So next night that I went up there I stayed away from the window.

It was four nights before Tony turned up. The weather was bad. The met service issued a status yellow warning. Like what did we do before coloured warnings, like when I was young? Weather just happened. Southwest veering-west winds will reach mean speeds sixty-five to eighty km/h with gusts of one hundred and ten km/h., but gusts of up to one hundred and thirtykm/h, are likely on exposed coasts and headlands for a time in the evening and early night. Heavy rain later. Ballsyhane is an exposed area. The coast is only a couple of miles away. Like from the top of Ballyshane you can see Lonely Rock Light. When I got up there the trees were heaving and it was roaring like the sea. The wind blew me up the hill, I would probably end up being blown away on my way back.

I was up there jammed against a tree, watching for action. After a bit I started to think I might as well go home. Then my mam’s new car came up the drive. I checked my phone and it was still not ten o’clock. Tony got out. He was carrying a large cardboard box. He rang the doorbell and someone let him in. He was there for over an hour and I was actually totally freezing. But eventually I saw him come out again. He was carrying something. He put it in the boot of my mam’s car and drove off. I went home. Out through the torrent of the woods, onto the road where the wind almost lifted me off my feet. A few times I had to shelter. Once I held on to a gate. I thought it was going to lift me in the air like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz. I’ve seen that five times. I love it. It took me nearly an hour to get home. I was soaked. My dad said, Where the hell were you? I said I was walking The Dog and I got lost in the gale. He just gave me the scan.

They were talking about something I could see. I was standing there in the kitchen dripping. My mam was sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of that camomile shit. She thinks it helps her sleep. I hate the smell. My dad was leaning his ass against the sink. He had a glass of something invisible, maybe gin, maybe water. When he joined the Golf Club he started on G&T.

He said, How did Kelleher find out about the Revenue?

My mam said, I’d say everybody knows. These things get around. But I’ll tell you one thing, I got a call from the bank yesterday. They wanted to talk to you. They wouldn’t talk to me. It’s about the farm.