False Mermaid

“Phone book? Oh—the telephone directory, is it? What would you be needing with that? Sure, no one uses those old printed books anymore, not when you can just ring directory enquiries on your mobile—” She glanced down, sensing Elizabeth’s disappointment. “Do you know, I’m sure we must have a directory here somewhere. The oh-one for Dublin, is it?” The woman began to search under the counter.

Elizabeth glanced over her shoulder to make sure her dad and Miranda had not come back. “I’m not sure. I just need to look something up.”

The woman continued rooting around in the boxes under the counter, finally producing a fat telephone book. “There you are, now. You’re not lost, are you, love?”

Elizabeth shook her head, and started flipping through the book, startled at all the pages and pages of Lynches, Kennedys, Kavanaghs—until at last she came to a page full of Gavins. There must be hundreds of them. She traced her finger down the column, looking for one in particular, and there it was: “Gavin, N., Whitefriar Street, Dublin 8.” The woman behind the counter was staring at her.

“Um—you wouldn’t have a pen?”

“Would a biro suit?”

Elizabeth wasn’t sure how to reply. Would a Byro Suit what?

The woman smiled and handed her a ballpoint pen. She quickly scribbled Nora’s address and phone number on the inside of her wrist, yanking her sleeve down to cover it.

The woman leaned down and spoke quietly. “First time in Ireland? You’re not in trouble, are you, love?”

“Oh no—nothing like that. I just wanted to surprise someone.” Elizabeth turned to see a well-dressed couple passing the store entrance. “There’s my mom and dad now—they’re looking for me. Thanks for your help.”

Outside the airport’s front entrance, she climbed into the first taxi in line. “I need to go to Whitefriar Street,” Elizabeth said to the driver, and waited for a reaction. She hoped he wouldn’t guess that she didn’t have money to pay the fare. Not the right kind of money, anyway. Elizabeth tried not to look nervous when he glanced back at her in the rearview mirror. What if he’d seen her checking the address on her arm?

“No luggage, miss?” he asked.

“No. I have to get to Whitefriar Street—where my aunt lives. It’s a family emergency.” That made it sound serious enough. The driver glanced at her again in the rearview mirror, then edged his cab out into the flow of traffic.

6

On the way out of the Emergency Room with her mother, Nora saw the fisherman, Sotharith. He was still there, waiting for her. She pulled on Eleanor’s arm.

“Mam, wait—there’s someone I have to see.”

Sotharith looked up as they approached. He stood, clearly uncomfortable in this place. But he had stayed. “You—okay?” he asked.

“Yes, they’re letting me go. This is my mother, Eleanor Gavin. Mam, this is Sotharith—I’m sorry, I don’t know your family name.”

“Seng,” he said. “Seng Sotharith.”

“My Good Samaritan,” Nora said to her mother. “He flagged someone down after the accident, and got me here.”

Eleanor pressed her palms together close to her face and bowed deeply. “Choum reap suor,” she said.

Sotharith would not meet Eleanor’s gaze. “Choum reap suor,” he murmured, mirroring her bow but bending even lower. “You speak Khmer?”

“Very little,” Eleanor said. “A few words picked up from my patients.”

A new light sparked in Sotharith’s averted eyes. “You a doctor?” he asked.

Eleanor nodded. “I run the community clinic in Frogtown.”

“Sotharith’s father was a doctor,” Nora explained. “Before the war.” She could see her mother grasp what had become of this man’s doctor-father, and perhaps the rest of his family as well.

Eleanor turned to him. “Lok Sotharith, you’ve been very good to us. I would like to repay your kindness somehow.” She handed him a card. “Will you come and see me at the clinic when you can?” He took the card and nodded, bowing low to her mother once more.

Nora couldn’t bear the thought of leaving her rescuer. She needed to speak to him, to find out more about what he knew about the phone and the note he’d found in the woods. “My father is bringing the car around—can we take you home, or offer you a meal—something?” He shook his head, and she realized that he had spent nearly a whole day looking after her. He might have put his job at the restaurant in jeopardy.

“Choum reap suor,” he said, bowing again. Nora joined her mother this time, pressing her palms together and repeating after him as her mother did: “Choum reap suor.”

When Tom Gavin pulled the car up in front of the Emergency Room entrance, he said: “We’re taking you home with us, Nora. No arguments.”

“None offered.”

As they turned onto John Ireland Boulevard near the Capitol, Nora’s phone began to chirp. She hoped it was Frank, but the voice on the phone was female, and worried.

“Nora, it’s Saoirse Donovan. I’m not quite sure how to tell you this—I’ve got a child here who says she’s your niece.”