—And why, asked O'Reilly, —did Cillian cry?
—O'Reilly? said Ocean.
—What?
—The pram moved before Cillian cried.
—Yes, said Saibhreas. —It's haunted, like you said.
Alina sat as the little girls told their mother about the wicked old lady and her pram full of kidnapped babies, and how the wicked old lady had pushed the pram all the way to Ireland.
—Enough, already, said O'Reilly.
She turned to Alina.
—That's some hardcore story-telling, Alina.
—She takes the skin off the babies, said Ocean.
—Who does? said O'Reilly. —Alina?
—No, said Saibhreas. —The old woman.
—My my, said O'Reilly. —And look at the fair Alina's skin. How red can red get?
Alina stared at the cold chicken on her plate. She felt the shock – O'Reilly's fingers on her cheek.
—Hot, said O'Reilly.
The little girls laughed.
—We'd better call a halt to the story, Alina, said O'Reilly. —It's getting under your skin.
The little girls laughed again.
The following morning, Alina pushed the pram along the promenade. She had not slept well. She had not slept at all. O'Reilly's fingers, Mr O'Reilly's foot – Alina had felt their presence all round her. She'd got up and torn a piece of paper from a notebook. She'd chewed the paper. Then she'd pushed the pulp into the keyhole of her bedroom door. She'd lain awake all night.
She walked. The wind was strong and pushed against the pram. It woke her up; it seemed to wash her skin. It was a warm wind. Gloves weren't necessary. But Alina wore her gloves.
The pram was haunted. O'Reilly had said so; she'd told her little daughters. Alina did not believe it. She knew her folklore. Prams did not haunt, and were never haunted. And yet, she did not wish to touch the pram. She did not want to see it move before her fingers reached it. She'd put on her gloves inside the house, before she'd lowered the baby into the pram. She did not want to touch it. Not even out here, in bright sunshine, away from walls and shadows.
The pram was not possessed. A dead rat could not bite, but Alina would wear gloves to pick one up. That was how it was with the pram. Today, it was a dead rat. Tomorrow, it would simply be a pram.
She took off one of her gloves. She stopped walking. The pram stayed still. Alina put her bare fingers on the handle. She waited. Nothing happened. She felt the wind rock the pram on its springs. But the pram did not move backwards or forwards.
She removed her other glove. She pushed the pram. She pushed it to the wooden bridge, and back. She would continue her story that afternoon, despite O'Reilly's command. She would plant the most appalling nightmares and leave the little imps in the hands of their foul mother.
And then she would leave.
She pushed the pram with her bare hands. But, all the time, and all the way, she felt she was being watched. She put the gloves back on. She was watched. She felt it – she knew it – on her face and neck, like damp fingers.
—One night, Alina said that afternoon, —the old lady left her lair in the park and made her way to a tree-lined street.
—Our street has trees, said Ocean.
Outside, the wind cracked a branch. The little girls moved closer to Alina.
7
Alina looked down at the little girls.
—The old lady crept along the tree-lined street, she said. —She hid behind the very expensive cars. The SUVs. This is what they are called?
The little girls nodded.
—And the Volvos, said Alina. —And – the Beemers.
Alina watched the little girls look at each other.
—She looked through windows where the velvet curtains had not yet been drawn.
Alina watched the girls look at the window. She had left the velvet curtains open.
She heard the gasp, and the scream.
—The curtains!
—I saw her!
Alina did not look. She leaned down and placed her hands beneath the little girls' chins.
—Through one such window, said Alina, —the old lady saw a bargain.
Alina held the chins. She forced the girls to look at her. She stretched her leg – she had earlier measured the distance from foot to pram – and raised her foot to the wheel.
—She saw two girls.
They heard the creak.
The little girls screamed. And so did Alina. She had not touched the wheel. The pram had moved before her foot had reached it.
Alina almost vomited. She felt the pancakes, the nalesniki she had earlier made and eaten, and the sour cream; she could taste them as they rushed up to her throat. Her eyes watered. She felt snails of cold sweat on her forehead. The little girls screamed. And Alina held their chins. She tightened her grip. She felt bone and shifting tongues. She could feel their screams in her hands. And the pram continued to move. Slowly, slowly, off the rug, across the wooden floor.
Alina held the faces.
—Two little girls, she said. —And, such was her wicked joy, she did not wait until they slept.
The pram crept on. It rolled nearer to the window. She heard the baby. She watched his waking rock the pram.
—The old lady found an open window, said Alina.
The baby screeched. And then other babies screeched. There was more than one baby in the pram.
The girls screamed, and urinated. And, still, Alina told her story.
—Through the window she slid. And through the house she sneaked.
The pram was at the window. The screeching shook the window glass.
—She found the girls quite easily.
The girls were squirming, trying to free their jaws from Alina's big fingers, and trying to escape from the wet rug beneath them. But Alina held them firm. She ignored their fingernails on her neck and cheeks.
—She had her sharp knife with her, said Alina. —She would cut the little girls. And she would take their skin, while their mother neglected them. Far, far away, in her Beemer.
But their mother wasn't far, far away in her Beemer. She was at the door, looking at her daughters and Alina.
—Hell-oh! she roared. —HELL-oh!
The pram stopped rocking. The little girls stopped screaming. And Alina stopped narrating.
O'Reilly stepped into the room. She turned on the light.
—She frightened us, said Ocean.
The girls escaped from Alina's grip. They shuffled backwards, off the rug.
—She hurt us, Mummy.
—We don't like her.
Alina took her hands down from her face. There was blood on her fingertips. She could feel the scratches, on her cheeks and neck.
She looked up.
The girls were gone; she could hear them on the stairs. She was alone with O'Reilly and the screaming baby. O'Reilly held the baby and made soft, soothing noises. She rocked the baby gently and walked in a small circle around the rug. The baby's screams soon lessened, and ceased. O'Reilly continued to make soft noises, and it was some time before Alina realised that, amid the kisses and whispers, O'Reilly was giving out to her.
—My fucking rug, she cooed. —Have you any idea how much it cost? There, there, good boy.
—I am sorry, said Alina.
—What the fuck were you doing, Alina?
Alina looked at the pram. It was against the wall, beside the window. It was not moving.
—The pram is haunted, said Alina.
—It's haunted because I said it's haunted, said O'Reilly. —I told the girls the bloody thing was haunted, to keep them away from the baby when he was born.
—But it is haunted, said Alina. —It has nothing to do with the lies you told your daughters.
—Excuse me?
—I saw it move, said Alina. —Here.
She stamped her foot. She stood up.
—Here, she said. —I saw. And I heard. More babies.
—Jesus, said O'Reilly. —The sooner you find a
peasant or something to knock you up the better.
—I felt their eyes, said Alina.
—Enough, said O'Reilly.
—Many times, said Alina, —I have felt their eyes. I know now. There are babies in the pram.
—Look at me, Alina, said O'Reilly.
Alina looked.
—Are you listening? said O'Reilly.
—Yes, said Alina.
—You're sacked.
8
O'Reilly wondered if Alina had heard her. She was facing O'Reilly, but her eyes were huge and far away.
—Do you understand that, Alina?
—Yes.
—You're fired.
Alina nodded.
—As of now, said O'Reilly.
—Yes.
—You can stay the night, then off you fucking go.
—Yes.
—Stop saying Yes, Alina, said O'Reilly.
But she wasn't looking at Alina now. She was searching for a phone number and balancing the baby on her shoulder as she walked over to the window and the pram.
—I'll have to stay home tomorrow, said O'Reilly. —So, fuck you, Alina, and life's complications.
She gently slid the baby from her shoulder and, her hands on his bum and little head, she lowered him into the cradle of the pram.
She heard the scream.
—No!
—Fuck off, Alina, said O'Reilly.
She didn't turn, or lift her face from the pram. She kissed the baby's forehead and loosely tucked the edges of his quilt beneath the mattress.
She stood up. She looked down at her son.
—There's only one baby in there, Alina.
She had the phone to her ear. She began to speak.
—Conor? she said. —It's O'Reilly. We have to cancel tomorrow's meeting. Yes. No. My Polish peasant. Yes; again. Yes. Yes. A fucking nightmare. You can? I'll suck your cock if you do. Cool. Talk to you.
O'Reilly brought the phone down from her ear at the same time that Alina brought the poker down on O'Reilly's head. The poker was decorative, and heavy. It had never been used, until now. The first blow was sufficient. O'Reilly collapsed with not much noise, and her blood joined the urine on the rug.
Mr O'Reilly was inserting his door-key into the lock when Alina opened the front door.
—Alina, he said. —Bringing Cillian for a stroll?
—Yes, she said.
—Excellent.
He helped her bring the pram down the granite steps.
—Is he well wrapped up in there? said Mr O'Reilly. —It's a horrible evening.
—Yes, said Alina.
—And yourself, he said. —Have you no coat?
He looked at her breasts, beneath her Skinni Fit T-shirt, and thought how much he'd like to see them when she returned after a good walk in the wind and rain.
Alina did not answer.
—I'll leave you to it, he said. —Where's O'Reilly?
—In the playroom, said Alina.
—Fine, said Mr O'Reilly. —See you when you get back.
Alina turned left, off her usual path, and brought the pram down a lane that ran behind the houses. It was dark there, and unpleasant. The ground wasn't properly paved or, if it was, the surface was lost under years of dead leaves, dumped rubbish and dog shit. But Alina stayed on the lane, away from streetlights and detection. She pushed straight into darkness and terror. She held her arms stiff, to keep the pram as far from her as possible. And, yet, she felt each shudder and jump, each one a screaming, shuddering baby.
At the end of the lane, another lane, behind the pub and Spar. Alina stayed in this lane, which brought her to another. And another. This last one was particularly dreadful. The ground was soft, and felt horribly warm at her ankles. She pushed hard, to the lane's end and fresh air. The sea was now in front of her. Alina couldn't hide.
She knew what she had to do.
But now she wasn't pushing. The wind shook the pram, filled the hood, and lifted it off the ground. She heard the cries – the pram landed on its wheels, just a few centimetres ahead, and continued on its course. Alina had to run behind it, pulling it back, as the infant ghosts, their murderers or demons – she did not know – perhaps their spirit parents, she did not know, as all of them tried to wrench the pram from her. She heard the wails, and under, through them all, she heard the cries of the baby, Gillian. Her adorable, intelligent Cillian. Now gone, murdered by the murdered infants.
She refused to feel the cold. She didn't pause to rub the rain from her eyes. She held onto the pram and its wailing evil, and she pulled and pushed the length of the promenade, a journey of two kilometres, to her goal, the wooden bridge, the bridge out to the strange island.
They found her in the sludge. She was standing up to her thighs in the ooze and seaweed. She was trying to push the pram still deeper into the mud. They found the baby – they found only one baby. The quilt had saved him. He lay on it, on top of the mud. The tide was out, but coming back. The water was starting to fill and swallow the quilt. They lifted the baby and the struggling woman onto the bridge. They left the pram in the rising water.
Home to Harlem
1
He can't find himself on the registration form.
—Excuse me?
—Honey?
—There's nowhere for me to tick. Here.
He points to the section on the form.
The woman looks at him. She looks over her glasses.
—African-American, she says.
—I'm not American, he says.
—You sure? she says
—Yeah, he says. —Yes.
She takes the form from him. She looks at the categories – White, Non-Hispanic; African-American; Hispanic, the rest – and she looks at him.
—Well, she says. —What are you?
—Irish, he says.
He's three days gone. Three days in New York. His name is Declan and he's buzzing. He's been up on the Empire State Building, he's been zinging around on the subway, he's been in Starbucks on the corner of Lenox Avenue and 125th Street. Harlem. He still can't get over it. He's been in Harlem. He's walked past the Apollo, he's bought a T-shirt in the Footlocker. Cheap too, great fuckin' value.