excerpt
‘Whatever. Who knows what’s true and what isn’t? But you know Flynn Casey. Always the rebel Republican. Loyal follower of James Connolly, his hero. His socialism got him involved with the IRA in strikes in Belfast in the Thirties. In fact he was shot in the leg during a march in the Lower Falls area that led to clashes with the police. Three years ago he was interned in Crumlin Road jail after that IRA campaign of protest against the arrival of the American forces.’
‘I remember that,’ said Seamus. ‘De Valera considered the arrival of the Americans an intrusion on Irish territory. And he was born in America himself. New York, if I remember rightly. And his father was Spanish. What a mad world we live in, Caitlin.’
‘Let’s hope the real madness is over now, Seamus.’
‘Amen to that. So what’s Flynn doing in Belfast? Apart from stirring up trouble.’
‘He’s managing a pub on the Falls Road, though he longs to be back in his Drumard hills. But he has Dermot in Belfast, and a grandson, if you can picture Flynn Casey as a grandfather.’
‘Happens to most of us,’ Slattery declared. ‘A grandson’ll keep him anchored in Belfast.’
‘Dermot married the youngest Sweeney girl, didn’t he?’ Michael said, without taking his eyes off the dancers.
‘And carried her off to the big city,’ Seamus replied. ‘They’re very happy there, so I’m told. Dermot has his own business as an electrician.’ Seamus paused momentarily. ‘Now there’s another good man gone. Ignatius Sweeney. Got out of bed one morning and dropped dead. And he hadn’t a grey hair in his head when he died. Still that short hair that stood straight up on his head. What your father described as the unravelled end of a rope. Good old Ignatius. I think he ate himself to death.’
‘That’s a terrible thing to say, Seamus Slattery,’ Caitlin chided.
‘Oh you know I didn’t mean it. A poor joke, Caitlin, and I shouldn’t have said it. Though old Ignatius might have enjoyed it. Violet, of course, went to Belfast to live with Dermot and Maire after Ignatius died, but I hear her health is not too good.’
‘I don’t think she ever got over Ignatius’s death,’ Caitlin said. ‘It was so sudden and unexpected.’
‘And Joe Carney’s another one,’ Seamus continued in his vein of In Memoriam. ‘His heart let him down. And young Joe. Joe-Joe we used to call him. Remember?’ Seamus leaned forward. ‘Remember the day you pulled him out of the harbour, Michael?’
Manolis Aligizakis 