‘I can’t do that. My mother wants you to stay.’
‘Speak to her!’ she implored, touching the sleeve of his jumper.
He sighed. ‘I have. I’ve told her we should let you go home.’
‘And?’
‘She’s scared you’ll go to the guards.’
Patricia felt so stupid. She had been so fixated on trying to leave and get back to Buncarragh, it had never crossed her mind that what was going on here was a crime. She could just phone the police. Her heart was beating faster. Something in her face must have betrayed what she was thinking, because Edward grabbed her arm and stared into her eyes.
‘You wouldn’t, would you? You’d never go to the guards?’ He tightened his grip.
‘You’re hurting me,’ she said, trying to squirm free.
‘It would finish her. She … please, I will sort this out. Please, if you can just be patient, I will get you out of here. She has been through so much and she just wanted this so badly. I’m sorry that it had to be like this.’ He dropped her arm and picked at the candlewick bedspread nervously.
‘Your mother is mental, Edward, she’s the one that needs locking up. She should be in a home!’
‘You don’t understand. She has been through so much.’
‘What? What has she been through?’ Patricia spat the words out. Angry and impatient.
‘She changed,’ Edward said quietly. He looked down at his hands as if they belonged to someone else. ‘After James. After he died.’
For a moment Patricia was silenced. She could imagine how losing a child could destroy a mother.
‘How old was he?’ she asked quietly.
‘Seventeen,’ Edward replied in barely more than a whisper.
‘What happened?’
He didn’t speak, just examined the folds in the covers.
‘You don’t have to tell me,’ she added softly.
‘No. I … I should tell you. You ought to know.’
Edward wondered how to begin his story. Should he start after the two boys had finished milking, when they had stood in the yard, James hosing off his wellington boots? He could tell her that it was a beautiful summer’s evening, the air still for once, and the sound of contented cows wafting lazily to them over the warm dusty fields. It was James who had suggested they take the boat out. Someone had told him that the mackerel were running and they still had a couple of hours of daylight. Of course Edward was going to agree. He was barely fourteen at the time and, having spent so much time alone on the farm, struggled to find his place amongst the packs of boys that roamed his school. James was more than just his big brother. He was his best, and only, friend. His hero, the man he wanted to become but doubted he ever would. James could control the herd with a few shouts, he was able to talk to girls, and their mother didn’t yell at him or tell him what to do. Edward would never have admitted it to a living soul, but he preferred life without their father.
Maybe his tale should begin a couple of hours later as night was creeping up on them and the wind suddenly returned, whipping up the grey ocean, slapping their little wooden rowing boat with growing force. Edward was the one who said they should head back and he hadn’t been able to disguise the fear in his voice. That was why James had stood up and started rocking the small boat from side to side. He had been laughing and teasing his younger brother. Edward had begged him to sit down but that only provoked James to rock the boat more violently.
He remembered he had reached up and touched James’s jumper. Had he pulled it? Had he tugged it? He could still feel the damp wool against his fingers. Edward had just wanted his brother to sit down. That was all. He had never wished him any harm.
What happened next was like a magic trick, or when the film skipped at the cinema in Clonteer. James just disappeared. Where his man-shaped outline had been visible against the darkening sky was suddenly clear. His brother was gone. Vanished. He remembered looking over the side but the choppy waves held on to their secrets. Had James jumped in to frighten him? Surely, he’d bob up to the surface in a moment, laughing and spluttering. He must be down there holding his breath. The seconds passed and became minutes and a horrified Edward had to accept that his brother was not coming back to the surface. He peered into the dark waves on either side but could see nothing. He wanted to jump in and slip through the waves like an oily seal till he found his brother but Edward couldn’t swim. That was partly why James had been trying to frighten him. He peered into the distance, trying to see if his brother’s dark-haired head had surfaced somewhere, but there was nothing. Edward felt sick and dizzy with panic. Where was James? He couldn’t be gone. James had to be alive, he had to be, but where? He called out his brother’s name, screamed it, but he knew that his voice wouldn’t carry to where his brother could hear his cries.