The Forester’s Daughter
When he is getting into his car, a stranger who holds his cards close to his chest approaches.
‘I understand you have a dog you’d sell.’
‘A dog?’ says Deegan.
‘Aye,’ he says, ‘a gun dog. Do you still have him?’
‘Well, I do.’ Deegan is set back on his heel but he recovers quickly. ‘I bought him last September but I’ve little time for hunting and it’s a shame to see him wasted.’
Deegan goes on to describe a retriever. He begins to talk easily about pheasants and how his dog can rise them, how the soup off a pheasant tastes finer than anything you can find in a hotel. He talks about the turf basket and how it is never empty since the dog came to the house. As soon as he mentions turf, the man smiles but Deegan does not notice, for he is remembering the girl on her birthday and how she and the retriever now bathe in the same water. But it is too late to back down.
From the archives
·
1967
The Third Policeman
'See that you regularize your irregularity instantaneously,' he called as his good-bye, 'and set right your irrectitude and put the murderer in the cage before he rips the bag out of the whole countryside.'
After that he was gone. Sounds came to us of sparse scraping on the gravel, a sign that the Inspector favoured the old-fashioned method of mounting from the back-step.
Read more of this excerpt...
The Third Policeman
'See that you regularize your irregularity instantaneously,' he called as his good-bye, 'and set right your irrectitude and put the murderer in the cage before he rips the bag out of the whole countryside.'
After that he was gone. Sounds came to us of sparse scraping on the gravel, a sign that the Inspector favoured the old-fashioned method of mounting from the back-step.
Read more of this excerpt...
“There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one's safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind.”
NON-FICTION
