The Birdwatcher (20 page)

She looked at them. ‘And?’ she said, not taking them.

The Sunday suit said he must have come here straight from church. ‘I thought you’d like them,’ McGrachy said, hesitantly.

Billy was amazed at the power of a woman over a man like this. There was nobody in the town, Protestant or Catholic, who wasn’t a bit scared of McGrachy, and here he was, standing and holding out a bunch of flowers to his mother, anxious that she wouldn’t take them off him.

‘It’s been a while since the funeral,’ he said. ‘I wanted to ask how you were keeping.’

‘We’re fine, aren’t we, Billy?’ she said.

‘My arm is getting tired from holding these flowers,’ he said.

She took them finally and handed them straight to Billy. ‘Put these in the big jug, will you, Billy?’

Billy left the two of them in the front room. Returning with the jug, he paused outside the door to listen.

‘I’m a widower, Mary,’ McGrachy was saying. ‘I know I’m a little older than you, but I have savings and a decent house of my own. I know you’re going to be a little short now. I’d be happy to lend some money. Just ask. Will you promise me that you’ll ask if you ever need it?’

‘Thank you, Mr McGrachy. That’s very generous.’

Billy coughed and entered.

‘They look nice. Thank you, Billy.’ Billy put the vase down on the sideboard.

‘Maybe the pictures, then? We could go to Belfast in the Rover,’ McGrachy said. ‘There’s a new Burt Reynolds.’

‘I don’t think so,’ said his mother.

Mr McGrachy looked shocked. ‘I thought you’d like that, Mary. You must be lonely, here on your own.’

‘Billy. Run upstairs and play in your room,’ said his mother.

‘I’m sorry if I asked too soon. You must be grieving still.’

By the time he returned back on tiptoes to the bottom of the stairs, McGrachy was saying, ‘It was me that got you and your late husband this house from the council, Mary. Remember that, don’t ye?’

‘The answer is still no, I’m afraid, Mr McGrachy.’

He was scared for his mother; McGrachy was not the kind of man to stand for this. He wanted to go and tell her to just pretend to like him at least.

‘Your husband loved you, Mary. He talked about you all the time.’

‘Well there’s something. He talked about you a lot too. He thought you were great. And the rest of your lot. He thought that made him a big man. And look at him now.’

There was an uncomfortable pause. He heard them moving. Now his mother was opening the front door.

‘I understand your bitterness, Mary, of course I do. But I’m here to help. One more thing, Mary, I want to ask. Your husband had something of ours.’

‘Wouldn’t know.’

‘I need it back.’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, Mr McGrachy.’

‘Something we had issued him with. On behalf of the Volunteer Force. He’d have kept it hidden somewhere, I guess. I expect you’ll know all his little secrets.’

‘Why would I know anything about it? He never discussed his business with me.’ She would have been standing there, arms crossed, waiting for him to leave.

‘I would appreciate it if you could find it, Mary.’

‘I’m sorry, Mr McGrachy.’

‘I need to know where it is, Mary,’ McGrachy was whispering again.

‘I would appreciate it if you went now.’

‘I’ll be back if I don’t hear.’

‘Goodbye, Mr McGrachy,’ his mother said.

‘Well, I’d earnestly appreciate it if you would start looking for it, Mary.’

Billy crouched on the stairs, barely breathing, hoping his mother couldn’t hear him. Only when McGrachy’s car drove away did he dare fill his lungs.

He emerged from the bottom of the stairs, moving as if he’d just run down them. ‘You OK, Mum?’

‘Fine,’ she said, wiping her eyes on the sleeve of her blouse, even though all the time she made it sound like she hadn’t been frightened.

‘Where do you think we could go?’ said his mother. ‘What about Rome? I always fancied Italy. “Three Coins in a Fountain”.’

Sunday evenings there was nothing on the telly if you didn’t want to watch
Songs of Praise
. They were both lying on their backs on the living-room floor.

‘Not Italy. We don’t speak the lingo.’

‘Jamaica.’

‘What would you do?’ The furthest they’d ever been was on holidays to Portrush.

‘I will open a bar on the beach and make a fortune. Or maybe Paris. I could be an artist.’

‘You’ve never painted a picture in your life, Mum.’

‘You don’t know. I could be a great artist. Do you think there are still artists in Paris?’

They had a packet of crisps and a bottle of red lemonade each. Mum had put some vodka in hers.

He wondered, was this just a game, like when he was a kid and she used to make up stories? Or did she really mean it? If they could get away from here, maybe everything stupid he had done would be forgotten. ‘Are you being serious, Mum?’ said Billy anxiously.

‘Serious as a broken bone,’ she said.

‘Good,’ he said. ‘So am I.’ It would mean leaving his friends too. He was scared he would never make new ones.

After a while, Billy said, ‘America, Mum. Can’t we go and live in America?’

They would speak English there, at least. She sat up on the carpet and took one of her crisps from the packet, and before putting it in her mouth, said, ‘I don’t like the accent. Or the cars.’

He thought of his dad, working in the garage on his Pontiacs and Cadillacs. ‘No. How much money would we need, to leave, Mum?’

‘Quite a bit,’ she said.

‘So we have some?’

‘Some.’

‘How much have we got?’

‘Not a lot.’

And they lay on their backs, looking up at the ceiling.

‘Well if you’re not going to school today, you’ll have to help me pack away your father’s things.’

Pack away his father’s things? He had never thought that they’d have had to do that.

She took his father’s cap off the back of the kitchen door, and chucked his walking stick out of the back door. ‘Good riddance to the bloody thing.’

Billy had not liked that stick much either.

He watched as she threw open the doors to his father’s wardrobe and started pulling out his suits, laying them on his bed. In the pockets of his suits they found two pound notes, a toffee and a few bus tickets. Billy was disappointed. The contents of his father’s pockets should have been more interesting.

‘Maybe I should keep his best suit for you,’ Mum said. ‘For when you’re the big man.’

He imagined wearing it, collar turned up like he was a punk rocker. Last week Rusty Chandler’s older brother Stampy came back from Belfast with a suit that had five-inch lapels. It was bloody extreme. Billy looked at the jacket and pulled a face.

‘Perhaps not, then.’

Billy’s mother packed the clothes in a large suitcase and Billy sat on the lid while she strapped one of Dad’s belts around it.

‘Take it down for me, will you, lovely. I’m just a poor weak woman.’

So he lifted it and started dragging it to the landing and he was just at the top of the stairs, when something caught his foot.

He felt himself slowly tripping forwards. In an attempt to regain his balance he let go of the case, but he was already out over the top of the stairs, falling head first, crashing to the bottom, his load following behind.

His mother screamed.

On the floor, Billy lay dazed, soft, hazy whiteness all around him. Had something happened to his eyes? Had he gone blind? He raised his fingers to his face to check.

‘Aaaah!’ With a yelp he jumped up. The case had sprung open, sending clothes everywhere; a pair of his dad’s old underpants had landed on his head. Big, pale floppy things. Jumping up and down, he flung the dead man’s underwear away from him.

Seated on the kitchen stool, Mum held him on her knee and stroked his head like she had done when he was a little boy, though he was far too big for that. ‘You must have caught your foot on that loose carpet. I was always after him to fix that. Looks like he’s gotten out of that one, anyway.’

‘Is it swelling up?’

‘Like a ping-pong ball,’ she said. ‘The arsehole is still taking a whack at us from the grave, eh?’

For some reason that was funny and they were both laughing as the doorbell rang. Neither of them moved.

‘Pretend we’re not in.’ She winked. And she hugged him even closer, smiling.

‘I’m just calling to see if you’re OK, Mary. Open the door.’

She unfolded her arms, and stood, putting Billy back on his feet, then went to the kitchen door and called, ‘Go away, Fergie. I don’t need your help.’

The neighbours would be watching. It would get back to McGrachy again that Ferguson had been here.

‘Mary. I’m not going until I find out if you’re all right.’

‘It’s not helping. Just go. Please.’

They could hear him standing a while, feet on the back-door metal door scraper. They could see him too, a dark shape through the patterned glass. Mum went to the hallway, picked up a pile of shirts that had been thrown out of the suitcase and started folding them again.

He left his mother to the clothes and went back up to his room where he was supposed to be doing the homework he had never handed in last week. On the way up, from the landing window, Billy watched Fergie trudge back to his car, feeling sorry for him. It was sort of embarrassing that a policeman liked his mother this much, but Fergie was OK.

Billy was there five minutes, kneeling by his bed with his homework open on the blankets, when his mother called, ‘Billy. Can you come down? Without tripping this time.’

She wanted him to take the clothes out. The Sally Army would be picking them up that afternoon.

There was a suitcase and a cardboard box. He picked up the box first.

Outside, when he looked up, he saw that Ferguson had not driven off. He was still there in his police car, head down. Billy squinted.
Go away, Fergie. Leave us alone.
Fergie sat, writing something.

Billy went back inside the house, saying nothing, and lifted the suitcase. Was this all his father had owned? It didn’t seem like much.

Ferguson was sucking the end of his biro. He didn’t even look up.

An hour or so later Billy came back downstairs. He had been drawing birds instead of doing his homework. When he opened the front door to see if Fergie was still there, he saw that the box and suitcase had gone, but there was now a piece of paper folded in half.

On the outside it said:
Mrs Mary McGowan
. Thinking it was probably a thank-you note from the Salvation Army, he opened it.

Dear M.

Things are a little hairy now, I know. There are a lot of rumours flying around. But everything will be all right.

The writing was neat; even letters, all nicely upright.

I’ve been trying to say this to your face, but I never could figure out how to do it. You don’t have to tell me what happened. But trust me. I will protect you WHATEVER you did and WHATEVER has happened and WHATEVER is going to happen too. Please remember that.

Your loyal friend,

John Ferguson

I love you. Always did.

He read those last words with puzzlement. To a boy of his age, love was mysterious, especially when applied to his mother. Love was something that sent grown-ups nuts. It was scary.

‘Come and help me wash up.’

Fergie and Mr McGrachy? Both of them. God’s sake.

‘What are you doing out there, Billy?’ called his mother from the kitchen.

And, not wanting to be caught reading it, he scrumpled the note up and stuffed it into his pocket.

‘Was that a note?’

‘No. Just my homework.’

‘You’re a good boy,’ she said, and she handed him a drying-up cloth.

Donny finally caught him on Tuesday, on the way back from school.

He had been expecting it. Billy had just crossed River Street when out of nowhere, a fist clouted him on the side of his head.

Sitting on the pavement, Billy looked up.

In flared jeans and dark glasses, Donny stood above him. He must have been there in the alleyway, waiting for him.

‘I seen you and that copper Ferguson.’

‘I didn’t say nothing.’

Grabbing his shirt collar, he yanked Billy to his feet.

‘You’re hurting me.’

‘Yes,’ he said.

Tugging on the shirt, he pulled Billy into the small alley that led down to the path alongside the river, behind the workshops. No one could see you from here.

‘Well how come, after you talked to him, he pulled me in and started asking me about some gun?’