Torn Away

by James Heneghan

  He shrugged his coat back on in case the teacher should spot him. He was on the plane, the flight attendant at the doorway smiling at him, welcoming him aboard.

  He moved in with his head down. Damn! His coat caught on a seat arm in the narrow aisle and exposed his shirt. McManus was watching him from one of the aisle seats. Declan’s heart skipped a beat. Had McManus seen the shirt? Declan would soon know. He took a seat at the rear of the plane, ready to move if someone else claimed it.

  He stared out the window.

  His heart was beating wildly. Another twenty minutes or so and he’d be on his way home.

  He closed his eyes and said a prayer and thought about Brendan Fogarty’s face and all the others in the Holy Terrors when they saw him back home in the Falls Road. And Tim O’Malley next door, and Tim’s ma and da, their eyes wide with shock and surprise. “Is it back you are?” Unbelieving, like seeing a ghost.

  “Could I please see your ticket and your passport?”

  It was a flight attendant, a dark man in a navy blue uniform.

  His stomach sank.

  What rotten luck! McManus had seen him. There was nothing he could do. He felt suddenly very weary as though a great weight were pressing him down.

  They took him to the immigration office.

  It was the same man as before. Raghavji.

  His eyes popped. “I know that boy!” he cried.

  Chapter Ten

  Matthew looked tired. “I came as soon as I got the call.”

  It was three o’clock in the afternoon in Raghavji’s office. Declan had been kept in a locked room for over six hours.

  Matthew gave Declan one of his doleful looks. “I’ll not be a jailer, Declan. If it’s escape you want, then go. I’ll not stand in your way.”

  “Then give me the money to pay my way back,” Declan demanded.

  Matthew shook his head. “I can’t do that, because I want you to stay. You belong here now. This is your home.”

  “My home is in Ireland.”

  Matthew said, “We’d hoped you would take this country to your heart as Kate and I did.”

  “So if you wanted so much for me to stay,” Declan sneered, “why is it you didn’t come chasing after me to the airport?”

  Matthew shook his head. “We telephoned the police to keep an eye out for you. We drove to the ferry terminal. Nobody remembered having seen you. We returned home and waited by the phone. That was a smart move—the boat.” He allowed himself a small smile. “You’re the bold man—the spit of Liam, your father.”

  “Too bold and too much of a handful for you! You don’t want me here. Let me go home.”

  “I’ll make a deal with you. Stay with us until the end of March, and if you still want to go, then I’ll not stop you. I’ll pay your way back.”

  “You’ll pay my way back?” Declan couldn’t think. He felt weary.

  “Come back with me now,” said Matthew. “We can discuss it with Kate tomorrow.”

  “What if I don’t come back with you?”

  Matthew shrugged. “Then I’ll leave you here.”

  Declan felt tired and defeated. There seemed to be no way out of the trap he was in. Perhaps the only way was to accept his uncle’s offer of a deal. They drove back to Otter Harbour. He slept uncomfortably in the old truck most of the way.

  Kate was waiting for them with hot chocolate to drink. “Will you eat a bite of the blueberry pie?” she asked Declan. She was happy to see him back.

  Declan handed her the twenty dollar bill and change. “I took this.”

  She dropped the money in the drawer. “We were destroyed worrying about you, Declan, love.”

  Declan ate the pie and finished the hot chocolate. “Could I have some more of the pie?”

  The next morning at breakfast, Declan said to Matthew, “Let’s talk about this deal of yours.” Ana and Thomas were not yet up. Kate sat down with her coffee.

  “Stay with us to the end of March,” said Matthew. “Then if you still feel you want to go back to Ireland, I’ll pay your way.”

  “March is over six months away!” said Declan. “That’s too long.” He thought for a moment. “Make it the end of next month, October.”

  Matthew said, “Be reasonable, Declan. We want you to stay for as long as possible so you’ll get to like it here. Tell you what, stay to the end of February.”

  “End of November,” said Declan. “I’ll not stay longer.”

  Matthew shook his head. “To give Otter Harbour a proper chance needs at least six months. But I’ll accept end of January.”

  “No! November,” said Declan. “That’s my final word.”

  “January,” said Matthew. “That’s my final word.”

  They eyed one another, Declan defiant, Matthew stubborn, both equally determined.

  “How do I know I can trust you?” said Declan. “How do I know you’ll keep your word?”

  Kate was horrified. “Declan! I’ll not allow you to speak to your uncle like that! In his own house! God strike me dead if I’m telling a lie, but Matthew never broke a promise in his life.”

  There came a clatter on the stair.

  “November,” said Declan. “I’ll not be...”

  “Good morning,” said Miss Ritter on her way out the door. “It’s another lovely day.”

  “It is,” said Kate.

  “Help yourselves to the cookies,” Miss Ritter sang as the door closed behind her.

  Declan stared at the closed door angrily, then glared at his aunt. “Who is that old woman?”

  “Miss Ritter,” said Kate. “She has the room next to Ana’s. She’s always the cheerful one, isn’t she, Matthew?”

  But Matthew, his mind still on the argument, wasn’t listening. “You’re the stubborn man!” he said to Declan quietly. “But I’m just as stubborn as ye! I said January and January it will be.” He pushed away his empty plate and started to rise from the table.

  “Wait,” said Kate. “I have the solution. Make it after Christmas and make it a part of the deal that Declan go to the school.”

  “Huh?” said Matthew.

  “It’s a deal,” said Declan before his uncle could object.

  There came a patter of bare feet on the stairs as Ana and Thomas tumbled down into the kitchen together, laughing.

  “Welcome back, Declan,” said Ana, smiling.

  “Back, Declan,” said Thomas, a huge grin on his face.

  “You’ve been sitting on the stairs listening,” Kate accused them.

  They laughed.

  Declan looked at Ana. Her pale green eyes looked back at him with a sparkle that told him she had heard every word of the deal he had made with his aunt and uncle.

  After breakfast Ana declared a private holiday, refusing to go to school.

  “What ails you, girl?” said Kate. “Have you lost your senses?”

  “Declan’s back,” she said. “We decided to celebrate, didn’t we, Thomas?” Thomas, still grinning, nodded vigorously. Ana turned to Declan. “Come for a walk with us along the beach. Then after that we’ll show you where the otters live, and there’s a deep pool with an octopus.”

  Declan shrugged.

  They started out. Ana wore her big sunglasses.

  Thomas danced excitedly around Declan, making whooping noises.

  “You’ve made Thomas happy, coming back,” said Ana, “you really have.”

  “Hmmph!” said Declan.

  “Hmmph yourself,” said Ana.

  Chapter Eleven

  They scrambled down the rocky cliff in front of the house and walked along the beach. Thomas tagged along behind, happy to be a follower.

  “Who is Miss Whatsername, the old lady who lives upstairs?” said Declan.

  “Miss Ritter? She came about the same time I started in grade two—that’s about five years ago—when her house burnt down. She forgets things.” Ana laughed. “Poor Miss Ritter. Most of the time she thinks she’s still in her old house, she really does. Believes we’
ve all come to visit her. She’s kind of hilarious, don’t you think? Matthew put in a little kitchen for her with a little hotplate surrounded by that safety stuff . . .”

  “Asbestos.”

  “Right. So she’s pretty independent. Only thing we have to worry about is her burning the house down. I’ve got the job of chief sniffer—because my room is next door. If I smell anything burning, I’m supposed to holler.”

  Ana picked up a thin piece of driftwood and wrote her name in the sand in letters a foot high. Then she handed it to Declan, to write his name beside hers, but he threw it up in the air at a passing gull. Ana gave him a bruised look.

  “Sorry,” said Declan, “but this is not my country for me to be putting my name on.”

  Thomas ran and fetched the driftwood. He tried to write his name in the sand. Ana helped him. They stood back and admired their handiwork. Thomas laughed happily.

  “Your name is spelled with only one n?” Declan said to Ana. He could see he’d hurt her and was sorry.

  “That’s right. I need only one.”

  They walked in silence.

  “How old are you, Ana?”

  “Twelve. I know how old you are—thirteen. And I also know you lost your mother and your sister.”

  They stopped at the edge of the ocean and stood for a while, looking at the breakers rolling in. Declan had his hands in the pockets of his jeans. Ana picked up a stone and threw it into the sea. Thomas copied her and started collecting more stones, yelling happily as he threw them into the surf.

  “It was a bomb explosion, wasn’t it?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.” He hadn’t talked to anyone about the bomb, not even the O’Malleys.

  “It might do you good to talk. That’s what Kate always says and she’s right. It was in a shop wasn’t it, when your mother was shopping?”

  Declan was silent for a while, seeing for the umpteenth time the images from his nightmares. “No,” he said.

  “Where then?”

  He considered. Ana was looking at him. He met her eyes. “It was a restaurant, one of those posh places where ladies go for tea and buttered scones. They’d never been there before; it was a treat.”

  They continued along the beach. Hungry gulls screeched and wheeled overhead, and high on the cliffs black cormorants dried their wings. Thomas was still throwing stones into the sea. Ana yelled back at him, “Come on, Thomas.” She turned back to Declan. “Do you want to tell what happened? You don’t have to, you really don’t, but . . . “

  As they walked, he told her the whole story.

  His ma and Mairead had been sitting at a window table in Ford’s Tea Room. It was Mairead’s birthday, and she was drinking tea with her ma and eating a chocolate eclair, taking care not to drop any chocolate or spill any tea on her new white wool sweater. She was a happy, normal little kid of ten, taking a day off school and shopping with her ma on her birthday.

  “How do you know they were sitting by the window? And how do you know Mairead was eating a chocolate eclair?”

  “I don’t. I wasn’t there; I was at school. But that’s usually the way I see it.” He frowned. “Her white sweater was a birthday gift. Sometimes when I go over it in my head, the details change a bit: sometimes Mairead is eating ice cream with a spoon, and my ma is talking to her and waving a piece of strawberry cheesecake on the end of a fork.”

  By this time they had reached the dock where the boats were tied up. Declan felt the sun warm on his face. They sat together on the bottom of an upside-down herring skiff.

  “The bomb went off at about ten o’clock in the morning,” continued Declan.

  Six people, including Mairead and their ma, Mary Doyle, were killed instantly; two more died on the way to the hospital; and twenty-two people were injured, eight of them seriously.

  “Who did it?” said Ana.

  “The dirty Prods!”

  “The Protestants?”

  “That’s right.”

  It was the police who came to the school with the news. He was called out of his last period history class to go to the headmaster’s study. As he walked along the corridor and down the stairs, he wondered what he had done to arouse the interest of the Head. This of course was before he joined the Holy Terrors, when his worst sin up to then had been thinking impure thoughts about Bridget Fahey, the most beautiful girl in the school, though he didn’t tell this part to Ana.

  “You joined a gang?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Why?”

  “Because the Holy Terrors are sworn to fighting the British. And fighting the Protestant militants. And fighting the police too. We have three enemies: the Brits, the Prods and the police. We’re freedom fighters.”

  When he saw the policeman standing beside the headmaster’s desk and the headmaster himself sitting with his head bowed, the first thing Declan thought was that he was about to be accused of something he hadn’t done.

  The policeman told him quietly about the bomb, and the headmaster said he was sorry and to let him know if there was anything he could do to help. Was there anyone else at home? No, his da was dead; there was only the three of them: Mary Doyle, Mairead and himself. He would be all right, he told the headmaster; there was Mrs. O’Malley next door if he needed anything. They wanted to send someone with him, at least to Mrs. O’Malley’s. He said no.

  He had gone home to an empty house.

  When he had finished talking, Ana sat a little closer to him on the bench. “When did your father die?”

  “About ten years ago. I was only three. They killed him too. With a gun.”

  Ana flinched. “Declan, you’d be crazy to go back there. All that killing. You really would. You gotta stay here; you can’t go back!”

  He shook his head. “You don’t understand. The Irish people have been fighting for their freedom for hundreds of years. Just like the blacks in America. I’m needed. I’ve no choice. Besides, I want to get them—I’ve got to get them—for my sister and my ma. I’ve got to go back.”

  “Oh, I understand all right,” said Ana, her voice heavy with irony, “I understand that you want to go back to all that killing. Look, I feel sorry about your family, Declan, but you’ve still got your own life to live. Killing people isn’t the answer!”

  “It’s my life,” he said angrily.

  “If you call hating and killing a life!”

  “I should have known you wouldn’t understand!”

  Ana bristled. “Maybe I’m younger than you, Declan, but in lots of ways I’m much older. I understand a lot more than you think I do!”

  “You understand nothing!” He jumped up and started back along the beach toward the house.

  Thomas ran. “Wait up, Declan!” he called to Declan’s stiff back.

  “Stay with your know-it-all sister!” yelled Declan.

  When Declan got back, he found his uncle in the old clapboard garage, bent over his workbench, tinkering with a television set.

  Declan looked around. The garage was full of old toasters, TV sets, electrical appliances of all kinds. Many had been cannibalized for their spare parts. There were bicycles and parts of bicycles and junk of every description; in the corner where Matthew had his workbench there was an electric heater.

  Matthew looked up from the TV set.

  “So this is what you do? Repair TV’s?” Declan leaned on the end of the workbench.

  Matthew nodded and waved a hand around the cluttered garage. “I fix things.”

  “People too? Do you fix people too? You fixed me right enough, dragging me over the top of the world and setting me down in your British Prison Columbia. You’re the great pair of fixers, you and my aunt!”

  “We made a bargain. Your sentence expires in just over three months. When the time comes, you are free to go. I will pay your way as I promised.”

  “Three months! You sure sucked me in with all that talk of six months. I see now the pair of you had it all planned. ‘Make it after Christmas.’” D
eclan mimicked his aunt.

  “A bargain is a bargain.”

  “I’m beginning to regret it. How can I trust you? Didn’t you have me kidnapped? And any man who would leave poor Ireland to solve her own troubles is not a man to be trusted.”

  “In Ireland they kill one another. Killing solves nothing, Declan. Blood begets more blood.”

  “Swear an oath on the death of my da!”

  Matthew sighed and raised his big hand. “I swear on the death of my brother Liam, your da.”

  “That you’ll pay my way back home after Christmas.”

  “Home after Christmas.” Matthew turned back to the TV set.

  Chapter Twelve

  Pender was a small school. Mr. Taylor, the principal, said they would start him in grade nine and arrange for his records to be sent from Ireland.

  “Don’t bother,” said Declan. “I won’t be here long.”

  “Where will you be?” Mr. Taylor was a stern man with piercing blue eyes and a way of tilting his head slightly to one side when he asked a question.

  “Back home.”

  “Ireland is still your home? But I understood you have no relatives living there.”

  “No relatives, but Ireland is my country and the Irish are my people.”

  Mr. Taylor studied the form on his desk. “You are now living with your aunt and uncle in Otter Harbour?”

  “Until Christmas.”

  Mr. Taylor smiled. “Give us a try. I think you will like it here, Declan.”

  Declan scowled. “Will there be anything else?”

  Mr. Taylor placed the form in his desk tray. “That’s everything. Let me know if there’s any way I can help you settle in.”

  “Thanks, but I’ve no intention of settling in to anything British.” He got up and grasped the knob of the door. “Especially your British Conundrum Columbia!” He did not wait for a reply, but closed the door behind him, and wandered down to the school cafeteria where he saw Ana chattering with two girls.

  She saw him and came over. “I’m sorry I lost my temper yesterday, Declan.” She smiled. “Kate is right; she’s always telling me I shouldn’t poke my nose into other people’s business.”