After a day or two, I could feel Ireland beginning to work its magic on me. Once the jet lag wore off, I slept better than I had for quite a while, alone in my bed, in the silent darkness. My fingers had stopped itching for a keyboard. I could have a glass of wine with dinner, or even two, and I could eat more than one dessert, all without John looking over his reading glasses with disapproval. I discovered I liked being on my own. More important, I liked who I was when I was alone.
I ventured into the nearest town a time or two, to pick up food and to look around, but I scuttled back to my little cottage fairly quickly: it was beginning to feel like home. Still, I was getting kind of restless, so I started walking. The nearest neighbor’s house was more than half a mile away, so I could ramble when and where I wanted without disturbing anyone. I was surrounded by fields used mainly for grazing cattle, if the large cowpats were any indication, but since I saw no cows, I assumed they were all safely stowed in their winter quarters.
It felt good to get out, to breathe clean air, to feel the autumn sun on my face, to use muscles I hadn’t felt in a while. I felt free. It wasn’t like walking in a city, where you had to be alert all the time for weirdos on the street, crazy drivers, or craters in the sidewalk. It was just me and the land, and a few birds and the occasional rabbit.
For the first few days I didn’t see another soul. Then I saw someone a good distance away: a woman, maybe a few years older than me, dressed much as I was in jeans, a nondescript jacket, and sturdy shoes. She was leaning against a wooden fence, and she didn’t appear to notice me, and I felt oddly relieved. Since I’d been heading on a course that bypassed her anyway, I kept going.
The next day I saw her again, coming upon her suddenly as I rounded the corner of a stone wall, and the sight of her startled me. “Oh, hi,” I said awkwardly. “Do you live around here?”
“I do. You’d be staying at the McCarthys’ cottage?” Her accent was local, her voice low and musical.
“I am. Do you know Catherine McCarthy?”
“We go back a ways. Will you be stayin’ long?”
“No, I’m just here for a couple of weeks. On vacation.” I realized I hadn’t had a conversation with another human for several days, beyond How much do I owe you? to the salesclerk at the Costcutter store in town. I had to resist the urge to start babbling. “It’s peaceful here.”
“That it is. I’ll leave you to it, then. Safe home.” With no further comment she turned and left. I stared after her retreating back, equal parts relieved and miffed. I hadn’t wanted to start up a friendship with a local stranger, but on the other hand, I’d always heard that the Irish were friendly people, and this woman had been anything but. Odd.
I trekked back to the cottage, but before I could insert my key in the lock, I noticed a small painted wooden sign over the door, half obscured with ivy. It appeared to be in Irish. I thought it said Faoi an Cnoc, which I couldn’t begin to pronounce. Did the house have a name?
It was getting dark and I was thinking about starting dinner when someone rapped on the front door. It turned out to be Catherine McCarthy. “How’re things?” she asked. “No problems?”
“Come in, please. Everything’s been fine. I really like the house.”
“Glad to hear it. I just wanted to be sure you were settling in.”
“I am, thanks. Oh, I just noticed—that sign over the front door? What is it?”
“Faoi an Cnoc?” It sounded to me like “fwee an kanock.” “It means ‘under the hill.’ Comes from an old Irish song, ‘The Little House Under the Hill.’ You’ve seen as how the house sits just below the top of the hill? Cuts the wind a bit, else it would go howlin’ round the house like a banshee.”
“That makes sense. Do you live nearby?”
“The next town over. My husband used this land fer pasture, and the house came with it. Then he says, why not fix it up and rent it out, bring in a bit of cash? So he modernized it, did all the work himself. Spent a lot of time on it, when he wasn’t looking after the cows.”
“He did a good job.”
“He did that.”
“Well,” I said briskly, “I don’t want to keep you from your supper. Thanks for stopping by. I’ll let you know if I need anything else.”
Catherine gave me a long look, then turned to go. “I’ll stop by again, before you go.”
“Great. Thanks.” I shut the door behind her with relief. And then I felt guilty. After all, she’d been trying to be a good landlady, making sure I had whatever I needed. And it was her house, wasn’t it? She was just looking after her property. Funny about the work her husband had done—I’d wondered about some of the decorative touches I’d seen here and there. Men were usually clueless about the small details of housekeeping, like putting a light over the sink so you could see to wash the dishes, or providing enough towel bars in the bathrooms. In this cottage, all the little things like that had been seen to.
The next day I took a different route for what had become my daily walk, and the woman—I realized suddenly she’d never given her name—was there again, this time coming toward me on the lane I’d chosen. “Good morning. Grand day, isn’t it?” she said with a smile.
“It is. Hey, you want to come back to the house, maybe have a cup of coffee?” I thought I might be able to make up for my abruptness with Catherine yesterday. And maybe there was such a thing as too much solitude.
“Oh, don’t trouble yourself. But I’d love to see what Catherine did with the place—her husband was after fixing it up, wasn’t he?”
“That’s what she told me. Didn’t Catherine ever show it to you?”
“We had a . . . I’d guess you’d call it a falling out before it was finished. Are you sure it’s no trouble?”
“Of course not,” I said firmly. “I’d be glad of the company.” She fell into step alongside me, and we were back at the cottage in under five minutes. “Do you know, I don’t think I got your name yesterday.”
“Nor I yours. I’m Honora.”
“And I’m Ellen.” I extricated the house key from my jacket pocket and opened the door, leading the way inside.
Honora walked a couple of paces in and turned slowly. “Nice. He did good work, didn’t he then?”
“Catherine told me that she and her husband had been renting it out for a while. So they never lived here?”
“Ah, no. Patrick’s family had lived on this piece of land for generations. But he’s gone now.”
So Catherine’s husband was dead? She hadn’t said, but then, why would she tell me? “She told me that she’s living in town now. Can I get you some coffee? Or tea?”
“No, I haven’t the time. I was just wanting to see what was changed, but I’ll be on my way.”
“Well, thanks for saying hello—I haven’t seen many people to talk to. I’ve almost forgotten how.”
“Don’t I know the feeling! Thanks for letting me in, Ellen.” And then she was gone.
I pottered around the kitchen, throwing together a meal and thinking about how I was—or wasn’t—talking to people around here. Maybe I’d finished the first part of the post-John healing process, and it was time to go back to the world of people. But it was dark now, and I wasn’t sure of my way along the lanes—they all looked the same, particularly after dark. And I’d never been one to hang out in bars at night back home. Maybe tomorrow, during the day. I could visit one of the local pubs and talk to some people.
I took my walk in the morning without running into Honora, then I drove into the nearest town after my lunch. There were a couple of pubs and a couple of cafés, and I chose a pub based on the roomy parking space in front of it. Besides, I could visit a café anywhere, but how often could I visit a real Irish pub? Inside there were no more than five people—this was definitely not tourist season.
“What can I get yeh?” the bartender asked. He was thirtyish and needed a haircut, but he had a kind of scruffy good looks that were appealing. And a nice smile.
“A pint of Guinness, please.” I’d allow myself one but no more, since I was driving. As he filled a glass, I studied the photos that were layered on the walls over and around the bar. “What’s the story on all these?” I asked, pointing at them.
“People come in, they like to leave something. Kinda like a reverse memory, you know? Or maybe they’ve got the same picture tacked up back home because they like to feel the connection. I haven’t seen you in here before,” he said.
“You remember everybody who comes in?” I countered, reluctant to reveal too much.
“Pretty near. There are fewer than you’d think. Not so many Americans as there were a few years ago. What brings you to this end of the world?”
“The peace and quiet,” I said, more sharply than I intended. He gave me a long look, then retreated to the other end of the bar, leaving me alone with my drink. Had I been rude? Did I care? When I finished my pint, I left the pub and walked to the nearby market to stock up on supplies, then drove back to my cottage in time to admire the sunset.
The next day it was raining, which made me even more restless. I recalled that there was a cheerful fire at the pub—and a bartender I’d brushed off more sharply than I intended. I really had to stop doing that to people who were only trying to be nice to me, a stranger. I found my rain jacket and set off at midday.
The same bartender was there, and there were no more people than before. Maybe the same ones, maybe not—I couldn’t tell. The bartender came over when I sat on a stool at the bar. “A pint?”
I smiled. “You remembered.”
He smiled. “It’s not so hard—that’s what most people ask for here.” He set about pouring one for me.
“I apologize if I kind of snapped at you yesterday,” I said. “I’ve been staying in a rental cottage for the last few days, and I guess I’m out of practice talking to people.”
“Not to worry. If you’re here for the peace and quiet, you’ve come to the right place.”
“Thanks. Good to know.”
“Where is it yer stayin’?” he asked. When he saw my look of dismay, he said, “I’m not about to rob the place, you know—just making conversation.” He slid my full pint across the bar. “But I’d guess it’s Catherine McCarthy’s place—I’ve heard she lets it out now and again.”
“It is. Nice house, and not too big. Not too many other people nearby, either, which is kind of what I wanted.” I was already saying too much, and I didn’t want him to think I was inviting him to ask questions, so I hurried to change the subject. “I’ve only talked to one of them, a woman named Honora who must live close by. I’ve seen her a couple of times.”
When I looked at the man behind the bar, he was mindlessly wiping off the top of it, pushing the rag in aimless circles, his eyes blank. When he finally looked up at me, he said carefully, “About your size, dark hair?”
“Yes, that sounds like her. You know her?”
He nodded. He looked like he was going to say something else, but then a couple of men came into the pub and he turned to them. After he’d served them, he started talking with one of them, so I finished my pint and left.
The next morning the rain had stopped, at least for the moment. In a way I was sad, because I’d had a lovely time the night before, curled up in front of the fireplace, where there burned a fire I’d made myself, reading a mystery by an Irish writer I’d never heard of. I hadn’t missed watching television—or having a companion. But a fair day in Ireland was not to be wasted, I told myself—I could read after dark. I pulled on a sweater and my windbreaker and set out over the fields.
I came upon Honora leaning on the fence where I’d first seen her, watching a few birds hunting for anything left to eat in the field. “Hello,” I called out as I came up behind her. “I was in town yesterday, and I met someone who knows you—the bartender at a pub in town.”
She turned to look at me then. “That’d be Declan. He’s my brother. What did he say?”
“Not much. I just said I’d run into someone named Honora on one of my walks, and he described you.” I waited for some comment or explanation from her, but she went back to watching the near-empty field. “Is your house near here?”
“No. I just come here for the walk. I like the view of the land. If you see Declan again, tell him I said hello. And tell him to look under the storage shed.” She turned away; apparently our conversation was over, even if I didn’t understand what she meant.
Bewildered, I said, “See you later,” to her back and resumed my own walk. I wouldn’t have called her warm and welcoming. Maybe I’d ask Declan about her later—and then I realized I’d already decided to go back to the pub. Funny how after only a week I’d settled into my own routine: wake, walk, go into town, come back, cook, read, bed. And then again the next day, and the next. Well, that was what I had been looking for, wasn’t it? Time to think, to get to know myself again.
That afternoon the sunshine still held, so I drove down the lanes into the town. I strolled around for a while, admiring window displays and puzzling over some that I didn’t understand. One window was filled with grave decorations like nothing I’d ever seen. Bookstore, clothing shop, realtor, café—I made the rounds and ended up in front of the pub. Declan was inside again—what kind of hours did he keep?—and there were no other customers.
He greeted me with a smile. “How are yeh?” he said. “Will it be a pint today?”
“Why not?” I said. When he returned with my brimming glass, I said, “I saw Honora this morning. She said to tell you hello. And she said something I didn’t understand.”
Declan’s face had gone still again, like before, and his eyes were fixed on mine. “And what would that be?” he asked in a tight voice.
“She said to look under the storage shed. Does that make sense to you?”
He thought for a moment, then nodded once. “That it does.” He turned away, much as Honora had, and became very busy polishing glassware. When I finished my pint I left some euro coins on the bar and went on my way.
Since the following day was fair again—close to a miracle, so many nice days, the newscasters on the television informed me—I decided I was going to try going a bit farther afield and exploring some local monuments I’d been reading about in my one and only guidebook. I left shortly after breakfast, driving along the coast, stopping at a few small towns, and enjoyed myself thoroughly. It was after three by the time I drew near my little cottage—only to find a couple of police cars parked in the driveway. I pulled off the road as far as I could and approached the nearest officer. “What’s going on?”
“Who would you be, miss?”
“I’m Ellen Leonard, from the States. I’m renting this cottage from Mrs. McCarthy. Is there a problem? Has somebody broken in?” I’d heard that there was little crime in Ireland, and I had nothing worth stealing anyway.
He didn’t answer immediately, as if turning over a variety of answers before picking one for me. “Nothing to concern yourself with. There’s been a crime committed here, but long before you came.”
It was then that I noticed that several officers were poking around in a small shed to the side of the property, one I’d had no reason to explore. And then I recognized Declan. “What’s he doing here?” I nodded toward him.
“Declan? How do you know him?”
“Only from the pub where he works. We’ve chatted a little, that’s all.”
The young officer shook his head. “It’s a sad thing. We’ve had a tip that there might be someone buried beneath the shed.”
I felt a knot of nausea gather in my stomach. As I watched, a guard backed out of the shed and looked over to the officer near me and nodded. Declan shoved his way into the shed, and came out a shrunken man. My policeman shook his head sadly. “It’ll be his sister, then.”
“What was her name?” I whispered.
“Honora. She disappeared a couple of years ago. Story was, she’d run off with Patrick McCarthy, for he hasn’t been seen since. If Honora’s here, so might he be.”
I swallowed, hard. Should I tell him I’d talked to Honora just yesterday morning—and she’d told me to tell Declan where to look? No, they’d think I was crazy, now that they’d found a body. A woman’s body. Could it be someone else? Had Honora played some awful trick before she vanished? She’d seemed so, well, real, when we’d talked.
But after all, this was a place where people believed in leprechauns and banshees. I’d been talking to a ghost.
I looked up to see the woman who had called herself Honora watching from the crest of the hill. No one else seemed to notice her. I could swear she was smiling. Then she waved at me, turned, and was gone.
I couldn’t just stand there watching the guards do their gruesome work, so I took a walk—not toward where I’d last seen Honora, but the other way—and I waited until they let me back into the house. They had no reason to keep me out: after all, if anything had happened inside the house, it was years ago, so the evidence was long gone.
I expected to spend an anxious night, knowing what I knew now, but to my surprise I slept straight through. I decided to believe that Honora had delivered her message and she was done with me. The next day I waited until I thought the pubs would be open and drove straight to town and the pub. Declan was back behind the bar, although there were no customers, and he wasn’t surprised to see me.
“Why didn’t you tell me that Honora was dead?” I demanded as soon as I walked in.
He looked at me a moment before answering. “We didn’t know fer sure, because there was no body. But I knew. We’d been close, the two of us, and she’d let slip about her and Patrick. I’d never heard from her, after she disappeared.”
“But why’d she talk to me? Not you?”
“I couldn’t say,” Declan said, with some regret. “Yer a woman, yer not from here. And then there’s the date.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s Samhain, isn’t it? Today’s the first of November—the Day of the Dead. The doors to the other world are open and the souls of the dead come out. You were stayin’ where she died—mebbe she’s tied to the place.” He gave me a half smile. “If you believe that kind of thing.” As I struggled to take that in, he added, “They’ve arrested Catherine for the murders.”
“Murders, plural? More than one?”
“Honora and Catherine’s cheatin’ husband. The gardaí are guessing Catherine came to the house to see how the work was goin’. Her husband was laying the patio and he was messing about with the concrete—and she came upon him and Honora together there, takin’ a break from the work. Looks like she took a shovel to their heads, the both of ’em, and shoved them in the same hole. Handy that he’d a batch of concrete ready to go, so she just went ahead and covered ’em up. She’s a strong woman, that one, and she’d have had no trouble at all. The shed was put in a couple of days later—one of those ready-made ones, went together fast.”
And then she started renting the place out? That was cold. I remembered Catherine’s hands, thick-skinned and scarred, and I didn’t doubt she could have done it. I stifled a hysterical giggle. “Does that mean I don’t have to pay for the cottage?”
“I’d say yer safe enough turnin’ yer back on it. Just leave the key behind a stone by the door when you go—it’ll be sorted out later. Will you be leavin’ us now?”
I considered, but not for long. I’d come to this place to get to know myself post-John. Now I’d learned that I could chat with someone who wasn’t there and accept that the dead could walk the land, at least now and then, and it didn’t scare me. And I knew that I didn’t need John and all his grand plans, and that felt good. “No, I don’t think so. I kind of like it around here.”
“Would yeh rather have another place to stay, fer the rest of your time here, then? I know some places . . .”
I smiled at him. “No, I’m good. Honora trusted me with her message and believed I’d tell you, but I don’t think I’ll be seeing her again. I’ll stay where I am.”
“Good woman. Can I get you a pint? On the house.”
“Declan, I think I need one. I’m sorry for your loss.”
“Honora’s been gone to me for a while. Maybe now she can rest. I thank you fer that.”
Excerpt from Relatively Dead