Issue 42 - Columbia: A Journal of Literature and Art

through to the main house, to the small sitting room where his
father will be.
This time, though, my mother does not take him. He goes
down the hall by himself to where the old man is waiting, sitting
in his armchair by the fire, alone. My mother busies herself
in the kitchen, heats through soup, rolls, puts the water on to
boil for tea. When I come down from my bedroom to take the
things through she's away upstairs herself and Callum's sitting
in the chair before his father, his father not saying a word. The
lamps are on, and the fire's bright this darkish afternoon with
snow in the air and still one or two old dogs barking, poor
beasts, not understanding why it is they've not been allowed to
see him, to come rushing in and fall upon Callum to lick him
all over his hands. They know alright that it's Iny brother who
is here.
But it's not for me to go - to release them. I set the tray down
on the small table by the window and Callum says, "Hello, Helen"
then, and I turn to him, for the first time in a long time I'm looking
on his face again.
Then his father speaks, "He took his time getting back to us,
Helen. Didn't he? Our boy?"
He smiles, first time I've seen the old man smile since he's been
back up here, a smile, a real smile. He takes a sip from his dram.
"Don't think I'm going back with you though," he says, "Callum.
I'll not, and you should know this fine, I'll not be taken."
"Dad..." Callum says, "Hello..."
It's as though there's light all around the pair of them. I can
see it, in this room with its deep wooden walls and windows
set, this late afternoon, with all the little panes of glass. To see
them, together again, my father and my brother, these men
who, though they will never know it, have a daughter and a
sister, too...
"That'll be all, I think, Helen," the old man says then. "You
can leave us now. Tell lain we'll not be needing the guns in the
morning..."
And I turn to go. Leave them, the one facing the other, by the fire
I set this morning.
"Wish your mother goodnight from me," my father says to me
as I go out the door, back into the dark hall, yet the sense of light,
this gorgeous piece of light still present, with me, at my back.
From this man who's come from where he was, come up that long
road that's behind him, crossed the Pass, and returned to us, to
Nowhere, "Falabh." Our Aite Aon Arech, our End of the Road. Our
home.•