Conor and I move away from the wall and look up to see Dermot peering over the edge of the roof, wearing a yellow hard hat.
‘Let me assure you, Dermot, if I’d had any idea you were within earshot I’d have kept my thoughts well and truly to myself.’
I turn back to Conor and shake my head in annoyance.
‘Just letting you know we’re up here,’ Dermot continues from the roof. ‘To what do we owe the honour, Darcy? Did you get bored
doing your desk job?’
‘I’m going to take off,’ Conor says, kissing me on the cheek. ‘I can see where this is heading; you and Dermot obviously have
things you need to
discuss
.’
‘But—’ I protest, as I watch him bound off down the hill. I look up at Dermot.
Right.
I march away from the cottage so I can see fully up on top
of the roof. Paddy is balanced on the tiles wearing jeans ripped at the knee, his DM boots, a Gorillaz t-shirt and, like Dermot,
a yellow hard hat. Dermot is wearing his usual attire of jeans, heavy boots and a heavy cotton shirt – today it’s checked.
‘Yo, Darcy, it’s a great view from up here,’ Paddy calls. Seeing me for the first time, he precariously tries to stand up
on the roof. ‘I’m king of the world, so I am. From up here I can see for miles.’
‘You’ll be king of your own coffin in a minute if you fall off this roof,’ Dermot grumbles, turning around to look at him.
‘Now sit back down and try and replace that tile like I showed you. I’m going down to see Darcy for a minute. The ladder’s
over the other side,’ Dermot says for my benefit, gesturing across the roof.
I walk around to the other side of the cottage to find Dermot swinging his leg over the top of a ladder that is propped up
against the wall, and beginning to climb down. ‘Loose tiles,’ he states matter-of-factly as he jumps down the final couple
of rungs. ‘Least he’ll know how to replace them in future.’
As irritated as Dermot makes me much of the time, this is one aspect of his character I like. ‘I’ve noticed you’ve been teaching
Paddy quite a lot since he arrived.’
Dermot shrugs as he brushes some dirt from his hands. ‘The lad’s keen to learn, when he stops messing about. I don’t mind
showing him.’
I wonder if Dermot secretly yearns to have someone to pass all his knowledge on to, and I’m reminded of the photo of the young
girl in Dermot’s cottage again. Who is she? I still haven’t found out. He never mentions any family, and I wonder if he
ever sees this little girl any more. ‘You’re very good with Paddy.’ I smile at Dermot. ‘You seem to have a way with him. In
fact, you’ve got everyone working really well together.’ I try and swallow my pride and my annoyance for a moment. ‘It’s a
brilliant team we’ve got here on Tara, now. I don’t think I could have brought everyone together like you have.’
‘Like I’ve said before, Darcy, you’ve got to make it clear from the start how things are going to be. People will respect
you for that in the long run.’
I nod in agreement, but I can’t quite admit out loud that he’s been right. That would just bring on one of those self-satisfied
looks from Dermot that I just can’t bear.
‘So,’ Dermot asks, ‘did you want me for something in particular?’
‘I was just coming to see how you were getting on.’
Dermot nods approvingly ‘Extremely well. As with all my projects, it will be completed on schedule and you’ll have five more
cottages ready to receive visitors, just as you requested.’
Pity you’re not in charge of getting the visitors here too, I think to myself. Maybe I’d have more of a success rate then.
‘You’ve all done a brilliant job, Dermot, thank you.’
Dermot glances at me in surprise. ‘Have you got many bookings through yet?’ he asks, beginning to gather up a few tools that
are lying around on the grass.
‘That depends what you mean by bookings. There have been a few enquiries.’
‘How many, exactly?’ Dermot sticks a hammer in his tool belt and some loose nails in his pocket.
‘Two.’
‘What, two actual bookings?’
‘No, two enquiries.’
Dermot swivels around to face me. With the sun lighting him from behind, he looks a bit like a big tough cowboy with guns
hanging either side of his hips in a holster, except with Dermot it’s his tools hanging off his belt, and instead of a Stetson
it’s the yellow plastic hard hat he’s wearing. ‘You have no actual bookings yet?’
‘No, but it’s virtually impossible from here to do anything more than list the cottages with a holiday lettings agency. If
I had internet access, this would all be so much easier,’ I sigh.
‘Why?’
‘Because then I could set up my own website for the island, and receive email enquiries. I could have a Facebook page and
Tweet about it and, oh, Dermot, the possibilities are endless with the internet.’
‘Are they indeed?’ Dermot sounds unconvinced. ‘Unfortunately, the internet is something you don’t have the luxury of here,
so you’re going to have to think of something else.’
I stare at him. Couldn’t he at least sound sympathetic for once?
‘What’s that look for?’ Dermot demands. ‘Do you expect me to try and dream up marketing ideas for you as well as do all this?’
‘But … ’ I begin.
‘And it’s not like we’ve exactly seen much of you over here, have we?’ Dermot continues before I can even try and tell him
how much I’ve appreciated what he’s done. ‘How many brushes have you lifted over the last few weeks, Darcy, that haven’t been
for your hair?’
My eyes narrow as my patience thins. That’s below the belt, even for someone wearing such a boring one as Dermot. ‘That’s
not fair, and you know it. I’ve been busy doing other stuff.’
‘Other stuff that doesn’t risk chipping your nail polish?’
‘For your information, Dermot, I haven’t actually painted my nails since I got here, see?’ I thrust my hand in Dermot’s face.
Dermot pretends to examine my nails, then screws up his nose disdainfully. ‘Bit of a mess, aren’t they?’
I snatch my hand away. ‘I can’t win with you, can I? I’m going to go now, before I disturb your busy work schedule any further.
I’m so sorry to have bothered you with my very minor issues.’ I march furiously away before he can wind me up any further.
That man, he’s insufferable!
But as I descend back along the path, I begin to feel myself grow calm much more quickly than I usually do after I’ve had
‘words’ with Dermot. Maybe it’s because I’m breathing so heavily and taking great big gulps of fresh sea air down into my
lungs as I walk back to my cottage. But I also begin to wonder if it’s anything to do with the fact that my fist is gripped
very tightly around not the giant bar of chocolate in my coat pocket, but what’s sitting in the pocket of my jeans. The little
pink stone.
Later that afternoon, I’m sitting at my desk gazing out of the front window of my cottage still wondering how on earth I’m
going to get people to visit this island when I can’t advertise it properly. What’s the point in even putting ads in papers
or magazines, if people can’t get an immediate response to their enquiry by phone or email? No one has the patience for ‘snail
mail’ any more. Factoring in the boat trips, the whole process will probably take about a fortnight, if I’m lucky. We should
probably rename our postal service ‘whale mail’, instead.
There’s a knock at the door.
‘It’s open, come on in.’
I swivel my chair around to see Paddy appear at my office door.
‘Hey, Paddy, did you get the roof fixed?’
‘Yeah, had to, or I don’t reckon Dermot would have let me off till I finished the job proper.’
I smile. That sounds about right.
‘But he’s OK. He’s teaching me plenty.’
‘I know, and you’ll learn a lot from him, he’s very clever. So, what can I do for you?’
‘I couldn’t help hearin’ what you two were talkin’ about when I was on the roof back there, earlier. About the cottages and
advertising and stuff, and I heard you say you could do with the internet.’
‘Yes, that right.’ I look wistfully at my trusty laptop sitting on the desk behind me. Since I’ve been here it’s only really
been used by Niall, for timetables and financial spreadsheets. I almost feel like I’m letting it down by not allowing it to
be put to its full use.
‘Only Eamon’s got a computer, see, and I wondered if he could get the internet on it.’
I open my eyes wide and stare at Paddy.
What did he just say?
‘Paddy, did you just say Eamon’s got a computer?’
‘Yeah, I clocked it the other day when I was walking Brogan up near Eamon’s place. She got caught in some brambles growing
up the side of his cottage, and when I untangled her I just happened to take a gander in one of Eamon’s windows, and that’s
when I saw it.’
‘A computer?’ I ask doubtfully. ‘At Eamon’s? Are you sure?’
Paddy raises his dark eyebrows and looks reproachfully at me. ‘I may not know how to fix tiles on a roof, Darcy, but sure
I know what a computer looks like.’
‘Yes, of course you do. But why would Eamon of all people have a computer?’
‘I don’t know,’ Paddy shrugs. ‘Why don’t you just ask him?’
Paddy’s answers, although sometimes simple, are always refreshingly straightforward. I smile at him. ‘I might just do that.
It’s about time I took the dogs for a walk, anyway.’
‘Can I come too, and bring Brogan? Much as I love learning the tricks of the trade from Dermot, he was mentioning something
about us putting ballcocks into the cisterns this afternoon, and I’m sorry but,’ Paddy pulls a face, ‘that just sounds wrong
to me, Darcy.’
I laugh. ‘Sure, you can come. It would be good for us to have some company, and while we’re out maybe Brogan can teach my
two terrors how to behave.’
We head over to Eamon’s cottage together. As our three dogs bound about in front of us as we walk, I’m pleasantly surprised
that Paddy and I find lots to chat about along the way – Tara, Dermot, Paddy’s life back at the hotel with Mary, and I’m also
surprised at the frequency with which Niall’s name crops up among all these subjects. For two such opposites, they seem to
have hit it off extremely well and become great friends already. When we finally arrive in front of Eamon’s cottage, we find
the curtains are drawn and there’s no sign of life.
Paddy walks over to one of the windows. ‘This is where the computer was.’ He presses his face to the window to see if he can
see through the curtains.
‘Anything?’ I ask.
‘Nope,’ Paddy peels his face away from the window. ‘Nothing’s getting through there.’
We wander around the cottage to see if there are any other visible ways to see inside, but all the windows are barricaded
shut.
What has Eamon got stored in there, and why doesn’t he want us to see it?
‘Nothing left for it, then,’ Paddy says.
‘Go back?’ I say, beginning to turn around.
‘No.’ Paddy shakes his head as though I’m being really dumb. ‘Break in!’ he announces, his eyes lighting up.
‘We can’t just break in to Eamon’s cottage!’
‘Why ever not?’ Paddy asks in amazement. ‘It’s not like we’re going to steal anything. We just want to have a look.’
‘It’s Eamon’s private property. It’s not right.’
‘Ah-ha.’ Paddy knowingly holds up his finger. ‘But who owns the island now?’
‘I do, but—’
‘And therefore, in theory, who owns all the property that is built on Tara?’
‘Me, I suppose … No, Paddy,’ I say, sternly holding up my own finger now, ‘that still doesn’t make it all right to break into
someone else’s home.’
‘All right, it’s your choice. But I could have you in and out of there in five minutes flat, and no one would ever know we’d
been here.’
For a split second I’m tempted. But I shake my head. ‘I’m in no doubt you could have, Paddy. But no; I’ll wait and ask Eamon
when I see him.’
‘Ask me what?’
We both spin around to find Eamon standing a few metres away from us. ‘Well?’ he asks as he walks towards us, his walking
stick gripped tightly in his right hand. ‘What’s your question, Darcy?’
‘Er … ’ I stare wildly at Paddy.
Paddy turns away and starts whistling.
I turn back to Eamon. ‘You see, the thing is, Eamon, I … I was just wondering if you had a computer in your cottage, that’s
all.’
Eamon is startled for a moment, but recovers his composure quickly.
‘Now what would I be needing one of those contraptions for?’
‘I don’t really know. So are you saying you don’t have one, then?’
‘Now did I actually say that, Darcy?’
Did he? Now I was getting confused.
I turn to Paddy again.
Paddy rolls his eyes and shakes his head. ‘I saw you the other day, Eamon, when I was up here with Brogan. Sitting in that
window you was, clear as day.’
Eamon nods.
‘So you
do
have a computer?’ I ask, my eyes wide.
Eamon nods again. ‘I cannot tell a lie.’
‘But why?’
Eamon smiles. ‘And why ever shouldn’t I have one, Darcy? Just because you might think of me as some old codger doesn’t mean
I can’t work a few buttons on an oversized calculator.’
‘Can we see it?’ If Eamon’s computer is able to hook up to the internet, I might have half a chance at some form of contact
with the outside world. Visions of emails, Facebook and Twitter flash through my head, and then the Holy Grail … internet
shopping.
‘Sure,’ Eamon says, heading towards his cottage. I make a move to follow him but he turns back. ‘You’ll be fine here. I’ll
be right back.’
I turn and frown at Paddy. How can we see the computer if we wait outside?
Eamon emerges a few moments later with a very modern-looking, state-of-the-art laptop. I don’t know why, but when Paddy had
said he’d seen Eamon at a computer I’d imagined him at a huge old desktop PC, with a box-screen monitor and a big old grinding
hard drive.
‘There now,’ Eamon opens up the lid and shows me the inside. ‘What’s so special about that?’
‘Nothing, I … I mean, it’s a nice laptop, Eamon. Does it do much?’
Paddy sighs impatiently. ‘What Darcy is trying to say is, do you use it for the internet?’