Summer's End, page 15
In the silence it crossed her mind for a moment that he might just be right, making her, therefore, in the wrong.
Maybe, she considered now, she had jumped the gun a bit, but the situation had definitely looked bad, and something about Ava’s too-good-to-be-true manner made her feel uneasy.
She looked at her brother now and decided there was no point in having a head-to-head argument while he was in this unusually defensive mood. But neither, she suddenly decided, was she going to completely capitulate and let him think he could speak to her as he liked.
“Well,” she eventually said, “thank you for putting me well and truly in my place. Now I know how you feel about my concerns for your wife and family, I’ll certainly keep my opinions and advice to myself.” She looked over to the window. “That’ll be the last time you need to worry about me saying anything to you.”
Seán stared at her for a few moments, as though not quite sure how to proceed. On the one hand, his outspoken sister seemed to have taken his point on board, but, on the other, she was reminding him that she had criticised his behaviour in the best interests of his wife and family.
“I think,” he said, his voice lower and without all the anger, “we should forget about it all now.” He held his hand up. “I accept it might have looked bad but, now you’ve heard the reason, you can forget about it.” He moved across the room to sit on the edge of the sofa next to her, lowering his voice further still. “And you can rest easy in the knowledge that both my father and myself are quite content with how things are back home, and neither one of us would be so stupid as to risk our families.”
“I wasn’t saying that,” Lily argued, “but careless words and actions can tarnish things. I’ll say no more tonight, but I’ll tell you, it will take me a long time to forget what my father said.”
Seán shrugged. “Be that as it may, I don’t feel as strongly about it as you do, and I bet none of the other brothers would. Women and men have different ways of going on, and there are times when my mother drives us all to distraction – you included. I think it was a hundred per cent the beer talking. I don’t think he even remembers half of what he said.”
Lily turned her head away.
He moved from the sofa to get down on one knee beside her chair. “I don’t want us to fall out, Lily, and I’m sorry if I blew up at you earlier. I know you only mean well.” And when she turned to look at him with tear-rimmed eyes, he patted her hand and said, “I know you feel hurt and let down by him – but my advice is to treat it as a load of drunken rubbish and forget all about it.”
They heard footsteps out in the corridor and Seán stood up, then Ava came in carrying a tray with tea and buttered toast.
“This will make us all feel better,” she said, smiling at them.
Chapter 19
The atmosphere over breakfast in the dining-room was light the following morning. Whether it was the sunny, frosty weather or the fact they were all determined to make the most of their final day, Lily didn’t know, but she was happy to enjoy it.
“I had a great sleep last night,” Pat stated, “and I definitely feel the better of it. I hope poor oul’ Declan feels the same.”
“I think he’ll have been well looked after in the hospital,” Lily said. “The nurses were all lovely.”
Seán clapped his hands and rubbed them together. “So what’s the plan for the morning?”
“A walk into the town to get a paper,” Pat said, “and I might go mad and bet on a few horses. After that, I think we should drive into Tullamore and see what the story is with Declan. They said the doctors would be doing their rounds after eleven.”
“Better leave it until closer to lunch-time so,” said Seán. He turned to Lily. “And have you plans made with the long-haired student today?”
Lily looked down at her plate. “Maybe tonight. I thought we’d be visiting people today to say goodbye.”
“And we will,” Pat said. “But we just need to get Declan sorted first.”
Lily looked out of the window now. “It looks lovely with the trees and bushes all white. I wonder if it’s frosty back home and in Newcastle?”
“There’s a more than fair chance it will be,” Pat said. “The further north you go the colder it is.”
Lily’s gaze lingered on the white scene as she thought about her room and her friends back in Newcastle. Her room in the lovely old house with her desk and books, the view of the circular campus she had from the front door and of the playing fields at the back, the corner of the long teak desk she always sat at in the lecture room.
She thought of the Students’ Union Bar and the great nights she’d had with her college friends, and the Saturdays spent shopping in the city. She liked Fenwick’s department store, but she particularly loved the shops in the small backstreets like Pilgrims Lane which had a nice bookshop, a funny old sewing and knitting shop, Harrison’s, and her favourite boutique, Love. Strangely enough, the girl who owned the shop and made most of the clothes, Sarah, came from Offaly. She must call in and tell her that she had been to her part of Ireland for a funeral.
Her thoughts then moved to tomorrow, when she would leave Ireland and Dara Ryan behind. How sad it was that they should be parted already, she thought, when she felt closer to him now than she had felt towards any other boyfriend. If she had known how hard this was going to be, she might have thought more carefully about spending the day in Dublin with him.
She felt something touch her hand and she suddenly jumped.
“Lily,” her father said, “are you all right? You looked as if you were a million miles away.”
She turned to him and smiled. “I’m fine, I was just thinking about college and all the things I have to do when I get back.”
* * *
They took the morning easy, walking down to the shops for newspapers and a magazine for Lily, and then all three went into a pub and had two sweet hot toddies each while they chatted and read.
Then they went back for the car and drove out to the hospital. They found Declan all dressed and waiting for them in the ward. He had bandages strapped around his chest and had been given enough painkillers to keep him going until he saw his own doctor back home.
“Is that it?” Pat asked. “They didn’t do anything else?”
“No,” Declan said. “They said if I find the bandages too tight or uncomfortable or if they make it hard to breathe I can take them off. The doctor said, apart from putting ice on my ribs to reduce any swelling, it’s just a case of letting them heal on their own.”
“How do you feel?” Seán asked.
“As if I’ve been hit by a bull,” Declan said, and then he closed his eyes to stop himself from laughing.
They drove out to Ballygrace to see Pat’s cousins again. They sat chatting for a while, and the story of Declan and the bull was recounted in great detail which led on to a variety of stories involving incidents with bulls.
Bridget then insisted they all sit down for an early afternoon dinner of roast chicken. When Pat told them of their plans to go to one of the bars in the evening, she said she hoped they didn’t mind if she wouldn’t join them as she wasn’t really a pub kind of woman and she was behind with ironing and various chores on account of the funeral.
Later they made their goodbyes then moved on to visit the relatives from England who were still at the auntie’s cottage. After a couple of hours there, again recounting the story about the bull, they, along with some of the relations drifted on down to the local pub.
Marie and some of the girls had said they might call down later, so Lily found herself as one of only three women in the pub. At first she felt a bit self-conscious, but as the time went on, she didn’t mind as the men and lads all included her in the conversation.
When it came to seven o’clock, Lily thought she had better phone Dara to let him know she was still in Ballygrace if he wanted to join them. When she asked her father if he knew where the nearest phone was, Declan cut in.
“I’m going to head out to Carraigvale in a taxi if you want to come with me.”
He looked at Pat. “There’s no point in her hanging about here with a bunch of men.”
“It’s up to yourself,” her father said. “You’ve seen everyone really, so if you want to go and meet the young lad, then do.”
When the taxi called for them, Pat had a quiet word with Lily and assured her that he was taking things a lot more slowly, and she needn’t worry about him drinking too much that night. In fact, he said, he was deliberately drinking the small bottles of stout instead of pints.
“That’s fine,” Lily said. “I’ll see you back in Carraigvale later.”
When they got to the bed and breakfast, Ava let her use the phone and she called Dara. He was delighted she was back and asked if she would like to call up to the house and meet whoever was in, and then they would go into town to hear a band playing in one of the bigger pubs by the canal.
Lily told him she felt a bit shy coming up to the house on her own, so he said he would call for her and they’d walk up together.
They arranged a time and then Lily went off to have a bath and wash her hair.
As she lay in the comforting hot water, Lily realised she felt apprehensive about meeting Dara’s family. She didn’t know whether having only one female – his sister, Rose – to meet was better or worse. She tried to think how her brothers’ girlfriends might have felt when they came for the first time to their house, and then she had a pang of guilt as she remembered giggling at one girl in particular. It was a girl that her other brother Patrick brought home and Lily could not remember now what had been so funny. Something trivial to do with her hair or something she was wearing. Lily knew now that it must have been awful for the girl – and more awful for Patrick who had gone mad at her later for her bad manners. She hoped Dara’s sister was more mature than she had been at that age.
Her thoughts moved back to her own family again, and she wondered whether Ava had said anything to Declan about the unwelcome visitor from the previous night. Whether she had or not, Lily decided she wasn’t going to interfere.
An hour or so later she went down to the lounge wearing the grey cheesecloth smock over a crimson miniskirt, black tights and the stretchy PVC boots she had also bought in Dublin. As she looked down at her legs, she kept wondering if they looked a bit too outlandish for the small town. As she approached the open door she was surprised to find that Dara was already there waiting for her in one of the armchairs and appeared to be totally relaxed chatting to Declan.
His face lit up when he saw her. “We’re just saying that it’s been a very eventful few days for your family.”
Lily lifted her eyes to the ceiling. “You can say that again.”
“It’s been different,” Declan said, giving a lop-sided grin. “A trip we won’t easily forget.”
When they were on their way up to Dara’s Lily told him about the incident with the man who had called looking for Ava the night before.
“What was he like?” Dara asked.
Lily repeated the description that Seán had given.
He hesitated. “I didn’t like to say anything before, but she was in the cinema one night with an older man who sounds exactly like that.”
“That’s why you mentioned about her liking older men, isn’t it?”
“Well, I was reluctant to say anything because I don’t know her well enough to make any judgements. For all I knew it might be her father or her uncle. I couldn’t tell anything from the way they were with each other. She was always polite but distant any time she came to the cinema, and my aunt and my brothers all said the same thing.”
“And you only saw her once in the cinema with the older man?”
“Yes . . .” He paused. “Although one of my brothers saw her in a car with him, and said he was sure they were arguing.” He shrugged. “The other times I’ve seen her around is with Mrs Stewart or another girl who sometimes helps out in the bed and breakfast. I didn’t want to tell you about the older man in case you thought I was making too much of it – as I say, he could be a relation.”
“According to Ava he’s definitely not,” Lily said. “She said he’s some man she used to work for who now seems to be obsessed with her. I don’t know why she doesn’t just sort him out or threaten him with the police. I know I wouldn’t put up with it.”
Dara laughed. “Everybody isn’t as confident as you, Lily.”
“Well, Ava doesn’t strike me as lacking in confidence. She seems to have all the men in our family fighting her corner. And I think it was all a bit dramatic, crying in Seán’s arms about it. I felt a bit uncomfortable the way she was acting as he’s a married man.” She looked at Dara and rolled her eyes. “I know it sounds as if I don’t like her, but in a lot of ways I do. She’s really nice and helpful and I’m sure if it works out she’ll be a lovely girlfriend for Declan.”
“I suppose that’s the main thing.”
“You’re right,” Lily said. “I’m not going to say anything more about it to Declan or Seán.”
Dara’s house was much bigger than Lily had expected, a tall old-style semi-detached house on three floors. It was only a few streets away from the cinema, tucked down a laneway. He told her that his Aunt Carmel, whom she had met at the cinema, owned the one next door.
“That’s the way our family are,” Lily said. “My aunt Sophie lives only a few houses up from us. They’re not as big as yours though – only about half the size.”
“Our last house wasn’t as big,” Dara said. “And I should warn you that this one is a bit dilapidated. My father’s always saying he’s going to do work on it but he never gets around to it. He did a lot more in the other house, when my mother was alive. I think he just doesn’t have the heart for this house just yet.”
“I suppose it takes time,” Lily said.
“It does . . .”
Lily could see exactly what Dara had meant about the house. The hallway they arrived in seemed more suited to an old farmhouse than a town house. There was a big antique hallstand with a square marbled centre beneath an ornate but mottled mirror, and a dark wood panel on either side with coat hooks. It was over-burdened with coats and the marble top was dusty and cluttered with a mountain of mail and cinema tickets. Underneath it there was a collection of boots and shoes and wellingtons.
Lily immediately liked the old building and the lived-in feel of the house, but as they walked down a few steps into a big old rambling kitchen, sweet with the smell of baking, she knew her mother would have a heart-attack at the casual state of affairs. There was a family-sized pine table with a mixture of wooden chairs and stools around it, a tall cupboard with glass doors, and two white-painted dressers full of crockery. The surfaces were cluttered with ornaments and an assortment of random objects like scissors, maps and a home-made clay pot filled with pens and pencils
“Is there no one in?” Lily asked, looking around her. Then she noticed the worktop by the sink, with the round loaf of soda-bread which was cooling from the oven, and the dozen fruit scones which also looked newly baked.
Dara moved towards the hall. “I’ll just give a shout upstairs.”
Lily heard him calling, “Rose!” and then “Joe!”
A few seconds later she heard noises from upstairs and then footsteps coming down. A tallish, smiling fellow who looked a bit older than Dara came in and was introduced as Joe. Lily noticed that his hair was thick like Dara’s, and even though it was quite a bit shorter, it seemed much more unruly. He shook Lily’s hand so enthusiastically that she thought her fingers would be crushed to pieces.
“Lovely to meet you, Lily,” he told her, his head nodding up and down.
He was just asking her which part of Scotland she came from when a small, slim girl with shiny black bobbed hair and a serious face came into the kitchen.
“Lily, this is Rose,” Dara said. “She was upstairs studying as she has exams next week.”
Lily smiled and went forward to shake the girl’s hand. “Hello, Rose,” she said. “I was just thinking you’re the same as me, one girl living in a house full of brothers.”
Rose’s face brightened a little. “Are you an only girl too?”
Lily nodded, thinking the girl had lovely brown eyes like Dara’s but that there was a sadness in them. “I am, and I’m the youngest as well. I bet your brothers don’t drive you as mad as mine do.” She was trying to keep things light. “They’re always working on cars or my dad’s coach and they’re in and out of the house, leaving oily rags and fingerprints on everything.”
Rose smiled properly now. “Oh, mine can be just as bad when they’re doing work on the van.” She glanced over at Dara, then she said, “Will you have a cup of tea? I baked some scones for you and my Auntie Carmel left in a fresh loaf of soda bread as well.”
Lily put her bag and gloves down on the table. “That would be lovely,” she said, surprised and delighted that the girl had made such an effort. “And so good of you to go to the trouble of baking. Can I give you a hand?”
“You could butter some bread if you don’t mind.”
“I’d like to make myself useful,” Lily told her. “I’m used to it at home.” She was about to say, ‘My mother has me well-trained’ when she just stopped herself in time.
She noticed Dara over by the window fiddling with a transistor radio, and when some low music came on, she knew he was trying to make things more relaxed for her.
Rose went over to the cupboard and brought out some side plates and a dish of butter. She put them down on the table beside Lily, then went and got a plate of sliced ham, some tomatoes and a jar of home-made strawberry jam.
They were sitting round the table drinking tea and Joe was telling Lily all about his day job in a local Veterinary Suppliers when the door opened and Dara’s father, Jimmy, and his other brother, Frank, came in. They all, she noticed, had the exact same thick hair, although Frank’s was the shortest of the brother’s and a lighter brown and his father’s was mainly grey.
