An Irish Country Love Story (13 page)

But the dog had no luck.

They left the open country and entered a wood of old birch trees. The branches were bare, their slender trunks mossy on their north sides. O'Reilly sent Arthur ahead into a forest floor dappled by light and shade and carpeted with last year's brown soggy leaves. They gave off a musty smell that was half decay and half the aroma of the mushrooms in a fairy ring growing directly in front of his path.

“You'll think I'm a superstitious eejit,” he said, “but just to be on the safe side, let's skirt that ring of mushrooms.”

“Why?”

“Now, don't laugh, but it's called a fairy ring, a place where the fairies supposedly dance. Celtic legend holds that anyone who enters such a ring will either die young or become invisible to the rest of the human race and never be seen again. And I want to go on seeing you for years to come.”

She shook her head. “A few years ago I probably would have thought you were being silly, but since then I've heard Kinky's stories about her encounters with the
sidhe,
the little people.”

She did not need to say any more, and anyway, they both needed to save their breath for the business of climbing.

Arthur crashed through the undergrowth, but the going was getting tougher as the incline increased. O'Reilly stopped to disentangle clinging bramble thorns from Kitty's coat. “You walk behind me,” he said, and forced a way upward for them both using the stick like a machete.

They were coming to a clearing when directly ahead of the big dog a bird with brown and black plumage, liquid brown eyes on either side of its head, and a long straight bill broke cover and flew jinking away among the tree trunks ahead.

“Woodcock,” O'Reilly said, and watched it disappear. He stopped and put a hand on his hip. “Let's take a breather for a minute. I'm not as young as I used to be.” He ached all over as his stretched muscles groaned and complained.

“I don't like the look of the sky,” Kitty said.

He looked up to where billows of heavy clouds, like murky seafoam driven by a rushing tide, were blowing in from the west. “I don't like the look of it either. Let's hope we find Jasper before it starts to rain.”

“Poor old thing,” Kitty said.

“And poor old us too if it does. I'd hoped for a decent day out for you on your day off. Get your mind off your work.”

“Och, Fingal,” she said, “I'm having a lovely time and I'll be damned if a bit of rain's going to spoil it.” She looked ahead. “I can see Arthur waiting for us. Let's catch up to him.”

*   *   *

Donal Donnelly clutched a steaming mug of tomato soup. “I gotta say I'm disappointed, sir. I'd'a thought somebody would have found the poor ould dog by now. There's a brave wheen of good hidey-holes in the ground we've covered, but not a sausage. Neither hide nor hair of him. He's vanished intil thick air, so he has.”

O'Reilly managed to hide his grin. “We've still a fair bit of the hills to cover after lunch, Donal.”

“And all the lads is still hopeful,” Donal said. “They're a good bunch. I'll nip over til their table now, and I'll see you, sir, on the Comber Road at the end of the day. Get you and the missus a lift back til your motor.” He finished his soup and headed off to have a word with the rest of his group.

Lunch had helped to keep up the search party's spirits, O'Reilly thought, but there was a lot more ground to cover. With a bit of luck …

“I know you're all disappointed about Jasper,” said the marquis, “but I think the ladies of the Women's Union who provided the repast deserve a vote of confidence.” He sat on his own folding stool at a temporary table set up with four others in the shallow snow on the hill's crest.

O'Reilly knew Kinky had joined her friends at the Bishops' early that morning to help prepare the lunch. It was a tribute to how this village worked and he was happy to be a part of it.

“And of course Mister Bishop for providing the food and making the arrangements,” John MacNeill added. “There he is, doing the rounds of the other tables.”

“Ballybucklebo Borough Council elections coming soon,” O'Reilly said. “Bertie never misses a chance to look for a few more votes. Laying on this lunch won't hurt his chances.”

The meal had been served in a wide, grassy area that had been cleared round the old Martello tower. Fifty of the stout, two-storey, circular fortresses were built at the entrances to Ireland's harbours during the French Revolutionary wars of 1792 to 1802. They had been inspired by a circular tower that was part of a Genoese defence system at Mortella Point in Corsica.

“Do you know I've a distant connection with a tower like this in Dublin?” O'Reilly said.

“Don't tell us you helped build it, Fingal,” Kitty said, and grinned at him.

Dear God, but that woman was a tease and he loved it and was quite able to tease right back. He shook his head at her and continued. “And you, I suppose, were the tea girl on the building site? Hardly, my lovely young Kitty. No, James Joyce was said to have written in one in Sandycove near Dun Laoghaire in County Dublin. He was accompanied there for several days by his friend Oliver St. John Gogarty, who was included in
Ulysses
as Buck Mulligan. Gogarty went on to become an ENT surgeon. He'd been a friend of my mother and father in Dublin in the '30s. He advised them that I should specialise.” He looked around at the crowd of people all there trying to help a neighbour. “I'm very glad I didn't take that route.”

Conversation ebbed and flowed. O'Reilly looked at the old structure again. Ballybucklebo's tower had been in poor repair for as long as he could remember, its second storey crumbling, the stones scattered at its base. Still, it held on to an air of history and romance and O'Reilly imagined a single officer in his cocked hat inspecting his garrison of fifteen redcoats, drilling them on the grass beneath the tower.

O'Reilly and Kitty were sitting with the marquis, and Myrna and Lars were engaged in an animated conversation of their own. O'Reilly's pipe sent up smoke signals like those made by an Indian brave in a western movie. Great heaps of ham, chicken, and fish-paste sandwiches accompanied by steaming mugs of Kinky's tomato or mushroom soup had vanished and only a few dejected crumbs littered the plates.

“I believe, Fingal, that thanks are in order for stopping Ruby,” the marquis said.

O'Reilly shrugged.

“I should have felt dreadfully to blame if Lars had been hurt,” Myrna said.

“Fingal was very brave,” Kitty said. “I'm proud of him.”

O'Reilly muttered in imitation of his hero Captain Horatio Hornblower, “Ha-hmm,” and took refuge in tamping the tobacco into his pipe more firmly.

“You know you have my thanks, Finn. I was very lucky you were there,” Lars said. “I've been trying to explain to Myrna that I just don't see the point of tearing off after a fox who's simply minding his own business and trying to trot across an open field. It simply doesn't make sense to me. And you all already know how I feel about shooting birds.”

Oh-oh, O'Reilly thought. I hope he's not going to get into another wildlife preservation spat with Myrna.

Myrna drew herself up to her full seated height. “There is a long and respected history of fox hunting in this country. Foxes have killed more chickens in our coops at Ballybucklebo House than I can begin to count. And the wretched animals are bloodthirsty little creatures. They'll kill every hen in the coop by slitting their throats with those razor-sharp little teeth of theirs, and then eat only one. They're little demons, I tell you. So if you like birds as much as you say you do, my dear Lars, I should think you'd be quite in favour of the hunt. Now I think,” she inhaled deeply, “on that subject we must simply agree to differ.” She rose, keeping her back stiff. “I'm going to check Ruby's saddle girth. Can't have you falling off because it's loose.” She strode off to where the horses were tethered to a tree, munching oats from their nosebags.

Lars looked at Fingal. The elder brother pursed his lips and raised his shoulders, arms outstretched, palms up.

O'Reilly shook his head and busied himself relighting his pipe.

After some silence John MacNeill said, “It's been a while, Fingal, since we've had the pleasure of your and the lovely Kitty's company. I've a rare week free of meetings, so pick a night next week when you're not on duty and the pair of you come for dinner.”

“I will,” O'Reilly said. He looked at Lars. “And I'll try to make it on one of the nights you're there.” O'Reilly wanted to see how things might or might not develop between his brother and the marquis's sister. At the moment they did not look promising.

“Thank you, John,” Kitty said as she glanced at Myrna's retreating back, to Lars and back to Myrna.

“Now,” said the marquis, rising, “I must go and thank Bertie and then, I suppose, Fingal, you're going to have us search the downslope. I do hope we have better luck there.”

“That I am, John, that I am, but I'll need to send a couple of men to bring the cars round to the Comber Road. Nobody's going to want to trudge all the way back. It's a tough struggle through the undergrowth and”—he nodded up—“I don't like the look of the sky either.”

*   *   *

“I am beginning to lose faith,” said Kitty. “I don't think we're going to find the poor old thing.”

“I think you're right,” he said. The going downhill had been easier, but still no yells of triumph had been passed along the line from either side. “I know this coppice. I shoot woodpigeons here. It's the last cover before the road.”

The wind was rising and a few heavy drops had rattled through the branches.

“And while I'm disappointed that we've not found Jasper, I'll be glad to get you back undercover. I think we're in for another gale.”

She laughed. “You're very sweet worrying about me, pet, but a bit of rain never hurt anyone. My mother used to say, ‘You're not made of sugar. You won't melt.'”

O'Reilly's laugh was cut off by Arthur, who had run ahead with his nose to the ground and stopped in his tracks, legs rigid, tail stuck out behind him as stiff as a wrought-iron poker.

“Hang on.” O'Reilly's spirits rose. “Arthur's onto something. Birds or rabbits or hares would have burst from cover. Push him out, boy, push him out,” O'Reilly said. “Maybe luck is on our side. Just maybe.”

Arthur glanced over his shoulder then made a beeline for the base of an oak where two thick, twisted roots lay half exposed above the ground. O'Reilly saw a dark opening between where the roots left the trunk and patches of freshly dug earth at the burrow's mouth.

“I hope Jasper's found a wild animal's den and holed up in it. You wait here, Kitty.”

Arthur was digging frantically with his forepaws, hurling sandy soil out in a continuous stream.

A rank stink assailed O'Reilly's nose. Damn it. No. Jasper wasn't down that hole. Something else was. He grabbed Arthur's collar, hauled, and yelled, “Leave it.”

Arthur, obedient as ever, stopped digging, but turned and looked with eyes full of reproach at his master as if to say, “Och, boss, I've almost got it,” which was the last thing O'Reilly wanted. “Come on,” he said, backing off several paces. As he did, a snout appeared.

Arthur gave a small bark.

A pointed muzzle and blunt ears emerged from the hole. Then the white head and face, save for two black stripes running from behind its ears, past its eyes, and down onto its muzzle. It bared needle-sharp teeth and hissed at the man and the dog before hauling the rest of its short, stocky body covered in grey, bristly fur out of the hole. It darted at Arthur and O'Reilly lifted his stick ready to strike, but at the last minute the badger turned aside and trotted off on stumpy legs and with a rolling gait disappeared more deeply into the wood.

O'Reilly heaved a grateful sigh that he'd been able to act quickly enough. “That's a badger. They usually only come out at night,” he said, “and if one's cornered it can give a dog a nasty bite. I reckon that old Brock's making a beeline for a safer sett.”

“So that's a real-life version of Kenneth Grahame's Mister Badger. What a comical creature.”

“If you remember your
Wind in the Willows,
Badger lived in the Wild Wood and was indeed a shy, retiring animal—until one of his friends was attacked.”

“Mister Toad,” said Kitty. “When Toad Hall was invaded by the weasels.”

“Then Badger became a warrior. It's the same in real life. If one's threatened he'll fight like bejasus.”

“Dear old Arthur. He still looks disappointed.” The big dog had flopped down on the ground and laid his head on his paws. “I believe he would have taken on the badger to protect us.” She stooped and with both hands began petting the dog, who thumped his tail.

“Now, don't forget. Arthur Guinness is a working dog, and he's still working. You'll spoil him.” O'Reilly had tried to sound serious but Kitty looked up and smiled her brilliant smile.

“Away off and chase yourself, Fingal O'Reilly. We all deserve some time off, and thank you for arranging mine today. I know we didn't find Jasper and I'm sorry for it, but I enjoyed every exciting minute. Woodcocks and badgers, fairy rings and a fox hunt. And of course your company. I've had a lovely day. It certainly made up for all yesterday's aggro on the ward.”

“It was a pleasure, pet,” he said, and it was. He'd make damn sure she had more lovely days until the time was ripe to suggest they both slow down at work. That would be then, but now it was time to go. The few earlier drops had turned into a steady rain that pattered through the branches and was beginning to soak his tweed jacket. Good thing Kitty had her Barbour.