Cold spring, p.9
Cold Spring, page 9
His trousers were wet from the hand-line, which wouldn’t matter so much if he had a worthwhile catch to take home. He wound the hand-line round its frame and put it aside. Reaching down into his sack, he took out one of the two of the partans he had caught in a rock pool that morning while the tide was out. He banged the partan with a stone to break its shell and tied a chunk of its flesh to the byan hook with a length of thread. The water around the Leic Chrochta was deep. He dropped the sink in the water and waited as it took the baited hook to the bottom where the byan were supposed to feed. Raising the rod about eighteen inches or so, as Tom Barron had taught him, so that the bait was left dangling just above the bottom, he held the rod firmly with both hands, lifting and lowering it ever so slowly. He felt like saying a little prayer, but he knew it wouldn’t work because normally he didn’t believe in prayer. Instead he said to himself, ‘I hope the byan are as hungry as I am.’
Gradually, he forgot about his hunger. His mind emptied as the rhythm of the fishing took over. After a while he thought he felt a little nibble but it could just have been the current tugging at the line. He held the rod steady for a moment, then raised it with a little jerk. His wrist came alive as the line went taut. He caught the line in one hand, dropped the rod behind him, and hauled in the line hand over hand. It was a fine strong byan with thick lips and coarse reddish scales like chain-mail. He unhooked it carefully so as to avoid the spines before putting it in the bag with the pollock. Neither Sharon nor Emily would eat byan because of its strong flavour, so he would have it all to himself. He would be home by half-past four, in good time to gut both fish and prepare them for Sharon’s version of fish cookery.
He sat down on the rock and listened to the fluttering of the gasping fish in the bag. Now he knew why Tom Barron always lit his pipe after laying down his rod. He himself was not a smoker but he felt that somehow the ritual in which he had participated remained incomplete, that he should do something else to bring a perfect afternoon to its destined conclusion. It was strange how the byan had come to him while his mind was blank. He had been fishing mechanically, going through the motions with his eye on the empty horizon. Then suddenly, a strike! That’s how stories came to him, always while he was thinking of something else. Just as the byan came up to him out of the depth of darkness,
a story often overtook him unexpectedly on the road,
stealing up behind him and pouncing while his mind was on other things. That was life at its best, life as it should be lived every day.
Sharon was washing her hair when he got home, and Emily was colouring a picture in the little book he’d bought her. He gutted the fish and washed them in cold water flavoured with a pinch of coarse salt. Then he cut off the heads because Sharon didn’t like looking at what she called ‘the sorrowful eyes’. That done, he settled down to write a short story about an inexperienced tourist who’d lost his way in the hills in a fog, and as if by magic came upon a still-house and a mysterious poteen-maker who promptly sent him on his way with complicated directions and a consolatory bottle. When the tourist arrived back at his hotel, he told his fellow guests about his adventure. He offered them a drink from the bottle and discovered that the liquor it contained was nothing less than pure spring water. They laughed at his surprise and told him he’d imagined it all.
Over dinner he said to Sharon that it was time they sent Emily to school. She was lively and bright, and she would benefit from the company of other children.
‘She’d learn nothing of any use at school,’ Sharon said. ‘Everything is taught here through the medium of Irish. What good is that to her, I’d like to know?’
‘I’m learning Irish myself,’ he said. ‘I could help her learn while I’m teaching myself.’
‘You’re quite cuckoo, Nick. I for one have no intention of enduring another winter here.’
‘Give yourself time. As you get to know more people, you’ll settle in.’
‘Unlike you, I have no intention of going native. There’s nothing here except hills and sheep and old men. This isn’t living. We’re only existing from one day to the next… ’
It was always the same with Sharon. No matter what subject he brought up, she would bring the conversation round to the misery of life in Leaca. It was such a shame because there was no other girl remotely like her.
10
Muiris was in his armchair holding forth with all the authority of a bishop on his episcopal throne. He had a lean face with a clean jaw line, and whenever he clenched his teeth, which he did with predictable regularity, you could see his maxillary muscles ripple beneath the tight skin. Having poured poteen for his neighbours with his customary generosity, he himself partook judiciously of a hot whiskey with cloves and sugar.
‘I must tell you a good one before I forget,’ he said. ‘Here was I making a wee run out in sight of Loch an Aifrinn, thinking I had the mountain to myself, when who darkens the still-house door but my bold Ambrose.’
‘Ah, go ’way!’ Cormac exclaimed.
‘Not a word of a lie. And he’d have come in to see what was going on if I hadn’t blocked the doorway. “Curiosity killed the cat”, says I.’
‘I’ll bet he had no answer to that,’ Neil Durkin smiled.
‘He had an answer all right. Bold as brass, he told me it was care that killed him.’
‘Sure that makes no sense at all.’
‘I told him that if you take good care of a cat, he’ll live longer than yourself, because a cat has nine lives as every galoot should know.’
‘You were fit for him, Muiris, fair play to you.’
‘I wanted to get rid of him without letting him see what I was doing, so I gave him a bottle of the bucko and sent him on his way.’
‘I hope you gave him the singlings!’ Marcus laughed.
‘Or the dirty drop!’ Cormac suggested.
‘I gave him the best, the very best, because it isn’t in my nature to give any man less, and anyway I didn’t want him going round saying my poteen is horse piss. And do you know what I’m going to tell you? He took one slug and nearly choked on it!’ Muiris slapped his thigh and showed his teeth in silent laughter. It was a laugh peculiar to himself, which involved a wrinkling of the nostrils, a swelling of the stomach, and a nervous trembling of the lower jaw. Everyone who knew Muiris knew when he was laughing, though no sound would emerge from between his lips. A laugh from Muiris was a signal for other men to laugh in appreciation, which his neighbours duly did, but whether they were laughing at what made Muiris laugh or at his way of laughing was anyone’s guess.
‘And what took him out to Loch an Aifrinn?’ Marcus wondered.
‘No one knows what that man is thinking,’ Muiris said. ‘He’s foxier than any fox. He could even have been looking for Agent Cox’s grave. Some men can foresee things before they have time to happen.’
‘He was up to nothing good, whatever it was,’ Cormac said. ‘Wasn’t he down on the strand a couple of days ago pretending to be looking for cast-in and the wind from the east!’
‘Maybe he was looking for driftwood for the fire,’ Daniel said. ‘There’s nothing wrong with that, is there?’
‘It’s better than stealing a creel of your turf, if that’s what you mean,’ Cormac agreed.
‘Ambrose was working for you the other day, Tom. Did you notice anything strange about him?’ Muiris asked.
‘He’s a worried man,’ Tom said. ‘He’s trying to make a living with the pen and not making much fist of it. He has to rely on the rest of us for the odd day’s pay.’
‘Sure, everyone knows that the spade is mightier than the pen. So what did you talk about?’ Muiris asked.
‘He told me he used to work in advertising. He got paid to think up a new slogan every day. He thought up “Guinness is good for you.”’
‘I must get him to think up a slogan for my poteen,’ Muiris smiled. ‘The man’s a lunatic. Didn’t he come down the road the other day talking his head off and not another soul in sight.’
‘He makes up stories and writes them down,’ Tom said. ‘In his way he’s a kind of shanachie, I suppose.’
‘Shanachie, my foot! There’s no need to make up more stories,’ Cormac said. ‘The old stories are good enough for any man.’
‘I wouldn’t agree there,’ Tom said. ‘Aren’t the newspapers full of new stories every day?’
‘I think you’re becoming too fond of Ambrose,’ Muiris advised. ‘He’s cleverer than you think. If you’re not careful, he’ll soon have you in his pocket.’
‘There’s no danger of that,’ Tom said. ‘I listen to what every man has to say and then make up my own mind.’
Muiris gave him a long look of dry appraisal.
‘It’s over a month since Paddy Canty was murdered and there’s still no sign of the murderer being arrested,’ he said. ‘The police have made a hames of the investigation. First, they arrested Red Miller instead of Ambrose. When they finally arrested Ambrose, they let him go again. Now, believe it or not, they’re looking for a man on a motorbike! Sure, they’re only going through the motions, they don’t know what they’re doing. It’s up to us to get justice for Paddy. We all know who did it, it’s as clear as day. There’s no point waiting any longer. Like our grandfathers before us, we must carry out the sentence ourselves.’
‘What does that mean?’ Daniel asked.
‘The Triangle, that’s what it means.’ For a moment there was total silence as Muiris surveyed the faces before him.
‘You realise what you’re saying?’ Daniel said. ‘If we go for the Triangle, we’ll all be guilty of murder before the fact.’
‘What fact would that be now?’ Cormac wondered.
‘We’ll be guilty of conspiracy to murder,’ Daniel explained.
‘We’ll be putting right a terrible wrong, according to the ancient law of the land. We’ll all take an envelope from the pile and the man who gets the Triangle in the Circle will carry out the sentence. And the beauty of it is that none of us will know which of us it is.’ Muiris thrust out his chin and turned to Daniel.
‘It’s still murder in my book,’ Daniel said.
‘Your book is written in English, then,’ Muiris told him. ‘There’s only one law in Leaca and it’s written in Irish. It’s called dlí na féine, Brehon law.’
‘There was no capital punishment under Brehon law,’ the schoolmaster said.
‘I know the Brehon law,’ Muiris insisted. ‘It was handed down in my family. My people were Brehons before me.’
‘Brehon or no Brehon, it’s still murder,’ Daniel said. ‘It will follow you like a shadow for as long as you live. You’ll never be able to forget it. On your deathbed it will stare you in the face.’
‘Did the man who executed Agent Cox have it on his conscience?’ Muiris asked.
‘Maybe he did. We don’t know.’
‘Agent Cox was different,’ Tom Barron said. ‘The country was under foreign rule then and the foreigner wasn’t welcome. Ambrose is harmless. Like the rest of us, he’s only doing his best to make ends meet.’
‘Does that mean stealing other people’s turf and breaking into their houses in the small hours with nothing but robbery and murder on your mind?’
‘Where’s the proof?’ Daniel demanded. ‘If there was any proof against him, he’d have been arrested long ago.’
‘Who’s doing it then, if it isn’t Ambrose? Do you think it’s me?’
‘I wouldn’t accuse you without proof positive,’ Daniel said.
‘You should have been a lawyer,’ Muiris scoffed. ‘Isn’t that what’s wrong with English law? When the lawyers get going, certainty flies out the window. They’ll always find a hundred excuses for reasonable doubt.’
‘I’d rather live with reasonable doubt than a miscarriage of justice. In my view justice should be left to judges and juries.’
‘If that’s what you think, you should go home to your books,’ Muiris said.
‘Books have nothing to do with it but right thinking has.’ Daniel put down his glass and said good night.
When he had gone, Muiris declared that anyone who agreed with the schoolmaster should leave the meeting. When no one moved, he gave Tom Barron one of his searching looks.
‘Are you staying, Tom?’ he asked.
‘I’ll stay,’ Tom said, though he was far from sure why he’d said it. He felt uneasy over the turn the conversation had taken. There was no talking to Muiris in one of his Brehon moods.
Muiris asked each of them in turn if he was ready for the Triangle, and each of them said yes. Then he poured more poteen and told them he was going to get the envelopes from the bedroom. While he was gone, they talked in low voices and looked into the fire rather than at one another. They all looked serious. For want of something better to do, Neil Durkin took an armful of turf from the salley-rod basket in the corner and replenished the fire. After a while Muiris returned with five envelopes, which he put in an empty bucket that stood on the form by the back door.
‘There’s a sheet of notepaper in every envelope,’ he said. ‘I’ve drawn a circle the size of a half-crown on every sheet and a triangle inside the circle on only one of them. Every man will take an envelope from the bucket as he leaves. The one that’s left will be mine. No man must tell any other man what was in his envelope. Whoever gets the triangle must carry out the sentence alone.’
‘What is the sentence?’ Neil Durkin asked uncertainly.
‘According to Brehon law, a murderer must get the same treatment he gave his victim. Paddy was strangled. Is that clear?’
‘I think it is,’ Neil Durkin said.
‘It couldn’t be clearer,’ Cormac said. ‘Death by strangling.’
Sharing a sense of having opened a new chapter in local history, they drank their poteen and talked about other things. They all looked serious, as if they could think of nothing but the envelopes in the bucket. Towards midnight they said good night to Muiris and headed home.
Tom could think only of the terrible decision they had come to and the slim envelope in his inside pocket. It was as if he had woken up from a nightmare that now did not seem possible. His stiff leg was giving him trouble again and he was sweating, though the night was cold. When he reached the yard, he hesitated before going into the house. Instead he went into the barn and opened the envelope. He struck a match and held up the flame before the single sheet. He had drawn the one with the triangle. The real nightmare, the living, waking nightmare, had begun.
11
‘Can’t you sleep?’ Nancy said. ‘You’re keeping everyone awake, shaking the bed and puffing and rolling like a whale.’
‘It’s my leg again,’ he said.
‘Or too much poteen! You never sleep well after raking with Muiris. Turn on your side and think of Jim when he was a boy. That’s what I always do.’
He hated secrecy and the need to keep her in the dark. She had asked him who was at Muiris Mór’s, and he had told her there were only the two of them. If he had said there was a meeting, she would have given him no peace, wanting to know what was discussed and who said this and who said that. He did his best to think of Jim as a boy but he could only think of Ambrose and Muiris, two impossible men. It was all very well making big talk about the Triangle and the time of Agent Cox, but you couldn’t kill a man in cold blood. It wasn’t right; it was against all instinct and sense of what should be done and what shouldn’t. He blamed himself for having stayed on at the meeting. He should have left with the schoolmaster when he’d had a chance. He pulled the bedspread up over his head, hoping against hope that he would sleep.
He spent the following day on the hill with the dog as his only companion. By evening he had come to a decision. He would ask Ambrose to give him a hand thatching the old house, which he now used as a barn. He would talk to Ambrose and listen to him and keep a clear head. He would not be swayed by Muiris and the others. He would make up his own mind. It stood to reason that a guilty man couldn’t hide his guilt.
* * *
Ambrose arrived while they were having breakfast. Nancy gave him a mug of tea, and when she offered him a thick slice of buttered soda bread to go with it, he didn’t say no. Quite possibly, the poor devil had had no breakfast at home.
‘Not a bad day,’ he remarked as he tucked in.
‘It’s dry and calm, and that’s what counts,’ Tom said. ‘The last thing you need for thatching is wind.’
When they’d eaten, Tom took him out to the barn to show him the side that needed thatching. Ambrose remarked that it was a fine old house, and Tom told him that it was once the family home and that the new house had been built by his father when he himself was a boy. He gave him Jim’s scythe because he was about the same height as Jim. Ambrose tried out the scythe in the yard, and Tom told him it was just right, that it could have been hung specially for him. He had taught Ambrose how to mow with a scythe last summer. At first he looked awkward, holding the scythe with the tip of the blade pointing downwards. Tom showed him how to keep the heel of the scythe as close as possible to the ground with the tip of the blade slightly raised. To give him his due, he didn’t need telling twice. After half an hour’s practice he was a capable scytheman, though his gait of mowing was still a bit stiff with the result that he probably expended more energy than was strictly necessary. He had strength to burn, however. If he didn’t, he wouldn’t be burning it.
