A Life Before Death?

The Whiterock Road was pitch black, and the occasional young couple, hurrying home, clung their way past McCrory Park.

A few stragglers leaned together outside Jim’s Café. An over-crowded black taxi laboured up the hill. Few people noticed the two figures walking down towards the Falls Road. One was a thickset man in black overcoat, white open-necked shirt and white drill trousers. He wore a cap pushed back on his head and walked with one hand in his pocket. He didn’t seem to be in any hurry. His companion, a younger man dressed in jeans and an anorak, had to shorten his natural stride to match the older man’s. They walked in silence alongside the cemetery wall until they reached the Falls Road. They turned right at the bottom of the Whiterock and strolled slowly up the road. The young man cleared his throat. His companion glanced at him.

“Come on, we’ll cut down here.”

The younger man nodded. They hurried down Milltown Row and went more cautiously then, the older man in front bent forward with one hand still in his pocket. Down and over the football pitch, across the Bog Meadows and up towards the graveyard.

The moon peeked out at them from behind clouds. Cars on the motorway below sped by unknowing and uncaring. The man with the cap was out of breath by the time they reached the hedge at Milltown Cemetery. The cemetery waited on them, rows and rows of serried tombstones reflecting the cold moonlight. It was desperately quiet. Even the sounds from the motorway and the road seemed cut off, subdued. They forced their way through the hedge and on to the tarmac pathway. Nothing stirred. They waited a few tense seconds and then moved off, silently, a little apart, the young man in the rear, the man with the cap in front. It was twenty past eleven.

The young man’s heart thumped heavily against his ribs. He was glad he wasn’t alone, though he wished the older man hadn’t worn the white trousers. They wouldn’t be long now anyway. Ahead of them lay their destination. As the moon came from behind a cloud he could see the pathway stretching before him. His companion cut across a grassy bank and the young man, relaxing a little by now, continued on alone for the last few yards.

He thought of the morning when they had last been there, the funeral winding its way down from the Whiterock, the people crossing themselves as it passed, the guard of honour awkward but solemn around the hearse. He thought of the people who had crowded around the graveside. Men and women long used to hardship but still shocked at the suddenness of death. Young people and old people. Friends of the family, neighbours and comrades of the deceased. United in their grief. And in their anger, too, he reflected.

He sighed softly, almost inaudibly, to himself as he came alongside his companion again. The older man whispered to him. Wreaths lay on the grave which had been dug that morning, and the fresh clay glistened where the diggers had shaped it into a ridge. The two men glanced at each other and then, silently, they stood abreast of the grave.

They prayed their silent prayers, and the moon, spying from above, hid behind a cloud. The men stood to attention. A night wind crept down from the Black Mountain and rustled through the wreaths. The older man barked an order. They both raised revolvers towards the sky and three volleys of shots crashed over the grave.

The young man was tense, a little pale. The man with the cap breathed freely. He pocketed his weapon. The young man shoved his into the waistband of his jeans. They moved off quickly. The moon slid from behind the clouds; the wind shook itself and swept across the landscape. All was quiet once more. The two men, moving across the fields, reached the Falls Road. They walked slowly; they didn’t seem to be in any hurry. Few people noticed them as they walked up the Whiterock Road. It was five past twelve. Jim’s Café was closed. An occasional young couple, hurrying home, clung their way past McCrory Park. A car coming out of Whiterock Drive stopped to let the two men cross its path. As they did so the cemetery wall was caught in the car’s headlights.

The white graffitied “IS THERE A LIFE BEFORE DEATH?” flashed as the vehicle swung on to the main road and headed off towards Ballymurphy.

The two men paused and looked at each other. Then they, too, continued on their journey.