Cal, knowing that, takes it slow and steady. The heat is already starting to build. On the purple bogland, the bees fill up the heather with a ceaseless, intent hum and a rustle so tiny that only their sheer numbers make it audible. The view shifts with the twists of the path, over crumbling stone walls and stretches of tall moor grass, to the spread of trim, busy fields far below.

In the Reddys’ front yard, Liam and Alanna have found a broken-handled spade and are building earthworks in the shade of a bedraggled tree. They come running over to explain their construction to Cal and investigate him for candy bars; finding he’s brought none today, they zoom back to their project. The sun is drawing a rich, restless scent from the spruce grove behind the house.

Sheila Reddy answers the door. Cal makes a point of finding chances to speak with Sheila often enough that she doesn’t feel her daughter is off with a stranger. Mostly she smiles and seems pleased to see him, and tells him how well the mended roof has held up to the weather. Today, her face has the same shuttered wariness it wore years ago, when he first came here. She holds the door like a weapon.

“Morning,” he says. “Looks like another hot one coming.”

Sheila barely glances at the sky. “Theresa’s at football,” she says.

“Oh, I know that,” Cal says. “I was hoping to speak to Mr. Reddy, if he’s free.”

Sheila looks at him for a minute, expressionless. “I’ll get him,” she says, and shuts the door behind her.

Liam starts kicking at a corner of the earthworks, and Alanna yells at him. Liam kicks harder. Alanna yells louder and shoves him. Cal resists the urge to tell them both to knock it off.

Johnny takes his time coming to the door. Today the first thing about him that irks Cal is his shirt, which is a blue pinstripe, freshly ironed, with the cuffs neatly rolled. It’s set to be another sizzling day, the kind where even the shriveled old ladies who arrange flowers in front of the Virgin Mary grotto dig out short sleeves, but this little schmuck feels the need to express that he’s too fancy for everything about Ardnakelty, right down to the weather.

“Mr. Hooper,” he says pleasantly. This time he doesn’t try to shake hands. “Did you enjoy last night? You were an addition to the party: you’ve a fine voice on you.”

The guy’s not even outside his door and he’s managed to irk Cal a second time over, acting like last night was his personal party and Cal was some gatecrasher he decided to humor. “Thanks,” Cal says. “You sounded pretty good yourself.” Johnny, inevitably, sang “The West’s Awake,” in a poignant tenor with plenty of grandeur on the big notes.

Johnny laughs that off. “Ah, I can carry a tune, is all. It’s in the blood, sure: everyone from around here can hold their own in a singsong.”

“Sure sounded like it,” Cal says. “You got a minute?”

“I do, of course,” Johnny says graciously. He strolls across the yard towards the gate, letting Cal follow and leaving the door open, to make the point that this can’t take long. In the sunlight, his hangover shows; there are bags under his eyes, and redness in them. It sits poorly with his boyish mannerisms, giving them a tawdry, used-up air. “What can I do for you?”

It’s been Cal’s experience that men like Johnny Reddy don’t deal well with being taken off guard. They’re used to picking the easiest victims, so they’re used to being the ones who set the agenda, the pace, and everything else. If someone takes that away from them, they flounder.

“I hear you’re looking for investors to get some gold into the river,” Cal says. “I’m in.”

That wakes Johnny up. He stops walking and stares for a second. Then: “Holy God,” he says, bursting into extravagant laughter. “Where’d that come out of?”

“The buy-in’s three hundred bucks. Right?”

Johnny shakes his head, grinning, blowing out air. “My God, Theresa musta got the wrong end of the stick altogether. What’s she after saying to you, at all?”

“She hasn’t said a word,” Cal says. “About that or any of it. And I haven’t asked her.”

Johnny hears the edge in his voice and backs off fast. “Ah, I know you wouldn’t do that,” he assures Cal. “Only you have to understand, man. This’ll be a wonderful opportunity for Theresa, I’ll be able to give her all kinds of things that she’s never had up till now—music lessons, she’ll be able to have, and horseback riding, and whatever she fancies. But I won’t have her put in the middle of it all. Being quizzed about what she knows, having to worry about what she should and shouldn’t say. ’Twouldn’t be fair on her.”

“Yeah,” Cal says. “I’m with you on that.”

“I’m glad to hear it,” Johnny says, nodding gravely. “It’s great to be on the same page.” He brushes off the gate rail and leans his forearms on it, narrowing his eyes to gaze out over the mountain slope. “Then, if you don’t mind me asking, who was it said this to you?”

“Well,” Cal says, settling his back against the gate, “I gotta admit I was kinda surprised you didn’t mention it to me yourself. What with my land being right on the gold line, and all.”

Johnny’s face registers a twinge of embarrassed reproach, like Cal has committed a social error. “I’da loved to bring you on board,” he explains. “I need a chance to repay a wee biteen of all the kindness you’ve shown Theresa, while I was away. But that’ll have to wait a little longer. Man, no harm to you and no offense meant, but this is Ardnakelty business. Mr. Rushborough’s going to stick to taking his samples on land that’s owned by Ardnakelty men. You heard him last night: where to find the gold, that’s been passed down through his ancestors, and ours. Not yours.”

Cal is out of practice. He let Johnny use Trey as a sidetrack, and now Johnny’s had enough talking time to recover his footing and come up with an angle.

“Well, I can see why you’d take that into account,” he says, smiling at Johnny. “But it was an Ardnakelty guy that told me the whole story, and invited me along last night. He said I oughta remind you about me and my land being involved, just in case you’d forgotten. Does that set your mind at ease?”

Johnny laughs, his head going back. “Go on, let me guess. Mart Lavin, is it? He’s always been a terrible man for stirring the pot. I thought he’da outgrown it by now, but some people never learn.”

Cal waits. He’s had squirrelly little conversations like this with squirrelly little fucks like this before, hundreds of times: two-layer conversations where everyone knows what’s going on, and everyone knows that everyone knows, but they all have to keep playing dumb for the squirrelly little fuck’s convenience. The wasted energy always irritated him, but at least back then he was getting paid for it.

Johnny sighs and turns serious. “Man,” he says ruefully, rubbing at his face, “let me tell you what I’m dealing with. I’m in a bit of a delicate position here. I can’t take a step offa this mountain without people coming up to me asking why they’ve been left out, why your man won’t be digging on their land. That’s people I’ve known since I was a wee baba. I’ve tried to explain to them that I’m not the one that decides where there’s gold and where there isn’t, and if they just let the hare sit, there’ll be plenty of opportunities to go round. But…” He spreads his hands and gives Cal a world-weary eye-roll. “Sure, you can’t make people hear what they don’t want to hear. What would they all think if I let a stranger in on this, while I’m keeping them out? Half the townland would go mental on me. I’ve enough on my plate without that.”

“Well,” Cal says. “I sure wouldn’t want you inconvenienced.”

“It’s not just that,” Johnny explains. “Mr. Rushborough’s not looking for a lucrative business venture. He’s looking to get in touch with his heritage. No harm to you, but an American who blew in with a few grand in his pocket to buy up Irish land…that’s not the buzz he’s after. He wants to hear that there’ll be no outsiders in this, because then he knows he’s no outsider. If it starts to look like a free-for-all, the whole idea might turn sour on him, and then where would we all be?”

“Hate to think,” Cal agrees. He looks over the house, at the thick grove of trees rising up the mountainside. Even in this weather, a breeze nudges among the branches, languid but not restful, saving its force.

“Like I said,” Johnny reassures him, “there’ll be plenty to go round, all in good time. You just sit tight. You’ll get your share. You never know: Mr. Rushborough might even fancy having his own wee bit of Ardnakelty, and come looking to buy your land.”

“Gee whiz,” Cal says. “Imagine little ol’ me being bought out by a millionaire.”

“The sky’s the limit,” Johnny tells him.

“What happens if the guy decides to head out panning first thing this morning?” Cal inquires. “Once his hangover wears off.”

Johnny laughs, shaking his head. “You’ve some mad ideas about all this, man. D’you know that? You talk like Mr. Rushborough’s only here to grub up all the gold he can get his hands on. He’s here to see the land where his ancestors lived and died. He’s got plenty to do before he gets around to the river.”

“Let’s hope so,” Cal says. “Be a shame if your gold rush was over before it even got going.”

“Listen to me, man,” Johnny says indulgently. “This story about putting gold in the river, or however it went. I don’t know who told you that, but whoever he was, he was taking the mickey—having you on, that means; having a wee joke with you. We’ve a fierce mischievous sense of humor around here; it takes a while to get used to. Don’t you be doing anything foolish with that story, now, like maybe bringing it to Mr. Rushborough. Because I can tell you right now, he won’t believe a word of it.”

“You don’t think?” Cal inquires politely. He has no intention of discussing this with Rushborough. He’s under no illusion that he has Rushborough’s measure yet.

“Ah, God, no. I’ll tell you what to do. Don’t let on you fell for the story—don’t be giving Mart Lavin, or whoever ’tis, the satisfaction. Go back home and say nothing about this morning. And when he comes asking how you got on with me, you laugh in his face and ask him if he takes you for a fool.”

“That’s an idea, all right,” Cal agrees. He turns around to lean his arms on the rail, shoulder to shoulder with Johnny. “I got a better one. You cut me in for my share, and I won’t go up to town and tell Officer O’Malley what kind of scam you’re running on his patch.”

Johnny looks at him. Cal looks back. They both know Officer O’Malley would get a great big handful of nothing out of Ardnakelty, but that doesn’t matter: the last thing Johnny needs right now is a cop all up in his business, making everyone wary.

Johnny says, “I’m not sure I oughta let Theresa hang around a man that’d want in on a scam like that one.”

“You’re the one that came up with the idea,” Cal says. “And let her hang around to hear it.”

“Didn’t happen, man. And if it had, I’m her daddy. That’s why I want her around me. Maybe I oughta look a little harder at your reasons.”

Cal doesn’t move, but Johnny flinches anyway.

Cal says, “You don’t want to try that, Johnny. Trust me on this one.”

The heat is building. The sun up here is different; it has a scouring quality, like it’s scraping your skin raw to make it easier to burn. Liam and Alanna have started chanting something giggly and triumphant, but the high air of the mountain thins it to a wisp of sound.

Cal takes the three hundred bucks out of his pocket and holds it out.

Johnny glances at it, but doesn’t move to take it. After a moment he says, “That’s nothing to do with me. If you want to do something with it, talk to Mart Lavin.”

Cal more or less expected this. Mart said no one wants to trust Johnny with cash, so they’re buying the gold themselves. Johnny is keeping his hands clean, and making the men think it’s their smart idea.

“I’ll do that,” he says, pocketing the cash. “Good talk.”

“Daddy!” Liam yells, and he starts pointing at the earthworks and calling out some long excited story. “I’ll see you round,” Johnny says to Cal, and he saunters over to Liam and Alanna’s construction, where he squats down and starts pointing at things and asking interested questions. Cal heads off all the way back down the mountain, to find Mart.

—

Pissing Noreen off comes at a price. Lena is the last person in several townlands to hear about Johnny Reddy’s Englishman’s granny’s gold. Contrary to Noreen’s opinion, Lena is not a hermit and in fact has a respectable number of friends, but the close ones are women from the book club she did in town a few years back, or people from work—Lena does the accounts, and whatever else needs doing, at a stable out the other side of Boyle. She can go for days without talking to anyone from Ardnakelty, if she feels like it, which under the circumstances she has. She hasn’t been into the shop, on the grounds that if Noreen starts shoving her down the aisle again, Lena might tell her to fuck off and mind her own business, which would be satisfying but unproductive. She hasn’t been round to Cal’s, either. The easeful rhythm they’ve established, over the past two years, has them meeting a few times a week; and Lena, who has never before felt the need to worry about what Cal might read into her actions, doesn’t want him thinking she’s hovering and fretting over him because Johnny bloody Reddy is back in town. She expected Trey to come back looking to stay the night again, but there’s been no sign of her.

So the first Lena hears of the gold is when she calls round to Cal on Tuesday to give him some mustard. Lena likes finding small gifts for Cal. He’s not a man who wants many or fancy things, so she enjoys the challenge. At the food market in town, on her way back from the morning’s work, she came across a jar of mustard with whiskey and jalapeños, which should both please Cal and give Trey’s face the look of mingled suspicion and determination that he and Lena enjoy.

“Fuck me,” Lena says, when Cal has put her abreast of the situation. They’re on the back porch, eating ham sandwiches for lunch—Cal wanted to try the mustard straightaway. A few of the rooks, who zeroed in on the food before Lena and Cal even sat themselves down, are stalking the grass at a safe distance, turning their heads sideways to keep an eye on the prize. “Didn’t see that one coming.”

“I thought Noreen would’ve told you before now,” Cal says.

“We annoyed each other, the other day. I was giving it some time to wear off. I shoulda known. I miss two days of Noreen, and I miss the biggest news in years.”