by Carol Coffey
Sam Moran was late leaving his office in Wicklow town for the fourth time this week and was aware that Mona would think he was either carrying on behind her back or was hitting the bottle. He was doing neither – not that either activity was beyond him and he hadn’t exactly been a model husband. What he was actually doing was working, finishing off mindless reports on marts, house prices, and other tedious articles that Talbot said he was falling behind on. When he was sure that the rest of the staff had left the office he would spend a couple of hours looking through archives on IRA activity in Wicklow and on the Byrne murder, hoping to find a connection. Most Thursday evenings he would have joined the usual bar flies for a couple of pints before going home but the truth was he hadn’t felt at ease since his meeting with McCracken in Dublin the previous week. On more than one occasion, he felt that he was being watched. He knew that his imagination was not running away with him. He had met plenty of rough types before and was not easily scared. What worried him more was his friend’s warning that McCracken was involved with the Provos. Although logic told him that this was unlikely, it was unusual for Rabbit to be either wrong or scared and he was definitely scared. But it didn’t make sense to Sam. Why would a well-educated man of McCracken’s social standing be involved with the Provos?
As he left the office he pulled his collar up against the cold wind that blew around the yard noisily, scattering the fallen leaves. The sky was dark grey, threatening a heavy downpour. In a corner of the parking area, Sam thought he caught a glimpse of a figure behind a large tree and felt his heart skip a beat. If someone was trying to scare him, they were making a good job of it. He quickly got into his car, locking the door before driving swiftly away towards home.
Kate squealed nervously as she drove the battered truck through the near field, Dermot sitting beside her, white-knuckled and tense in the passenger seat. He had moved the cattle from the field earlier that morning, joking with Kate that he was afraid she would run them over. Dermot was teaching Kate to drive. He noticed over the past few days that her face looked younger, now that Seán was in hospital. She was at least getting to sleep through the night and with both Ben and Tess away all day, she had more time to herself than she had ever known.
Kate was nervous about the idea of driving at first. She wasn’t sure that she would ever need to learn how to drive but Dermot had insisted, saying that if neither he nor Seán were around and Ben was ill, she would need to be able to take him to town. Kate knew that Seán might not recover and hoped that she could rely on Dermot to be around. She looked squarely at him.
“You’re not thinking of abandoning me, are you?” she asked half-smiling, not wanting to make a big deal out of it but nervous just the same.
“No, Kate, I’m not, but you need to be as independent as possible, you know?”
“Yeah, you’re right,” Kate replied, still feeling slightly worried that Dermot had had enough of working part-time on the small farm and perhaps had notions of moving on. She had to know if this was the case and despite the jokes and laughter at her hopeless driving, the question burned in her mind for the rest of the lesson.
When they went back to the house, Kate offered him some tea and they sat in silence as they ate leftover fruitcake and put turf on the dying fire. Winter seemed to have stolen autumn’s place and an icy wind had blown about the farm for days.
When he stood to go back to work, Kate followed him to the door. He turned, sensing that she had something to say.
“Dermot, I meant what I said. I like having you here. I’d hate to see you go. I . . . I need you here . . .”
Dermot smiled shyly at Kate. He wanted to hold her, to kiss her but stood awkwardly in the doorway, blushing slightly and lowering his head towards the floor to hide his discomfort.
“I’m not going anywhere, Kate, honestly. I like it here. I like being with you,” he said slowly, amazed at his candidness. “You’ve nothing to worry about.”
He looked up at Kate who seemed as nervous as he was. His heart raced as he leaned slowly forward, Kate leaning in to meet him, and they kissed clumsily and quickly in the open doorway. They separated and looked away, both of them self-conscious and embarrassed. Dermot moved forward again and wrapped his strong lean arms around her. He could feel her body tremble as he pulled her towards him and kissed her again, their shyness now dissipating. They kissed more fervently, Dermot moving her wayward curls as he kissed her neck, her face, her lips. Kate raised herself onto her toes and pushed her body into his large frame, moving her hands passionately through his thick black hair, his arms now caressing her back. They parted again and looked into each other’s eyes, searching, questioning. This moment was just as she had imagined it would be on so many lonely nights in her room. It felt natural and almost familiar, as though they had always been together. Dermot smiled at her and ran his fingertips gently along her face. He kissed her once more, very gently, then he left the kitchen and went back to his work, leaving Kate smiling shyly behind the closed door.
Chapter 29
1974
Three months, two weeks and five days after Leroy left the institution, he returned abruptly and without notice. He was led by two police through the shocked crowd in the common area on the second floor where the children were having a drama lesson and were practising their new play. Tess who was sitting to one side, her fingers placed in her ears to drown out the sound of tin whistles and recorders, dropped her arms and looked at her friend. His face was cut and bruised. He smiled at her, showing two missing front teeth, and raised his arm slowly and painfully to wave at her. Tess stared after him until he disappeared from view. A strange feeling rose in her stomach that she did not recognise, something like the feeling you get on a swing but not exactly the same. She looked at the teacher whose eyes had begun to water and at the nurse who was shaking her head from side to side as she walked quickly to the teacher’s side.
“Again!” the nurse whispered. “I wouldn’t let her mind a dog, never mind that poor boy!”
Tess heard this but then lost track as the nurse continued to speak in a whisper and the teacher nodded, her eyes still moist.
At the nurses’ station that evening Tess stayed out of view and listened carefully as the finishing shift brought the night shift up to date. Tess found it easier to hear what people said when she didn’t have to look at their faces and couldn’t understand why people always insisted on this. She could never find the words to tell them that if she had to look at them, she couldn’t hear them and had no idea what they were asking her to do. She waited patiently until she heard her friend’s name mentioned.
“Leroy Brennan returned today. The police picked him up and brought him to hospital. He’s had four stitches to a cut above his right eye. His face and torso are badly bruised and he has lost two teeth. He said he has no pain but staff should check on him later,” the voice said matter-of-factly.
“Do we know what happened yet?” a female voice asked.
“He said his mother’s boyfriend beat him because he refused to go to the shop for cigarettes. She’s saying he was fighting with kids in the flats.”
Tess could hear some of the nurses make “tut-tutting” sounds although no one spoke and they moved on to discuss the next child.
Tess did not see Leroy for the rest of the day but was pleased when he appeared in the common area that evening and quietly sat down beside her. She heard him take a deep breath.
“My mam got a new boyfriend,” he said simply before raising his hands to his bruised face and falling silent beside her.
Tess knew that Leroy did not want her to ask any questions so she remained silent, glad to have her only friend back. She noticed that Leroy had reverted to his strong American accent which had mellowed in previous months.
At breakfast the following morning some of the other kids were dying to rile Leroy about yet another short stay with his mother.
“Where’s your ma, Leroy?”
“Dunno,” he said sha
rply, looking at Tess and reddening slightly beneath his light brown skin.
“Didn’t take her long to dump you this time, did it?” another voice asked from the other end of the table.
“Shut up!” Leroy shouted, feeling increasingly angry and hoping to stop the conversation before it got too far. He did not want Tess to know the truth about his mother, not when he couldn’t even face it himself.
“Ah, face it, Leroy. She only wants you wh–”
Leroy pushed the boy in the chest, knocking him off the bench and onto the ground before savagely beating him on the head with his closed fists. Two nurses moved quickly from the corner and separated the two, holding them back as they tried to lunge at each other again.
Leroy looked over at Tess and was upset to see that the fighting had distressed her and that she had jumped up from her seat and was now kneeling on the ground rocking back and forth. She was muttering about a lake.
The taller nurse pulled Leroy by the arm and insisted he apologise while simultaneously asking the other boy, whose face was bleeding, to apologise for upsetting Leroy. Tess quietened quickly and watched with great interest as the boys shook hands and said their sorrys before walking swiftly away. Within minutes the fracas was over and everyone returned to the table to finish their breakfast. Tess stared around at the other children and at the two nurses who had resumed their conversation in the corner as though the fight had never taken place. Something about this intrigued her. She quickly recorded each sequence of the event in her mind, anxious to remember everything and replay it later in the quiet of her usual hiding place.
Chapter 30
1981
In Wicklow town, Sam Moran peered out through the dusty office blinds before grabbing his coat to leave for the day. Over the past few weeks his days had been more or less the same. As well as his usual columns, he worked late on the Byrne case before going straight home. His new-found commitment to the newspaper didn’t go unnoticed by his employer who was trying to make more of an effort to get along with him.
Sam had become more nervous of late as Mona had told him a man had knocked one morning looking for him. Naturally, she thought her errant husband had brought some trouble on himself and quizzed Sam all evening about it. Mona was partly right. Sam was sure that McCracken or one of his henchmen was watching him since their meeting but he wondered what they wanted as they knew his routine by now. Sam also knew the visit to his house was another warning, a warning which said “We know where you live, we know you have a family so keep your mouth shut” and wondered if this was the last he would hear about it.
Despite the threat, he had continued making discreet enquiries. He thought he had stumbled on something much bigger than the Byrne murder and knew that if he figured out what that was, he could find himself at the top of his game.
Sam was just about to get into his car when he heard a voice call his name. From behind the tree a man’s voice told him to come over where they couldn’t be seen. Sam thought about getting into his car and driving off as fast as he could as there was no one in the office to come to his aid.
As if he read his thoughts the voice said, “I wouldn’t even think about driving off. I have a gun pointed at you. You won’t get far.”
Sam stood back from the car. He couldn’t understand how he could think so clearly but he reasoned that if this bloke wanted to kill him, he would have done it by now. He figured they just wanted to intimidate him some more, make sure he would keep his nose out of the Byrne case. Sam walked slowly to the corner of the yard, towards the oak tree where the voice was coming from. He thought the accent sounded Northern but there was a howling wind so he couldn’t quite make it out. He looked fleetingly to his left at the row of windows in his office building.
“I know there’s no one in there, don’t think we haven’t been watching you, so quit the shit!” the voice said.
Definitely a Northern accent, Sam thought to himself.
“What do you want with me?” he asked, trying to sound as though he wasn’t frightened.
“Come closer.”
Behind the tree stood a short, stocky man, not McCracken, wearing jeans and a black jacket with expensive-looking leather shoes. He was also wearing a balaclava.
Very fucking brave, thought Sam.
“Despite our warning, you’ve been going around asking questions about a mutual friend of ours, haven’t ye now?”
“Depends on what friend you’re talking about,” Sam quipped. “I have a lot of friends.”
Sam felt the barrel of the gun against his cheek and fell backwards, only just managing to stop his fall. He straightened himself up and looked directly at the masked man.
“Don’t get smart, mister!” said the man. “You’re in no position to get mouthy. Now, we know where ye live, lovely wife by the way, nice arse. Lovely kids too, daughter looks like she’ll be a looker like her oul’ one. Might take a better look next time I call.”
Sam swallowed hard and knew his mouth had, as usual, got the better of him. He stayed silent, waiting.
“Take this as your last warning. If we hear about you asking questions about our friend, you won’t get another chance. Do you understand what I’m telling ye?”
“Yes,” Sam replied weakly.
The masked Northerner stepped out and looked around him quickly. He punched Sam twice in the face and ribs, knocking him to the ground before kicking him in the stomach.
“That’s to make sure you’re not a slow learner, right?”
Sam coughed hard on the cold ground and tried to catch his breath. When he sat up he felt sticky ooze coming from his face and knew he was bleeding. He let out a long groan as he stood up. He got into his car, turned on the light and looked at his face in the rear-view mirror. There was a long, narrow gash just below his eye from which blood trickled down his face, making the cut look much worse than it was. His ribs hurt. He hadn’t been beaten up since he was a teenager in Dublin, preferring in his later years to talk his way out of trouble. But there would be no talking his way out of this. He knew these people meant business. Whatever it was that McCracken was hiding, it was heavy. Even though he realised the danger he was in, he already knew he would continue working on the story, the desire to know what McCracken was hiding fuelling his insatiable curiosity. He needed to know how Byrne and McCracken were connected and would have to come up with ideas to get this information without drawing attention to himself.
He drove off, looking into his rear-view mirror to check if anyone was following him but feeling slightly ridiculous as he did so. The cut below his eye had started to bleed more profusely. He knew he was facing a long night of interrogation from Mona and spent the journey concocting a story even she would believe.
Kate was worried. The letter for Tess from her training course stated that they had found her work experience in Marshall’s Art and Craft Centre in Glenmire, a larger town about twenty miles from Árd Glen. Kate did not like the thought of Tess in a town where no one knew about her difficulties. At least in Knockbeg, some of the women doing the course with Tess had been from around the area and knew the family. Nurse O’Connell tried to reassure her, reminding her how worried she had been when Tess started the course. Kate was pleased to see the changes in her younger sister who, although anxious about the two-week work experience, was also excited about her “first job”. Kate finally relented and was pleased that, as there was no daily bus to Glenmire, Dermot would have to drive Tess there and collect her each day. The work experience wasn’t due to start for another four weeks and perhaps by then she would be confident enough to drive Tess there herself.
Delighted that her sister had agreed to let her go, Tess jumped around the room excitedly. She couldn’t wait to show her new boss how well she could type and answer the phone. Later, when the reality of the upcoming change set in, she withdrew to her room, making lists of all the things that could go wrong.
Later that day, when Kate visited her brother in hospital, she found hi
m propped up in bed. A drip slowly fed fluid into a vein in his left arm and his skin was covered in a light pink lotion. He was shaved and bathed and looked like he had already put on weight. Kate hadn’t visited the first week, pretending to her older brother that Ben had been sick and that she hadn’t wanted to bring any infection into the hospital. The truth was she hated seeing Seán so ill and, besides, there was a small part of her that was still smarting about him hitting her only a couple of weeks before. She wasn’t sure if her brother was annoyed that she hadn’t visited sooner as he looked sleepily in her direction with no particular expression on his face. She looked around the ward, which had a long row of beds on either side, each placed directly under a long narrow window. The room was sparse and clean with each bed covered by crisp white sheets and pillows with a small wooden locker by its side. There were no flowers, no colour, and the ward was silent as seven or eight men lay on their beds sleeping. Kate wondered if Seán was sedated as his eyelids were half closed.
She told him that she was learning to drive and he showed some interest. She told him about Tess’s work experience but could tell that he didn’t want to hear anything about his youngest sister. He asked her about the farm. Kate hadn’t heard Seán express an interest in the farm in years and wondered if he was going to recover and return to the man he had been.
After sitting by his bedside for some time she could see that he was tired. As she rose to leave, he gently caught her hand and shook it. He had tears in his eyes. When Kate asked him what was wrong, he simply shook his head. She kissed her brother on the forehead, something she had not done in a very long time and promised to return in a couple of days. When she reached the top of the large, old-fashioned ward, she looked back. Seán was waving weakly at her. She could see that he was smiling. She waved back and slowly walked out of the ward down several long corridors towards the exit and cried all the way home.
