He Loves Me Not...He Loves Me

by Claudia Carroll

  ‘I hope to Jaysus you have a better defence than that worked out, ya thick gobshite,’ replied his loving wife, ‘or else we’re all fucked.’

  ‘Sure, darling, these aul’ Tribunals go on for years and years and everyone knows nothing happens at the end of them. Maybe a couple of moany letters in the papers giving out about taxpayers’ money being wasted, but that’s about all. I’m just trying to get as much as I can out of the country while the going’s good, just in case.’

  ‘Just in case what?’

  ‘Ah, don’t be worrying, luv. It’ll never come to that.’

  Mrs Flanagan was a complete natural. After her first take, even Montana rushed over to congratulate her. ‘You’re sooo wonderful in this part!’ she raved. ‘It’s, like, so rare when an actor blends seamlessly into the role, it’s beautiful to see.’

  ‘It certainly never happens to some people who call themselves actors,’ said Guy, pointedly addressing Montana, ‘unless they happen to be playing alcoholic porn stars.’

  ‘You know, you were so realistic, when you said the potato famine had begun, I almost felt hungry,’ laughed Montana, gamely choosing to ignore his jibes.

  ‘Ooh, she’s hungry, better lock up all your lettuce leaves,’ he went on, ‘not to mention your drinks cabinet.’

  Montana blushed, but said nothing.

  ‘I never realized he was such a wanker,’ said Mrs Flanagan, shaking her head. Then, whispering conspiratorially to Montana, she said, ‘Listen, if ya ever fancy a nice gin and tonic, luv, I’m yer girl, I’ll sort ya out, no bother.’

  Novice that she was to the pecking order on set, Mrs Flanagan then unwittingly broke the most important unwritten rule of all by sauntering up to Ella Hepburn and addressing her directly.

  ‘Suppose ya didn’t recognize me all done up like this, did ya?’ she said.

  Ella just looked straight ahead, totally ignoring her.

  ‘By the way, you and me have more in common than you’d think,’ Mrs Flanagan went on, under the mistaken impression that they were bonding. ‘Do ya know, we were born in the same year?’

  Ella, whose age was a closely guarded state secret, now turned to glare at her.

  ‘Yeah, that’s right! Now yer’re looking a lot better than I am, what with all the work you’ve had done and all, but if ya don’t mind me saying, yer hands are a bit of a giveaway, luv. I’m telling ya, when you die, the only way they’ll be able to tell yer real age is by cutting ya in two and counting all the rings.’

  Montana had to bite her lip to stop herself from guffawing.

  ‘Come on, Mrs Flanagan, let’s get out of everyone’s way while they set up the reverse-angle shot,’ she said, steering her well out of the line of fire.

  ‘Reverse-angle what?’

  ‘Oh. Basically, we do exactly the same thing all over again, except this time they set up the camera and sound from the opposite angle, so that Jimmy D. can intercut the scene later,’ she explained patiently.

  ‘Jaysus, I thought all that fella did was sit on his fat arse, smoking cigars and shouting “action” every so often. So tell me this then, luv, how do ya cope with the media intrusion into yer private life? I’m only asking so I can prepare meself for what’s coming, ya know,’ she said, as though a Vanity Fair magazine cover was only a phone call away. ‘Oh yeah, and another thing, have ya any tips on coping with other people’s jealousy about yer success? I’ve a feeling I might be needing them.’

  She wasn’t joking. About an hour later, when they were finally ready to shoot the scene from the reverse angle, disaster struck.

  Sound and cameras were rolling away, and Mrs Flanagan was just about to launch into her soliloquy about the dispossessed tenant farmers baying for blood at the back door, when the ground underneath them began to shudder. Not just shudder, but quake with a violence that should have been measured on the Richter scale. The windows began to rattle as though they might shatter at any second and the crystal chandeliers were swinging dangerously from side to side.

  Mrs Flanagan went on with her speech, even though the walls were now reverberating and a loud, grating noise like twenty foghorns blaring in unison filled the air.

  ‘Earthquake!’ shouted Jimmy D. from his director’s chair. ‘Evacuate the building!’

  ‘Earthquake? In the back arse of Ballyroan?’ Johnny shouted back at him. ‘Where do you think you are, San Francisco?’

  ‘Everybody out!’ ordered Jimmy D., ignoring him.

  ‘No! Keep filming!’ Mrs Flanagan screamed, seeing her stab at stardom evaporating. ‘It’s only the pipes, it’ll stop in a few minutes! Keep rolling that fecking camera!’

  ‘Remain calm and leave through the main door . . . actually no, just get the fuck out!’ Jimmy D. was finding it hard to keep the panic out of his voice and, given that the Hall sounded like it was about to collapse, it was hard to blame him. There was almost a stampede as the extras and crew bolted for the door, leaving poor Mrs Flanagan all alone in the middle of the floor.

  Twenty minutes later, she stormed into the kitchen where Lucasta sat calmly smoking a cigarette and soaking one of her cat’s paws in a bowl of disinfectant.

  ‘Finished already?’ she asked innocently. ‘So how did it go?’

  ‘As if ya didn’t know, ya devious aul’ bitch!’

  ‘What on earth are you talking about, you saggy old woman?’

  ‘Somebody mysteriously turned on every tap and flushed every toilet in the bleedin’ house just as I was about to say me feckin’ lines!’

  ‘You know, I worry about you, Mrs Flanagan. There’s no way you can have built up so much anger in just one lifetime, you’re carrying over too much bitterness from a past life.’

  ‘It’s this present life ya should be worrying about.’

  ‘Are you threatening me?’ said Lucasta, covering the kitten’s tiny ears as though he’d overhear the row and be sullied by bad vibes.

  A devious look came into Mrs Flanagan’s eyes. ‘All I’m saying is, ya’ve probably got about two dozen cats by now. Must be very difficult, in fact it must be impossible for ya to watch all of them, all of the time.’

  ‘This is the final boarding call for all remaining passengers on flight BA Three Six One Nine. Could the last remaining passengers please proceed immediately to gate B Twenty-seven.’

  The British Airways ground hostess stood impatiently by the boarding gate as the last few stragglers filed past her, until there was only one youngish man left. Ordinarily she’d have given him a filthy look as he paced up and down the business-class departure lounge with his mobile phone clamped to his ear. But this guy was different. For starters, he was gorgeous-looking, tall and fair-haired with the most amazing blue eyes. Secondly, he seemed to be having a heated argument on the phone, to put it mildly. She didn’t want to interrupt, but she knew he only had about two minutes before she’d have to close the flight.

  ‘Operator, you’ve just got to try again, it’s an emergency,’ he was arguing loudly. ‘I’ve spent the last few hours trying to get through to this number, it can’t just be disconnected, there has to be something wrong. It’s a Kildare number, 045 37210. Yes. Davenport Hall.’

  ‘I’m awfully sorry, sir,’ she said flirtatiously, ‘but it really is the final call.’

  ‘No problem,’ he said, switching off his phone and tucking it into his coat pocket.

  ‘May I see your passport and boarding pass please?’ she asked, clocking that he wasn’t wearing a wedding ring as he handed them over. She was careful to check his name before giving them back.

  ‘Thank you very much. Enjoy your flight, Mr de Courcey.’

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  PORTIA HAD WISELY decided not to pass on Chief Justice de Courcey’s news until all the family could be together, so it was well after ten that night when filming had wrapped before she could grab them in the kitchen. (This had the added advantage of Lucasta being well oiled by then; she was invariably easier to talk to after a few gins.)

&
nbsp; Blissfully unaware of the ructions that had taken place during the day between her mother and Mrs Flanagan, Portia found herself innocently asking if there was any particular reason why they both adamantly refused to be in the same room as each other.

  ‘I have spent the day trying to gather all my kitties together so that malevolent bitch couldn’t inflict pain on them and I’m worn out,’ wailed Lucasta. ‘It’s true you know, girls, what I’ve always suspected. Sagittarian women really are a shower of fucking bitches.’

  ‘I’m sure she’s insulting me,’ shouted Mrs Flanagan from the kitchen garden, ‘because her lips are moving.’

  Portia sighed with the weariness of one who had quite enough on her plate without dealing with this.

  ‘What’s up, sis?’ asked Daisy. ‘But if it’s bad news, I’m not sure that I want to know. I’ve sort of reached my quota for the day.’

  ‘Well, it’s news,’ replied Portia. ‘I’ll leave it up to you to decide whether it’s good or bad.’

  A cackle of laughter could be heard through the open door, from where Mrs Flanagan sat smoking on a bench in the garden.

  ‘Ignore,’ Lucasta commanded. ‘I mean it. Neither of you is to speak to that thundering trollop in the garden.’

  ‘I feel like I’m watching an episode of Poirot,’ she said, shouting to be heard. ‘Jaysus, Portia, all yer’re short of is a French accent and a moustache. Next thing ya’ll be saying: “I suppose you’re all wondering why I gathered you here.”’

  ‘Steve and I had a meeting with Michael de Courcey today,’ Portia began.

  ‘Andrew’s dishy father?’ said Lucasta, brightening. ‘What the fuck did he want?’

  ‘Mummy!’ hissed Daisy. ‘Let her get on with it, will you?’

  ‘Actually, to talk about Shamie Nolan.’

  ‘Oh, I’m just working on a spell to cast on that bastard,’ said Lucasta, ‘just to make sure he gets what’s coming to him.’

  ‘That could well be on the cards,’ Portia replied. ‘It seems that the Planning Office in Dublin are investigating some irregularities about land that he’s bribed County Councillors to rezone. According to Michael, he’s been getting away with this for years, and making a fortune out of it in the process.’

  ‘But how does this affect Davenport Hall?’ asked Daisy.

  ‘According to Michael, Shamie Nolan had already secured rezoning for just about every acre of our land before he bought it from Daddy. Steve was at the meeting where Nolan managed to persuade the Kildare County Council to apply for permission to rezone and, well, you know Steve has been busting a gut for us ever since.’

  ‘So, in other words, he bought it from Daddy knowing that the land was going to be worth about ten times what he paid for it,’ said Daisy, getting angry.

  ‘Well, the slieveen little bastard,’ Mrs Flanagan shouted from the back garden.

  ‘In a nutshell,’ said Portia, ‘Michael told us that his contact in the Planning Office reckons our land was to be rezoned for high-density, fast-track housing.’

  ‘What, do ya mean like poxy, scutty little holiday homes or something?’ Mrs Flanagan shouted. ‘Did Shamie Nolan seriously think he could turn the place into Albert Square?’

  ‘That’s exactly what he thought. There’s such a huge demand for affordable housing in Dublin that he had planned to build about four hundred units here, two- and three-bedroom houses, duplexes and even an apartment complex. It would amount to an entire village, right here on Davenport land.’

  ‘This beats fucking Christmas,’ said Lucasta, stunned.

  ‘And will they get the bastard for doing this to us?’ asked Daisy with tears in her eyes.

  Portia smiled at her. ‘If only life was like that, darling. As Steve says, it’s very unlikely he’ll be hanging up his tartan cap and jacket on the back of a cell door in Mountjoy Jail. No, what’s likely is that Michael de Courcey will set up a Tribunal to investigate all of his business dealings and all of the brown envelopes he’s been bribing councillors with. All they have to do is follow the money trail.’

  ‘So how exactly is he punished then?’ asked Daisy. ‘Or does he just get away with it?’

  ‘If there is a big Tribunal, then his name will be plastered all over the papers, he’ll be publicly humiliated and Steve says he’ll be forced into resigning his seat in the Dáil. It’ll certainly spell the end of any political ambitions he may have held.’

  Daisy began to snigger.

  ‘And imagine his awful wife turning up at the hearings in Dublin Castle in one of her rig-outs. They’ll think he’s married to a transvestite.’

  ‘Yeah, but one thing,’ said Mrs Flanagan, still shouting, ‘Shamie Nolan may be the greatest tosser that ever walked this earth, but, now correct me if I’m wrong, he is still the legal owner of Davenport Hall, isn’t he?’

  Portia nodded.

  ‘So, unless you got all six numbers in last night’s Lotto and the Thunderball Plus and the bonus number, and we’re rich now and you’re going to buy the Hall back and we’re all going to end happily . . . how exactly is this good news?’

  Hours later, as Portia lay wide awake in bed staring at the ceiling, she reflected on what Mrs Flanagan had said. She was absolutely right, of course; the awful Nolans still owned the Hall lock, stock and barrel. No matter what public disgrace lay in store for Shamie, there was still no telling what fate held for the Hall. All the Davenports could be absolutely sure of was that Albert Square, as Mrs Flanagan put it, would not now be built on their land. But what was to stop the Nolans taking possession at the end of the month, as planned?

  The grandfather clock in the entrance hall below her chimed four a.m. as she shifted restlessly from side to side. She’d bravely spent the day forcing herself to think about anything other than Andrew, but it was no use. Try as she might, she kept coming back to what Michael de Courcey had said. In a week’s time, he would be married. She could remember so clearly the night of their first date, when they’d sat on Killiney Beach eating chips in the lashing rain and giggling like a pair of teenagers. She remembered what he’d said about Edwina and how unhappy he’d been with her in New York and all the reasons he’d had for calling off the wedding.

  And in a week, they’d be married. And there was nothing she could do.

  Paddy was leaving nothing, absolutely nothing to chance. Even if it meant having to have a conversation with the one person he loathed above all on the set.

  ‘Come in!’ said a disembodied voice from inside the make-up trailer.

  ‘Ah thanks, emm, Mr van der Post, thanks very much,’ Paddy replied, stepping in. ‘I just wanted to radio mike ya for this scene, if that’s all right.’

  ‘Work away,’ Guy replied as Serge painstakingly applied a prosthetic scar to the side of his ribcage.

  ‘What’s that?’ Paddy asked, clipping the mike to the waistband of his cream linen suit.

  ‘You like it?’ Serge replied. ‘Jimmy D. requested it specially. It’s to make Brent look a little more butch, you know? More Alpha Male? Like he’s been in a bar-room brawl or, emm, something . . .’ He broke off, catching the insulted look on Guy’s face in the mirror. ‘Oh, not that your playing of the character isn’t completely macho, it’s just that . . .’ he back-pedalled like a maniac.

  ‘Get your fudge-packing hands off me, that’s enough fucking make-up,’ Guy snapped at him, rising out of the chair and walloping the trailer door shut behind him.

  ‘Jaysus, I knew he was a wanker, but I’d no idea he was that bad,’ said Paddy incredulously.

  ‘Oh honey, I could write the book,’ replied Serge, calmly taking a sip of Eau de Davenport. ‘And you know, one day I will, and it’ll be a bestseller and I’ll call it Film Sets Uncovered and believe you me, I will kiss and tell. I’ve worked with some monsters in my time, but Guy van der Post is Godzilla compared with the rest of them.’

  ‘Shite. I wanted to ask him something.’

  ‘Well, maybe I can help?’ Serge’s curiosity was roused
.

  Paddy looked at him for a moment, unsure whether or not he could be trusted, and then decided, what the hell?

  ‘It’s about Daisy, actually.’

  ‘Oh, you have come to the right person, sit down and tell me every sordid detail.’

  ‘Don’t overreact or anything, right? It’s just that I tried to move in with her and she threw all me stuff out in bin liners. I think maybe she just wasn’t ready for the kind of commitment I can offer her, ya know? Like, she’s a bit raw after being with that fucking eejit Guy.’

  Serge nodded, like a senior consultant listening to a patient’s symptoms.

  ‘So, I was thinking, OK, she’s an old-fashioned girl, she doesn’t want to live with me before marriage, so why don’t I just . . .’

  Serge clasped both of his hands to his open mouth. ‘Oh my GOOWD! Don’t tell me you’re gonna propose!’

  Paddy went red. ‘Yeah. So I was just looking for a bit of advice on what I should do, ya know?’

  ‘This is just so romantic,’ gushed Serge, pacing up and down with excitement. ‘It’s gotta be a huge gesture, it’s gotta be something that the lucky lady will remember for the rest of her life!’

  ‘In my family, the bloke usually says, “You’re what? Right. I suppose we have to get married now.”’

  ‘That won’t do at all!’ Serge was almost squealing by now. ‘Know your prey, honey. Remember, Daisy is an aristocrat. Her family have probably been marrying their cousins for about three hundred years or something – you only have to look at the mother to see that. Boy, if ever there was a family crying out for fresh blood, it’s the Davenports.’

  ‘Gift,’ said Paddy, delighted with his confidant, ‘cos I was a bit worried about the class thing. I mean, I know I fit into her world really well, but the thing is, will she fit into mine?’

  ‘She’ll be with a man who truly loves her,’ replied Serge, teary-eyed. ‘What more could any girl want?’

  ‘So, how do ya think I should ask her then?’

  Serge breathed deeply. ‘It should happen at the cast dinner tomorrow night, when everyone’s together. I think you wait till dinner’s over and then . . . oh! Oh! Inspiration striking! You have the mad housekeeper serve her a chocolate mousse for dessert and you hide the engagement ring inside it!’