastic bag of cans, which meant the older men were legless by the time Heuston Station stumbled into view, the two boys just as giddy; just as pink.
There had been hours to kill before kick-off, so they had set about strolling the capital’s streets, Fionn’s daddy spinning stories of the 1916 Rising as they went along. They visited the GPO with its bullet holes, Kilmainham Gaol where the rebellion leaders were executed. More than once, Fionn thought he spotted a tear in his daddy’s eye. But later they had been turning on to the North Quays when they spotted the cattle penned in makeshift droves. Fionn had stopped, confused. There wasn’t a blade of grass in sight. Apparently the Liverpool boat had broken down so now the herd wouldn’t be loaded today after all. Fionn’s father had noticed his mouth agog and laughed his arse off. Catch yourself on – you’d think you’d never seen livestock in your life!
Of course, there would be none of that any more – the Dublin cattle mart shut down back in 1973. These days the capital felt further from muck and shite than ever. Fionn had forgotten it was the Faheys they were with that afternoon. He could remember him and Martin sharing a 99 ice cream; could remember feeling relieved when Ireland won because it meant his daddy’s temper wouldn’t be so bad.
Davey had boarded a train of his own just two weeks after the funeral. Another week and he had phoned from his halls to say he had arrived in one piece. After that, the silence on the farm was so complete Fionn felt like the last man on earth – even the swallows had buggered off early this year. But then the lawyer had written regarding the Bull’s investigation, so straight away Fionn had booked his ticket; had phoned Davey and told him to choose an evening and a pub. It gave him six weeks to get everything in order and put into action the plan he had already been deliberating. It had nearly killed him, but finally he and his envelope were here.
And yet, when he checked the time again it seemed everything might not be in order after all. The clock’s face was wrapped in a tinsel headlock – deck the halls and the pubs and the timepieces. Fionn thought of the Millennium Clock and how the River Liffey kept wrecking the mechanics. The Council had finally decided to shut it down for good – two hundred and fifty grand down the toilet and all the way out to sea.
Speaking of toilets, Fionn needed a go – the Coke had found its way straight through. He decided if there was no sign by the time he got back, he would return to his hotel. But as soon as he stood, the door flew open and the draught it brought was an icy mare.
‘Were you giving up on me just as easily as that?’
The hinges slammed shut and the draught was gone. Fionn felt the warmth spread straight through his chest. ‘I was just getting in another round.’
Davey uncoiled his scarf from his neck. ‘A G and T. And a packet of nuts if you’re feeling flush.’
Fionn had to turn very quickly to hide his smile.
As he waited at the bar, he banished his bladder and forced himself not to be looking back – not to be checking where his son sat awaiting, not standing him up or letting him down. It was less than three months, but already Davey looked older. Finer. Though also, truthfully, a bit gaunter – he had always had cheekbones, but Jesus those were a vicious pair of yokes.
Fionn ordered the drinks from a lad in reindeer horns. A packet of nuts. ‘Actually, make it two.’ He had eaten earlier, but he was still famished after the day of interviews in windowless rooms. He watched the Coke spit brown from the tap and barely wished it was something stronger.
Still the envelope sat curved against his cheek.
He carried the pint glass in one hand and the tumbler in the other with the little bottle wedged between the fourth and baby finger, because two trips were for country eejits who couldn’t manage or keep up with the pace. The nuts were in his left-hand pocket, one batch salted and one dry roasted, because who ever knew the difference, really?
A radio started up with some tinny cheer. God rest ye merry gentlemen reunited from dismay.
Davey added the tonic to the glass then swirled it all around with the little black stop-sign stick. Fionn set to the packets. The foil kept slipping through his hands, until eventually it popped and a few strays went flying. He blushed pink as a boy; felt the glances from the men to his right and wanted to tell them to shove their cricket bats up their arses.
‘Good luck.’ Davey’s glass was raised. Above his cheekbones, black circles traced beneath his eyes.
‘Your good health.’ They nodded at one another, though their rims didn’t actually clink. Fionn only felt like the second last man on earth.
Their chat began, not easy but not particularly tough either. ‘They’ve put me up in Jury’s for the week.’ Fionn cocked his head to the left, though the hotel could have been any direction from here. ‘Mind you, they warned me yesterday it might be longer. On account of all the new charges that keep emerging.’ The Coke was flat. He hadn’t been given a lemon this time. ‘The MBM production is the main one, obviously, but then there’s tax evasion, bribes to vets. Modern Ireland – land of saints and scholars and agricultural scams!’ Fionn’s laughter startled the neighbours again, but this time he didn’t mind. He wondered if they had ever seen a tractor before in their lives.
He was still struggling to get over the farce of some of the things he had heard about this week – splattering blood on counterfeit documents just to make them look real; using fake Islamic stamps to sell meat to the Pakis that wasn’t halal in the slightest. Fionn had answered a few questions about the border runs; about the use of false tags. He had answered more than a few questions about the role of Fergus Hynes. He had been cautious at first, but soon he realised how little energy he had left for the silence and the covering up – God knows, there had been enough of that in this country to last a lifetime. Plus, the lad doing the witness interviews seemed a decent sort, even if he was from Dublin. He kept saying the word ‘tribunal’ like it was meant to make an impression. He kept saying the Bull would be taken right the way down.
Fionn was wary, though – not of broken legs or of phone calls warning him to keep his gob shut – oh no, he was expecting those at the very least. What made him wary were alibis; convenient scapegoats that were already starting to emerge. Some said the Bull was claiming total ignorance. Others said he was leaning on his powerful friends. He had contacts in the Dáil who were pulling all the right strings.
Fionn went for his Coke. A splatter of fucking blood.
And Fionn had assumed the Butchers would have come up in conversation by now. The prosecutors had asked about the abandoned cold store; had mentioned a particular interest in the irregular. Then again, maybe the lack of mention was fitting since, according to the rumours, the group had broken up – the end of an era. Some said they had emigrated; some mentioned the Aran Islands. Fionn tried to picture it – the remaining seven stuck on the arse end of Inisheer, knitting Christmas geansaís out of boredom and the tail ends of history. He remembered Sol saying he had a wife, so now Fionn imagined writing her a letter to say that he was grieving too. He remembered Sol saying he had no children, so now Fionn looked across the table at his son. Greedily, he opened the second packet of nuts. ‘And tell me, Davey, how’re you getting on with the course?’
Davey brightened to the topic, reciting words like ‘essays’ and ‘tutes’; fancy phrases like ‘intellectual rigour’ and ‘philosophical enquiry’. He said he had his first lot of exams right after Christmas, which meant he would probably just stay in halls over the break.
Fionn nodded; felt the pressure of the envelope. He didn’t tell his son there would be nowhere else to go.
‘It’s not easy, though.’ Here Davey’s brightness seemed to wane. He put down his glass then found his hand
redundant so placed it between his knees. ‘I’m finding it … It’s a big leap from the Leaving Cert, you know?’ He stared around the room towards the bar. The man behind it was staring back. He had acquired a red flashing reindeer nose.
Fionn nodded, though of course he didn’t really know. Instead he found himself thinking, as he so often did, about the day of Davey’s results. By the time Fionn had returned from the shops, the Fiesta was already gone. He knew straight away – realised she must have driven down to collect her son; to enact their old ritual one last time. The car was found mangled in a ditch a half-mile from the school. Fionn told Davey her seizure had happened at home. It wasn’t easy, but Fionn was determined to spare the lad that. He knew guilt could sometimes be even more vicious than grief.
___________
It took him until the next round to finally produce the envelope. He saw that he had written his son’s full name across the front: Davey McCready. Even though the whole point was that the McCready bit didn’t matter any more. Fionn had learned, at last, that taking care of family sometimes meant letting them go.
‘What’s this?’ Davey returned from the bar with his gin and Fionn’s final Coke. He would be awake all night with the pissing as much as anything.
Fionn waited for his son to sit then reach across the table. The cheque looked so flimsy in his hands.
‘I got rid of everything.’
And though it might not have been clear, Davey seemed to understand straight away. ‘But that land belonged to your father. And to your grandfather before that. And—’
‘I know.’
Behind them now, the radio was playing ‘Fairytale of New York’. Fionn half-smiled. They’ve got rivers of gold, all right.
Davey wasn’t finished. ‘What about the girls? Surely you didn’t sell them as well?’
Fionn’s chest rushed with joy hearing him use that word. It wasn’t ‘herd’ or ‘cattle’; it wasn’t even ‘animals’. He had taught him something at least.
But then the rush was over as Fionn thought of them; of what, in the end, he had done. He hung his head. The runaway nuts lay crushed by his feet, looking like little grains of meal.
It was years since he had been down to the National Ploughing Championships. This one was an even bigger affair than usual. There were flags everywhere: ‘IRISH BEEF IS BETTER BEEF’. Any illegal feed had been destroyed. They said the industry might just be OK after all. But Fionn wasn’t paying attention to any of that, was only searching for the black market scumbags he had heard about from the rumour mill. In the end, they gave him a decent deal; gave him a plastic box filled with a liquid grey and thick. Fionn had stashed it in his glove compartment and sped all the way home through the lashing rain. Modern Ireland – land of saints and scholars and agricultural scams.
He knew only one girl had to test positive for him to qualify for the government compensation scheme, but he also knew, somehow, that it had to be her. He suspected it was to do with sacrifice, or maybe it was just so that he could do the honours – otherwise it would be some stranger in some sterile slaughterhouse where all the infected animals were sent.
Fionn had tried his best not to breathe when he opened the plastic box, but even the trace he caught was diabolical. Glassy’s eyes rolled back in her head as if she could see the stuff the needle was injecting – the pulp of plaques from other, weaker brains. Fionn hadn’t cried at Eileen’s funeral – had only stared at the Virgin Mary and the green-eyed woman who slipped in down the back. That night, he had curled up sobbing in the empty byre. By morning the roof had finally caved in.
‘What will you do next?’
Here in the pub, his eyes were dry. He licked the salt from his fingertips. ‘Maybe a bit of travel. Your mother always talked about Los Angeles. You never know – I might send you a postcard of me sitting in the O of the Hollywood sign.’ He stopped. The pain of mentioning Eileen ran through his bones and locked his jaw.
But he saw Davey’s mouth smiling: ‘Thank you, Fionn.’ So he forced a reply: ‘It was the very least I could do.’
___________
Eventually, final orders came and went, and soon after that the lights faded up. Fionn considered making a joke about city folk having no stamina, but secretly he was more than a bit relieved.
Davey left for the loo and Fionn remembered his own burning desire, but there was no chance of a tandem trip. Instead he waited outside, buttoning the jacket he hadn’t actually taken off – such a waste of a decent shirt. The yellow glow of the taxis blurred with the festive halogen. The cranes above had been decked with twinkles too. The poster on the bus stop was for a new Liam Neeson film called Michael Collins. It seemed even Hollywood wanted a piece of rebel history these days.
Fionn would stroll back to the hotel and make a cup of tea with a thimbleful of UHT milk. The lawyers wanted him in tomorrow at nine, although that just meant more sitting and waiting around – the Irish knack for inefficiency and the tribunal prep only getting under way. He was certain they would extend his stay; would rope him in for other lines of questioning. He tried to remember the face of the Protestant lad who had met them on the border. He wondered if Mossy and Briain were playing dumb. He wondered if he would have to go to Penneys for another shirt.
But in truth, it didn’t matter how long it all dragged on – how many nights he spent on those synthetic pillows – how many times he scoffed those ginger biscuits that were always replenished by some invisible, benevolent hand. Because what did he have after this? What else would fill his days? Only an emptiness stretching blank like a darkness rolling over a border and far away until it meets the sea.
‘Here you are.’
Fionn turned to his son, who was holding a cigarette he had rolled himself.
‘Will I walk—’
‘I’m going—’
They both stopped. Neither of them went again. Instead they stood, their breaths mingling up to a sky that was a bit smoggier than back home, but even still there was no denying the stars.
‘You know the way I always told you about Glas Ghaibhleann. Giving milk, like, to the multitudes? Well, there are other versions of the story too. I’ve been … They’ve been at me a bit this week.’
Next to him, Davey didn’t answer, but he didn’t walk away either. By now, Fionn could more than settle for that.
‘Obviously some greedy chancers wanted to take advantage of the cow’s abundance. To harness her powers, like, and turn a profit. Up in Donegal a group of lads decided to pen the poor thing in. But she soon got restless and levitated herself into the air and eventually disappeared into the sky. And since then they say there has been never been any free milk on the island of Ireland.’
Behind them now there was a bang, which made them both jump. The barman bolted the door. He had shed his horns and his nose. He looked from one man to the other then gave Davey a wink. ‘Hope I’ll see you in here again soon.’ Fionn willed his son to wink back.
‘But they also say you can still see her milk spread out across the sky. That’s why the Irish for Milky Way is Bealach Bó Fionne.’ Fionn paused before he translated. ‘The Way of the White Cow.’
‘She loved you very much.’
Fionn tried not to jump again. ‘She loved you too.’ Then he laughed. ‘We had that in common at least.’
‘We did.’
And as he watched his son walk away for the very last time, Fionn tried to spot some other shared trait; some feature or genetic link that had been passed down. When he found nothing, he closed his eyes and smiled, already tasting tomorrow’s fry. There would be rashers and sausages and crispy hash browns. He would make sure to ask for extra pudding. He had always preferred the black to the white, even though he knew that it was bad; even though he knew it was mostly to do with blood.
Epilogue
New York, January 2018
‘Drink?’ He is reaching for the cabinet even before he has asked the question because he knows his own answer anyway. He places the James
on on the counter while she finally removes her coat. He hadn’t noticed her boots before, the giant knots. She keeps them on.
She barely stopped talking all afternoon, yet in the cab she was oddly quiet. Even when the driver tried to ask about her visit, she only mumbled something about a cousin living with his partner upstate, journalists both. Ronan realises he hasn’t actually asked what it is she does for a living. He kicks the roll of bubble wrap out of his way and moves towards the elevator-sized fridge. The dispenser summons ice all the way up from its toes.
She takes the whiskey from him without a word of thanks, too busy staring out the industrial windows. The giant grid splices the sleetscape into a series of images like a black-andwhite contact sheet. He downs his glass, then refills it. ‘OK,’ he concedes. ‘OK, it’s through here.’
Inside his makeshift darkroom, he clicks the safe light on. The low buzz kicks in straight away, the colour a dim and headachy red. He plugs in the timer and the enlarger while she hovers by the door. She still hasn’t said a word. On the line hang a couple of prints he took recently as part of a commission for the National Portrait Collection. The first is Senator Mitchell, the American lad who helped negotiate the Good Friday Agreement. This year will be two decades of Northern Irish peace. His overbite is a slice of peroxide white.
Ronan mixes his developer, his stop bath, his fixer. He doesn’t usually allow himself to drink in here, but tonight is quite the exception.
The second photo on the line is of Eoin Goldsmith – or the ‘Bull’, as he is still sometimes known. It was taken shortly after the award ceremony in Dublin for the Freedom of the City. Ronan had never seen a standing ovation that lasted so long or sounded so loud. He has never seen so much coldness in one face.
He puts down his glass and rifles through the drawer, digging deep for the negative strip. He knows he has buried it in the very darkest corner.
The Butchers Page 23