An Irish Country Wedding

by Patrick Taylor

  “You’ll do no such thing, Fingal O’Reilly,” Kitty said. “She was only being affectionate.”

  O’Reilly glanced up to where Lady Macbeth sat. Her tail had subsided and the little cat was washing her backside. He took a deep breath. Kitty was right, and it wasn’t an angry owner her ladyship needed. She already had Bertie Bishop after her hide even if she did have an alibi.

  “All right,” O’Reilly said. “You’re forgiven, your ladyship.” He dusted himself off. Nothing broken except a plate or two. Nothing wounded but his pride, and sure wouldn’t that recover? “We’ll say no more, and I think it would be pleasant to take our coffee upstairs. You can join us or go on any time you like, Barry.”

  “I’ll be off,” said Barry, “unless you want some help clearing up this lot.”

  “No need. Away you go.” O’Reilly bent beside Kitty, who had started to pick up bits of broken china. He said, “There’s a tray in the kitchen. I’ll get it.”

  “Fingal. These plates are Belleek. Kinky’ll know there are two missing. She’ll never trust me in her kitchen again.” Kitty straightened, holding up a handful of china pieces etched in green and gold shamrocks. “There’s a shop in Belfast that carries discontinued patterns. I’m sure I can find replacements there.”

  “You, Kitty O’Hallorhan, are a gem without price.” He straightened, still on his knees.

  “She’s practically been all the family you’ve had for years, Fingal. I want to come into it in July as gently as possible.”

  He bent and kissed her, an urgent yet tender kiss amid the plates and cutlery, the overturned chair and the sounds of Lady Macbeth purring from the pelmet. “Thank you, Kitty. Thank you for helping me try to put Kinky’s pieces together again.”

  16

  I Have a Dream

  “You’re sure you’d not want to get home now, Helen?” said O’Reilly. “It’s Friday afternoon. You stayed late last Friday. We can chance not having anyone here to answer the phone for a little while.” Helen, who had been washing and ironing all afternoon, was now in her favourite chair by the fire, and Lady Macbeth was in her usual position, curled up by Helen’s right hip. He noticed she wasn’t reading Dickens. “What have you got there?” he asked.

  She held up a magazine. Popular Science. “There’s a great article here about Professor Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin.”

  “Didn’t she get the Nobel for chemistry last year?”

  “Aye. Only the third woman to do it. She does this thing called X-ray crystallography and figures out the three-dimensional structure of molecules. It’s very, very interesting stuff, so it is. Them two fellahs Watson and Crick would never have figured out the structure of DNA without it.”

  He heard the enthusiasm. And Helen did have Advanced Senior physics and biology. She probably understood the principles of the subject better than him, although he had been fascinated when the news broke that the two scientists and a Doctor Wilkins had unraveled what the press called “the secret of life” back in the early ’50s. They’d got a Nobel in 1962. “I thought your interests were more literary,” he said.

  “I love reading, but I like science too.”

  “Good for you,” he said, and meant it, “and you really should go home. The word’s out about Kinky and most of the folks’ll understand if there’s no reply.”

  “Och, Doctor O’Reilly,” Helen said, “I’m in no rush. My boyfriend,” her lip curled, “the gurrier, took himself off a couple of weeks ago with a wee tramp from Turf Lodge up in Belfast.” She shrugged. “I’d just be sitting at home helping my da watch TV. I really don’t mind staying on here. Away you on off to see Donal and Julie, and give them my best.”

  “Bless you, Helen. It’s important for the Donnellys. I’ll try not to be too long.”

  “Can I ask you a question, sir, before you go, like? Do you have time?”

  “Of course.”

  “You asked me a while back if I’d like to go to university.” She gripped the fingers of her left hand with her right.

  “I did.”

  “This last couple of weeks when you and Doctor Laverty have been out I’ve been phoning round, looking for a proper job, like you said I could.”

  “And?”

  She shook her head. “I never knew you could be too qualified, but when I tell people I’ve my Advanced Senior?” She scowled and shook her head. “They all say I’d cost too much. So I’ve been thinking.”

  “Go on.”

  “You’ll not laugh?” Her tones were as serious as a priest giving the last rites and he saw the knuckles of her left hand blanch as her right tightened its grasp.

  “Of course not.”

  “How’d I set about going to Queen’s?”

  “Queen’s?” O’Reilly said. “And why the hell not? You have the marks, so you’ll have no trouble getting admitted.”

  “I rung up yesterday,” she said. “My subjects are enough all right, I could get in, but,” she sighed, “people like me—”

  “You mean women?”

  “Naah. There’s lots of women at Queen’s. I mean … my da’s a labourer and all.” She looked into his eyes.

  “And you think you’re not good enough? Balls.” He’d hated the class system since his student days. “Utter bloody balls. You, Helen Hewitt, are as good as the next man … or woman.”

  “Thank you,” she said quietly, “thank you for saying that, but even if I am, it’s going to be dear. I asked my da and he says if I really want to go I can live at home for free, but I’d have to travel to Belfast, buy books, clothes, and there’s the fees. Seventy pounds a year.”

  “A lot of money. I know.” He vividly remembered his own student days when he’d had to live on the smell of an oily rag, count his pennies at every turn.

  “I hear tell that in America you can get a loan to be a student. You’ve to pay it back after you qualify, but—”

  O’Reilly frowned. “I don’t know if you can here, but we can find out, or maybe you could work your way through. I have a friend in Belfast. His boy went to England last summer, to Grimsby. Worked in a frozen pea factory and made enough in his summer holidays to pay his fees.”

  “I’d not mind working,” she scowled, “if I could get a bloody job.” Her hand flew to her mouth. “Pardon me, sir. I shouldn’t have said that.”

  O’Reilly chuckled. “Never worry. I used to be a sailor. I’ve heard a damn sight worse.”

  “A sailor? Like on a big ship?”

  “After I left school. I was in the merchant navy for three years and spent another year on a Royal Navy warship.” He grinned. “I needed money to go to university too. Just like you.”

  “I never knew.” There was a hint of awe as she spoke.

  “It’s not important. What is is finding out about Queen’s for you. There might even be scholarships.”

  “Will you help me, sir? Find out, like?”

  “Damn right I will, but it’ll take some time, that’s all.”

  “Would you, sir?” Her eyes shone. “Honest?”

  “Cross my heart.”

  “And we’ve lots of time. Applications don’t close until September.”

  O’Reilly cocked his head on one side. “You’ve been doing your homework, haven’t you?”

  “My da says if you want something bad enough it’s up to you to work hard enough to get it.”

  “Your da,” said O’Reilly, “is a wise man.” And this is one very determined young woman. “I will help you as much as I can, and we’ll be keeping you busy here for a while longer while I do. We hope Mrs. Kincaid’s coming home next week, but she’ll still be taking it easy.”

  “I’m glad she’s on the mend,” Helen said, “and I can use the money until she gets back to her work.”

  O’Reilly grinned. “I’ll start asking as soon as I can. Now, what would you like to study?” She had Advanced level passes in sciences, so what would suit a young woman with that background? Botany? Zoology?

  Helen blushed, glance
d down at the floor, then, straightening her shoulders, looked O’Reilly straight in the eye. Her voice was barely above a whisper. “I … I’d like to be a … I’d like to be a doctor.” The last words came in a rush. “I’ve been watching you and Doctor Laverty and—”

  “By God’s Holy trousers,” O’Reilly roared, and slapped his thigh. “A doctor? Sweet Jasus. I don’t believe it. You, Helen Hewitt, really take the biscuit. I’ve not heard anything so bloody marvellous in years.”

  She blushed. “Someone’s got to find out what cures cancer. If that Professor Hodgkin can do research, maybe I could too. For my ma, like.”

  Oh, Helen, Helen, he thought, it’s far too early for you to be thinking about that kind of thing. Let’s get you into medical school first. After six years and your houseman’s year you’ll be like Barry, trying to decide what you want for a career. One step at a time. He hugged her, held her at arms’ length, and said, “You have the Advanced entrance requirements, you told me you’d got Junior Latin too, so there’s not a reason on God’s green earth why you shouldn’t go to medical school as long as we can raise the money.”

  “Doctor O’Reilly,” she said, darted forward, pecked his cheek, and stepped back. “Thank you.” Her smile was vast and from the corner of each green eye a single silver tear slipped. “Thank you very much.”

  O’Reilly took a deep breath before saying, “I’ll do everything I can. That’s a promise.” He’d not tell her now, but almost certainly Cromie or Charlie Greer would know about scholarships or funds to help students from working backgrounds. When he met with the lads to discuss the reunion he’d find out. “I’ll be back as quick as I can.”

  * * *

  O’Reilly, still marvelling at Helen’s determination, let himself into the backyard to be greeted by a joyous Arthur. “Come on, lummox,” he said, looking up at the hospital-blanket-grey May sky and turning his collar against the steady drizzle.

  He drove to Donal and Julie’s rented cottage along the Shore Road. Oily rollers marched across a leaden lough. It had been a busy week, but he’d managed to run up to the Royal on Wednesday afternoon to see Kinky, whose daily progress reports from Jack had been, and continued to be, of steady physical improvement. She’d certainly looked much better, was eating solid food, and had only five more days of antibiotics to take. He hoped she would get home next week. Perhaps once she was home, he’d think of something to let her see how much she was needed.

  He parked outside the Donnellys, told Arthur to stay, and headed up along the gravel path. He noticed that there were no weeds, which, given Ireland’s climate, was remarkable. Someone had done the weeding. Donal and Julie were two house-proud people, considering they’d only been living here since they’d been married last Christmas and now were hoping to move out very soon into their own home. Lots of folks, he knew, would have let the path go for the landlord to sort out.

  “Doctor O’Reilly.” Julie smiled and said, “Come in. We’re both ready.” She was wearing a pac-a-mac, a plastic see-through raincoat. It could not hide her belly, neatly rounded with a—he had to think—a twenty-eight-week pregnancy. He followed her into the hall. Donal’s bicycle of many colours, which he’d painted from the leftovers in half a dozen paint pots, stood propped against the staircase. A sleek greyhound pushed a questioning muzzle against O’Reilly’s hand. “How are you, Bluebird?” O’Reilly stroked the dog’s head and wondered when Donal would implement the plan to race her again. He’d mentioned it when he was in the Royal.

  “How’s about ye, Doc?” Donal appeared from a room to the left. His duncher perched rakishly on a small white bandage. He pointed to it. “Miss Brennan says this here comes off for good on Monday.” He grimaced. “I’ll be quare nor glad to see the back of it. I’d love to get a good scratch at my nut, so I would.”

  “Itchiness is a sign of healing,” O’Reilly said. “A good sign.”

  “If you say so, Doc, but it’s like I’ve got the whole of the Third Plague of Egypt under there, so it is.”

  O’Reilly had to think. What was the third plague Moses had visited on Pharaoh? Lice, that was it. “I can imagine,” he said, and felt itchy himself. “Are we all set to go? Doctor Laverty would have liked to come but he’s visiting Ag— I mean he’s visiting a patient.”

  Donal dangled keys. “Oh, aye, I know all about that. Julie saw Cissie Sloan at the grocer’s and she said Miss Brennan asked Doctor Laverty to take a look at Aggie’s very close veins. She’s got a temperature and a ferocious aching in her leg, so she has.”

  So much for patient confidentiality, thought O’Reilly with a grin. If Cissie Sloan knew something, the whole of the townland would know inside an hour.

  “Your man Dapper Frew, the estate agent, him that’s Mister Coffin the undertaker’s cousin, give me these here,” Donal said, shaking the key ring. “Said for to let ourselves in.”

  “Grand,” said O’Reilly. He’d heard that estate agents in North America showed potential buyers round houses for sale. Here in Ulster the owner did the showing, but Myrtle Siggins, who’d lived to the grand age of 101, had been dead for a year now. Clearly Dapper, a fellow piper in the Ballybucklebo Highlanders, trusted Donal to look round on his own. “Let’s go.”

  “You be a good girl, Bluebird,” Donal said to the greyhound, who looked from eyes abrim with adoration for her master. He turned to O’Reilly. “Lead on, MacDuff, sir.”

  17

  The Fury and Mire of Human Veins

  Barry parked in the housing estate and headed for one of the identical terrace houses. The drizzle had stopped and the pavement, decorated with the blurred chalk outlines of hopscotch, shone damply in bright contrast to the scummy puddles that had collected where the tarmac was cracked. Cigarette butts disintegrated in the gutters and kept company with discarded fish-and-chip wrappers.

  Colleen Brennan opened the door. “Thanks for coming, Doctor Laverty. Aggie’s in the parlour.”

  Barry hung his coat on the hall coatstand, the one he’d used three days ago when he’d popped in to make sure Aggie’s superficial thrombophlebitis was getting better. It had been—then. “You think it’s the deep veins?” That’s what Colleen had said on the phone.

  Colleen Brennan was a thickset, sandy-haired woman of thirty-five who had been the district nurse in Ballybucklebo for thirteen years. She nodded. “Aggie has a temperature of one hundred point two and says her leg hurts. It is tender.”

  “I see.” Both were signs of deep venous thrombosis. “I don’t like the sound of that,” he said. “Let’s take a look at her.”

  “This way.”

  Barry followed the nurse into a small room. A worn rug covered the linoleum in front of the grate where a coal fire had been banked with slack, little pieces of a low-quality coal. When dampened and put over the ordinary coals, it slowed the rate of burning and saved money. Aggie lay on a couch underneath a red blanket. “Afternoon, Doctor,” she said. “I’m terrible sorry to drag youse out in this mucky weather, so I am.”

  “Don’t worry, Aggie,” Barry said. “Miss Brennan wanted me to see you.”

  “Aye. Well.” She moved herself farther up the couch. “Before we start on me, how’s Mrs. Kincaid? I knew she’d been taken poorly but Cissie told me she’s still in the Royal and had to have an operation. It’s terrible, so it is. Poor crayter.”

  “She was quite sick,” Barry said, “but she’s on the mend.”

  “If youse sees her, tell her I was asking after her, so I was.”

  “I will,” Barry said. “I’m sure she’ll be pleased.” He moved closer to the couch. “Miss Brennan says you’re not so well, Aggie.”

  She shrugged. “Them hot water bottles, and towels, and the aspirin all helped. The red bit’s got much wee-er, but I took an awful ache in my calf this morning, you know. It wasn’t like the first one, but I didn’t want to bother you, sir. I waited until Miss Brennan called by.”

  Barry resisted the temptation to remind Aggie that he’d told her not to tho
le it, but call him if she was worried. She’d not be the first of his patients who, out of consideration for their doctor’s time, had let their condition deteriorate. “I’d better have a look,” he said. He waited until Aggie had thrown back the blanket. The hem of her tartan wool dressing gown was pulled up. Barry crouched beside her. She lay so her left leg was on the outside of the couch. The red area he’d first seen last Tuesday had practically vanished. “Show me where it hurts,” he said.

  She pointed to the centre of her calf. No superficial vessels coursed beneath the skin, but the deeper posterior tibial and peroneal veins drained the calf muscles and were prone to clotting and causing pain. Her ankle looked swollen. “This won’t hurt,” Barry said, and pressed his fingertips into the swollen area above her ankle. Pits formed and were slow to disappear. That was oedema, fluid collecting there because the damaged vein could not carry it away. Another sign. “Tell me if this is sore,” he said, and palpated her calf over the courses of the deep veins.

  She sucked in her breath as his fingers probed.

  “Sorry,” he said and, before she had time to object, rapidly flexed her ankle toward her shin.

  “Owwwwch.” She gasped and screwed up her face. “That’s right sore, so it is, not like the last time you done that.”

  A positive Homan’s sign, which, while not infallible, if taken with all the other findings made Barry sure that Aggie did have a deep venous thrombosis. “You were right, Miss Brennan,” he said. “You’ve got trouble in a deep vein, Aggie.”

  Colleen inclined her head but did not smile. Barry understood that her concern for the patient outweighed her professional satisfaction at having been correct. And she was right to be worried. Aggie was at risk of a piece of the clot breaking off, being carried to the lungs, and causing pulmonary embolism, a potentially lethal condition.

  Treatment was straightforward, but although he could start it here, she would have to be admitted for follow-up and monitoring. “I’m sorry, Aggie,” he said, “but you’ve got a deep clot. We call that phlebothrombosis.”