Excerpt: The Pocket

He had blamed many a mishap and indiscretion on the bottle over the years, but he knew that this one wouldn’t be so easy to dismiss. What on earth could make him do such a thing? He struggled for an answer as the tears came and streamed uncontrollably down his face, but no answer would come. The reason why was simple. There simply wasn’t one to be found.

There was only an endless parade of heavy questions and morose ideas that seemed to have horns and tails. Liam knew he would never be able to face his daughter again… never. He had been ashamed enough to do so in the face of his constant failure to maintain steady employment, but now? This was something that could not be remedied. Somehow the fact that he had irrevocably lost his daughter’s love and respect was worse to Liam than anything heretofore could ever have been – his struggles with the bottle, his inability to handle his responsibilities as the head of the household, even sweet Maggie’s death and the resulting muteness of little Margery.

There was only one thing to be done, Liam thought to himself – one solution and one only – but he must do it quickly before Margery and Lucy awoke and began to go about their daily activities. He rose from the living room floor with new purpose, and made his way quietly into the bedroom he had shared with Maggie for so many years.

Everything on Maggie’s dressing table was exactly as she had left it except for the addition of the silken pocket the constable had brought to the house and placed in Liam’s hand. He’d come into this room and tossed it there as soon as the constable had left as if it were something metallic and red hot that was burning his hand, and he not been able to bring himself to touch it or retrieve the store of coins inside of it since – not even when the need for the drink had descended upon him like a hurricane and he had had no other coin upon his person. It was almost as if somehow he had known that gin was not the purpose to which this money was meant to be put. It was almost as if he had known, even then, that some other situation tied to some other need would eventually present itself.

He carefully and reverently lifted the pocket now, noticing it’s smooth, silky texture as well as the faint waft of Maggie’s perfume that still clung tentatively to the ribbons. Liam thought vaguely and briefly how powerful a memory trigger scent could be as he shook the small handful of coins into his palm. For a moment, it had been almost as if his Maggie were right there beside him, and then she was gone again just as quickly.

He quickly counted the coins that were now glittering in his cupped, shaking palm. Yes, that ought to be enough, he thought to himself with a weary nod. And with that he rose and made his way quietly out of the house. As he shut the front door soundlessly behind him, he breathed a sigh of relief that he had not woken his daughter and then allowed his feet to take him to his destination.

It was a cool morning despite the fact that the sky was clear and the sun was shining. It was almost as if the skies above London were as confused and full of contradictions as he was at this moment. How very appropriate and fitting that was. At that point, he allowed his mind to wander and remember better days – days when Maggie was alive and watching out for all of them. Surely nothing like last night would have ever happened with her around to keep harm out of the house. She had been the light that had guided all of them and without her? Without her, there was just no hope for anything anymore.

His thoughts came to an abrupt end when he saw the bright, apple-green door of Mooney and Sons appear at the end of the street and grow steadily nearer as his footsteps continued to convey him in its direction, seemingly of their own volition. He hadn’t been here in quite some time, although he had at one time been a regular customer, which he was reminded of upon hearing the familiar jingling of the bell Mooney kept attached to the door.

Although the memory was faint, he could still recall the days when he had at least a few possessions of his own that might be worth something to someone other than himself – the days when he had first began to prize the cool, smooth feeling of a gin bottle in his hand over the history and roots offered by family heirlooms and sentimental valuables.

“Top of the morning to you, good sir,” Mooney called merrily, greeting Liam from his usual spot behind the front counter. “What can I do for you this fine day?”

Although Liam did not agree that there was anything fine at all about this day – quite the opposite in fact – he approached the counter, looked around the small shop at the couple of customers actually out shopping at this hour, and leaned in close to Mooney before whispering, “Would you happen to have any pistols at this time, my good man?”

“Pistols,” repeated Mooney in a low, conspiratorial tone, already curious. “And what might you be needing a pistol for, if you don’t mind my being so bold as to ask?” If there was one thing every one of Mooney’s customers had in common, it was a story – a twisted tale as to why they were there in the first place.

His instincts told him that this tired-looking, scraggly, beaten-down man before him at this moment could be no different. Besides, the fellow looked mighty familiar. Yes… that was it. This was the poor Irishman that Mooney had watched take a slow dive into drunkenness a little at a time, giving away his treasures and the little bits of his pride away one by one. And then – just like that – he had been gone. Mooney had assumed the man had long ago drunk himself to death. Now that he found himself face to face with what almost seemed to be a pale ghost of the same man, he couldn’t help but wonder why he was seeing him again at long last after so many years.

“That’s me own business, sir, if you don’t mind my being so direct,” replied Liam. He did not want to share his true plans with the old shopkeeper, nor did he have the energy or the inclination to come up with a viable excuse to give as an alternative at this moment.

Mooney hesitated, toying with the idea of pressing on, and then decided against it. “Fair enough, my good man,” he said. “It just so happens that I do have a set of dueling pistols in stock at the moment.” And with that, Mooney stooped down with a small, involuntary grunt of discomfort due to the rheumatism in his knees, temporarily disappearing behind the counter. When he rose again, he had in his pudgy hands a handsome, if somewhat battered case that he promptly placed on the counter and opened to allow his customer to view the contents and see if they were to his liking. Not that he really thought it mattered. Those that came to Mooney and Sons in search of items like pistols were rarely doing so in hopes of obtaining a new heirloom in the family to pass on to their children.

“They’re a bit battered and old,” Mooney explained. “Been around the block a time or two, I suppose, but they’re still in working order, mind you. They even have a little compartment underneath still full of caps and good gunpowder. ”

“They’ll do,” said Liam as he gazed into the box at the dueling pistols. “As long as they’re in working order. How much do you want for them?”

“How much have you got?” Mooney asked in response. He knew darn well that the ones who came in looking for pistols didn’t tend to be particularly concerned with matters of price.

Liam reached into the inside pocket of his dirty, rumpled waistcoat and extracted the sundry collection of English coins – the coins some nameless man had decided his wife’s body was worth the night she died. He tiredly turned his palm over, allowing the coins to rattle and roll onto the counter and receive Mooney’s scrutiny.

Mooney stopped the coins in motion with one deft movement of his ham-like hands, and held them still in his huge, oversized palm as he counted them carefully. “Well, what do you know? That’s exactly enough!” He chuckled greedily and spirited the coins away into one of his many pockets.

“Well, that’s fortunate, I’m sure,” retorted Liam sarcastically. “What are the chances?”

“Slim to none, I’m sure,” replied Mooney. “And I guess that makes these yours.” With that, Mooney shut the lid of the case containing the two dueling pistols and pushed them gently across the counter in Liam’s direction.

Liam all but snatched them off of the counter and hid them inside the front of his jacket to the best of his ability, as the case was bigger than a man of his size could easily conceal. Quickly he muttered a brief, perfunctory word of thanks and walked briskly out of the shop into the cold London morning, the last one he would ever see.