Chapter Four #3
Noreen, who rings Lena every day, doesn’t notice that Lena is close to silent on the subject of Rachel.
She’s ringing to talk, anyhow, not to listen.
Noreen’s place in the village comes at a price of its own, like everything around here.
As the universal provider, she fires out supplies, information, advice, and sympathy with the speed and force of a tennis-ball machine, but the dynamic doesn’t allow for her to have needs in return.
No one expects Noreen to cry on their shoulder or spill her worries on them.
She stores all that up and gets it out of her system on Lena, who can be relied on to have few opinions and not to pass anything on.
“She didn’t leave a note,” Noreen says, a few days in.
“That’s what they were looking for, didja know that?
all around the old footbridge—that’s where they think she went in, off the bridge, something about the currents, or anyhow that’s what they told Claire—but they never found one.
Is that not odd, like? Would you not expect her to leave a note? ”
Lena has got back from work late. She works part-time at a stable out the other side of Boyle; officially she just does the books, but sometimes she hangs on to give a hand with the horses or take one out on a trail ride, and this week she’s been doing one or both every day, regardless of the weather.
She was making herself a sandwich when Noreen rang.
She puts the phone on speaker, leaves it on the counter, and goes back to slicing bread.
“I wouldn’t have a clue,” she says. “I’d say some people do and some don’t.”
“I know. You’re right, sure. I just wish she had; to keep things clear, d’you know?
I know that’s not right, saying the poor child shoulda done things different, and her in that state, but still.
” Noreen speeds up when she’s frazzled. It makes Lena turn calmer, which speeds Noreen up even more.
“Come here to me, Helena. When are they going to send her home?”
“They’ll do it as soon as they can,” Lena says.
Rain ticks fitfully against the window. She’s lit the woodstove, but the kitchen, after just a few hours with no one but the dogs to fill it, still feels chilly and damp.
She changes her plan, throws the cheese back in the fridge, and gets out sausages instead.
The house needs the smell of something warm and rich.
“They wouldn’t give Fintan a date,” Noreen says. “They told him they were running tests. What’s that mean? What kinda tests?”
“How would I know?”
“What does Cal say?”
“I haven’t asked him.”
“Well, ask him, so. He’d know how they work. The, what’s that I’m looking for, the protocols, or whatever they call them, procedures?” Noreen cracks a bite off something crunchy, maybe a carrot stick. When Noreen is nervy, she eats.
“I’d say that’s all different in America,” Lena says. “From what Cal’s told me, anyhow.”
“It might be, all right. Sure, they’re mental over there; their police have guns and all. Who knows what they’d be at.” For a moment Noreen sounds daunted, but then she rallies. “Get Cal to talk to the Guards, so. Tell them they need to get a move on.”
“Why would they listen to him?” Lena inquires. She focuses her mind on arranging the sausages in the pan. She has plenty of practice keeping her calm with Noreen, but her stock of it is low right now.
“He’s a feckin’ detective! They’ve that thin blue line yoke, sure, they haveta listen to each other, how else d’you think Paudie Nagle still has his license, and him driving like a maniac, only for his brother—”
“Right,” Lena says, before the torrent can drown her. “I’ll pass it on.”
“They oughta send her home,” Noreen says.
She catches a sudden hard breath, like she’s reaching the last of her control.
“Honest to God, Helena, they oughta do that. ’Tis feckin’ barbaric, leaving Claire and Fintan waiting like this.
Claire hasn’t slept since; if she doesn’t get Rachel home soon, we’ll be burying the two a them together. ”
Lena says nothing. The sausages spit in the pan. A gust of wind slams rain against the window, and then drops away.
“And it’s not only the family,” Noreen says.
“ ’Tis grand for you, sure, you wouldn’t notice the difference, but everyone’s getting themselves into a terrible state.
If we could have the wake and the funeral and all, that’d be the end of it; everyone could leave it then.
But with it hanging over us, people can’t stop talking, and then they wind each other up worse.
That aul’ gobdaw Tom Pat Malone, didja hear what he’s saying? ”
“Haven’t seen him,” Lena says. Tom Pat enjoys a reputation as a great character, but she considers him a predictable little chancer.
“He’s saying he heard the banshee, the night before Rachel went.
Didja ever hear the like? That fecker’s deaf as a post, he wouldn’t hear the banshee if ’twas sat on his own bed—if it even existed, like.
He’s only saying it for notice, but he went and said it to a buncha kids, and now Freya Kelly won’t go to bed in case she hears the banshee.
And Doireann feckin’ Cunniffe was in here yesterday banging on about having a premonition.
I nearly told her to stick her premonition up her arse, I’d my mouth open on it before I caught myself.
I can’t be saying that kinda thing to customers, I’ll be outa business. ”
“You shoulda clattered her,” Lena says. “And then asked her why she didn’t have a premonition and dodge.”
“Doireann Cunniffe’s not the point. Everyone knows what she’s like. The point is, if they leave it much longer sending Rachel home, people’ll start saying worse. They’re hinting already, some of them. Nothing you could put your finger on, you know the way. Hints, only.”
Noreen leaves a gap so Lena can ask what kind of hints. When she doesn’t, Noreen changes her tack. “Didja call round to Claire?” she demands.
“I’ve been working,” Lena says. Sometimes she annoys herself. All it takes is a good dose of Noreen, and she turns into a kid making excuses.
“But you didn’t call round to Clodagh Moynihan, sure you didn’t?”
“Jesus,” Lena says. “Have I ever?”
“Some people are. Outa sympathy for their loss, like, ’cause Rachel was practically engaged to Eugene.
” Noreen cracks off another bite with a vicious snap.
“Loss, me hole. None of the Moynihans ever gave a shite about anyone but themselves. There’s some awful lickarses around here, d’you know that? ”
“Well,” Lena says, “you couldn’t pay me to go near Clodagh, if that helps.”
“Call round to Claire, but. Do it tomorrow, if you’re not in work.”
“Why would I call round to her?”
“Feck’s sake, Helena! The poor woman’s after losing a child.”
“When Sean died,” Lena says, “the last thing I wanted was randos turning up on my doorstep.”
“I know, yeah. I feckin’ know. Miss Independent, that’s what you’ve always been. Wouldn’t answer the door, wouldn’t pick up the phone, no one saw hide nor hair of you for months, I was so worried I couldn’t sleep at night— Claire’s not like that.”
“I haven’t a clue what Claire’s like,” Lena says. She stabs a sausage hard enough that it splits. “That’s my point. Why would she wanta be stuck making chitchat with someone she hasn’t talked to in thirty years?”
“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, why d’you always have to make everything difficult? Call round to show her you’re on her side.”
“No one told me there were sides,” Lena says.
Noreen makes an explosive noise of sheer exasperation. “Someday I’ll murder you, d’you know that? I’ll feckin’ brain you with a biscuit tin, and your Cal can haul me off to jail where I’ll get a bitta feckin’ peace for once. O’ course there’s sides. How would there not be sides?”
“Then there’s sides,” Lena says. “I’m not on one.”
“Right,” Noreen snaps. “That’s grand. Away you go and leave the rest of us to do the dirty work, like always. I don’t know why I even bothered asking.”
“I’m not leaving you to do anything,” Lena says. She doesn’t pick up the phone, in case she ends up throwing it. She just stands there with a fork in her hand, talking to her countertop like a lunatic. “Call in to whoever you want, or don’t. I’m not making you do it.”
“You are, yeah. Claire needs people round her. There’s not enough women in this place that we can afford to have one that doesn’t do her bit.”
“My bit,” Lena says. “And what would that be, now?”
“ ’Tis one thing when it’s just the Tidy Towns, or the tea after mass, everyone knows what you’re like, but now here’s every woman in this place taking turns bringing Claire lasagnas and walking the dogs for her, and you can’t even—”
“I bring Trey and her mates to the football. I even make them fecking sandwiches. That’s my bit. The rest’s nothing to do with me.”
“And that’s another thing,” Noreen snaps. “You’re making that child as bad as yourself. She wouldn’t be caught dead going around with Ardnakelty kids, oh God no. Tell us, go on: when you bring her mates to the football, where are they from?”
Lena says, “Trey can go around with whoever the fuck she likes.” The dogs look up at the note in her voice.
“She can, yeah. And when she grows up without a single friend in this townland, will you be proud of yourself then?”
“Who says she needs friends around here? Who says she’ll even be here, in a coupla years’ time?”
“D’you know what?” Noreen’s voice is rising. “That’s only a brilliant idea. The pair of ye oughta feck right off, to Dublin or London or somewhere no one’ll ever expect anything from ye, God forbid. Leave this place to people that actually appreciate it.”
“D’you know what that sounds like?” Lena says. “That sounds like paradise.” She’s used to fighting with Noreen, having done it all her life, but this feels different; it bites deeper.
“Great. That’s a plan, so. Off you go, and don’t be wrecking my fecking head any more.”