Lily was inoffensive in every way. He supposed she had to be, because even though it was not in any way her fault that that her husband upped and left one day, it was regarded with shame in the area. She looked after her two boys, went to mass, kept her house clean, and lived out what must have been a lonely kind of existence, Conor thought. For women in her position, remarriage or even a friendship with another man was utterly out of the question – a fact that had made Conor sad for her, since he would have really liked his Mam to have met someone nice.
Passage West was his father’s home place and despite the fact that his Mam came from a village nine miles away, she was always considered a blow-in. She died as she lived, quietly and without fuss, when Conor was fifteen and Gerry was twelve. It was decided by the all-powerful village triumvirate – the headmaster, parish priest and the local sergeant – that Conor should get an apprenticeship as a mechanic and Gerry should go into care, as there were no relatives willing to take the boys on, and all attempts to contact their father in England had failed.
The word “care” Conor knew, had very little to do with how children who ended up in industrial schools were actually treated in the Ireland of the 1970’s, and he was determined to keep his brother out of one of these institutions. With the help of his mother’s only real friend and neighbour, Mary Harrington, he fought long and hard to win a reprieve. Eventually, it was agreed that Conor could continue to live in his mother’s house, get a job and look after Gerry.
As he parked the coach, memories of his past came flooding back. Gerry had always been spoiled. He had no recollection of his father, and by way of compensation or something, he had been indulged throughout his childhood by his endlessly uncritical mother. Conor remembered the last time he saw him: dark hair combed back in a Teddy Boy style, trousers so tight Conor wondered how he could manage to walk in them. His feet clad in a pair of winklepickers on his little finger a gold ring.
Gerry left school at the age of 16, the year after he spectacularly failed his Intermediate Certificate. What he lacked in academic prowess he equally lacked in ambition and the desire to work. Conor managed to talk Matt Sheehan, the owner of the local hardware shop, into giving Gerry a job. Matt had great time for Conor, so it was with a heavy heart he came into the garage where Conor was working as a mechanic one day two months later to say he would have to let Gerry go. He had caught him stealing from the till, and, he told a horrified Conor, Gerry had only laughed when confronted with the accusation. Matt assured him that there would be no question of involving the guards or anything like that, but under no circumstances was Gerry to show his face in Sheehan’s Hardware ever again.
Conor arrived home that evening to find Gerry lying on the sofa watching cartoons. Gerry wore the same smug expression he always wore – as if he was laughing at the world. He did not acknowledge his brother’s presence: he might as well have been invisible. Conor flipped.
‘Do you have any idea how hard it was for me to stop them taking you to that industrial school? And then you do this to me?’
He remained motionless, glued to the television, unfazed by his brother’s outburst. Incensed at his attitude, Conor pounced on him, dragged him outside to the back yard and punched him into the face. As blood began to pour out of his mouth, Conor stopped and stared in horror, imagining his Mam looking down on him.
‘Oh God! I’m sorry Gerry, I shouldn’t have hit you...it’s just...’ Still wearing more or less the same smug expression, Gerry walked back into the house, lay down on the sofa and continued watching TV while holding a tea towel to his bleeding mouth.
After Sheehan’s Hardware, there were several more jobs, but none lasted more than a few months. Either he was fired or he got bored and stopped turning up for work. Eventually, Conor resigned himself to supplementing Gerry’s weekly dole money out of his slim earnings. The strange thing about Gerry was that outside the house he was considered by his peers to be a great fellow, full of fun and devilment, a great hit with the girls. Along with his dark, Brylcreemed hair and startling blue eyes, Gerry O’Shea had charm and style – all far too exotic for Passage West. He listened to Jerry Lee Louis and Elvis Presley – the glam rock of the seventies didn’t interest him at all. He made retro seem so cool. He was an expert in all things American and was frequently heard saying that the minute he got a chance he’d be out of Passage West and off to the States, never to return. In the meantime, the local girls fought for his attention, and the younger lads wished they had his sex appeal.
Everyone else in the village considered Gerry O’Shea very bad news indeed.
Conor was seen as the opposite of his younger brother, hardworking and decent. When his boss, Joe Kelly, got arthritis, Conor kept the business going. Joe had long since been the father figure in Conor’s life, allowing him to tinker around the garage when he was a young, never losing his temper with him, no matter what the circumstances. He knew that someday he would make Joe an offer for the business, and he worked hard so that he could save enough to get a loan from the bank. Joe and his wife felt very protective of the young apprentice and he even had hopes that their daughter and only child Noreen would catch his eye. But while Conor was always friendly to Noreen, he never thought of her in any romantic way. He even drove her and her father to the church the morning she married Tom Butler, the butcher from the next parish.
Conor pulled up outside what had once been Kelly’s garage. These days, Mary Harrington had told him, someone was renting it as a lock-up. His mother’s old friend was the only person from Passage West with whom he kept in touch. Joe and Eileen were both dead now. He didn’t go to either funeral because he was away travelling on both occasions, but he sent flowers, and he wrote to Noreen expressing his sadness at her loss. He was glad he didn’t recognise the two girls crossing the street and therefore wouldn’t have to make conversation with them. Once again, he thought how much he hated coming back here, how he dreaded making conversation with old neighbours. The village itself was fine and the people very nice and friendly but the place held nothing but bad memories for him. If it weren’t for Mary, he thought as he stood there waiting for her to answer the door, he would never again bother with this Godforsaken place.
‘Conor!’ she exclaimed ‘Why didn’t you ring me? I’d have made a few scones or something.’
Conor gave her a hug, noting how thin and old she had become even in the few months since he’d last seen her.
‘Spur of the moment thing,’ he replied, ‘it’s great to see you. I have a group over in Kinsale, so I just thought I’d call in to see how you are.’
‘Ah sure you know how it is Conor. Dragging the divil by the tail the whole time. I had a mass said for your Mam last week, for her anniversary. Hard to believe its thirty-one years isn’t it?’
‘Indeed it is,’ Conor agreed. ‘A lot of water under the bridge since then.’
‘Actually I’m glad you called. That young couple renting your place wanted to know if they could put up gates to make the garden secure for the little one. I told them that would probably be fine, but I’d check with you,’ Mary said as she filled the kettle.
‘There’s a pile of post there for you, but something came a few weeks ago marked urgent and personal, so I sent it on to the Dunshane. Did you get it?’
Conor looked up from the pile of mostly junk mail that she had handed him. ‘Oh yeah. I did. Thanks for that.’ He knew better than to mention Sinead’s name to Mary. She had felt at the time that Conor was wrong to say nothing when she went off with Gerry. She had also said that if she were any kind of a girl at all, she would realise that Conor was the better man by far. It didn’t say much for her that she couldn’t see that. The last thing Conor wanted to hear was Mary’s opinions about the feckless Sinead. Mary didn’t understand, not really.
Conor took piece of paper from his pocket and put it on the table.
‘Here’s a voucher for a travel agent in town. Now, I’m not going to argue with you about it, so just go in
and book a flight. Go to see Joanne alright? It’s all covered and I don’t want to hear another word about it.’
‘Ah Conor there’s no need’ Mary argued.
‘There’s every need, but we’re not having that debate right? I owe you so much I could never repay you. We both know it. You’re going to New York to visit your daughter, and I’m paying for it, and that’s the end of it. And before you say another word, here’s a few bob to spend too. I get dollars as tips and it’s not worth my while changing them, so you’re going to take those too. ’
Mary opened the envelope. ‘Jesus Almighty there must be hundreds in there! I’m not taking that off you.’
‘It’s fifteen hundred dollars and you are taking it. Now where’s my tea?’ he said with a big smile.
He chatted with Mary for another half an hour before announcing that he had to get back to the group. ‘Sure I’ll call again in a few weeks or so,’ he said as he left.
Both of them knew it would be more like a matter of months before he would return to Passage West, and, once Mary died, he would never go back again.
Chapter 9
‘Conor!’ Patrick said with obvious pride, ‘I would like you to meet my friend Cynthia Jeffers.’
‘Well how are you Cynthia? Patrick was telling me you have a lot on your plate at the moment, sorting out your late-uncle’s house?’
‘Oh gracious yes,’ she replied, ‘though without the invaluable help of Patrick here, I should imagine I would never have emerged from that dratted pile! Uncle Herbert, did you know him?’ she said, raising an enquiring eyebrow. ‘He was whipper-in for the Weston Hunt for many years? Large fellow, handlebar moustache? He won a prize for his marrows at Chelsea several times.’
‘Em no… Cynthia,’ said Conor, suppressing a smile, ‘I can’t say I do…em did.’
‘Well never mind,’ Cynthia continued unperturbed, ‘anyway, as I was saying, Patrick here really was wonderful. Therefore, I simply must buy him a drink to say thank you. You will join us Conor. What will you have?’
‘Well, just the one,’ Conor replied, fascinated by this friendship between herself and Patrick.
She turned heads as she swept ahead of the two men following her into the bar. It wasn’t just that she was tall, it was also the way her hair seemed to sit on her head like an enormous nest – hair that looked as if it hadn’t been combed for many, many years. She was wearing what appeared to be a long, knitted purple tube affair, which stretched from under her arms to just above her knees. Over that, she wore a short pillar-box red woollen cape.
‘Cynthia was telling me all about the history of her uncle’s house today,’
Patrick recounted as they sat awaiting her return from the bar. ‘I never knew about the way all those beautiful houses got burned during the Independence struggle here. You should see this place Conor, I mean sure, it’s run down now, but it must have been spectacular in its day. And the way all the people who lived around about here worked on the estate or in the house. Y’know, when you think about it, those rich people were just trying to live their lives too. I mean they got here just by an accident of birth, the same as the rest of us. Some of them were bastards for sure, but I guess most of them were just ordinary people trying to keep going.’
Conor suppressed another smile. Was this the same man who was spouting all that anti-English propaganda on the bus the other day? Amazing what a woman can do.
‘That’s exactly it Patrick. You’re right when you say some of those landlords behaved very badly towards their Irish tenants. God knows they paid a high price for that when the time came, and rightly so, but the thing to remember is that even though we always saw the gentry as kind of English, if you know what I mean, they thought of themselves as Irish, a lot of them. There aren’t many left nowadays, most of them went back to England during the Troubles, but the ones who stayed seem to have got on well enough. It’s sad all the same, I always think, to see all the old Protestant churches sold off, turned into houses and restaurants and the divil knows what. Still, I suppose there’s no way to keep them going, no congregation and no clergy. Most of the ones that are still operating around here only have a service once every few weeks because the vicars have to go from church to church since there aren’t enough Protestants in any one place to warrant a full-time clergyman.’
‘Do you think Cynthia’s a Protestant?’ Patrick asked in amazement. The idea that the Irish were anything but Catholic hadn’t occurred to him.
Before Conor had time to answer she was back.
‘Oh there you are chaps!’ cried Cynthia, expertly balancing three creamy pints of stout. Patrick looked at Conor as Cynthia downed the first third of her pint in one go and then proceeded to wipe her mouth with the back of her hand.
‘So Cynthia, you aren’t from around here are you?’
‘No, no not at all. I grew up in Waterford, near Dungarvan. My parents, frightfully elderly and doddery now of course, still live there. But for how much longer one simply can’t tell. The upkeep of those draughty old places is simply crippling, as you know.’
Conor nodded in agreement and smiled at the idea that his childhood terraced house in Passage West would have given him any experience of the travails of running a big Georgian house and estate.
‘We have most of the rooms closed now, of course,’ she continued. ‘I’m simply confounded as to why my ancestors felt the need for such enormous houses in the first place. These days, we live between the stables and the kitchen mostly. A local woman, Mrs Mooney, comes in to do for us. She and her family have worked at Kilgerran forever. Her husband takes care of the grounds. Mind you, Mr and Mrs Mooney are as ancient as my parents, so it’s a rather poorly run establishment,’ she concluded with a tinkly laugh.
The conversation flowed easily and Conor excused himself as soon as was polite, leaving Patrick and Cynthia alone.
When, eventually, the barman began calling time, Patrick was reluctant to leave.
‘Well Cynthia, can I just say what a great time I’ve had…’
Despite his usual chat and bluster, he wasn’t finding it easy to say the right thing here. He knew he didn’t want this extraordinary woman to walk out of his life forever but he couldn’t think of how to say that without sounding like some kind of a creep or a stalker.
‘Oh Patrick, so have I my dear,’ Cynthia trilled. ‘It does seem rather a pity that you have to go so soon ...’ Cynthia, it seemed was as tongue-tied as Patrick. As they walked to her filthy Volvo, there was an awkward moment when neither of them could decide whether to kiss on the cheek or shake hands. The result was a sort of ungainly, mutual stabbing of stomachs and a half a hug.
‘Enjoy the rest of your holiday Patrick, and thank you again so much for all your help,’ said Cynthia.
Winding down the car window, she thrust a business card at him ‘in case you are ever in the area,’ she said hesitantly. She drove away erratically to the sound of the exhaust backfiring and much grinding of gears as Patrick stood in the hotel car park and waved forlornly.
The following morning the group gathered outside to board the coach.
‘So everyone, what should we do about seats? Should we rotate the front seat or does anyone have any preferences?’ Bert asked pleasantly. Anna and Corlene had discussed earlier at breakfast how tiresome it was that Dorothy always grabbed the front seat.
Dorothy was furious. She always engineered it so that she got to the coach before anyone else every morning. ‘If you were as familiar with taking tours with this company as I am, you would realise that it’s always operated on a first- come, first-served basis,’ Dorothy replied with barely concealed contempt.
‘Well, I only asked,’ Bert replied ‘because I’ve got myself a bad knee, I sure would appreciate it if I could have an aisle seat so I can stretch out my leg, if no one minds that is.’
He had hoped to sit beside Ellen today. He’d enjoyed himself walking around with her in Blarney and Kinsale. She was a very relaxing person t
o be with and she had some interesting opinions on lots of subjects, but always delivered in a soft, gentle voice. Despite their easy companionship however, he never even toyed with the idea of telling her about his project. In some ways, he found it hard to imagine her in front of a class of teenagers, before she had retired. As he got to know her, he knew that they had probably liked and respected her and so she probably rarely raised her voice. The way she spoke about that Dylan guy was an example of how well she related to young and old alike.
Juliet boarded the coach and deliberately chose a seat in the middle, half-hoping that she could sit with someone else today. Buoyed up by her successful escape the previous night, she had promised herself that from now on she would be more assertive, would not accede to Dorothy’s every demand. She was mortified by her travel companion’s attitude and the way she treated people, and was now trying to distance herself from her as much as possible. While she was putting her jacket on the overhead luggage rack, the voice she had come to dread rang out impatiently,
‘Juliet, you are in the wrong seat. Our seat is here. Sit inside this morning will you? I prefer to look out the front window. The roads in this country are terrible. I feel ill if I don’t keep the horizon in my line of vision at all times.’
Juliet dithered, and was about to insist on staying where she was when Dorothy said in exasperation, as if dealing with a pouting toddler, ‘Quickly, Juliet, you’re blocking the aisle.’
Juliet turned to see Dylan waiting for her to move. Sheepishly, she picked up her handbag and slipped into the inside front seat with an air of weary resignation.
Dylan headed for the back seat, hoping to make himself invisible in the corner where he listen to his music uninterrupted. He had bought all the CDs the traditional music group were selling at the gig and was looking forward to a day of reacquainting himself with the tunes that had enthralled him so much. He believed some kind of chemical reaction took place in his brain every time he listened to the fast rhythmic tunes or the haunting, slow airs. According to the sleeve notes, between them, the various members of the group played a whole range of instruments. Dylan really hoped that the music he had discovered was to be found in other towns that the coach would be visiting over the next few days. If he could manage to immerse himself in the music, maybe this trip would be halfway bearable after all. Diarmuid, the piper had told him lots of interesting things about the traditional music they played, and where it had originated. He gave Dylan some names to look out for, bands that would be playing later in the week in Killarney, if Dylan wanted to come along. He decided there and then that no matter where Corlene and the rest of tour were going, he was going to the gig. Come hell or high water.
The Tour Page 7
