Faithful Place Read Online Free PDF Page A

eyed me up and down. “Could you not be bothered putting on a decent shirt, even?”
    I said, “Howya, Ma.”
    “Mammy, not Ma. The state of you. The neighbors’ll think I raised a homeless.”
    Somewhere along the way I swapped the army parka for a brown leather jacket, but apart from that I still have much the same fashion sense I left home with. If I’d worn a suit, she would have given me hassle for having notions of myself. With my ma you don’t expect to win. “Jackie sounded like it was urgent,” I said. “Howya, Da.”
    Da was looking better than I’d expected. Back in the day, I was the one who took after him—same thick brown hair, same rough-edged features—but the resemblance had faded a lot along the way, which was nice. He was starting to turn into an old fella—white hair, trousers up above his ankles—but he still had enough muscle that you’d think twice before taking him on. He looked stone cold sober, although with him you never could tell till it was too late. “Nice of you to honor us,” he said. His voice was deeper and hoarser; too many Camels. “You’ve still got a neck like a jockey’s bollix.”
    “So they keep telling me. Howya, Carmel. Kev. Shay.”
    Shay didn’t bother to answer. “Francis,” Kevin said. He was staring at me like I was a ghost. He’d turned into a big guy, fair and solid and good-looking; bigger than me. “Jaysus.”
    “Language,” Ma snapped.
    “You’re looking very well,” Carmel informed me, predictably. If the Risen Lord appeared to Carmel one morning, she’d tell him he was looking very well. Her arse was in fact pretty high-impact, and she had developed a genteel meet-my-sinuses accent that didn’t surprise me one bit. Things around here were more like they used to be than they ever had been. “Thanks very much,” I said. “So are you.”
    “Come here, you,” Jackie said to me. Jackie has complicated peroxide hair and she dresses like something out of a Tom Waits diner; that day she was wearing white pedal pushers and a red polka-dot top with ruffles in bewildering places. “Sit down there and have a cup of tea. I’ll get another cup.” She got up and headed for the kitchen, giving me an encouraging little wink and a pinch on her way.
    “I’m grand,” I said, stopping her. The thought of sitting next to Ma made the hair go up on the back of my neck. “Let’s have a look at this famous suitcase.”
    “Where’s your rush?” Ma demanded. “Sit down there.”
    “Business before pleasure. Where’s the case?”
    Shay nodded to the floor at his feet. “All yours,” he said. Jackie sat down again with a thump. I picked my way around the coffee table and the sofa and the chairs, under all those eyes.
    The suitcase was by the window. It was a pale-blue thing with rounded corners, spotted over with big patches of black mold, and it was a crack open; someone had forced the pathetic tin locks. What got to me was how small it was. Olivia used to pack just about everything we owned, including the electric kettle, for a weekend away. Rosie had been heading for a whole new life with something she could carry one-handed.
    I asked, “Who’s touched this?”
    Shay laughed, a hard sound at the back of his throat. “Jaysus, lads, it’s Columbo. Are you going to take our fingerprints?”
    Shay is dark and wiry and restless, and I’d forgotten what it was like, getting too near him. It’s like standing next to a power line; it makes you edgy all over. He had sharp fierce grooves going from nose to mouth, these days, and between his eyebrows. “Only if you ask me nicely,” I said. “Did you all touch it?”
    “I wouldn’t go near it,” Carmel said promptly, doing a little shudder. “The dirt of it.” I caught Kevin’s eye. For a second it was like I’d never been away.
    “Me and your da tried opening it,” Ma said, “only it was locked, so I called Shay down and I got him to take a screwdriver to it. We’d no choice, sure;