Falling Glass (28 page)

“What do you want, love?” the ice-cream man asked.

“What you recommend for these two?” she said.

“Ach, there’s only one thing. A 99 with chocolate sprinkles,” the icecream man said with finality.

“Okay, three of those.”

She watched him make it.

Soft-serve ice cream in a cone with a Cadbury’s chocolate flake shoved down the middle and then the ice cream dipped in chocolate sprinkles.

All three of them walked to the beach. A man with a donkey appeared beside them and asked Claire if she wanted a “toty wee ride on it”. Claire stared at her mum with a guilt-inducing tremble in her lower lip.

“Can I, Mum?” Claire asked.

“Ach, she’s a quare aul girl, easy with the bairns,” the man said, patting the donkey on the forehead.

“Okay,” Rachel said.

“And me next,” Sue demanded.

“Sure,” Rachel agreed.

Killian walked along the line of caravans, negotiating his way among stray dogs and cats and even chickens who you would have thought would have been in their run by this time of the evening.

There were kids running around and although most of the men would be having a barney over at the horse auction, Killian knew that he was being watched by several pairs of adult eyes from behind net curtains.

Five hundred years of prejudice had taught the Pavee to be on their guard against strangers.

He walked to the first caravan and knocked on the door.

A girl of about twelve answered it. She was dirty and holding a screwdriver in one hand and the air-intake of a motorcycle in the other.

“Hello,” Killian said.

“Hi,” the wean replied.

“What’s that, a two-stroke?”

“Look, I’m busy, what do you want ya big yin?” the girl demanded in a Glasgow accent so broad that it would have made Colonel Pickering think twice about a wager with Professor Higgins.

“I’m looking for the camp boss,” Killian said.

“That would be me,” a voice said behind Killian.

He turned.

A young man wearing a green trench coat covered with badges and wild flowers. Underneath he had on a navy blue jumper, brown corduroy trousers, combat boots and a long striped scarf. He was pale-skinned with unruly black hair and a pointed beard. He was about twenty-four or twenty-five which would be about right.

“Who are you?” Killian asked in Shelta.

“I’m Donal. I’m the clan chief,” Donal replied in the same tongue.

“You’re the king?” Killian wondered.

“We don’t use that terminology anymore,” Donal said.

“Okay. What happened to Dokey McConnell?”

“Dokey’s been dead three years now, and the chief before me was topped down on Muck Island a while back. It was an incident. Made the TV. You may have heard about it.”

Killian hadn’t heard about it, but it didn’t surprise him. Travellers died early and usually in violent ways.

“Now, friend. Who are you?” Donal asked.

“I am Aidh Mac an tSaoi of the Light Hands of the Clan of the North,” Killian said.

Donal stroked his beard and nodded. “Aye, I know ya. Or of ya. You’ll be wanting Katie then?”

“She’s here?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll talk to her presently, no doubt, but I wanted to ask you for your help.”

Donal’s eyes narrowed. “What sort of help?”

“I’ve got a woman with me and two kids; we’re on the run from the peelers, we need a place to stay for a few days.”

Donal didn’t hesitate. “You can stay in my rig, I’ll bunk with Dovey Carmichael.”

“It’s only for a few days, mind, until we get things figured out.”

Donal laughed. “It doesn’t matter. Stay a year and a day if you like. You need money?”

Killian shook his head.

“Third one in, give me fifteen minutes to move my stuff. Weans ya say? Boys, girls, both?”

“Two girls, Seven and five.”

“Okay. Give me a few minutes. It’s that bluey white one over there.”

“I’m really grateful,” Killian said, touched by the easy hospitality of this world that he had left so long ago.

“Nay worries mate. If you need any grub, Granny Sheila just made some
stew, it’s wild good, fresh lamb, if you know what I’m saying, two down there on the right. It’ll set you up powerfully. Girls was it, you said?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, gimme ten minutes.”

Donal offered his hand. Killian shook it.

“I had a feeling someone or something was going to turn up today,” Donal said. Like all Pavee Donal reckoned that he was in touch with invisible forces whose power, alas, never somehow extended to racecourses or the dog track.

“Where’s Katie’s house?” Killian asked.

“The very end, with the best view of the bay,” Donal said with a wink.

“I’ll say hello while I’m waiting,” Killian muttered, oddly embarrassed.

“Do that. She’s got Tommy but she’s still a bit lonely now that all the weans have flied the coop. I’ll get this caravan sorted for you.”

Donal went into his caravan and turned on the light.

Killian walked along the caravans and trailers until he reached the last one. It was a standard Ace Ambassador from about 1989. The aluminum had buckled and the paint was chipping. It had seen better days.

He hesitated for a moment, then knocked on the door.

“Who is it?” a voice asked.

“An old friend,” Killian said.

There was a significant pause and the sound of a glass clinking before the door opened.

Her hair was long and brown with only a few streaks of grey. Her face was sunburned and her lips thin. She was skinny. Too skinny, but her eyes were clear and she was still very beautiful. You wouldn’t have thought that she’d had six kids. Six that he knew about it.

She looked at him. Shook her head. Smiled.

They hadn’t seen each other in a dozen years. More.

“You want a drink?” she asked.

“Sure,” he said.

He ducked his head and followed her inside the caravan and sat down on a wicker chair. The inside was better than the out. The foam
furniture had been reupholstered in leather and the stove and mini fridge looked new.

And the view indeed was spectacular.

All of Brown’s Bay, the glens of Antrim, Scotland.

Katie handed him a glass of clear liquid.

“Thank you,” he said and sniffed it.

There was no smell.

“It’ll have to be a quick one. Tommy is wild jealous.”

“Who’s Tommy?”

“You know Tommy Trainer? Betty Trainer’s boy?”

Killian shook his head. “Doesn’t ring a bell.”

“He’s a bit, shall we say, boisterous, you know what those Trainers are like, they hung his great granda during the war.”

Killian shook his head. “I don’t remember them. Is he a bother? Does he hit you?”

“Ach, he’s just a boy. I can handle him, but he might do something stupid if he barged in here and then he found out about you and me. He might want to give you a going over.”

“You think he could?” Killian asked with a twinkle.

“You’re no spring chicken,” Katie said and laughed.

“I’m only forty,” Killian protested and took a sip of the poteen.

It was a pleasant little moonshine as moonshine went, but still it wasn’t made for sipping. He knocked it back and it burned his throat.

“So how are you?” Killian asked.

“I can’t complain. The kids are all in one piece.”

Killian smiled. “Six of them, I heard.”

She nodded. “Three boys, three girls, perfect eh?”

“Perfect,” Killian agreed.

“Let me fill that wee mug.”

She poured him another healthy measure from an old Smirnoff Vodka bottle and he swirled the poteen around in his glass.

“So what are you doing here?” Katie said.

“I’m in a spot of bother,” Killian replied.

“Why does that not surprise me?”

Killian leaned back in the sofa and shook his head happily. “I don’t know,” he said, getting a little buzzed.

“What happened to your clothes?” Katie asked.

“I went for a wee swim in Lough Erne this morning,” Killian said.

“I’ll bet there’s a woman at the back of this,” Katie tutted.

“That’s a bet you’d win, as usual,” Killian said.

Katie pulled the hair from her face and clipped it back. She got up from her seat and sat next to him on the sofa. She took his hand in hers.

“How long has it been, Aidh?”

Killian shook his head. “I don’t know,” he said. “You haven’t changed much.”

She laughed again. It was the same lilting, girlish laugh that he’d loved when he’d only been a snapper.

She squeezed his hand a bit harder.

“Are you still in America?” she asked.

“No, no, I’ve been back a few years now. England for a while, but back here for good I think.”

“And you’re in trouble?” she asked, with concern in those hazel eyes.

With her forehead knitting like that, she looked older. Old.

“A wee bit of bother, nothing for you to concern yourself with.”

“Ha!” she said and pinched him. “I stopped worrying about you, last century. The nerve of ya!”

Killian’s grin broadened.

There was a bang outside and he flinched, but when he looked out the window he saw that it was only fireworks they were letting off after the conclusion of the fair.

“Where do you live?” she asked. “Are you on the road?”

“No, I’ve got a wee place down in Carrick. I actually have some flats up in Belfast too. Can’t get rid of them. You know what the property market’s like.”

“Is that the bother you’re in?”

“No. It’s a different kind of bother.”

She nodded, drank her glass and dragged the bottle across the coffee table with her foot. She filled two more glasses.

“How’s Karen?” he asked after a deep breath.

She beamed. A big easy smile with no recrimination in it.

“She’s doing well. You know how hard it is for the first year.”

“First year of what?”

“She has twins.”

Killian’s heart skipped a beat.

“Twins?”

“You hadn’t heard? No, how would ya?”

She stood. “Hold on a wee minute. I’ve got a picture. Hold on there sunshine.” She went to the back room of the caravan and came back a moment later with a small picture of two baby girls in pink nightgowns. They were about six months old in the photograph and both had a shock of red hair.

“Oh my God,” Killian said, delighted.

His hand was shaking and he could feel the tears.

“You can keep that if you want,” Katie said, moved. “They look like a couple of wee trolls don’t they?”

Killian shook his head. “No. They look beautiful. I can really keep this?”

Katie leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek. “Of course you can, love,” she said.

It was the waterworks now and Killian sniffed and dabbed his face with his sleeve.

Rachel and her weans. And now these two little gangsters.

He turned his head from her.

It was almost too much.

He took his sodden wallet out of his back pocket and carefully put the photograph under the clear plastic where his driving licence should be.

The wallet gave him an idea.

He looked between the notes and found a slightly damp cheque.

“Have you got a pen?” he asked.

Katie looked at the cheque and shook her head. “Don’t be doing that now,” she muttered.

“I want to,” he insisted. “It’s okay. My problems aren’t financial. It’s the right thing to do and I want to.”

“She’s doing great. She’s with this guy. Regular guy. Civilian. Not in The Life. English.”

“She’s married?”

“Not as such. But, you know, it’s a steady thing. He’s called Trevor. Works for the Civil Service. He has a goatee.”

Killian laughed. “That’s the clincher is it?”

“You can mock. I’ve met him. He’s good. You’d like him.”

“I like him already. Gimme a pen, woman.”

After a wee bit more poking she found a biro and he wrote a cheque for ten thousand pounds and gave it to her. He knew he could trust Katie to give Karen the bulk of it.

“This is too much,” she said.

“Take it.”

Katie took the cheque and of course by now she was crying too.

“Have you seen Donal?” she asked by way of changing the subject.

Killian nodded. “Aye, he’s fixing me a place. His place in fact.”

“He’s a good ’un too.”

Killian sighed and got to his feet. “Well, I suppose I better…”

They stood there and looked at one another. The years and the mistakes and everything else seemed to evaporate and there they were two weans again, sort of, but not really, in love.

“How are the rest of your kids?” Killian said, remembering his manners.

“Everyone’s fine,” Katie said. “Now, look, the fireworks are reaching their climax which means that everything’s gonna be over and my old man will be along in a wee minute.”

Killian nodded and went to the door.

Katie hid the cheque under a coffee jar. “I won’t cash this until you’re free of your present difficulties,” she said.

“No, no, cash it now, please, it’ll make me feel better knowing that you’re sending something to her. And really I’m fine for money.”

“Okay,” she said.

He put his hand on the door handle, but before he could leave she gave him a hug and a kiss and then pushed him outside into the dusk.

She waved to him from the living-room window and then pulled over the curtains.

He hoped she really would cash it.

He coughed and wiped the tears from his face and touched the wallet with the picture in it.

He couldn’t resist another look.

Two wee gangsters indeed.

Donal saw him from the other side of the campsite and waved. Killian put the photograph away.

“You’re all set, mate,” Donal said. “It’s a fairly big caravan as you can see, you and your lady friend will have a twin and the girls can share the double, unless you want it the other way around?”

“No, that sounds fine,” Killian said. He’d probably sleep on the sofa anyway.

He shook Donal’s hand. “You’re a real lifesaver, mate,” he said.

Donal shrugged. “Don’t even mention it. Remember there’s stew if you want it.”

“I forgot about that, I’ll ask the girls.”

They shook hands again and Killian walked down to the beach.