‘A born trickster,’ Tommy Martin agreed.
Billy Winters went out into the May sunlight, cupped his hands and shouted down:
‘Ward!’
Ward looked up. Billy beckoned with a wave of his right arm and watched as Ward came up the stairway, conscious that his movements were more cat- than carter-like. Billy went through to his office, pulling at his nose talking back over his shoulder:
‘I have this small problem, Liam.’
‘You’ll solve it, Mr Winters.’
As Ward followed Billy into the office, he saw the uniform, engaged Quinn’s eyes for a second:
‘The law’s high up today!’
When Quinn did not respond, Ward said:
‘And how is Inspector Quinn?’
‘Biding my time, son.’
‘Trouble growing in the fields?’
‘A lot of noxious weeds about; we’ll deal with them.’
Billy interposed.
‘I had a visit this morning, Liam, from your parish priest.’
‘Your friend, Leo McManus.’
‘Client, Liam, I have no friends, no enemies, just clients . . . what did you do on him?’
The pause extended unnaturally until Ward asked:
‘What’s he saying?’
‘He’s saying he’ll cancel all orders from this quarry for the church avenue if I hire you to deliver . . . that’s what he’s saying’.
‘Jesus,’ Ward muttered.
‘Mind your language, Ward,’ the Inspector said.
‘Is it aginst the law now to say “Jesus”?’
‘I’m cautioning you, boy.’
‘You’re a caution all right.’
‘What did you do on him?’ Billy asked again.
‘You tell me . . . I haven’t a pup’s notion.’
‘He broke up a crossroads dance and someone broke up his new glasshouse before he got back . . . He thinks it was you.’
‘He could be right,’ Tommy Martin muttered.
‘Stick to you sums, Tommy,’ Ward said.
‘Was it?’ Billy asked.
‘If I wanted to harm the man, I could think of something better or worse.’
‘I’d be certain of that,’ Quinn said.
‘Well that’s it Liam,’ Billy said, ‘you can’t supply for the avenue at Tully but the county roads go on forever . . . you’ll not be stuck for work.’
Billy turned to Tommy Martin and said:
‘Give him a chit for that new stretch out by Dernagola.’
Ward took the piece of paper, looked at it and began moving towards the door. With his back to the three men he said:
‘He’ll be sorry.’
Billy directed his voice to Ward’s back:
‘“The man Ward is bad”, your priest said, “near evil”.’ Ward turned at the door. The three men watched the effect on his face: none.
‘That fellow would turn me into a rabbit,’ Ward said, ‘roast me for his dinner if he could . . . That’s evil . . . tell him that from me.’
Billy coughed out a sudden laugh and called after him as he went down the stone staircase:
‘Tell him that yourself.’
‘A brazen trickster,’ Tommy Martin said again as the Inspector followed Billy out on to the narrow platform which looked down on the quarry.
They watched Ward tell Blessing. A black fox-snout talking into a blonde mule’s ear. They saw Blessing look away and spit. The four-wheeled draycart turned and moved toward the quarry exit.
‘That fella’s no laughing matter,’ Quinn said to Billy as he came back into the office.
‘I know he’s a rogue,’ Billy said.
‘Rogues are harmless,’ Quinn said, ‘that fella’s a villain and if it was my quarry I’d race him.’
‘He’s my tenant and he’s behind with his rent,’ Billy said, ‘and if you can’t work you can’t pay.’
‘I’d poverise him, and for good reason.’
‘Can I hear why?’
Quinn looked away to where his two constables were climbing a steep path towards the top of the quarry accompaning four of Billy’s workmen, each carrying two boxes of dynamite. Constable Shanley was sitting now beside the strong sealed coach.
‘Can I hear why?’ Billy asked again.
‘No, I’m sorry, Billy, you can’t,’ said Quinn.
‘Is it grave as that?’
‘I’d mind my step with that fella . . . That’s all I can tell you for now.’
Billy watched the heavy navy-blue back as Quinn descended the stone steps towards the quarry floor. Two men this morning, both allergic to Ward. A warning?
As Quinn and Shanley moved towards the sealed wagon, Ward dropped his voice and muttered, ‘Up cadging a cheap tombstone from Billy Winters.’ Quinn turned and almost barked:
‘The cowards mutter . . . say your piece out loud, son!’
‘Blessed,’ Ward said aloud, ‘are the peacekeepers for they shall be called the R.I.C. . . . the Queen’s Royal Irish Constant Bullery!’
Shanley put his hand on his leather-covered truncheon. Quinn restrained him by saying quietly:
‘Let him jape for now. When we get him in a cell some night, we’ll put manners on him.’
6
At the top of the staircase, Beth paused at the hall window which looked down on the yard. From this window, twelve months ago, she had first seen Ward walk through the arched entry and stand waiting until he glanced up and saw her. Billy was away in Portland buying stone. Mercy had gone with a basket of tea, eggs, meat and bread to the hay-makers in the lake meadow beyond the fort field, a good half mile away. Beth had no idea who Ward was or what he was doing in the yard. She remembered afterwards sensing that her life would be different from that moment, would be bound up in some way with this man.
On her way down the staircase she had tried to decide who he could be: a new apprentice mason at the quarry? Some kind of merchant from Dublin or Belfast? A French or Italian mechanic for the new stone-crusher?
‘Yes?’ she had said at the back door.
Ward crossed the cobbles towards her. Even from where she stood she could see the cat-like tawny flecks in his green eyes. He seemed to have a slight turn in one which gave his face an uncommon look, an expression she found difficult to read. He was very good-looking, fine-skinned, dark; a kind of beardless Christ with slightly irregular teeth. His voice when he spoke was much darker than expected, a hint of Fermanagh combined with a slight American drawl:
‘Is the boss about?’
‘He’s away till Thursday.’
‘I’m Liam Ward of Brackagh.’
‘Tom Ward’s nephew.’
‘That’s me.’
‘Then we’re neighbours.’ She held out her hand.
‘I’m your father’s new tenant.’
‘You have a problem, Liam?’
‘Yes . . . an old fool of a cow in a bog-hole and no manbody for miles about to help pull her out . . . they’re all at hay.’
‘We’ve a big pony here, you’re welcome to him. Have you someone to lead him?’
And when Ward had hesitated, she said:
‘I’m free: I can lead him for you.’
Very quickly he helped her to bridle and harness Punch into the gig. They were heading for Brackagh within five minutes. Sitting alongside him she was conscious of his bare arms, and because of this she had kept talking, asking one question after another which seemed embarrassing in retrospect. He had answered with ease. Only later did she realise they were skilled half-answers; he elaborated nothing. Yes, he had been gone for over ten years. Yes, he was first hired out at Clonoula as a child. Yes, he had spent a while at Florencecourt as a stable-boy. Yes, he had been six years in America, two in Dublin, and yes he had two shire horses. Today he had loaned them to a neighbour, Blinky Blessing, who had them in Enniskillen; and no, nobody could live off thirty acres of Fermanagh scrubland. Or for that matter, a hundred acres of scrubland here or anywhere. The avenue of Clonoula went
very steeply at the end towards the gatelodge, a track dug out of the side of an extended drumlin sometime in the eighteenth century.
Emerging onto the county road they turned sharp right, went on a hundred yards up the road, then veered left into a rutted lane between two heathery bog-mounds. Hungry scutch-grass spined the lane, tentacles of briar reaching from the verges. The whole of Brackagh as far as she could see was deep in meadowsweet, coarse wild grass and giant hemlock. Beyond this rough land, there were islands of birchwood and alder and a small lake or pond called Laban.
Above Laban Lake, Ward’s house stood on a slight elevation, set in a grassy island. Half the house was thatched, the other half roofed with rusting tin. There were a few hardwood trees and a small orchard. She remembered the talk about his uncle Tom Ward: a thatcher and poacher; how he had managed to weave his way drunk up this dark lane on winter nights, year in, year out, and how everyone said he would be found in a bog-hole. In spite of the forecasts, he had died in his bed, sober.
Suddenly through the maze of cut-over bog, she saw a bovine head rear and plunge. There was a calf standing near by. The calf blared as they approached. Ward got down from the gig and led Punch towards the bog-hole. A muddy rope hung round the branch of a birch tree. She noticed a spade with a cow’s horn for a handle, a black horn. He tied the rope around the cow’s horns, attaching it to each side of the cob’s collar. He then gave the reins to Beth:
‘I’ll do what I can to get her back feet up.’
He took off his shirt. Beth watched as he reached arm-deep down into the glarry ooze. He pulled up the cow’s tail. He then rubbed it dry with bracken, twined it round his wrists and dug his heels into the edge of the soggy bank, nodding at Beth and saying:
‘Don’t give him his head . . . it could break her neck.’
‘I know what to do,’ Beth said.
As Ward began to pull she led the cob forward very gently, keeping a backward pressure on the bit. For a moment it seemed as if nothing would happen. With a quiet gum-click she encouraged the cob to pull a little harder. The cow blared feebly. There were veins standing out on Ward’s face and neck, then a suction noise as the bog slowly released its hold on the cow. It slid out like a great hunk of black liver, up the bank and on to the coarse, bluish grass. Ward kept a tension on the rope in case the cow staggered up and stumbled in again. It became very clear very quickly that the cow was too weak to move. Beth put her hand on the cows nose; it was cold:
‘She’s very chilled.’
The cow was now giving great involuntary trembles every ten seconds or so. Beth had seen this before, trembles preceding coma followed by death. Ward had begun to clean off the glar and was rubbing the cow vigorously with handfuls of heather.
‘Have you whiskey in the house?’ Beth asked.
Ward thought about this for a moment. He then said, almost reluctantly:
‘I have.’
‘Tell me where and I’ll get it.’
‘In the dresser press, left-hand side, there’s a naggin of whiskey.’
‘How do I get in?’
‘The water-tank at the gable: there’s a stone at the corner of it, the key’s under that stone.’
As she left, Ward was still rubbing the cow. She could see that it was a roan cow.
The front yard, or street, was alive with ducks, geese and hens scraping on a midden topped with scutch-grass and clumps of nettles. The tree at the gable was oak with a malignant growth half-way up and leaves that seemed luridly green. She found the key, and let herself into the kitchen. The smoke-yellowed windows were small, and the interior poorly lit. When her eyes became used to the dimness she began to see detail. It was more like a saddler’s shop than the inside of a cottage: horse collars and hames, britchens and plough reins, saddles and harness, all up on holders. There was a pervasive smell of horse sweat. Everywhere she looked she saw nose-cramps, shears, dipping crooks, hay-rope makers, a clutter of familiar pastoral gadgets. A rope line across the front of the hearth was hung with three shirts, two collarless, one that looked like silk. She touched it. Silk. It was what it seemed.
On the kitchen table there were two catalogues of property sales: both London auctioneers, one of them opened and pencil-marked, coach-house inns, farms, building land. She got the whiskey from the dresser cupboard, unconsciously putting the key in her skirt pocket.
Ward was sitting apart on the root of a fallen birch. From a hundred yards or so she could tell from his posture that the cow was dead.
He got up as she approached, took the bottle and nodded his thanks. There was a silence till she asked:
‘When did you see her last?’
‘Yesterday sometime.’
‘She could have been in there all night?’
‘Very likely she was . . . she was agey.’
‘It’s a loss nonetheless.’
‘Yes.’
He uncorked the naggin of whiskey and offered her the bottle.
‘No thank you.’
She watched as he swallowed. He re-corked the bottle and said:
‘I’m beholden to you, Miss.’
‘I’d do the same for any neighbour.’
They looked in silence at the cow. The calf had moved away, had begun to nibble here and there through the coarse grass.
‘You’ll need a foster-mother.’
Ward nodded:
‘There’s a lot I need.’
‘She could have ended worse,’ Beth said.
‘How?’
‘In a knacker’s yard.’
‘What’s so special about dying in a bog . . . for man or beast?’
‘Don’t you want to be buried with your own people?’
‘When you’re dead you won’t know or care: no one else will either.’
‘That sounds a shade . . .’ she searched for-a word, couldn’t find one and said ‘. . . cold.’
‘Millions of us died in the famine . . . who knows or cares now about any single one of them?’
‘We all do . . . don’t we?’
Ward shrugged, stood up and said:
‘Miss, I’m thankful,’ he said again, and began putting Punch back into the gig.
‘You’ll have a job burying her.’
‘I’ll get help later.’
She was aware as she drove away of his eyes on her back. She knew also that she would not mention this episode to Mercy Boyle, nor to Billy when he returned.
Half-way up the avenue in the failing light she remembered the key in her pocket. Should she go back now or wait till morning? He might be forced to break a window or the lock. He was probably still in the bog burying the cow. She turned the gig and headed back down the avenue again. It was almost dark now in the lane that led to Brackagh. Approaching the area where the cow had died, she saw Ward walking towards the lane-way carrying a spade. In the distance she could see another spade-man topping up the cow’s grave. She reined the pony, waiting till she could make out his face:
‘I put your key in my pocket and forgot. I’m sorry.’
As she was feeling for the key she said:
‘I can bring you home if you like.’
‘I’ll not say no to that,’ Ward said.
‘You got help burying her.’
‘Your other tenant, Blinky Blessing.’
‘You must be exhausted.’
‘I wouldn’t be on for a jig at the minute.’
She heard herself laugh:
‘I’m sorry.’
‘For what?’ Ward said. ‘You’ve had all the bother.’
At the door of the cottage he said:
‘I can give you tea with no milk.’
She heard herself say:
‘I take it that way.’
She sat on a creepie under the chimney and watched him rake back the greesach of hot embers, handing him kindling of small turf and twigs, heather from under the creepie. He scooped up water with a white enamel bucket from a tub in the corner, filled a black kettle and swung it over the fire. H
e then placed two brown eggs in a blackened pot and placed them to boil against the burning turf. When he went down the room towards a wide shelf stacked with bags, jars and tins, she heard a soft flop-noise, and saw then with horror the blind scurry of a rat towards the kitchen door. From where he stood Ward gave a sudden jump, landing with both feet on the rat: crushing it under his boots. To stop it twitching he dug the heel of his studded boot across its neck. He then opened the door and kicked the rat out to the dark street. She felt slightly sick. He went back to the shelf, opened a square tin and took out a loaf of shop bread:
‘That fair sickened you, I’d say?’
‘A little.’
‘Bad cess to them; they can eat their way through stone walls.’
‘Don’t you have a cat?’
‘It died.’
‘We’ve a dozen yard-cats, half-wild; no rats get near the house . . . take two if you can catch them.’
He pushed the brochures, catalogues and newspapers to one side, brushed the board table with his forearm and placed two mugs on it. Inside, the mugs were so brown she could scarcely see the tea when it was poured. She said ‘No thank you’ to the sugar, watching him put four heaped spoonfuls into his mug before buttering thick slices of bread which he had with the boiled eggs. He ate very quickly, swallowing mouthfuls of the hot, sweet tea. He pointed at the loaf with his knife, offering.
‘No thank you,’ she said picking up a brochure:
‘Is this private?’
He shook his head. She began to read the advertisements underlined in pencil. It had to do with steam passage to America and Canada, grants of land in Canada.
‘Are you planning to emigrate?’
‘It’s a neighbour man marked those . . . I’d be more for the Yukon or South Africa . . . Gold.’
‘Don’t you care about Brackagh?’
Ward shook his head.
‘Growing up,’ Beth said, ‘I used to think this bog and Laban Lake were strange and beautiful. A kind of paradise.’
‘Try living here. You’d have the same life as that rat; and who’d choose to slave and be beggared in a bog?’
‘Mr Parnell’s changing all that.’
‘He can’t change the weather, stop blight or beggary, and he’s no King to me . . .’
Death and Nightingales Page 6
