Northern Spy(67)

“Well, we didn’t,” I say, bouncing Finn on my lap.

“You’ve been limping.”

“Only from blisters. We had to walk for a long time when we left,” I say, which doesn’t come out sounding as reassuring as I’d hoped.

Marian steps into the room, in her own police-issued clothes, followed by the detective. “The IRA has issued a statement,” he says, handing me his phone. I scroll past the picture of Seamus, in a mustard-yellow corduroy blazer, to read the statement. “A devoted volunteer, Seamus Malone, was tragically killed in an unintended explosion in South Armagh yesterday morning.” The statement goes on about Seamus’s legacy, his standing among his comrades, and the plans for a full paramilitary funeral, with a guard of honor. The service will be held at St. Peter’s cathedral, with a procession to the burial at Milltown cemetery. Near the bottom, the statement says, “Two others, Marian Daly and Tessa Daly, also died in the explosion after having been court-martialed and found guilty of informing.”

“Oh,” I say softly. It’s like stepping into a lift shaft. I look at the detective, Marian, my mam. “Everyone who knows us will think we’re dead. I can’t do that to them.”

“You don’t have a choice, love,” says my mam. “It’s this or the IRA looking for you. You’re safe now, that’s all that matters.”

Finn shifts on my lap, and I smooth his hair. I can’t go home, I can’t even go back to say goodbye. “What will happen now?”

“You’ll be given new names,” says the detective. “And resettled outside of Northern Ireland.”

Marian presses her mouth into a thin line. She loves Belfast even more than I do, she has never lived anywhere else. I take a sip of ice water through the straw, and think, We’re not so badly off. We could have been killed yesterday.

“Do you want to be placed together or separately?” asks the detective.

“Together,” we say at the same time.





42


IT’S RAINING IN DALKEY, on the cliffs and the railway line, the lighthouse and the harbor, the slate roofs and chimneys, and on the skylight above the table where Marian and I are having breakfast. The table itself is crowded with plates. Neither of us could decide, so we’re sharing the polenta, the crêpes, and a lemon danish, wedged onto the table along with a cafetière of coffee, milk, and cups. I cut up toast and set it on the high-chair tray. Finn nods to himself, studying the options, before lifting his first bite. Marian tips honey over her crêpe, I spread cherry jam on mine and then roll it up like a cigar. Around us, the other tables are full of people chatting. Marian finishes her half of the polenta, and we trade plates across the table.

The IRA thinks we’re dead. They think that we were in a locked room when the farmhouse exploded.

“More coffee?” asks Marian.



* * *



—



After leaving the café, I strap Finn into his carrier and we walk through the village. We’ve been settled in the republic, in a small village on the coast thirty minutes south of Dublin. The IRA has plenty of supporters in the republic, but what I’ve already noticed is how little people here concern themselves with events in the north. Their lives have carried on as usual, while across the border ours imploded. It would infuriate me, if it weren’t part of what will keep us safe here. Our other option for resettlement was a town in the southeast of England, and I couldn’t imagine my son speaking with an English accent one day.

We’ve been in Dalkey for a week now. We prepared a backstory for ourselves, but none of the locals seem particularly surprised that we’ve ended up here. They’re used to visitors deciding to stay.

Dalkey sits on a headland at the southern tip of Dublin Bay, with views across the water of the city, and the ferries leaving Dun Laoghaire. I find everything about Dalkey appealing, everything to scale—the curved main street, the train station, the church, the houses, the cedar elms and umbrella pines. I can’t tell if this is down to my near-death experience or the village itself.

“It will start to annoy you eventually,” says Marian.

“Probably,” I say cheerfully.

The police are providing us with housing for a year. Mine is a small new-build house on the village’s outskirts. You can’t tell that it’s owned by the police, used to lodge informers and protected witnesses. I wonder about the others who have stayed there before me, if they felt scared, or overwhelmed. It’s a lot of work, faking your own death. A lot of admin.

Every hour, I remember something else. The food in my fridge. The unreturned library books. The newspaper subscription. It would be easier for me to handle these tasks myself, but, the thing is, I’m supposed to be dead. So instead I have to call my mam, my next of kin, and she has to ring on my behalf, and try to explain to the customer-service representative that I’ve died, and that, no, she doesn’t have my account number. She spent a wearying afternoon yesterday trying to cancel my auto insurance.

“Sorry, mam,” I said, and she said, “Couldn’t you have left Tom as your next of kin? It would serve him right.”

On our first night across the border, I called Tom from the hospital. “I’m in the republic,” I said. “With the baby.”