The Empire Trilogy Read Free Page B

retrieved his own and scratched his head with it. “By the way, I’m Ripon. I expect you’ve heard about me.”
    â€œAs a matter of fact I haven’t.”
    â€œOh? Well, I’m Angela’s brother.”
    Angela, who recorded her life in detail, had never mentioned having a brother. Disconcerted, the Major followed Ripon out of the station and threw his suitcase, which Ripon had not offered to carry, on to the back of the waiting trap before climbing up after it. Ripon took the reins, shook them, and they lurched off down a winding unpaved street. He was wearing, the Major noted, a well-cut tweed suit that needed pressing; he could also have done with a clean collar.
    â€œThis is Kilnalough,” Ripon announced awkwardly after they had ridden in silence for a while. “A wonderful little town. A splendid place, really.”
    â€œI suppose you’ve lived here some time,” the Major said, trying to account for Ripon’s absence from his sister’s letters. “I mean, you haven’t recently returned from abroad?”
    â€œAbroad?” Ripon glanced at him suspiciously. “Not really, no. I’m afraid I haven’t.” He cleared his throat. “I suppose the smell of the place seems strange to you, turf-smoke and cows and so on.” He added: “I know Angela’s looking forward to seeing you. I mean, we all are...jolly pleased.”
    The Major looked round at the whitewashed walls and slate roofs of Kilnalough; here and there, silent men and women stood in doorways or sat on doorsteps watching them pass. One or two of the older men touched their caps.
    â€œIt’s a splendid town,” repeated Ripon. “You’ll soon get used to it. On the right a little farther down is the Munster and Leinster Bank...on the left O’Meara’s grocery and then the fish shop, we’re near the sea, you know...beyond, where the street bends, is the chapel of Our Lady Queen of Heaven, fish-eater, of course...and then there’s O’Connell’s, the second best pork-butcher’s...” Curiously, however, they passed none of these places. The Major, at least, could see no trace of them.
    They were now on the outskirts of Kilnalough; here there was little to see except a few wretched stone cottages with ragged, barefoot children playing in front of them, hens picking among the refuse, an odour of decaying vegetation in the air. Reaching the top of an incline they saw the dull sparkle of the sea above a quilt of meadows and hedges. The smell of brine hung heavily in the air.
    Abruptly Ripon was in good spirits, almost jubilant (perhaps even a little drunk? wondered the Major) and kept recognizing landmarks of his childhood. Pointing at the middle of a flat, empty field he told the Major that that was where he had flown his first kite; in a hawthorn hedge he had once shot a rabbit as big as a bulldog; in the barn over there he had had a rewarding experience with the peasant girl who in those days used to be cast in the role of the Virgin Mary every year for the Christmas pageant mounted by Finnegan’s Drapery Limited...and yes, in the copse that lay on the other side of the barn young Master Ripon, watched by all the servants and all “the quality” from miles around, had been daubed with the blood of the fox (a not dissimilar experience, he added cryptically)...and on this very road...
    Not far away the two massive, weatherworn gateposts of the Majestic rose out of the impenetrable foliage that lined the sea side of the road. As they passed between them (the gates themselves had vanished, leaving only the skeletons of the enormous iron hinges that had once held them) the Major took a closer look: each one was surmounted by a great stone ball on which a rain-polished stone crown was perched slightly askew, lending the gateposts a drunken, ridiculous air, like solemn men in paper hats. To the right of the drive stood what had once