‘I’ll never be able to smell anything again. My sinuses are in agony. Never mind. We both look absolutely beautiful. It’s a pity there won’t be anyone worth impressing. I suppose Kit won’t dance with anyone but you.’
It had more than once occurred to me that Liddy was forming a crush on Kit. When he looked at her she became self-conscious and when he wasn’t looking at her she stared at him with all her eyes.
‘I’ll be too busy to dance,’ I said. ‘I’ll have the supper to see to. One more dab of Shalimar to be on the safe side and then we’ll go and help your aunt.’
‘Are you sure you like it?’ The scent had been Liddy’s birthday present to me and she asked me this at least once a day.
‘Love it. Steel yourself and take a good sniff.’ I lifted my chin and held my neck towards her. ‘Can you detect anything resembling a cow? I don’t want to inflame Michael into losing self-control.’
Liddy giggled, sniffed and coughed. ‘Promise. Not the faintest hint.’
We went to Constance’s bedroom. She was standing in her petticoat, looking in despair at the heaps of clothing on her bed. Her bare feet were beautiful: well-shaped, straight-toed and unmarked by corn or callus; one of the benefits of gumboots.
‘How gorgeous you both are! Liddy darling, you’ve put on weight and how much better you look for it. And even Father Deglan’s going to be guilty of impure thoughts when he sees you in that dress, Bobbie. Golly!’ she added as I advanced upon her. ‘You smell like a distillation of all the flowers in the world. But how is any man to dance with you without being knocked unconscious?’
‘It’ll be better when it warms up on my skin.’
‘You’d better hurry up, Aunt Connie,’ said Liddy. ‘What are you waiting for?’
‘I’ve tried on everything I’ve got and it’s either too tight or too frumpy. Whatever made me buy such ghastly things in the first place? Was I off my head? Or under the influence of a mind-altering drug?’
‘I thought you said you were going to wear your brown,’ said Liddy.
‘I put it on but it makes me look exactly like one of Siobhan’s cow-pats. Unfortunately it’s the only thing that fits. I must have put on at least a stone since last year.’
‘This is pretty.’ I held up a black dress.
‘I can’t do up the zip.’
‘Put on the brown again and let’s see it,’ I suggested.
Liddy zipped it up for her. It was big enough but the ridges and bulges about Constance’s hips and thighs made her look like a badly wrapped brown paper parcel.
‘It would hang better if you took off your pants,’ I suggested.
Constance looked startled. ‘You mean go downstairs without any knickers on?’
‘Why not?’
‘I should feel indecent. Utterly wanton.’
‘As no one else would know, would that matter particularly? You needn’t be wanton.’
‘I suppose not.’ Constance felt under her dress and withdrew the article, which was waist-length and made from aertex.
‘That’s much better,’ said Liddy. ‘Wait there.’
While she was gone I went through Constance’s jewellery box: a mess of unravelling cotton-reels and loose face powder. At the bottom I found a heavy Middle-Eastern-looking necklace, made from square gold beads alternating with round ones of turquoise. ‘Put this on,’ I said.
The gold lit Constance’s face and the chunkiness diminished her broad shoulders. ‘I think there are some earrings and a bracelet to match.’ She examined herself in the looking glass. ‘Finn brought the set back for me years ago from somewhere like Egypt or Syria but I’ve never worn them. I always thought they were too flamboyant for me.’
‘On the contrary.’ I rummaged through the box and found them. ‘They are perfect for you. He has a good eye, obviously.’
‘I expect Violet chose them. She always dressed so well, poor darling.’
Liddy reappeared with an armful of brightly coloured fabrics and some curling tongs. ‘I’ve brought some of Mummy’s scarves. You could knot them over your hips to hide the podgy bits.’
Poor Constance’s self-image was so poor that she did not flinch at the brutal candour of youth but did as she was told.
‘Here, try this.’ Liddy picked up a lovely silk wisp, the colour of aquamarines. ‘It’ll go perfectly with that stunning jewellery and cheer up that horrible brown.’
The effect was everything one could have wished. The plainness of the dress was transformed at a stroke into understated sophistication. ‘Now hair. Sit down.’ Liddy pushed her aunt on to her dressing-table stool and got to work with the tongs. She smoothed Constance’s untidy curls into an elegant series of waves, parted at the side to hang sexily over one eye. ‘OK, let’s have a look in your make-up drawer. Oh, heavens, Aunt Connie! The sort of mascara you have to spit on went out with flint axes.’
Liddy went away and came back with her own pots, pencils, bottles and compacts. She shaded, smudged, outlined, blended, brushed and blotted and the result was a triumph. Constance was an almond-eyed Juno, a tawny goddess, with flawless skin and red lips.
Liddy surveyed her aunt critically. ‘There’s still something not quite right. I know.’ She took a pair of tweezers from her make-up bag. ‘Those eyebrows. We haven’t time to do them properly – besides they’ll probably go red where I’ve plucked them – but I’ll just take out the ones in the middle.’
‘Ow-how, ooh-hoo!’ protested Constance, but when at last she looked at herself in the mirror, she exclaimed, ‘I can’t believe that’s me!’ She caught Liddy’s hand. ‘Thank you, darling. It’s too sweet of you to take so much trouble.’
‘Any time,’ said Liddy airily but I saw she was pleased.
‘I’m sorry but I’m going to have to go to the lav again. It’s because I’m nervous. When I was younger I hardly saw anything of the dance floor. I was always standing with crossed legs in the queue in the cloakroom.’
Liddy and I waited for Constance at the head of the stairs so we could make our entrance together. From the landing I could see through the banisters into the hall below where the dancing was to take place and probably had done every year since the building of the present castle some five hundred years ago. We had practically denuded the demesne that morning to decorate the panelling with branches of greenery. It looked luxuriant and bosky. In the absence of dance crystals Katty and Pegeen had grated candles and scattered the shavings on the oak boards to make it ‘skeety’. The smell of wax wove in with the smell of burning turf and the sharper scent of sap from the birch, lime and larch.
Kit, Mr Macchuin and Eugene were standing in a group before the fire. The two former were wearing dinner jackets while Eugene had on his usual green frock-coat. As we descended the stairs, I was delighted to see Eugene’s eyes fasten on Constance with an expression of acute interest.
‘You look very pretty, Liddy.’ Mr Macchuin stepped forward to kiss his daughter. ‘Like a healthy young woman instead of a bag of bones.’
I almost tutted aloud at this typically masculine compliment that seemed to disparage as much as it affirmed. He turned to look at his sister.
‘Good God, Con! I hardly recognized you.’ He looked her up and down with brotherly impartiality. ‘Your hair’s different. And you’re wearing lipstick. What’s it all about?’ I longed to tread hard on his uncomprehending foot. Then he said, ‘It’s a welcome change from the cardigan and boots.’
‘Yes, indeed.’ Eugene’s nostrils flared as he breathed heavily and his eyes bulged. ‘“The shallop of my peace is wrecked on Beauty’s shore.”’
Constance blushed prettily.
‘I can’t wait for the dancing to start.’ Kit took hold of me and waltzed me expertly round the room. ‘My God! You’re intoxicating! It’s like drowning in a river of flowers. “Some day,”’ he sang in a light baritone, ‘“when I’m awf’ly low – When the world is cold – I will feel a glow just thinking of you – And the way you look tonight.” Will
you promise to dance with me all night? Once I’ve done my duty by the wallflowers, that is?’
‘I’d love to but until supper’s been eaten and cleared away I’m strictly on duty.’
‘It was a fine day for the Macchuins when you dropped in.’
I looked over my shoulder at Constance standing before the fire, her rouged mouth parted as she listened to Eugene. At Liddy checking her appearance in the punch ladle. At Flavia coming down the stairs in a charming blue dress, holding a book in front of her and feeling for each step with her toe. Behind Flavia came Maud in black as always but with a diamond necklace and earrings that blazed. After Maud came Sissy, her usually lithe skips hampered by a strapless dress covered with flashing green and silver sequins that hugged her figure all the way down to her ankles. A net frill stuck out over her bare feet. Her breasts were covered (barely) by embroidered scallop shells. The mermaid costume suited her simian features and jagged black hair with its blood-red tips. She wriggled with tiny steps across the hall and put her hand on Mr Macchuin’s arm. He had his back to the room and was prodding a sod of turf into flame with his toe. The expression on his face as he took in Sissy’s appearance was worth any amount of dusting and potato-peeling.
‘It was a fine day for me.’
‘Well, Liddy,’ I heard Maud say as we drifted by, ‘that’s a pretty dress. But you’d better not put on any more weight. At your age I had an eighteen-inch waist and so did your mother.’
I made Kit stop beside them. ‘Liddy’s just perfect,’ I said. ‘Don’t you think so, Kit?’ I squeezed his hand hard.
‘What?’ He gave Liddy a careless glance. ‘Oh, a siren. The boys will be dazzled.’
Maud looked me up and down. ‘How singular! Our housekeeper is better dressed than any of us.’
THIRTY-THREE
The musicians: three fiddlers, a banjo-player, a flautist and a man with a bodhrán (a sort of drum), positioned themselves on the landing which was large enough to be a sort of minstrels’ gallery. Not long after their arrival the guests began to pour in through the open front door. Everyone, from Colonel Molesworth who had driven over in his Bentley from Annagh Park to Francie Synge who had deserted her post by the swing door of the Fitzgeorge Arms, was gorgeously arrayed in his or her best party clothes. Osgar, overwhelmed by the sudden influx of humans, retreated beneath the side table from where he maintained a sullen surveillance, unable to let himself go sufficiently to join Maria who greeted every visitor with barks or dribbles according to her view of them.
I went to check that all was well in the kitchen. Katty and Pegeen were handling the pans of food with unusual care, fearful of splashing their best clothes. They had been responsible for the traditional dishes. Crubeens, rated high by Timsy and the girls, were pigs’ trotters (back feet only) pickled in strong vinegar then boiled. Drisheen was sheep’s blood and mutton suet mixed with breadcrumbs and milk. Pudding was made from carrageen moss, a kind of seaweed. After it had been cleaned of molluscs and tiny worms, it was simmered in milk with lemon rind and sugar and poured into a mould where it set like blancmange.
I had poached a salmon, roasted three chickens and baked a large ham, and made a quantity of hollandaise sauce. There were potatoes, of course, and Turlough McGurn had promised cucumbers if he had to cross the Sahara with a team of camels to get them. Instead of the six I had ordered he sent six boxes, so I made not only cucumber salad but cucumber soup and mousse as well. For pudding I made crème brûlée using the eggs and cream which we now had in abundance.
As soon as I saw that there was plenty for everyone I relaxed. The Irish habit of talking to strangers as though they had known them for years contributed in no small way to the party spirit. Unmarried women were much in demand when dancing began again after supper. Several men with shiny suits and shinier faces, who had been too shy to ask before, were now emboldened by punch and inclined to quarrel about who should take me round the floor. But when Michael McOstrich appeared in the doorway, they melted away.
‘You’ll take a spin with me, Miss Norton.’
He looked magnificent in his evening clothes. There was about him a fierce manliness, which I might have found attractive had I been at all interested in agriculture. He was as determined in his dancing as in his wooing and made no concessions to other couples. As a result we left a trail of crushed feet, bruised shins and knocked heads behind us.
‘I was getting in the cows,’ he said in explanation for his late arrival. He marched me once round the circumference of the hall before saying, ‘Won’t you change your mind about refusing my invitations? I’ll confess you’re a trouble to me. I don’t know when I’ve taken such a fancy to a young lady. Perhaps you don’t realize that my intentions are honourable? I’m not the man to trifle with God’s holy laws. I mean it all fair and square.’ He stood still so suddenly that a couple ran into us. ‘I’m offering marriage, Miss Norton.’
‘Please call me Bobbie. This is so sudden. Of course I’m aware that it’s a great honour …’ We seemed to have strayed into Jane Austen. It would be wrong to seek safety in cowardly ambiguity. ‘I’m afraid it’s impossible.’
‘I’m offering a good home. And there’d be nothing like the work there is here. Máire could wait on you. And no one would dare to look down on you. Just let them try.’ Michael tightened his hold on my waist and scowled ferociously. ‘There’s not a man in Connaught I couldn’t buy out if I chose. Finn Macchuin now, he’s an embarrassed man. Likely he’ll soon be selling Curraghcourt to make ends meet.’
‘Oh, I hope not!’
The dismay in my voice struck Michael’s ear suspiciously. ‘What’d it be to you?’
‘The family have been here such a long time.’
‘The McOstriches have been at Ballyboggin nearly as long.’
‘I should be just as sorry if you had to sell up.’
‘No fear of that. Why, there isn’t another farm with a brand-new spudding machine for twenty miles about. I’ve ordered a new bed.’
‘Really? I’m so sorry,’ I added in apology to the woman whose eye I had nearly put out with my elbow.
‘The best in the shop. Headboard, sprung mattress, the lot. I’m not a man to spare expense where it’s wanted.’
‘I’m sure you’re thoroughly generous.’
‘As to that, there isn’t a man in Connaught can drive a harder bargain. I make a pound do the work of ten of other men’s. Now, say you’ll come over to Ballyboggin and take a bite of supper? There’d be just the two of us. My brothers can eat in the scullery. Máire takes hers standing up as it is.’
‘I should hate to put your family to so much inconvenience.’ Through the gap beneath Michael’s armpit I caught sight of Sissy dancing with a man who was already drunk. Her dress was split to the thigh. She did not seem to be enjoying herself. When she caught my eye she stuck out her tongue. This emboldened me to set in motion the plan I had been hatching. ‘Besides,’ I went on, ‘I couldn’t square it with my conscience to make another girl unhappy by accepting your very kind proposal. It might even drive her to do something desperate.’
‘What’s that? What girl?’
‘A girl who, I happen to know, is almost broken-hearted because you never show her any attention.’
‘Broken-hearted, you say?’ Naturally he was interested. ‘Over me? And who’s the cailín?’
‘I’m not sure I ought to tell you. It would be breaking a confidence.’
‘A lady’s feelings are sacred to me. I’m not the man to make free with a girl’s reputation.’
‘Well, in that case … it may surprise you to know that Sissy McGinty is looking at us right now and wishing with all her heart and soul she was in my shoes.’
‘Sissy McGinty?’ he bellowed. ‘The tinker’s bastard?’
‘Ssh! Remember her reputation.’
‘Why, it’s known the length and breadth of Galway she’s Finn Macchuin’s bit of flash.’
‘Do keep your voice down. A man of the wor
ld like you must know it’s a woman’s prerogative to change her mind.’
‘It’s true you’re a fickle crew if not kept up to the mark.’
I wondered what methods Michael might employ to keep any woman belonging to him ‘up to the mark’. But I thought Sissy could take care of herself.
‘You wouldn’t have any difficulty keeping a girl’s attention fixed, I’m quite sure.’
‘Oh, Bobbie!’ He sighed sentimentally and pressed me to his capacious chest. ‘Couldn’t you find it in you to be that girl? I know I’m a rough sort of fellow. When my father died, God rest his soul, the bailiffs were at the door and I’ve four brothers and a sister younger than me. I had to set to and bring the place about or they’d have starved. I’ve not had time to cultivate the winning ways that ladies like. I’ve had to lie down in my mud last thing at night and get up before dawn to make the place pay. But I’d be good to you, no fear of that.’
At that moment I felt I had glimpsed the real man behind the boasting and self-assertion. I forgot that the sum of our acquaintance amounted to half an hour’s conversation and was truly sorry to be the cause of pain.
‘It wouldn’t work, Michael. We have nothing in common. But thank you, anyway. Now I really must go and see to things in the kitchen.’ I tried to free myself from a grasp like a cattle-crush. ‘Why don’t you ask Sissy to dance?’
‘You don’t mean it? A McOstrich and a McGinty? Why, her father sharpened knives for a living and her mother was out of the cathouse.’
‘I call that ungallant of you. A McOstrich of Ballyboggin stooping to petty snobbery? I’m shocked. You could make a queen of a beggar-woman, if you chose. Sissy was good enough for Senator Macchuin, remember.’
‘That’s true.’ This evidently gave Michael pause. If there was one man to whom Michael was ready to bend the knee it was Mr Macchuin.
‘She’s got a passionate nature, that’s obvious. She’s very pretty. And original.’
‘Maybe.’
‘And she’s very fond of you.’
Moonshine Page 48
