Lake of Sorrows

“Well—thanks, Charlie. I’m grateful for your help.” She could feel the workmen’s eyes upon them, and understood that all poor Charlie Brazil wanted was to be shut of her as quickly as possible. “I’m afraid I have to ask another favor. Could you point me toward the manager’s office?”

“Over there,” he said, indicating a single-story pebble-dashed building about fifty yards away.

“Right,” she said. “Thanks again.” Heading toward the manager’s office, she heard a leering voice behind her inquire: “What’d you do for the lady, Charlie?” There was an unsettling chorus of sniggers, and Charlie Brazil’s deep voice muttered darkly: “Ah, feck off and leave me alone, why don’t you?”

2

There was no one at reception inside the manager’s office. Nora considered ringing Cormac to let him know she’d arrived safely, but decided against it. She wanted to put off talking to him as long as she could. Her emotions were too much in turmoil. A small sign on the nearest wall bore a single word, “Toilet,” and an arrow pointing to her left down a short hallway, so she ducked in to have a look in the mirror. It was a shock: her eyes were horribly bloodshot, and her insides felt rubbed raw. Bits of peat dust clung to her hair and eyebrows, and to the tear tracks that lined her cheeks. No wonder Charlie Brazil had looked at her so strangely. What a fine state for meeting the brass here. She brushed as much of the peat from her hair as she could, and splashed her eyes with cold water, which stung as much as the dust had. As she dried her face on the cloth towel, the door swung open, and Nora stood face-to-face with a vigorous, casually dressed man of about forty, whose expression betrayed astonishment and a certain amount of suspicion. Perhaps she hadn’t paid close attention to the sign and had accidentally wandered into the gents’ by mistake.

“Sorry if I’m somewhere I shouldn’t be,” she said. “I got caught in a windstorm out on the bog, and I was just trying to get a bit of the dust off before I found the manager.”

“You’ve found him,” the man said.

“You’re Owen Cadogan?”

“I am,” he replied. “And you are…”

“Nora Gavin. I’m here for the bog body excavation.” Surely he’d known she was coming down from Dublin. “I think you spoke with Niall Dawson at the National Museum—he said he’d explained all the arrangements.” A subtle change came over Cadogan’s demeanor; she thought it safe to surmise that the Dr. Gavin he’d expected was neither female nor American.

“Ah, right, Dr. Gavin. You’re early.” He ushered her down the hall toward his office. “We’re not expecting the museum crowd until later in the day. Anyway, sorry you were caught out there in the dust. Been dry as a desert here for two weeks, and that’s one of the rare hazards of fine weather.”

“I’ve never seen anything quite like it. But one of the workmen was kind enough to make sure I got here in one piece—Charlie Brazil?”

“Ah, yes,” Cadogan said, with a grimace that suggested she ought to consider giving Mr. Brazil a wide berth in future.

“I have to admit the gas mask had me rather taken aback at first.”

“Ah, he’s all right,” Cadogan said. “Bit of a quare hawk, Charlie is—an oddball.” He led her back through reception and into his tiny office, where he gestured for her to have a seat. The place reminded Nora of her auto mechanic’s office at home with its practical, no-frills atmosphere, its metal desk and uncomfortable vinyl chairs. “Afraid I’m fending for myself here at the moment,” Cadogan said. “The girl’s out sick today. Can I get you a cup of tea—or coffee, is it?”

Cadogan gave the impression that he was a very busy man: the quick gestures, the eyes that never settled in one place for too long. Whether consciously or not, he gave Nora the distinct impression that she was keeping him from duties much more important and necessary than her comfort. But breakfast had been three hours ago, and she realized that she was actually quite hungry. “Tea would be great.”

“Won’t be a minute.” He ducked out of the room, and Nora tried to put a finger on what she sensed about him. Brisk, businesslike, still stirred by ambition—but on the cusp of forty, when a lot of men began to feel themselves softening into middle age, and to wonder why it was that the responsible job and the family and the new house weren’t enough to keep them from feeling somehow anesthetized inside. A dangerous age.