Local Whispers

by C K Williams

  Yes, I have been reading a lot of nature writing. And I will still be wanting back my copy of A Month in the Country, if you please. Don’t pretend both of us don’t know who has checked it out of the library cart and has not returned it yet. I donated it to the cart, and I would appreciate seeing it back there.

  But you must be here about poor Alice Walsh. How did I hear? Oh, love, how did anybody hear? It is a little hard to miss, isn’t it, when the police drive through the town with their sirens blaring? Don’t you know that this was the first time, the first time I can ever remember the police having used the siren in Annacairn? Not even during the Troubles. In Newry, yes, with all the British troop transports coming from the coast. I remember that there was an explosion once, and William outside playing football, and he and his friends turned just one corner and saw the burnt-out army vehicle and the dead bodies of the soldiers. That was when I knew this was not where we would be living. No, there were no sirens in Annacairn. Unless my memory tricks me. It feels far away, does it not? Well, to you, it must have. Were you even alive for them? I am sure you weren’t. Just like Alice Walsh. You have known nothing but peace.

  It feels like history to you, you say? All you learned about in school were Vikings and kings and mediaeval battles? Well, it is different for us. My brother, a Detective Sergeant at the time, he was kidnapped on the border by the IRA in the 1990s. All he had done was go on a fishing trip. They tortured him for five days before they summarily executed him. All we got back was his body in parts.

  So, yes, I heard the sirens. I was out in the garden, checking for mushrooms. I was paying close attention because they are easy to confuse with other fieldcap mushrooms. William and Tessa were with me, good enough to help their mother out in the garden. They had spent the night. William and Tessa do not see eye to eye, of course. William can be a bit of a fool sometimes. He married a Republican, for one.

  You thought my son and I were not on visiting terms? Oh, no, you would be quite wrong. I love my son. I would do anything for him. And so would his sister. We are family. An old family. My family has owned land here even before the Irish Rebellion. That was in 1641. My forefathers were part of the Protestant Ascendancy. Of course, this is all long ago. But old roots do not wither. They reach deep. They are stronger than you think.

  Oh, yes, it is true. Catholics could not vote or attend the Irish Parliament back then. You may consider that unjust. Look at you, I can see your expression turning all dark. But these days, I feel like my voice barely counts anymore at all. Simply because I am old. Take the referendum; ask for the will of the people, but when you do not like the will of the people, you say that it is too many of the elderly voting, and that is the only reason why Leave won. As if we weren’t part of the people simply because we are old. As if we did not matter anymore. As if it wasn’t bad enough that I had to give up my wonderful car. All electric, too. Not too old to know what is good for the planet, I assure you!

  It does feel very much like that. As if the elderly did not matter anymore. I hardly recognise the country I live in these days. I used to be a judge, as I am sure you are aware. When I practised the law, it ensured order. Now, all the law seems to do is let people get off with slaps on the wrist. The moment they legalise abortion, you might as well abolish all courts. Just let everyone walk around murdering and pillaging, why don’t we?

  But I am boring you, aren’t I? You young people believe this is all a little sectarian, don’t you? Alice certainly thought so. She was so young but had such strong opinions already.

  God, Norah, isn’t it terrible? Or should I call you Detective Constable when you are on duty? Of course, I can do that. It feels odd only because I have known you ever since you were a little girl, coming to get all your reading material from the library cart. Most of those books were donations from my library.

  No, you are right. This isn’t what you have come here to talk about. But I simply do not know what to say. It was William who told me that Alice Walsh was dead. That they had found her body, and that you had taken in Kate for questioning. Nothing came of it, I suppose, since you released her? It is frightening, is it not, to think that a doctor would be involved in such a crime? To think of how many times I sat in her office, looking at that scalpel on her desk, a touching, if ludicrous gift of her parents’. Then again, from my time as a judge, I know it is silly to think of doctors as better people. They commit crimes just the same as any other profession. And their crimes tend to have more dire consequences.

  There is that man visiting her. Jannis Loose, his name is, I believe. Like Janice Joplin. From Germany. Not a Nazi, of course. At least not as far as I can tell.

  No, no, he is all right. Quite all right. I will say, I do not see why he should involve himself so much. It is hardly any of his business, all of this, is it? But I am glad someone is taking care of Kate. She must be frightened out of her wits, with the threats she has been receiving. You are aware of those, aren’t you? Are you doing anything about that?

  Had I noticed anything unusual about Alice Walsh? Well, let me think. I did not see much of her, of course, except for when she helped me out with my library. It needs sorting out. Before I leave this mortal coil.

  Anything unusual…

  Well, I don’t know.

  It does not seem decent.

  I trust that this will remain confidential.

  If it goes to court, of course, but until then…

  Alice went to Cork for her summer holiday. And I thought she came back changed. She seemed more secretive. Maybe even a little angry. Confused. And she seemed to have trouble in school. The other girls were teasing her.

  No, I could not possibly tell you what about.

  I would have no clue whatsoever.

  Except that there was perhaps a hint in the books she chose to steal from my library.

  Oh yes. She stole my classics. She took them without telling me and never returned them. My copy of The Well of Loneliness. Nana, by Emile Zola, I am sure you have heard of it. Q. E. D. by Gertrude Stein. And Mrs Dalloway, by our very own Virginia Woolf.

  You do not know what these books have in common?

  They are about love affairs between women, Detective Constable.

  Make of that what you will. I know nothing for certain. But perhaps Father Daniel does?

  What do you mean, Alice Walsh never went to church? Of course she did.

  Oh no, not to mass. She went in secret. To confession, perhaps?

  I am sure there is a harmless explanation why she went in secret. Maybe she did not want her parents to know, or her mother at least, who had been so adamant Alice practise the faith. Perhaps Alice did not want her mother to know that she had finally succeeded in her cajoling, her threats, her pleas.

  Or perhaps there was another reason. But why would you keep church visits secret? What reason could there be?

  How do I know? From Tessa. Tessa cleans the church, on Tuesdays and Thursdays, when there is no mass. Did you not know that?

  Alice Walsh was there. Every Tuesday. Every Thursday. As if there was something weighing on her conscience. She always met with Father Daniel. Always just the two of them. She might have confided in him, mightn’t she?

  Why did I not say so the first time you came knocking?

  Oh, goodness. I did not think that it was important.

  Day 4

  Saturday 5th January 2019

  Evidence #10599

  Category: Diary, Victim’s

  Description:

  Diary of Alice Walsh, discontinued for unknown reasons after the summer of 2018

  1/8/2018

  Still in Cork. Met someone today. Two someones, I guess. Betha and Enda. They’re twins. It’s funny, twins. They’re funny. More than funny. We met on the beach, can you imagine? Because it’s been pissing down, that’s why it’s funny, and that’s why it happened in the first place: hard to overlook the only two other nutcases out in that weather. But I like to walk by the sea in the rain. It looks s
o wild. So wild.

  And the sound of raindrops on my hood, that’s also beautiful.

  They speak Gaelic. And French. I know because they helped a French couple find their way to the public loos, after we’d left the beach. I want to learn Gaelic. It sounds beautiful. It is going to be this huge issue though. Maybe I should learn French instead. That’s not going to be as much of an issue, maybe.

  I wonder if it’s difficult. Learning another language. I never really gave it a serious go in school I think and now school’s almost over and Betha and Enda, when they go to uni they’ll do semesters abroad in Paris and I’ll be stuck in Belfast or Dublin. Fuck everything.

  * * *

  4/8/2018

  Every day with Enda and Betha. Enda has to leave tomorrow. He’s going to a summer school in Prague at the uni there because he’s this fucking over-achiever. It’s sad. We got sloshed. It’s morning now. Last night was wild though. It was really beautiful.

  We talked about learning Gaelic. They said I should. I said it’s an issue. They said it shouldn’t be an issue, it’s a language, languages are there to help you communicate with people. It’s awesome when you can suddenly understand people you couldn’t understand before.

  I laughed. Language is there to be spun, I said, to make you believe shit that isn’t true. Like the whole referendum bullshit.

  I think I shocked them. Betha especially. I really didn’t want to shock her. I want to…

  I want to impress her.

  * * *

  6/8/2018

  You know what I found out? They’d been raised with Gaelic. They had to learn English in kindergarten. They learned my language, so that they could talk to me. Did I learn their language? No, I didn’t. Here the two of them are, making all these plans, going to summer schools in Prague and semesters in Paris, and my universe extended as far as Dublin and maybe Edinburgh or London. I mean, what the fuck? There’s a whole world out there and I’m like no I can’t learn Gaelic that’s too much of an issue. Why is that a fucking issue? Who’s decided that it is? And you know maybe I also wanna go to Paris or Prague or whatever, but with Brexit, that isn’t going to happen, is it? The future doesn’t look so bright anymore, suddenly. And the suicide rates in the North are through the roof. Maybe it’s because… I don’t know what that is.

  I thought maybe it would be awkward with Betha, without Enda, but it’s not.

  I am so glad.

  * * *

  9/8/2018

  She’ll come to visit. In the winter. She promised. And Enda will come, too. I wonder if this is for real. Or if we will all realise, once I am back home and we don’t get to see each other every day anymore, that we were just friends for a season.

  I hope we won’t.

  Though, maybe.

  Maybe it’d be better.

  Then I could stop wondering.

  Why I feel so drawn to her.

  * * *

  10/8/2018

  I’m happy.

  God, I am so very happy.

  I kissed her.

  * * *

  11/8/2018

  Okay, so we were both drunk last night, and it was my last night, and I think that’s why we kissed. We were drunk. And I didn’t want to go. I wanted to see her again, and not be in a different country from hers. But I’m back home now. Crossed the border. Not that there was anything to cross. But there might be. Soon. And then what? I mean, what the fuck. What the actual fuck. This is one thousand fucking per cent unnecessary. One thousand fucking per cent. One thousand fucking per cent. And it’s not like the majority of people here said they wanted out. It’s the British bastards, isn’t it, that want out? Well, they can fucking go if they fucking want to.

  * * *

  13/8/2018

  Told Elizabeth about Betha and Enda today, when I helped her sort through her books. She made a joke, consorting with the enemy. Ha-fucking-ha. Might have snapped at her. Might also have taken a few books.

  Not stolen. I’ll return them.

  I don’t know where to keep them. They are all… books about…

  Women who love women. Or women who love women and men. Queer women.

  Am I queer?

  I can’t be.

  It’s just… It’s just Betha.

  It’s just that I miss them. Betha and Enda.

  Especially Betha.

  Fuck.

  What my mum would have to say about that.

  I can’t be. I can’t be.

  What if I am?

  School would turn into hell. Life would turn into hell. My whole life.

  Fuck. Shit.

  Maybe if I just slept with a man… Because I haven’t. Never before. Not yet.

  But maybe if I did, then I’d know. Whether that’s for me.

  Yes, I need to find someone who’ll do it. Someone who won’t ever tell my parents.

  * * *

  21/8/2018

  I know who. He’d never tell Mum and Dad. And then, when Enda and Betha come to visit, I’ll know. I’ll know what to do. What to tell Betha. And how.

  He’s perfect.

  09:46

  It is the bright light of morning, the police have been here and left again, and we are dressed and back at the living-room table, bent over the threatening letters. Kate is wearing a grey chequered suit; she loves suits so much because she came from nothing, and it still makes her feel real when she puts one on. As if she was someone. And she needs to feel like she is someone just now, a real person, not a doctor whose practice is empty.

  I am wearing a wool cardigan, anything to warm the cold fear out of my blood. Kate is still looking at the new letter, her brow furrowed, fingers against her lips, leaning over the table. Her fingers are as elegant as her legs, all her limbs made to dance. It physically hurts, imagining what these fingers would look like smashed to mush with the heavy butt of a rifle. These legs, perforated by six, seven, twenty bullets. It hurts even more because we are fighting. About the letter.

  “They are Bible quotations,” I point out.

  “Anyone can pick up a Bible,” Kate says. “This does not point to Daniel any more than it points to Megan Walsh.”

  “I am not saying that it points to Daniel,” I reply, patience wearing thin. “But you are going to have to accept that it is very likely that someone you know is threatening you, whether you like it or not. I saw a rifle in the church, at the vigil,” I go on. “Who owns that one?”

  Kate looks at me. Her eyes are guarded. “It’s Daniel’s.”

  For a moment, all I can do is gape at her. “Father Daniel owns a weapon?”

  “You think only men like Sean own guns?” Kate asks, almost scoffing at me. She is right to scoff. I should know better than that. Still, Daniel would not have struck me as the kind of man to be into shooting. “Plenty of people own rifles around here,” Kate goes on. “Sean, William O’Rawe, the Adamses. Maybe even Megan and Patrick, yes. I don’t know.”

  There were plenty of rifles leaning against the wall of the Walsh’s house. William O’Rawe was there, too. We still don’t know how his wife Florence knew about Kate’s injury. I didn’t say anything, Kate didn’t say anything.

  That only leaves Daniel.

  To hell with it. “I’m going to see Father Daniel right now.”

  “I’m coming with you,” Kate says.

  “No, you aren’t,” I say sharply. She got to object with her little visit to the graveyard, now it’s my turn. “You will lock the door behind me and not go out on your own, do you understand?”

  Kate’s expression twists into something awful.

  “Last night, there was a man outside your house with a rifle,” I say, clenching my teeth so that I will not shout.

  “He did not do anything. If he wanted to do something, why did he just stand there?”

  “You cannot seriously tell me that you are not at least a little bit frightened!”

  “Don’t you fucking shout at me,” she answers.

  “I am sorry,” I say
, trying with all my might not to shake her. “I didn’t want to shout at you. Listen, please stay here. I want you to be safe.”

  “By hiding in my house?” she hisses.

  “You were attacked!” I take a step towards her. “Kate, someone used violence against you, and they were standing outside your house with a rifle last night.”

  I can see that she is struggling. She wants to protest, but she knows I’m right.

  It seems to be physically painful for her, but she nods.

  10:39

  The church lies empty as I walk in. Grey daylight is filtering in through the windows; the ceiling is so high, so high above me. When I look up, it seems to be spinning away from me for a moment. It doesn’t exactly make me feel better when I see the rifle, once again leaning carelessly against a wall at the back of the church.

  I make for the side door to the left of the altar, hoping to find Daniel behind it, assuming it leads to the sacristy.

  When I am no more than three feet away from it, it is suddenly pushed open from the other side, making me jolt backwards. Barely far enough to avoid the collision, Daniel’s chest brushing mine before he even realises I am there. Again he freezes, as if in shock. He is right there, right in my face, him and his tall body and long throat and wide innocent brown eyes.

  I am breathing hard all of a sudden.

  For a moment, I think that so is he.

  Then he takes a decided step back, looking me up and down again, and his expression turns stormy.

  “You don’t seem glad to see me,” I say, bluntly. Perhaps this is his tell, that expression. Perhaps he did let it slip that Kate was attacked, and that is why he is shrinking from me.