Read Online The Riders by Tim Winton - Free Book Online

streetand pulled in beside it as Pete climbed out grimly waving.
    Pete led them to the little green doorway at the side of a shopfront. Pete knocked and blew on his hands.
    A jaded and fearful woman let them in wordlessly.
    â€˜Mornin, Maeve.’
    â€˜He’ll not be up for hours, Peter. Don’t even bother yourself.’
    â€˜This is Fred Scully from out at the Leap.’
    â€˜Oh, yes, the Australian,’ she smiled wanly.
    â€˜Pleased to meet you,’ said Scully, smelling boiled cabbage, cigarette smoke, turf and bacon fat.
    â€˜Peter talks about you all day.’
    â€˜Oh. I hope it’s not all bad,’ he said limply.
    â€˜Ready, Scully?’
    â€˜Ready for what?’ said Maeve Keneally.
    Scully felt faint from the stuffiness and desperation of this house. It seemed no window had been opened here for generations.
    â€˜Just keep the front door open, Maeve.’
    Scully followed the postman through the gloomy house and into a foetid bedroom where Conor Keneally slept in his boots, and they took him by those boots, and dragged him off the bed, down the corridor with its greenish pictures of the Pope and the saints and Charlie Haughey, through the front door and out into the drizzling street where, finally awake, he began to struggle.
    â€˜Watha fook! Geroffa me!’
    â€˜We’ve got a job for you to do, so you can get in the van, Con.’ Pete hauled at his brother but the man slid back onto the lumpy pavement.
    â€˜I’m in the fookin wet street in me jammies, you bastard eejit!’
    â€˜Aw, Conor Keneally, you slept in your duds as ever. Get in your van.’
    Conor struggled to his feet. He was bigger than his brother and redfisted. His sideburns were like flames down his cheeks as he braced himself against the Toyota van, copping a bit of PVC pipe in the back of the head as he staggered.
    â€˜No one tells me.’
    â€˜Shut up and get in the van,’ said Pete trying to smile.
    â€˜Who’s gonna make me, gobshite?’ The big man straightened, smelling of the hop fields of the Republic. ‘You, Mr Post?’
    â€˜No,’ Pete said, pointing at Scully. ‘Him.’
    Conor struggled to focus on the scarred and wonk-eyed face of the Australian, who quite simply looked mealy enough to be up to it. It was no postman face.
    â€˜Now, Conor, this is one of Mylie Doolin’s London boys and he needs a job done.’
    The electrician slumped and held a great meaty hand to his head in horror.
    â€˜Aw! Awww, fook me now! Jaysus, what’re you doin Peter Keneally, you eejit!’
    â€˜Don’t be askin stupid questions. Get a meter box and all the guff.’
    â€˜There’s one in there,’ Conor said, sickly dipping his head to the van. ‘I was after comin from Tullamore –’
    â€˜Let’s go, then,’ interrupted Pete gruffly. ‘Our man will follow in the Transit.’
    Conor covered his face with both hands now. ‘Holy Mother, Peter. Mylie Doolin.’
    â€˜Aye,’ said Peter winking over his brother’s shoulder at Scully, ‘Mylie himself.’
    He watched them climb into the Toyota with a jug of sloe poteen. A dog barked. The rain fell.
    â€¢Â Â â€¢Â Â â€¢
    S CULLY STAYED CLEAR OF THE bothy all morning, keeping to the draughty barn to sand down and varnish an old mahogany chair he found in the loft. Now and then he heard shouts from the house: anger, exasperation, hangover, fear. It was funny alright, but he felt sorry for poor Conor, labouring in there with an imaginary gun at his head and a very real hangover inside it. Scully worked away in the giddy fumes grateful to Mylie once more.
    Just before noon when he could stand the cold no longer he went inside and heard a transistor playing fiddle music in the kitchen.
    Conor was at the table shakily filling out some paperwork, and Pete was throwing turf on the fire.
    â€˜Power to the people,