Rugby Warrior by Gerard Siggins Read Free Book Online Page A

down on his bed,plugged his music into his ears and turned away from his friends.

CHAPTER 17
    E oin was annoyed after the row in the dormitory, so he decided to make his escape. He grabbed
The Complete Rugby Footballer
from his locker, and left without a word.
    He was angry with both of his friends, but knew that his position as captain meant he had to stay out of their conflict.
    He growled at a junior-school boy who got in his way as he walked out the door, and broke into a trot as he headed for the furthest, quietest corner of the school grounds. It was here, on the banks of a bubbling stream, that he had found the herb that helped him recover from injury before the final last season.
    Eoin sat down on a rock and opened up the book, scanning a paragraph or two before he realised he wasn’ttaking in anything that he had read. He needed to relax. He closed his eyes, just letting the sounds of the water wash over him on the mild autumn day. His peace was soon interrupted by a strange voice.
    ‘Hello, son, I think I recognise that book you’re reading . Where did you ever get that old thing?’ asked a man who was standing on the other bank of the tiny stream.
    Eoin looked closely at the man, who had a thick black moustache and seemed to be wearing a heavy woollen uniform.
    ‘It was in the school library. I’m doing a project on one of the authors,’ he explained.
    ‘Well, that’s very amusing.’ the man replied, ‘And is it Billy Stead you’re doing your pro-ject on?’
    ‘Eh, no, it’s the other one, Dave Gallaher,’ said Eoin, ‘Why do you ask?’
    ‘Because, little fella, standing here in front of you is Company Sergeant-Major David Gallaher of the Twenty-Second Reinforcements – reporting for duty.’
    Eoin stared, not quite sure what to say next. He already suspected he had some sort of ghost-seeing power, and wasn’t as rattled by this apparition as he would have been a year earlier.
    ‘I thought you looked a bit familiar,’ he started. ‘Are you
really
Dave Gallaher?’
    ‘Well I used to be,’ the stranger replied. ‘I suppose I’m what you’d call a ghost now … Where exactly am I? Your accent is familiar, but you’re definitely not from Belgium.’
    ‘No, you’re in Ireland. This is a boarding school called Castlerock College. It’s in Dublin.’
    ‘Ireland? Wow, that’s a long way from Ponsonby. I was born in Donegal, you know, a little place called Ramelton . Don’t remember it at all, I’m afraid. I remember the long journey to New Zealand, but nothing of my time in old Ireland. My mother left my baby brother behind, you know. He was ailing and she knew he wouldn’t survive the voyage. He died about a year later I think. My poor mother was brokenhearted when she got that letter.’
    Eoin stared as the spectre sat down on another boulder on the far side of the stream.
    ‘How did you end up here?’ Eoin asked.
    ‘Who knows,’ said Dave. ‘I’ve had a very contented existence since a German shell blew me into eternity back in ’17. I wandered the former battlefields of Europe for a while, meeting too many old buddies, and I’ve popped up here and there at rugby grounds when I got a hankering after the great game. But this is the first time I’ve been back in Ireland. It doesn’t seem to havechanged that much …’
    ‘Well, you haven’t really seen an awful lot of it here hiding in the woods in the corner of the school grounds. You won’t recognise much, I’d say,’ said Eoin.
    ‘Do they still play rugby here?’ the former All Black asked. ‘I came over here with the New Zealanders in 1905, 1906, but I had an injured leg and missed the test match. One of my ambitions was to play in my native land, but I was crook so it never happened. I spent most of my time here in bed in the hotel; very disappointed, I was.
    ‘They played in a place called Lansdowne Road if I remember. Is that still there?’
    ‘Well, we certainly
do
play rugby,’ explained Eoin. ‘The old