Chapter Twenty-Four

ON THE THIRD day, Sorcha finally snapped. She’d been as calm as possible, kept Orla at bay, but her patience had finally been worn out. She marched upstairs to her spare room. Or Vince’s room, as it had become. Crabmeat lay at the closed door, as he had done since Vince sealed himself away from the world. Upon seeing her, Crabmeat wagged his tail once, a perfunctory response, like a head nod to a barely liked neighbour.

“Go on, you. Get out of the way. Shoo.” She waggled her foot at the dog, and he plodded over to the top of the stairs. She banged her fist on the door. “You’d better be decent because I’m coming in, and I don’t want to see an aul lad’s tackle.” She shoved the door open.

Vince lay on his bed shirtless, the braces of his trousers by his sides, his feet bare. On the floor laid several bottles of gin, all empty.

“For feck sake, will you ever open a window? It smells like a brewer’s carthorse died in here." She flung open the curtains, threw up the sash window, and in rushed the clacking of hooves and the chattering town chorus. She started to clear up the empty bottles.

“Don’t need you picking up after me,” Vince said, his voice rusty, his lips dry.

“Someone has to do it.”

“Not you.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t realise all your other friends were here to rally around you. Where are they? Under the bed, are they? Or maybe they’re hiding in the wardrobe? Or is it just me? Am I the only person on the entire island who cares about what’s happening to you?”

Vince kicked the bedclothes away. He heaved himself up so as to sit against the wall with his feet touching the floor.

Crabmeat wandered in, found the borrowed coral banyan crumpled up into a ball, and lay on it.

Sorcha sighed and sat beside Vince on the little bed. She almost tipped into the well that had formed around him. Her feet dangled over the edge of the frame. She slipped off her shoes and wiggled her toes by his. “Look at my perfect little fillets next to your bloated gammon joints.” He didn’t respond, and so she sighed again. “Really, though, no one has come around to check on you. Do you…have anyone? Friends?”

Vince shook his head. “Not on Blackrabbit. Haven’t had since I was a young lad. Not really. Told myself I don’t get lonely. Tricked myself into believing it. Can believe anything if you have to.”

“You have family, though, don’t you? A mother?”

“Runs the asylum. Have a brother too. Innkeeper on Merryapple. Wants me to work there with him.”

“That sounds nice, doesn’t it? Would you not consider it now the Watch is done?”

Vince licked his cracked lips. “Wouldn’t be safe for him. Too many people want me to suffer. Might take it out on him. His husband. His family. Took this role to clean up my mess. Make it so I can go back to Merryapple safely one day. Didn’t work.”

“What are you going to do now, then? Because I hate to break it to you, but you’re not staying in here until you drink yourself to death. I’ll not be left to look after that mangy dog of yours.”

“Won’t have to drink myself to death. Only a matter of time before someone comes to finish me off.”

“Oh, wonderful, so I’ll have a gallon of blood to clear up as well.”

He fell quiet again. Sorcha scratched at her arm, trying to think of what to say. “You never struck me as the type to mope about. I had you pegged as a man of action, you know? I thought you’d face any crisis head-on, take it by the throat and shake it until the answer fell out.”

“Come after me last year, things would have been different. Philip Talan would be lying face down in the Lowena. Lambshead would be a sticky smear under my boot. Can’t do that now. Got to be a better way.”

“What’s brought this on?”

Vince lay his thumb over his forefinger and loudly cracked the knuckle. “Something Celeste said. About how they all looked up to me. How I abandoned them. Asked me what I’d be without them or the Watch. Didn’t have an answer. Still don’t. Can’t just be a brawler my whole life. Has to be more to me than that. Have to try to be more.”

“You took a lot of young people off the streets, didn’t you? That’s what we always heard. You trained them from an early age. Or had them trained, at least.”

“Easier that way. Made them more loyal, in the long run.”

“It’s no wonder they looked up to you, no wonder they felt betrayed when you walked out on them. They’ve known you most of their lives. You provided for them, in a way. Gave them the tools to survive. And now you’ve rejected them. Started a new life without them. On the other side of the law, as well. It’s as if everything you told them was a lie.”

“Celeste said the same thing.” Vince leaned his head against the cold wall. “Sorcha, you don’t know what it’s like. To have lived a life of violence. To know your own life will end in violence. To have waited for it every day. To know you deserve it.” His breathing turned shallow, his voice quivered. He covered his face with his hand. He might have sniffed away a tear; she couldn’t be sure. “Still so young,” he said. “Hours are fat when you’re young. All the time in the world to sit and ponder. Hours are lean as whippets at my age. Don’t know what it’s like. Thought I knew who I was. How my life would be. All changed now.”

Sorcha frowned and clasped her hands. “It must be quite frightening. I suppose it’s like being unmoored. Cast adrift. You worked hard to make things better. That’s a start, isn’t it? You’re a good many things, but you’re no fool. I know you didn’t think you could wipe your slate clean with one good shift on the Night Watch. Could it be, though, that maybe you didn’t realise just how steep a mountain you had to climb?"

Vince rubbed his face and still wouldn’t look at her.

She nudged his brawny arm and smiled. "People don’t climb mountains alone, you know. And you don’t have to, either."

He nodded then, and his weighty shoulders dropped. He stared dead ahead.

“Mind you,” Sorcha said, “I wouldn’t count on Orla’s help. She wants you out of here as soon as possible.”

“Didn’t fancy breaking it to me gently?”

“Ah, sure it’s not as if you didn’t know already. She thinks you’re a bad influence on me.”

“Might be right. Never been known to have a positive effect on people.”

“Well if I start to feel the urge to pick a pocket or hold up a coach at musket point, I’ll be sure to let you know.” She slouched against the wall.

“Sit up straight. Bad for your posture.” Vince picked at the dirt under his fingernail. “Never lost your accent.”

“Ah, sure, Irish accents are carved in stone. A thousand years at sea couldn’t weather them away. I like how you Pellans talk, mind. All bleddy this and backalong that.”

“One of us too, now, aren’t you? Been here long enough. Thought about going back? To Ireland?”

Sorcha fell quiet for a touch too long. “I don’t think it would be a good idea. We’ve built a life for ourselves here. To be honest, we have more here than we ever would have had at home. Besides, I’ve enough trouble with an overbearing sister, I don’t need to go back to an overbearing mother.”

“Orla took care of you. Provided for you.”

“And now she thinks she owns me.” Sorcha tucked her legs under herself. “When we were sleeping rough, we had people offering to help. They wanted to train us to survive. To steal. And pick pockets. They were part of a gang, they said.”

Vince clasped his hands together in his lap. “So, if Orla hadn’t found work…”

“I’d have ended up working for you.”

“Still did.”

“Hah, true enough, I suppose.” Still no smile on his stony face, but at least he looked at her now. It broke her heart a little to see him in such a state.

“Sounds to me like Orla worries about you, is all. Feels responsible for you. Heart’s in the right place. Good thing to have people who worry about you. Only met my brother for the first time last year. Known him sooner, it might not have taken me so long to see what I was. Life is better with family.”

“Not all family.”

“Really think Orla is as bad as your mother?”

Sorcha scratched at her arm again. “Ah, no, I wouldn’t go that far. I’m just being mean because it feels nice, sometimes. It does, doesn’t it? Just to be a little bit of a mean aul cow? Warms the blood. I just wish she’d loosen the apron strings a little.”

“Could have a word.”

“That’s sweet but I’m not sure scaring her would help in the long run.”

Vince frowned, catching the band of his eyepatch in a forehead furrow. “Wasn’t going to scare her. Just have a chat.”

“You’re scary when you chat. It’s the voice. And the eyepatch. And the lingering air of menace.”

Crabmeat rolled onto his back and whined until Vince rubbed his belly.

Sorcha picked her words carefully. “Can I ask, if you weren’t here, if you were still above the Watch House, what would you be doing with your time? Eating some beef, downing a bottle of gin, falling asleep in your chair?”

“Not always beef. Sometimes ham.”

“Being Watch Commander, that was it for you, wasn’t it? Your last chance.”

His frown deepened. “Bit personal.”

“Push through it,” she said, patting his knee. “Come on. Be a big, brave boy.”

“Very well. Yes. Watch was my last chance. Happy?”

“Oh my, no, not at all.”

Crabmeat clambered up on the bed and onto Vince’s lap. Vince laid his giant hand on Crabmeat’s head. He looked like he could have crushed the dog’s skull if he wanted to.

“Going to talk to Orla?” he asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t think there’s any point. I just…I just want her to understand not everyone wants to put on a pretty dress and find a nice man to settle down with.”

“Don’t like men?”

“I like them. I just don’t want to marry one. Not yet.”

“Not even Alfie Exeter?”

Sorcha snorted out something like a giggle. “Now who’s being personal? But while we’re talking, can you do one thing for me? Please?”

Vince raised his chin and nodded.

“Please have a wash,” she said with a laugh. “Please. I’m begging you. Your fancy man won’t want you if you don’t.”

“Who?”

“Your man, Captain whatshisname, with the perfect moustache and the neat-as-pins beard. I’ve seen the way he looks at you, all moon eyes and smiles. Sure he’s mad about you, so he is. It’s plain as day, the way he looks at you.”

Vince stopped petting Crabmeat. “Not like that. Just screwing.”

“Oh. Well. That’s…well.”

“Sorcha Fontaine blushing. Never thought I’d see the day.”

She scrunched her nose and made a face. “It’s just the thought of two aul fellas lapping at each other like thirsty dogs at a water bowl.”

“Because the thought of your gangly limbs failing about like a newborn foal is so arousing?”

She straightened her spine. “Excuse me, I am not gangly—I am graceful.”

Vince let one of his hands go limp and slapped it against his thigh. “Like a daddy-long-legs banging against a windowpane.”

Sorcha snorted another laugh. “I think I liked it better when you hardly talked.”

“Only talk to people I trust.”

“Ah, you trust me! Sure that speaks very well of you, so it does.” She sat up and wiggled her shoulders, pleased with herself.

“Mixing giblets with a man I knew wanted to put me out of work. That speak well of me?”

“It says you must really like him.”

“Never met anyone quite like James. Hard to think straight when he’s around. Want him to look at me like he wants me. Want him to like me.”

Sorcha thought about the day Captain Godgrave had come striding into the Watch House in his immaculate uniform. “He is very handsome, in fairness. For an aul lad.”

“Not old. James is younger than me.”

“Sure, that’s not saying much. The cliffs of Blackrabbit are younger than you.”

“Rude brat.”

“I’m only rude to people I trust,” she said, flicking her long dark hair over her shoulder.

“Not true at all, is it?”

“It’s not, no, not even a little bit,” she said. “No, I’m rude to everyone. I just don’t think it’s fair to play favourites.” She curled her lips and held her hands open. “Oh, come on, you’re still not going to give me even one little smile?”

“And take away your only reason for getting up every morning?”