A Star Called Henry by Roddy Doyle

Author:Roddy Doyle
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Penguin USA, Inc.

—Fergus Nash?

I turned away from Paddy Clare’s counter but I brought my bottle with me, in case I needed a club. I had a chisel in my pocket but I didn’t want to go for it.

—Your name is Fergus Nash?

—Yeah.

He was like the rest of us, in a coal-covered jacket and trousers. His cap was off and I could tell from his forehead that he’d washed himself quite recently. He had a half-gone pint in one hand and the other was in his jacket pocket. I’d never seen him before.

—I knew you when you were Henry Smart.

He spoke softly. The accent wasn’t quite right. I studied his face again, looked behind the dirt. Nothing came back; I still didn’t know him.

—You’ve got the wrong man, pal, I said.

—No, he said.—I don’t think so.

He was nervous but sure of himself. He looked straight at me like someone who had other men to back him up. I looked past him, but I knew all the others, and none of them were with him. I fit there; he didn’t. He was by himself, although Paddy Clare’s could have been surrounded by uniformed rozzers and the more dangerous men from Dublin Castle, outside waiting for the signal to roar in and take me. I was in trouble. He was a G-man, I decided, a detective from the Castle, but the decision didn’t bring recognition. He wasn’t one of the bastards who’d stared at us over the shoulders and heads of the soldiers as they rounded us up and marched us off to Richmond Barracks the day after Pearse had surrendered. I’d never seen him at any of the roll-calls in the days after, when they’d taken away the leaders and shot them. And back before that, before the Rising, he wasn’t one of the ones who’d hung around outside Liberty Hall, trying desperately to blend in with the railings. I didn’t know him at all.

—Who are you? I said.

—Dalton.

I still didn’t know him. But I was changing my mind about him. He edged a tiny bit closer to me. I stayed put.

—Jack Dalton, he said.—I was there the day you dived down the manhole. And that, man, is one day I’ll never forget.

He held out his hand, and I took it. I felt the softness in his fingers under the blisters and cracks; real dockers’ hands were always hard and smooth, like worked mahogany, from years of rubbing the shovel. I let go of his hand when I saw the pain slip across his eyes.

—I’ve been away for a while, he said.—A hotel across the water.

—And now you’re back.

—That’s right, he said.—Will we go somewhere else?

—Fair enough.

And that was how I found my way back in. Jack Dalton had been in the College of Surgeons in Easter Week, with Michael Mallin and the Countess. He’d spent the time since then in Frongoch and Lewes, until two weeks before I met him. He’d joined the Volunteers - F Company of the First Battalion - before he had a job or a roof over his head, two hours after he got off the boat from Liverpool.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.