Erin Hart - Haunted Ground

“You’ve never told me how you came to be so interested in bog bodies,” he said, taking a dripping plate from her as they washed and dried the supper dishes.

“I guess it started with the summers I spent with my grandparents in Clare. My grandfather used to cut a bit of turf, and I was always fascinated by the things he turned up in the bog. Nothing spectacular, mostly small chunks of waterlogged wood that looked as if they’d been cut only the day before. He showed me once where he’d come across the outline of a fallen tree. The wood was completely gone, but it had left a kind of ghost image in the turf.

“Then when I was about fourteen, I decided to do a school paper about bogs. I stumbled across a book in the library that had these incredible black-and-white pictures of Tollund Man.” She paused. “You know Tollund Man, the famous bog body from Denmark?”

Cormac nodded. “I certainly know of him, although we’ve never actually met.”

“Isn’t he incredible? To see his face, down to the worry lines and the eyelashes and the chin stubble, so perfectly preserved after two thousand years. That was it for me. And the more I found out, the more interesting it was. Why was he naked? Why was his throat cut? And why was that noose around his neck? I started digging for everything I could find about bogs—archaeology, biology, chemistry. Even when you understand the science of bog preservation, it’s still pretty mysterious, the way unsaturated fatty acids are gradually replaced by saturated fatty acids with two carbon atoms less. So the body’s organic compounds aren’t broken down in the usual way, but chemically transformed.” She pulled the stopper in the sink and watched the last of the soapy dishwater as it slipped down the drain.

“Are you all right, Nora?”

She nodded. “Just thinking.”

Nora climbed the stairs from the kitchen with Cormac following behind her. When they reached the main foyer, the only sound was the loud, steady ticking of the grandfather clock.

“Dead quiet, isn’t it?” Cormac said.

“A bit too quiet. I think I’m just going to head upstairs to bed.”

He made no reply, but followed as she turned to go up the main stairs. They had just come to the landing when Cormac spoke: “Hugh gave me a very nice bottle of single-malt that I was thinking of cracking open for a nightcap. I don’t suppose you’d care to join me?”

She stopped and half turned to him: “I don’t know, Cormac….”

His voice was quiet. “It’s only half-ten. Come and sit with me for a while. Maybe that willie-the-wisp I saw will show itself again tonight.”

Nora still hesitated, struck by the thoughtful expression in his eyes. She found herself wondering whether the slight and rather appealing pronouncement of his lips—the muscle she knew professionally as the orbicularis oris—came from playing the flute. “Single-malt?” she asked. He smiled. “Maybe you could play that tape of Mrs. Cleary for me again.”

A few minutes later, Cormac was lighting the fire in his room, and Nora was tucked into a heavy leather armchair just beside it. “You know, I wonder if we shouldn’t have tried to find Jeremy,” she said as Cormac handed her a heavy tumbler containing a small amount of golden liquor. She lifted the whiskey to her nose, and enjoyed the dusky scent of turf smoke that rose from the glass.

“My guess is that he would hate anyone fussing over him,” said Cormac as he settled into his chair opposite her. “Whatever it is will blow over. Wait and see.”

“And how did you happen to gain such insight into adolescent psychology, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“If I know anything about a mixed-up young lad like Jeremy,” Cormac said, “it’s because I was once just like that myself.”

“And what had you so confused?”

He drummed his fingers on the arm of his chair, then moved to the fireplace again, to gaze down into the flickering light.

“Oh, you know, typical bewilderment of a young fella leaving home and finding out he isn’t quite as smart as he’d reckoned he was. And then my mother was very ill. She died the following winter. She was the only real family I had at that point, it was like being cut adrift.”

“God, Cormac, how awful. How old were you?”

“Nineteen. I don’t know what would have happened if Gabriel hadn’t thrown me a lifeline.”

“I had no idea you and Gabriel went that far back. I saw the picture on the mantel—” Nora suddenly realized she hadn’t told Cormac about being in his house. “You must be truly missing him.”

“I am.” Cormac’s face was still turned away from her, but she could hear the note of desolation in his voice. “The strange thing about Gabriel was that he had no children—I’m not sure whether that was by choice or by chance—I don’t know how he knew so much about being a father.”

“What happened to your own father?” Nora could feel his embarrassment at the question, and wished she could withdraw it.

“Maybe we’d better talk about something else,” he said. But when he looked at her, Nora could see that he was at war with himself, unsure whether to venture into that uncharted, dangerous place. “I’ve always told everyone he was dead.”

She wasn’t prepared for this response. “He’s not?”

“No.” Cormac seemed to be trying to form the words in his head. “When I was nine, he volunteered for a few weeks at a South American mission run by an old friend, and became very involved in the human rights work they were doing. He went back again, and happened to be part of a delegation visiting Chile when the generals took over. The six weeks he was supposed to be there turned into six months, and after that, I think my mother knew he wasn’t coming back. It was hard for both of us, but especially for her, I think. She could never be officially angry with him; the man was a humanitarian hero.”

Cormac knelt and reached for the poker to stir up the fire. “He did come home for a time when my mother was ill, but after she died he went back to Chile. I’ve tried to put myself in the place of all those people who lost someone. It’s hard.”

“Where is he now?”

“He came back to Ireland two years ago, to his family place up in Donegal. He wrote me when he was coming home, but I couldn’t—I haven’t seen him since the funeral.” She understood now that this was the first time he’d ever told anyone the whole truth.

“Cormac, I’m sorry.”

“Yes. Well. It’s my own choice.” He changed the subject. “Would you like to hear that tape now?”

“I would.” She didn’t want to press him any further. Was he sorry that he’d told her all this? “Maybe we can keep an eye out for your willie-the-wisp while we have a listen,” she said. “Where were you when you saw it—just there in the alcove?”

“Yes. But listen, if you’re coming away from the fire, you’d better have this.” He pulled a small blanket off the bed and draped it around her shoulders.

“Thanks. Won’t you be cold as well?”

“I’m very warm,” said Cormac, and he pressed the backs of his fingers to her cheek to prove the point.

“So you are.”

Nora sat with her knees pulled up to her chest on one of the deep, cushioned window ledges in the tower alcove as Cormac pushed the button on the tape recorder. They sat looking out into the darkness, listening to the background noises of conversation and chairs being rearranged. The sound of Mrs. Cleary’s croaking voice affected her almost as much the second time she heard it. When the old lady’s song ended, she asked, “Why wouldn’t the song just say the girl’s name?”

Cormac switched off the tape. “Too dangerous. Besides, at the time, everybody in the locality would know who it was talking about. Lots of songs were written in code. It was pretty common convention during dangerous times.”