Free The Crow of Connemara by Stephen Leigh Page A

agreed. His arm was around Keara’s waist. “They do’nah even stop the clocks, turn the mirrors, or open a window when one of their own passes, or if they do, it’s for the show of it. They send the body to the undertaker immediately rather than have it properly washed and prepared and left at home for the wake. They use their damned vehicles to carry the body instead of carrying it themselves.”
    â€œPiss on the feckin’ leamh,” Niall grunted. “Just like they piss on us.”
    â€œNiall . . .” Keara began, but Niall scowled at her, slicing through her reply with a hand through the air.
    â€œNah,” he said. “Yeh need nah say a t’ing. The Old Ones were right to abandon this world an’ go through to Talamh an Ghlas when they did. I only wish my ancestor woulda had the sense then to follow ’em.” Maeve saw his glance go accusingly toward her.
    â€œWe’ll follow soon enough,” she told them. Niall started to protest, but Aiden nudged him in the side with an elbow, shaking his head.
    â€œLet’s get what we need done here and get back to the island,” Aiden said.
    â€œAgreed,” Maeve answered. “I’ll leave the three of yeh to get the supplies we need; I’ll go talk to the garda about their little letter. Keara, please make sure everyone else stays out of trouble.”
    Across the street, the mourners had filed in behind the casket and the doors to the church had closed behind them. Faintly, they could hear an organ’s asthmatic wheeze and warbling voices plodding through a song. “G’wan,” Maeve said. “I’ll meet yeh all back at the boat in an hour or two.”

    The garda station was on Galway Road. Maeve walked across Bridge Street and onto Low Road, then followed the curve until it met Galway Road—the station was down to the right, another ten-minute walk away: an unimposing, brick-faced edifice with an array of silver cars emblazoned with fluorescent blue and yellow parked in front and a placard proclaiming
An Garda Síochána
in front. A pair of uniformed gardai held the door open for Maeve, then walked out toward the cruisers as Maeve went to the sergeant at the front desk. “I’m here to see Superintendent Dunn.”
    The sergeant glanced up from the papers in front of him. A finger the size of a sausage tapped the paper as if the sheets were likely to escape if ignored. His florid, heavy gaze traveled from her face, down her body, and back again. He smiled with his mouth, but the folds around his eyes were untouched. “Yeh are now, are yeh? Well, who should I tell him has come calling?”
    â€œMaeve Gallagher, from Inishcorr. I’ve come about the notice that was delivered to us two days ago.”
    Thick eyebrows raised slightly. He picked up a phone handset from his desk and pressed a button on it while still looking at Maeve. “Superintendent, I have one of the Oileánach here who wants to see yeh. Maeve Gallagher.” Maeve could hear the faint scratch of a reply from the phone, and the sergeant nodded. “I’ll send her in, then.” He replaced the phone on its cradle and pointed to a hallway to his left. “Down there, missus. Third door on yer left.”
    Maeve nodded to him and followed where he’d pointed.
Superintendent Cedric Dunn
was painted in black letters on the frosted glass of the third door in plain block letters. She knocked on the glass once, and a voice boomed, “Come in” from the room beyond. Maeve twisted the door handle and pushed the door open.
    Cedric Dunn had the build of a former athlete who had seen the inside of a gym only infrequently in the last decade. He rose from his chair as Maeve entered the office. His suit had been tailored for a body twenty pounds lighter; his pants fit tightly under a small shelf of stomach. But the torso was still muscular and retained the general v-shape