Free The Angel by Carla Neggers

delivering them to a knot of men gathered in a semicircle of spindly chairs in front of a small television. She’d learned they were local farmers and fishermen who’d known each other all their lives. They’d arrived at the pub one by one over the past hour to watch a hurling match and argue good-naturedly among themselves. If they’d been arguing about fairies, magic, ancient rituals and ancient stories told by the fire—
    that, Keira thought, would have compelled her to eaves
    drop, perhaps even to join them. She didn’t know much about hurling, except that it was fast, rough and immensely popular with Eddie O’Shea and his friends. She’d had dinner at the pub last night, too. She’d hit it
    THE ANGEL
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    off with Eddie right away. Nonetheless, she was keenly aware that the locals were beginning to construct a story about her and her presence in their village. She supposed she’d helped by dropping an odd tidbit here and there—
    not fiction so much as not the whole truth. She’d never once lied to any of them.
    They believed she’d come to Ireland in the typical IrishAmerican search for her roots and herself, and she supposed, in a way, she had.
    She left a few euros on the wooden bar and took her coffee with her as she stepped outside into what was, truly, one of the finer evenings of this and her two previous visits to Ireland. A good beginning to her stay, she thought. She could feel her jet lag easing, the tension of her last hours in Boston finally losing its grip on her. A man in a threadbare tweed jacket, wool pants, an Irish wool cap and mud-encrusted wellies sat at a picnic table next to the pub’s entrance. He faced the street, smoking a cigarette. He looked up at Keira with eyes as clear and true a blue as she’d ever seen. His skin was weather-beaten, laced with deep wrinkles. He had short, straight gray hair. He could have been sixty or eighty—or a hundred-and-eighty, she thought. He had a timeless quality to him.
    He said something in Irish that didn’t include one of the fifty or so words she knew. Her mother spoke Irish—or used to. “I’m sorry—”
    “Enjoy your walk, Keira Sullivan.” He blew out a cloud of cigarette smoke and gave just the slightest of smiles. “I know you. Ah, yes. I know you well.”
    She was so stunned, she jumped back, stumbling and nearly spilling coffee down her front.
    When she righted herself, coffee intact, the man was gone. 74
    CARLA NEGGERS
    Where had he slipped off to so fast?
    Keira peered up the quiet, narrow village street, lined with brightly colored stucco houses. The vivid blue, fuchsia, green, yellow and red could light up even the gloomiest Irish weather. Baskets of lavender and dark pink geraniums hung from lampposts. A few cars were parked along the sides of the road, but there was no traffic. Except for a single dog barking toward the water and the occa
    sional hoots from the men in the pub, the street was quiet. Keira debated going back into the pub to see if the man was there, or asking Eddie O’Shea if he’d seen him, but as much as she and Eddie had hit it off, she’d known him less than two days and didn’t want to stir up any further gossip. Maybe the mysterious man had overindulged in Guinness and was staggering up a nearby lane, or he lived in one of the houses on the main street and simply had gone home. Maybe he’d decided to have a little fun with the American tourist.
    She couldn’t read anything into what the man—a perfect stranger—had said.
    Keira took his spot at the picnic table, and as she sipped her coffee, lukewarm now, she noticed there wasn’t even a hint of cigarette smoke in the pleasant evening air. After she left the pub, Keira shoved her hands into the pockets of a traditional Irish wool knit sweater she’d bought in Kenmare, a pretty village famous for its shops and restaurants. It was located farther up Kenmare Bay, which separated the Beara and the Iveragh peninsulas, two of the five fingers of