Читаем The Hunter полностью

“That’s what my granny woulda put there, all right,” Mart agrees. Cal can tell from the quizzical angle of his head that Mart is finding Rushborough very interesting.

“Just don’t step on the mound,” Francie says ominously. “Mossie’s nephew stood on that mound, one time, to show he wasn’t afraid of any aul’ superstition. He got a tingling right up his legs, like pins and needles. Couldn’t feel his feet for a week.”

“God between us and harm,” Mart says solemnly, raising his glass, and they all drink to that. Cal drinks along with them. He feels, more and more, like they could all do with something between them and harm.

He’s seen these guys leprechaun up before, at innocent tourists who were proud of themselves for finding a quaint authentic Irish pub that wasn’t in any of the guidebooks. They convinced one earnest American student that the narrow window in the corner had been blessed by Saint Leithreas and that if he could climb through it he’d be sure to get to heaven, and he was halfway through before an outraged Barty came out from behind the bar and hauled him down by the seat of his pants. They tried it on Cal, too, in his first couple of months here, but he declined to dress all in green in order to ingratiate himself with the local Little People, or to walk round the pub backwards to avert bad luck when he dropped his change. This is different. They’re not heaping extravagant quantities of blarney down this guy’s throat to see what he’ll swallow. This is a subtler, meticulous operation, and a serious one.

“Now there’s a mighty idea!” Johnny cries, turning from P.J. to the alcove. “P.J.’s after pointing out that we can’t welcome a man home without a bit of a singsong.”

P.J. looks like he didn’t notice himself having any such idea, but he nods obligingly. “Oh, my goodness,” Rushborough says, delighted. “A singsong? I haven’t been to one of those since I was a boy at my grandmother’s house.”

“Get out the guitar there,” Sonny orders Con, and Con turns promptly to get it from the corner behind him: clearly this was in the plan. If Rushborough wants heritage, he’s going to get it. “Ah, begod,” Mart tells the table happily, “there’s nothing like an aul’ singsong.”

The normal repertoire in Seán Óg’s, on evenings that turn musical, is a mix of traditional Irish stuff and everything from Garth Brooks to Doris Day. Tonight it’s wall-to-wall green, in a tasteful array of shades: homesickness, rebellion, booze, and pretty girls, mainly. P.J. starts off with “Fields of Athenry” in a rich, melancholy tenor, and Sonny follows up by bellowing out “The Wild Rover” and slapping the table till the glasses jump. Rushborough is entranced. On the maudlin songs he leans his head back against the banquette, with his eyes half closed and his pint forgotten in his hand; on the rowdy ones, he beats time on his thigh and joins in the choruses. When the men invite him to take his turn, he sings “Black Velvet Band” in a light, clear voice that almost fits in, except for the accent. He knows all the words.

The crowd in the pub shifts and eddies, without hurry but with method. People pause at the entrance to the alcove, listening to the singing, or swapping news, or waiting for the bar to clear; after a few minutes they move on, leaving the space for someone else. None of them intrude on the alcove. Cal didn’t expect them to. Soon enough they’ll want to meet Rushborough, but that can wait for another day. For now they’re content to circle, collecting impressions to discuss at leisure: his clothes, his hair, his accent, his manner; whether he looks like a Feeney, whether he looks like a millionaire, whether he looks handy in a fight; whether he looks like a fool. Cal isn’t sure what a millionaire is supposed to look like, but to him this guy looks like he could do plenty of damage in a fight, and he doesn’t look like any kind of fool at all.

The singing comes round to Cal. He doesn’t try to add to the greenery—even if he wanted to, it would make a dumb tourist out of him, and he’s not aiming to be a tourist right now. He sticks with “The House of the Rising Sun.” Cal has the right voice for pub singsongs, a big man’s voice, nothing showy or impressive, but good to listen to. He spots Johnny noticing that he takes his turn as a matter of course, and not liking it.

When he’s accepted his round of applause, and Dessie has launched into “Rocky Road to Dublin,” Cal heads for the bar. Barty, topping up two glasses at once, nods to him but can’t take the breath to talk. His face is sweating harder.

“Women,” Mart says with deep disapproval, appearing at Cal’s shoulder. “This pub’s full of women tonight.”

“They get everywhere,” Cal agrees gravely. “You reckon they should stay home and take care of the kids?”