The Four Streets Saga

by Nadine Dorries

  ‘Not at all,’ said Brigid, generously rushing in. ‘I will have Joseph any time, so I will. It’s not a problem at all for me.’

  Alice began to fake her protest but Brigid cut her off. Brigid was playing into Alice’s hands, beautifully.

  ‘I won’t hear a word, now shush. If ye need to go again, just bring him over to Auntie Brigid.’

  Alice didn’t feel a shred of guilt. Not a flicker of remorse.

  What she did feel was jealousy. It had been brewing since the first time she had met Sean alone. And now, at this moment, in Brigid’s kitchen of perfect pastry and well-behaved children, it was stronger than ever. Alice was jealous of the Brigid who in just a few moments would fuss round Sean as soon as he walked in and slipped into their ordered and happy family life.

  A realization dawned upon Alice. Sean was two different men. There was the man she had come to know, who had sat in the pub with her, and the man he would become when he walked into his own home and sat at his own hearth.

  She didn’t want to be there when that happened.

  Claiming Sean as her own would be easy. Removing him from the grip of his wife, daughters, mother and his comfortable domestic routine would be much more difficult.

  ‘Jerry, I am taking Joseph over to bed, he is almost asleep,’ she said, pulling back the pram quilt and laying Joseph down.

  As Alice fastened the studs on the side of the pram hood, Jerry spoke while he was still eating. ‘I’m coming, I’m coming,’ he spluttered, shovelling the last forkful down, and thinking that whatever Alice had prepared for supper would not be a patch on Brigid’s pastry.

  ‘Would ye like some on a plate to take home, Jer?’ asked Brigid innocently, not realizing that Alice would perceive the offer as a direct attack upon her competence as a wife.

  Jerry, desperate to say yes, looked to Alice for approval.

  ‘No thanks, Brigid. He has to eat the food I prepared at home yet.’

  Alice locked eyes with Brigid and smiled as she spoke. A thin smile. Her mind elsewhere.

  Thinking. Brooding. Plotting.

  ‘Ah, ’tis the only way to a man’s heart, making him good food, I can guarantee that, so I can,’ said Brigid as she stood with one hand on the back door and the other in her apron front pocket. She cut a lonely silhouette framed in the light, watching them both walk down the path together. ‘’Tis how I caught my Sean. Once he had tasted my pastry, he didn’t stand a chance,’ Brigid chuckled.

  ‘Really?’ Alice threw the reply over her shoulder, laced with more than a hint of sarcasm. ‘I’ll have to remember that one for the future.’

  Mrs McGuire walked down the entry and stopped as Sean loomed into sight. ‘Sean,’ she called out. ‘What are ye doing, stood there?’

  Sean looked at his mother and was speechless.

  How could he say, ‘I’m waiting for Alice to leave my house so that I can go home’? His mouth flapped open and closed again while he desperately tried to form a sensible sentence. They both heard the back gate click shut and turned together to see Alice and Jerry walking towards them.

  ‘Hello, Alice, Jerry,’ shouted Sean. He was playing for time while he thought what to say to his mother.

  ‘Hello, Sean. Hello, Mrs McGuire,’ said Jerry. ‘Jesus, Sean, ye have the best pie waiting for ye in your house. I almost stuffed the lot down and left ye nowt.’

  ‘Kathleen will be delighted to hear that the best pie you have ever tasted was made by Brigid,’ whispered Alice sharply under her breath to Jerry, just as both men roared with laughter.

  Without realizing it, Sean’s eyes were fixed on Alice.

  Hers gave nothing away. Mrs McGuire forgot to ask again why she had found her son standing alone, kicking the entry wall, rather than in his own home.

  Little Paddy ran in through the back door, shouting, ‘Mammy, Da, I have the ciggies.’

  ‘What took ye so feckin’ long, ye lazy article?’ grumbled Paddy, as he took the fags. ‘I bet ye fecking dawdled all the way, didn’t ye?’

  ‘I did not, Da, I ran all the way.’

  ‘Ran, my arse, ye bleeding liar.’

  ‘Da, I did, I ran.’

  Big Paddy cuffed Little Paddy across the ear with one hand whilst he snatched the ciggies from him with the other.

  He had run out of cigarettes an hour earlier and had been pacing the floor, glancing at the back door every thirty seconds, waiting for Little Paddy to return.

  The dog lay on the floor, with his tail tucked in and his ears down, as close to Little Paddy as he could possibly be.

  Little Paddy began to whimper.

  ‘Stop crying like a babby, Paddy,’ said Peggy as she walked into the room.

  ‘I can’t help it. Da just hit me over the ear and called me a liar. He said I didn’t run home with his cigs, an’ I did.’

  ‘If yer da says ye didn’t, ye didn’t and don’t cheek him.’

  ‘I did, I’m not a liar, Mammy, an’ Alice and Sean can prove it, so they can.’

  ‘Alice and Sean?’ said Peggy. ‘How can Alice and Sean prove it?’

  Big Paddy was taking out a ciggie and putting a second one behind his ear, ready to go before the first one burnt out.

  ‘Because they both saw me in the entry and I spoke to them. They saw me running, so they did.’

  ‘Alice and Sean?’ said Peggy for the second time. ‘What were they doing in the entry then?’

  Peggy had begun washing the dishes and was rinsing a dinner plate under the running tap.

  ‘They was kissing,’ whimpered Little Paddy.

  Peggy had leant over to lay the plate onto the draining board. Paddy had struck a match to light his ciggie. Both looked at each other in shock as the plate slipped from her hand and smashed into pieces all over the kitchen floor.

  17

  KITTY AND NELLIE stood anxiously waiting, just inside the open front door, excited and holding hands, sheltering from the midges. The light was fading fast when they spotted the lights of the farm van trundling down the Ballymara road.

  As it passed, it illuminated the rhododendrons on the opposite side of the road. Kitty wondered if her mother would be as taken with their size and wildness as she had been.

  Liam’s younger brother, Patrick, who was driving, teased both girls, slowing down just outside the front gate, then grinning and waving through the window, before speeding onwards towards the McMahons’ farm to turn the van round.

  Kitty ran to wait at the gate. Patrick and Kathleen had been to Dublin to collect Maura and had left long before the girls had woken.

  Kitty could scarcely contain her excitement. Now she and Maura hugged and held onto each other tightly, before walking down the path and in through the front door.

  The fire had been stacked high and the flames made the kitchen brighter and warmer than usual. The smells of burning peat and freshly baked bread competed with each other. Maeve, who was moving the dishes of food around the table to make space for the salmon, quickly removed her apron. Glancing in the mirror hanging above the sink, she pushed the stray strands of auburn hair behind her ears and, licking the top of both index fingers, ran them quickly across her wayward eyebrows.

  Both of the dogs were fast asleep, stretched out on their sides in front of the fire, paws covered in the softly drifting peat ash. Their legs were twitching in a dream world, chasing rabbits.

  ‘At last,’ beamed Maeve, scooping Maura into a hug.

  Maeve would never betray the fact that she had been more than a little worried about Maura’s arrival. For Maura lived in Liverpool. A city of sophistication. With bright lights and modern ways. With music and culture and fancy clothes. Liverpool had everything Mayo didn’t. Maeve had heard there was a clothes store called C&A, stocking every fashion you could find in the magazines, and a Woolworth’s bigger than any building Maeve had ever seen. The doctor’s wife also came from Liverpool and she had proudly shown Maeve the china she had bought in a store called Lewis’s.

  But one loo
k at Maura told Maeve she had nothing to fear.

  ‘Bernadette’s lovely friend. I have heard so much about ye,’ said Maeve, linking her arm through Maura’s.

  A look of sadness crossed Nellie’s face. Then came that familiar ache in her diaphragm. The deep loneliness she could never explain. The longing for a mother she never knew. She wanted to plead with Maeve, Say her name again. Please, say it like you used to say it to her.

  ‘The child has been pacing around all the day, looking up the road waiting for ye, so she has.’

  Maeve grinned at Kitty, who nuzzled in and tightened her arms round her mother’s waist, sheepishly burying her face in Maura’s shoulder.

  Kitty inhaled deeply the scent of her mother, the familiar mixture of Nelson Street and cigarette smoke. She was calmed. Everything was better than it had been and it would be even better, now that Maura was here.

  Nellie watched Kitty hugging her mother.

  She had Alice, but Alice had never hugged Nellie.

  She looked at the expression on Kitty’s face. Nellie knew she had never felt whatever it was Kitty was feeling right now.

  Nana Kathleen had been watching too and now she put an arm gently round Nellie’s shoulder, kissed the top of her head and asked, ‘Are ye glad to see me home, or what, young lady? And where’s me kiss, for goodness’ sake?’

  Almost as soon as Maura walked into the house, Liam’s brother, Finn, arrived with his wife Colleen, as did the McMahons from the farm next door. Each had seen Patrick’s van pass by or turn at their door. Julia, Nana Kathleen’s sister, and her husband Tom, also pulled up in their van outside.

  The noise in the kitchen was deafening, as everyone made Maura feel welcome.

  Kitty was keen to hear the news from home.

  ‘Has Sister Evangelista said anything about my being away?’ she asked nervously.

  ‘Not at all,’ Maura replied gently. ‘The sister has her hands full, mind. They have Daisy from the Priory in the sick bed at the convent and she has been there for days. No one knows what is up with her, but she has taken to her bed, so she has, and they all seem in much of a dither.’

  Maura didn’t add that the police had been at the convent every day, wanting to interview Daisy, and were being given short shrift by Sister Evangelista. This news gave Maura some comfort. What on earth could she possibly say to the police that would present any danger to them?

  In honour of their guest, Liam had opened the bottle of whiskey, usually kept until after the harvest. The weather had been so good of late that the village was preparing for the harvest to begin the next day.

  As usual, Kitty woke not long after falling asleep.

  She wondered if the night would ever come when she slept all the way through. Now she strained to hear if anyone else was awake.

  Maeve, Kathleen and Maura were still in the kitchen, peeling potatoes and placing them in a pan big enough to bathe an average toddler. Their voices were muffled but comforting enough to send Kitty straight back to sleep.

  ‘It was very plush,’ said Kathleen, as she plopped another peeled potato into the cold water in the pan. ‘I have never been inside anything like it. Polished wooden floors, a big oak press and very smart rugs and curtains. I wasn’t allowed to see the bedrooms. The Reverend Mother said no one is allowed to, but she assured me that the beds were very comfortable. If the bedrooms are anything like the morning room and the hall and stairs, it’ll be the poshest room Kitty will ever have slept in.’

  ‘Did they seem kind enough, though, Kathleen? I don’t care about posh. God, the child is used to nothing like posh, it’s kindness she needs.’

  Maura sat down, wiping her hands on the clean apron Maeve had loaned her.

  ‘She was the Reverend Mother, Maura, more businesslike, I would say, but the young novices, they seemed lovely, now, and I’m sure they will be the ones Kitty has more contact with.’

  ‘And what is this Rosie O’Grady like, then, who will be delivering the baby? I know she is your sister-in-law, Kathleen, but is she a good woman?’

  ‘She’s Julia’s sister-in-law, not mine, and a very well-qualified midwife. What is more, she will keep her trap shut.’ Kathleen rubbed the top of Maura’s arm comfortingly as she said this. ‘I wish the boat had come in earlier and ye could have come to see the Abbey with me, Maura, but this morning was the only time the Reverend Mother had free and time is short.’

  Maeve looked at both women. Her heart was heavy and she hated the conversation. With no children of her own, she would love to have adopted Kitty’s baby but Liam wouldn’t hear of it. He was still hoping, even though Maeve was approaching forty, that one day soon they would be blessed with their own son.

  ‘Let Kitty have tomorrow, before ye tell her,’ Maeve said. ‘Kitty and Nellie have looked forward to the harvest so much and they will have great fun. If ye ask me, I think one or two of the village lads may have their eyes on our little ladies.’

  Kathleen poured away the cold water from the two big hunks of bacon in which they had been soaking all day, and put the pan under the tap to refill the pan.

  ‘Aye, well, they may do, but Kitty is just beginning to show. We can’t wait too long before she is taken to the convent. She can have the harvest and then I think we have to take her. But we will let her have her last day here without worrying about what the next will bring. She doesn’t need to know yet.’

  ‘We can all drink to that,’ said Maeve, with a wink, emptying out the remainder of the whiskey into the glasses.

  They sat on the settle in front of the fire. Maeve kicked an ember out of the fire, then jabbing the poker into the flaming peat, she lifted it up to light her last cigarette of the day. The heat from the embers almost singed her eyelashes and tears sprang to her eyes. Wiping her face with her apron, she passed her cigarette along to the other two so that they could light their own.

  Picking up her glass, Maeve said in a quiet voice, ‘Who says it’s a man’s life, eh?’

  In unison, all three lifted their glasses, took a sip of the whiskey from one hand and a large pull on their cigarette from the other.

  ‘I hope bloody Liam is asleep when I get into bed and isn’t going to give me a hard time, looking for his wicked way before the morning. I could do without it tonight,’ said Maeve as she exhaled a long blue thread of smoke.

  ‘He’s his father’s son, Maeve, so ye have no chance,’ said Kathleen. ‘Be prepared.’

  All three laughed, took another drink, and stared into the fire.

  Maura wanted to tell them that she had seen Bernadette standing at the farmhouse door when she had arrived. That she had felt a cold hand slip into hers as she walked from the van to the front door. Would they think she was mad if she did?

  Bernadette, thought Maura, our lovely Bernadette.

  In the comforting silence between the three women, Maura felt cold air pass in front of her and rest right next to her. She knew that, joining them, sitting with them, in their motherly, loving silence, was the friend, sister and daughter-in-law they had all loved best of all.

  The flaming red sky of the previous evening kept its promise and the sun rose early, burning away the river mist, ensuring that there would not be one drop of soft, west coast rain to spoil the harvest.

  Kitty stood at the back door to the farmhouse, the milking pail in one hand, the other shading her eyes, as she strained to look up the hill. This morning’s weather would put everyone in high spirits.

  Maeve appeared in the passageway and bent to take the pail handle and helped Kitty carry the milk into the dairy shed.

  ‘People will start arriving soon so get your breakfast now, quick, young lady. There will be no chance at all to stop this morning once the cutting gets under way.’

  Maeve had been up since five, preparing breakfast early, and had kept it warm on large enamel plates on the range shelf next to the fire, where the big pan of potatoes began to simmer.

  ‘It will take at least an hour for the potatoes to come
to the boil,’ said Maeve when she saw Kitty looking at the huge pan. ‘And still we have the cabbages to cook.’

  Maeve was red-cheeked and flustered, but it was all a dramatic effect. She had everything beautifully under control.

  The two big hunks of bacon had been simmering on the fire overnight. It had taken all Colleen and Maeve’s strength to lift the pan together and heave out the bacon haunches, which were now cooling on the huge wooden table, ready to be carved up for the lunch.

  ‘That bacon looks grand, Maeve,’ said Liam, trying to pull a slice off as Maeve walked past.

  ‘Keep yer hands off, ye thieving bugger,’ said Maeve, slapping him on his cap.

  Liam and the men were tucking into large plates of eggs, sausage and fried potatoes. Kitty’s morning sickness had well and truly passed, but she still couldn’t eat the sausages.

  ‘God, they smell just like the pig stall. I’ll be sick if I eat them,’ she said to Nellie.

  Now they heard a strange noise coming from outside.

  Nellie ran to the door. ‘It’s the thresher, the horses are pulling the thresher.’

  Kitty was amazed by the sight that greeted her.

  Men, women and children were walking across the peat, carrying their pitchforks and scythes, following a horse-drawn contraption in the form of a square wooden box on wheels.

  Everyone from indoors moved into the fields to greet those who had arrived and, within what seemed like minutes, they were all at work. The cutter moved slowly as others began on the outside edges with scythes. The oats were put through the thresher to separate the grain, then the stalks were gathered up with pitchforks and stacked six feet high.

  The women remained in the kitchen, preparing the food to be carried out to the barn at midday.

  ‘Run and put these cloths on the hay bales in the barn now, please, girls,’ said Maeve. ‘Nellie, you remember what we did last time you were here, don’t you?’

  The girls ran into the barn and shifted around the bales Patrick had pulled down for them earlier, arranging them into seats, with eight bales in the middle to serve as a table.