Hidden River (Five Star Paperback) by Adrian McKinty Read Free Book Online Page B

priest says.
    It belatedly dawns on me. This is a Christian burial. She was a Christian. All that Hindu mythology had been what? A pose? An embrace of the exotic in dyadic, sectarian Ulster.
    Oh, Victoria. We are so similar. Can you not see, you there, the rain hammering off your coffin top, your brothers stumbling on the earth. We are so alike. You, the third child, the last born, the youngest. You and I, both of ancient peoples, alien here in this atavistic god-intoxicated land. You and I, the punch line of a joke. We both have failed. You are dead and I am a specter of a man. I look away. Down from the Knockagh, the forest and the beginnings of the town.
    Stand still and gaze anywhere but the fourth row.
    The cemetery is pitched on the high ground above the main body of Carrickfergus. Winds coming down from the Antrim Plateau and up from the lough. John complains about the rain and he and Facey move discreetly toward the lone tree.
    “We commend to Almighty God our daughter,” the priest must be saying. “Ashes to ashes.” And they try to lower the coffin but the rainwater has caved in earth on either side of the grave, and it won’t go down. Mr. Patawasti asks them to try again. They attempt it three more times but she will not go.
    I remember that. Stubborn, proud, the only dark-skinned girl in a school of six hundred. Captain of the debate and field hockey teams.
    Everyone is getting soaked. Mr. Patawasti says that that’s enough. He walks off with his two sons and the uncle and my da and other members of the disbanded cricket club. Great solace you will be, Da. Don’t think I didn’t see you sneak on your yarmulke. Hypocrite. Did you say Kaddish that previous burial? Did you convince us that she would live again, somehow? Did you offer us one ounce of comfort? “Your mother’s gone for good, but her memory lives inside of us.” I needed more than that, you bastard. They walk right past me. And oh God, Mr. Patawasti is coming right over with Da. I back up against a gravestone. I want to run. He opens his mouth to say something but he doesn’t. His face is torn apart, his eyes vacant. The skull showing beneath the skin. He looks like the subject of the funeral, not one of the mourners. It’s horrific. He stares at me for a second and then the party moves on. Dad looks at me and nods.
    They make their way back to the cars. I stand in the shelter of the tree, shaking, waiting for the weather to break. The gravediggers leave, the cemetery keeper leaves. The coffin sits there by the grave, rain pattering on the name plaque and the memories. I walk over. The wreaths, a dozen or more. The biggest one from America: “From all at CAW, fond memories of a wonderful person—Charles, Amber, and Robert Mulholland.”
    I look down the pale lough. I can imagine the Viking boats, like this coffin, shaped from pine or spruce. A boat carved from pine dissolving into the bog of the next world.
    “Come on,” John says, “we might as well make a dash for the car, this is going to be on all day.”
    “What is?”
    “The rain.”
    “We’ll go to the pub,” Facey says.
    Go to the car, like a sleepwalker. Get in, drive to Carrick. John talking to Facey in the front. Someone has bought the Triumph brand name, will be making them, again. Motorcycles. Nonsense. John, Facey, why can’t you see the ocean of pain around you? Tribulation falling from the skies. Did you ever read the Venerable Bede? Of course not. Life is like a bird at night, flying into a great hall full of feasting, behind is darkness, ahead is darkness, the journey through the wonder, brief, bewildering, awful, done.
    “We’re here,” Facey says, takes the keys from the ignition, turns around, grins, “we’re here.” Aye…
    The fire in Dolan’s was lit and I stood there drying out my wet funeral-and-interview suit. A cold, nasty day but the fire helped a lot. I dried off and got some crisps from the bar. John supplied the information about the