The car screeched to a halt only twenty feet from the water’s edge. At long bloody last, he said to himself as he leapt from the driver’s seat, the fog’s lifting and the island’s there - only two miles of Atlantic Ocean now stand in my way.

He then noticed a solitary figure, fishing rod in hand, sitting on the end of an old disused pier, legs and line dangling over the edge.

"Not much happening, friend," he said to the old man, after picking his way along the pier’s storm lashed decking. "Where do I catch the ferry to that island?"

"You’re much too late for the ferry, sir, been no ferry from here these past ten years, and I think it took all the fish with it." The old man replied in his Irish brogue, then spitting in disgust at his lack of success in catching his supper.

Most visitors have trouble with the local tongue, but to this stranger the old man’s news only sent his brain into further agitation. What bloody next? Autumn gales causing thirty-six hours delay to the ferry from Holyhead, then the endless twisting roads leading to Ireland’s West Coast - and the bloody fog on top of it all. Now there’s no damn ferry! Because of her fear of flying, I’m almost out of bloody time.

"Ten years! How do people get a bloody cross then?"

"To be sure, why would any yoke want to cross? That’s a fine car you’d be after driving there, sir. English?"

"Yes, it’s English. Never mind the bloody car, how do the people who live on that island get across?"

Swinging his legs back and forth over the pier’s edge, the old man made another cast into the waves; "Not a soul has lived there these past five years."

"What? The Island’s deserted? There’s a fishing village over there, look - I can just make out a chimney above the trees. I’ve got to get over today, it’s important."

"There was a fishing village, so there was. Until the EU quotas came in. They hung on for as long as they could, but they had to leave in the end. Probably went to where you’d be just after coming from, sir. When the work runs out then so does the money, it all ended with just the one family staying put."

"Thank God, at least there’s someone left. Do they have their own boat? Can I contact them?"

"I'd say you where jumping the gun a little there, sir," the old man kept his eyes fixed firmly on his fishing line. "They’ve been gone these five years come November. To be sure, they didn’t want to leave. They’d taken up with the drug smuggling you see, sir, and the Gards and the Navy raided the island one dark night. Caught the whole lot of 'em, the mammy, the daddy and the three sons. Caught red handed and jailed for twenty-five years, who’d have thought it? Such a devout family, never missed a mass."

"Look, I need to get to that island today, is there anyone who can take me across? It’s vital I get there today."

"The Gards don’t like anyone going to that island, sir. They dug at it for months. People tell of buried drugs but the Gards only found what was in the house and on the boat. They don’t like people going there, sir, they keep watch, everybody is after staying away."

Clutching a thick roll of twenty-pound notes, the stranger’s hand appeared from his pocket; "Doesn’t anyone have a boat to take me across?" his thumb flicked the pale purple sheets, drawing the old man’s eyes away from his line and onto a more beguiling lure. "I'll pay well, but it has to be today, I don’t care about the Gards."

Throwing his rod onto the pier, the old man shuffled to his feet, removed his cap and held it with both hands to his chest as he directed his words straight at that huge hypnotic wad, "Michael Doughty is after having a boat nearby, sir, but he’d want to be knowing how much for the passage?"

The stranger thrust the roll to within six inches of the old man’s face, still flicking through the notes as he spoke, "If Michael Doughty will take me to that island today, wait ten minutes then bring me back? There’ll be one thousand English pounds for him - in cash."

"I’ll go and get me boat." Michael Doughty turned and scurried away as fast as his old legs would allow.

"Don’t be gone long, Michael, I’m in a hurry. What about the Gards?"

"I’ll be gone only ten minutes, sir, we’ve got to go before it gets dark, and them yokes wouldn’t be able to find their own arse's if they didn’t stink."

As the stranger flicked cigarette ash through his car’s open window, his third since Michael left, he pondered the rest of his journey. The only snag now, as far as I can see, is the Gards. I have to finish today and time’s running out, so I’ll only worry about the them if and when they appear – I’ve no choice but to trust the mercenary old sod. Or have I? The old bugger's been gone for half an hour now, what’s wrong? I’ve offered a thousand pounds but does the old fool think there might be an even bigger reward? Will he return with his boat or with the Gards? Sod him, I’ll try farther along the coast…what the?

Chug-chug-chug – the noisy overture of a boat’s engine raised the stranger’s heart rate to match the tempo of the invisible craft’s rhythmic beat. A full minute later, the cause of his heightened anxiety rounded a small headland and sailed into view.

Michael Doughty, alone and sitting in the stern, held the tiller with one hand, and fiddled with the engine with the other.

Though it wasn’t much of a boat the stranger jumped from his car and almost punched the air, but steadied himself with a sharp rebuke - you’ve a job to do and time’s short, save the bloody histrionics for later.

A shiver then came from nowhere and navigated his spine, making him pull up the zip on his jacket as he collected a holdall from the boot. Then, holding the bag firmly in his arms, he walked to the end of the old pier.

"Sorry for the delay, sir, but I’m here now with old Shirley, she’ll get you there, sir, no problem, jump in. About that fifteen hundred pound fare, sir?"

"I said a thousand, you old bugger. Here’s five hundred, the rest on the way back. I thought you’d gone for the bloody Gards?"

"Me sir-no sir!" Michael opened his jacket and stuffed the notes inside his shirt, "They’ve been after talking to me about some salmon that keep going missing, but what would I be knowing about missing salmon? Maybe I’ll pop in and have a chat with ‘em some day, when I’ve more time on me hands?" He then whistled moon-river as he headed old Shirley toward the island.

God, I feel so exposed in this bloody open boat on this bloody open sea, the stranger told himself as he scanned for the Gards or anything else that could foil his plan, the closer I get to my goal the greater the risk of bloody failure.

"If it’s the worry of the Gards that’s making that head of yours so jumpy?" Michael shouted from the stern. "Don’t worry, they’ll be sitting around a nice warm fire supping tea at this time; I’ve been dodging them yokes for years, they couldn’t catch a chill in a thunder storm."

"They managed to catch the smugglers with all those drugs!" the stranger shouted back, keeping his eyes locked on the horizon and his arms around the holdall.

"Bejesus, somebody must’ve sent ‘em a map. Aren’t I just after telling yous, they have trouble finding their own arses without the stink of ‘em?"

"Michael, right now they’d have no trouble at all in finding my arse."

Some fifteen trouble free minutes later they arrived at the island’s old wooden jetty. A flaking sign said, "Welcome to Inishdore," but more in hope than expectation.

"Tie-up Michael, I’ll only be ten minutes," yelled the stranger as he leapt onto the jetty, nearly losing his balance because of the holdall. Watched closely by Michael, he strode onto the land at the far end of the jetty, then looked around, before turning back to face the pier in order to check his alignment. He then moved a few paces to the side, paced out a couple of dozen strides away from the landing stage, where he scratched a mark in the earth with his foot. Then, retracing his steps, he laid the holdall down on the jetty’s ancient green decking. Stooping, he pulled back the zip and reached inside with both hands. They cradled a beautifully decorated spice jar when back in view.

Returning to his roughly scratched marker, he carried the jar as if it were the most precious thing in his life. When on the correct spot, he slowly lifted the lid - the sea breeze drew flimsy wisps of white powder from within.

"Jesus, Mary and Joseph, I knew it was the drugs?" Michael had crept up behind the stranger and was now looking around his shoulder and into the lidless pot. "I just knew it? Look at that powder, must be worth a fortune? Burying it here - brilliant, just brilliant! The Gards have dug at this place til it took the palms off ‘em, and they’ll never look again. Pure genius, the safest place in all Ireland. This’ll cost you more than a grand for the fare though!"

Spinning around, tears and anger flooding his eyes, the stranger faced Michael, "You bloody idiot, these are my wife’s ashes. She was born on this Island, left when she was sixteen and never returned. I promised on her deathbed that I’d return her to the spot where she used to play as a child. I promised that I would sow her ashes in this very spot on her birthday. That’s why it has to be today. Today she’s fifty years old, and she’s come home - to stay."

Michael’s jaw hit his chest, closely followed by his cap as he crossed himself and muttered, "Saints preserve us," before going into a stream of Hail Marys and Our Fathers.

The stranger turned, and at arm’s length lifted the urn. Then, ever so gently, he tipped out its priceless contents.

Every atom of that precious white dust was welcomed and embraced by the very same breeze that all those years ago had been her constant companion in this isolated place. Through loving eyes, the stranger watched as she danced and played, wild and excited, with those long-lost flurries. Her favourite jig filled his ears with its riotous air, and he could see once more those happy times, when just as wild she’d danced him off of his feet - her beaming face laughing as she tried to force his unwilling body just once more around the floor.

When she’d settled, exhausted, into her eternal home – the stranger replaced the lid and stood the empty vessel upon her cherished ground, "Goodbye, you’re home now," he sobbed. "I’ll be back someday for my own turn around this dance-floor, but I’ll make sure they fly me here then. You’d better be bloody waiting, Girl!"

Then, with drowning eyes, but head raised, he turned and marched away, "Come on, Michael, I hope to God you know a place where a man can get drunk, and be left well alone with his thoughts and his memories."