‘The guards were up in the yard today’.

‘They were?’

Two pints of stout settled into uniform darkness with cream caps firming up. Each was watched with an anticipation, attentive for the right moment. Two men sat in predetermined places. High wooden stools side by side, tight up to the bar for support. One was red-faced from the elements, mostly bald with untended stray hairs. The other’s face was etched in earthy ridges, a worn grey mop above reaching down to bushy brows.

‘It’s that aircraft, always said there was something dodgy about it’.

‘Out of place, no doubt of it, hardly any crime in that though’.

‘Stolen goods apparently’.

Mine was a frothing yellow lager. While I was still to be acknowledged as a fixture, it was far from my first time in the place. The idleness or, sometimes just the quiet in the house, brought me in. Hard to pass the time when reared to use it. Even over my pint, I have to fight that urge to do, if only a sudoku puzzle. I watched them in the mirror, they were partly hidden by the patchwork of bottles built up in front. Not just meandering curiosity to pass the time, my attention was piqued.

That plane was a feature of my daily circuit. Past the grotto, up through the tail end of the woods, and out along the road towards the sea. A view of stubbled barley, remnants of summer gold, and an expansive sheen of heaving blue, gave way at the bend. The metal hulk of a green biplane took over, a dirty white stripe down its side, steel struts spread to stand resolute on the crest. The twisted remains of a propeller, a circular stack of engine plates, and a dirt spattered windshield reached for the sky.

‘Says he bought it fair and square from a reputable dealer, nothing to hide. It was up there in the open for anyone to see’.

‘Sure he had it shown off in the festival parade over in the village last summer. He even got a prize for it’.

‘He’ll have paid good money down the proverbial sounds like.’

Two pints were raised deliberately, studied with near reverence, and tipped with measured care. Identical hands grasped each one, bulky testaments to past labours, cut with a tracery of soil ingrained lines. The glasses were set back on the counter, a rim of froth left along the upper lip of each man. Two men from the same mould, they settled easily into the embrace of the stout.

‘Taken from a couple over Mealagh valley way, on four acres up there where all them old tombs are’.

‘Not easy, to steal away with an aircraft. You’d need time and equipment for that’.

‘They’re off in Australia for the while, husband’s from out there. There was no one left to watch over it’.

My glass is half drained, lager flows quicker than the stout it seems. Dried purple veins, and translucent paper skin on the hand that cradled it, put me at an age with the pair. No traces of history in mine though, they were not my tools of trade. I travelled with papers and laptop, and then I didn’t. Grounded, made redundant, and returned to base by a date in the calendar.

That plane stood out proud on its own, even with the corrugated sheets of a barn raised behind it. There was the scrapyard behind out of sight with the hilltop, fields of rusted tractors. Every time I came by, I would take longer with it. The cockpit was stripped of its works, but still looked skywards in naïve anticipation. The cabin held a scattered debris of metal pipes, padded doors, plastic tanks, dirty cloths. It was one of the Antonovs, Soviet. It fought fires, sprayed fields, and carried freight. This plane had worked for a living.

‘What would you need a lump of an aircraft like that for, long past any proper use?’

‘Other than the scrap in it, I can’t see’.

‘Like it’s for show, the way he has it, a mark of prestige for the big man that’s there’.

Both men wore jackets, rendered uniformly dark and shiny with time. Each had an open-necked white shirt washed and ironed to a cardboard texture. The chat seemed more performance than exchange, paced to match ingestion of the stout. They were born to this, having watched their fathers before them. That’s what roots do for you. There’s a role to take on, even when purpose has waned to a few head of cattle.

‘For show?’

‘Yea, the outdoor ornament to beat any that came before it. Some have leprechauns in the garden, he’s got an aircraft.’

‘That’s some display alright, and it up the side of a hill with no audience.’

I nodded to the barman for another lager. Three faces blank of emotion, carved in final form, watched back from the mirror. I still look different, less weathered for lack of exposure, better dressed with more resources. Inside we are at one though, bones aching against stools for lack of firm padding, muscles strained just to hold the parts together. I’m assuming a birthright long rejected, taking my place among the paraphernalia that define the Anchor Bar. Roots do recover it seems, just need tending with some sustained alcohol.

The plane seemed more worn with my every passing. The moss encrustation gradually spread its patterns of darker green over the shell and suggested cracks in the windshield. The wings drooped, ever more burdensome for an ageing body to bear. The undercarriage still stood strong, but down to tyres punctured and sunk ever further in the muck. Nothing’s built for pasture, no one is.

‘What would that couple in Mealagh be doing with the aircraft?’

‘Story has it they’re to convert it into a holiday home’.

‘They set the guards on it from the other side of the world for that. For sure, there’s nothing stranger…’.

Dapples of cream slid regretfully down the side of each glass. Their turn to signal, never a word needed, just a heavyset finger lifted. The conversation paused, a refuelling stop. They sat back as if to consider the facts, the crime scene laid out before them. No trace of anxiety or rush about them, just at ease with being there, everything going to plan.

‘That’s not right you know’.

‘No?’

‘That pair in Mealagh, they’re the ones doing the thieving. What business do they have turning it into a house? Should be let be as it is, now its day is done’.

The plane was just getting repurposed. True, it had some dignity up there on the hill, poise in its true frame that boasted past endeavour. There was something of the men beside me in that. They could’ve been talking about me though, with my ever more desperate search to repurpose myself. I turned to face them.

‘You’re right there, that’s the real crime’

By Niall Crowley

From: Ireland

Twitter: NiallCrowley_