Tom looked at the price. ‘Now, you can do better than that for me, Gerry,’ he said, and he stepped back.
‘Ah, now, Jesus,’ said Brady, but by the way he glanced out to the yard, Tom knew he would come down again. They went back and forward, and Brady sighed and chewed his lip and shook his head, and when they finally shook, it was on a price Tom knew was a good one, and Brady asked Tom where it was he had the new farm.
Tom looked at him, surprised. Then he remembered: he had told Brady he was stocking a whole new place. ‘Ah, I’ll be keeping them up in the sheds at home for a while,’ he said, the words tumbling out in a hurry. ‘I haven’t the new yards ready for them yet. And you don’t need to worry about delivering them. The son will be down from Dublin tomorrow and myself and himself can come in to you and drive them out. It’s just as handy.’ He thought of the neighbours watching: Keogh behind the shop door, Jimmy Flynn maybe going past on his blue Ford as Tom and Mark turned the new tractors in at the lane.
‘Grand, so,’ said Brady. ‘You’re out near Edgeworthstown, isn’t it?’
‘Dorvaragh,’ Tom said. ‘Just ahead of the crossroads there as you go out the Bal road.’
‘I thought so all right,’ said Brady, and he looked again at the cheque Tom had handed to him. ‘Tom Casey,’ he said. ‘Sure I know you, of course,’ and there was in his voice the note Tom heard in most voices now: the commiseration; the fascination. And as soon as the next thought flashed into his mind he hated himself for thinking it: that there might have been more off the price still, had Brady recognized him, had he made the connection sooner. He was shaking his head to get rid of the idea when he realized that Brady was studying him.
‘I have you now,’ Brady said. ‘Didn’t you buy that Massey from me there a few years before?’ He did not wait for a response. ‘That Massey was a very nice little runner,’ he said. ‘At the time. But, Jesus, you’ll get better satisfaction out of these two.’ He laughed. ‘And you never thought of trading her in? You’re a man in a hurry.’
‘Ah, I’ll keep her,’ said Tom.
Brady nodded. ‘Fair enough, Tom. No harm in having her around the place. Sure, maybe the son can run her around.’ He winked at Tom. ‘Ha? Don’t let him get his hands on these beauties.’
‘Ah,’ Tom shrugged. ‘It’s a lot of interest he’ll have in them anyway.’
‘I doubt that,’ Brady said. ‘Unless he’s blind altogether.’
‘We’ll see,’ said Tom, as Brady handed him the receipt. ‘Thanks very much.’
‘Thanks yourself,’ Brady said, offering his hand. ‘And the very best of luck to the two of ye with the new place.’
*
The phone on the kitchen counter rang that evening as Tom was sitting down to his dinner. He was over to it and had the receiver to his ear before it finished the second ring. It was Mark.
‘I was trying to get you earlier,’ Tom said. ‘What were you at?’
‘Work,’ Mark said. He sounded tired. ‘And then Aoife.’
Tom cleared his throat. ‘Working on the Edgeworthstown one, was it?’ he said. He hoped Mark would recognize the generosity of the question, the interest it showed in his life. His heart speeded up as he waited for Mark’s reply. It took a moment to come, and it came flat.
‘Yeah,’ Mark said. ‘Edgeworth, yeah.’
Tom nodded. In his mind’s eye he saw the old manor at Edgeworthstown, the porch with its two black pillars where he used to wait in the car for Maura to finish her shift. When first he started to call for her, when first they started to go together, it was like picking her up from school. There was always a nun watching from the door. And Maura would come down the steps like a schoolgirl, her coat over her uniform, the thin strip of her handbag swinging from her shoulder. As she slid into the car, there was her perfume and her bare knees and her sideways hello. Granard and Longford and Mullingar for the dances then. As far away from Edgeworthstown as they could. Wanting something different.
‘Anything new with you?’ Mark said then.
Tom hesitated. ‘Aoife’s asleep?’ he said, looking at the clock over the range. It was seven.
‘No,’ said Mark. ‘She’s here beside me. She’s watching one of her DVDs.’ He seemed to yawn. ‘What did you do yourself today?’
‘Ah,’ said Tom. ‘Just tipping around. You know yourself.’
‘Yeah.’
He took a long breath. Now was the time. Now was when he would have to tell him. He should have told him already; he should have phoned him from Brady’s again and again until he answered. ‘I went up to Brady’s for a while to look at a few things,’ he said.
‘To Brady’s?’
‘Aye,’ Tom said, carefully. ‘He had me looking at all his new machinery.’
Mark clicked his tongue. ‘That bollocks. He got the timing as wrong as he could get it with that place.’
In his chest, Tom felt a jolt. ‘How do you mean?’ he said, and he knew it sounded too anxious. ‘He says it’s doing well,’ he added then, more lightly.
‘Well, he’d say that,’ Mark said, in the same tone full of scorn. ‘But if he thinks anyone’s going to be stupid enough to shell out for his overpriced rubbish the way things are going now, he’s mistaken.’
‘What do you mean, the way things are going?’ Tom said.
‘Do you not listen to the radio? The country is fucked.’
‘What the hell do I want with the radio?’ Tom said, and what came into his head was the radio that Brady had shown him in one of the new tractor cabs. You could plug all manner of things into it, Brady had told him. There was nothing you couldn’t play through it, he had said. Tom had not asked him what he had meant.
‘Yeah, well,’ Mark said, and he sighed. ‘Anyway. Sorry. I just never trusted that guy Brady, that’s all. The prices he charges are ridiculous. But I suppose there’s nowhere else to go if you need a part.’
On his forehead and underneath his arms, Tom felt himself sweat. His heart was thumping. ‘Yeah,’ he said, and he wanted to hang up the phone.
‘So what was it you were looking for from him?’
‘Ah,’ Tom said, and as he shrugged, his shoulders felt like someone else’s. ‘Just a few bits for the Massey. Nothin’ much.’
‘It’s giving you trouble?’
‘Ah,’ Tom said. ‘The usual.’
‘I’ll take a look at it for you when I get down again,’ Mark said.
The room felt darker to Tom. It felt as though it had begun to move. ‘You’ll be down soon?’ he said, and he put a hand on the counter to steady himself.
‘Next weekend, maybe,’ Mark said. ‘I’ve a lot of work now.’
‘You won’t be down this weekend coming?’
‘Tomorrow?’ Mark said. ‘Ah, no. No way. Sorry.’
‘It’s all right,’ Tom said, quietly.
Mark said nothing for a moment. ‘We can get through a lot when I’m down next weekend,’ he said then. ‘You must have a cattle test coming up this month some time, have you?’
‘No.’
‘But they’re always around the end of October. Did Farrell not send you a card?’
‘I had one earlier in the month,’ Tom said, his voice so loud that the dog raised its head. ‘I’ll let you go.’
‘All right,’ said Mark, and he sounded uncertain. ‘Sure if you need help with that tractor before the weekend, I’m sure Sammy could help you.’
‘I’m sure he could,’ Tom said. ‘I’ll let you go,’ he said again.
Chapter Twenty
It was not that Mark had been lying to his father. He had meant to get down to Dorvaragh the following weekend. It had seemed possible when they spoke on the phone: there had been the stretch of another whole week ahead. But by Wednesday it was obvious that he could not be out of Dublin, not even for a couple of days. There was too much to do. He was on a roll with a new chapter: if he left it, he would lose the rhythm of it. He could not afford to be away.