The Hollow Heart (The Heartfelt Series) (17 page)

Ryan watched as Sinead made Mrs Molloy as comfortable as
possible, but diagnosed the old lady had fractured both her hip and collarbone
in the fall. How bad the breaks were, was impossible to tell, but the old woman
was in excruciating pain, the merest movement, agony. Sinead spoke softly to
her, administering a pain killer.

“This will ease things a little, Mrs Molloy. Try not to
move.” The old woman barely felt the needle. As Sinead withdrew it, she flashed
a look at Padar. He nodded. The old lady started to cough, the very act
unbearable. She whimpered, pitifully.

“It’ll be alright Mrs Molloy, we’ll get you to the hospital
just as soon as we can,” Padar said reassuringly. The woman’s eyes pleaded back
at him.

“God love her,” he said to Ryan, as he closed the bedroom
door behind him.

The men set to work. Father Gregory was sloshing about
downstairs, passing items of furniture and bric-a-brac up to Ryan on the
landing.

“She’ll have to be moved; Sinead’s concerned pneumonia will
set in,” Ryan said. Gregory looked up.

“This place won’t hold much longer. We all need to get out.”
As he spoke, there was a loud groan and a beam at the gable end of the cottage
eased away from the wall. “Let’s go. Now!”

The 4x4 barely made it back down to the village. Two
converging waves pushed it off course and at one point it stuck in a landslide
of mud, wheels spinning.

 “Keep it going, Padar. If it stops we’ve had it,” roared
Ryan over the storm. As he and Gregory heaved the vehicle over into a
slipstream, it freed the backend and they were away again. The vehicle slid
into the pub yard. Ryan and Gregory carried Mrs Molloy inside, while Padar
chained the vehicle to the building.

“It could get worse,” Padar told Sinead, as she pushed the
precious bag of medicine under her coat and made for the sandbagged entrance.

Kathleen MacReady had managed to make contact with the
Coastguard about Mrs Molloy. She was sipping out of a bottle of stout up at the
bar. It was a trend she had noticed the youngsters favoured with foreign
lagers, although lager was not to her liking, she could never miss out on a
trend. Her spindly legs clad in laddered black stockings were crossed in
wellington boots, a scarlet French beret was flattened on her russet curls. She
wore dangling diamante earrings, her Friday earrings. Things must be bad. Today
was Saturday.

“We’ve a bit of break in it coming this afternoon. Not long.
The air ambulance will try to get in then. She’d need to be down at the pier
though.” Miss MacReady addressed Padar. The pier to which she so grandly
referred, was a fifty foot stretch of stone and wooden jetty tacked onto the
bay at the edge of the village, just beyond where the road turned to a sandy
track.

“It’ll be under water.” Padar glanced out of the window. The
water was rising steadily in the yard. The street which had become a stream,
was turning into a river. He and Father Gregory had the same thought. Not ten
minutes later they were launching the boat into Main Street. Ryan went with
Joan Redmond’s husband, Paul, to commandeer his, and with three other men, they
loaded the sturdy fishing boats with lump hammers and pickaxes.

“What’s the plan?” asked Miss MacReady, puffing on a
cigarette, despite the ban.

“We reckon if we break a hole in the sea wall to release
some of the water coming through the town, we’ll at least be able to get down to
the jetty with Mrs Molloy.”

“And save half the village from following the bridge into
the ocean,” added Father Gregory.

“You have a couple of hours. Then it’s back, maybe worse.”
Miss MacReady dropped the stub of her cigarette into the beer bottle. It hissed.

“Please Padar, she’s only one old woman. You’ll all be swept
away,” Oonagh pleaded. Mrs Molloy groaned in the corner.

“Has to be done,” Padar answered. And the men left.

After about an hour and a half, the water which had been
rising rapidly in the street, started to subside and drain away. The men had
managed to make a hole at a pressure point. The water began to spill through
the gap down the cliff face and, as the wind dropped back, the driving rain
dissolved into a swirling, damp mist.

“Right, let’s go,” commanded Sinead, as Marianne and Oonagh
lifted the frail old lady, strapped in a sleeping bag, onto the lightweight
stretcher that Phileas had brought down from the pharmacy.

“I’ll drive,” said Oonagh, unchaining the 4x4. “I understand
her temperament.” She nodded at the car.

In minutes, they were at the pier; the reassuring whir of
the helicopter blades a little way out to sea. The men had moored the boats to
the jetty, the waves crashing them against the wall. Oonagh counted, to be sure
they were all still there. She blessed herself. The women edged the vehicle as
close to the sea wall as they could. The men hauled one of the boats, hanging
onto the mooring chain, towards them. The women passed the shrouded parcel
across. The old lady was as light as a feather, her only bulk, the sleeping
bag. Sinead had dosed her with morphine and although her eyes were open, she
was out of it. Padar and Ryan took her into the boat, while Father Gregory and
the others began hauling it back down the jetty, the outboard motor struggling
against the tide to give any direction or support.

“Alright?” Oonagh called to Padar.

“Nearly there, love.” The wind whipped the words back.

They did their best to keep it stable, pushing it as far out
into the bay as possible. The women huddled together at the wall, watching the
scene as if it were in slow motion.

Then, in what was the briefest of movements, the sea rescue
helicopter appeared, hovering hawk-like over the little vessel bouncing in the
swell. A member of the crew in high visibility garb descended and the bundle
that was Mrs Molloy was quickly strapped to the helicopter’s stretcher. With a
flick of his hand, she was lifted away. The man followed, and while those below
held their breath, there was the merest swoop of acknowledgement, and the
aircraft flew back towards the mainland. Even the sea seemed to breathe a sigh
of relief, as momentarily, the waves flattened and the wind dropped. The men
turned and headed back towards the shore, the threatening sky following close
behind.

“We’ll chain the boats up in the yard at the pub. There’s
probably still enough water to float them,” Padar called over the wall to
Oonagh.

“Will we need them again?”

Padar eyed the sky beneath his hood. She had her answer.

“We’ll punt back up the lane,” laughed Father Gregory,
already making headway, pushing the boat along with the oars.

“Last one back’s a poof,” challenged Ryan, standing up in
the other boat. “Sorry Father.”

“Sorry yourself,” quipped Gregory. “You’re the thespian!”

They raced, as best they could, punting back along the lane
towards the village. The women looked at each other.

“Adrenaline or Testosterone, I don’t know which?” sighed
Sinead, climbing into the vehicle.

Oonagh grimaced as she pulled herself up behind the wheel,
her face ashen.

“I’ll drive back,” Marianne offered, making for the door.

Oonagh gripped the wheel.

“No sure, I’m grand.”

They too, raced all the way back to the pub.

The first thing a visitor to Knock
Airport will notice, even after the biggest terrorist attack the Western World
has ever seen, is its relaxed, gentle intimacy. The sprawling airfield in one
of Ireland’s most westerly counties is only a few miles from Knock, the tiny
village where the Virgin Mary miraculously appeared to a gathering of locals on
21
^st
August 1879.

Passengers, airport personnel and even security staff, of
which there are scant few, communicate in a civilised and cheery tone, talking
of whence they had come and where they were going. They sit around the bar in
the centre of the general lounge, travellers together, chatting and laughing,
drinking beer and taking tea. Knock Airport feels like the beginning or the end
of a very pleasant adventure, the place has a tangible sense of wonderment, a
most unusual atmosphere for an airport, miraculous even and, given its history,
perhaps not surprising. Of course, it did not appear that way to everyone.

Larry Leeson strode out of the lavatory marked ‘Fir’ –
Gaelic for man - his fist taut around the handle of his holdall, his eyes
smarting as they always did after he had spent more than five minutes on an
aircraft. The flight from Shannon to Knock had been particularly harrowing, the
little plane had been bumped and buffeted during what the captain said was a
welcome lull in a particularly severe weather front.

“A lull?” Larry had asked incredulously of the lone air
stewardess, who having served coffee, hastily took her seat and strapped
herself in.

Now safely on terra-firma, Larry took an inhaler from the
pocket of his Donegal tweed overcoat, bought in a hurry especially for the
trip. He had been concerned he would look conspicuous; the collection of
cagoules, hoodies and fleeces modelled by his fellow passengers did little to
assuage his fears. He returned the inhaler, sniffing to clear his head and,
wiping horn-rimmed spectacles on his scarf, squinted at a large, roman-faced
clock. Had he gone back in time? He was half expecting to find a horse and cart
at the taxi rank.

A blond man, in a blue blazer and spotted handkerchief was
leaning against the door of a battered people carrier. He wore jeans and cowboy
boots and was seriously underdressed for the weather. On closer inspection, the
ensemble had seen better days, frayed cuffs were revealed as he put a roll-up
to his lips, trying to shield the lighter from the wind.

“In-is-may-hon?” Larry asked, hoping the man could only
speak Gaelic and he would fall at the first hurdle and have to return to the
sanctuary of the airport, the next flight to Shannon, and home. The man clipped
his cigarette, beamed at Larry and threw open the rear door; in the same
movement, slinging Larry’s holdall and briefcase into the boot. Larry had no
choice but to follow his luggage into the vehicle. The man jumped into the driver’s
seat and, revving the engine as if it were Formula One, flung the car down the
sweeping driveway and out of the airport.

“Where was it, sir?” he barked, fixing Larry with a
bloodshot eye through the rear-view mirror. Larry looked blank.

“Is it the Shrine you’re after, sir?” The words were spoken
very quickly, sliding into each other in a slur.

“The Shrine, sir, is that it? Knock d’ya want?”

Larry realised the driver was asking him where he wanted to
go. He was getting the hang of this Gaelic alright, he was sure he had
understood a couple of words here and there. Larry fumbled in his inside pocket
and pulled out a sheet of notepaper bearing the words: ‘From the desk of Lena
Leeson.’ He could almost hear her adding, ‘And don’t you forget it.” He handed it
to the driver, who mercifully slowed down a fraction to read.

“Can you understand?” Larry said very slowly. “Do you know
it?”

“I do, sir. It’s a good way though, will cost a bit. Is that
okay?”  Larry did not answer. “Many dollars,” said the driver.

“How far?”

“Nearly an hour.”

“Okay.” Larry gripped the door handle as the car bounced
over another pothole.

“Is this the best road?” he asked, after half an hour of
torture.

“Well, it sorta is.”

“How come?”

“It’s the only road,” replied the driver, swerving to avoid
a hefty boulder.

An hour later, Larry was nauseous and no amount of inhaler
could ease his discomfort. The windscreen wipers were useless against the
driving rain and Larry could not tell if the headlights were on.

“Is it much further?” He had long ago given up any attempt
at conversation with the driver, who was listening to what sounded like an
interminable and explosive diatribe on the radio. It was in fact, a hurling
match commentary.

“Nearly there, sir,” quipped the driver, as they veered around
a bend, swerved a bit and then, with brakes screeching, came to a shuddering
halt before a bank of flashing blue lights, a red-and-white-striped barrier
weighted with sandbags, and a couple of police cars parked nose to nose.

“Mother of God!” exclaimed the driver. He leapt from the
car, almost into the arms of a large police sergeant who was wearing a high
visibility vest and cover on his cap. Larry wound down the window. The wind
carried their voices to him.

“Howaya Pa’?” The sergeant greeted his cousin, recognising
the taxi immediately.

“Michael. What happened? What’s wrong?” asked the driver.

“The bridge is down. Did you not hear it on the radio? Came
down last night. Fierce damage. No access, I’m afraid. Innishmahon is out of
bounds.”

“Lord, God! Anyone hurt?”

“No. Thank God. No-one was on it at the time.”

“And across the way? Anyone hurt over there?”

“We don’t think so. But the lines are down, and you can
never get a signal there unless you’re half a mile out to sea or up on the
cliffs.”

“My sister Kathleen? Any word?”

“Ah, sure leave it to Kathleen MacReady, typical
postmistress, she had the radio working in no time and got through to Inspector
O’Brien when it was discovered at first light. Sean Grogan was heading across
to check his sheep above in the field.”

Larry Leeson groaned and sunk lower into the seat. The
driver stuck his head through the window and started to explain the situation,
spitting softly onto his chin through the gaps left by his missing front teeth.
The policeman gently moved him aside.

“I’m sorry sir,” he said to Larry. “The bridge is closed.
What business have you over there?”

Larry blinked.

“Oh, no business.” He sat upright. “Just looking someone up;
an old friend.”