Run Before the Wind (24 page)

I regretted my next question almost before I asked it; it began as a joke, but before it was out of my mouth it was serious.

"And which one of them do you fuck?" I asked, stuffing my last bite of choucroute into my mouth.

She never missed a beat.

"Both," she said evenly, gazing calmly across the table at me.

"Sometimes together."

The sauerkraut turned dry in my mouth. I chewed it valiantly, to keep from having to speak.

"I particularly enjoy them together," she said, motioning to a waiter for the bill.

I swallowed hard, chasing the food with some beer. I was shocked to the bone.

"Are you shocked?" she asked.

"Certainly not," I replied.

I felt her hand on my thigh under the table.

"Are you excited?"

"Yes," I replied, and I was astonished that it was the truth.

"Let's get out of here," she said, signing the check and pushing the table away. I followed her out of the restaurant and to the car, where the chauffeur was waiting, braced, with the door opened. He handed her a fresh Paris Herald Tribune. In the car she handed me the newspaper, then turned, reached down and unzipped my fly.

"Le Louvre," she said to the chauffeur.

"oki, Ma'amselle," he replied, starting the engine.

As her head came down to my lap, I flung up the newspaper to shield us from the chauffeur's eyes in the rearview mirror. A headline at the bottom of the front page said, "inept but lucky GUNMEN ROB CORK BANK AND ARMORED CAR," but my vision blurred before I could read the story.

I STUMBLED OFF the plane in Cork, a shell of my former self, after two almost sleepless days of gorging myself on French food and wine, while myself being gorged on by Jane Berkeley. I had not before, nor have I since known any woman so voracious in all her appetites, and I reached the cottage slaked, sated, drained and shattered. The telephone began ringing as I was unlocking the door.

I got it on the fifth ring, not really caring if the caller hung up.

"Hello."

"To whom am I speaking, please?" It was a man's voice, one I did not recognize.

"To whom do you wish to speak?" I replied, annoyed.

"To either a Captain Pemberton-Robinson or a Mr. Lee, please." The voice maintained a businesslike courtesy.

"This is Will Lee." There was something terribly official-sounding about the man's voice; I wondered if he were a policeman.

"Mr. Lee, my name is Primrose, Major Primrose. I believe you may be expecting my call."

I drew a blank; he guessed that from my silence.

"I've been asked ... is this a secure line?"

I laughed aloud.

"What?"

"May we safely speak on this line?"

"Well, sure, I guess so ... I ..."

"This is the number of the cottage, is it not?"

"Yes .. . look, I'm afraid I don't have the slightest idea what you're talking about. Are you suggesting this phone might be tapped, or something?"

"I'm merely being careful, Mr. Lee. I believe you had a discussion with a gentleman in Paris about a potential problem."

The penny finally dropped; this was Derek Thrasher's security man.

"Oh, yes, I'm sorry, I just didn't make the connection."

"I've just rung to tell you that all is in place. You may scrub your other arrangements as of this time."

"Ah .. . oh, yes, I'll tell Mark .. . Captain PembertonRobinson."

"Let me give you a number to call if you should experience any difficulties or need further assistance from us." I jotted down the number.

"Please call any time, day or night; leave a message for me, personally--Major Primrose--or if your problem is .. . of a.

pressing nature, just tell the man who answers that you have a Code Four situation, and what help you think you may need."

"Code Four."

"Right. Don't telephone us from the place in question unless it's absolutely necessary; that will be difficult to keep secure. The cottage line should be all right, but we'll check it periodically to be certain."

"Yes, fine." All this seemed a little preposterous to me, but it was also curiously comforting. I hung up; it was just noon. Mark would be at the yard and Annie was out someplace. I undressed and collapsed into my bed.

Sometime later I woke, groggy and disoriented. I looked at my watch: nearly four o'clock. I got into the shower and let the hot water run. Dried and dressed I still felt fuzzy around the edges; I picked up Mark's sheepskin coat and walked out into the chilly January late afternoon. Perhaps a walk would clear my head.

I trudged back along the road toward the main house, walking fast to get my circulation going. The tide had turned in the river and was going out fast, now. A cloud passed over the sun, and I noticed for the first time that it was looking like rain. This happened so often in Ireland that I hardly paid attention. I turned and started back for the cottage, hurrying to beat the weather. From a distance I heard the baying of hounds; the hunt was in full cry over the hill to my left. As I half-walked, half-ran toward the cottage the pack crested the hill, and I thought I saw the fox dart into the woods behind the cottage. The hunt was close behind. A hundred yards up the hill horses were clearing one of the many stone walls that crisscrossed the countryside that made Irish hunting so exciting and so dangerous. I could see Lord Coolmore in the lead, riding hell for leather. A few drops of rain fell, now. I hurried on.

As I approached the cottage I could see that two of the hounds had broken from the pack and were worrying something on the foreshore of the river, just in front of the cottage. A sickly odor wrinkled my nose. Things were always washing up with the tide;

once there had been a dead dog, another time, a sheep. I would have to push whatever it was back into the water or, so close to the cottage, it would stink up the place for hours until the tide came back in and floated it away. I didn't relish the job, but I jumped down from the stone wall before the cottage and walked along the foreshore, shouting at the dogs, trying to run them off. Foxhounds are not the cute little beagles non-hunting people imagine them to be. They are big, brawny animals, half-wild. I threw a stone toward them. One backed off a few feet, then resumed tearing at the carcass. It was big; a sheep, or maybe even a small cow.

I threw more stones, and this time both dogs reluctantly retreated a few yards and stood, waiting for a chance to get back at their disgusting meal. I avoided looking at the thing and cast about for a stick to move it with. The stench was awful, now. There was an old mop we had used on Toscana lying on the wall; I picked it up and started toward the carcass. Once I had it back in the water I didn't think the hounds would swim after it. Approaching the water's edge I finally had to look at it. I stopped, frozen in my tracks. It was not a sheep, not a cow. I was looking at the bloated, discolored corpse of a man, lying face down on the foreshore, its legs still in the water. The flesh of its back and an arm was torn where the dogs had been at it. Heavy raindrops splashed on its filthy skin.

I turned away and tried not to vomit but failed. When I got control of myself again, I started for the cottage; I had to call someone, but the dogs were still there. I charged them, swinging the mop, chased them until they ran into the woods toward the sound of the pack, receding into the distance. I hoisted myself up the wall, walked weakly into the cottage, found the phone directory, called the local police, and briefly told my story. They would be along shortly. I sat down heavily and put my head between my legs. As it began to clear I was struck suddenly with a thought:

who was the man? I stood up quickly. What had happened in my absence?

I walked outside and stood on the wall, forcing myself to look down at the naked corpse a few yards away. The smell seemed to be growing worse. I gagged but held on. It was not a woman, I felt sure of that, even with the awful bloating. Thank God it wasn't Annie, but ... It was difficult to determine how big or tall the man had been, since the legs were partly obscured by the water.

I've got to look at the face, I thought, I've got to go down there and turn it over. But I couldn't do it. Instead, I went back into the cottage and, trembling, dialed the number of Cork Harbour Boatyard.

"Hello?" It was Finbar's voice.

"Pinbar, it's Will." I took a deep breath.

"Is Mark there?"

"Oh, hello, Willie. No, he didn't come in today. I rang the cottage about ten thirty, but there was no answer. I haven't spoken with him since before the holiday. Where are you?"

"I'm at the cottage."

"He's not there, then?"

"No." I was beginning to think he might be.

"Well, maybe he just needed a day off. He's been putting in a lot of time, y'know."

"Yeah, okay, Finbar, I'll see you later."

"Right, Willie."

I hung up, shaking badly. Panic was creeping up on me, now.

What was I doing in this place where people didn't want us, where our work had to be guarded by people like Major Primrose? Why did one of us have to die before I knew that I shouldn't be here?

And Christ, where was Annie?

"Willie! Welcome home!"

I jerked around. Annie walked across the room, tossing a duffle onto the sofa, struggling out of her coat before coming across the room to hug me. I held onto her tightly.

"What's wrong?" she asked, taking my head in her hands. She made a face.

"And what's that awful smell?"

"Annie ..." I was having difficulty speaking.

"Annie, where's Mark?"

"Right here, old sport." He was standing in the front door, holding two bags of groceries.

I sank into a chair and tried to take some deep breaths while the two of them stood mutely and looked at me.

"Just give me a minute," I managed to say. I took some more breaths. I was curiously angry with both of them.

"Mark, why didn't you go to the yard today?"

"We decided to drive down to West Cork for New Year's. We spent a couple of nights at Castletownshend."

"Then why the hell didn't you call Finbar?"

"I tried, but the phone down there was on the blink. Anyway, Pinbar knows how to run a boatyard without me. What's going on, Willie? What's wrong?"

"There's a goddamned corpse out there on the foreshore, that's what's wrong, and I thought it was you!"

Mark turned and left the cottage, and Annie started after him.

"Hold it, Annie! Please don't go out there. Really, you don't want to." She stopped.

Mark stuck his head inside the door.

"The police arc here; you'd better come and talk with them."

I walked from the cottage to find two policemen on the foreshore, kneeling over the corpse. They were wearing yellow rain gear; it was coming down hard, now. One of them, the sergeant in charge at the little Carrigaline station, got up and came over to me.

"Mr. Lee?"

"Yes, I'm Will Lee. I called you." I told him my story.

"I

don't think it was there when I left the cottage; I would have smelled it. It must have washed up while I was out walking."

The sergeant nodded.

"I'd say you're right. They don't smell much when they're still in the water, but once they're out, they go bad very quickly. He's been in the water for a few days, I'd say."

"Do you think he was dumped around here?" Mark asked.

"Maybe, but he could have been put in the water in Carrigaline, or almost any place in Cork Harbour. The tides do some odd things, and the current in the river here is pretty stiff at times."

"About two knots at full ebb or flow," Mark said.

The sergeant turned and looked at his men, who were rolling the corpse into a plastic bag for loading onto a stretcher.

"I'd like you both to come and have a look at him; I know he's not a pretty sight, but he won't get any prettier, and I'd like to know if you recognize him."

We followed the sergeant down to the foreshore; a policeman was just zipping the bag shut. He partly unzipped it again for our benefit. Mark and I looked at the face.

"I don't know him," Mark said.

"At least, I don't think so. It's pretty hard to imagine what he looked like without the swelling."

"And you, sir?" the sergeant asked of me.

I started to say, no, I didn't recognize the man, but then my eyes drifted downward from the face and stopped.

"Just a minute," I said. I found a tin can on the wet foreshore, got some water, and splashed a little on the corpse. Some mud and weed washed away.

"Jesus Christ," Mark said quietly.

We were looking at a heart-shaped tattoo on the corpse's chest;

the initials, "M. M." were clearly visible.

"His name is Donal O'Donnell," I said to the policeman.

"One of the twins? Prom Kinsale?"

"Yes. The tattoo is the only way I could tell them apart."