The New Policeman Read Online Free

all. It had brackets for mounting it on the wall, but it still sat on the floor, leaning against the chest of drawers, just another of those little jobs that were on the long finger, waiting for that imaginary time when he finally caught up with himself and had a few moments to spare.
    He had amassed all the prizes over the years—for playing the fiddle and flute, for hurling, and for dancing. In his final year at primary school he had been unbeatable at step dancing. His teacher thought he could be all-Ireland champion, but secondary school put an end to her hopes for him. Michael Flatley and Riverdance might have wowed the whole country, the whole of the western world even, but they cut no ice among J.J.’s classmates in Gort. Dancing was uncool. Only nerds did it. J.J. gave it up. Playing music was a bit less unacceptable, to begin with at least, and J.J. had carried on with the fiddle and flute, attending fleadhs and piling up the medals and trophies. He would still be doing it now, if it hadn’t been for the time factor.

    There had been several competitions earmarked for the summer that had just passed, but somehow all the dates had come and gone without J.J., all of them lost in the headlong rush of their lives. And now there wasn’t even time to wonder about it; about what it was they had been doing that was so much more important than the fleadhs.
    His fiddle was hanging on the wall. It was a beautiful instrument, coveted by every fiddler who had ever played it. Its tone was vibrant and sweet, ringing through the tunes, however fast and furious their pace. For a moment J.J. allowed his eyes to rest on it, savored the little lift that the prospect of playing it always produced in his heart. He had been trained early; indoctrinated, some might even say. He was good. Playing had brought him prizes and praise. But none of these things was responsible for the soft flutter of anticipation, the itch in his fingers as they longed for the feel of the strings and the bow. J.J. played because he loved it. J.J. Liddy did, anyway. But what about J.J. Byrne?
    Helen called him from the foot of the stairs.
    “Coming!” he called back.
    Half the clothes he owned were strewn around the floor, some dirty, some nearly clean. What did ladswear to clubs anyway? He had never been to one, nor could he remember having seen any of his friends on their way to one, or on their way back. He opened his jeans drawer. His best trousers were in there, the ones he wore to mass. They would be too smart, surely? He didn’t want to look like a dork. What, then?
    “J.J.?” Helen again. “Come on, we haven’t much time.”
    He swept his way across the room, snatching up clothes with his hands, kicking them into a pile with his feet. When everything was in one heap, he bundled it up and charged down the stairs. It could all go in the wash. He would decide later what to wear.
    Helen was sitting beside the range, getting the concertina out of its case. Music was always played there, in the big old kitchen. In the old days that was where the dances had been held. Helen told visitors that, and showed them the places where the flagstones had been worn down by generations of dancing feet. The conversion of the barn had been her own enterprise. Her mother, who was still living at the time, had been disgusted by the idea until she saw the result. Then even she had been forced to admit that it was a lovely place for dancing. When J.J. looked around the kitchen now,he found it hard to believe that four sets had ever had room to move in there. Four sets was thirty-two dancers; all on the go together. It was a big kitchen, but it wasn’t that big. Helen, however, swore that it was true. She had played for the dancers herself, along with her mother.
    As J.J. crammed the clothes into the washing machine, he heard his mother’s fingers moving tentatively across the buttons of the concertina, fishing for the old tunes she wanted him to learn. He picked up