The Voyage of the Dolphin (21 page)

There was a catch in the giant's throat as he uttered these words, and he reached up to brush away a teardrop.

‘Forgive me, I haven't spoken of this for many years,' he said.

‘Don't worry. We understand.' Phoebe rose and touched his sleeve.

‘What about the cairn?' Rafferty asked. ‘Why was there a dog in there?'

‘Oh,' McNeill said, ‘that was poor old Rex. He died on his final trip out of the valley. Coote was heartbroken.'

‘And what about Franklin? Did they find anything?' said Fitzmaurice, who had woken a minute earlier, apparently unaware that he had been asleep.

‘You mean you haven't met him yet?'

‘I beg your pardon?'

‘He's been living here for years.'

‘What?'

‘I'm only teasing. I think you're more likely to have news of him than I am.'

‘Sorry. Silly question.'

‘So,' Crozier said, ‘you stayed. And you're still alive and kicking.'

‘That's another thing I can't explain. Life is long here. I've lived to see my great-grandchildren: not many men can say that.'

‘Didn't you ever miss home?' Rafferty asked.

The giant laughed.

‘Look around you. Sure, isn't it more like Ireland than Ireland itself?'

They all agreed it was.

‘No, there's no doubt about it.' McNeill's tone became grave. ‘What I have built here is very precious. It gives me great pride. It has made me very happy. My life before, though I concede I was luckier than most of my kind, was full of pain. I was made to suffer because I was different. I was forced to hide away. Here, no one judges: big or small, we're all equal. My children, I fathered ten of them, and their grandchildren, and their children after that, will live here in peace and freedom, beyond the reach of the world I left behind.' He edged forward in his chair. ‘As long, that is, as the valley remains a secret. That is
imperative
. No one must know we are here. Which is why, my friends,' he climbed to his feet, ‘…
you can never leave this place
.'

 

With a sigh, what remained of the fire collapsed in on itself. From behind them came the soft thud of a book closing and the old Inuk's chair squeaking as he leant back. The giant towered before them, his face lost in shadow.

‘I'm aware,' McNeill said, ‘that probably sounds a little… dictatorial, but I really cannot allow our community here to be jeopardised. You know as well as I do that if people learned of this island it would only be a matter of time before they came in search of it.'

Phoebe was the first to recover her voice.

‘But you can't keep us here against our will.'

‘No, you're free to go.'

‘I thought you said…'

‘But you would never find your way out. The route is extremely treacherous. Unless you know how to get to the pass that leads through the mountain, and only a handful of us do, it is highly unlikely that you would survive the attempt.'

‘What if we promise to keep quiet?' Rafferty said.

‘Ah, now.' McNeill surveyed the rafters, ‘If it was just myself I would accept your word, my young friend, but there are others to consider, and in my experience the only real guarantee of a secret is death. Unless, of course, you believe in ghosts.'

‘This is outrageous,' Fitzmaurice spluttered. ‘You can't be serious. Please tell us this is a joke.'

‘I'm afraid I cannot. I
am
serious. But, honestly, is the prospect really so unpleasant?'

‘Our ship is waiting for us. They'll send a search party.'

McNeill brushed the protest aside as though shooing away a fly.

‘Sleep on it. I think you'll find the idea will grow on you. And, I tell you what,' he clapped his hands together, ‘tomorrow night I'll cook for you. Something special. How about that?'

He left the room, his footsteps booming on the bare wood. The others sat in silence, too flummoxed to speak. Outside in the valley, an owl began to interrogate the night, the sound melancholy, urgent, almost human.

In the days that followed, not knowing how else to pass the time, the four of them did their best to fall in with the rhythms of the valley, rising at dawn to help with the ploughing and scything, the harvesting, and all the myriad other tasks and labours of agricultural life. There was grain to be pounded, fruit to be picked, livestock to be fed. Fitzmaurice found he had a talent for milking musk-oxen. Sometimes, in the afternoons, they took a picnic lunch and slipped away to walk in the forest and swim in the rockpool beneath the waterfall. Occasionally, such was the beauty of the landscape, some among them forgot, briefly, that they were prisoners, and in Fitzmaurice's case, given that without the precious skeleton there was little glory awaiting him at home, even to embrace the prospect of a longterm future. Phoebe, however, was having none of it, and returned often to their predicament.

‘There
must
be a way out.'

They were sitting on a ridge at the edge of the pines, with a view of the village on the opposite slope, the vast, whitewashed gables of the cottages brilliant in the afternoon sun.

‘If I'm remembering correctly,' Fitzmaurice said, ‘the trick is to stab the giant in the eye.'

‘Come again.'

‘Mythology. You know, Ulysseuss.'

‘Ulysseuss?'

‘Greek chap. Escaped from some giant by stabbing him in the eye. Dressed himself up as a sheep too, for some reason, s'far as I recall.'

‘Oh, Hugh.'

‘What?'

‘I think you mean
Od
ysseu
s,
and I can't really see how that helps. For a start our host, though he would certainly appear to be a man of singular vision, is not a cyclops. Secondly…'

‘Who do you think built those houses?' Rafferty interjected, his head on one side.

‘What?'

‘The cottages. Look at them: they're massive. They required a huge amount of labour.'

‘The giants built them, of course.'

‘Hold on. There was only one giant to begin with. He couldn't have done it on his own.'

‘What are you saying?'

‘I'm saying the Inuit built them. I think the Inuit do most of the work around here.'

Crozier groaned. ‘Not the Oppressed People speech again, Rafferty.'

‘Why not? It's…'

‘What do you reckon,' Fitzmaurice said, changing the subject, ‘old man McGregor is going to say when we don't show up?'

‘Well, he definitely won't be pleased.'

‘I imagine he'll say something like…' Phoebe shook her head, ‘like: “where the —k are those b—ing —ing a—s? Where the…”'

Rafferty broke in. ‘No, it'll be worse than that, more like, “what in the name of —k are those c—ing little —ers doing, the s—faced —ing …'

‘Anyone else hungry?' Fitzmaurice was on his feet. ‘I wonder what's for dinner.'

They considered for a while.

‘Don't get me wrong,' Crozier said, ‘the food's incredibly good here, but it's so rich, so complicated. I'd kill for something plain… like hardtack, or... what's that stuff we had back at the camp?'

‘Pemmican?'

‘Yes. Some pemmican hoosh.'

 

In the wake of his decree, aside from hosting his promised ‘special' meal (rare fillets of caribou with wild mushrooms and snow goose liver in a sauce of sweet wine and bone marrow), the giant kept his distance. They would see him from time to time strolling to or from his winery, and in the evenings, in the reading hall, he would wave or nod in their direction, but his demeanour was haughty.

Regarding the nightly entertainment, they had come to the end of
Gulliver's Travels
and embarked on
The
Pilgrim's Progress
. Crozier was soon reminded of the soporific nature of his father's weekly sermons, and the effort required for concentration on the spoken word. During one particularly dry passage, read by an elderly Inuk in the manner of someone deciphering a handwritten prescription, he nodded off, dreaming that he was picking his way through a valley of scorched bones. When he awoke (with a loud, involuntary snort), he looked up to find one of the young giants, Ossian, who was sitting across the aisle, watching him with a curious expression.

Ossian was the youngest of McNeill's grandsons, and, at barely a sunbeam off nine feet, the tallest. He was also the least blessed in the areas both of aesthetic appeal and intellectual reasoning, deficiencies he made up for with an abundance of puppyish enthusiasm. Flirtatious, eager to please, and extremely clumsy (he was constantly bandaged and patched as a result of stumbles and collisions), he was something of a contrast to his brothers and uncles who, after the initial courtesies, had retreated to a state of reserve that bordered on
froideur
. Crozier winked at him and, the young giant, seeming to snap out of a reverie, flushed and averted his eyes.

The next day, taking a break from scything, the four voyagers were lying beside a wheat field, eating their lunch in the sunshine. Heaps of golden stalks lay around them; other workers sat in groups at intervals, talking and laughing. In the adjacent orchard, a woman was singing. Above them, impossibly high and far, the mountain peaks gleamed though ribbons of cloud.

‘Well, I'm getting used to it.' Fitzmaurice popped a cherry into his mouth. ‘And let's face it, what have I got to go back to? Without the bones I'll be frogmarched straight out of College. On the other hand it would be good to see home again. Give old Ninian a punch on the jaw.' He shielded his eyes. ‘Hello there.'

The sun was blocked out and above them stood a smirking Ossian. It transpired that he was wondering, if it wasn't too much of an imposition, if they wouldn't mind talking some more about the country of their forebears. He had only ever heard his grandfather's version, and it was from so long ago. (Crozier wasn't sure things had changed
that
much.)

‘Is there anything in particular you want to know?'

The young giant squatted down.

‘What's Ireland like now? What's it like to live there?'

They each pondered the question. Crozier pictured the rain-dark factories and churches of his native city in its cradle of hills, heard the clang of the shipyard and the clatter of drums, the wingbeats of gaudy flags, silver drizzle sweeping across Belfast Lough. Phoebe was back in Ennisfree, in the cold hush of an unheatable house, looking out at drenched greenery and recalling the sense she had often had in the Irish countryside, that secrets beyond telling lay beneath the drowned soil. Rafferty found himself on the Dublin quays, inhaling the scent of roasted barley from St James' Gate — bitter, savoury: the city's essence, like the smell of home-cooking; saw also the cliff-like terraces and pillars, the statuary of a foreign power, and felt the familiar flash of heat in his blood. It was Fitzmaurice, emerging from a daydream about riding to victory in the Kilkenny Donkey Derby, who finally spoke.

‘Most of the time it's jolly good fun.'

‘And is it really as green as my grandfather says?'

‘Very much so. You see, it rains a lot.'

Ossian twisted and pulled at the plait of hay in his hands. Perspiration gleamed on his forehead. A pulse twitched in his neck.

‘And the
colleens
, the sweet colleens!' he blurted. ‘Are they really as beautiful and mysterious in their ways?'

They all laughed. The young giant, most of whose waking hours were spent in dogged but ineffectual pursuit of the young Inuit women, blushed.

‘Oh they're
mysterious
all right,' Crozier told him.

There was a tinkling of harness bells and a rumble of wheels as an oxen cart passed behind them.

‘But the girls here are lovely too,' Crozier added.

Ossian mumbled something, wrinkling his long, wide nose.

‘And it's undeniably green.' Crozier glanced furtively at the others, recognising their shared thought in that instant. They had to chance it.

‘Listen, Ossian,' he said. ‘Charming as it is here, we were just talking about how much we miss Ireland – the sweet colleens and the green fields and what have you — and how we'd love to go home. I don't suppose… What would you think about showing us the way through the mountain?'

The giant shook his head as though trying to clear water from his ears.

‘My grandfather would kill me.'

‘Well he wouldn't find out until afterwards. Perhaps he wouldn't mind so much?'

‘He'd kill me. That's for sure.'

There was a pause, and Crozier gazed across the fields, flicking through possibilities. Then he looked up at the young giant again.

‘You could see our ship.'

A gleam came into the big cow-like eyes. Snow geese, in a loose, wishbone formation, flapped overhead.

‘Could I come with you?'

Crozier pictured this colossal man-child lumbering through the streets of Dublin pursued by clamorous mobs of gawkers. He put the thought from his mind.

‘Would you
like
to come with us?'

*

It was the only full moon they had seen since crossing the Arctic Circle. (In its other phases it had bobbed around the horizon throughout the voyage, often accompanied by a phantom twin and, once, in Lancaster Sound, by a pair of mirage siblings so sharp it was difficult to tell which was the real one.) Ghostly at first, it had grown more vivid as the sun dipped behind the mountains, until at last the valley was flooded with silver light. In the middle of the green a huge bonfire sent orange flakes zig-zagging into the sky. Long tables had been laid out with food and jugs of wine; joints of meat sizzled on spits. Dancers, in buckskin parkas of intricate design, were parading back and forth to the rhythm of drums, while young Inuit women, silhouetted against the flames, sang whooping, breathy songs.

It was the night of the
ceilidhe
,
a monthly tradition in the valley, and all the residents, men, women and children, were gathered. At the table of honour, in the shadow of the schoolhouse, the four adventurers sat with McNeill and Pinga, and various senior giants. It was the first time they had broken bread together since the old man had told them of their fate, and though the wine was flowing, conversation was an effort. Ossian continued to dither over his decision. The young giant, patently subdued, was sprawled on the grass some distance away, glancing over from time to time with a haunted expression. Catching one of these, McNeill turned to Phoebe.

‘Poor Ossian seems out of sorts, don't you think?'

She started, then recovered herself.

‘Does he? I hadn't really noticed.'

‘Hasn't been himself for a while now. Very… restless.'

Phoebe sensed the giant was watching her.

‘Maybe he's in love.'

McNeill laughed.

‘Well, it certainly wouldn't be the first time. And if that's the case it won't last long, but I don't think that's it. I just hope he's not tiring of our life here.'

‘Oh, I doubt it. Where could be better than this?'

‘Where indeed? You're settling in, then?'

‘It's lovely.'

‘And the others?'

There was a sudden hush and a bustling rearrangement took place around the fire. Several giants appeared carrying huge stringed instruments, and from out of the dusk came a tentative skirl of pipes. The musicians settled themselves, the eldest son, Finn, tucking a fiddle the size of a cello under his chin, and began to tune up.

‘I think they could be very happy here,' Phoebe replied.

The giant nodded.

‘
Fertilior seges est alieno
semper in arvo
,' he murmured.

‘Pardon?'

‘I said…' But his words were drowned out by the sudden onset of music: the clattering, rashers-and-sausages rhythm of a double jig, at deafening volume. Immediately the giants rose, whooping, from the table and, seizing various partners, rushed onto the grass. From all sides others came running, and within seconds the green was a whirl of flailing limbs.

‘Time to dance,' McNeill yelled in Phoebe's ear, and plucking his wife up like a rag doll, he entered the fray. Phoebe cast around for the others. Both Rafferty and Crozier, fear in their eyes, were sprinting towards her, pursued by a pair of giantesses. Rafferty arrived first and fumbled for her hand. Crozier was collared and, with a cry, hoisted into the air by his triumphant captor and whisked into the midst.

It was hot in there — the bonfire, the numbers, the exertion — and barely had they caught their breath than the next tune began. Fitzmaurice, a veteran from childhood of many a peculiar social event, was the only one of them relatively at ease, prancing around and waggling his head like an Indian street vendor. A variety of dance styles was in evidence, from text-book Irish to the tribal foot-stamping and arm-waving of the Inuit, but mostly it was a strange, jerky hybrid of both. On the edge of the crowd, Ossian was swinging his legs morosely to and fro. Crozier, his feet dangling, did his best, between violent gyrations, to watch for a sign that the young giant had resolved his inner conflict.

Round and round they went: jigging and reeling, hornpiping and stomping as though the world was about to end. Trapped in the giantess's sweltering embrace, Crozier began to feel faint. At last she paused to mop her brow and, peering over her shoulder, he saw that Ossian was also standing still. Their eyes met and the giant slowly nodded his head. And then they were off again, caught in a wheeling blur of shadows and flames, in a din of pipes and drums, under a bouncing moon.