The Best American Mystery Stories 2012 (38 page)

“No, thanks, Mr. Dunphy. Mammie's busy right now, but I'll let her know your offer.”

Jimmy was not so easily put off, especially by a young bucko getting too big for his breeches. “Maybe we should let the mammie decide. Ya never know . . .”

“That's all right, Mr. Dunphy. Thanks anyway.” With that, Myles met the old man's eyes with an unsmiling dismissal, turned, and raced down the steps, tripping over the tangle of border collies stacked up below him before righting himself and sprinting for the kitchen, where his mother was baking bread over the open hearth.

“Mammie, Mammie, it's a telegram!” he yelled as he barged into the dimly lit kitchen, borders charging in tow. Kitty Hogan looked up from a deep reverie. She was cranking the handle of the bellows which fed a glowing turf fire. Over it, a covered iron skillet rested. She started, as if coming awake, brushed a wayward curl from her forehead, and nervously wiped her hands on her faded, striped blue apron. A shadow of dread crossed her lined though beautiful face.

In Kitty's forty-four years, telegrams meant only one thing: bad news. The last one had been two years before, announcing that her beloved Aunt Mary—a second mother to her—had died in New York. The one before that, in October of '55, had summoned her to Dublin, where Maura, her youngest daughter, had been run over at a crosswalk near O'Connell Street Bridge. She'd died two days later at the St. Vincent's Hospital, without regaining consciousness. Maura was a bright, good-natured girl, just eighteen, the last of the five sisters at Temple Hill Nursing School, all on meager scholarships. She'd only been in the city a week.

Meeting his mother's hazel eyes, Myles handed her the telegram with trembling fingers. Kitty hesitated before reaching for it, took a deep breath, and walked to the dresser at the back of the kitchen. Hours seemed to pass before she eventually opened the drawer, pulled out a paring knife, and slit the green envelope in one swift flick. Even the borders sensed the tension and sat on their haunches, as at feeding time, their gazes riveted on Kitty's every move. She stepped toward the light of the front window, took another deep breath, and plucked out the folded, official note, which she read silently to herself, several times; then, finally, aloud:

 

Coming home Friday (May 1). 6pm bus to Enniskerry. Jack.

 

Tears streamed down Kitty's pale cheeks, dripping on her apron. She swatted them away as a smile erased the shadow, spreading from her lips to her streaming eyes, then to her whole body. She let out a scream of pure ecstasy. “Oh, Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! Jack is coming home. Your father is coming home. Oh, my God! Oh, my God! I knew he would come someday. I knew God would answer my prayers . . . I just knew it . . .”

She whirled about the concrete floor in a wild dance of joy Myles had never seen before, almost knocking him over as she swung her arms wide. Inspired by her exuberance, the borders started to bark, joining the circular dance. Suddenly Kitty pulled up, self-conscious and blushing, almost childlike. She smoothed the faded apron, brushed back the curls from her forehead, and regained her normal no-nonsense comportment.

“Now listen, Myles, we have a ton of work to do to get ready. We have only two days, mind you. We'll have to paint the road gate, clip the hedges, and cut all those thistles in the cow field. Oh, and Myles, you'll have to go up to Billy Roach and get a haircut. What would your father say if he saw you looking like that? He'd think I was raising a teddy boy . . .” She rattled on in this vein, extending the list in her assertive fashion, but Myles had already tuned her out and was walking toward the cowshed to finish his feeding chores.

This was the moment he'd dreaded for two years, ever since he'd quit Enniskerry National School in the middle of the fifth grade to help his mother on the farm.

Myles was the only one in the family who seemed to accept the fact that his father was never coming home. He'd heard the story so many times, with so many variations and subplots, that he felt it was just another fairy tale. Kitty had tried to make excuses for Jack and present him as a heroic figure, but Myles never bought the fiction, sensing an unspoken truth: the real hero was the woman who stuck with him and his older sisters instead of farming them out to relatives, or worse: Killane orphanage, the workhouse in Gorey.

Kitty Hogan was a maddening bundle of contradictions Myles could never figure out. She could be gentle and nurturing, treating Myles as an equal, a partner. Ever since he could talk, she had sought his views on all sorts of grown-up matters, large and small: Should she sell the bonhams or fatten them? Should she plant Furlong's Field with oats or lease it to John McDonald? Should she let the girls go to the dance in Bray Sunday night? And she wasn't just humoring a child; she really listened to what he had to say and encouraged him to tell her the truth, especially when it was hard.

Like two years ago when he left the turkeys' run open and a fox killed the whole flock; it was their only Christmas cash crop. “Mammie, I have a confession to make.” He found her in the middle of baking a cake for supper. “Well, this sounds serious. You look like you've seen a ghost.” Myles sat down, fought back tears, and spilled the story. “It's all my fault. You told me to lock the gate every time I came out, but I didn't. I just forgot it, like an eejet. And that's when the fox must've slipped in. I never saw him. Just heard the racket and ran in there. It was too late. He'd killed them all and was gone. There wasn't even any blood. Just broken necks. Like I said, it's all my fault and I don't mind if you whip me with the belt. I deserve it . . . I'd do anything if it'd make 'em come back . . . anything.”

Instead of a whipping, she gave him her brightest smile, wrapped her arms around him, and said, “You're a good man, Myles Hogan. Any fool can tell the truth when it wraps him in glory. It's the hard truth that separates the men from the boys. Now, let's have some tea and scones before we have to break the news to your sisters that we have to cancel Christmas this year.” As she said this, her voice broke and she turned away to hide the tears.

This was in sharp contrast to the way she treated the girls, whom she dismissed as a bunch of “gillagoolies.” His sisters resented this, of course, and took it out on Myles with fiendish creativity. Knowing his fear of the dark, they seldom missed an opportunity for nightly terror games. Once, when he was about seven, they put a small goat in his bedroom, complete with horns; the devil come to claim his prey. Myles promptly went into screaming convulsions, to gales of triumphant giggling from under the bed.

The harsh punishments meted out by his mother only made Myles feel more guilty. He tried to make it up to his sisters by currying favor, but to no avail. It was their mother's approval they craved, not his. But for them, that approval would always be in short supply.

Myles had always been puzzled by the deference people showed his mother. All sorts of people—men, women, prosperous, and poor—seemed to speak of her with a kind of reverence, like they might speak of the bishop or prime minister. It had a magical power that seemed to cast a protective shield around him and his sisters as soon as people knew their names. Being Kitty Hogan's son was special in Enniskerry; everyone seemed to understand that, for reasons Myles could only guess at. “Can I give ya a lift? Ain't you Kitty Hogan's boy?” “Sure it's all right. Ya can have it for five bob. Aren't you one of the Hogans of Rathdargan?” “Yer mother's a great woman. She done a lot for this country. You must be very proud to be her son.” Once he asked her what people meant by this, but she brushed it off with, “Oh, son, we all did a lot for our country in the old days. It's not worth talking about. Now, run down to the lower meadow and bring in the cows!”

But he knew there was more to it. He had seen some of it firsthand.

He recalled the fate of the schoolteacher, Brigid Breen, after she slapped his oldest sister, Nora, for misbehaving in school. For other children, beatings in the National School were expected and accepted. Except the Hogans. Myles remembered the terrible spectacle of Miss Breen falling on her ample knees on the gravel road, pleading for mercy, as Kitty stood leaning against the stone wall, cool as a lioness ready to pounce.

Miss Breen's plea was in vain. With one backhand swipe, the hefty schoolmarm practically flew across the road, landing in a pile of nettles, nose gushing like a crimson fountain. “Now, Miss Breen, let that be a lesson to you. That's how it feels to be slapped by someone stronger than you are. Never lay a hand on one of my children again. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, Mrs. Hogan. Oh, for the love of God, please . . . It was just a misunderstanding. It'll never happen again. You have lovely girls. All so bright . . .”

“Thank you, Miss Breen. I'm glad you approve of them. If they give you any trouble, just let me know. I'll deal with them myself. I discipline my children, not you. Your job is to educate them. Don't you agree?”

“Yes, yes . . . of course. We all have a job to do. Thank you, Kitty . . . I mean, Mrs. Hogan.”

“You're most welcome, Brigid. Safe home, now.”

The other episode that puzzled and frightened Myles was the exchange he'd overheard between his mother and the Hannigan twins two years before. Billy and Bobby Hannigan were neighbors. They worked the big family farm and general store in Newtown, just off the Dublin Road, near Sally Gap. They were tall, burly redheads, popular with the girls and well liked by one and all. Both were gifted football players, dominating defenders for the senior Wicklow team. They came from a well-respected family. Their father (Sean the Gap, as he was affectionately known) was a feared and famous IRA guerrilla fighter. The twins seldom visited Rathdargan, so it was a surprise to hear their voices downstairs speaking in hushed tones with his mother early one Friday morning as Myles was waking.

Billy Hannigan, in his distinctive tenor voice, was speaking softly as Myles came fully awake.

“With all due respect, Mrs. Hogan, what we do or don't do with girls at the dances, that's our own business. I don't see where ya get off summoning us here to lecture us about Molly Redmond or what happened at the dance in Kilkenny Sunday night. If she has a complaint about anyt'ing, she should call the Garda.”

Kitty's voice, calm and deadly, came back—the same tone Myles had heard her use with Miss Breen. He felt a tightening in his stomach and fought back a wave of nausea. Suddenly he felt sorry for the Hannigan twins and had to resist an impulse to.

His mother's voice continued the deadly inquisition.

“That's a good speech, Billy. It shows courage, which is admirable, given your situation. Now, Bobby, what do you have to say for yourself?”

“Not a t'ing, Mrs. Hogan, except that I'm sorry it had to come to this. Tell ya the God's honest truth, we didn't mean no harm. We had a few pints an' t'ings got a bit out of hand, I s'pose. An' the reason we're here is 'cuz me father has great respect for you 'n what ya did for the cause. We all have. We meant no harm, as God is my witness, Mrs. Hogan.”

“Very good, Bobby. God is your witness, always has been and always will be, but we won't need to call on him just yet. Your brother should take a page from your book, since contrition is the gateway to redemption. But you're both whistling past the graveyard if you think this is just about making nice.

“No. That won't do at all. Here's why: I've known Molly Redmond since she was a little baby. Her mother and I were in the movement together long before you lads were even a gleam in your daddy's eye. She's a lovely girl and it so happens I'm her godmother—not that you should know that.

“But after the dance last Sunday night, she came by for our little chat, as usual. Only this time she was hysterical. She told me everything. Everything. About what you blackguards did to her in Kelly's hay shed—or tried to do, I should say. I'm glad you have a few scruples left. Since her mother died in that ferry accident, I'm the one she turns to for advice. Thank God she did. And that's your bad luck . . .”

The long, ominous silence that followed was finally broken by Billy Hannigan's blustery voice.

“Look here, Mrs. Hogan, like I said, we came over here 'cuz Da respects you—we do, too, don't get me wrong—but what do ya want from us? Molly is no saint; she's a bit of a tayser—if you ask me. So I don't know what you want from us. What's done is done. It won't happen again, I can assure you of that. Is that the sort of t'ing ya want us to say?”

Upstairs, Myles had moved a little closer to hear his mother's reply. He could see her pacing back and forth through the cracks in the floorboards.

“Oh, I know it won't happen again. That's not what I'm worried about. No, not a whit. But as I said, it's not going to be as simple as assuring me of your noble intentions. The road to hell is paved with those, as the fella says. Your amends will be much more tangible than mere words. As a show of good faith, I want three hundred pounds in twenty-pound notes for Molly's education, with a written explanation to her that this is your way of apologizing to her and her family for the emotional distress you caused. Be sure you both sign your names with Sean, your da, signing as witness. I also want you to donate one of your best Jersey cows to Pete Redmond to make up for the one that got killed on Dundrum Road last month. It was the only one they had. It's only a neighborly thing to do anyway; I'm sure your da won't mind.

“Oh, and while you're at it, it would be grand if you cut out five Cheviot ewe lambs and donated them, too. The Redmonds have had a couple of bad years and need a bit of sun to shine their way. You'll never even notice, but it'll make a world of difference to them.”

Whatever had happened downstairs, the Hannigan twins went mute. Not a word of protest was spoken, as Myles heard their hobnailed boots scrape the concrete kitchen floor.