Chapter 98: The Phone in the Boathouse

The coastguard cottage was at the top of the cove on the north side and it had a door that did not lock and a window with no glass in it and a chimney that had not had a fire in it since the spring. The telephone was on the wall by the door and it was a black bakelite thing with a cord that had gone stiff and a dial that had a number written on it in pencil.

It was still ringing when I got there.

Eileen was behind me with her grey hair down and her coat open and Declan was behind her and Cormac was behind him and the whole of the co-op was coming down the slip in a crowd with lamps.

I picked up the receiver.

“Who is this?” I said.

There was a click on the line and then a woman’s voice said, “Is that the coastguard cottage?”

“Who is this?”

“I am asking the question.” The voice was old and it was dry and it had the accent of the west coast polished smooth. “I have been ringing that number for three days and there has not been an answer and there has not been an answer since the spring and there is a thing I have to say to a wolf in Dún Aonghasa and I am going to say it now whether there is a wolf there or not. My name is Maire and I am in Galway and I am the woman who posts the letters.”

The whole cove went quiet.

“Maire,” I said. “This is Niamh.”

The line was quiet for a moment. Then Maire said, “You are in the coastguard cottage.”

“I am in the coastguard cottage and the whole co-op is on the slip and the Alpha is on the headland and there is a wolf in this village who has been writing letters to my sister in Athlone and signing them with a name she trusted.” I put my hand on the wall. “Maire. There is a thing I have to ask you and I am going to ask it now and you are going to answer it because there is no time. Who is the wolf in this village who has been going up to Galway every week since April?”

“It is not a wolf,” Maire said.

“What?”

“It is not a wolf and it is not a man. It is a woman and she is not in this village and she has not been in this village since 1981. She is in Galway and she has been in Galway since 1981 and she has been writing letters to the co-op for thirty six years and signing them with the name of the Alpha.” Maire’s voice was steady and very old. “Her name is Eileen and she is the daughter of the woman who took the seat in 1961 and she is Mairéad’s sister and she has been running this village from Galway since her mother died in 1983.”

I stood in the coastguard cottage with the receiver in my hand.

“Mairéad’s sister,” I said.

“Mairéad’s sister and the woman who burned the Alpha in 1961 was her mother and the woman who signed the deed of gift was her mother and the woman who has been writing to the co-op for thirty six years is her.” Maire was quiet for a moment. “I have been posting her letters since 1975 and I have been posting them because she told me that if I did not she would put my daughter out of this territory. And there is a thing I have to say and then I am going to put the telephone down and go to my bed. The woman who came down that shore road in the grey coat is not Eileen and the woman who has been in the north for twenty years is not Eileen. She is a wolf called Bridget who was banished in 1988 and who was told to put a grey coat on and make a claim in a name that was not hers. And the real Eileen has never left Galway and has never worn a grey coat and has been in a house in Galway for thirty six years writing letters to a village she has not set foot in since 1981.”

I put my hand over the mouthpiece and turned round.

“Eileen is in Galway,” I said. “The woman in the grey coat is not Eileen. She is a wolf who was banished in 1988 and who was told to put a grey coat on and make a claim in a name that was not hers. And the real Eileen is Mairéad’s sister and she has been in Galway since 1981 and she has been running this village from a house in Galway for thirty six years.”

Declan’s face had gone the colour of the wall.

“Then the letters,” he said. “The letters to your sister in Athlone.”

“They came from Galway and they came from a woman in a house in Galway who has been writing letters for thirty six years and who knows how to write a letter in a hand that a woman will trust.” I put the receiver back to my ear. “Maire. There is a thing I have to ask you and it is the last thing. The letters to my sister in Athlone. Who wrote them?”

Maire did not answer for a long time.

“I posted them,” she said. “I posted them every week since April and they came to me in a bundle from Galway with a note that said, post these to the cottage in Athlone and do not read them. And I did not read them and I posted them and I have been carrying it since April.” Her voice was very quiet. “And there is a thing about the bundle that I have to say. The last bundle came on the twelfth of June and it had a letter on the top of it that was not for the cottage in Athlone. It was for the co-op and it was addressed to the Alpha and it was in the same hand and it said, the woman from Dublin is to be hunted on the headland at the full moon and the wolf who takes her is the wolf who keeps the seat.”

The cove was very quiet.

“Then there is a thing I have to do,” I said. “And I am going to do it now.”

I put the receiver down and turned round and the whole co-op was on the slip with lamps.

“The hunt is at nine,” I said. “And there is a thing about the hunt that the whole co-op is going to hear before the moon is up. The Alpha did not write that letter. The Alpha did not send for the hunters and the Alpha did not tell the men from Sligo where to come and the Alpha did not put a knife in a rope on the pier. The wolf who did all of it is in Galway and she is Mairéad’s sister and she has been running this village from a house in Galway for thirty six years.” I looked at the whole of them. “And there is a thing about the woman who is standing on that headland tonight waiting for the moon. She has been a hard woman and she has done things that no wolf should do and she is going to answer for them. But the hunt that she called tonight is not her hunt. It is a hunt that a woman in Galway called for in April and that she has been carrying in her pocket since the twelfth of June and that she has been too proud to say out loud.”

The whole slip was silent.

And then Declan said, “Where is she?”

“She is on the headland with eleven wolves and she is waiting for the moon.”

I went up the slip at a run.

The track to the headland was dark and the wind was coming off the sea and the moon was not up yet and the whole co-op came behind me with lamps. We came over the shoulder of the headland and the ring of stones was ahead of us and there was a light in it and there was a wolf standing in the middle of the ring.

It was Mairéad. She was in her black coat with her silver hair down and her hands at her sides and the eleven wolves were standing along the stones with their lamps on the ground.

And there was a telephone in her hand.

It was a black bakelite thing with a cord and she was holding it up and the cord went down over the stones and into the dark and there was a box at the foot of the flat rock with a battery and a wire and a thing that had been put there in the night.

“There is a telephone in the coastguard cottage,” she said. “And there is a telephone in this ring of stones and there is a wire between them that was put there in 1961 and I have known about it since I was a girl.” She held the receiver up. “And there is a woman on the other end of it who has been ringing it for three days and who has just said a thing to me that I have been waiting thirty six years to hear. She said, Mairéad, the game is up.” Mairéad put the receiver down on the stone. “She said the game is up and she said it in her own voice and her own voice is the voice of the woman who came into this hall in 1961 and told me that my mother had saved the pack. And I have been the Alpha of this village for fourteen years on the word of a woman in Galway who has been writing the letters and calling the hunts and putting the money in the bank.”

The whole co-op was silent.

“Then there is a thing I have to say before the moon is up,” Mairéad said. “And I am going to say it in front of the whole co-op and the whole of it is going to be written down. The hunt is called off. There is no rogue in this territory and there is no wolf to be hunted and there is not going to be a fight on this headland tonight.” She looked at me. “And there is a thing about the morning that I am going to say and then I am going to sit down on this stone and not say another word. The woman in Galway is called Eileen and she is my sister and she has been the Alpha of this pack for thirty six years and I have been the woman who signed the papers. And there is a thing I have to do before the sun is up and I cannot do it alone. I have to go to Galway and I have to bring her back.”