Now and in the Hour of Our Death

by Patrick Taylor

  The comfort of him. So what if she was better educated? Had established herself as an independent woman? Broken away from her slum roots? No matter what the crisis, Davy was her rock. Her “bridge over troubled waters.” She could no more leave him than cut off her right arm.

  McCusker, her ginger tom, jumped up on her lap—

  Her Canadian tortoiseshell, McCusker, butted at her, weaving over her crumpled duvet, demanding attention. Fiona stroked the animal.

  Poor Davy, she thought, brushing the cat away as she got out of bed and went through to the bathroom. God, but I still miss you.

  She’d stayed with him for two more years, but when a bomb he had made killed the father of two little girls in one of her classes, she’d snapped, given him an ultimatum, “The Provos or me.” And when he’d made his decision, she’d moved out.

  Davy came after her weeks later, said he’d changed his mind, just one more mission and he would go to Canada with her. Those weeks without him had been the loneliest of her life. His promise about Canada had seemed to her then like having a doctor coming to her bedside and telling her that the diagnosis of cancer was wrong, that she’d live. She’d waited—but the mission had gone wrong. The court had given Davy forty years.

  She could picture him the day she’d gone to the Kesh and told him she was leaving Ireland. His big hands twined and untwined on the tabletop, his face crumpled, and his eyes glistened with the tears that she knew he was holding back until she had gone.

  She turned on the tap and filled a glass of water.

  Inside her, the old pain whimpered. Oh, Davy.

  She reached into the medicine cupboard for the Tylenol, found two, swallowed them, and put both hands to her temples.

  Always when she had the nightmare, a migraine would start, the pain crushing like a woodworker’s vice.

  CHAPTER 3

  THE KESH. LISBURN. FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 1983

  Davy McCutcheon clamped a piece of wood in a vice, picked up his plane, sighted along the board’s short length, and began to work. Shavings curled and fell on the floor of the prison’s carpentry shop. He and seven other prisoners working in the shop had earned the privilege of learning carpentry. He was aware of them around him but kept his gaze fixed on his work. Forward, keep the pressure steady, let the plane bite, move along the wood’s surface, lift and start again. Forward, keep the pressure steady …

  Davy liked the shop. In here the prison stink—disinfectant, boiled cabbage, half-washed men, clogged drains, backed-up toilets—was masked by the smell of freshly sawn wood and hot glue. The rhythm of his work pleased him, made him feel for the moment like his own man, in nobody’s debt. But today he was beholden. There was that promise made to Eamon.

  He glanced to the workbench and confirmed that the plastic protector was firmly in place on the blade of a chisel. A peek down the room. The screw had his back turned. The woodworking instructor, a civilian, old Mr. Donovan—Pa to the screws and prisoners alike—was deep in conversation with another apprentice. Pa was so ancient that they said he’d helped Noah measure up his cubits and spans of gopher wood.

  Davy did not smile at the old joke. Why the hell had he let Eamon talk him into this? Eamon and his, “Look, Davy, it’s only a wee favour.” Wee my Aunt Fanny Jane. He would lose his privileges and his remission time if they caught him. He wanted to learn this trade, and he didn’t want to lose one day. He was going to be a different Davy when he did get out.

  He put down the plane and picked up a set-square, but he used the back of his hand to nudge the chisel off the bench top onto a pile of shavings. Another quick glance round. No one had seen, or if one of the other inmates had, he was keeping that to himself. Davy kicked the chisel under the shavings.

  He let out a long breath. He hadn’t realized that he’d been holding it. Right. Back to work.

  He ran the set-square along the length of the plank. Not quite smooth yet. He noticed as he picked up the plane that his hands trembled. He told himself to take a breather, leaned against the bench, and let his thoughts turn to the distant day when he would be free and to what life had been like before they stuck him in here.

  Yes, he’d been a dyed-in-the-wool Republican. Yes, he’d made explosives for the “Cause,” but there’d been more to life than that. He could see himself back in Belfast, in the stands watching a game of soccer.

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake, pass the bloody ball.” These words were roared by Jimmy Ferguson, who stood next to Davy, one of the hundreds in the terraces, out in the open air, in the drizzle, leaning on iron pipes set in the ground like upturned, flat-topped U’s.

  “Jesus, Davy, that winger should be traded, so he should.”

  “Give him a chance, Jim. It’s his first season with Celtic.”

  “It should be his bloody last. Christ, would you look at that?”

  The Glentoran forward who had intercepted the misdirected pass was dribbling the ball down the right wing, coming nearer to the Celtic goal. He sent it soaring across the goal mouth to be fired by the centre forward straight into the back of the net.

  The Glentoran supporters cheered.

  The goalkeeper pointed at his full back in the gesture beloved by all goalies, as if to say, “That wasn’t my fault.”

  “Do you know,” said Jimmy, “I’m getting frozen. Do you fancy leaving early and going for a jar?”

  “Fair enough. As long as I’m home by six. Fiona’ll be expecting me.”

  They walked from the grounds and took a bus to their usual pub. Three snotty-nosed kids stood outside, each clutching a bag of potato crisps and a glass of orange Crush. Davy stopped and spoke to the biggest. “Would you lot not be better in the bus shelter out of the rain?”

  Children were not allowed into public houses, so their fathers would be inside having a pint while the wee ones had to be content to shiver outside. It troubled Davy. He’d seen enough cold, underfed kids on the streets of the Catholic Falls district, aye and on Sandy Row, the Loyalist stronghold. He was fighting for the wee ones as much as for Irish freedom. Social justice was meant to be part of the Provos’ agenda.

  “My da would kill me if I didn’t wait for him like he told me.” The lad dragged his sleeve across his nose and sniffed.

  Davy stuck his hand in his pocket and pulled out small change. “Here.” He gave it to the boy. “Away you and your mates to that wee café and get some hot chocolate inside you.”

  The child hesitated.

  “Who’s your da?”

  “Willy McCoubrey.”

  “I know him. I’ll have a word in his ear. Tell him where you’ve gone. You run away on now.”

  “Thanks, mister.” The boy ran off, yelling at his friends to “come and get some hot chokky.”

  Jimmy shook his head. “You’re daft about kids, aren’t you? You’re just a big softie.”

  “Not at all.”

  “Pull the other leg, Davy. Do you think my wee girl, Siobhan, calls you Uncle Davy because you’re an ould targe?”

  “Well…” Davy didn’t want to talk about kids. Fiona had made it very clear she didn’t want any. Not while the Troubles ground on and on. Maybe, because she knew that what he was trying to do was supposed to bring the civil war to a close, maybe that was why she still stayed with him. Jesus, but it had been a near thing the day the Abercorn was blown up. He’d thought she was going to walk out.

  “Are we going in for a jar or aren’t we?” Jimmy held the swing door of the pub open.

  Davy picked up the plane. It would be great if wee Jim could hold the doors of this fucking place open as easily.

  “How’re you getting on, Davy?”

  Davy swung round. “Jesus, Pa, you near scared me to death creeping up like that.”

  “Have you a guilty conscience?”

  Bloody right he had.

  “Here, let’s have a look.” Pa slid his callused hand along the freshly planed surface. “I don’t need a set-square. There’s still a bit of a bump.” He took the
plane, squinted, adjusted his stance—his left foot was less than an inch from where the chisel was hidden—and made two swift strokes. “Try your square now, son.”

  The metal arm of the tool slid along the surface as if it were gliding on ice.

  Davy forced himself to smile. “You’re a quare dab hand at that, so y’are.”

  Pa grinned. “You’re no’ so bad yourself. Is it next year you’re goin’ for journeyman?”

  “Aye.”

  Pa clapped Davy on the shoulder. “You’ll’ve earned it, but you’d two left hands when you came to me first. Couldn’t tell a fretsaw from a mallet. You hadnae a clue.”

  Of course he bloody well hadn’t, Davy thought. All his life, man and boy, in the old IRA and then the Provos, but he’d been a bloody good bomb maker. And that was all he was. No trade. No future. But he had had the Cause. He’d have died for it. And now? Shit. Davy almost spat, but he remembered that Pa was nearby. Well, anyway, he was going to see Eamon right. But for personal reasons, not for the Cause.

  “Pay attention, Davy. You get your journeyman’s certificate, and you’ll have a good trade when…” Pa stopped. No one mentioned that in here. Men could have nervous breakdowns counting the days until they’d get out. Some had. Pa coughed. “I’ll be off now. That lad over there”—he nodded to one of the other prisoners—“thinks a dog’s hind leg is a straight edge.”

  “Thanks, Pa.” Davy tried not to stare at the floor as the old man walked away. At least Pa was blocking the view of where Davy was working. He dropped to the floor, grabbed the chisel, lifted the leg of his trousers, tucked the handle under his sock, and secured the blade beneath an elastic band that he’d slipped over his ankle before coming here. He could feel the pressure underneath his sock.

  He rose and saw the little hairs on his forearm rise and make goose flesh. He pulled his sleeves down and made a show of returning to his work. Damn you, Eamon Maguire, you and your “Could I have a wee word, Father Davy?” Eamon wanted a favour and that favour was now cold against Davy’s calf.

  Davy shook his head. Eamon and his friends were planning to break out of the Kesh. Bloody madness. They’d not have a snowball’s chance. The screws, never mind the prisoners, couldn’t go from one block to another without a daily password. There were double air-lock gates, guards everywhere—and their fucking Alsatian dogs. One push of a button in their communications room and the Brits could shut this whole place down tighter than a duck’s arsehole. The outside walls were punctuated by guard towers full of soldiers with rifles and machine guns. Mad, the whole bloody lot of them, and yet Eamon had said that they were bound and determined to go—and that Davy could go with them.

  He wrapped a piece of sandpaper round a block of wood and started to put the finishing touches to the now-smooth edge of the plank.

  That had made him think. God knew he’d tortured himself in his first years here, dreaming of escape, of finding Fiona. Fiona, with the laughing, sloe-black eyes. Fiona, who’d promised to come back to him when he’d left the Provos but had visited him only once after they’d stuck him in here to tell him that it was no good. She was going to go to Canada, without him. Canada was a hell of a big country. He had no idea where she was. Break out? What was the point?

  The sandpaper rasped, made wood dust. Davy sneezed and wiped his nose with the back of his hand.

  What if Eamon’s lot did get out? Where would they go? Ireland was a very wee place. They’d never get out of the country. They’d be lifted in no time flat, and then God knows how much longer they’d get. Davy’d time enough to serve. Even if they caught him with the chisel he was trying to steal, he’d lose his remission time and his woodworking privileges, and probably have more years added.

  Davy started sanding again.

  He knew it was stupid of him to have agreed to get the bloody tool. Eamon had asked as a friend. Even then Davy had tried to refuse, but when Eamon had begged Davy for help, not for the Cause but because Eamon was desperate to see his girl, Erin, the poor bugger had been nearly in tears. How could Davy have refused? He’d seen the pleading in the eyes of a man who wouldn’t ask the devil for a glass of water. They’d grown close over three years in the same cell. Davy told himself he was an ould softie. He should have had more sense. And yet here he stood, the steel of the chisel cold against his calf. All he had to do now was get it back to his cell.

  He put the sanding block down and picked up another blade from the bench, slashed it across the palm of his left hand and let a roar out of him like a banshee. “Fuck it. Jesus. Aaaaw.”

  Pa and one of the screws rushed over. “What’s up, Davy?” Pa asked.

  “I’m bleeding like a stuck pig.” He thrust his hand under the guard’s nose.

  “Jesus. I can’t stand the sight of blood.”

  Davy saw the man’s face turn ashen. “Do something. Make a tourniquet.”

  “What?”

  “Get a bit of rope or … Here, gimme your tie.”

  The guard fumbled with the knot.

  “Hurry up, for God’s sake.” Davy’s hand throbbed and burned. Blood dripped onto the pile of shavings where the chisel had been hidden. Pa hovered in the background making sympathetic noises.

  “Here y’are.” The guard turned his face away.

  Davy grabbed the tie in his right hand, draped it over his left wrist, and tried one-handedly to make a knot. “Look, could you maybe tie that?”

  The guard fumbled but managed to make a loop and tighten it. The flow of blood was reduced to a trickle, warm on Davy’s fingers.

  “Ah, Jesus, you’ve blood all over my tunic.” The guard took a deep breath. “Come on to hell out of this. We’ll need to get you to the infirmary.” And to Davy’s delight, the guard tugged him toward the back door of the workshop, not the front where the security equipment stood. And in the infirmary? It would be his hand they’d be looking at. Not his ankle.

  * * *

  “Be more careful the next time, McCutcheon.” The prison doctor, a young man Davy reckoned was still wet behind the ears, was obviously unhappy with having had his day interrupted. He finished bandaging Davy’s left hand. “See the nurse in a week and get the stitches out.” He spoke to the guard. “Take him back to his cell.”

  “Yes, sir. Come on, you.”

  Davy rose. “Do I not get any painkillers?”

  “What?” The doctor stopped in the doorway.

  “It’s throbbing like hell, so it is.”

  “The local anaesthetic should still be working.”

  “It never worked in the first place.” Each of the six stitches had bitten his hand as it went in and came out. “And you’re telling me to be careful?” Davy shook his head. “You were in too much of a bloody rush.”

  “Don’t speak to me like that or…” The doctor reddened.

  “Or what? You’ll have me locked up?” Davy’s smile was sardonic. He could hear the guard sniggering.

  “I don’t have to stand for this.” The physician stormed out.

  The guard said, “You’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din. I’d not have taken a wheen of stitches if I could feel them.”

  “I’ve had worse.” Like a shattered leg after the bomb explosion and no medical help but Jimmy Ferguson.

  “I near took the rickets, so I did, just watching.” The guard was solicitous. “Here”—he fumbled in his pocket—“here’s a clatter of Aspirin.” He gave the small box to Davy.

  “Thanks, Mr. Carson.” Davy stuffed the box into his own pocket. “Should we not maybe be getting me back now?”

  “Fair enough. Come on.”

  Davy followed the guard along corridors where an inmate was cleaning. His mop spread a grey film of sudsy water on the grey concrete floor. A screw leaned against the wall, leafing through a copy of a kiddies’ comic. He barely bothered to look up as Davy and Mr. Carson passed. They went through the electric gate from the infirmary and out onto the walkway to H-block 7.

  Davy saw the perimeter wall with it
s manned watchtowers, where soldiers scanning the compound leaned on their machine guns. Davy could see no farther. Whatever world lay outside was hidden by the wall and by the cold rain that mizzled down on the sterile acres of the Long Kesh prison.

  Mr. Carson had to give the day’s password to the guard at the gate in the razor wire to be allowed to enter H-block 7. Walls, wire, gates, guards. Just like Davy had told Eamon. And Eamon was going to bust out of this? He must think he’s Harry fucking Houdini.

  “There y’are, Davy. Number sixteen. Home sweet home.” Mr. Carson halted outside the doorway. “I’d better be getting back to the shop. Take care of that hand now.”

  “Thanks, Mr. Carson.” Davy saw Eamon leap off his bunk.

  “Jesus, Davy, what happened?” He stared at Davy’s left hand. The bandage was the size of a boxing glove. Blood had seeped through, dried, and turned rusty.

  “Cut myself.”

  Eamon backed inside to allow Davy to enter.

  “Is it bad?”

  “I’ll live.” But the cut pounded. “Would you get me some water?”

  “Right.”

  While Eamon ran the taps, Davy fished out his Aspirin and fumbled with the box lid. “Could you open this? I’m all thumbs.”

  Eamon opened the box and took out the bottle of tablets. “How many? Two?”

  “Aye.” Davy popped the pills into his mouth, accepted the water, drank, and swallowed. He could sense Eamon’s impatience. Davy lowered his voice. “I got what you’re looking for. It’s in my sock. I’ll give it to you after lights-out.”

  “You did?” Eamon clapped his hands. “Fucking A-one.”

  “Aye, and if you’re thinking of digging your way out with that wee thing, by the time your sentence is up, you’ll still be fiddling away.”

  CHAPTER 4

  VANCOUVER. FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 1983

  The principal fiddled with an overhead projector, throwing yet another set of incomprehensible figures on the olive-drab wall of the teachers’ common room. The chintz curtains were drawn. A single ray of sunlight sidled in through a tear in the material, and Fiona had to move her chair sideways to avoid the glare.