A WALK IN the Phoenix Park the following day cleared my head after a broken night’s sleep. The ground had frozen overnight and the place looked like a Christmas card – all deer and patchy snow and kids with toboggans – making it difficult for me to hold onto my bleak mood from the day before. I left my parents’ house around two, glad that I hadn’t told them about my encounter with Luke. I didn’t see what could be gained by it; they already knew he was out, and seemed to be coping. Better than I was, if I was honest. It was good to see them excited about something for the first time since Faye’s death.
I went straight to the airport, having changed my mind about doing some Christmas shopping in town. I told myself it wasn’t because I feared another encounter – that would be too much of a coincidence. But I really wanted to get back to Inishowen, not least because I wanted to talk things through with Molloy. The flight was quiet, with no more than six or seven people on board, and the weather was calm and dry, which meant no delay this time. I picked up my car at Derry airport and drove straight to Glendara. It seemed that no more snow had fallen, and what little remained was scattered like spilled salt on the grass verges and in the fields, making them appear a paler shade of green than usual. All very pretty, but the roads were lethal. I took one bend slightly too fast and skidded straight across the center line, scaring the life out of two sheep who were frighteningly close to the hedge. Luckily there was no traffic, and I was able to right the car with no damage done, but it didn’t help the state of my nerves, already in fairly ragged shape.
I felt the tension ease as I drove into town and realized how happy I was to be back. Originally a refuge, a place to escape, Inishowen had become my home almost without my noticing. I wondered how much of that was to do with Molloy.
I pulled in opposite Stoop’s newsagent’s with the intention of buying Saturday’s papers before heading back to Malin, assuming there were any left – it was already after five. As I took the key from the ignition, my phone rang. It was Maeve, my friend and the local vet.
“You’re back.”
“How do you know?”
“I can see you.”
I looked around the darkening square, but there was no sign of Maeve’s familiar figure. Then just as I was about to get out of the Mini, a jeep pulled up beside me and she grinned at me from the driver’s seat. I climbed out and opened her passenger door. She was red-cheeked and damp, and the sweet smell of manure wafted in my direction from her heavily stained boiler suit.
“Are you still working?” I asked.
“Just finished, thank the Lord. I haven’t been able to feel my hands for about two hours.” She removed them from the steering wheel and shook them out.
“Fancy a coffee?” I asked.
She gave me a wry look. “I’d kill for a hot port, to be honest, but I have to drive home later. And,” she glanced at her watch, “Stan was supposed to be cutting my hair ten minutes ago, so I’d better get back to the clinic and change out of this gear. He’ll have a fit if I enter his inner sanctum looking like this.”
“Fair enough.”
“Are you heading home now?” she asked.
I nodded. “After I grab the papers.”
“Okay. I might give you a shout once I’ve been shorn.”
“Don’t let Stan hear you saying that!”
The irony of Pat the Stoop, the newsagent, being a strapping six-foot former Gaelic football player always struck me, but then I suppose that’s the way with nicknames. Pat McLaughlin alone would never have been enough to distinguish him from the hundreds of other McLaughlins in the area. I had a filing cabinet each for Dohertys and McLaughlins, most of whom were not related. Pat was about to close up when I pushed open the door.
Stoop’s is a long, narrow shop with stone flags and floor-to-ceiling white shelves offering periodicals on everything from surfing to embroidery. Other than a regular lick of paint, I suspect it hasn’t changed in forty years. Never the brightest of retail outlets, with some lights turned off it was like a cave; it was brighter on the street. But the Irish Times wasn’t yet packed away, so I nabbed one from the stand and brought it to the counter.
Pat was stacking boxes of Christmas cards. “Ben. How are you?”
Unlike his grandfather, who had acquired the nickname originally, the newsagent was a straight-backed man with a high color and rheumy eyes. I’d often wondered if that was why he kept his shop so dark.
“Good,” I said. “Busy day?”
“Aye, not too bad,” he replied as he took the fiver I offered him. “But just you wait till next week, when it’s too late to go into Derry, and they’ll all be in here looking for their wrapping paper and Sellotape. That’ll be the really busy time for us. Especially if the snow comes back.”
“You’re probably right.”
“I am,” he said with certainty. “Do you know?” He leaned forward conspiratorially as he handed me the change. “I’ve sold selection boxes on Easter Saturday and Easter eggs on Christmas Eve. Desperate people.” He winked. “There’s always someone who leaves it just that wee bit too late.”
My cottage was in darkness when I arrived back in Malin, and there was no sign of Guinness despite my calling him a couple of times. I called Molloy too, but got his voicemail so left him a message.
The house was freezing, having been empty for two days, so I dumped my briefcase and bag on the kitchen table and went straight to the sitting room, where I found a fire log in the box by the fireplace and lit it, tossing a couple of bits of turf on top. Then I returned to the kitchen, took a lasagne from the freezer and stuck it in the microwave – easy options all round. Finally, feeling a little sorry for myself, I opened a bottle of wine.
I spent the evening by the fire with the papers. Alone. There was no sign of Molloy, Maeve, or Guinness all evening. So much for looking forward to getting home. At eleven o’clock, I put some food out for Guinness in case he came back during the night, and went to bed having decided to take advantage of my solitude and go for an icy dip at Lagg beach in the morning. It would give me the shake I needed.
The next morning, Sunday, I woke early to the sound of rain lashing against the window. There had been a thaw during the night, but the weather had turned really nasty. I opened the curtains to the sight of skeletal trees on the green thrashing about like angry stags, and quickly changed my mind about going for a swim. Icy sea swimming might be helpful to my mental health, but I wasn’t prepared to risk my neck to do it. I took myself to a hot shower instead.
A bedraggled-looking Guinness was waiting for me on the doorstep when I went down.
“Where have you been?” I asked, but he wasn’t exactly forthcoming.
He looked so pathetic that I let him into the back kitchen, where I fed him and put down an old towel for him to sit by the radiator. He appeared distinctly unimpressed when I closed the kitchen door on him, leaving him to dry out.
As I waited for the coffee to brew, I checked my phone. No messages. Where the hell was Molloy?
When I’d finished breakfast, I decided to drive to Glendara to track him down. I didn’t usually go to his place – we had got into the habit of him coming to my cottage instead – but I thought in the circumstances I would make an exception. I needed to talk to him about Kirby.
The Mini was shunted all over the road as I drove in along the coast, and the sea looked threatening, angry in shades of grey and green. I hoped there were few boats out today. I thought of wives and mothers waiting for the return of a fishing trawler, five days before Christmas.
It was early, not yet nine o’clock, when I approached Glendara. The town would usually be quiet at this time on a Sunday morning, the only people about being early mass-goers. But today there were cars parked all along the road on the way in, as if for a wake or a funeral. Had there been a death, I wondered, one I hadn’t heard about? It would explain Molloy’s absence; guards were often needed to police traffic at a wake. But as I passed the fire station, I saw that its doors were wide open and the fire engine was gone.
About five hundred yards from town, the road was blocked off; the squad car parked across the center line created a temporary barricade. There was no one in it. Where was everybody? Despite all the parked cars, there wasn’t a soul about. After a brief hesitation, I turned the Mini around, found a space to park, and walked the rest of the way into town, pulling up the hood of my coat. It was still raining, although less heavily now, and the wind had died down.
A smell of smoke like a damp bonfire hung in the air. I reached Phyllis’s bookshop and saw that her lights were on, but when I pushed at the door, the shop was closed and there were no lights in her flat above. If I were a detective, I would think that she had left in a hurry.
I came to the corner and the air was acrid. A group of about thirty people was clustered at the far side of the square; a motley collection with coats and hats and umbrellas. They were watching something. I caught a glimpse of yellow tape, and as I walked closer, smoke. Not billowing, but rising in wispy lines above the crowd, like steam from the spout of some giant kettle.
Then I saw the words on the tape: Please do not cross. I took in the two fire engines, hoses, men in high-vis yellow jackets and helmets, and felt the stab of fear that comes with the sight of an emergency vehicle. But there was a lack of urgency about the scene, as if I had arrived late, as if I were witnessing the aftermath rather than the main event.
I made my way to the front of the crowd and found myself looking at a blackened, soaked building belching out small puffs of bluish smoke. Whatever it had been, it was unrecognizable now. Three walls remained, the floorboards splintered and broken, timbers protruding between the floors at strange angles. It looked like a child’s toy that had been kicked to pieces. Charred debris was scattered over the footpath and onto the road. My mind raced as I tried to work out what the building used to be. I knew this square well, but the scene was so shocking that I was disoriented. Whose house had it been?
I examined the buildings on either side, the shops at ground level: Liam McLaughlin’s estate agent’s a few doors down, Stoop’s newsagent’s on the other side of the road, Illusions Hair Design two doors to the right. Suddenly, I knew what I was looking at. An empty vodka bottle with optic still attached rolled towards my feet, confirming it. My heart sank. It was the Oak. The Oak pub had burned down.
The smoke stung my nostrils like chlorine, the foul air a noxious taste on my tongue. A voice behind made me turn. It was Phyllis. She looked awful, her face smudged black and her hair sticking up in tufts, as if she’d been helping put out the fire herself. Her eyes were brimming.
“Oh, Ben, it’s so awful. It’s completely destroyed.”
“What on earth happened?”
“I don’t know. It happened during the night. Poor Tony.” She switched her gaze to a tall figure in a waterproof jacket, his face deathly white, talking to one of the firemen.
“Was there anyone in there?” I asked, horrified, realizing as I looked at the wreckage again that of course Stan’s flat was gone too. The walls separating the pub from the buildings on either side were intact, but everything else was destroyed. It was amazing that the fire hadn’t spread, that the fire service had managed to isolate it, especially with the wind.
“Doesn’t seem so.” Phyllis shook her head, running her hand through her hair and making it stick up even more. “That’s one thing to be thankful for, I suppose. Stan must have been out. Apparently, the fire started about four o’clock this morning. God knows how.”
“How long have you been here?” I asked. “You look shattered.” She smiled, a watery smile. “Since six. I heard the sirens. Wanted to see if I could help. But there was nothing I could do, just watch helplessly like everybody else while it burned. And try to talk to Tony.”
We stood watching the scene for a few minutes in shocked silence. At one point, I spotted Molloy and he caught my eye but didn’t react.
“Do you fancy a cup of tea?” Phyllis asked suddenly. “I’m parched and I don’t think there’s anything useful we can do here for the moment. We can come back out in half an hour.”
“Okay,” I said gratefully.
I followed Phyllis as she made her way back across the square and towards her shop. She took a deep breath before turning the key, as if giving silent thanks for her own hearth, and we walked through the bookshop and climbed the winding staircase that led to her flat. Fred greeted her with great excitement, and she fondled his ears affectionately.
“You want your walk, don’t you? Well, I can’t let you out at the moment, I’m afraid. Too many burning embers. But I’ll bring you out on a lead after we’ve had our cup of tea.”
She filled the kettle in her kitchen, switched it on and dumped some tea leaves into a huge earthenware teapot. “Earl Grey and Barry’s do you? It’s my new house blend.”
“Great.”
I slumped at the table while I waited for my tea. “How on earth did it happen? I presume it started in the pub rather than the flat?”
She shook her head. “No idea. I presume so. Maybe it was an electrical fault? Or someone left something burning? You know they needed two fire brigades to put it out? Buncrana is there as well.”
“Who locked up last night, I wonder?”
“Tony says it was Carole. He was trying to get hold of her when I saw him first.” Phyllis looked grim. “I think for a while he was terrified she was still in there. But the firemen are certain the whole place was empty, flat, pub and cellar.”
Cellar, I thought, remembering Stan’s complaint about the noise. Could that have had anything to do with the fire? From what I had seen, the cellar seemed to be completely burned out. Phyllis handed me a steaming cup, breaking my train of thought. The tea was refreshing, washing away the itch of smoke at the back of my throat.
Half an hour later, we left Phyllis’s flat and returned to the square. It had stopped raining now, and other than a few small heaps of smoldering debris, the fire was out. One fire brigade remained, with two firemen working through the wreckage. That ominous stench was still in the air.
With the exception of a few stragglers, the crowd had dispersed, but Tony remained where we had left him, in front of his ruined pub like the chief mourner at a wake. He was hunched, hands buried in his pockets, speaking to Eddie Kearney. Eddie was holding his hands up defensively and appeared close to tears. Before we reached them, Eddie turned and left, draping his arm around a slight dark-haired girl who was waiting for him.
“God, Tony, I’m so sorry,” I said as the publican turned to greet us.
He looked haggard, his long face pale in the morning light, his skin merging with his neat grey beard, the usual flicker of humor absent from his grey eyes.
“How did this happen?” he said helplessly. “I wasn’t even in the pub last night. I had Carole and Eddie running the place for me.”
My eyes were drawn to Eddie’s departing figure, his arm still around the girl.
Tony followed my gaze. “I knew it would be too busy for Carole on her own, the Saturday before Christmas, so I asked him to work a few shifts. He was happy enough to do it.” He shook his head, distraught. “But God knows – did they leave something switched on? A heater or a kettle or something?”
“You think that’s how it happened?” I asked.
“Eddie swears they didn’t, but these things don’t happen by themselves.” He frowned. “And by the sound of him, he left early, snuck off to Culdaff to listen to some band or other. Left Carole to lock up on her own.”
“Did you get hold of Carole?” Phyllis asked.
Tony shook his head, his face troubled. “She’s not answering her phone. It’s going straight through to voicemail.”
“Maybe she’s still asleep. If she had a late night?” He nodded stiffly.
“I presume the fire service will be able to tell you what caused it?” I asked.
He sighed. “I hope so. And then I need to speak to my insurance company.”
“What can we do?” Phyllis asked, placing her hand gently on Tony’s arm. “You know everyone is going to want to help.”
He looked up gratefully. “Thanks, Phyllis, but I don’t think there’s anything anyone can do. Unless you can track down Stan MacLochlainn. He’s another one who’s not answering his phone.” He shook his head. “The guards have been trying to get him too. I’m told he’s away to Dungloe to see his mother.”
He looked up at the smoldering wreckage of his pub. “I just thank God he wasn’t here.”