The Lake. Sheena Lambert

it would be Peggy working here alone now most days? Not for the first time, she tried to imagine her father’s reaction to the situation. He would certainly have been surprised. He would have expected Peggy to be working in one of the hotels in Galway or Dublin by now, maybe even assistant manager of one of the smaller ones. That had been the plan. But then isn’t that the way with plans? They have a tendency not to pan out as expected. And he would have been disappointed in Jerome and Hugo, that was for sure. Especially Hugo. Peggy thought about her eldest brother, away in London, working at God only knows what. He had been expected to take over the family business, like a million eldest sons before him. Their father had expected it, their mother had expected it, the whole village had expected it. Peggy herself had taken it as a fact of life. When her father needed him to, Hugo would come back from London, or wherever he might have been, and pick up where Patrick Casey had left off. It was generally assumed that Mr. Casey had died of a broken heart. But Peggy was of the opinion that the shock of Hugo’s refusal to stay on in Crumm after their mother’s funeral did more damage to their father.

      ‘Another round? Miss? Are you with us?’

      Before Peggy could react, a voice from behind her said, ‘three pints? I’ll drop them down,’ and Carla materialized out of nowhere. ‘What’s wrong with you?’ She took three pint glasses from the shelf and tilted one under the tap. ‘Are you asleep? It’s not Waterford crystal you know.’ She nodded at the tumbler Peggy was polishing with a cloth.

      Peggy looked at the glass and put it down on the shelf. ‘Where did you come out of?’

      ‘I was just checking to see if you needed any help.’ Carla started on the third pint. ‘I can stay here for a while if you like. Do you want to get some dinner in the back?’

      ‘No. No thanks.’ Peggy stood up and flexed her shoulders. ‘I’m grand here.’ She walked out from behind the bar and went to collect empty plates from a table where three men were sitting.

      One of them smiled up at her. ‘That was lovely now, thanks girl,’ he said, his ruddy cheeks and crackled nose telling of many seasons on the lake. ‘Did you make it yourself?’

      ‘I did.’ Peggy smiled back.

      ‘Beautiful, beautiful.’ One of the other two men at the table lifted his hand in thanks, his eyes never leaving the pint glass in front of him, his grey beard bouncing against his collar.

      ‘Could ye be tempted to a slice of homemade apple tart with cream?’ Peggy asked.

      ‘Oh Lord,’ the affable, red-faced man patted his ample stomach. ‘I’m sure we shouldn’t but if it’s as good as the stew, sure we’d better give it a go.’ He nodded at the other two who seemed happy to go along with whatever their companion decided.

      Peggy smiled at him and took the plates behind the bar. ‘I’ll just be a sec’,’ she told Carla, and went in through the door to the kitchen.

      Five minutes later, she walked back into the bar carrying three plates of warm apple tart; a little cloud of cream melting on each one. She sensed immediately that the bar was fuller, and noticed a new table of three men, younger than the usual fishermen, the three of them watching Carla as she placed their pints before them. She put the plates of apple tart down to appreciative grunts and gentle chants of ‘beautiful, beautiful,’ from the bearded man. Back behind the bar, when she looked up, there was a man sitting right at the end of the counter on a high stool.

      ‘Oh, sorry,’ she smiled. ‘I didn’t see you there. What can I get you?’

      The man looked amused. ‘Have I stumbled onto some Amazonian public house?’

      ‘I beg your pardon?’ Peggy looked directly at him.

      He glanced over at Carla. ‘It’s not often you come across bars being run only by women,’ he said.

      ‘Who’s to say I haven’t got a big lump of a man out the back?’ Peggy cocked her head towards the back door.

      The man laughed, but then seemed to collect himself. He sat up straighter on the stool. ‘I’m sure you have no need of one,’ he said. ‘I’ll have a pint, so.’

      Peggy put a glass to the tap. He was a funny one. It wasn’t too often they got strangers on their own in Crumm. Even the anglers tended to come in little groups after a day on the lake. You might get the odd German passing through, but Peggy knew this fellah was no more German than she was herself. His accent was soft. A monied lilt. First generation Dublin, she guessed. Carla handed her some used glasses over the bar, winking at her. Peggy scowled back. She noticed the stranger stealing a glance at them both.

      ‘So,’ she said, topping up the pint, ‘are you here for the fishing?’

      ‘Not exactly.’ He put some coins down on the counter. He drew the pint over to him, and lifted it to his lips. ‘Sláinte,’ he said, and sucked back a third of it before it had a proper chance to settle.

      Peggy could see tables that needed clearing, but she stayed where she was behind the counter, rinsing glasses that had already been rinsed.

      ‘So is this your place?’ he said at last.

      ‘It is,’ Peggy replied. ‘Well, mine and my siblings. It’s a family business.’

      He nodded. Peggy watched him stroke the pint glass. She wondered if he might be one of the contractors in to help a local farmer make the last of the hay. His fingers were long and tanned. His fingernails were clean. She dragged his coins across the bar with the flat of her palm, catching his eye as she did so. Facing the till, she could see his reflection as he took another drink from his glass.

      ‘So if you’re not a fisher, and you’re not a farmer, what is it that you do?’ She spoke to his reflection as she slowly tidied the till drawer.

      ‘What makes you think I’m not a farmer?’ His mouth curled in a smile.

      Peggy turned and leaned heavily against the drawer, closing it. She nodded at his glass. ‘They’re not the fingers of a manual labourer,’ she said.

      Frank regarded his hand, turning it front to back.

      ‘No?’

      ‘No.’

      ‘So I’m too clean to be a farmer?’

      She smiled despite herself. ‘Something like that,’ she said.

      They were still looking at each other, when Carla came around the bar, dirty pint glasses dangling from each hand. She ignored Peggy and smiled openly at the man sitting at the bar as she left the glasses on the counter. He glanced from one sister to the other.

      ‘Hello,’ he said.

      ‘Hello.’ Carla smiled back. Peggy rolled her eyes and turned back to the till. Carla stuck her hand across the bar at him. ‘Carla Casey.’

      ‘Eh, Frank Ryan,’ he said. ‘Detective Sergeant Frank Ryan.’

      Carla’s kohl-streaked eyes were suddenly wide and she slapped her hands down on the bar. ‘Oh, are you up from Dublin for the body?’ She seemed to have forgotten about Peggy, who was standing behind her, watching Frank in the mirror. ‘So tell us, is it just one of the ones from the old graveyard?’ She leant on the bar opposite Frank and rested her chin in her hand. ‘Or was it new? Do you know who it is?’

      ‘Eh, well, I’m not really at liberty to discuss it right now.’ Frank sat back a little on his stool. ‘The pathologist will be here tomorrow. He’ll have to examine the body.’

      ‘So there definitely is a body?’ Carla asked him. ‘It wasn’t just some old, empty box left there? You actually found a body?’

      ‘Eh, yes.’ Frank looked from Carla to Peggy’s reflection and back. ‘There was a body. There is a body. It does appear to be old though.’ He coughed. ‘As in, of course we can’t be sure until the pathologist examines it, but it would appear to be, eh, old.’

      ‘Oh.’