Mary Kate

by Nadine Dorries

  ‘Good morning to you, Mrs Marcus,’ she whispered as the door clicked shut.

  Lavinia Marcus had not exaggerated: the scene that greeted her was chaotic.

  ‘Oh, thank all the saints in heaven – you came,’ said Joan as Mary Kate walked in through the door. ‘Did she tell you about not using the front door?’ She was in the middle of combing Jack’s hair; he was sitting on a kitchen chair, wincing.

  ‘She did. I won’t do it again.’

  ‘Oh, don’t be apologising to me now. I couldn’t care less if you came in down the chimney, but that one, she thinks she’s Princess Margaret, so she does. Did she chew your head off?’

  Mary Kate walked over and took the comb from Joan. ‘There you go, you’re free now. The boys are mine.’

  Joan did not look displeased. ‘Jesus, Mary and Joseph, I have no idea where you came from, but I’ve never been so glad to see anyone in my life. Where are you from?’

  ‘Tarabeg,’ said Mary Kate. ‘What about you?’

  ‘Well, what would you know, Tarabeg, eh? I’m from Clew Bay, but I know Tarabeg well enough.’

  Within minutes of being freed from the boys’ demands, Joan had laid breakfast for them all.

  Mary Kate sat the boys down, now spick and span. ‘I’ve had my breakfast already,’ she said.

  ‘Well now, you be telling Deidra you’ll be having it here with the boys and me.’

  ‘Do you know Deidra?’ Mary Kate was surprised, and then almost chastised herself. Why wouldn’t they know each other? Everyone in Mayo knew each other indirectly, and the Irish diaspora in Liverpool had to be close.

  ‘Oh, sure, we all know each other. On a Friday or Saturday night we go into town together. You will have to come along with us. We take the bus. Do you dance?’

  ‘I learnt to at the convent.’

  Joan threw her head back and laughed. ‘We all learnt at the convent, but it’s not like that here. You’ll have your eyes opened, so you will.’

  In no time at all, Mary Kate had the boys organised and ready for the park. ‘Will you show me your room first?’ she asked. ‘We have to make sure it’s tidy and clean before we leave.’

  David looked as though the sky had fallen in and landed on the kitchen floor. Jack nodded enthusiastically. ‘We have a sitting room too, and me and Daddy, we have a big board on the floor for our battle.’

  It took over an hour and a half to tidy their room. Jack helped Mary Kate with all of it, while David sat on his bed and refused. Mary Kate gave him a very simple choice. ‘You can have it your way or my way, David. Either you help or I take Jack to the park on his own and you stay here.’

  He looked up from his comic, a sneer on his face. ‘You wouldn’t dare do that – I’ll tell Mummy.’

  Just as he spoke, Mary Kate heard the front door slam. Walking over to the window, she looked down. A taxi was waiting on the street. Mrs Marcus said something to the driver, ducked in and was gone in a flash.

  She turned back from the window. ‘Well, that was your mammy leaving. You are free to tell her if you want, but that won’t be until later. In the meantime, you still have two choices: help, or stay here.’

  Jack was scooping up books from the floor beside David’s bed; once his arms were full, he was then inserting them into the empty gaps in the bookcase. It took a few minutes, but eventually David slipped off the bed and onto the floor.

  ‘Come here, Jack – you’re putting them back all wrong. The Last of the Mohicans goes on the top.’

  Mary Kate smiled. ‘Good boy, David,’ she said as she stroked his hair.

  He didn’t quite reach a smile, but the expression on his face was softer.

  ‘I have a brother who’s only a bit older than you. His name is Finn and he’s just like you.’

  The moment was lost as David snapped back, ‘I’m not Irish. The Irish are dirty, all the boys around here say so.’

  Mary Kate smarted. His words had hit her like a slap to her face. She’d never heard anyone say an unkind word that encompassed the entire population of her country. Swallowing hard, she replied, ‘The only dirtiness I have come across since I arrived in Liverpool, David, has been here, in this house. More specifically, in your room.’

  David opened his mouth to speak and then closed it again without saying anything. This girl was not like Joan; he was not going to be able to make her cry or shout in indignation or anger. He could see that and he didn’t like it. ‘I’m going to tell Mummy to get rid of you,’ he said quietly.

  Mary Kate pretended not to hear and instead turned her attention to the boys’ sitting room, where Jack had lined up his soldiers in columns on a huge board laid out on the floor.

  She didn’t get a chance to talk to Joan until later in the afternoon. The boys were in the garden with two other boys from down the street who had called and asked were they allowed out to play. Mary Kate wasn’t sure of her ground, so she invited the visitors to play in the garden, much to the delight of the dog, who never left Jack’s side. She took them out a tray of squash and biscuits, then collapsed into the kitchen chair to enjoy a cup of tea with Joan.

  ‘How did you manage before I got here?’ she asked. ‘You haven’t stopped and I’ve been with the boys all day.’

  ‘The boys only broke up from school last Friday,’ said Joan. ‘It wasn’t too bad before, but I have all the cleaning to do as well. It wasn’t easy. She’s out all the time, so she is. Never here to help with the boys.’

  ‘Where does she go?’

  Joan looked behind her to see were the boys near the door before she replied. ‘Feck knows, but she comes back smiling. Not like the poor doctor. God in heaven, I have no idea where the man gets the energy from. Works every day God sends and, sure, if you speak to any of his patients, they say he’s the best doctor in all of Liverpool.’

  ‘I know – he looked after me after I was attacked.’ Mary Kate had explained all about her mugging and Cat when she’d helped Joan hang out the washing earlier.

  ‘Well, you know what I’m talking about then,’ said Joan. ‘The missus, she gives him an awful time. The man has no peace. She doesn’t deserve him.’

  ‘Where is she now?’

  ‘I have not the faintest idea. I never do. She tells me nothing. I just have to run her house and her children – why would anyone tell me anything.’ Joan looked up at the huge clock on the wall and leapt to her feet. ‘I promised Jack I’d make him biscuits. I had better get a move on.’

  Mary Kate listened to the boys’ shrieks, which sounded like Finn playing with Keeva’s sons on the bridge, and she was swamped with homesickness. This place, the boys, her emotions, all that was happening – it was too much for her, she realised. She had seen and met almost as many people in Liverpool as there were in Tarabeg.

  *

  Lavinia sat on the side of the bed and pulled on her stockings. Robin handed her a lit cigarette. There were two glasses on the bedside tables, drained of whiskey and soda, and the room smelt strongly of alcohol fumes, cigarette smoke and sex. The quilted pink satin eiderdown and woollen blankets were trailing off the end of the bed onto the floor and diffused daylight filtered through the long net curtains.

  Lavinia’s hotel of choice was the Adelphi, but Robin had booked a room in a different hotel on Mount Pleasant, only yards from the Adelphi, which had displeased her. Their hastily discarded clothes were spread across the floor. As she stood to fasten her suspenders, he leant over and slapped her bare buttocks revealed by her slip.

  ‘That was bloody good, eh?’ He grinned and lay back against the pillows.

  ‘Actually,’ said Lavinia as she took the proffered cigarette, ‘it’s been better. You having to leave at two o’clock to get back to work doesn’t give us much time, does it?’

  ‘Steady on, Lavinia. What about your poor husband? I’ve had to leave him running the show. Have a bit of sympathy for the old chap.’

  She lay back against the pillow next to him and rolled onto her side. ‘I dare you,�
�� she said.

  He exhaled his smoke and turned his face sideways. His dark hair had the first signs of grey appearing at the sides, his eyes were the palest blue, almost grey, and his lips, neither thin nor full, were pulled into a quizzical grin. He’s one of those bloody men who gets better looking with age, she had often thought. But his eyes were shallow, untrustworthy; unusual eyes for a doctor.

  ‘You dare me what?’ he said, his eyes now twinkling.

  She kissed his lips slowly and between breaths said, ‘I dare you to take the weekend off.’

  Robin spluttered. ‘How can I do that? Besides, we are both at the Thompsons’ party tomorrow.’

  ‘I know, but can’t you have a course starting on Saturday – one that’s being held in a very nice hotel somewhere? We could have dinner and spend a whole night together. We both know that sex in the morning is the best, and we’re missing out.’

  She slipped her hand down and cupped him, and instantly, although it had been only half an hour since their last bout of passionate lovemaking, he began to swell against her. With a sense of urgency, he stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray at the side of the bed, curled one hand behind her neck and the other under her buttocks, and pulled her towards him.

  ‘Hang on,’ she said, placing the flat of her hand against his chest. ‘I need to hear a “yes” first.’

  ‘Yes,’ he groaned. ‘Yes. Now come here.’ He pulled her towards him, pushed his thigh between hers, lifted her up and slipped into her. ‘You are insatiable,’ he said as, with little preamble, he thrust himself inside her, guessing that she wouldn’t complain.

  She let out a small yelp, fastened her arms across his back and bit down hard into his shoulder. He moaned with pleasure. The clock on the bedside table came into view. It was two thirty-five. She had won. There was no way she would allow him to short-change her by sparing her only the time he had allocated. She imagined her husband, alone, struggling for a little longer with his precious patients, and the thought made her smile.

  16

  When Joe Malone finally received a reply from Tarabeg, it was not the news he’d been hoping for. It seemed his great-granddaddy’s relatives had mysteriously vanished from Tarabeg Hill, but that only made him more determined to go and see the place for himself. In recent weeks, Joe had visited the offices of Messrs Collins, Murphy, Browne and Sons on a number of occasions, to discuss the situation, and had formed a bond with Mr Browne. Though their lives were worlds apart, there was a historic connection between them, and it intrigued them both. He decided to ask Mr Browne’s advice.

  ‘Well, there’s only one thing for it,’ Mr Browne said. ‘You must take the mountain to Mohammed. You must go over there yourself and find your inheritance. I always think it’s the best way: to speak to people face to face. Look a man in the eye when you ask a question if you want an honest answer.’

  Mr Browne sat back in his chair and crossed his legs in front of him. A self-satisfied expression settled on his face as he joined his hands together. It had been an immense relief to discover that Joe Malone had no interest in Messrs Collins, Murphy, Browne and Sons other than the profit it made and thereby his share. The last thing Mr Browne needed at this stage in his life was for the sleeping partner to wake. Things were going to proceed just as they always had. He found the prospect of change abhorrent and considered himself far too old to contemplate new ways. He secretly hoped that Mr Malone might take a liking to the old country, to the place so many Irish Americans still referred to as home.

  ‘I don’t think I have any choice,’ said Joe. ‘I had better start making arrangements.’

  ‘Oh indeed, you don’t have to worry about that. Miss Carroll will sort everything.’

  Mr Browne summoned Miss Carroll into his office in his customary manner: he picked up the gold-plated telephone, rattled the handset up and down a few times and then spoke into it in a deep voice that was totally unlike the one he’d used with Joe. ‘Miss Carroll, would you step inside, please.’

  Joe grinned. Mr Browne’s formal ways had begun to amuse him.

  Miss Carroll, who had to be sixty if she was a day, turned the brass door handle and came into the office, her head held high. She was wearing shoes far too high for a woman her age. Her lipstick was too red and bled into the deep lines etched into her upper lip; it would have looked better on the lips of one of the younger women in the typing pool he’d been introduced to when he was first shown around the office. The typing pool had been the only element of the business to rouse Joe’s interest. He could not have found the world of law-making more stuffy or boring if he tried.

  Miss Carroll and Joe had already made their introductions before the meeting with Mr Browne had begun and, much to his delight, she had served him his espresso coffee just as he liked it. She was a woman who prided herself on her attention to detail. She knew every client, their likes and dislikes, what they drank, the ages of their children, and the details of their various medical complaints. Miss Carroll was a pro and she knew it.

  As Joe had relaxed in a plush purple velvet chair opposite Miss Carroll’s own mini version of Mr Browne’s oak desk, waiting for Mr Browne’s client meeting to finish, he’d told her about the frustrating situation regarding Tarabeg. ‘What was the name of the village?’ she’d asked him, flipping over a sheet of her ring-bound notepad, which Joe could see was filled from top to bottom with incomprehensible shorthand. She found a clean sheet and wrote the name down quickly. When she’d finished, she chewed the end of her pencil thoughtfully, leaving behind a ring of red lipstick like a watermark. Then she laid the pencil back down on the pad and smiled up at him, just as Mr Browne opened his door and ushered out his previous client.

  Now, as the wood-panelled office door clicked shut, Joe swivelled around in his chair to acknowledge Miss Carroll’s arrival. As she crossed the acreage of deep-pile carpet to the desk, he took in her old-fashioned tightly waved hairstyle and was once again reminded of an older version of Wallis Simpson, the American socialite who had married an English king for love; it occurred to him that this was possibly a similarity that she both enjoyed and cultivated.

  ‘Ah, Miss Carroll.’ Mr Browne looked up from his desk. ‘We need to book a ticket for Mr Malone to fly to Ireland, as soon as possible, please. First class, of course. On the account of Collins, Murphy and Browne.’

  Miss Carroll nodded and smiled benignly, giving nothing away. She stood under the central light in her dove-grey mid-calf dress and three strings of pearls sitting perfectly in place, her pad in one hand and her HB pencil poised in the other, just in case she might be required to take a letter. She turned and addressed Joe directly. ‘Please excuse me, Mr Browne,’ she said. ‘Mr Malone, following our earlier conversation, and while you were taking your meeting with Mr Browne, I took the liberty of researching a more efficient way of communicating with Tarabeg. Letters can be so unreliable when sent abroad. I do hope you don’t mind.’

  She glanced nervously towards Mr Browne from under her lashes. He nodded almost imperceptibly, a look of mild curiosity on his face.

  Joe smiled. ‘I see. And did you have any success?’

  Mr Browne, his interest piqued, sat forwards in his chair and rested his elbows on the table. Only Miss Carroll and Mr Browne knew that the day she retired of her own free will would be the day he’d be forced to do the same. He couldn’t possibly manage without her and although it remained unspoken, they both understood it. In the meantime, she continued to play the servant to his master, even though it was quite obvious to all that the roles had been reversed many years since.

  ‘There is a telex machine in the village post office. In fact, if you would like to come with me to our telex room, we could send a massage right now. It could be answered almost immediately. If there is one way to discover the whereabouts of any Malones still residing in Tarabeg, it will be via the post office.’

  Joe almost leapt out of his seat. ‘Miss Carroll, you are one angel,’ he said and he marched over
and hugged her so tight, a small birdlike noise squeaked out from somewhere within his embrace.

  Later that evening, Joe headed over to his mother’s house for his supper. ‘I have no idea how that place makes any money and I feel indecent that we are the beneficiaries,’ he said to her as she heaped pieces of fried chicken onto his plate.

  On the day he had returned from the will-reading and told her that they were the sleeping partner and shareholders in the most successful law firm in Brooklyn, she had needed to sit down. When he’d told her of the fortune waiting in a village no one had ever heard of before, she needed a drink. Tonight, just as she had each time he returned from meeting Mr Browne, her words rapidly turned to despair.

  ‘To think, your father might not have worked himself into the ground and be dead and buried if he’d known that money was sitting there, in that law firm, and that it was all his by rights.’

  She was really speaking to Rocket, stroking his muzzle, looking deep into his eyes. Rocket, aware of her pain, nuzzled his mouth against her palm and licked her.

  Joe reached across the kitchen table and squeezed his mother’s hand. He had never been very good with words and didn’t trust himself to say the right thing.

  ‘What did you say in the telex?’ she asked as she tore her eyes away from Rocket and focused on her son. ‘Eat your chicken before it goes cold.’

  Joe picked up the freshly ironed white napkin from the side of his plate and tucked it into the neck of his shirt as he glanced at her own empty plate. She’d lost twenty pounds since his father had died; it was hit and miss whether she ate the food she served up at supper.

  ‘I just said that I was Joe Malone the fourth, looking for the family of my late father, the Malones, who were last known to be in residence on Tarabeg Hill. And to please inform them that I’ll be arriving soon. That was all. Nothing else to say.’

  His mother gave a short harrumph. ‘You know, your daddy never stopped talking about them and yet he wouldn’t know any of them, not if they all knocked on the door together, carrying a sack of potatoes with leprechauns sat on their shoulders. He wouldn’t have had a clue. Never even seen a photograph of one of them. I could never understand it. Did you get a reply to the telex?’