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Back Trespasses Save as PDF
Chapters (44)
  1. COVER
  2. HALF-TITLE PAGE
  3. BY THE SAME AUTHOR
  4. DEDICATION PAGE
  5. TITLE PAGE
  6. 2015
  7. THE IRISH FOR NO
  8. 1
  9. 2
  10. 3
  11. 4
  12. 5
  13. 6
  14. DÚIL
  15. 7
  16. 8
  17. 9
  18. 10
  19. 11
  20. 12
  21. CHIAROSCURO
  22. 13
  23. 14
  24. 15
  25. 16
  26. 17
  27. 18
  28. IN CALVARY’S FLOW
  29. 19
  30. 20
  31. 21
  32. 22
  33. 23
  34. 24
  35. WHEN I MOVE TO THE SKY
  36. 25
  37. 26
  38. 27
  39. 28
  40. 29
  41. 30
  42. 2015
  43. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  44. A NOTE ON THE AUTHOR

When they reached the door, he told her to wait and went around the rear of the pub. He came back with six bottles of cordial and loaded them in her waiting arms.

If anyone asks, we were getting stock, he said.

I can’t do this, she said.

You can. And you will.

Leonardo, unused to the exertion of manning the bar alone, had a spritz of sweat on his moustache. Gina was still seated, nursing a Paris goblet to her breast. Bad bastards doing a thing like that, she said. She was almost enjoying herself, like she had with the McGeowns, basking in the celebrity that being close to tragedy brought. It filled Cushla with fury.

Fidel ordered a pint from her. Eamonn had climbed on the stool to turn up the volume on the television. The room fell quiet, the Babycham fawn regarding it through heavy lashes.

A march on Stormont. The car-bomb footage they had begun to use the first night, when Michael watched her rub away the ashes. Mary Peters holding her medal.

Two RUC men on the road outside Michael’s house, three on his driveway. A man in civilian clothes beside the rose bushes that were blooming now. His dark car parked behind the green Japanese one.

The man who was shot dead in his bed shortly before eight this morning has been named. Michael Agnew, a senior counsel, was killed in front of his wife, said the newsreader.

Footage from earlier today, of the stretcher being carried out. It was as though they’d thrown him on the gantry, his body jumbled under a white sheet, the awkward jut of his limbs. Something else was wrong, and at first she couldn’t tell what it was. His shoulder, she said, unable to stop herself. Wouldn’t you think they’d have been careful with his shoulder?

WHEN I MOVE TO THE SKY

WHEN I MOVE TO THE SKY

25

25

She put her face in the revere of Michael’s cardigan, inhaled. He was there, for a moment, but her nose became accustomed to the scent and he was gone. She was sticky with sweat, wearing only her underwear under the cardigan. She flung the covers off. Her bedroom door opened. Cushla seized the sheet, too slow, because Gina said, What if there’s a fire? You’d have to stand outside on the street in your drawers. She was carrying the tray on which Cushla normally served Gina’s breakfast.