The Whore-Mother (24 page)

The Electricity Supply Board stopped pouring and in the sudden darkness Sorahan bent and coughed to the surprising force of the skinny little man's gun in his stomach. “Get our in the fuckin rain, Mr. Sorahan,” Kiernan said savagely. “You can walk off when yer not wanted.”

Obediently, Sorahan stepped out into the wind and rain. They threatened jurymen. Below, the Atlantic charged the rocks, snarling and growling. What would be left of him?

Kiernan jammed the cottage door open with the kitchen table. The wind and rain whipped in on the woman.

“Why?” Sorahan asked him.

“Drunken oul bitch. She's not sleepin.”

Meanness. Pointless, mindless meanness. Sorahan went up the slope, leaning against the wind, shuddering under the lashing rain, trying not to think; ashamed to think. But his thoughts gnawed at him. Weren't he and Liz the great pair? Was it thirty years ago they did their midwife's share at the long labor of the new Ireland; didn't they get a Dutch cap fitted in London, against the law of the church and the law of the land? Didn't they plan their family of two boys and to hell with the rhythm method? Didn't they support Dr. Noel Browne and Dr. Conor Cruise O'Brien and their Labor Party with money sent quietly? Quietly. Never a word in public though. But a vote in the secret ballot. Silent midwives. Reform in the privacy of the imagination. Hope and pray. And they were old Republicans too. Weren't all proper Irishmen old Republicans wearing two hats? One Ireland. A lovely feeling in the imagination. The imagination. A united Ireland would be nice, wouldn't it? he said to Liz, but it's a long way off, maybe. Think about it, talk about it, keep it alive in the imagination. That was the Irish genius, wasn't it? Imagination. The man behind him wasn't in the imagination. What did the imagination do, for God's sake? It refrigerated the mind and you thawed out at fifty, in the lashin wind and rain on Sheep's Head, and knew you were still only twenty and scared to death, and reality was an ugly thing like the taste of too much whiskey in the mouth in the morning; and the stomach that went with it.

“Cuuu—saaack!” Kiernan yelled, and the wind whipped his voice away in shreds.

Sorahan looked round at him and stepped on air and fell and fell and hit heavily and rolled downhill. He was blind with shock and panic, tearing at short grass that slipped from his fingers and cut them. He came up hard against a boulder and lay winded and hurting and helpless and trembling wildly.

“Jasus,” Kiernan said beside him with genuine concern, “I thought you were a gonner. You walked off the ledge.”

Painfully and slowly they scrambled and crawled back up the treacherous slope. “In here,” Kiernan said. “There's shelter.” Clucking like a mother, he guided Sarah an under the rock overhang he had stepped off. There was somebody under it already. Kiernan's gun was out and waving. “Who is it?”

“Name's Cusack.” The man was sitting, his back against the rock wall. “It's a bad old day.”

“We're lookin for you.”

“Oh.”

Kiernan put his gun away. “We'll not waste time on a wet day,” he said. “We want to know about the young fella w'the gun in his pack. You told the Garda about him.”

“Aye. He told me I was drunk. I was too.”

Kiernan waited for a festering moment. “Mister,” he said, “I come a long way for you. Don't give me any shit. Tell me about the young fella.”

“Why's everybody askin for that one?”

“Who's everybody?”

“The young Yank girl. She went to the Garda after him. She came here too.”

“Wantin what?”

“Where he was. She paid a pound.”

Kiernan grinned slyly and gave him a pound. “Tell us about him.”

“He was down there, where that one fell. Sleepin under that rock. Sick. Right bad.”

“Beard?”

“Whiskers anyway.”

“How sick?”

“Ravin. Shoutin.”

“About what?”

“Maureen.”

“What?”

“That's all I made out. Maureen. That'd be the Yank girl, wouldn't it?”

“Where'd he go?”

“Along the slope.”

“Which way along the slope?”

“Car park way—off the Head.”

“And away?”

“Don't know. Didn't see him that far. He was staggerin round. I seen him fall, twice.”

“Where?”

“Down the slope.”

“And come up?”

“I didn't see. He had that gun.”

Kiernan held out his hand. “Gimme the pound back.”

“I told you,” Cusack said, and didn't move.

“I'm tellin you. Cough up the quid.” The gun was out again. The infallible persuader. Cusack handed over the pound. “Now, you lead us off this fuckin rock,” Kiernan said, “all the way to the car park.” The gun was still waving.

The going was easier on the way off the Head. Cusack knew the sheep and cattle tracks and Sorahan stumbled forward and feared for his ankles but he was steadier when they reached the car. “Go on home,” Kiernan said, and Cusack disappeared into the cloud.

“The last gun that one saw, he told the Garda,” Sorahan said.

“He knows this one could go off. I'll drive.” Kiernan was very much in charge. They crawled in silence down out of the cloud to the road on the south shore.

“Does Maureen mean anything?” Sorahan asked when they were safe.

“She's the sister. She helped McManus get away. She's dead.”

Sorahan's apprehension reared like a shock. He tried to skirt the question in his mind. His stomach couldn't take it yet. “McManus was very sick. He's likely in the sea,” he said weakly. That would be the end of this. He was chilled to his backbone and shivering.

“He's alive.”

“You don't know.”

“The Yank girl found him. She has him somewhere.”

“You don't know.”

“Right y'are. So we'll keep lookin till I do.”

Going through Kilcrohane he asked his question about Maureen. “How did she die?”

“Powers killed her. She wouldn't tell where the brother went. We couldn't let her off.” There was nothing much to it. A punishment.

“And Powers is sent to kill the brother too?” Bitterly Sorahan said, “Isn't one enough, for Christ's sake? Why two?”

“Three,” Kiernan said, staring out at the rain.

“Three?”

“Aye. He raped her before he killed her.”

“Raped her? Jesus Christ!” Sorahan felt sick. Perhaps it was the fall. “And you're goin to help him kill the brother?”

“Aye.”

“You mean that's the kind of scum I got these young fellows out to help?”

“Aye.”

“Don't depend on it, Kiernan!”

“Aye, well, I will, Mr. Sorahan. I will. You're all in this army like the rest of us. I mean, they're in, Mr. Sorahan, and they don't walk out and in as if they joined some oul women's social club, do they now? You and me knows that. You've all been sittin on your arses down here, doin nothin but raisin pennies while our boys is gettin killed and crippled. I'll depend on you and the young fellas. I will, Mr. Sorahan.” The threat was in his voice, not in his gnomish look.

“Don't try to scare us. There's not a man among us who'd lift a finger to help a bastard like that.”

“If it makes you feel any better I'll tell you somethin, Mr. Sorahan.”

“You can't make me feel better. You've already made me feel I want to vomit.”

“I can try, Mr. Sorahan. The story's this, sur. Powers was in charge of a tar-and-feather job and he got one of his men shot dead. He said McManus wusta blame for disobeying orders. then one of the women that was there let out that it was Powers sent McManus off the job. So that's one man lost and a bloody lie to cover it. Then he lost McManus the day he was supposed to kill him. Then afore he started after him he had t'have a night on a wee widow-woman up the street and his mate was took by the British army and he niver lifted a finger. He was seen comin outa the widow's house by a sick oul woman lookin out the window in the house across the street. Then he took the wee widow with him t'Strabane on his way here and they had a dirty-mouthed shoutin match in the hotel after he'd been up her till the cook said he was shakin the house. The polis is keepin the rape outa the papers, but they sneak wee things out when it suits their book and we got the word. They'll niver find Powers and they know we'll save them a wee bita work.”

“You said three?”

“Aye. I did. That's it. You twigged on quick. He has t'finish the job w'McManus, Mr. Sorahan. I have the black cap for him when that's done. That's one thing y'can say for us, Mr. Sorahan, we're terrible hard on bad morals. The only help I'll need from y'is a good place to bury Powers. That makes y'feel better, doesn't it, sur?” Kiernan had found his smile again.

“Christ!” Sorahan waited in his country school for twenty-five years. He waited through all the years for The Day. Now he had it, raw and close. He opened the car window to let the rain blow on his face and wished he could talk to his wife Liz.

“Don't let nothin bother you a bit, Mr. Sorahan,” Kiernan said comfortably, and meant it sincerely. “When Powers is done w'McManus, you and your young fellas is off duty. I'll do the rest of it.” He seemed to think he had pronounced a benediction.

When they came on the pack in a farmer's field beyond Foilakill, the wind had fallen away and the rain was a thick, gentle drizzle—a soft day, warm and clammy.

The men were huddled under a drystone wall and behind two cars and the motorcycles, getting what shelter they could.

Kiernan parked the car among them and did not get out. The food cartons were in the open trunk of the Stranorlar car, covered by a large plastic sheet that hung to the ground. The beer cases were on the grass. The eating was over, the drinking well begun. Powers paced impatiently among the young men, scowling at their miserable leisure. Young Barney brought food and beer to Sorahan and Kiernan and hurried back to the wall beside his hulking friend Colum. They were all past talking. They had found no trace of McManus and were soaked to the skin, chilled on a warm day. What commitment they might have had was gone. Powers had turned it to resentment, the rain had added misery.

The sheep dog came cautiously towards them from the farmer's cottage in the next field. It walked into the circle and stopped beside the plastic sheet, its head up. The men watched it with cold curiosity. It was something better to look at than their mutual discomfort. The dog jumped into the open trunk and sniffed about. Then, intelligently, it jumped to the ground and took the hanging edge of the sheet in its mouth. Tossing its head from side to side, it backed away and slowly dragged the sheet from the cardboard cartons.

Powers was pacing away from the car. When he turned, the dog was back in the trunk, its head among the sausages. “Get that bloody dog outa there,” he bellowed.

Nobody moved. They were smiling slyly. It wasn't great entertainment, but it was mild relief.

“Get the dog out!”

Colum heaved his bulk from under the wall and crossed the circle. He did not move the dog. He patted its wet rump, bent down, and pulled two bottles of beer from a case.

“Put them back and move the bloody dog,” Powers yelled at him.

“Move it yourself.” Colum walked back towards the wall. He was as big as Powers, but much younger; and cold, and full of his strength.

Powers blocked his way. “You've had enough,” he said, “put the beer back.” He was suspended between two problems, Colum and the 'dog that was now busy eating the sausages. Powers was not good at dealing with problems in pairs.

“I'll tell you what I've had enough of. I've had enough of your big mouth,” Colum said deliberately, and evidence of warmer life ran through the cold circle.

“Mr. Powers,” Kiernan shouted from the dry comfort of Sorahan's car, but Powers could hear only the sound of Colum's voice.

“Put the beer back and take the bloody dog where it belongs. That's an order,” Powers said.

“I'm drinkin the beer. Take the dog back yourself. You've been shoutin orders all day. You've been barkin like a mangy dog yourself, playin the bloody general or the bloody corporal till we're all sick of you. Give it a rest, you silly bloody playactor. We've all been wonderin just who the hell you think you are and who the hell you think you're talkin to....” He wanted to go on, full of a resentful spleen that spoke for all of them. They weren't revolting against an idea or an objective but against being wet and bullied and abused and especially by an Ulsterman and no bloody matter whether he was Catholic or Protestant, he was a hard-nosed, hard-tongued, pushy, bullying bloody northerner.... The young man stood where he was, waiting for Powers to swing at him.... But that was the naïve expectation of a man not greedy for short answers.

Powers drew his gun.

“Mr. Powers!”
Kiernan was out of the car.

But Powers was not listening. Colum's voice was roaring in his head. The dog jumped down from the boot with its mouth full of sausages and Powers shot it as it landed. The sound of the shot rolled down to the heaving seas. The men sat still, staring at Powers or the dog.

Sorahan was watching the dog. It lay on its side, its eyes open and the meat beside the open mouth on the grass. It cried quietly for a moment and then was silent. Blood came gently in a small stream from its mouth, staining the wet grass. Sorahan thought it looked like lava.

“Now put the beer down and carry the dog back to the farmer,” Powers said.

“Put the gun away and make me.”

Kiernan was beside Powers, his own gun pressing. “I'll take the gun, Mr. Powers,” he said, and snatched it from Powers' hand.

Colum dropped his beer and charged. He had been waiting most of the morning to make the charge. He had been drinking all through their lunch break to make ready for the charge.