Page 7 of Heart of the Wren
“We’ll have to knock it down,” Michael lit a cigarette. “It wouldn’t be safe to leave it as it is.”
“Are you sure one of your butts didn’t start this?” Dara pointed tothe shed.
Michael’s sleepy eyes widened. “What sort of gobshite do you think I am? Sure haven’t I worked here for twenty years with no fires, do you think I don’t know how to stub out a cigarette?”
“I’m only asking,” he said.
“Well don’t,” Michael said. “And get a feckin’ haircut, ye hippy, ye.”
???
Dara helped me to return the buckets to the nearest barn. After stooping to stroke and talk to a black cat, he started poking around in a dusty corner and uncovered a workbench.
“Do you always talk to animals?”
“They make more sense than most people.” He moved some clutter and pulled out a horseshoe.
“Dad always had a couple of horses,” I told him. “But they were a lot of work so after the last one died, I didn’t replace it.”
Dara rubbed the horseshoe with his sleeve, clearing off the cobwebs. “C’mere, I hope you don’t mind me asking,” he said, “but do you always wear odd shoes?”
I wore a brown boot on one foot and a black one on the other. I didn’t think anyone would notice. “I couldn’t find the match to either. Dark winter mornings, y’know how it is.” Truthfully, I searched with every light on but couldn’t find a matching pair of any of my shoes.
The barn creaked overhead, as it sometimes did. A pigeon flappednoisily around the rafters. I hugged myself as I was suddenly struck with a bone-deep cold. Leaving Dara to his own devices, I stomped across the farmyard and into the house.
In the bathroom, I splashed water on my face. Partially to clear the soot from my eyes but also to calm myself down. Despite the constant spray from the hose, soot had caked under my fingernails. I scrubbed them so hard with a frayed nailbrush I thought I might break the skin. I gripped the edge of the sink. The shed wasn’t important, nothing of particular value had been lost and yet… And yet, it was one more thing. One more kick in the teeth. One more nail in the coffin. I reached for a towel as the banging started.
Hurrying downstairs, I swung open the front door to find my way blocked by a ladder. “What are you up to?”
Dara paused his hammering. “It’s good luck to hang these up.”
Face turning red, I hurried through the hallway and out of the back door. I marched right around to the front of the house and pointed to the horseshoe now hanging in the archway above the door. “Who told you that you could do that?”
Dara beamed down at me. “Don’t worry, it’s the right way round. See? The ends point upwards so the good luck doesn’t fall out.” He climbed down from the ladder. “After the fire, I thought you could use some of it.”
I huffed and my ears were burning. “I don’t want it up there.”
“Ah, sure you can hardly see it, up in the eaves. It’s a good one. Made of iron. It’ll help keep them away.”
“Keep who away?”
Dara flashed his canine teeth again. “The fairies.”
Chapter 5
LORCAN
I SLID a forest green felt pouch with a slender leather strap across the bar. “Dara asked me to pass this on to you. For your cold.”
Big Tom cupped it in the palm of his hand and sniffed it. “A scapular? I didn’t think he was the religious type.”
Instead of a picture of the Virgin Mary or one of the saints, a Celtic knot adorned the pouch, carefully embroidered. I wondered if Dara had done it himself.
“He made it for you and said it would help,” Isaid. “He was out in the woods first thing this morning, looking for moss.”
"That was good of him.” Big Tom hung the strap around his neck and tucked the pouch into the nest of black chest hair under his shirt. “I’ll try anything at this point.” He sniffed hard and swallowed with a squelch. It made me queasy.
After a quick chat with Paul Regan, the local butcher, I joined Bullseye at his table. My oldest friend, Eoin “Bullseye” Dolan and I had been born around the same time, in the same hospital. We’d gone to school together and for most of our youth, we’d spent every weekend together. I’d been best man at his wedding and was godfather to two of his children. While I’d felt honoured, a part of me suspected he felt sorry for me, being, as I was, aconfirmed bachelorwith no children of my own. Nor was I ever likely to have any.
