by Maeve Binchy
‘Oh Lord, no, not those nuns. Nuns in some country place. They run homes for unmarried mothers, and the girls sort of work there and earn their keep, then when the baby is born it’s given for adoption and the girl comes back. She usually says she’s been to her granny’s. It’s a known expression, going to your granny.’
‘It must be a very lonely sort of thing to have to do.’
‘Yes, it’s not great certainly. The whole fear of it would put you off going the whole way, even if you weren’t afraid of losing the boy anyway.’
‘Are people still afraid of losing people by sleeping with them?’
‘Yes, definitely. I wouldn’t sleep with anyone if I had serious designs on them, because if I was serious about some fellow and did sleep with him, he might think I was a tramp. I’m not saying he’s right, but that’s Kilgarret law.’
‘And would you think he was a tramp, or a male tramp … or whatever we’d call it…?’
‘No, that’s different. You know about men not being able to control themselves, having this urge implanted in them by God. Yes, I do think it’s true actually. You know the way they want to do it with everyone. That’s God’s plan … or nature’s plan if you want to call it that, of seeing that the human race goes on. Men are mad to do it everywhere and women have to take control of them and insist that they only do it within matrimony and that’s society. …’
Elizabeth was rocking with laughter.
‘You’d be marvellous as a nun, honestly you would, telling all the girls about the facts of life like that. They’d never recover.’
‘But honestly isn’t that what they told us, in different words?’
‘Yes, very different words.’
‘I know it sounds ridiculous and complicated but that is the way things seem to work in Kilgarret anyway if not in the rest of the world.’
‘Do you blame all those nuns becoming nuns? I think I’d become a nun if I thought all those men were rampaging the town, made to do it everywhere.’
‘Spiking their seed all round the place … waiting for unwary females. …’
‘Aisling honestly.’
‘But that’s it, it’s just a game, and it’s like bridge or poker or whatever, people who know the rules and only take the right risks.’
*
Aisling was distressed to see Elizabeth cooking the books.
‘It’s very hard for you to understand,’ Elizabeth had explained. ‘Uncle Sean wouldn’t in a million years question what you spent or what Aunt Eileen spent … there’s no question of having to account for this and that. Father has the mind of a bank official who has to balance the books at the end of the day. He wants to balance the housekeeping too.’
‘But you’re cheating him. You’re keeping money. If he finds out … he’d be upset. Why don’t you just ask him for more?’
‘He’s got a small mind, he thinks in small terms and small sums and petty accounts. He never checks whether a tin of Spam costs three shillings or it doesn’t, but he does add the total up in front of me. Anything I save I earn, I don’t steal his money, I just think of ways of saving it and then I keep what I save. That’s all.’
Aisling studied the accounts. ‘Yes, I see. But it’s a bit petty on your side isn’t it? It’s not very generous … or the way people go on in a family.’
‘This isn’t a family, Father has never been generous. A big open heart like yours or Uncle Sean’s or Johnny’s he’d find frightening. He’d think that your household was on the brink of chaos because nobody knows exactly to the last penny how much it costs to feed and clothe you all. He’d never take into consideration that your mother feeds half the beggars that come to the door, and that she dressed and fed me for nothing for five years, and that she sends presents and gifts and has pence always in her handbag for anyone she thinks might need one. No, Father would be alarmed by that. He’s alarmed by all the marvellous food you brought from Ireland. Three times he asked me should we pay you. I think I should have said yes, it would have calmed him down.’
‘You talk about him very coldly, don’t you? You used to want him to be nicer and happier and everything. You used to want him to change?’
‘Oh yes I did. I used to think I could change him, that we could become like a picture of a Happy Family. “Mr George White, banker, and his only daughter Elizabeth, estranged wife in North of England but isn’t it wonderful how well they all manage in their ways.” But it didn’t work. You can’t change people, they go their own way. … Johnny says there’s more unhappiness caused in the world by people trying to change other people than anything else.’
‘Does Johnny say that? Why?’
‘Oh he gives examples. His friend Nick loves football, Nick’s girlfriend Shirley wants to settle down, go and look at furniture in the shops. Shirley wants to change Nick, make him stop playing football; Nick wants to change Shirley and make her come and watch football. They fight about it all the time. …’
‘Well, if old Shirley’s got to pound around buying all the furniture on her own, and let loverboy Nick play football … is that Johnny’s solution …?’
‘Something like that, yes, then they wouldn’t fight. …’
‘God, he’s more selfish than I thought,’ said Aisling. ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry it slipped out. I didn’t mean it.’
Elizabeth’s eyes filled with tears. ‘He’s not selfish. He didn’t come to Mrs Norris with me because he didn’t know, he’ll never know. He didn’t stop me going there because he wasn’t told the situation. Now you can’t say he’s selfish not to have been divinely inspired, can you?’
Aisling apologised. ‘I’m always saying the wrong thing, because I don’t think before I speak. I don’t understand things either … but that never stops me interfering. When I think of all those years you stayed with us and you never interfered or hurt anyone. You only patched up quarrels instead of causing them. I feel very thick and stupid coming in here … telling you how to behave to your father, telling you what your boyfriend should and shouldn’t think.’
‘Oh, but if you knew how I hate your going back. I don’t know how I’m going to carry on without you. It’s so lovely talking and sharing and knowing that you’re interested in everything … I’ve missed that so much, I’ve had a big hole in my life. …’
‘So have I. …’
‘But you’ve a whole family … Aunt Eileen. …’
‘Yes, but not about the things we talk about, you and I.’
‘I know.’
There was a silence.
‘Letters aren’t really any good are they? They don’t explain much. I can’t see Kilgarret through your letters, but maybe it will be better now that you know how interested I am in even little things. …’
‘Yes, and now that I know all the cast over here… maybe you’ll write about them properly … and not all this “nice” and “super”. …’
‘And you must cut out all that “nothing much has happened in the last six months” bit.’
‘Oh I will, I’ll keep you informed of every groan and grunt in the back seat of the car. …’
‘Aisling, I’ll be so lonely without you.’
‘Of course you won’t. Haven’t you got Johnny?’
Johnny took them both to the pictures on Aisling’s last night. And to a fish supper afterwards in a big noisy place with marble tables and high ceilings and a great smell of vinegar and batter. No, he wouldn’t hear of any contribution, this was his treat. Elizabeth beamed, glad to see his generosity and big-heartedness shown so obviously to Aisling.
‘Anyway,’ said Johnny. ‘It’s a goodbye present.’
‘Gosh, I’ll have to keep coming and going if I get goodbye presents like this all the time.’
‘It’s not only for you,’ said Johnny easily. ‘I’m off too. I’m going to take a train to the Mediterranean Sea … so it’s a joint goodbye.’
‘You’re going to what …?’ Elizabeth’s face was red and then white, just like it used t
o be when she was new at the school and the nun had asked her a question she couldn’t understand.
‘We only arranged it today … Nick’s got a few weeks off. He works in a car firm, Aisling… and his boss says business is slow if he wants to go now, he can have half-pay for five weeks and then a guarantee of his job back. He’s jumping at it.’
‘And you …?’ Elizabeth looked horrified. She looked so shocked that Aisling knew instinctively that it was going to irritate Johnny.
‘So you’re going to jump at it with him, Johnny?’ Aisling said hurriedly. ‘What a marvellous idea. Can you take time off from work too?’
‘Yes.’ Johnny was eager. ‘Stefan keeps asking me to take a break and now this seems too good to miss. Nick’s getting the tickets.’
‘When are you going?’ Elizabeth’s voice was a whisper.
‘Saturday, or Friday if he gets a sleeper on the train before.’
‘How great.’ Aisling had to speak at the top of her voice to try to cover the look of hurt and the stony silence from Elizabeth. ‘Is it the south of France or is it Spain … or where?’
‘It’s France, apparently there’s a village that a friend of Shirley’s was talking about… where you can hire a chalet or a tent… and you don’t need much food in this weather. Shirley said it was meant to be smashing.’
‘Is Shirley going with you?’ asked Aisling, before Elizabeth could ask the same question in a hurt little voice.
‘No, between ourselves, that’s part of the reason for the sudden hop. Shirl has been very wearying about everything, and Nick wants a bit of a breather. Too much domesticity and the dangerous clanking sound of wedding bells being yearned for.’
‘Oh, he’s quite right to run then,’ said Aisling. ‘That’s why I ran from Ireland. You need to put space between yourself and that sort of thing. Thank the Lord none of us have those kind of inclinations.’
She looked sideways at Elizabeth, praying that she would have recovered. She was amazed at what she saw. Elizabeth’s face was back to normal and she was smiling broadly.
‘Poor Shirl,’ she said, ‘I suppose I’ll have to comfort her when you’ve gone. I’ll try to get her interested in someone else.’
‘Oh, I think he quite likes her, it’s just that she’s such a hanger-on. …’
‘She’s rather pretty. I’m sure she’d find it easy to get another chap. Perhaps we’ll go on the prowl together when you’re off in La Belle France.’
‘Ah, but you’re not to have another chap. You’re not to be lost. Do you hear me?’
‘Um yes, well I’ll probably still be here. I’ll be rather too busy to go out prowling, so we’ll have to hope that I’m not swept away accidentally. No? I’ll work with Mr Worsky and Anna, I might even be a partner when you come back.’
Aisling looked in amazement at Elizabeth’s bright face. She was playing it so utterly right. Johnny was almost wavering. He was regretting slightly his decision to go, he was looking at her with enthusiasm and interest.
With a wave of understanding, Aisling realised that if Elizabeth was going to play the game by these rules it was going to be one long act from now to the very end. There could be no normal behaviour, no real reactions, no chance of saying what you felt, what you meant. It would be watching your step, planning your moves.
Elizabeth didn’t cry when they got home, she would not admit her shock and upset. She was calm and measured.
‘No, I refuse to get upset. I told you before he’s what I want. I’ll do anything to have him, anything. I’ve done so much already. I’m not going to lose it all by behaving like silly Shirley and whinging and whining because I’m not being taken along. …’
‘But for God’s sake, I know I’m not going to interfere, but wouldn’t it be reasonable to say. …’
‘I’m not talking about being reasonable. I really am much more like Mother than I thought. Mother wanted something more open and outgoing than Father and so do
I. Mother wanted Harry, everyone would have said that it was an unreasonable thing to want… but Mother went ahead and she did what was necessary to get Harry and she got him and that’s it. That’s what I’m going to do. …’
‘It’s different.’
‘Of course it’s different because Mother was dreadfully odd by the time she did it … but the principle is the same. …’
Aisling said, ‘I suppose I don’t know what it’s like to be so fond of someone that I’d do … well, do all you’ve done.’
‘Oh, you will Aisling. Honestly you will some day be as fond of someone as I am. It sounds a bit … as if I were an old woman giving you old wives’ advice … but you will find someone. And then just like they say in all the songs and the films … you’ll know.’
‘Yes, but once you do know, that’s when the troubles seem to begin,’ Aisling said doubtfully.
Elizabeth’s father said that Aisling’s visit had been like a breath of fresh air. Mr Worsky and Anna Strepovsky gave her a picture of a fairy woman in a forest and said she should have it framed back in Ireland, perhaps it had to do with her name. … Monica gave her staff discount on a blouse she bought for Mam, and Johnny Stone kissed her goodbye on the cheek and said that some time next year he was going to take the van and Elizabeth to Ireland and do a tour of all the old houses which might sell their contents to him.
‘I’ll come with you if I’m not married to the Squire.’
‘Oh, don’t dream of marrying the Squire,’ said Johnny.
Elizabeth clung to her at the barrier in Euston.
‘I keep trying to fight down this awful feeling that I’ll never see you again, and that you’ll go home and think of everything that happened here and you’ll become revolted by it all. You’ll cut me out of your life.’
‘I’ll never cut you out of my life, I couldn’t, you’re part of it you silly old thing,’ said Aisling. ‘If it weren’t so soppy I’d say I love you.’
‘Well I love you too, I’ll never be able to thank you. Never.’
The crowds on the platform swallowed up Aisling in her turquoise summer coat as she walked down the length of the long train. And when she looked back at the barrier there were too many people and she couldn’t see Elizabeth in her grey dress waving and wiping her eyes with the corner of the red scarf which was meant to make her look jaunty.
XI
ELIZABETH THOUGHT THAT it would be much easier to write to Aisling after the visit … but she found to her great disappointment that it was just as hard to explain, just as difficult to describe things. One set of restrictions had been replaced by another. It made her uneasy since she realised that she must assume Aisling was critical of Johnny. And yet Aisling had hardly said a word that could be interpreted as criticism. But then what she kept forgetting was that Johnny didn’t know there was any reason for him to feel especially protective and loving and grateful to Elizabeth at that time. Johnny didn’t know anything about the visit to Romford and the encounter with Mrs Norris, and he never would.
So the letters seemed strained, again. Elizabeth tried to write cheerful things about Father, but Father had never again been so cheerful since his fiftieth birthday. In fact at times Elizabeth wondered whether she had imagined Father singing all those songs. He never sang since, and she hadn’t mentioned the night to him.
*
It was odd that Aisling was able to write without restraint. Sometimes she would urge Elizabeth to burn the letters once they were read in case they would both be hanged or Aisling put in gaol for pornography. Her descriptions of the ever-frustrated passions of Tony Murray were hilarious, and often apologised for by the phrase, ‘But of course to a woman of the world like yourself all this must seem very amateur’. She asked questions too about Father and whether the awful woman who was after him was getting anywhere. She told Elizabeth to tell Stefan and Anna that she had enquired about old houses in Ireland and whether they might be bursting with antiques. The answer was yes, they might, but if anyone came over from Engla
nd in a van to buy them from them they would immediately assume they were being robbed blind and would hold on to whatever they had.
She touched so lightly and so unsurely on the subject of Johnny, compared to everything else. The references to him were half-joking, guarded almost as if she had reread the sentence before allowing it to go. The rest of the letter was pure Aisling, sentences falling over each other … enthusiastic and maddening. Exactly the way she talked.
Aunt Eileen still wrote, cheery newsy letters, half-joking references to the handsome young man whom Aisling had described as being the best-looking man she had ever laid eyes on. Elizabeth found it hard to write about Johnny in any normal way so she wrote in an exaggerated style saying that the Lord and Master had gone off to Scotland, or the Answer to Hollywood had put up a new sign on the shop saying ‘Worsky and Stone’ and spent most of his day out on the pavement admiring it. She couldn’t write to anyone that she loved Johnny Stone so much that her heart was hurting from jumping up and down in her rib cage. That’s the kind of thing Aisling would have been able to say but then of course, Elizabeth remembered ruefully, Aisling’s heart wasn’t jumping up and down at all. It was staying exactly where it was, stationary and deliberating whether or not to lock itself permanently into Tony Murray’s heart.
Tony thought that Aisling looked even better when she came back from England than she had done before. He had found the days very long because he had no idea when they were going to end. His mother, disapproving and hard to please about this as well as everything else, became a severe trial to him. She had suggested that he might invite one of the Grays to the tennis club dance. Heedless of his protests that he didn’t even know the Gray girl and didn’t want to go to the dance with anyone, and would like to be allowed to mind his own business, she spoke on in a firm monologue which she believed was reaching him because of its constant repetition. Not that she had a thing against the little O’Connor girl, a charming child. Had she not always been made welcome at their house when she was a friend of Joannie’s but such a child, and so nice and so limited, and so young, and what a pity Tony didn’t extend his friends a little more. Why, Mrs Gray had been saying only last week. … Tony turned off his mind. He would often get up without excusing himself and leave the table, or walk from the sitting room with its view down towards the river. No explanation, no apologies, just one swinging movement into the car and a bold sweep down the drive.
