excerpt
“You gave him a good one, Clifford. Finn would have approved.”
Slattery joined Michael and Clifford on the road as they turned to walk to the MacLir house. They crossed the bridge over the Shannagh River that separated the parishes of Aughnashannagh and Corrymore. “A good speech, young Clifford,” Slattery said generously.
“Thank you, Seamus. But I think I could have done better.”
Slattery ignored Clifford’s modesty. “So there he lies,” he said, changing the subject. “Finn MacLir, dead and buried. Within sight of the hills and the sea. Who could wish for more? Certainly not Finn.”
“He’ll be very much at home there, won’t he?” said Sweeney who was walking in step behind the other three. “Reunited with his Roisin.”
“Throw in a cask of wine,” Slattery declared, “and he wouldn’t want to move till Judgement Day.”
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Back at the house the women were buttering bread and bannock, slicing loaves and ham and roast beef and cheese and making sandwiches. A large, black kettle on the cooking range boiled with jiggling lid and hissing splash of water. Caitlin moved the kettle away from the fire to a cooler part of the range. Her cheek still bore a slight discoloration from Michael’s belt buckle. She told those who noticed it that she had bumped into the henhouse door.
Nora came in from the sitting room. “There’s a dozen in there now,” she announced, “and I see more coming up the road.”
“I suppose there’ll be twenty or thirty before the hour’s out,” Caitlin said. “They’ll devour a mountain of food.”
Mother Ross came into the kitchen. “I don’t like it,” she said, half to herself.
“You don’t like what, Mother Ross?” Caitlin asked.
“I don’t like that crowd out there in the sitting room. They’re not talking the way they used to when Finn was here.”
“What way are they talking?” asked Una Slattery. Her tall, thin body was bent like an angle-bracket as she took two loaves of bread out of the oven and tapped them to make sure they were done. She closed the oven door and carried the hot loaves to the table.
“They’re talking politics,” said Mother Ross.
“Didn’t they talk politics at Finn’s parties?” Violet Sweeney asked.
Libros Libertad 