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I
stopped to rest again my ma had gone.
    But there was someone else there. Colman Dooley.
Leaning against the telegraph pole beside our gate. It
wasn't a good start. He was watching me, and he was
laughing.

13
    'I'm Colman from up the road,' he said, coming into the
yard. 'Coley, if you like.'
    He was taller than me and a lot broader as well.
Beefy. I let him take the axe from my hand. He looked at
the blade.
    'It's blunt,' he said, with a big grin and a laugh
behind it. 'Completely useless. You might as well be
hitting it with a lump hammer.'
    I felt the blood in my face. 'I know,' I said.
    'Come up to the house,' he said. 'My grandfather
will sharpen it. He has the knack.'
    I shrugged. 'I don't care.' I'd had my go with the axe
and that was all I wanted. I didn't care whether the
wood got chopped or not.
    'Come up,' he said. 'He'll do it in ten minutes.'
    'Don't bother,' I said, but he turned back towards
the road with the axe in his hand and I found myself
following him.
    'Do you want to tell your mother where you're
going?' he said.
    'No,' I said.
    His bike was leaning against the hedge. It was a
fancy mountain bike with suspension. He picked it up
and handed me the axe. We walked up the road, him
pushing his bike and me with the axe on my shoulder.
    'How far is it by the road?' I said.
    ''Tisn't far,' he said. 'About a mile maybe.'
    'Your grandma came across the fields yesterday.'
    ''Tis shorter all right,' Coley said. 'But it's boggy. I
didn't want to turn up in my wellies. You might have
laughed at me.'
    But he was the one who was laughing. Every second
time he opened his mouth a laugh came out of it. I didn't
like it. It felt like he was laughing at me. I wanted to
knock the stupid grin off his face, but I kept my spare
hand in my pocket where it was safe.
    After another while he said: 'Sure, you weren't to
know.'
    'Know what?' I said.
    'About the axe. Being blunt and all. How would
you know about things like that? I don't suppose you see
too many axes in Dublin.'
    I shrugged. I wished he'd shut up about it.
    'I might ask my father for the chainsaw,' he said.
    I thought a chainsaw was a murder weapon. 'What
for?' I said.
    'Go through those old sticks like butter,' he said.
'We'd make short work of them.'
    Coley told his grandfather my name was Robert. My ma
must have told him that. She always did when she was
trying to make an impression on someone, the stupid
bitch. No one called me Robert, not even her. I got called
Rob, Robbie, Bob, Bobby, Bobser, Robser – so many
names I sometimes forgot who I was. The one I liked
best, though, was what Beetle called me sometimes.
Roberto. It wasn't the name so much as the way he said
it. He only used it when I did something really cool, like
snatching the latest model Nokia or throwing off a garda
car with a handbrake turn. Then he would say
'Roberto!' rolling all the Rs, like a ringmaster looking
for applause for some brilliant acrobat or something.
    'RRRoberrrrto!'
    Maybe he'd say it tonight when I turned up with the
Skoda. I felt the phone in my pocket. No texts from any
of them. No calls to see if I was OK. But then, that
wasn't our style. We only contacted each other when we
were looking for action.
    'You can call me Rob,' I said to Coley's grandda,
but I meant it for Coley, really.
    His grandda looked at the axe. Coley was grinning,
but trying not to.
    ''Tisn't work, I suppose,' his grandda said, getting
up out of his chair.
    'Of course it's work,' his grandma said, coming out
of the kitchen. 'But nobody seems to care any more.
They even open the shops in Ennis on a Sunday now, can
you believe that?' She was looking at me but I didn't
know what she was on about and I just shrugged.
    'Sunday is just like any other day now,' she said.
    ''Tisn't really work,' Grandda Dooley said again.
He winked at me and went out the door. Me and Coley
followed him out into the yard. There was any amount
of buildings and barns out there, but he went to a
row of small stone sheds, a bit like