Chapter 148: The Beta's Choice

The whole of the hall was silent and the sergeant stood at the table with the paper in his hand.

"There is a thing about a woman in a good coat," he said, "that I have been thinking about since the barracks. She has said the whole of it and she has named a judge and a man in Galway and a woman in a black coat. And there is a thing about a woman who has said the whole of it and who names a wolf in a hall at nine o'clock in the morning. She has done it because a woman in a good coat who has lost everything is a woman who is going to take a wolf down with her."

The whole of the hall was silent.

"Say the rest of it," I said.

"The rest of it is a paper," the sergeant said. "It is a statement and it is in her hand and it says that the woman Niamh came to this village in June on the instruction of a man in Galway. And there is a thing about a statement that is in the hand of a woman in a good coat. It is a statement that is going to be in a court in Dublin and it is a statement that a judge is going to look at." He put the paper down. "But there is a thing about the whole of it that I have not said and that I am going to say now in front of the whole of this co-op. I have been in that barracks since Monday and I have been in the room with the woman in the good coat and I have heard the whole of it. And there is a thing about a woman who names a wolf in a hall at nine o'clock in the morning and who has been in a room with a sergeant and a notebook for three days. She has named every wolf in this village and she has named every wolf in Galway and she has not once said a thing that a sergeant is going to be able to write down without a second wolf in the room to say it is true."

The whole of the hall was silent.

"Then there is a thing I have to say," I said, "and I am going to say it and then the whole of it is going to be in a file in Galway before the evening. The statement is a statement of a woman in a good coat and it says I came to this village in June on the instruction of a man in Galway. And there is a thing about a man in Galway. He is the Keeper of the Rolls and he is in a room in Galway and he has been in a room since Friday and there is not a wolf in this hall who is going to be able to say I have been in a room with him." I put my hand on the table. "But there is a thing about the whole of it that I am not going to say. I am not going to say that I did not come to this village because of a man in Galway. I came to this village because my sister was dead and because there was a note on a table and a weight on a table and a wolf on the headland. And there is a thing about a woman who comes to a village because of a note and a weight and a wolf. She is not a woman who is working for a man in Galway. She is a woman who has been in a village for a month and who has been in every room in it and who has said the whole of it out loud."

The whole of the hall was silent.

And then Declan stood up.

"There is a thing about the whole of it," he said, "that I am going to say and that I have been trying to say since the pier. The statement is a statement and a statement is a paper and a paper is a thing that a lawyer in Dublin is going to argue about. But there is a thing about a paper that names a wolf in a hall at nine o'clock in the morning and that is in the hand of a woman who has been in a room with a sergeant and a notebook for three days. It is a paper that a sergeant is going to be able to put in a file and a file is a thing that a court is going to look at." He came down the floor. "So I am going to do the thing that a wolf does when a paper is put in front of a pack. I am going to put a paper of my own on that table."

He put a paper on the table.

It was a statement and it was in his own hand and it had a date on it and it was signed.

"There is a thing about this paper," he said. "It is a statement that I have written this morning in the shop and it says the whole of it. It says that I took five hundred pounds out of the co-op's account and gave it to the Keeper of the Rolls and that I did it because the Alpha told me to. It says that I stood in a door and let a thing happen to a woman I carried down a road. It says that I wrote eleven letters to a woman in Athlone and did not post them and that I posted one and did not follow it. And it says the thing that I have not said to a living soul until this morning." He put his hand on the paper. "It says that I have been the Beta of this pack for twenty years and that I am not fit to be the Beta of this pack and that I am giving the rank to the co-op and that I am going to be a wolf in this pack and not a rank."

The whole of the hall was silent.

"Declan," Tom said.

"There is a thing about a wolf who has been a rank for twenty years," Declan said. "He does not know what he is without it. He has been a man who gets up and goes to the office and comes home and gets up again and there is not a thing in it that is a future. And there is a thing about the whole of it that I have been trying to say since the shore. The whole of it was not a woman in a black coat and it was not a woman in a good coat. It was a village that was frightened and it was a man who stood in a door and did not say a word." He put his hand down. "So I am not going to be the Beta. I am going to be the wolf who stands beside the woman who is going to be in that chair and I am going to say the whole of it in that room on the fourteenth and I am going to take whatever the co-op gives me."

The whole of the hall was silent.

And then Cormac came down the floor and stood beside his father.

"There is a thing about a boy who has been in the hand of the Alpha since he was fourteen," he said. "He has been a thing that was used and he has been a thing that was broken in 1994 and he has been a thing that cut a line and stood on the rocks and did nothing. And there is a thing about the whole of it that I have been trying to say since the slip. I am not going to be a claimant and I am not going to be an heir and I am not going to be the son of Siobhan in front of a court. I am going to be a wolf in this pack and I am going to stand beside my father and the woman who is going to be in that chair and I am going to say the whole of it out loud."

The whole of the hall went up.

And then the woman with black hair put her hand on the table.

"There is a thing about this morning," she said, "that the court is going to say before it does the thing a court does. The statement that was put on this table by the sergeant is a statement of a woman in a good coat and it is going to be in a court in Dublin and it is going to be argued about by a lawyer. And there is a thing about a statement that is put on a table in a hall with the whole of a co-op in it and that is answered by a statement in the hand of the Beta of that pack." She put her hand flat on the table. "The court has heard the whole of it. The court has heard the file and the list and the book and the boot and the ring and the healer's book and the whole of the co-op on its knees on the flagstones. And the court is going to say a thing now that a court has not said in this territory since 1901."

The whole of the hall was silent.

"The seat of Dún Aonghasa is vacant. The heir of Maeve is declared. The woman Niamh is of the blood and her claim is lawful. And there is a thing about a claim that is lawful and a seat that is vacant and a co-op that has been in a hall since six o'clock this morning." She put her hand out. "The court is going to put the whole of it to the co-op. Not a claim. Not a challenge. A vote. The whole of the co-op is going to vote on the wolf who is going to hold that seat until the heir is ready. And there is a thing about a vote that is taken in a hall with the whole of the file on the table and the whole of the nine in the room. It is a vote that is going to be in a file in Galway before the evening."

The whole of the hall went up.

And then the green door of the hall opened and a woman came in with a lamp in her hand and her gold hair going grey at the temples and her grey coat over her arm and her face white.

It was my sister.

She came up the floor and stopped in front of the table.

"There is a thing about a vote," she said, "that the whole of this hall is going to hear before it is taken. I am Siobhan and I am the daughter of Maeve's daughter and I made a claim in March and I lost it and I was put in a boathouse with a rope round my neck. And there is a thing about a wolf who has been in a boathouse and who is standing in a hall on the fourteenth of July." She put her hand on the table. "She is not going to be in that chair. She has never been going to be in that chair. She is going to be a wolf in this pack and she is going to stand beside the wolf who is."