They had been way past the heavy smog air of Port Talbot and the approaching gentle seaside night of Swansea before she saw him stir beside her out of the corner of her eye. She had tried to keep looking straight on, but his legs all splayed out over the seat, easily in stroking distance, had been a little more than distracting to tell the truth. His curls were all mussed up around his head and he had yet to open his eyes, instead just running his tongue over his lips “dreaming about me huh?” she had said quietly

“Aye maybe I was” squinting now as his hand pulled at the soft cotton of his trousers, grinning. Jesus if he had wanted her to pull over into a lay by, he was going about it the right way “Where are we?”

“About half an hour from Holyhead and the ferry”

“Well I have had a good kip then, thank you!” There had been a few more miles when she just let him be, just held his hand and kept her eyes on the road, before the car was stowed and the ferry had set out into a darkening sky.

Right now they were standing at the bow of the ferry, alright then so it wasn’t Titanic, there was no band playing waltzes, no cocktail dresses nor fox furs, just the sound of a thousand fruit machines and the smell of petrol mixed with the Irish Sea, but she smiled broad all the same. He was next to her and yeah Ok he was staring out at the grey water with the cold air harsh on his face, his fingers drumming the peeled paint railing, rather than exchanging meaningful looks while rousing choruses tugged at heart strings, but he was here. Kate Winslett, eat yer heart out. And no icebergs. That had to be good.

“Jamie, you can tell me what’s going on”

He winced a bit and passed her the bottle of lager he had been cradling “I don’t know as I want to, you might turn the ferry back around and go home” If she wedged herself between the railing and his body she discovered he had to look at her, anyway it was warm there and she let out a sigh

“Jamie…I like Dublin as well as the next person, ‘plenty to do and see’ as they say, I happen to be fond of a Guinness or two. I also happen to like you…a lot…and well, you might say curiosity killed the cat but there must be a reason I am here? Or was no one else in when yer knocked?”

Jamie closed his eyes tight and shook his head, his arms all round her and breathing hard “Of course not, I wanted you to come. Truth is Emmy, apart from Danny, and that’s all fucked now, there was no one else I knew would just up sticks and do it” He was frowning, she could almost feel the will power of determined thought “I haven’t known yer long, well hardly at all in fact...shit...I dunno, maybe that’s not true either… I don’t know anything much anymore.  But it just seemed to me that you would do anything. That’s sounds bad.”

She couldn’t help giggle a little “Jeez my reputation is shot huh?”

Jamie leant back and pulled her face up to look at it “That you would do anything for me. It felt like you were waiting for me to walk in that cinema. We could do what we did...fuck…aye well yeah, that we could fuck right then and there because it was something that was bound to happen, if that sounds frigging weird, then well sit down Emmy, I have some things to tell yer about me dreams and me thoughts and dead outlaws.” The lights of Dublin were beckoning like fallen stars by the time she finally sat back on the cold metal seat and took a huge gulp of night time air, his earnest eyes daring, pleading, asking, for something that wasn’t ‘you are fuckin’ mad’

She started a few sentences in her mouth that never got further than her lips, sitting back to consider how best to say before trying again. “Do you believe in souls Jamie?”

Right answer and he let his shoulders go. “Well to tell the truth I never gave it much thought ‘til now. Of course I went to church with me Ma, brought up a good catholic boy, but I never felt much of a connection to all them angels, heaven and that though yer know? Seems to me they set the rest of us up to be saying sorry all the time.”

Emmy grinned “well I guess so, or to burn in hell. But at least you got the fire and the passion of Christ, and absolution! Don’t forget that! We just had the stern telling off, and the knowledge that you could never quite wipe the slate clean; dull protestant ethics and Puritanism.”

Jamie shook his head and lifted her on to his lap ‘just don’t tell me uncle” whispered in her hair “I thought about that. Like this might be a ghost or a soul that lost his way going downstairs or something? But it is more than that. Christ when I saw that picture of him strung up, I could feel the ropes around me chest and this emptiness, like something up and left.” He seemed more than happy that she burrowed further into his body “Fuck I don’t know what to think Emmy, I feel like I am going home and going out of me mind both.”

Whatever he was going to say next was lost in the tannoy sounds of ‘Please return to your vehicle. Will passengers please prepare to disembark; we will shortly be arriving in Dublin Ferry Port.” Nothing left then but to grab her hand and find exit B level 3 row Y, easy if you had advanced skills in orienteering. Jamie glanced at her as they turned the endless corners, alright so he might have an Australian outlaw shouting something he wasn’t quite able to hear yet, but he also had her and that felt good.

Inside the car and cocooned somehow she ran her hand down his leg, a reminder maybe of other more earthly tangible reasons to be here, and laid her head back on the seat, she was tired now, but Jamie, well he was compulsive “what was he like then this Joe Byrne?”

“Well see I was a mess last night so I don’t remember the details of it all Lass, but we spent hours at the computer, between me throwing up and the screen going all blurry that is” As they crept towards the ramp though he felt the blood surge back into his veins, a tinge of something else and he couldn’t help a smile, the words suddenly flowing out “He was a rebel, a larrikin, a selector and a gold miners son, a poet, a Cantonese speaker, a lover of women- they say he had women all over Victoria, used to arrive on a kind of borrowed horse and bring them little gifts yer know?” Emmy swallowed hard and reached her hand into the nylon pocket of her uniform, her fingers closing around the small silver charm as he continued

“He was a thinker, a bit of a lad, an opium addict, the kid who could read top of his class, a wild rider- you know he could shoot a coin out the sky while on horseback, now what d’yer think of that? He was a singer and…and he was a loyal friend to that Ned Kelly. He fought alongside him though he didn’t need to, he could ha’ bailed out but he didn’t. He wrote stuff, that Jerilderie Letter that they were on about with Ned, and all sorts. He inspired people and he made a difference Emmy. They wanted a revolution, a Republic and the end of the British and Queen Victoria’s rule, had it all planned out, or so they thought anyway, but the coppers turned up late and surrounded the Inn, shot them to pieces, then burned it down, civilians and all. Like in that fillum- you remember?”

“Well sort of…” she blushed a bit “anyway, he sounds like a bright star Jamie, are you sure that it’s such a terrible thing to listen to him?”

He ignored her suggestion that such a thing was possible and continued anyhow “Aye apart from the fact that he shot his friend. Emmy…I don’t understand why he could do that? All of that stuff I just said was true and alright so he wasn’t no angel, spent time in prison, and they shot those coppers of course. But Joe and Aaron had been together since they was boys, and from what I remember Megan said, Joe stuck with him even when the rest of them were saying he was a traitor.”

“He must have had a good reason Jamie; maybe he was finally convinced in the end that Aaron did tell the cops about the gang and all? Maybe he thought that Aaron was going to get them all killed or maybe it was revenge” she was really digging the depths of a hazy memory that was more about sticky strawberry scented legs and flushed skin

Jamie’s half hearted “yeah, maybe” however was taken up with clunking the gears into action and they emerged onto the ramp, all Dublin harbour before them, in the distance the dark black green hills but here a sparkling waterway of lights and channels, the industrial tip of a rural island.

He couldn’t speak for the leap of his stomach. Jesus. It was all there in front of him. Old ships pulling out of the dock with bellies full of men, sailing gaols heading south to flies and dust and animals that carried their young in pouches, the creak of wood, and the cries of women left behind, all fighting for recognition in his head. Tickets and trams and home. He was taking him home. Trouble was Jamie wasn’t so sure which way round that went. If he could have spoken he would have told her about the narrow terraces and washing lines, the filth and the stench of Dublin starving, the shouts of men organising as best they could and the threadbare shawls of  women who fed their kids on scraps. About his grandfather from County Carlow deported for fighting back. “What the fuck?” Jamie swallowed hard, “alright then, not my grandfather”

“Jamie, we can drive off now...” the harsh beep of horns behind made him start. Ah, move yer feet, only now I am not so sure as I know how. Christ. OK so she is looking at me saying something “First gear…” aye that’s it. Don’t suppose he ever saw a car. Jamie McGuire will yer pull yerself together and drive off this bloody ferry. See it is easy. Right.

Beside him Emmy just held tight while flipping her fingers at the car behind. Jesus some people were impatient. They hit Irish soil with a bump at the end of the ramp, a long narrow street stretching out in front and she turned to see him smile.

***

“Tell me you aren’t jokin’!” Millie was open mouthed and struggling to sit forward in the couch while Megan told her the events of the last 24 hours. “Danny…Jamie...fighting...police cells...Fine got that, now lets go over that other bit again. You got Orlando Bloom’s phone number? On you? Now?”

Megan rolled her eyes and laughed at her old friend “Millie this is serious!”

“Too fuckin’ right it is! Where is it? Stored on your phone?”

“Ah see now that is where the trouble started, my phone. Speaking of which, it would be really handy right now, I have no idea where Jamie is either. He left this morning to go to his hearing and that was the last I saw of him”

“Megan you really need help! Misplacing Jamie McGuire on top of everything else? That’s the second night you have spent at his place, you going to tell me nothing happened again”

 Megan decided that long dead outlaws was really going to be too much for this conversation and took a gulp of wine “we just talked Millie, well I cuddled him some, he was pretty upset.”

 Millie furrowed her brow and shook her head “well next time you see him, tell him I am a good listener Ok?”

A few miles away on the high rise estate in Hoxton, the door of Jamie’s flat burst open with the force of two black boots, there being no answer to the heavy knocks, leastways not from this particular door, and Jamie, had he been there, might have needed more than a good listener, a lawyer maybe. Uniformed men splintered the all too fragile council issue wood as the door swung open onto the one bedroom accommodation. He had been waiting forever for his name to rise up the list of hopefuls, single young men having a built in disadvantage when it came to allocated points for priority. But the truth was there weren’t so many people who wanted to live here, the wind tended to whistle round those open concrete corridors that were meant to encourage community but in fact only increased the desolation, the grills on the windows of lower floors gave the full story away. ‘Up and coming- be a deli on the corner in no time’- that’s what he had told his Ma when she shook her head at his new address as he stuffed the last of his belongings in his uncle’s car

Inside though it was a different matter. Jamie liked comfort, things to make his eyes and his body and his ears smile. Alright the sofa was old, but it had soft loose covers and cushions, textures and colours and feels. Beside it a little table with a lamp and a place for the remote control an exotice soft rug on the floor and Jamie could hole up for a week if he wanted to. Michael had laughed his head off the first time he visited “I am getting worried about you mate! What sort of bloke buys cushions??” Jamie had pulled a face and shrugged, laughing it off, but he knew exactly. The sort that likes to feel them behind his back while he sits down to watch a fillum on the box, and the sort that likes women to stay, put their feet up on his lap, sink into his sofa while they talk to him in those soft voices and let him wonder at all that warm strong sex they have. That sort of bloke.

His sense of order and ‘just so’ however would have been sorely tested and thrown into a whirl, right now the pillows were scattered over the floor, with his books and his CD’s and as the police moved through his flat, the careful placing of pictures and candles and clothes on rails came unravelling in a crash of disregard. “Campbell said this McGuire was dealing eh? Well he doesn’t seem to have been doing so well Inspector! Hardly George Yung is he?”

“Shut it Sergeant! The Irish git is a cocky sod, looked at me like he had some fucking thing to say alright. You don’t have to be Cracker to know...just know, who is going to be trouble, and this one had it written all over him" Inspector Boyne  wasn't quite acting with the Superintendent's knowledge, drug use being frankly wider spread round here than even the tabloids let on, and hardly a priority, but what he could feel as he stood in this flat was that challenge that he had sensed in the cells the night before as Jamie stood there in front of him. Catholic Irish and proud of it, a shared history that ripped them apart. 

The Inspector  picked up a book from the shelf and flicked the pages absentmindedly while he thought, the words in forms and styles that failed to connect. Alright so most coppers had long and very precise memories of their side of the story- Guildford, Birmingham, Hyde park, and they weren't far away enough to assuaged yet, but this lad...well there was something else behind those eyes and it had been eating at him all night. Despite his youth he had a defiance, some might call arrogance, that shone out bright. Why don't you do yourself a favour, and  take a ride home The Inspector cleared his throat and turned sharply to where his Sergeant was carefully searching bookshelves and cupboards "Just find the stuff and while you are about it I will give him something to think about...fuckin’ poetry who reads fucking poetry?” The pages floated individually to the floor ‘Trip Trap’ haikus mixing with the water in the Lake of Innisfree.

I WILL arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made:
Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honeybee,
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

 And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of the mourning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet's wings.

 I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,
I hear it in the deep heart's core. (Yeats)

From Jamie’s bedroom a call of ‘found it!” had the wiry Inspector stretch his lips in a wry smile, well it wasn’t as if he didn’t have enough in his pocket anyhow, just in case. The rather pathetic haul consisted of a small lump of resin in a wooden box from under Jamie’s bed "Sir, I thought we weren’t bothering with this stuff anymore, personal use and that?”

“Listen sonny, McGuire has been bailed to appear in a fortnight, his mate gave us a tip off, raving he was, off his head drunk looking for some woman, I  forget her name now but I have no doubt that if we find her we find our friend here. Danny Campbell got himself picked up by uniformed again in Primrose Hill and he was under the altogether misguided impression that by supplying us with information he would get off Scot free. Stupid fucker, I failed to enlighten him, but another one of those micks behind bars suits me just fine. Cleaning up the streets we are Sergeant! Never heard of Zero Tolerance? That’s what you have in the LAPD! Now are you done with the personal use shit?” The sergeant lowered his head and shrugged “and while you are at it, add this to the box” A small plastic bag of fine white powder landed on the floor beside him “well lookee there- Class A- my my what a naughty boy!”

“Inspector…I don't think...”

“Collect the evidence Sergeant, I will be waiting for your report” The door banged shut, as much as it could, as they stepped out into the concrete walkway “I will be back for you yer bastard”