July 2019, Clooneven
Jessie
Dave stood in front of her, shoulders back, head raised as though the room was his. Jessie looked from him to Lorna. Ger looked at her.
‘This is insane,’ she said. ‘You can’t keep us here like a pair of hostages.’
‘That,’ said Dave, ‘isn’t what we’re doing, but you know that. All we want is a little chat about why you were messing around on private property. It won’t take long.’
That his tone was measured didn’t make it any less menacing. She was baffled that she’d ever suspected him of having an affair with her sister. Now that she assessed him properly, she saw the violence in his narrow eyes, in the entitled tilt of his chin, in the impatient way he tapped on the kitchen counter. She wondered why she hadn’t seen this from the start. Then again, successful criminals tended not to advertise their crimes. They wore their disguises well and adapted their personalities to suit the occasion. If you wanted to win someone’s confidence, you didn’t get a facial tattoo. If you wanted to buy coffee without arousing suspicion, you didn’t wear a balaclava.
‘Those buildings aren’t private property,’ she replied. ‘At least, not to me. They belong to Simon and Lorna, so I’ve more right to be out there than you have. Anyway, what we were doing is beside the point. What matters is what you were doing.’
She hoped she sounded confident because, despite her sister’s presence, she was scared. After Dave had found them at the sheds, he’d summoned Simon. To begin with, she’d been too shocked to put up much of a fight. Ger had been tougher. At one point, she’d been convinced he would hit Dave. The problem was that, short of dashing across the fields, there hadn’t been anywhere for them to go. Dave had insisted on bringing them to the house, which was where they were now, standing in Clevedon’s sterile kitchen, arguing about what they’d seen and what it meant.
Simon had remained with Quan and Linh. So far, Lorna had said almost nothing, and when she did speak, she was subdued.
Dave, however, was bristling with energy. He was buzzing. ‘You can lose the attitude,’ he said to Jessie. ‘I don’t know what rubbish you have in your head but, take my word for it, you’re wrong.’
‘What exactly is it I’m wrong about?’
He didn’t answer.
Lorna dragged a hand through her hair. Under the kitchen spotlights, she appeared drained, her face all shadows and bone, her neck thin and sinewy. ‘What I don’t understand is why you were out there to begin with,’ she said. ‘Like, why were you rambling around in the dark? What were you looking for?’
‘As Jessie said,’ replied Ger, ‘what we were doing isn’t the issue. Oh, and for fear you’re wondering, we saw the plants in the other buildings, so we know what’s going on.’
‘Ah, he speaks,’ said Dave, cocking his head to one side. ‘Now that your girlfriend’s found her voice, I thought you were going to leave all the yapping to her. She’s got plenty to say for herself.’
Ger gave him a watery smile. ‘That’s one dodgy business you’re running out there.’
‘Dodgy business?’ said Dave, with a smirk. His face was suited to smirking. ‘You haven’t a clue what you’re on about.’
‘Yeah, I do. It’s a pretty serious offence, human-trafficking.’
‘Oh, I see. That’s what they told you, is it? “Human-trafficking” no less.’ He recited the words as if reading the television news. ‘By the sound of things, the pair of them spun you a yarn, and you were gullible enough to believe it.’
‘I know who I believe,’ said Ger, ‘and it isn’t you.’
They could continue like this all night, thought Jessie, both sides tossing out questions that wouldn’t be answered. Lob and volley. Back and forth. While she wasn’t convinced that Lorna would force them to stay, neither could she see Dave agreeing to let them go. And he was clearly the one in charge. A professional in a room of amateurs. She returned to the idea of making a run for it. After all, Ger was fit, and she knew the terrain. She quickly dismissed it as a fanciful idea. They were unlikely to get further than the driveway, and Ger’s car was in the opposite direction. Besides, she wanted to hear what her sister had to say. She decided to try a different approach.
‘Lorna,’ she said, ‘I don’t know what you’re mixed up in or why, but you’ve got to let Linh and Quan go. If you do that now, maybe the consequences won’t be so bad.’
She noticed a nervous twitch in her sister’s cheek.
As Lorna went to speak, Dave intervened: ‘There’s no lock on any of those doors. The two of them could have walked away any time they liked.’
‘And where would they have gone?’ asked Jessie. ‘You’ve got their passports.’
For a second, he seemed taken aback by her knowledge. Then he gave a dismissive wave of the hand. ‘Simon has the passports for safekeeping. They could have asked for them back, no worries.’
‘A likely story. They’ve no money and only a vague idea of where they are. Oh, and they’re terrified.’
‘Is that what they told you?’
‘Yes, and like Ger, I trust them. Anyway, I was talking to my sister, not you. I don’t even know who you are.’
As the minutes passed, Dave became more agitated. Lorna, on the other hand, appeared to be shrinking into herself, as though the consequences of Jessie and Ger’s presence were sinking in. It was hard to believe that this was the woman who, only a few hours earlier, had swaggered into the café and reprimanded Jessie for taking a lunch break.
Of the four, Ger was the most together. He retained at least a veneer of calm.
‘I think it’s time we were heading away,’ he said to Jessie. ‘We’re not going to get any sense here.’
He turned, as if moving towards the door, prompting a swift lunge from Dave, who seized his arm and yanked him back.
‘You’re going precisely fucking nowhere,’ he said.
Ger struggled free, and Jessie feared a fight. A snap judgement told her that while Ger was younger and healthier, Dave was probably more experienced. And more vicious.
‘For God’s sake,’ said Lorna, in what could only be described as a whispered shout, ‘calm down, would you?’
She was, it occurred to Jessie, scared that a commotion would wake the children. The last thing she needed was Ethan or Zoë wandering in, looking for a glass of water or a reassuring hug. Her intervention worked, and the pair lapsed into a silent standoff.
‘We’ve got to sort this out,’ continued Lorna, fiddling with her rings. ‘Perhaps we can come to some sort of agreement. What if—’
Before she could give full voice to her proposal, the back door was pushed open. Jessie looked around to see Simon accompanied by Quan. Although supposedly in charge, her brother-in-law looked haunted, his shoulders sloping, his skin misted with sweat.
‘What are you doing up here?’ said Dave. ‘And where’s the other one? Why did you leave her on her own? Who knows what ideas this pair of clowns,’ he nodded at Jessie and Ger, ‘have been putting into her head?’
For a moment, there was quiet.
‘Where is she?’ he repeated, an edge to his drawl.
‘Not where she should be,’ said Simon.
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘It means that during the hassle down below, she disappeared. We’ve been looking everywhere for her without any luck. It’s pitch black out there. We went as far as the back boreen, and there’s a car parked there all right, but no sign of life.’
So much for Quan and Linh being free to leave whenever they liked, thought Jessie. She wondered if Linh’s escape had been prompted by what they’d said to her about the town being close by – and about people being willing to help.
Dave walked towards Quan. ‘Where’d she go?’
Quan recoiled as though the man in front of him was radioactive.
‘I asked you a question,’ said Dave. ‘Where is she?’
Quan shook his head. ‘I don’t know.’
‘I’m not swallowing that. Where is she?’
‘You can ask all night if you like,’ said Ger. ‘It’s obvious he’s telling the truth.’
Dave jabbed a finger in his direction. ‘You can stay the fuck out of this. It’s nothing to do with you.’
‘Listen,’ said Simon, ‘I don’t reckon Quan knows anything either. He was fairly shocked when he realised Linh was gone.’
‘Well, there aren’t too many places she could have got to. There’s nothing around here apart from bog and more fucking bog. And she hasn’t had enough time to make it to Clooneven.’ He picked up his leather jacket, which had been lying over the back of a chair. ‘Come on, we’ll go and take a proper look. Have you got a torch?’
‘There’s a couple under the stairs,’ said Lorna. ‘I’ll get them.’
Again, Dave turned to Quan. ‘You’re to stay here with the women, and you,’ he nodded at Ger, ‘can come with us. But no tricky stuff, yeah?’
There was a logic to this division. Quan was unlikely to leave the house while the others were searching for Linh, but if Ger had stayed behind, Lorna would have been outnumbered. Say what you like about Dave, he knew what he was doing.
After they’d left, Lorna continued to ooze tension. Jessie remembered what Ger had said earlier in the evening about her ability to wheedle information from people. This was an opportunity to test her skills. Right now, she was operating on scraps. She still didn’t know who Dave was or why he was conducting his business here. Or why Lorna and Simon had got involved.
She switched on the coffee-maker.
‘What are you doing?’ asked Lorna.
‘Mowing the lawn. What does it look like? Do you fancy a cup, Quan?’
She glanced in his direction and was struck again by how young he was. Twenty-two, Linh had said; the same age as Bridget when she’d drowned on the Mary and Elizabeth. At twenty-two, Jessie’s life had been a perpetual party. He seemed wary of her. Then she recalled how she’d lied the previous night when she’d denied having a connection to Lorna and Simon. He had reason not to trust her.
‘You’re probably wondering what I’m doing here,’ she said. ‘Lorna’s my sister but . . . I didn’t know about Linh and yourself until last night. That’s why Ger and I came back.’ She took three mugs from the cupboard and fetched a litre of milk from the American-style fridge. ‘I’ll make coffee for all of us.’ She needed to act as though she was in charge, as though everything would be fine in the end. ‘And I’ll throw on a few slices of toast. Anyone else for toast?’
‘Jesus Christ,’ said Lorna. ‘Will you stop it?’
‘Stop what?’
‘You know what I mean. The happy housewife carry-on. You’re behaving like this is a perfectly normal situation.’
‘I don’t see what else I can do. What’s been going on has nothing to do with me.’
‘You could have kept out of it, though. Why did you feel the need to go snooping out the back?’
Jessie reminded herself that this wasn’t about her. Losing her temper would be counterproductive. She said nothing. Instead, she focused on fixing the promised coffee and toast. In the background, the machine clunked and hissed. The aroma of warm bread drifted from the toaster. Quan, who had been standing a few metres apart, began to relax. When the toast was ready, he joined them at the kitchen island. He ate like he hadn’t had a meal in days. Lorna stared at her plate.
For the first time in twenty-four hours, Jessie was ravenous. Also, eating saved her from having to say anything, and she was still working out how to tackle her sister.
It was only as she placed another round of bread in the toaster that something hit her. Simon had mentioned seeing Ger’s car. He hadn’t said anything about a bicycle. If Linh had taken Jessie’s bike, she’d be well clear of the area by now. She might find someone to talk to.
When they’d finished eating, she looked at Quan. ‘Is it all right if Lorna and I go over there?’ She tipped her head towards a low scarlet sofa at the far end of the room. ‘I need to have a word with her.’
He nodded.
Jessie felt awkward about challenging Lorna in front of Quan. It seemed insensitive to discuss someone’s ill-treatment while they were within earshot. This was also a family discussion, however, and she might not get a better opportunity to confront her sister.
She took out her cigarettes and offered one to him. He declined. She lit up, took a long pull and asked Lorna for an ashtray.
‘I didn’t say you could smoke,’ her sister replied.
Jessie blew a stream of smoke towards the ceiling. ‘Are you serious?’
Lorna found an ashtray.