The Road Ahead
A short story by James Ballantyne
There’s the long way back and there’s the short way,’ Max Morrissey mused as he stepped out into the street from the casino. In his inside pocket nestled twenty-two grand in banknotes, the fruitful gain of a spontaneous night’s gaming at the tables. He looked up at what he could make out of the city sky. ‘Quiet in these early hours. Think I’ll stroll back to our hotel to clear my head. Go the long way through the park and down the slope. Enjoy the sun coming up over the river.’ He set off at a lazy pace, remarking on the first hint of daylight glinting on a skyscraper.
A more cautious man, conscious of the wad of notes in his pocket, might have hailed a taxi at that time of night but Morrissey’s motto in life was Easy come, easy go,’ or, as his late father would put it, ‘The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away.’ Fortune had favoured him all night and was unlikely to let him down now. Knowing the city like the back of his hand, he loved to stroll along the nightscape of near empty streets and was aware of exactly where he was at all times. ‘Go straight here, turn left here, be careful on the cobblestones there.’ As he made his way he was thinking of his affair with Aisling. He hated himself for using the word ‘affair’. Although he was something of a confirmed bachelor at the age of 34, he was not what you would call a ladies man or even a charmer. On the contrary, the few relationships he had had in life were relatively long lasting and even ‘meaningful’ he admitted to himself, until his love of gambling always became an issue, one that had not surfaced yet with Aisling, who in her down to earth way admitted that she enjoyed a flutter on the horses now and again.
To appease the concern that the Casino Manager had raised about his deciding to walk the two miles or so back to his hotel, he glanced idly over his shoulder once or twice but there was never the slightest indication that anyone was following him, or even keeping pace ahead of him. The odd night worker here and there passed on a bicycle, nodding vaguely in his direction to acknowledge a fellow night owl. Morrissey turned his thoughts to Aisling again. Their eyes had met in a bar mirror when they were enjoying an aperitif after work. Idle chat followed after which they went on to enjoy dinner at a restaurant. They went their separate ways afterwards and that might have been the end of it had he not asked her for her telephone number. For days he struggled with the attraction he felt toward her before he rang and asked if she would care to join him for another outing somewhere. To his surprise there was no hesitation in her acceptance of his invitation. And from there their mutual attraction grew. Quickly they became lovers but, at her insistence, continued to live apart. That arrangement suited him at first but by now he was wondering if he dared ask her to come and live with him. He had a nice flat and a decent job. Oddly enough, he had never felt like cohabiting with his previous lovers. But Aisling had gotten under his skin. He was certain that he was in love with her and she might well turn out to be the love of his life.
An ambulance screamed past him, followed closely by a blue flashing police car. He turned and watched the vehicles as they sped around a corner and out of sight, their sirens lingering until silence signaled their destination. A second ambulance howled by to join them. ‘Doesn’t sound good for somebody,’ Morrissey shrugged his shoulders and continued on his way.
The tree-lined street that he had strolled into now had been pedestrianized since he had last passed that way. Some town-planner’s imagination had conjured up metal bars in a chevronned pattern on the old pavement requiring him to zigzag between newly planted young trees. He shook his head and switched into the centre of the road. Ahead of him to his left a tall man was sitting on a bench minding his own business. Then a drunk appeared and squeezed onto the far end of the same bench and started to verbally abuse the first man who pointedly ignored him. Abruptly, the second man jumped to his feet, and slapped the first man in the face. The latter didn’t react. The assailant was shaping up to strike another blow when Max grabbed his arm and calmed him down. The man slumped back onto the seat and started to weep. ‘Thanks, friend,’ the first man said. ‘But don’t worry. He’s like that sometimes. Family things. We buried our only sister today.’ ‘Sorry to hear that, ‘ Max commiserated and continued on his way.
Family things?’ he was thinking, reminded of tensions with his own siblings with whom he didn’t always get on because of his gambling addiction. Moving on from the encounter with the brothers he reflected on whether he had been foolhardy to involve himself in their dispute. What if they had been lying in wait for him to rob him of his winnings? Had he allowed his good nature to get the better of him? He wished Aisling was by his side. She would have kept a clear head. He could still feel the effects of the several whiskies he had downed during the course of the evening. He decided then that he would ditch his idea of cutting through the park and following along the river. Instead, he would take the more direct shorter route to his hotel along the main streets. He reflected on how Aisling had brought him luck in the short time he had known her. Not that she had been with him in the casino to observe his winning streak this night. In her calm presence, his life seemed to have acquired a more even tenor. He was in no doubt that she disapproved of his gambling habits but she didn’t make a song and dance about it like his siblings.
From a side street ahead emanated animated voices and flashing lights. He paused and looked down the street that was cordoned off. ‘A film crew shooting a scene for a movie,’ he told himself, ‘Thought it might be that. This area is known for it.’ One of the actors was having her make-up seen to, while some male extras in sharp attire were lounging around. ‘Gangster scenario’, he figured, ‘maybe a gambling underworld,’ but he didn’t embarrass the crew by enquiring about the cast and working title. Then coming up the main street toward him appeared seven tall men in single file, dressed in frock coats and wearing high Mad Hatter hats. Their hats and coats seemed to be made of stiff chalky matter sheened with ink and green. They halted, smiled, spread themselves out across the road and stared down the street past him with the fixity of Easter Island moai. He gently slipped through them. ‘Perhaps it’s not a crime movie after all,’ he told himself.
He found himself now in a long, oddly unfamiliar street and puzzled over his surroundings. Ahead of him two large, brown and purple pantechnicons were parked on the road past a bus stop. He paused near them and observed that one of the vans had an open entrance at one side before which a sturdy man of Balkan appearance and an Alsatian dog stood guard. Sounds coming from within the van suggested that some kind of fairground or circus was taking place there. The doorman stood impassively by and raised no objection when Max, full of curiosity, approached to peer through a crack in the curtains but try as he might he failed to see anything going on. The fairground noises, however, persisted. The doorman shrugged his shoulders. The dog snarled.
Max felt it prudent to move on.
The streets became more familiar again and he knew he was well on his way back to the hotel. One or two night stragglers passed him by unsteadily. A man flashed by on his bicycle, most likely going to work in the city centre. Dawn was slowly beginning to glow from the east then he heard the sounds of heavy machinery re-surfacing a road ahead. Steam was rising from newly laid tarmac. A double drum roller stood by, waiting its turn to go into action. Max breathed in the acrid aroma of the asphalt and observed the work with the practiced eye of a man who himself had once worked in construction. He reached into his pocket and took out a packet of cigarettes. Smoking was something that Aisling frowned upon too but, although never a heavy smoker, he liked a puff on an odd weed. As he lit a match his face was momentarily illuminated.
Max! Max Morrissey, that is you, ain’t it?’ the driver of the tandem oller called out and descended from his vehicle. ‘Jesus, Bunny!’ Max xclaimed, ‘I heard you had gone back North. How are you at all? ‘Fine, ine, and how are things with you?’ Bunny replied. From there, the conversation veered from times old to times new, including Max’s big ambling coup of the night that he couldn’t resist padding his breast-pocket and telling his old workmate about, until Bunny had to climb back into his cab to resume work. ‘You have my number now,’ he called out, Give us a call sometime. The wife would love to meet you.’ ‘Will do,’ Max replied, charmed at the unexpected encounter and resumed his amble up the street.
He had not progressed very much further when the bonhomie of his unexpected encounter with his friend gave way to a sudden sense of nease. He turned and looked around. But there was no sign of anyone following him. The morning light was now beginning to filter down the streets throwing shadows across his path. The inevitable cat on the prowl startled him. ‘Snap out of it,’ he told himself. An empty taxi drifted by The thought of hailing it but the hotel was only a few hundred yards away now. He quickened his step. Ahead of him he thought he saw shadows litting in and out of the side-streets. He looked again. Sure enough there was a pattern to the movements and that pattern was closing in on him.
He tried to keep his cool and was on the point of breaking into a run for the hotel when four men, masked with what appeared to be do-it-yourself andanas, jumped out into the street and positioned themselves in a line across the road. Max looked over his shoulder. He could dash back to the road repair site where Bunny and his mates could come to his rescue. There was nobody behind him at least. He was deciding on his next move when Aisling and her three burly brothers suddenly coalesced around the would-be robbers and advancing threateningly on them. ‘Stay cool, Max. We’re here,’ Aisling said calmly.’ The robbers looked at one another and not liking the odds of a scrap hared it past Max and off down the road oward town. The brothers laughed and one of them shouted, ‘Go, go!’ and they left it at that. As the bandits passed him Max saw that all four were dressed in builders’ apparel of one kind or another. The bandana of one of the men slipped and to Max’s consternation the face behind it was Bunny’s! As he stood there, feeling perplexed and betrayed, the brothers waved and quietly faded into the dawn. Aisling approached and accompanied him back to their hotel room.
When did he awake with a start, remembering that his winnings had indeed amounted to twenty-two thousand pounds at one stage but that he had then gone on to lose all but six thousand of that amount, laying further bets? After that, he decided to accept his more limited gains and call it a night. He had then taken a taxi back to his and Aisling’s hotel, hadn’t he? She was breathing softly alongside him. He leant over. ‘I love you,’ he whispered, thinking he would ask her to marry him later that very day. The wash of a smile ghosted across her sleeping face.
Photo credits: Patrick Tomasso
