“There’s nothing to these boats,” he said and switched on the engine. It purred like a good car, the Fibreglass not vibrating at all once it was running. “And there’s the gears — neutral, forward, neutral, reverse. There’s the anchor. And that’s the story. They’re as simple as a child’s toy. And still you’d grow horses’ ears with some of the things people manage to do to them. They crash them into bridges, get stuck in mudbanks, hit navigation signs, foul the propeller up with nylons, fall overboard. I’ll tell you something for nothing: anything that can be done your human being will do it. One thing you have to give to the Germans though is that they leave the boats shining. They spend the whole of the last day scrubbing up. But do you think your Irishman would scrub up? Not to save his life. Your Irishman is a pig,” he said. Only for the speech I’d not have noticed that he was by no means sober. “I’ve used this type of boat before, Michael,” she interrupted the flow. “They’re a lovely job. But — this shouldn’t have been done. The fridge is full, there’s wine, a bottle of whiskey.…”
“Mr Smith wanted everything to be right for yous. Mr Smith is a gentleman.”
Outside the misted windows the Shannon raced. When I wiped the port window clear the gleam of the water was barely discernible in the last lights.
“What’ll we do?” I asked. “Will we make a start or stay?”
“I’d hoped to make Carrick tonight,” she said.
“I think it’s too late. I think we should stay here tonight and leave at daybreak.”
“It’s the best thing ye can do,” Michael chorused.
I unscrewed the cap from the whiskey bottle in the fridge and poured three whiskeys.
“We’ll just have one drink here with Michael and then we’ll go and get the things out of the car. What kind of man is Mr Smith?’ I asked by way of conversation.
“A gentleman. The English are a great people to spend money. They’re pure innocent. But your Irishman’s a huar. The huar’d fleece you and boast about it to your face. Your Irishman is still in an emerging form of life.” The whiskey was large enough to have lasted a half-hour but he finished it in two gulps. When I poured him another drink he finished it too. Then, in case he’d settle in the boat for the rest of the evening, I suggested we should go back and have a last drink in the pub.
“I’ll stay,” she said as we went to leave. “I’ll check out the things on the boat, see what we need for the night, and I’ll join you later.”
“There’s no beating an intelligent woman,” Michael said as we climbed out of the boat.
“Do you live far from here?” I asked him over the whiskey and chaser I bought him in the bar.
“I’ve a few acres with some steers a mile or two out the road. There’s an auld galvanized thing on the place, and it does for the summer, the hay and that, but in the winter I live on one or other of the boats. It’s in the winter we do up the boats for the summer.”
“Who looks after the cattle?”
“A neighbour. I let him graze a few of his own on it and that keeps him happy. Before the boats started up I used to work here and there at carpentry. The wife was easy-going. She always gave me my head,” he joked since it was plain he had no wife at all.
It was with great difficulty he was prevented from buying her a large brandy when she joined us though she only wanted a soft drink. Afterwards he told us stories, all of them fluent. We only got away early by saying that in order to do the article we had to be on the move at first light. He caught both our hands at the wrist, murmuring, “Good people, good people. The best,” and making us promise several times to see him as soon as we got back. He got unsteadily to his feet to wave, “God bless,” as we went out. We got our things out of the car and went across to the boat.
“Well, that was a bit of local colour to start off with.”
“He was nice enough,” she said, “but he’s spoiled with the tourists.”
I was uneasy when she came into my arms in the boat. There was the pure pleasure of her body in the warmth, the sense of the race of water outside, the gentle resting movements of the boat, but I did not want to enter her.
“Why?” she protested.
“It’s just too dangerous.”
“According to the calendar I am back into the safe days.”
“It’s too risky.”
I felt her stiffen and recoil as I came outside and when I tried to touch her she angrily drew away, “You may be skilful but it’s not skilfulness I need. I would put a little warmth and naturalness and trust ahead of a thousand manuals but obviously that doesn’t rate very high in your book,” and she crossed to the other bunk. I could feel her anger in the close darkness but fought back the desire to appease it. I listened to the simple, swift flow of the water. All over the countryside dogs were barking, the barking starting up at different points, going silent, and then taken up again from a different point, like so many footnotes growing out of a simple text. Suddenly there was a loud banging of car doors, revving engines, horns, indistinct shouts in the night. The bars were closing. I must have been close to sleep for I did not notice her till she was kneeling by the bunk, her lips on mine.
“I’m sorry, love,” she said, “Let’s not do anything to spoil the trip.”
I took her in my arms. “I should be the sorry one. I want to but I’m afraid. In fact, there’s nothing I want more.”
“Goodnight, love. I’ve set the alarm for five.”
“Goodnight,” I said. “I hope you sleep well. You have a hard day tomorrow getting the article together.”
We got the boat away before it was quite light and the early morning mist didn’t look like rising. In the white mist and cold of morning, the boat beating steadily up the centre of the still water, the dead wheaten reeds on either side, occasional cattle and horses and the ghostly shapes of tree trunks and half-branches along the banks, there was a feeling of a dream, souls crossing to some other world. But the grey stone of the bridge of Garrick came solidly towards us out of the mist around eight. We tied the boat up, had a breakfast of fried eggs and bacon and scalding tea in a café by the bridge that had just opened. Afterwards we separated. She went about her business of collecting material for the article. I walked for an hour about the town, bought newspapers, and went back to read them on the boat. Nobody came by until she got back.
“I’m sorry,” she said as she climbed down into the boat.
“I was just reading the papers. Did you get everything you wanted?”
“Everything,” she flipped through notes and showed them like a trophy. “The people were wonderful. In fact, if anything, they were just too co-operative,” she jumped about like a girl. “We’re still ahead of time. In not much more than an hour we’ll be in that village I told you about.”
The wind had risen, blowing the mist away. The fields along the banks were all flooded, the river defined only by its two narrow lines of dead reeds. After about two miles we came out into a large lake, the waves rocking the boat; but when I turned the power up the boat, big enough to be comfortable on the sea, smashed through the waves. It was exciting to feel its chopping power. All this time she worked on her notes in the cabin. On the far side of the lake we joined the river again, passing between a black navigation sign and a red, the banks flooded for miles, the distance between the lines of reeds growing narrow. Soon, across the flooded fields the village came into view, goal posts upright in a football field, smoke rising from a few houses or shops scattered at random round a big bald ugly barn of a church.