The Hunter

Nineteen

Lena is at the washing line when she sees Mart Lavin stumping towards her, across what used to be her and Sean’s back field and is now Ciaran Maloney’s. Her first instinct is to run him off her land. Instead she returns his wave and vows to buy a tumble dryer, since apparently nowadays this bloody place won’t even leave her the pleasure of hanging out her wash in peace. Kojak, trotting ahead, comes to exchange sniffs with Nellie through the fence; Lena gives them a moment and then snaps her fingers, bringing Nellie back to heel.

“That’ll be dry before you get it hung,” Mart says, when he gets close enough. “This heat’s something fierce.”

“No change there,” Lena says, stooping for another armful of clothes. Mart Lavin has never called round to her before, even when Sean was alive.

“Tell me, now,” Mart says, arranging himself comfortably on his crook and smiling at her. Kojak settles himself at Mart’s feet and starts nipping through his fur for burrs. “What’s this I hear about you getting yourself engaged to the one and only Mr. Hooper?”

“That’s old news,” Lena says. “I thought you’da heard it days ago.”

“Oh, I did, all right. And I congratulated your fiancé properly, although I’d say he’s recovered by now. But I haven’t seen you to felicitate you, and it came to me today that I oughta do that. Seeing as we’ll be neighbors now.”

“We might be,” Lena says, “or we might not. Myself and Cal haven’t decided where we’ll live yet.”

Mart gives her a shocked look. “Sure, you couldn’t ask the man to tear himself outa that house, and him only after putting in all that work getting it the way he wants it. Not to mention me putting in all the work getting him the way I want him, give or take. I couldn’t be doing with starting all over again. Likely enough, with house prices the way they are, I’d be stuck with some fool of a hipster that’d live on flat white craft beer and commute to Galway every day. No: you’ll haveta bite the bullet and move down our way. We’re great neighbors to have, myself and P.J. Ask your fiancé; he’ll vouch for us.”

“We might keep on both places,” Lena says. “One for the winter, and one for a holiday home. We’ll be sure and let you know.”

Mart giggles appreciatively at that. “Sure, there’s no rush,” he acknowledges. “I wouldn’t say you’d be in any hurry to the altar. Am I right?”

“When we set a date you’ll get your invite. Fancy lettering and all.”

“Show us the ring, go on. Amn’t I supposed to give it a twist on my own finger, to bring me luck in love?”

“It’s in getting resized,” Lena says. She’s had this conversation with every woman in the townland, and has decided that if she ever gets an impulse to make another snap decision, she’ll have herself committed. She digs a few more clothes-pegs out of her bag.

Mart watches her. “ ’Twas a good move, the aul’ engagement,” he says. “A wise move.”

“Funny,” Lena says. “That’s what Noreen told me. The two of ye have a load in common.”

Mart raises an eyebrow. “Did she, now? I wouldn’ta thought she’da been in favor. Not right now, anyhow.” He shifts his weight to pull a tobacco pouch out of his pocket. “Have I your permission to smoke?”

“The air’s not mine,” Lena says.

“Personally,” Mart says, propping his crook carefully against her fencepost, “I’m all in favor of you putting a ring on that fella. Like I said, I’m after rubbing the corners off him, but he’s got a little way left to go; he doesn’t always heed me the way he oughta. It’s been a worry to me, the last while. Now that he’s your responsibility, we can discuss the problem together.”

Lena says, giving a T-shirt a neat flick to straighten it, “I’ve got nothing to say about Cal to anyone.”

Mart laughs. “God almighty, you’re the same as you ever were. I remember one morning—you were a wee bit of a thing, only this high—you came marching past my gate wearing your First Communion getup, veil and all, and a pair of welly boots. I asked you where were you off to, and you stuck your chin up just like you’re doing now, and you said to me, ‘That’s classified information.’ Where were you headed, at all?”

“Haven’t a notion,” Lena says. “That’s forty years ago.”

“Well,” Mart says, sprinkling tobacco into his rollie paper, “you’re the same today, only now you’re no wee bit of a thing. You’re the woman of the house now, is what you are—whichever house ye settle on in the end. If there’s trouble with the man or the child, you’re where people will come. And you’re where I’m coming.”

None of this is surprising to Lena; it’s what she bargained for. She’s having second thoughts all the same.

“Lucky for me,” she says, “neither one of them’s the type to make trouble. Unless they’ve no choice.”

Mart doesn’t answer that. “I like your fella,” he says. “I’m not the sentimental type, so I don’t know if I’d go as far as to say I’ve got fond of him, but I like the man. I’ve respect for him. I wouldn’t want to see him come to any harm.”

“ ‘Nice fiancé you’ve got there,’ ” Lena says. “ ‘Be a shame if anything was to happen to him.’ ”

Mart, tilting his head to lick his cigarette paper, glances at her. “I know you’re not mad about the idea of yourself and myself being on the same side. But that’s where we’ve landed. You’ll haveta make the best of it.”

Lena has had enough of Mart’s sidelong ways. She leaves her washing and turns to face him. “How did you have in mind?”

“The fine Detective Nealon’s been all round the townland,” Mart says. “Interviewing people, like, although he’s not calling it that. ‘Would you have time for a chat?’ That’s what he says, when he does show up at the door. Very civilized; as if you could say to him, ‘Go on outa that, young fella, I’ve the dinner burning on me,’ and off he’d trot, no problem. Has he been round to you?”

“Not yet. Or I missed him, maybe.”

“I’d say he’s starting off with the men,” Mart says. “And I’d say I know why. He said to me—halfway through our wee chat, all casual like—‘Were you up on the mountain at all, Sunday night?’ I told him the farthest I went from home was the back garden, when my fella Kojak here had a bitta business with a fox. And Detective Nealon explained to me that he’s been told there was a buncha lads messing about up the mountain, just about the time Rushborough died and just about the place he was found. And he needs to talk to them, ’cause they mighta seen or heard something valuable to the investigation. He can do a voice lineup with his witness, if he has to, but it’d be easier on everyone if the lads cut to the chase and come tell him all about it.” Mart examines his cigarette and nips away a loose thread of tobacco. “That, now,” he says, “that’s what you might call problematic.”

“Cal said nothing like that to Nealon,” Lena says.

“He didn’t, o’ course. I never thought he did. Nor does anyone.”

“Then what’s he got to do with it?”

“Not a sausage,” Mart says promptly. “That’s what I’m telling you: I’d like to see things stay that way. If I haveta have a blow-in living next door, I could do a lot worse.”

“He’s no blow-in now,” Lena says. “He’s my man.”

Mart’s eyes flick over her, not in the mindless way a man assesses a woman, but with thought behind them. It’s the way he might assess a sheepdog, trying to prize out its capabilities and its temperament, whether it might turn vicious and how well it would come to heel.

“ ’Twas a good move, getting engaged,” he says again. “I haven’t heard a whisper about your fella since you done that. But if Detective Nealon keeps on making a nuisance of himself, I will. I’ll be honest with you: you haven’t the same clout as, we’ll say, Noreen, or Angela Maguire, or another woman that’s coaching the camogie and helping out with the parish fundraiser and spreading gossip over the tea and custard creams. If Mr. Hooper was Noreen’s man, or Angela’s, no one would touch him with a ten-foot pole. As it is, they’d prefer to leave him be, outa respect for you as well as for him. But if they haveta, they’ll hand him over to Detective Nealon tied up in a bow. If I haveta, so will I.”

Lena knew all this already, but coming from him and like this, it reaches her in new terms. Cal is a foreigner, and she’s spent the last thirty years trying to make herself into one. She only ever managed to get one foot outside the circle, but when the enemy is closing in, it’s enough.

She says, “You can hand over whatever you like. Nealon can’t throw a man in jail with no evidence.”

Mart, unfazed, takes off his straw hat to wave it leisurely in front of his face. “D’you know something that gives me a pain in the backside?” he asks. “Shortsightedness. ’Tis a feckin’ epidemic. I’ll believe a man has good sense—or a woman, or a child—and then, outa the blue, they’ll come out with some piece of nonsense that shows they haven’t spent two minutes thinking it through. And bang goes another little bitta my faith in humanity. I haven’t enough in stock that I can afford to go losing much more of it. Honest to God, I’m ready to start begging people on my knees to just take the two minutes and think things through.”

He blows smoke and watches its slow spread in the motionless air. “I don’t know who fed Nealon that loada flimflam about lads up on the mountain,” he says. “It coulda been the bold Johnny, o’ course, but somehow I don’t reckon he’d go outa his way to stir up the townland against him just now, unless he had no choice. If Nealon arrests him it’ll be a different story altogether, but for now, I’d say Johnny’s got enough sense that he’s keeping his mouth shut and his ears open. So let’s say, just for argument’s sake, that ’twas young Theresa Reddy that did the talking. Will you humor me on that for a moment?”

Lena says nothing.

“And in exchange, we’ll say you’re right, and there’s not enough to tie Mr. Hooper to the murder. Or we’ll say he doesn’t appeal to Detective Nealon as a suspect—sure, aren’t the cops known for sticking together, the whole world over? And we’ll say there’s no evidence to put anyone else up the mountain that night, either. There’s poor aul’ Detective Nealon, empty-handed—except he’s got one person, ready and waiting, in his sights.”

Lena’s hands feel weak before she understands why. She stays still and watches him.

“There’s one person that admits straight out they were at the scene of the crime. They say there was a few men there, but they’ve nothing to back that up. And they mighta had a good reason to want Paddy Englishman dead. We all know Rushborough had a hold on Johnny, and we all know Johnny Reddy’d sell his own flesh and blood to save his own skin, not a bother on him.”

He watches Lena from under his tangle of eyebrows, steadily fanning himself. Somewhere a sheep calls, a familiar undemanding sound, far away in the fields.

“Think it through,” Mart says. “This isn’t the time for shortsightedness. What’ll happen next? And then what’ll happen after that?”

Lena says, “What is it you want off me?”

“It was wee Johnny Reddy that killed Rushborough,” Mart says, gently but with great finality. “ ’Tis a sad thing to say about a man we all knew from a baba, but let’s be honest: Johnny was always a charmer, but he was never what you’d call a man of conscience. There’s people saying Johnny wouldn’ta done it because Rushborough was more good to him alive than dead, but the fact is, the two of them brought over some unfinished business from London. Johnny owed your man a fair bitta cash, and your man wasn’t the type that’d take well to being left outa pocket. That’s why Johnny came home: he was hoping people here had enough fondness for one of their own that they’d dip into their savings to keep him from getting his legs broke, or worse. And that’s why Rushborough came after him: he wasn’t going to have Johnny giving him the slip. There might be a few people that heard some wild rumor about gold, but I’d say that’s a story Johnny put about to explain what the two of them were doing here.”

He uses his hat to waft his smoke politely away from Lena, and cocks an eye at her. “Are you with me so far?”

“I’m following you,” Lena says.

“A-one,” Mart says. “Well, Johnny had a bitta success. There’s plenty of people that’ll testify, if they haveta, that he came asking them for a loan. Some of them even gave him a few bob, for old times’ sake.” He smiles at Lena. “I’m not ashamed to say I loaned him a coupla hundred quid myself. I knew I’d never see hide nor hair of it again, but I suppose I’m an aul’ softie at heart. Maybe your Cal did the same, did he, for Theresa’s sake? And maybe his bank statement’d show him withdrawing that few hundred quid, a few days after Johnny came home?”

Lena watches him.

“How and ever,” Mart says, “Johnny couldn’t scrape together the full whack, and Rushborough wouldn’t be satisfied with any less than he was owed. There’s a few people that’ll say Johnny came back to them in the last coupla days before Rushborough died, begging for money again, saying ’twas life or death. Maybe you’re one of them, sure. Maybe that’s what Johnny was doing round here, the evening before it happened, banging on your door and bellowing outa him.”

He arches an inquiring eyebrow at Lena. She says nothing.

“Johnny was a frightened man,” Mart says. “And no wonder. I was never a fan of Mr. Rushborough; underneath the fancy shirts and the fancy talk, he always seemed like a right hard chaw to me. The Guards must be looking into him, and I don’t know what they’ll find, but I’d say ’twould frighten the life outa anyone, let alone a wee scutter like Johnny. He couldn’t run: if Rushborough had followed him once, he’d do it again. And sure, Johnny wouldn’ta wanted to head for the hills, anyway, leaving his wife and childer unprotected with that fella out for blood. No dacent man’d do that.”

Lena doesn’t bother to hide her dry look. “I’m feeling charitable,” Mart explains. “No harm in thinking the best of people. One way or t’other, Johnny couldn’t see a way out. He arranged to meet Rushborough somewhere on the mountain. Maybe he said he had the money ready for him after all. Rushborough’d be an awful eejit to meet him somewhere lonely, but sure, anyone can get overconfident, specially when he’s dealing with the likes of Johnny Reddy. Only instead of paying him, Johnny kilt him. I’ve heard he hit him over the head with a lump hammer, but then again, I’ve heard he stabbed him with a screwdriver, either right through the heart or right through the eye. Would you have any information on that?”

“No more than you have,” Lena says. “Noreen heard he was hit with a rock. But then she heard he was knifed, or maybe his throat was cut. That’s as much as I know.”

It sets her teeth on edge to give him even this much. It’s a surrender.

“Detective Nealon said nothing to your fella?”

“Not that he’s told me.”

“No matter,” Mart says peacefully, dropping his smoke to crush it out under his boot. “ ’Twoulda been useful to know, but we’ll do grand without. Whichever or whatever hit him, that was the end of the bold Mr. Rushborough. ’Tis an awful tragic story, and ’twon’t be popular with the tourist board, but you can’t please everyone. And most of the tourists that come here do be passing through to somewhere else anyway, or else they’re lost, so ’twon’t do much harm.”

Birds dive in the blue sky behind his head. The mountains are a slip of shadow in the corner of Lena’s eye.

“It all hangs together beautiful,” Mart says. “There’s just one wee bitta mud in the waters: that story about a buncha local lads doing something nefarious on the mountain that night. As long as Nealon’s got that to contend with, ’tis hard for him to settle comfortably on Johnny, or anyhow Johnny all on his ownio. And I’d like Detective Nealon to be comfortable.”

He arranges his hat back on his head. “There was no one on the mountain that night,” he says. “Only Rushborough and Johnny. Whoever’s been saying different needs to go back to Detective Nealon and correct the record. I’m not saying they musta seen Johnny leaving the house late that night, not for definite, but ’twould be helpful.”

At his feet, Kojak flops over onto the other side and sighs gustily. Mart bends, painfully, to rub his neck.

“If that loada flimflam did happen to come from young Theresa,” he says, “nobody’d blame her for making up a story to shield her daddy. Sure, it’d be only natural. Not even the detective himself could hold that against her. As long as she’s got the sense to know when ’tis time to come clean.”

He straightens up and pats his pockets, making sure everything is in its proper place. “If you think of it,” he says, “ ’tis no more than justice. Regardless of who kilt Rushborough, all this was Johnny Reddy’s doing.”

Lena agrees with him on this. Mart sees it in her face, and that she refuses to admit it. He grins, enjoying that.

“Johnny won’t go down easy,” she says. “If he gets arrested, he’ll tell the detective about the gold. Try and drop all of ye in the shite.”

“I’ll handle Johnny,” Mart says. “Don’t you worry your head about him.” He snaps his fingers for Kojak and smiles at her. “You just get your house in order, Missus Hooper. I’ve faith in you. No better woman.”

One of the deep pleasures woven through Lena’s life is walking around Ardnakelty. She has a car, but she walks everywhere she can, and counts it among the main compensations of her decision to stay. Lena doesn’t consider herself an expert on much, but she takes an expert’s fine-tuned satisfaction in the fact that here she could distinguish March from April blindfolded, by the quality of the damp earth in its scent, or tell how the last few seasons have unfolded by watching the movement of sheep in their fields. No other place, however familiar, could provide her with a map that’s built into her bones as well as her senses.

Today she drives up the mountain. She doesn’t like doing it—not only because of losing the walk, but because right now she would rather be out on the mountainside, where she could catch its every nuance. The car insulates her; she could miss something. But she’s hoping that, after she’s talked to Trey, they’ll need the car. She’s left the dogs behind.

Johnny answers the door. For the first time since he came back to Ardnakelty, he has the face he’s earned: old, pinched and stubbled, with a faint whiskey blur in his eyes. Even his vanity has gone. He barely seems to register Lena’s second of shock.

“God almighty,” he says, with a smile like a tic, “ ’tis Lena Dunne. What brings you up here, at all? Have you news for me?”

Lena watches his mind zip between hope and wariness. “No news,” she says. “I’m looking for a word with Theresa, if she’s about.”

“With Theresa? What would you want with Theresa, now?”

Lena says, “This and that.”

“She’s inside,” Sheila says, in the dark hallway behind Johnny. “I’ll get her for you now.” She disappears again.

“Thanks,” Lena calls after her. She says to Johnny, “Sorry for your loss.”

“What…?” It takes him a squinting moment to work out what she’s on about. “Ah, God, right. Himself. Ah, no, I’m grand—he’ll be missed, o’ course he will, but sure, we weren’t close or anything. I hardly knew him, only from down the pub. I’m grand, so I am.”

Lena doesn’t bother answering him. Johnny tries to lounge in the doorway, but his muscles are too tense for that; he just ends up looking like there’s something wrong with him. “So,” he says. “What’s the story from down in the valley-o?”

“You oughta come down and see for yourself, one of these days,” Lena says. “Take a bitta pride in your work.”

“Ah, here, get away outa that,” Johnny protests. “This has nothing to do with me. I done nothing on Rushborough. I’m just minding me own business up here, not saying a word to anyone, not saying a word to Nealon and his boyos. Everyone knows that. Amn’t I right?”

“Haven’t a clue,” Lena says. “Go ask them yourself.” She doesn’t blame him for getting panicky. Johnny’s between a rock and a couple of hard places. If Nealon believes Trey’s story, then the townland is going to come after Johnny; if Nealon doubts her, then Johnny’s going to be top of his list. If Johnny runs, Nealon will hunt him down. For once in his life, Johnny has no easy out. She feels no sympathy for him.

Trey, with Banjo at her knee, appears in the hallway behind him. Lena knows from one look at her face that this won’t be easy.

“Come out for a walk with me,” she says to Trey. “Leave Banjo.”

“Now there’s a great idea,” Johnny says. “Get yourself a bitta sunshine, have a nice chat. Not for too long, now, your mammy’ll need help with the dinner, but sure Maeve can—”

Trey gives Lena a quick wary look, but she doesn’t argue. She steps out and closes the door on Banjo and Johnny both.

They head up the road, higher onto the mountain, moving themselves well away from the house. Trey doesn’t talk, and Lena takes her time, getting her bearings. Like Cal, she’s become adept at reading Trey’s moods, but today Trey has a feel to her that Lena can’t interpret, something unyielding and almost inimical. She’s walking at a hard, fast lope, keeping the full width of the road between herself and Lena.

Gimpy Duignan, shirtless in his front yard washing the layers of dust off his car, turns at the crunch of their feet and lifts a hand to them; they nod back without slowing. The heat has shifted, turned denser and heavier. Between the tall spruces, the blue of the sky is thick and smeared like paint.

“I was gonna come see you anyway,” Trey says. She’s not looking at Lena. “Need to ask you something.”

Lena says, “Go on.”

“Brendan,” Trey says. “You said you had a guess who done that on him.”

Lena is rocked by the strength of her urge to give Trey everything she has. For generations, this townland has been begging for someone to come along and defy it wholesale, blow all its endless, unbreakable, unspoken rules to smithereens and let everyone choke on the dust. If Trey has the spine and the will to do it, she deserves the chance. Lena only wishes she had got there herself, back when she was young enough and wild enough to throw everything else away.

She’s got too old. The risks she takes now are middle-aged risks, carefully gauged to gain the best results with the least damage. Cal and Trey, as well as her changed self, keep her in check. She might still be willing to risk herself; she won’t risk them.

“I did,” she says. “And I told you it’s only a guess.”

“Don’t care. You know themens around here. Whatever you guess, you’re probably right. I need to know.”

Lena understands exactly what Trey is doing. In theory, she even approves. Trey could have decided to keep blasting away scattergun at a place that’s never treated her anything but poorly; instead, she’s taking deliberate, accurate aim, and Lena agrees with her that a matter this serious deserves accuracy. She has no idea how to communicate to Trey the chasm between theory and reality.

“I get what you’re at,” she says. “Just so you know.”

Trey glances swiftly across at her, but then she nods, unsurprised. “I only wanta get the ones that done that on Brendan,” she says. “Just them. I wanta leave the rest outa it.”

They pass the abandoned Murtagh house, slates coming off the roof and yellow-flowered ragweed growing waist-high up to the door. A bird, startled by something unseen, bursts up from the trees on the slope above them. Lena doesn’t look around. If someone is watching, the fact that she’s talking to Trey will do nothing but good. Mart will have spread the word, by now, that Lena’s been brought to heel.

“That’s why I need to know now,” Trey says. “Before your man Nealon ends up getting set on the wrong people.”

“Right,” Lena says. “Let’s say I give you my guesses, that I pulled straight outa my arse, going on nothing except I don’t like the cut of this fella, and that fella had a funny look to him around then. Are you going to stand up and say in court that you heard those lads dumping Rushborough?”

“Yeah. If I haveta.”

“What if I’m wrong?”

Trey shrugs. “Best I can do.”

“What if some of ’em can prove they weren’t there?”

“Then I’ll only get the ones that can’t. Better’n none. I already thought about all this.”

“And then what? You’ll come back here and go back to mending furniture with Cal, is it? Like nothing ever happened?”

The mention of Cal makes Trey’s jaw set. “Work that out when I get to it. All I’m asking you for is names. Not advice.”

Lena spent the whole drive looking for the right way to go about this, but all she found was the looming, intractable sense that she’s out of her depth. Someone else should be doing this, Noreen or Cal or someone who has a bull’s notion of how to deal with teenagers; anyone but her. Trey’s feet bite at the dirt and gravel with quick sharp crunches; the urgency thrums off her, barely kept in check.

“Listen to me,” Lena says. The sun comes at her like a physical force, pressing her down. She’s doing what she swore she’d never do: bending a child to this townland’s will. “You’re not going to like it, but hear me out all the same. I’m not going to give you any names, ’cause they’d do you no good. You’d have to be pure thick to send men to jail on nothing but someone else’s half-made-up guesses, and you’re no thick.”

She feels Trey’s whole body stiffen, rejecting that. “And now that you hate my guts,” she says, “I’ve something I need from you. You need to go into town, to this Nealon fella, and tell him you never saw anyone on the mountain last Sunday night.”

Trey stops moving, balked like a mule. “Not doing it,” she says flatly.

“I said you wouldn’t like it. I wouldn’t ask you if I didn’t have to.”

“Don’t give a shite. You can’t make me.”

“Just listen to me for a minute, is all. Nealon has this townland like a hornet’s nest; people are going mental. If you stick to that story—”

“I’m sticking to it. Serve them all right if they’re—”

“Here’s you saying you thought this through, and I’m telling you now, you haven’t. Nowhere near enough. You think people are just going to sit on their arses and let you work away?”

“That’s my business. Not yours.”

“That’s children’s talk. ‘You can’t make me, you can’t stop me, mind your own beeswax—’ ”

Trey says, straight into Lena’s face, “I’m not a fuckin’ child.”

“Then don’t be talking like one.”

They’re squared off across the path; Trey is set like she’s seconds from a fistfight. “You don’t tell me what to do. Tell me who done that on Brendan, and then leave me the fuck alone.”

Lena finds herself, suddenly and for the first time in a long time, losing her temper. Out of all the possibilities in the world, the last way she would have chosen to spend her summer was getting herself tangled neck-deep in a snarl of Ardnakelty drama, with Dymphna Duggan picking through her secret places and Mart Lavin calling round to discuss her relationship. She wouldn’t have done it for anyone in the world but Trey and possibly Cal, and now the contrary little fucker is giving her shite for it. “I’d only love to leave you alone. I’ve no wish to have anything to do with this bloody—”

“Then do it. Go home. Fuck off, if you’re not gonna help me.”

“What do you think I’m doing here? I’m trying to help you, even if you’re too—”

“I don’t want that kinda help. Fuck off to Cal’s, and the pair of ye can help each other. I don’t want you.”

“Shut the fuck up and listen. If you keep on at what you’re doing, this townland will tell Nealon it was Cal that kilt Rushborough.” Lena’s voice is rising. She doesn’t give a damn if everyone on the mountainside hears her. It’ll do this place good to hear things said out loud for once.

“They can all go and shite,” Trey snaps back at her, just as loud. “And Cal as well. Same as you, treating me like a kid, telling me fuckin’ nothing—”

“He was trying to look out for you, is all. If he—”

“I never asked him to look out for me! I never asked for anything off either one of ye, only—”

“The hell are you on about? What difference does that make?”

“The only thing I asked you for was who kilt Brendan, and you told me to get fucked. I owe you nothing.”

Lena is on the edge of shaking her till some sense comes out. “So you’re grand with Cal going to jail, is it?”

“He won’t go to fuckin’ jail. Nealon can’t do anything on him with no—”

“He can, yeah. If Cal confesses, he can.”

Trey opens her mouth. Lena doesn’t give her a chance to get anything out of it. “If Nealon’s got no evidence against Cal or anyone, he’ll go looking at the one person that was out on the mountain when Rushborough got kilt. This place’ll be well on board with that. Everyone knows you’re the one dropping them in the shite; they’ve the knives out for you already. They’ll give Nealon a motive for you and all, tell him Rushborough was abusing you or the little ones—”

“I’m not fuckin’ scared of them. They can say whatever they—”

“Shut up and listen to me for one fucking second. If Nealon starts going after you, what d’you reckon Cal will do?”

Trey shuts up.

Lena leaves her plenty of time before she says, “He’ll say it was him that done it.”

Trey punches straight for her face. Lena half-knew it was coming, but all the same she’s barely in time to block the punch away. They stare at each other, breathing hard and balanced like fighters, ready.

“Kid stuff,” Lena says. “Try it again if you want. It’ll change nothing.”

Trey wheels and starts walking fast up the path, with her head jammed down. Lena keeps pace with her.

“You can throw all the tantrums you like, but that’s what he’ll do. Are you going to let him?”

Trey speeds up, but Lena’s legs are longer. She’s done talking, but she’s not going to let Trey walk away.

They’re high on the mountainside, out of the spruce groves and into the wide expanses of heathered bog. Whatever about earlier, no one is watching them now. A small, hot wind strays down from the mountaintop, pulling at the heather with a child’s absentminded destructiveness; the sky off to the west has a dingy haze.

Trey says, down to the path, “Are you and Cal getting married?”

Lena wasn’t expecting that, although she feels like she should have been. “We are not,” she says. “I thought you’d more sense than that. I already told you I’m done with marriage.”

Trey has stopped moving again. She’s staring Lena out of it, unconvinced. “Then why’s everyone saying you are?”

“Because I told them so. I was trying to get the place off Cal’s back. It woulda worked, only for you setting Nealon on them, getting them all stirred up.”

Trey shuts her mouth. She walks on more slowly, her eyes down, thinking. Insects buzz and zip in the heather around them.

“If we hadda been getting married,” Lena says, “do you not think you’da heard about it before Noreen did?”

Trey glances up sharply at that. Then she goes back to trudging along, scuffing up dust with the toes of her runners. Her silence this time has lost its quality of stubborn resistance; all her mind is on working this through.

“I was an eejit,” she says gruffly, in the end. “Thinking ye were getting married, like. Not the rest.”

“You’re all right,” Lena says. “Everyone’s an eejit now and then. Now’s not the moment for it, but.”

Trey goes back to her silence. Lena lets her have all she needs. Things are shifting in the layers of Trey’s mind: plates grating across each other, crushing old things and heaving new ones to the surface, faster and more painfully than they should have. There’s nothing Lena can do about that; it’s a demand of the circumstances and the place, neither of which has any truck with mercy. All she can do is give Trey these few minutes to get her bearings amid her new landscape.

Trey asks, “How’d you know it was me that said it to Nealon? About men on the mountain that night?”

“Cal. And he said it was a load of shite.”

“He knew I made it up?”

“He did, yeah.”

“Then how come he didn’t say it to me? Or to Nealon?”

“He reckoned,” Lena says, “God help us all, that it was your choice to make. Not his.”

Trey digests that for another while. “He know you were coming here?”

“No,” Lena says. “I don’t know whether he’da argued with me or not. I’da come either way. You’ve a right to know what you’re in.”

Trey nods. That much, at least, she agrees with.

“I don’t blame you for wanting revenge,” Lena says. “But you haveta take into account where it’ll lead, whether you like it or not. That’s what I mean when I tell you not to act like a child. Children don’t take things into account. Adults have no choice.”

“My dad doesn’t,” Trey says. “Take into account where things’ll lead.”

“Right,” Lena says. “Your dad’s not what I’d call an adult.”

Trey turns her face upwards. This high on the mountainside, what’s around them is mostly sky, with a wide rim of heather that gives the air a wild, expansive sweetness. A hawk, tilting on currents, is only a flick of black against the blue.

“I had every right,” she says. A deep note of sadness weighs down her voice. “To get back at them. Whatever way I could.”

“Yeah,” Lena says. She understands that she’s won. “You did.”

“It was going great,” Trey says. “I done everything right. It woulda been good. And then some fucker went and kilt Rushborough, and ruint it all.”

Something in the way her head falls back, the skid of her eyes across the sky, looks like she’s worn too thin: she’s done too much trying, come too long a road, she’s relinquishing too much. Lena doesn’t regret asking it of her, but she wishes with all her heart that she could drive Trey straight to Cal’s and send the pair of them out to get a rabbit for dinner, instead of bringing her into town and aiming her into a detective’s hands. She wishes, for the thousandth time, that Johnny Reddy had never come home.

“I know,” she says. “I reckon you’re better off this way, myself, but I can see where you’d be pure pissed off.”

“Yeah,” Trey says. “Well.”

Lena finds herself grinning. “What?” Trey demands, instantly prickly.

“Nothing. You sound like Cal, is all.”

“Huh,” Trey says, the way Cal says it, and the two of them actually laugh.

Trey—settled in the back office of the shabby little Garda station with a Coke and a packet of crisps, in front of a chewed-looking MDF desk with a discreet voice recorder in one corner—plays a blinder. Lena, tucked away on a lopsided chair beside a filing cabinet, is watching for missteps, ready to shift in her chair as a warning, but there’s no need. She didn’t really expect there to be. When she asked Trey to do this, she didn’t overlook the fact that the undertaking would spook many a grown adult. She’s also aware that Cal would never have asked such a thing of Trey, who he feels has already dealt with more than enough in her life. Lena thinks differently. In her view, Trey’s hard-edged childhood has left her capable of more than the average kid her age. If she makes use of that when it’s needed, then at least all she’s been through has a point to it.

Nealon makes it easy for her. He putters about, boiling the kettle and keeping up the steady stream of talk, complaining cheerfully about the downsides of the job, staying in B & Bs and leaving the missus to mind the kids, spending his time annoying people who’ve all got better things to do than talk to the likes of him. Lena watches him and thinks of Cal, and how he must have done this a thousand times. He would have done it well; she can see him at it.

“And it’s not like on the telly,” Nealon informs them, pouring tea for himself and Lena, “where you have the one chat with someone and you’re done. In real life, you have the chats with everyone, and then one fella comes back to you saying he needs to set a few things straight. And o’ course you’ve been going off his statement when you talked to other people, so then you’ve to start all over again. D’you take milk? Sugar?”

“Just milk, thanks. D’you get that often?” Lena asks helpfully. “People changing their stories?”

“Wouldja stop,” Nealon tells her, passing her a big stained mug that says dad joke champion on the side. “You wouldn’t believe how often. People get caught on the hop, if you get me, the first time we talk. They feel like they’re on the back foot, and they keep things to themselves, or they come out with some load of aul’ rubbish. And then they go home and think, What the hell was I at? Then it takes them ages to come back in and put things right, ’cause they’re afraid they’ll get in trouble.”

Trey glances up at him, nervous, but she can’t hold his eyes. “Do they get in trouble?”

Nealon looks surprised. “God, no. Why would they?”

“Wasting your time.”

Nealon, pulling up his chair behind the desk, laughs. “Sure, that’s most of this job: wasting my time. Filling in this form and that form, and I know no one’ll ever look at the bleedin’ things, but it has to be done anyway. Come here, can I have one of those crisps?”

Trey holds out the packet across the desk. “Lovely,” Nealon says, selecting a crisp with care. “Cheese-and-onion’s your only man. Think about it this way: say some fella feeds me a load of rubbish, and then he’s got the sense to come back and clear it up before I go making an eejit of myself. Now, if I give him hassle, word’ll get around, and the next person who needs to set the record straight, they’re going to keep their lip zipped, aren’t they? But if I just shake his hand and thank him, nice and polite like, then the next person won’t have any problem coming in to me. And everyone’s happy. D’you get me?”

“Yeah.”

“When everyone’s happy,” Nealon says comfortably, leaning back in his chair and balancing his mug on his belly, “I’m happy.”

Trey glances over her shoulder at Lena. Lena nods encouragingly. She’s trying to look like a respectable pillar of the community, but she’s not in practice.

“What I told you that day,” Trey says, and dries up. Her face is pinched with tension. Nealon slurps his tea and waits.

“About hearing lads talking. The night your man died.”

Nealon cocks his head to one side. “Yeah?”

“Made that up,” Trey says, to her Coke can.

Nealon gives her an indulgent grin and a finger-wag, like he just caught her mitching off school. “I knew it.”

“You did?”

“Listen, young one, I’ve been doing this job since you were in nappies. If I couldn’t spot someone giving me the runaround, I’d be banjaxed altogether.”

“Sorry,” Trey mumbles. She’s got her head well down, picking at the skin around her thumbnail.

“You’re grand,” Nealon tells her. “Tell you what: you can fill out my expense claim for me, and we’ll call it quits. How’s that?”

Trey manages a small puff of a laugh. “There you go,” Nealon says, smiling. “So come here to me: was any of that story true?”

“Yeah. The morning stuff, how I found him. That part all happened like I said.”

“Ah, lovely,” Nealon says. “That’ll save us some hassle. How about the night before?”

Trey twists one shoulder.

“Did you go out at all?”

“Nah.”

“Don’t be picking at your nails,” Nealon tells her. He’s clearly come to the conclusion, after meeting Johnny, that Trey must be craving a father figure. “You’ll give yourself an infection. Did you hear voices outside?”

Trey obediently flattens her hands on her thighs. “Nah. Made up that part.”

“See headlights? Hear a car?”

“Nah.”

“We’ll start over, so,” Nealon says cheerfully. “You just slept through the night, is it? Then woke up early and brought the dog for a walk?”

Trey shakes her head. “Say it out loud,” Nealon reminds her, tapping the voice recorder. “For this yoke here.”

Trey gives the recorder a nervy glance, but she takes a breath and keeps going. “I did wake up in the night. Like I said. ’Cause I was hot. Just lay there for a while—I was thinking about getting up and watching the telly, only I couldn’t be ars— bothered. After a bit…”

She stops and glances over at Lena. “You’re grand,” Lena reassures her. “Just tell him the truth, is all.”

“Heard someone moving about,” Trey says. Her voice has turned jerky. “In the house, like. Real quiet. And then the door opening, the front door, and then it shut again. So I went out to the sitting room to look out the window, see who it was.” She glances up at Nealon. “I wasn’t being nosy. It coulda been my brother, he’s only little, and sometimes he walks in his sleep—”

“Listen,” Nealon says, grinning, “I’ve no problem with anyone being nosy. The nosier the better. Did you see someone?”

Trey takes a tight breath. “Yeah,” she says. “Saw my dad.”

“Doing what?”

“Not doing anything. Going out the gate, just.”

“Right,” Nealon says, very easily. “You’re sure it was him? In the dark?”

“Yeah. The moon was up. Full, like.”

“What did you reckon he was at?”

“At first…” Trey’s head goes farther down, and she scrapes at something on the thigh of her jeans. “I thought maybe he was leaving, like. Going off on us. ’Cause he did before. I was gonna go out to him, try and stop him. Only he didn’t take the car, so…” One shoulder lifts. “I reckoned it was grand. He was just going for a walk ’cause he couldn’t sleep either.”

Her head comes up, and she looks at Nealon straight on. “Only I knew if I said it to you, you’d think he kilt your man Rushborough. And he didn’t. They got on, like. They had no row or anything. My dad, that same night he was talking about how he was gonna bring your man to see this aul’ abbey up in Boyle, ’cause your man was into history—like, that’s the way he talked about him, just a guy he knew that was in town, not like he was—”

“Jaysus, young one, breathe,” Nealon says, leaning back and holding up his hands. “You’ll give yourself the head-staggers. Cross my heart and hope to die, I’ve never thrown a fella in jail for going outside his own gate. Like you say, your da probably just needed some air. How long was he gone?”

Trey leaves a second of silence. “Dunno. I went back to bed.”

“After how long?”

“A bit.”

“Go on, give us a guess. Ten minutes? Half an hour? An hour?”

“Half an hour, maybe? Coulda been less. Just felt long ’cause I was…” Trey twitches one shoulder.

“You were worrying he’d done a runner,” Nealon says matter-of-factly. “So would I have been. You didn’t go after him, just to make sure?”

“Nah. I wasn’t that worried, like. Just wanted to wait and see him come back. Only…”

“Only he didn’t.”

“He musta done, only I got tired. Falling asleep. So I went to bed. Woke up early, but, and I kept wondering, so I went to check if he was in his room.”

“And he was?”

“He was, yeah. Sleeping. Only by then I was awake. And Banjo—my dog—he was looking for a walk, and I didn’t want him waking everyone else. So I brought him out.”

“And that’s when you found Rushborough.”

“Yeah. The rest was like I told you before.” Trey catches a quick breath, almost a sigh. Her face has loosened: the hard part is over. “That’s why I stayed there so long, before I headed to Cal’s. I was trying to think what to do.”

Lena has stopped watching for her to put a foot wrong. She’s sitting still, holding her mug and taking in the new subtleties unfurling in Trey, the intricacies that just a few months back she couldn’t have fit into her mind, never mind put into skilled action. Trey may be doing Ardnakelty’s bidding, but her aims and her reasons are all hers. She’s not the townland’s creature in this, or Lena’s, or Cal’s: she’s rising up as no one’s creature but her own. Lena knows probably she should be afraid for Trey, for where this indomitability might land her—Cal would be—but she can’t find that in herself. All she finds is an explosion of pride, firing through her so fiercely she feels like Nealon will sense it and turn. She keeps her face prim.

“Tell us something,” Nealon says, tilting his chair on its back legs and sipping his tea. “Makes no difference to the investigation, I’m just curious. What made you change your mind today?”

Trey shrugs uncomfortably. Nealon waits.

“I was stupid, before. Made a hames of it.”

“How’s that?”

“I wasn’t trying to get anyone in trouble. I just wanted you to leave my dad alone. I thought, if I didn’t say any names, you couldn’t go hassling anyone. Only…”

“Only instead,” Nealon says, with a grin, “I went around hassling everyone. Is that it?”

“Yeah. It all went to shi— to bits. I didn’t— I never expected that. I wasn’t thinking.”

“Ah, you’re fifteen, for Jaysus’ sake,” Nealon says tolerantly. “Teenagers never think ahead; that’s their job. Was it something Missus Dunne here said to you that made you change your mind?”

“Nah. I mean, sorta, but not really. Lena came up to ours, to say she’d bring me in here to sign the statement yoke, ’cause my mam couldn’t do it, with the little ones. So I told her what I said to you just now, ’cause it was wrecking my head, and I figured she’d know what to do. I was thinking maybe I’d just tell you I made the whole thing up. Not say about my dad going out, like. Only…” Trey glances over at Lena again. “Lena said I oughta tell you the whole thing. She said if I left something out, you’d know, and then you wouldn’t believe a word outa my mouth.”

“Missus Dunne’s a wise lady,” Nealon says. “You did the right thing, telling me. Your daddy could’ve seen something while he was out there—maybe something that he doesn’t think was important, or else maybe his mate getting killed sent it right out of his head. But it could be something I need to know about.”

“I know he said he never went out,” Trey says. Her face is tightening again. “But my dad, he doesn’t…he’s scared of the Guards. I was as well, till I got to know Cal—Mr. Hooper. My dad was just worried, same as I was, if he told you he was out—”

“Listen to me, young one,” Nealon says. “Just shush a moment and listen. I’ll tell you something for nothing: you’ve done no harm to anyone except whoever killed that poor fella. And like you said, your da had no reason to do that.”

It’s the soothing, rock-solid voice that Lena uses with spooked horses. Nealon is ready and itching to arrest Johnny, and leave Trey to live with the knowledge that she put her dad in prison. Lena is fiercely, protectively glad that Cal is out of this job.

“Yeah,” Trey says eagerly. “I mean, no, he didn’t. He liked your man Rushborough, he never said a bad word about him, and if there was any trouble he’da said it to me—I’m the oldest one that’s still at home, see, so he trusts me, he talks to me—”

“Ah, here,” Nealon says, grinning and holding up a hand, “don’t start that again, for Jaysus’ sake. You’ll give the whole three of us the head-staggers. I’ll tell you what”—he glances up at the clock on the wall—“it’s headed for dinnertime, and I don’t know about yous two, but I’m starving. I can always come back to you for more details if I need them, but we’ll leave it here for today, will we?”

Lena knows what he’s at: he wants this signed and solid, before Trey has second thoughts. “Yeah,” Trey says, catching a sudden shaky breath. “That’d be good.”

“Listen to me, now,” Nealon says, suddenly serious. He taps the desk to get Trey’s attention. “I’m going to ask that nice fella out front to type up your statement, and then you’ll need to sign it. Like I said before, the minute you sign that, things change. That’s no joke; it’ll be a legal document that’s part of a murder investigation. If there’s anything going in there that’s not true, now’s the time to clear it up, or you could land yourself in serious trouble. D’you hear me?”

He sounds like a stern daddy, and Trey responds like a good kid, nodding hard and looking him in the eye. “I know. I get it. I swear.”

“No more surprises?”

“Nah. Promise.”

Her voice is steady, final. For a second Lena hears the deep note of that grief again, running underneath it.

Nealon only hears the certainty. “That’s great,” he says. “Well done.” He pushes his chair back from the desk. “Let’s get this typed up, and you can have a read of it, make sure your man doesn’t get anything wrong. How’s that? D’you want another Coke while you wait?”

“Yeah,” Trey says. “Yes please. And sorry.”

“You’re all right,” Nealon says. “Better late than never, wha’? Interview terminated at five-thirteen p.m.” He taps the recorder off and stands up, lifting his eyebrows at Lena. “I’m dying for a smoke—don’t you be following my example, young one, it’s a filthy aul’ habit. Missus Dunne, d’you fancy a breath of fresh air?”

“Might as well,” Lena says, taking the hint. She glances at Trey as she gets up, to make sure she’s all right being left, but Trey isn’t looking at her.

The Garda station is a small boxy building, painted a neat white and popped in among a cheerful line of macaron-colored houses. A bunch of little kids are hauling scooters up the slope of the road and freewheeling back down, yelling; a few mammies in a front garden are keeping an eye on them and laughing about something and wiping babies’ noses and stopping toddlers from eating dirt, all at once.

Nealon tilts his smoke packet at Lena, and grins when she shakes her head. “I reckoned,” he says, “if you smoked, you might not want the young one knowing. Thought fresh air was a safer offer.”

“I wouldn’t try hiding that from her,” Lena says. “She doesn’t miss much.”

“I got that, all right.” Nealon tips his head back to examine Lena—she’s taller than he is. “Helena Dunne,” he says. “Let’s see: Noreen Duggan’s your sister, and Cal Hooper’s your fella. Have I got that right?”

“That’s me,” Lena says. She leans back against the wall to shorten herself. “For their sins.”

“Look at that,” Nealon says, pleased with himself. “I’m getting the hang of this place. I called around to you there a couple of days ago, looking for a chat, but you were out.”

“Work, probably.”

“Must’ve been.” Nealon selects a cigarette and balances it between finger and thumb, apparently considering it. “Your fella, Hooper,” he says, “he was there when Theresa told me the original story. He said she was reliable.” He cocks an eyebrow: it’s a question.

“She is, yeah,” Lena says. “Or she always has been. But she’s not at her best, these last few weeks. Her daddy coming home, that threw her for a loop. She was always mad about him.”

“Girls and their daddies,” Nealon says indulgently. “It’s great. One of mine’s still little enough that she thinks the sun shines out of my arse. I’m making the most of it while it lasts: the other one’s thirteen, God help me, so everything out of my mouth is so stupid she could just die. Does Theresa not hold it against her da that he done a legger?”

Lena gives that a bit of thought. “Not that I ever saw. She’s been too over the moon about having him back. And scared he’ll take off again.”

Nealon nods along. “Don’t blame her. Will he?”

Lena glances behind her to make sure Trey hasn’t come out, and lowers her voice. “I’d say so, yeah.”

“The poor young one,” Nealon says. “That wasn’t easy for her, coming clean with me. Fair play to you, convincing her. I appreciate that.” He smiles at her. “I’ll be honest with you, I’m pleasantly surprised. Places like your townland, let’s face it, mostly they wouldn’t go out of their way for the likes of me.”

“My fiancé’s a cop,” Lena points out. “Or was. I’d see things a bit differently from most people round my way.”

“That’d do it, all right,” Nealon acknowledges. “How’d you convince her?”

This is the loose joint in their story, and Lena knows better than to try and pretend it’s not there. She takes her time considering. After the performance Trey put on in there, there’s no way in hell Lena is going to let her down.

“D’you know,” she says, “I didn’t have to do as much convincing as I would’ve expected. She was halfway there already; she just needed the bitta encouragement. You’ve got the whole townland up to ninety—I wouldn’t say you need me to tell you that, sure.” She throws Nealon a look that’s half wry, half impressed. He dips his head mock-modestly.

“Trey should’ve seen that coming,” Lena says, “but she didn’t. She had herself all worked up, thinking you’d get the wrong men and it’d be all her fault. At first she wanted to leave out the bit about her daddy, but I told her there wasn’t much point: you’d know there had to be a reason why she made up the first story, and you’d keep on at her till she came out with it. She got that. Mostly, but, I think she just couldn’t handle telling any more lies. Like I said, she’s not much of a liar. It stresses her out.”

“There’s people like that,” Nealon agrees. He twirls his cigarette, still unlit, between two fingers. Lena, as she’s intended to, gets the message: they were never out here for air, fresh or otherwise. “What d’you think of her da?”

Lena shrugs and blows out a puff of air. “Johnny’s Johnny. He’s a bit of an eejit, but I wouldn’t’ve said there was much harm in him. You never know, but.”

“True enough,” Nealon says. He watches the scooter kids. One of them has fallen and is howling; a mammy checks for blood, gives the child a hug, and sends it back to its game. “Tell us something. The evening before Rushborough died, Johnny was round your place for a good half-hour. What was going on there?”

Lena takes in a breath and then stops. “Ah, now,” Nealon says wryly, wagging a finger at her. “Didn’t I just tell you I’ve got daughters? I know when someone’s deciding whether or not to tell me the truth.”

Lena lets out a shamefaced laugh. Nealon laughs with her. “I’ve known Johnny all my life,” she explains. “And I’m fond of Trey.”

“Jaysus, woman, I’m not going to drag the man away in chains if you say the wrong thing. It’s not like on the telly. I’m just trying to find out what went on here. Unless Johnny told you he was off to bash Rushborough’s head in, you’re not going to land him in jail. Did he?”

Lena laughs again. “Course not.”

“Well then. You’ve nothing to worry about. So would you ever give us the scoop, before you have my head melted?”

Lena sighs. “Johnny was looking to borrow money,” she says. “He said he owed it.”

“Did he say to who?”

Lena leaves half a second before she shakes her head. Nealon cocks his to one side. “But…?”

“But he said something like ‘Your man’s followed me this far, he’s not going to give up now.’ So I reckoned…”

“You reckoned Rushborough.”

“I did, yeah.”

“And you might’ve been right,” Nealon says. “Did you give Johnny anything?”

“I did not,” Lena says with spirit. “I’d never see it again. That fecker still owes me a fiver from when we were seventeen and I subbed him into the disco.”

“How’d he take it? Did he get upset? Narky? Threaten you?”

“Johnny? Jesus, no. He gave it a bitta sob stuff about old times’ sake, and when he saw that was getting him nowhere, he cut his losses and headed off.”

“Where to?”

Lena shrugs. “I’d the door shut on him by that time.”

“I don’t blame you,” Nealon says, grinning. “Come here, would you do us a favor? I don’t want to keep the young one away from her dinner any longer than I have to, but would you come in to me tomorrow and get this on paper?”

Lena thinks of what Mart Lavin said about Nealon, how he makes things sound optional. “No problem,” she says.

“Brilliant,” Nealon says, tucking his unlit cigarette back into the packet. The flash of a look Lena catches on him, as his head comes back up, is hot and driven as lust, the triumphant swell of a man after a woman he knows he can get. “And don’t worry,” he adds reassuringly, “I won’t be mentioning this to Johnny or anyone else. I’m not in the business of making anyone’s life harder.”

“Ah, that’s great,” Lena says, giving him a big relieved smile. “Thanks a million.” One of the mammies, joggling her baby on her hip, is looking up the road at them. She moves closer to the others to say something, and they all turn to watch Nealon and Lena go back into the station.

As the car doors slam and Nealon raises a hand from the station step, Trey’s well-behaved earnestness falls away. She vanishes into a silence so thick that Lena can feel it building up around her like snow.

It would take some brass neck for Lena to offer comfort or words of wisdom. Instead she leaves the silence untouched till they’re out of town, onto the main road. Then she says, “You did a good job.”

Trey nods. “He believed me,” she says.

“He did, yeah.”

Lena expects Trey to ask what will happen next, but she doesn’t. Instead she says, “What’re you gonna tell Cal?”

“I’m not going to tell him anything,” Lena says. “I reckon you should tell him the whole story, but it’s your call.”

“He’ll be raging.”

“Maybe. Maybe not.”

Trey doesn’t answer. She leans her forehead against the windowpane and looks out at the countryside moving by. The road is busy with commuters zipping homewards. Beyond it, and unaffected by its frenetic rhythms, cattle nose at their leisure for bits of green among the yellowing fields.

Lena says, “Where’ll I drop you?”

Trey catches her breath like she’d forgotten Lena was there. “Just home,” she says. “Thanks.”

“Fair enough,” Lena says, flicking on her indicator. She’s taking the long way, the twisting roads up the far side of the mountain and over, to minimize the number of Ardnakelty people who’ll see them. Today will be general knowledge soon enough. Trey can at least have a bit of respite to grow accustomed to what she’s done, before the townland gets its hands on it.

Trey goes back to gazing out the window. Lena glances sideways at her now and then, watching her eyes scan methodically back and forth across the mountainside, like she’s searching for something that she knows she won’t find.