Chapter Nineteen #2
“She told me what Tommy was at,” Mrs. Duggan says. “She tried dancing around it at first, till I got bored of watching her dance and told her I already knew. I coulda taken offense that she thought I wouldn’t, but I’m not easy offended.”
There’s a quick beat of footsteps outside and the light shifts as someone passes by the window, but Mrs. Duggan doesn’t turn her head. She’s been waiting for her chance to tell this story.
“ ’Twas horrible, that wee girl said, what Tommy was aiming to do; horrible.
’Twasn’t her Eugene’s fault—she was fulla excuses for him; he just wanted a better life for the two a them, he was usedta taking his daddy’s word as gospel, he was under his daddy’s thumb, he hadn’t thought through what it’d do to the place…
” Her thin mouth curls in scorn. “Women’ll tell themselves every lie in the world about a fella they fancy.
But she couldn’t find a lie to tell herself about the rest. There’d be people dead, she said; people killing each other, or themselves.
I said likely there would be, all right.
She said everyone’d hate her and her precious Eugene both, and I said plenty would, all right.
She said even if she threatened to leave Eugene, ’twould make no difference ’cause he’d always do what his daddy told him, and I said he was in the habit of that.
She said she couldn’t do without him, she’d never imagined any life for herself that didn’t have him in it, and I said that was a terrible predicament altogether.
She said if she did leave him, Tommy’d go after her guns blazing, in case she talked, and I said ’twould be like him.
Then I asked her what she wanted outa me.
And she said she wanted a way to scupper Tommy’s plans.
” She glances at Lena over the rim of her glass.
“Did she come asking you for the same thing?”
“You said no charge,” Lena says.
Mrs. Duggan grins. Her swollen fingers probe among the objects on her table, trawling for something. The array of things has changed since the last time Lena was here: the playing cards, a jar of mint humbugs, scissors, tangled spools of colored thread.
“I thought at first she was one a them fools that take me for a witch woman,” she says, “and she was looking for me to put a curse on Tommy. I do get plenty of fools wanting curses, and love charms. Not just young ones; you’d be surprised how many aul’ lads come looking for a charm to make sure some foreign young one offa the internet loves them forever, instead of till the money runs out.
” She extracts her cigarette packet from among the spools.
“How about you?” she asks, her eyes moving up to Lena.
“Would you take a love charm, if I had one handy?”
Lena doesn’t blink. “Not my style,” she says.
The corner of Mrs. Duggan’s mouth lifts in amusement, like that told her all she needs to know.
“Wee Rachel looked like that kind,” she says.
“But I had her wrong, and she had me right. She was no fool, and she knew I’m no witch woman.
What she wanted was muck. Something she could bring to Tommy and say, ‘Wind your neck in, or I’ll tell this to the world. ’ ”
“I’d say you’ve plenty of muck on Tommy,” Lena says.
Mrs. Duggan holds out the cigarette packet. “Get one a those out for me,” she says. “My hands is bad today.”
She waits, sipping, while Lena takes out a cigarette and passes it over.
“I could fill a slurry pit with the muck I’ve got on Moynihans,” she says.
“Only ’tis all stuff that the world knows already.
They mightn’t know who Tommy bribed or what dirty deals he done, but they know he done plenty, and they think he’s a great man altogether, in spite of it or because of it or both.
None of that woulda been any use to the girl.
There’s things he coulda done that mighta stuck in people’s throats, maybe, but he never done any of them. He’s fierce careful, that fella.”
Lena says, “So you said to Rachel there was nothing she could do. Is that what you’re telling me?” She doesn’t believe it for a second.
Mrs. Duggan hooks her gold lighter from under a tissue packet and holds it out to Lena. “Light that for me,” she says.
Lena has to move in close to do it. Mrs. Duggan takes her time fitting the cigarette in her mouth and bringing it to the flame, her pale eyes holding Lena’s all the way. Under her floral powder there’s a smell like hot tar. The end of the cigarette glows red as she takes a long, slow drag.
Then she settles back in her chair, releasing Lena, and lets smoke seep from her mouth. “You’re getting wrinkles,” she says.
“I am, yeah,” Lena says, putting the lighter back on the table. The nearness has sent adrenaline gunning through her. She doesn’t let her hand shake.
“It does go awful fast from there on in. Before you know it, you’ll be eighty-two and stuck in a chair all day.
The young people don’t believe ’twill ever happen to them, but you’re old enough to know it will.
” Mrs. Duggan takes another long drag on her cigarette.
“And that’s if you’re lucky; lucky and tough.
Tell us, Missus Dunne: d’you fancy your chances? ”
Her eyes are still on Lena, sifting at their leisure through what the last few weeks have been.
She knows more than Noreen, or anyone, could have told her.
Nothing comes free here. Mrs. Duggan may not have the pleasure of forcing Lena to hand over payment, but she’s taking it anyway, pulling threads of it from Lena’s face and voice. “I’m tough enough,” Lena says.
“Maybe you are,” Mrs. Duggan says, “and maybe you’re not.
Just ’cause you’re able to start trouble, that doesn’t mean you’re able to see it through.
But we’ll say you’ll make it this far.” She nods to herself, the chair and the body.
“What’ll you do to amuse yourself then? When you can’t go walking the roads, or playing about with horses, or making jam, and your fella’s dead and buried, and half the time your hands is too sore even to do a bitta embroidery.
There’s a terrible lotta hours in the day. What’ll you do with them all?”
“Who knows,” Lena says. Out of nowhere, she pictures telling Sheila and Yvonne and Julie this story: And then she said, she did not, oh God she gives me the willies, pass Lena the gin she’s earned it, did I ever tell ye what that aul’ weapon said to me once?
“By that time I’ll probably be able to do alla that stuff online.
And have a virtual fella to do it with me. ”
“I’ll tell you what you’ll do,” Mrs. Duggan says.
“You’ll take whatever comes your way, and you’ll take whatever amusement you can get outa it.
And if you get a chance to make a bit more, you’ll do it.
” She smiles at Lena, through her cigarette.
“You’re telling yourself that’s all a loada shite, isn’t that right?
Lena Dunne’s too good for that carry-on. You’d never lower yourself.”
“Hadn’t thought about it,” Lena says.
“Wait,” Mrs. Duggan says. Her voice falls heavy as a stone. “You’ll lower yourself, all right, when ’tis that or go mad. A fool might be grand sitting and playing dominoes all day, but you’ve brains. If you don’t occupy them, they’ll turn on you. You’ll take what you can get.”
Lena, suddenly, is having none of this. “You were amusing yourself the same way when you were forty,” she says. “You could be helping the grandkids with their homework, if all you wanted was to keep your brains occupied. What’d you say to Rachel?”
Mrs. Duggan’s thin eyebrows go up. “Wouldja look at that,” she says. “Maybe you’re tougher than I thought.”
“Maybe,” Lena says.
Mrs. Duggan leans her head back in the chair to blow smoke upwards, and watches as it spreads out across the ceiling.
“Wee Rachel wanted a way to stop Tommy,” she says, “and I gave her one. I done right by her, I didn’t cheat her; I told her the truth.
It’d take something big, I said. A death on his hands.
And any death wouldn’t do. A good one, it’d haveta be; one that packed a punch.
Someone that was well liked, so that everyone’d be up in arms. Someone that was young and innocent, so no one could say they went looking for it. ”
Her eyes slide to Lena. “And what did I do then?” she asks.
In that overheated room, Lena is cold right through. She says, “You tell me.”
“Then,” Mrs. Duggan says, “I told wee Rachel where Dessie and Noreen keep a coil of rope, out in the shed, and a jug of bleach, and a bottle of antifreeze, and anything else that might take her fancy. And I told her where Noreen keeps pen and paper in the kitchen, for to write herself notes. And I told her to let herself out, and she did.”
Lena sits still, feeling the breath go in and out of her. Mrs. Duggan, sipping, watches her face and enjoys it.
“I had that girl wrong,” she says. “I don’t know the young people the way I’d like.
I thought ’twas a hundred to one against her doing it; more, maybe.
I thought all she wanted was for me to tell her there was nothing she could do, so’s she’d be off the hook.
I said to myself, says I, at them odds, if she goes through with it I’ll have Dessie go into town and buy me a bottle of the best sherry he can find. ”
She shifts her bulk forward, with effort, and finds a space for her sherry glass on the table. “Fill that for me,” she says. “And drink up.”
Lena says, “I’m not celebrating.”
Mrs. Duggan’s lip lifts in scorn. “You came looking for it,” she says, pressing out her cigarette in the ashtray, “and now you’ve got it, you don’t like it. You’re awful squeamish for a woman your age. Whether it turns your stomach or not, I was right: Tommy wouldn’ta been stopped any other way.”
Lena says, “He doesn’t look stopped to me.”
“Not yet, but he will be. Am I wrong?”
“I’ve to head to work,” Lena says. She stands up.