In the Woods

"But the motorway." Sam rubbed his hands over his face. "I can't think straight… If I say nothing, that motorway'll go through, over all the archaeological stuff. For no good reason."

"It'll do that anyway. If you go to the papers, the government will just say, 'Oops, sorry about that, too late to move it,' and go on their merry way."

"You think so?"

"Well, yes," I said. "Frankly."

"And Katy," he said. "That's what we're supposed to be about

. What if Andrews hired someone to kill her? Do we just let him get away with it?"

"I don't know," I said. I wondered how long he was planning to stay there.

We sat in silence for a while. The people in the next apartment were having a dinner party or something: I could hear a jumble of happy voices, Kylie on the stereo, a girl calling coquettishly, "I did tell you, I so did!" Heather banged on the wall; there was a moment's silence, then an outburst of half-muffled laughter.

"Do you know what my first memory is?" Sam said. The lamplight shadowed his eyes and I couldn't tell what expression he wore. "The day Red got into the Dáil. I was only a little lad, maybe three or four, but we all came up to Dublin to walk him in, the whole family. It was a gorgeous day, sunny. I had a new little suit on me. I wasn't sure what had happened exactly, but I knew it was important. Everyone looked so happy, and my dad…he was glowing, he was so proud. He put me up on his shoulders so I could see, and he shouted, 'That's your uncle, son!' Red was up on the steps, waving and smiling, and I yelled, 'That man's my uncle!' and everyone laughed, and he winked at me… We've still got the photo, on the sitting-room wall."

There was another silence. It occurred to me that Sam's father might just possibly be less shocked by his brother's exploits than Sam expected, but I decided this would provide dubious comfort at best.

Sam pushed back his hair again. "And there's my house," he said. "You know I own my house, right?"

I nodded. I had a feeling I knew where this was going.

"Yeah," he said. "It's a nice house-four bedrooms and all. I was only looking for an apartment, like. But Red said…you know, for when I've a family. I didn't think I could afford anything decent, but he…yeah." He cleared his throat again, a sharp unsettling sound. "He introduced me to the fella building the estate. He said they were old friends, the guy would give me a good deal."

"Well," I said, "he did. There's not much you can do about it now."

"I could sell the house, for the price I got it. To some young couple who'll never get a place any other way."

"Why?" I said. This conversation was starting to frustrate me. He was like a big earnest bewildered Saint Bernard, gamely struggling to do his duty in the midst of a blizzard that made every laborious step completely useless. "Self-immolation's a nice gesture, but it doesn't usually achieve very much."

"Don't know the word," Sam said wearily, reaching for his glass. "But I get the idea. You're saying I should leave it."

"I don't know what you should do," I said. A wave of fatigue and nausea enveloped me. God, I thought, what a week. "I'm probably the last person to ask. I just don't see the point of making a martyr of yourself and ditching your home and your career when it won't do anyone any good. You didn't do anything wrong. Right?"

Sam looked up at me. "Right," he said softly, bitterly. "I did nothing wrong."

* * *

Cassie wasn't the only one who was losing weight. It had been well over a week since I had eaten an actual meal, with food groups and everything, and I had been vaguely aware that when I was shaving I had to maneuver the razor into new little hollows around my jawline; but it wasn't until I was taking off my suit that night that I realized it was hanging off my hipbones and sagging away from my shoulders. Most detectives either lose or gain some weight during a big investigation-Sam and O'Gorman were both starting to look a little bulky around the middle from too much snatched junk food-and I'm tall enough that this is seldom noticeable, but if this case went on for much longer, I was going to have to buy new suits or go around looking like Charlie Chaplin.

This is what not even Cassie knows: the year I was twelve, I was a big kid. Not one of those featureless spherical children you see waddling down the street on preachy news segments about the moral inferiority of modern youth; in photos I just look sturdy, a little chunky maybe, tall for my age and horribly uncomfortable, but I felt monstrous and lost: my own body had betrayed me. I had shot up and out until it was unrecognizable to me, some hideous practical joke I had to carry around every moment of every day. It didn't help that Peter and Jamie looked exactly like they always had: longer in the leg, all their baby teeth gone, but still slight and light and invincible as ever.