Scarlet Feather

by Maeve Binchy

  'June?' Tom said.

  'Every night including Christmas night,' she said.

  'But Jimmy?' Cathy began.

  'Isn't bringing in any money, and will be glad of my wages.'

  'Cathy?' Tom asked.

  'Any night, obviously, and any day. This is our last throw.'

  'But won't you have to… ?'

  'No,' she said.

  'The holiday, the weekend?' He was mystified.

  'Won't happen. I'll be here for the duration.'

  'And I'll be here all the time, so there was hardly any need for a Power Elevenses at all.' The team would be there, every one of them, every night. They were going to do it, all five of them; they would see that Scarlet Feather didn't go under. All they had to do now was go out and get the bookings.

  It was a matter of leaflets; they'd put them up everywhere, in Lucy's university, in Con's pub, on the food counter in Haywards, in Geraldine's friend Mr Ryan's chain of dry-cleaners. Geraldine and Shona would deliver them around Glenstar, Lizzie would leave them in the apartment blocks where she cleaned. Stella and Sean, still starry-eyed from their wonderful wedding, would give them out in their area. Tom was to go to the printer's that morning. Cathy would go to the market and see if any of the stallholders might put them up. Geraldine was on the phone; she was delighted to hear they were all so enthusiastic, she would call in a favour from Harry, a journalist she knew, and ask him to give Scarlet Feather a mention in one of those Countdown to Christmas columns. They agreed to report progress to each other before the day was out.

  Their progress was strange. When Tom went to the printer's the man remembered him.

  'You lot were in a year ago, you bought Martin Maguire's place.'

  'That's right.' Tom was surprised.

  'Any word on how the poor divil is getting on these days? Terrible business that was, terrible.'

  'I think he's fine. Cathy, my partner, met him during the summer; he was going to come and see us, but at the last moment he didn't.'

  'Ah, you couldn't expect the man to set foot in that place again after all that happened in there.'

  'I'm afraid that I don't know. What did happen?' Tom said eventually.

  'Don't mind me, I talk too much,' the printer said.

  'Please tell me.' Tom was gentle but insistent.

  'His son Frankie went and hanged himself there, right in the premises. They never did another day's work in that place.'

  Cathy went to the market, it was gearing up with Christmas gifts, and there would be huge crowds passing through. But most of the stalls and stands didn't look suitable places to advertise their party service. Perhaps there was a community noticeboard on that building at the end; she walked towards it, and on her way she saw a bric-a-brac stall, and noticed a silver punchbowl just like hers. She picked it up and looked at the base.

  There it was. 'Awarded to Catherine Mary Scarlet for Excellence.

  'How much?' she asked the stallholder in a whisper.

  'Not sterling silver or anything, but a nice piece.'

  'Please?' she asked again.

  'Thirty?' he said doubtfully.

  'Twenty?' she suggested, and got it for twenty-five pounds.

  It doesn't matter to me in the slightest, but would you have any idea where you got it?' she asked.

  'Not an idea in the world,' he said.

  'It's not important now,' she said, and totally forgot about finding a place for their advertisement.

  Geraldine dropped into the newspaper and gave in the little piece about Scarlet Feather that she had typed out. It was ready to run. Harry was an old mate. She had known him for ever, and had recently given him the telephone numbers of two politicians, so he owed her.

  'Will you come and have a drink, Ger, it does me good to be seen with a young dishy piece like yourself, makes my street cred go up.'

  It was flattering to be called a dishy young piece, but then Harry was considerably older than she was. Everything was relative.

  'I won't, Harry, thanks all the same, I've a lot to do.'

  'Pity, I'm a bit down. I needed to be cheered up.'

  'I'm sorry, what has you down?'

  'All my old friends dying off like flies, poor Teddy's the latest, I suppose you heard.'

  Geraldine had heard not a word about the one man she had ever loved, the man who had left Ireland for Brussels with his wife and family twenty-two years ago. She felt faint, but she hid it. 'I heard something,' she murmured. 'But tell me…'

  'Oh, the usual, he's not going for the chemo this time. wants to come back to Ireland to die. Funny, he hardly came back at all over all that time, and he must be gone about fifteen years.'

  'Longer, I think,' she said.

  'Maybe. Did you know him at all back then?'

  'A bit,' she said, and got out into the fresh air before her legs went from under her in the warm office.

  'Do you get enough money to make it all right for us to live here,Muttie?' Simon asked.

  'Cathy said you're not to ask people about what money they get,' Maud was reproving.

  'I didn't ask how much Muttie got, I just wanted to make sure it was enough.' Simon was outraged to be misunderstood.

  'We have plenty, son, we lack for nothing,'Muttie said.

  'You lack a good coat,Muttie, yours is very thin.'

  'But I have a great thick jumper,'Muttie said cheerfully.

  'Father always had a good coat with a velvet collar, and I'm sure they got a lot of money for The Beeches.' Simon was distressed at the unequal nature of things.

  'Ah, but now remember, your poor father lost his house and your mother lost her health, so not everyone has everything, that's the most important thing to remember,'Muttie said.

  'There are new people going into The Beeches after Christmas,' Maud said.

  'Will that upset you, child? Will you miss the place?'

  'No,Muttie, I mean there's no one there any more, Mother's going to be in a home mainly, Father's travelling with old Barty and Walter's gone away. There's no one there any more to miss.'

  'And this is your home for as long as you like. For ever, really. I know it's not a grand place like you are used to, but we'd miss you to bits if you weren't here… We did, you know.'

  'We know you did,' Simon reassured him. 'Didn't you come all the way down to Kilkenny to find us?'

  'I wonder where Walter is,' Maud said. 'He never sends a postcard or anything.'

  'I'm sure he will one day,'Muttie reassured them.

  'I hope he has a good job,' Maud said. 'He was so nice to come and find us too, the day you did; I didn't expect him to.'

  'No, I thought he wouldn't bother with us, but he must have been worried about us,' said Simon.

  'We thought he had gone away himself that night, I don't really remember it all clearly,' Maud said with a troubled face.

  Muttie decided it was time to change the subject. 'They always say you should never look back. Do I look back to the day I meant to put the tenner on Earl Grey, and I wasn't seeing things clearly, so didn't I mix up the names and put it on to King Grey instead? A dark day that was, but do I look back on it? I do not.'

  'Tom, don't hang up, it's Marcella.'

  I'm not going to hang up,' he said.

  'Listen, I can't talk long, there's this television game giving dream prizes, you know, a flight in a helicopter, someone to cook a dinner party for you...'

  'I know.' Tom sighed. 'Geraldine tried to get us in there, but…'

  I'm having dinner with the director, I'm actually at Quentin's with him now. Why don't you and Cathy get down here, and I'll introduce you, and Brenda will praise you to the skies. Wouldn't it be a great chance—'

  'You're very good to think of it, but…'

  'But what, Tom, it's eight o'clock at night. I'll be here with this guy for at least another hour and a bit. Go on, get Cathy, I bet she'd think it was worth it.' She was gone.

  They met at Quentin's. Tom was wearing a dark suit and white shirt. />
  Cathy looked at him with admiration. 'You scrub up very well,' she said. She wore her blue velvet trouser suit, and her hair hung loose on her shoulders.

  'And you've put on make-up!' he said.

  'Let's only have a starter, we can't afford a whole meal,' she said, looking at the menu anxiously.

  Tom was looking over at Marcella, smiling up at a square-jawed man with glasses. The director who had the power to make Scarlet Feather's name. He realised with a sense of loss that he really didn't love Marcella any more.

  Brenda came to the table. 'I know what this is about,' she said. 'They're having their coffee now, don't order anything yet and they can sit with you for five minutes on their way out; you don't want the table covered with food.'

  'You're a genius,' Cathy whispered.

  'No, it's just that I love these kind of dramas, trying to change people's lives, it's what makes the business worthwhile. You should know, you do it yourselves.'

  It worked like a dream. Marcella showed surprise to see them, Tom begged them to sit down for five minutes. Douglas, the JfC director who seemed a nice sort of fellow, the only one in the dark about the whole thing, talked easily. Nobody mentioned the television show.

  'What are you doing nowadays, Marcella?' Tom asked.

  'I hope she'll decorate our television programme as one of the prize-givers,' Douglas said, smiling.

  At that point Brenda arrived and congratulated Douglas on having discovered Scarlet Feather, the best-kept catering secret in Ireland. 'Patrick and I always quiver when they come in here, they have such high standards,' Brenda said.

  'Tell me, what kind of a dinner party would you cook for eight people… ?' Douglas began. And they knew it was theirs. Under the table, they squeezed each other's hands very tightly.

  Kay Mitchell was in a nursing home. It was thought that she would never be able to look after herself fully; sheltered accommodation was mentioned as a long-term plan. The nursing home had been chosen with a view to easy access for the children, who could get there on one bus journey from school or from St Jarlath's Crescent. There was a cheerful sitting room where she could come and meet them every week. And would, of course, meet her husband Kenneth if he ever came back from his travels with old Barty. And Walter, if anyone could tell her where he was and when he was coming back. Sometimes she asked the twins, but they didn't know. Sometimes she forgot that The Beeches had been sold and asked about the garden. There were even days when she wasn't sure who Maud and Simon were, exactly. But the twins remained good-tempered throughout.

  'I expect if you've got bad nerves people sort of slip out of your mind like down through a grating,' Simon said as they went home after a visit where their mother had constantly asked them who they had come to see.

  'And then when the nerves get better, she finds them again,' Maud agreed, as they went back to the comfort of St Jarlath's Crescent, where everyone knew who they were and welcomed them home for supper.

  Geraldine did not take long to find which hospital Teddy was in, and learned that he had a private room. Twice she went to the hospital with the intention of visiting him, twice she left without doing so. She had even got as far as the corridor and seen that there was nobody else with him… But still something stopped her. Why had he come back to Ireland? He hardly knew anyone here now, his family had grown up in Brussels, he wasn't close to his brother and sister. Did she want to see him now, when he was so very ill? Did he want her to see him this way? Was there a wild possibility that now, in this last part of his life, he had wanted to see her again, but did not dare to ask her to visit. On her third visit she was determined not to run away. The door of his room was slightly open; she could see the end of a bed and a nurse talking to him. But still she couldn't go in. She had the phone number of the hospital and her mobile… She moved further down the corridor and made the call; they put her through to his room. She could hear the phone ringing beside his bed and then he answered.

  'Teddy, it's Geraldine O'Connor,' she said.

  'I'm sorry?' His voice was frail, he sounded confused.

  'You know… Geraldine,' she said, and paused.

  'Have you got the right person?' he asked.

  'Teddy, it's Geraldine, for God's sake, Geraldine.' She moved nearer to the room. He was not going to forget her or pretend that he had forgotten her. This was not going to happen. She had behaved so well for over half of her life, she only wanted to say goodbye, tell him that she had never stopped loving him.

  I'm sorry,' he apologised. 'I'm on a lot of medication and I'm afraid I don't recall everyone's names.'

  'So why did you come back here, then, Teddy, if you don't remember anyone?' She knew her voice sounded hard.

  'Please forgive me,' he said, and put the phone down.

  She saw the nurse moving around his bed. Geraldine didn't go into the room. She stood without moving in the corridor and watched the pleasant-looking girl go back to the nurses' station at the corner. Geraldine didn't know how long she stood there. One or two people asked her if she was all right, and she must have answered satisfactorily. She saw people going into the various rooms, but nobody went into Teddy's. Eventually she turned away and went to the elevator. She was too shaky still to drive her car, so she had a cup of tea in the restaurant downstairs. It was all for the best, she told herself. What could she have talked about with him, anyway? How he had ruined her life, how his doctor friend had ruined her chances of ever having a child? Would she have told him about all the men who had replaced him in her life, but none of them loved as he had been loved? A man about to die would not want to hear such tragedy. She wiped away the tears that were falling into her cup of tea. It had all been for the best that he hadn't remembered her.

  It had been such a wonderful night at Quentin's that Tom had not wanted to darken the mood by telling the story of young Frankie Maguire, who had killed himself at the premises. Sometimes he looked around wondering which room it might have happened in. But it wasn't something Cathy had to know now, nor indeed any of the others. And anyway, there wasn't a free moment for anyone to tell anything. The television dinner party was on… Tom and Cathy would be in the studio… The leaflets were beginning to yield some resulys, the five of them worked non-stop, cooking, packing and unpacking the van, delivering, serving and clearing up, taking more bookings. So much was happening that Tom couldn't sleep. It was no effort to get up and go to bake bread at Haywards at a time when most people were asleep.

  Shona wasn't asleep; she was letting herself in at the same time.

  'I'll make you breakfast,' he offered.

  'Done.' She came and sat in the kitchen and watched as he got the place to life, prepared his doughs and got them both coffee and toast.

  'What on earth has you in so early, Shona, they work you too hard?'

  'No, this is my own life. I'm in because I want an uninterrupted hour on the Internet. I'm the one in charge of booking a holiday and I'm not very used to it.'

  'How many of you are there going?' Tom asked absently.

  'Two,' she said.

  He looked up with a smile. 'That's nice,' he said.

  'Not what you think, Tom.'

  'Nothing's what you think,' he said. 'The older I get, the more I realise that.'

  Cathy went into the hairdressing salon at Haywards. 'I want a totally new image for a television show tomorrow,' she said.

  'What kind of an image?' asked Gerard, the senior stylist.

  'I want to dazzle everybody,' she said.

  Gerard had been given better guidelines in his life. 'What will you be wearing?' he asked.

  'A red T-shirt, black trousers and a white pinafore. I have to have my hair sort of hidden in a hat I think, or something to make it look as if it isn't falling onto the food.' Gerard asked not unreasonably why, if her hair was going to be hidden by a hat, she needed a new hairstyle or any hairstyle, in fact. Maybe it was a hat she needed, a smart, white hat. 'I have to have a nice hairstyle because months ago my mother-
in-law gave me a token here,' she said, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

  'What did you do with it?'

  'I gave it to my friend June who got purple streaks,' Cathy said.

  'I see,' said Gerard.

  'And I only have three-quarters of an hour, Gerard, so could you think of something quick.' Gerard sent down to the store for a white hat so that they could examine the situation more clearly. 'This will take for ever!' Cathy wailed.

  'You're a pro and I'm a pro. You wouldn't let your food go out looking like swill. I don't want you going on the television with my hairdo looking like a bird's nest after a party.'

  Cathy's saw the point; he had to protect his reputation too. Gerard fixed on the white cap at a jaunty angle, and then proceeded to cut her hair to just above her shoulders.

  'I look like a simpleton in a pantomime,' Cathy said, staring at herself.

  'Thanks a bundle, and I bet your food tastes like shit too,' said Gerard, insulted.

  They caught each other's eye in the mirror, and both began to laugh. The sedate clientele of Haywards was startled to see the near hysteria as Cathy and Gerard laughed until they thought they would never stop.

  'Tom, you know we wouldn't annoy you in a million years,' Maud said on the telephone.

  'I know that, like you know I wouldn't offend you in a million years, but it's just that we're so busy now, you wouldn't believe it.'

  'I would believe it. I heard Muttie tell his wife Lizzie that the two of you will be in your coffins before St Patrick's Day with the amount of hours you're working…'

  'He said that?' Tom reached over and grabbed a saucepan just before it began to burn.

  'He did, he said if ever he got a lot of money that he'd go out and he'd invest it in your company.'