Cruel Winter: A County Cork Mystery

by Sheila Connolly

  “I didn’t expect to be here. I’ve been telling Billy that Eveline’s taken a bad turn. Harry’s been down from Dublin the past few days because he was worried about her, and when she worsened, he thought it might be better if she was in hospital rather than at home, in case . . .” Gillian didn’t finish the thought. “So he dropped me off here.”

  “You didn’t want to stay at the house with the O’Briens?” The O’Briens were an older couple who lived at the manor, both to look after Eveline and to keep the building from falling down. Maura had met them, but they never ventured into town—and certainly not into her pub.

  “Eveline seems to have accepted this”—Gillian laid a gentle hand over her rounded belly; she was now six months pregnant with Harry’s child—“but the O’Briens think I’m a fallen woman and won’t talk to me. If I get stuck somewhere with this weather, I’d rather it were here, where I’m among friends.”

  “Well, you’re welcome here, of course. But how bad could it get?”

  Gillian sighed. “I’ve no idea. I’ve spent much of the past few years in Dublin, and the city seldom shuts down, as you might guess. I remember some big storms here when I was younger, but I was small then, so my memories probably aren’t accurate.” Gillian studied Maura’s face. “Go on, then—tell us we’re eejits to worry about a bit of snow and wind, after all yer years in Boston,” Gillian said in an exaggerated country accent.

  “Well, Boston’s had some pretty major storms in the last few years. I think the record last time a big one hit was ten feet of snow, spread out over a few weeks, and then it wouldn’t melt. I’ll let you do the math for what that means in centimeters.”

  “A lot, I’ve no doubt,” Gillian said, laughing. “I don’t think we’ll see the likes of that here. But Harry might want to stay with his great-aunt at the hospital, whether or not the roads are clear to drive.”

  Maura remembered again that Eveline Townsend was the same age as Billy. Did her sudden decline trouble him? He seemed ageless, although he wasn’t exactly spry—he moved slowly even over the short distance to his rooms at the end of the building. Maura had known him less than a year, but she’d be sad to lose him. As far as she knew, he didn’t have any close family anywhere nearby—he’d never married, and she thought he’d once told her he’d outlived his siblings and even their children. Maura caught him watching her, and he smiled. Was he psychic? Or did anyone who lived as long as he had learn to read expressions and even thoughts? Maura was glad she could at least offer him a safe home and a pint when he wanted one.

  Now what? She’d done what she could to prepare for the storm, but was it enough? Or was she overworrying? Maura glanced up at the television, which was still turned on but without sound. The weather seemed to be the major story, with occasional comments about somebody shooting at somebody else in a country that was not Ireland—where nobody ever shot at anyone—and the weather maps seemed to show that the storm had grown. And the arrows on the screen were aimed right at West Cork. Not good. She was torn between wishing at least a few patrons would show up—for one last pint before everything shut down—and hoping they’d have the sense to stay home.

  Just past eleven, Jimmy and Rose came in. Rain had begun to fall, and the wind had risen even more; the two looked like wet cats. Maura regretted that she hadn’t told them not to bother. “Sorry, you two, but there’s not much to be done here. Would you rather be at home?”

  “Nah, the oil tank’s about run dry,” Jimmy told her, “so we thought we’d make use of yer heat here.”

  “That’s fine with me, Jimmy,” Maura said, wondering if he’d expect her to pay for his hours at the pub today when there was no one to serve. And Rose’s. “How you doing, Rose?”

  “Fair enough, Maura.” She lowered her voice as Jimmy went off talking to Mick. “I think me da just wanted to get out of the house, and I’d didn’t want to stay behind in the cold.”

  “You don’t have to apologize, Rose. I don’t know what to expect from this weather, but it looks like we’d all feel happier facing it together.”

  Mick came up to her. “I’ll be checking on me gran now if that’s all right with yeh.”

  “Sure, go ahead. I think we can handle the crowd here.” Which was nonexistent. “Will she be all right? Or do you want to bring her down here?”

  “No worries—she’ll be fine. She has all that she needs up at her cottage. Bringing her down here would probably be more upsettin’ to her.”

  Maura knew that Mick drove his grandmother Bridget down to church each weekend, but she couldn’t recall if Bridget had ever gone anywhere else. Mick was probably right: Bridget knew her own home and was safe there, so why make a big thing of this storm? It would all be over by tomorrow, wouldn’t it? “Say hi for me, will you? And check out how the roads are up that way. I really don’t want to have to figure out how to camp here tonight.”

  “I’ll do that. I’ll be no more than an hour or two.”

  Maura checked the clock again—not even noon yet. This was going to be a long, dull day. “Anybody want to think about lunch, while we can still get around?”

  Several hands shot up. “Let me go, Maura,” Rose volunteered. “I’ll go mad if I’m cooped up all day. I’ll see what I can find, but I’m pretty sure it won’t be fancy.”

  “Thanks, Rose. Let me give you some cash.” Maura rummaged in the cash drawer and fished out some twenty-euro notes, which she handed to Rose. “And bundle up!” God, now she sounded like her own gran. Rose was young and healthy, and a walk of a block wouldn’t hurt her.

  Maura decided that she might as well go hunting for those oil lamps. She hadn’t spent much time in the basement since she’d taken on the place. And it had a few bad associations, since Jimmy had taken a fall down the aged stairs just after she’d first arrived. She knew the kegs of Guinness lived down there, holding at the right temperature without any added refrigeration, but she let Mick and Jimmy wrestle those up and down the now-repaired stairs. She’d poked around a couple of times before, and the fancy coffee machine they were using now had been one of Jimmy’s inspired buys—one he had lost interest in quickly. He’d gotten it cheap, apparently, but Old Mick couldn’t be bothered with the thing, so it had been sent down to the dark basement. Once they’d hauled it up the stairs and polished it up, it had proved useful, especially with women patrons. But as Maura remembered it, there were a lot more dark corners downstairs that she hadn’t explored—and not a lot of light. She knew the building was over two hundred years old; what were the odds that people had been dumping unwanted stuff down there for most of that time? What would two-hundred-year-old junk look like?

  “I’m going to check out the cellar,” she announced, “to see if there’s anything we can use.”

  “I’ll handle the customers,” Jimmy volunteered generously.

  Maura stopped at the top of the stairs. “By the way, Jimmy, do we have any shovels?”

  “Yer after diggin’ a hole?”

  “No, for snow.”

  Jimmy shrugged. “We’ve seldom needed them. Might be one or two out the back.”

  Apparently, Jimmy was too lazy to go and look. Sometimes Maura wondered why she kept him on at the pub, but she didn’t want to make life any more difficult for Rose. “When I come back, could you go check, please?”

  “If yeh want,” he replied without enthusiasm.

  Jimmy’s attitude was an ongoing problem, Maura reflected as she made her way cautiously down the stairs. Nothing like a handrail, nope. A single light bulb in the middle of the room, which didn’t do much. No windows. No wonder she hadn’t been down here much. She should ask Mick to explain how the connections with the kegs worked or if they were like the ones she had known at various bars in Boston. She’d left it to Mick and Jimmy to handle the deliveries and connect things, but she should know what to do.

  She stopped at the bottom of the stairs and turned in a full circle, looking carefully. There were wooden shelves along some of the walls, b
ut they looked like they’d collapse if she sneezed on them.

  A jumble of rusted pots and pans was piled every which way in one corner. They looked like they’d crumble under a good scrubbing, so they should probably go to the dump. What was it they called it around here? A tip? Maura wondered if there were any newer pans in the old kitchen, which she hadn’t used at all. Another shelf held a stash of old bottles, their labels peeling or gone entirely. All were empty, so any hope of finding some amazing old vintage or a cache of fifty-year-old whiskey died quickly. She poked into a few wooden packing crates holding not much of anything. Finally, in a far corner, Maura spied what looked like a few dusty oil lamps, long dry. At least they were intact and had wicks, which she seemed to recall were necessary. Two—no, three. That would probably do for a while. If they were needed. She hoped they wouldn’t be.

  Anything else she needed to know? The basement was cold and damp, and there was no hope of converting it into anything like usable space. Better to concentrate on the second story—no, it was called the first floor around here—and see if there was any hope for that. If there had been any cast-off pieces of furniture stuck in the basement, they’d long since rotted away. Maura sighed: there was not much help here, except for the lamps. She’d leave them where they were for now, since she knew where to find them.

  She trudged back up the stairs. “Jimmy, where’s the oil tank? Out back?” Another thing she hadn’t kept very good track of. She’d been here long enough that she should have a grip on details like this, instead of relying on Mick and Jimmy all the time.

  “In that small shed on the side, it is,” he told her.

  “Thanks. Good to know.” No sign of Rose back from the store with food. Maybe there was none left in the village. Maura hoped that at least a few customers would stop in during the lunch hour, even if it was on their way home. As she peered out her front window, she wasn’t surprised to see Sean Murphy pull up in his garda car. Sean was one of the most junior of the Skibbereen gardaí, the local police. Maura had been told that Leap had once had its own garda station, but it had long since closed for budget reasons. Now the Skibbereen officers made regular if rare passes through the town. Maura had a suspicion that Sean stopped by Sullivan’s a bit more often than the schedules called for—and it wasn’t to make sure the regulations were being followed. They’d been out together a couple of times, and she suspected Sean would like to see her a bit more often.

  When he climbed out, she held open the door to Sullivan’s for him. “Welcome, Sean. Have you come to warn us that all heck will break loose soon?”

  Sean smiled at her, but his heart wasn’t in it. “Nothing so bad as that Maura, but I am charged with checking that people are aware of what’s happening.”

  “Oh, you mean that little snowstorm?”

  “I wouldn’t take it so lightly, Maura. I know yeh’ve Spent most of yer life in Boston, where there’s plenty of equipment to handle what comes, but it’s not like that here.”

  “Sorry, Sean—I didn’t mean to be rude. I just don’t know what to expect or how much to worry.”

  “Most times, I’d say you could just wait it out. But what with this global warming stuff, the storms have been growing larger and more unpredictable. I’d rather have people safe, so I’m making sure everyone knows. I know the younger folk are all about their mobile phones, but some older ones may not pay attention to the warnings on the telly or the radio.”

  Maura wondered briefly which category he put himself in: young or old? He wasn’t more than twenty-five, but he took his professional responsibilities very seriously. As well he should when people were at risk. “What do I need to do? Before you start, we’ve got oil for the furnace and turf and coal for the fire. We’ve got kerosene for lamps if the power goes out. What else should we be thinking about?”

  Sean shifted into full professional mode. “Keep your paths clear, especially in the front, before they can turn to ice. Clear off any outside grates, so the melt can run off. Try not to drive unless you have to. And drive carefully, slower than you usually do.”

  “Are there snowplows and sand trucks around here?”

  “Some, fer the main roads like this one. Not for the lanes. People may find it hard to get home, and if one car stalls out up a hill, the others can’t get by. Best to stay where you are if it looks bad.”

  Most of what Sean said, Maura and her crew had already worked out, except for the drains. Did she even have drains? Where would they be? “Do you guys get better official reports than we do?”

  He shrugged. “The weather’s unpredictable, so it’s of little help. Will you be set?”

  “I think so. If people stop by, what should I tell them?”

  “To go home if they can. If they’re the worse for drink, try to keep them here. Either they’ll be a risk to others on the road, or they’ll end up in a ditch and freeze to death.”

  That Maura hadn’t considered. Was she responsible for people—most likely men—who made stupid choices under the influence of drink she had served them? “Thanks, Sean. I’ll do my best. Will you be on duty throughout whatever comes?”

  “Most likely. I’ll be passing by now and again. Take care, will yeh?”

  “I’ll try.”

  She shut the door behind him and watched as he had to lean into the wind to get to his car.

  Four

  Mick came in a minute or two after Sean had left, shaking water off in all directions.

  “Everything okay with Bridget?” Maura asked.

  “As good as can be expected,” he said, hanging up his not-so-waterproof coat. “She wouldn’t leave if I dragged her by the hair, so I made sure she was well fixed for whatever may come. Was that Sean Murphy I saw? Did he have any news?”

  “On the storm? No. Mainly that no one wants to predict what might happen. I asked about what we should do to prepare, and it seems like we’ve done most of what he said. Jimmy told me there might be a shovel or two out in the shed if we need them—not that he volunteered to go get them or anything—and I found three lamps in the cellar to go with the kerosene I got. And that’s all I know. Oh, and Rose went out to find some food, but she hasn’t come back. Should we worry?”

  “She’s probably sweet-talking the staff wherever it is she went to get them to check whatever they’ve been hiding in the back for just such occasions. She’ll be fine.”

  It would be hard to get lost in a village that had only one main street and only one place to buy ingredients for making any food. There were restaurants, of course, but Maura wasn’t quite ready to pay for prepared food, assuming there was any available at any of them. Anne Sheahan was already looking after her own guests, and Maura wanted to save her as a last resort. At least Anne had a real restaurant kitchen and should have some basic supplies stockpiled. Maura looked up at the silent telly again: the weather was still the biggest news story, and it looked like the storm had grown yet again. Of course, Maura was used to news coverage back in Boston, where the weather forecasters gleefully billed every snow shower as the “storm of the century.” They’d been right about once a decade, but the most recent time was only a year or two earlier. Global warming or just bad luck?

  Rose was next to return. It was such a slow day that everyone in the pub turned to see who the opening of the door would bring, and the sight of Rose—or more likely the carrier bags she brought—cheered them up. “Sorry it took me so long, Maura,” she apologized, “but there was little ready-made to be had, so I had to stop and think about what we could put together here. Unless this lot will be happy with cold bread and butter?” She smiled at the group in the room, who shook their heads. “Maura, yer sure the stove in the back doesn’t work?”

  “I’ve never tried it, but it’s got about an inch of grease on it, and I have no idea what fuel it needs. Sorry. I’d tell you to go check, but it might blow up in your face. Maybe Mick knows more than I do.”

  “No worries—I figgered as much. If we can’t make the stove work,
I brought things that we can warm up or even cook over the fire, if we can only find some pots and pans.”

  “Rose, you’re brilliant!” Maura said. “I think I saw some in the cellar that might work if we scrubbed them up a bit. Jimmy, could you go down and bring up what’s there? There’s a stack in one of the corners—you should be able to find them.”

  Jimmy turned reluctantly from a conversation with one of the few non-employees in the pub. “What’re yeh lookin’ fer?”

  How clueless was he? “Anything that doesn’t have holes in the bottom, that we can use to cook in. You know, pots? Pans? Use your imagination.” Or common sense, if he had any.

  “Right,” he said glumly, then tromped down the cellar stairs.

  Maura noticed that another man had come in while she was scavenging in the basement, but she didn’t recognize him, and he already had a pint glass in his hand. She wandered back to the old kitchen, where Rose was busy unpacking what she’d managed to find: bread, eggs, and veggies (apparently not a hot-ticket item in a blizzard). Rose noticed Maura’s look. “If we find the pot, I thought we’d do a soup and eat it with the bread. I cleaned them out at Costcutter, but nobody wanted the vegs anyway. I even brought some spices.”

  Maura almost laughed. “Rose, you are a wonder. We don’t deserve you.”

  “I like to cook,” she said simply. “Even over a turf fire.”

  “So how does this thing work?” Maura asked, staring at the squat, lumpy but very solid-looking stove streaked with soot and grease.

  “Near as I can tell, it’s what they called a solid-fuel stove. It’s a Rayburn—and cast iron. It’s pretty simple,” Rose said, opening and closing a variety of hinged doors. “You put yer fuel in here”—she pointed to one cavity at the top—“and yer oven’s on this side. See? There’s an indicator for the temperature. You put yer pots and pans on the top. It’s not fast, nor is it easy to control the heat, but it gets the job done. You could bake something in the oven if you really wanted.”