The Deportees (17 page)

It was dark outside, and dark too in the room. Alina stood up.

—But the story, said Ocean.

Alina went to the door and walked behind the pram. She pushed it slowly towards the girls. She let them see it grow out of the dark, like a whale rising from a black sea. She let them hear it creak and purr. She heard them shuffle backwards on their bottoms. Then she stopped. She stepped back to the door, and turned on the light.

She saw the girls squinting, looking at her from around the front of the pram.

—Tomorrow I will continue, said Alina.

They followed her into the kitchen. They stayed with her as she peeled the potatoes and carrots. They offered to help her. They washed and shook each lettuce leaf. They talked to fill the silence.

Alina left them in the kitchen, but they were right behind her. She went back to the sitting room, and stopped.

The pram had been moved. She had left it in the centre of the room, where the little girls had been sitting. But now it was at the window. The curtain was resting on the hood.

Alina heard the girls behind her.

—Did you move the pram? she asked.

—No, said Saibhreas.

—We've been with you all the time, said Ocean.

Alina walked over to the pram. She wasn't so very concerned about its mysterious change of position. In fact, she thought, it added to the drama of the interrupted story. The little girls lingered at the door. They would not enter the room.

Alina picked up the baby from the pram's warm bed. He still slept. O'Reilly would be annoyed.

—I pay you to keep him awake, she'd told Alina, once. —In this country, Alina, the babies sleep at night. Because the mummies have to get up in the morning to work, to pay the bloody childminders.

Alina walked out to the hall. She heard the car outside; she heard the change of gear. She saw the car lights push the colours from the stained-glass windows, across the ceiling. She felt the baby shift. She looked down, and saw him watch the coloured lights above him.

—Intelligent boy.

The engine stopped; the car lights died. Alina turned on the hall light. The little girls were right beside her.

—Your mother, I think, said Alina.

—Our dad, actually, said Ocean.

—How do you know this? Alina asked.

—Their Beemers, said Ocean. —Mum's Roadster has a quieter engine.

—It's the ultimate driving machine, said Saibhreas.

The lights were on, their daddy was home, and the little girls were no longer frightened. But Alina was satisfied. The lights could be turned off, and their fear could be turned back on – any time she wished to flick the switch.

She walked the next morning and thought about her story. She pushed the pram past the shelter and hoped to see her handsome biochemist. He was not there. She pushed into the wind and rain. Seawater jumped over the wall and drenched the promenade in front of her. She turned back; she could not go her usual, mandatory distance. She felt eyes stare – she felt their heat – watching her approach. But there was no one in front of her, and nothing. She was alone. She looked into the pram, but the baby slept. His eyes were firmly closed.

The little girls had their hair wrapped in towels when Alina continued her story that afternoon. They'd had showers when they came home from school, because they'd been so cold and wet.

Alina closed the curtains. She turned on only one small side-light.

The baby slept in the pram, beside Alina's chair.

—And so, said Alina.

She sat.

The little girls were at her feet, almost under the pram.

—Did the old witch come to Ireland? Ocean asked.

Alina nodded.

—To Dublin, she said.

—There are no forests in Dublin, Alina, said Saibhreas.

—There are many parks, said Alina.

—What park?

Alina held up her hands.

—I must continue.

—Sorry, Alina.

Alina measured the silence, then spoke.

—Soon, she said, —the squeak of the pram's wheels became a familiar and terrifying sound late at night as the old lady pushed it through the streets of this city. It was a very old pram, and rusty. And so it creaked and—

Beside them, the pram moved. It did not creak but it moved, very slightly.

The girls jumped.

Alina had not touched it.

The baby was waking. They heard a little cry.

Alina laughed.

—Strong boy, she said. —It was your brother.

Ocean stood up.

—Maybe O'Reilly's right, she said.

—Yes, said Saibhreas.

She crawled away from the pram.

—What did O'Reilly say? Alina asked.

—She said the pram was haunted.

Inside the pram, the baby began to howl.

Alina stared at the pram while, inside, the baby kicked and screeched.

—Aren't you going to pick him up? said Ocean.

—Of course, said Alina.

But, yet, she did not move. It was as if she'd woken up in a slightly different room. The angles weren't quite right. The baby's screech was wrong.

She stood up. She approached the rocking pram. The movement did her good. The room was just a room.

She looked into the pram. The baby was there, exactly as he should have been. He was angry, red, and rightly so. She had been silly; the little girls had frightened her.

She turned on the light and the pram was just a pram.

—The pram moved today, said Saibhreas.

She said this later, in the kitchen.

—I should hope so, said O'Reilly. —It's supposed to bloody move. I pay a Polish
cailίn
to move it.

Alina blushed; her rage pushed at her skin. She hated this crude woman.

—It moved all by itself, said Ocean.

Alina stared down at her chicken. She felt something, under the table, brush against her leg. Mr O'Reilly's foot. He sat opposite Alina.

—Sorry, he said.

—Down, Fido, said O'Reilly.

She looked at Alina.

—Lock your door tonight, sweetie.

—I do not have a key, said Alina.

—Interesting, said O'Reilly. —What happened the pram?

—The baby cried, said Alina. —And so, the pram moved some centimetres.

—And why, asked O'Reilly, —did Cillian cry?

—O'Reilly? said Ocean.

—What?

—The pram moved before Cillian cried.

—Yes, said Saibhreas. —It's haunted, like you said.

Alina sat as the little girls told their mother about the wicked old lady and her pram full of kidnapped babies, and how the wicked old lady had pushed the pram all the way to Ireland.

—Enough, already, said O'Reilly.

She turned to Alina.

—That's some hardcore story-telling, Alina.

—She takes the skin off the babies, said Ocean.

—Who does? said O'Reilly. —Alina?

—No, said Saibhreas. —The old woman.

—My my, said O'Reilly. —And look at the fair Alina's skin. How red can red get?

Alina stared at the cold chicken on her plate. She felt the shock – O'Reilly's fingers on her cheek.

—Hot, said O'Reilly.

The little girls laughed.

—We'd better call a halt to the story, Alina, said O'Reilly. —It's getting under your skin.

The little girls laughed again.

The following morning, Alina pushed the pram along the promenade. She had not slept well. She had not slept at all. O'Reilly's fingers, Mr O'Reilly's foot – Alina had felt their presence all round her. She'd got up and torn a piece of paper from a notebook. She'd chewed the paper. Then she'd pushed the pulp into the keyhole of her bedroom door. She'd lain awake all night.

She walked. The wind was strong and pushed against the pram. It woke her up; it seemed to wash her skin. It was a warm wind. Gloves weren't necessary. But Alina wore her gloves.

The pram was haunted. O'Reilly had said so; she'd told her little daughters. Alina did not believe it. She knew her folklore. Prams did not haunt, and were never haunted. And yet, she did not wish to touch the pram. She did not want to see it move before her fingers reached it. She'd put on her gloves inside the house, before she'd lowered the baby into the pram. She did not want to touch it. Not even out here, in bright sunshine, away from walls and shadows.

The pram was not possessed. A dead rat could not bite, but Alina would wear gloves to pick one up. That was how it was with the pram. Today, it was a dead rat. Tomorrow, it would simply be a pram.

She took off one of her gloves. She stopped walking. The pram stayed still. Alina put her bare fingers on the handle. She waited. Nothing happened. She felt the wind rock the pram on its springs. But the pram did not move backwards or forwards.

She removed her other glove. She pushed the pram. She pushed it to the wooden bridge, and back. She would continue her story that afternoon, despite O'Reilly's command. She would plant the most appalling nightmares and leave the little imps in the hands of their foul mother.

And then she would leave.

She pushed the pram with her bare hands. But, all the time, and all the way, she felt she was being watched. She put the gloves back on. She was watched. She felt it – she
knew
it – on her face and neck, like damp fingers.

—One night, Alina said that afternoon, —the old lady left her lair in the park and made her way to a tree-lined street.

—Our street has trees, said Ocean.

Outside, the wind cracked a branch. The little girls moved closer to Alina.

Alina looked down at the little girls.

—The old lady crept along the tree-lined street, she said. —She hid behind the very expensive cars. The SUVs. This is what they are called?

The little girls nodded.

—And the Volvos, said Alina. —And – the Beemers.

Alina watched the little girls look at each other.

—She looked through windows where the velvet curtains had not yet been drawn.

Alina watched the girls look at the window. She had left the velvet curtains open.

She heard the gasp, and the scream.

—The curtains!

—I saw her!

Alina did not look. She leaned down and placed her hands beneath the little girls' chins.

—Through one such window, said Alina, —the old lady saw a bargain.

Alina held the chins. She forced the girls to look at her. She stretched her leg – she had earlier measured the distance from foot to pram – and raised her foot to the wheel.

—She saw
two
girls.

They heard the creak.

The little girls screamed. And so did Alina. She had not touched the wheel. The pram had moved before her foot had reached it.

Alina almost vomited. She felt the pancakes, the
nalesniki
she had earlier made and eaten, and the sour cream; she could taste them as they rushed up to her throat. Her eyes watered. She felt snails of cold sweat on her forehead. The little girls screamed. And Alina held their chins. She tightened her grip. She felt bone and shifting tongues. She could feel their screams in her hands. And the pram continued to move. Slowly, slowly, off the rug, across the wooden floor.

Alina held the faces.

—Two little girls, she said. —And, such was her wicked joy, she did not wait until they slept.

The pram crept on. It rolled nearer to the window. She heard the baby. She watched his waking rock the pram.

—The old lady found an open window, said Alina.

The baby screeched. And then other babies screeched. There was more than one baby in the pram.

The girls screamed, and urinated. And, still, Alina told her story.

—Through the window she slid. And through the house she sneaked.

The pram was at the window. The screeching shook the window glass.

—She found the girls quite easily.

The girls were squirming, trying to free their jaws from Alina's big fingers, and trying to escape from the wet rug beneath them. But Alina held them firm. She ignored their fingernails on her neck and cheeks.

—She had her sharp knife with her, said Alina. —She would cut the little girls. And she would take their skin, while their mother neglected them. Far, far away, in her Beemer.

But their mother wasn't far, far away in her Beemer. She was at the door, looking at her daughters and Alina.

—Hell-oh! she roared. —HELL-oh!

The pram stopped rocking. The little girls stopped screaming. And Alina stopped narrating.

O'Reilly stepped into the room. She turned on the light.

—She frightened us, said Ocean.

The girls escaped from Alina's grip. They shuffled backwards, off the rug.

—She hurt us, Mummy.

—We don't like her.

Alina took her hands down from her face. There was blood on her fingertips. She could feel the scratches, on her cheeks and neck.

She looked up.

The girls were gone; she could hear them on the stairs. She was alone with O'Reilly and the screaming baby. O'Reilly held the baby and made soft, soothing noises. She rocked the baby gently and walked in a small circle around the rug. The baby's screams soon lessened, and ceased. O'Reilly continued to make soft noises, and it was some time before Alina realised that, amid the kisses and whispers, O'Reilly was giving out to her.

—My fucking rug, she cooed. —Have you any idea how much it cost? There, there, good boy.

—I am sorry, said Alina.

—What the fuck were you doing, Alina?

Alina looked at the pram. It was against the wall, beside the window. It was not moving.

—The pram is haunted, said Alina.

—It's haunted because I said it's haunted, said O'Reilly. —I told the girls the bloody thing was haunted, to keep them away from the baby when he was born.

—But it
is
haunted, said Alina. —It has nothing to do with the lies you told your daughters.

—Excuse me?

—I saw it move, said Alina. —Here.

She stamped her foot. She stood up.

—Here, she said. —I saw. And I heard. More babies.

—Jesus, said O'Reilly. —The sooner you find a peasant or something to knock you up the better.

—I felt their eyes, said Alina.

—Enough, said O'Reilly.

—Many times, said Alina, —I have felt their eyes. I know now. There are babies in the pram.

—Look at me, Alina, said O'Reilly.

Alina looked.

—Are you listening? said O'Reilly.

—Yes, said Alina.

—You're sacked.