The Troubles by Unknown Read Free Book Online Page A

Taggart...Rain is pelting my cheeks, cooling me to a numb, immobilized state as we wait in an underpass just a few hundred feet from the train station. The familiar aroma of earth, young grass and moist dankness is a stark contrast with the town’s foul vapor, the result of farming and recent lazy irrigation. Rain for me has a restorative nature and I usually embrace God’s baptism with reverence, as we are an island of continual cycles in the shadow of grey constellations. To not see the vitality of the perpetual evolutionary momentum is to be blind.
         We are now rudderless and exposed in this town, Newry, at the entry to the Gap of the North, which is almost on the border of the Republic of Ireland. The irony is that Lanary and I have journeyed only forty-five kilometers, with only one hundred and ten left, before having this unwanted detour. I had expected that this evening we would have been in East Dublin at Lanary’s nephew’s small flat.
         A child’s voice pitches through the pounding rhythm of the downpour. His accent thick and sweet from the isolation of country life. “Ca as duit?” he asks of us. Before I am able to respond and tell the small rain soaked boy we are from Belfast, he pelts us with another query. “Cen t-ainm at a ort?’’
         “Well lad, ya are a little forward aren’t ya.’’ Lanary directs that penetrating schoolteacher’s gaze designed to intimidate, to the young boy, who along with some meager groceries is walking his ancient looking, ill-fitting bicycle, a couple sizes too big.
         “Me name is Alastar and this old bloke behind me is Lanary,” I tell the keen, wet behind the ears, child. I kneel down slightly, allowing my intimidating height to diminish as not to appear a threat. ‘’What’s yer name laddy?’’
         “Mise is ainm dom Finn!” The lad appears to not have any outward hesitations regarding strangers and he grins a sweet, charming, tooth full smile as now we have exchanged formalities. ‘’Well faite Mr. Alastar and Mr. Lanary! Dia dhuit ar maiden!’’
         “Morning greetings to ya as well, Finn. Might ya have knowledge of the whereabouts of a pub?”
         Lanary has quite an affinity for all the polite vices as he likes tobacco and fancies a good whiskey when he needs time to ponder his next move. Finn’s grin now has a quality to it that appears as though we are amusing to him and shockingly in practiced English he begins directing us to the Railway Bar, a mere block away, at 79-81 Monaghan Street. We march our trio quickly through the drench of the lingering downpour to the sign that tells us our eager guide was stating the truth and with his task completed, the boy chirps pleasantly, “Go dte tu alan.’’
         “Safe to home now, Finn.’’ I turn toward him and wave my pale pruned hand gratefully as he nimbly jumps on the rickety bicycle and with little abandon; he splashes directly through tub-sized puddles as he disappears from the horizon in a joyous montage. 
         Lanary pushes the heavy doors of the pub wide and they buck and groan with an unoiled screech. As our ragged twosome enters the stale dank air of the Railway Bar, I immediately wish to turn around to the freshly cleaned cobblestones outside. The pub is not unique in its décor (or for what decor is usually lacking in such establishments) as the few chest height windows, which brace the front of the small sixteen by twenty foot room, are discolored with erroneous permanent stains. There are two rectangular tables placed in front of these windows and immediately to our left six barstools, most of which are missing a peg, though the patrons seem to have become accustomed to their wobbly seats. Behind them the back bar shelves display cracked glasses and tarnished amber bottles of Bushmill’s whiskey, the lighter Jameson whiskey and Lockes Blend for the hardened type and in the center, proudly standing like a flag pole is the one