Julia in Ireland

by Ann Bridge

  “Yes, next week-end.”

  “Oh my darling, do let’s get married soon! I hate being rationed to seeing you once a week!” the man burst out. “When can we get married?”

  “Well, how long does it take in your Church? Do you have to have banns called once a week for three weeks?”

  “Not called, no—the notice of the marriage is put up in writing in the Church porch on three successive Sundays. But darling, don’t say your Church, like that! Couldn’t you become a Catholic? Should you mind very much?”

  She laid her hand on his distressed face.

  “I don’t think I should mind at all” she said. “Nearly all the nicest people I’ve known have been Catholics. It’s more a question of whether the Church would mind a rather un-religious person becoming a Catholic just to please somebody else.”

  “I think the Church holds that a good action is a good action, even if the motive could be improved upon” Gerald said smiling, “and she certainly regards becoming a Catholic as a good action! And I don’t think your motive is too bad either—to please someone else is an act of charity, surely?”

  “I should never have thought of it like that—it seems to me just a perfectly natural thing to do.”

  “I don’t imagine you have ever thought about it at all” he said, still smiling. “You have loving impulses, and act on them. The trouble with the Church is that she does think, and tries to make her children think too. That’s why she insists on people—if they’re adults, at least—receiving thorough instruction before they can be welcomed into the Church.”

  “How long does thorough instruction take?” Julia asked.

  “I don’t really know—most of my friends are cradle Catholics. Anyhow, they would know at Farm Street, or the Oratory; and you’d do better to receive instruction in London.”

  “Why?”

  “Oh, most of our priests here are pretty fundamentalist still!” O’Brien said smiling. “You’d much better get your instruction in London. And there’s no great rush; I’m sure the dear old Archbishop would get me a dispensation for a mixed marriage.”

  “You mean marry first and become a Catholic later?”

  “Yes—on the assumption that you were thinking of getting married rather quickly. Were you?” He took her hand and looked eagerly into her face.

  “I just thought it mightn’t be a bad plan to get married while I’m over here anyhow, without any fuss or anything, and then go back and fetch the Philipino. It was just an idea” Julia said.

  He got up and walked about the room.

  “You don’t realise how much I long to agree” he said, sitting down and taking her hand again. “But—no, my dearest heart, it isn’t a good idea. All those dear people at Glen-toran, who are devoted to you, would be disappointed, and even hurt, and justly so—especially that quite darling old Mrs. Hathaway.”

  “She doesn’t live up there—she lives in London” Julia said, foolishly—she was so startled that he should feel so strongly about this that she spoke without thinking.

  “Well, then she can come up again and stay for the wedding—and you can stay with her in London first and let her help to choose your trousseau, which she’ll adore doing,” he said, smiling at her very tenderly.

  “I don’t really need a trousseau—I’ve got heaps of things.”

  “Well, only buy as little as she will allow!” he said, still smiling. “But do be married from Glentoran—it’s been your home for so long. There’s a Catholic Church within reach, isn’t there?”

  “Oh Lord yes—the Macdonalds’ Chapel is quite close.”

  “There you are then. That’s settled.”

  Chapter 10

  In fact there was a great deal more to be settled, as Gerald and Julia found out even before she left that afternoon—in fact as soon as they sat down and began to make plans. Gerald raised the question of the lift from the kitchen to the nursery, which Julia had suggested on an earlier visit—“If we’re going to have alterations done, I’d better put them in hand at once; we don’t work all that fast in the West. You’d better come and show me exactly where you want it”—and he took a pad from his desk and made her come out and decide on the exact place there and then, and afterwards go round the house with him to see if she wanted anything else done? That was really all that was needed in the way of structural alterations, except for the addition of a hot rail for airing in the nursery bathroom; but in the course of this peregrination Julia was painfully struck by the extreme ugliness of a great deal of the furniture. This reminded her, inevitably, of all the beautiful pieces from Gray’s Inn, now in store, and of her and Philip Jamieson’s pictures, some very good, as she looked at the sad and rather faded watercolours in the drawing room—all-too-obviously amateur family productions. She sank down into a chair and looked about her, discouraged.

  “I’ve tired you, marching you about like that” he said, looking at her with concern.

  “Not really. Gerald, do you like these pictures?”

  “I’ve never really noticed them—yes, I suppose I do. I don’t mind them; they’ve always been there. Why? Are they very bad?”

  “Yes, frightful!” she said, smiling. “Who painted them?”

  “Oh, various grandmothers and great-aunts, I think—I don’t really know. But if you don’t like them, we’ll take them down. What would you put in their place? I mean, it’s nice to have some pictures in a room, isn’t it?”

  “Over the mantel-piece I’d like to put a rather lovely Seurat I’ve got. But what about the wallpaper? I expect it’s faded.”

  “We’ll soon see.” He lifted one or two pictures down off the walls. In fact in the West of Ireland, with little strong sunshine, wallpaper doesn’t fade as much as in England, but where the pictures had been the difference in tone was fairly marked. “Well, it’s time this room was re-papered, anyhow” Gerald said cheerfully.

  “Yes—or perhaps just colour-washed; ever so much cheaper” Julia said, feeling remorseful. “There must be firms in Galway who do colour-washing.”

  “Oh yes, I’m sure there are—Helen will know. Then you can scrap these and hang others wherever you like. Have you got a lot of pictures?”

  “Quite a number, yes. But we won’t put up any you don’t like, dearest” she said. “You may think mine frightful!”

  “I don’t notice pictures much” he said, cheerfully. “What about furniture—have you got a lot of that too? If so, I expect you’d like to have your own stuff about you.”

  “How good you are!” But Julia didn’t feel equal to tackling the question of furniture in depth just then—she approached it from a slant.

  “Can I have a morning-room?” she asked.

  “I’m sure you can—but what is a morning-room?”

  “Oh, a little room of my own, preferably downstairs, where I can keep my books and papers, and write letters and do accounts. There’s one I saw just now, near the front door, that would do beautifully.”

  “Show me” he said. “No, not if you’re tired.”

  “Not in the least tired.” She got up, and led him down the hall—on the opposite side to the drawing-room she opened a door into a small room with a large window looking onto the drive and the pastures beyond it; there were several rows of coat-hooks on the walls, but very little else.

  “But this is part of the gents!” Gerald objected.

  “Well, need it be? Isn’t there room enough to hang coats in the hall?”

  “But it is” he said; he opened a door on one side of the room which did indeed, as Julia saw, lead into the men’s lavatory, wash-basin and all.

  “Well, wall that door up. This would be perfect; my desk in the window, so that I can watch your pretty horses while I lick my stamps, and plenty of room for books on the other walls.”

  “Shall you want book-shelves put up?” he asked, getting out his pad. “How many?”

  “None, bless you! I’ve got plenty of book-cases, and removable shelves too—they can all co
me over with the nursery stuff.”

  “Why, does the nursery have to have special furniture?” he asked, surprised, as they walked back to the drawing-room.

  “Nothing much—children do have cots and play-pens, you know, and their own little tables and chairs; and as I’ve got all that, why buy new? Oh, and fenders round the fires, of course; and I daresay Nannine Mack would like her old armchair—make her feel at home. That lot will really mean a lift-van anyhow, so we might just as well fill it up with my pictures and book-shelves and desk.”

  “Then what about the furniture that’s in those rooms now?”

  Julia repressed a strong impulse to say “Burn it!” and substituted “Give it away! I’m sure there are nuns in Galway who could find a use for it—nuns find a use for everything!”

  But Gerald was as sharp as a razor, especially where Julia was concerned, and read her unspoken thought. “Is it frightful, like these pictures?” he enquired.

  “Well actually, yes” Julia stated frankly—now they were at it.

  “Is the furniture in this room frightful too? I daresay it is; one doesn’t notice things one’s grown up with. Do say” he said earnestly.

  “Not the upholstered stuff, with the pretty cretonnes Helen got for you; that’s perfectly all right,” Julia said remorsefully. “But I don’t honestly like all those black painted Victorian tables and shelves and what-nots, very much. I’ve got some rather lovely Queen Anne things we could replace them with, if you didn’t mind.”

  “I don’t mind anything, so long as you have the place the way you want it,” he said, kissing her. “Surely you know that by now?”

  “Oh Gerald, you are a love! Very well, we’ll have two lift-vans, and enrich the nuns with all the horrors! And I can have all my pretty things, and everyone will be happy. I’ve got enough for several bedrooms, too.” At the mention of bedrooms a thought struck her—probably the beds at Rossbeg were as ghastly to sleep on as the furniture was to look at. She got up. “May we go and see?”

  Her foreboding proved to be perfectly correct. Gerald—they began with his room—slept in a smallish double bed with quantities of brass knobs at its head and foot; Julia at once got onto it, and bounced up and down; it sagged in the middle, and the mattress was lumpy.

  “Goodness! Can you sleep on this? I shouldn’t get a wink.”

  “Don’t you like sleeping in a double-bed?”

  “Yes, very much, darling—only a really big one, six feet wide, with a box-spring mattress, and a proper over-lay. Actually that’s one thing I haven’t got, but I’m sure you can get them in Dublin; Helen has a beauty.”

  “Well, you order whatever you like in Dublin as you go through, and have it sent down.”

  “Oh, bless you”—but before she could say any more Bridgie burst into the room, her greying red hair wilder than ever, her face distraught.

  “Oh, may the Lord have mercy on us! Timmie Keane is dead!”

  Gerald crossed himself. “When? And what of?”

  “They found him in the field by the tractor, Jamesy Halloran said. I can’t know what of. Oh, may the Lord have mercy on us!” Bridgie repeated, and burst into loud sobs.

  “I’d better see Halloran—the bran will have come, so. Can you see to her, Julia? I’ll not be long” Gerald said, and hurried out. Julia led the sobbing Bridgie back to the kitchen, sat her down at the table, and gave her a glass of water, wondering a little what connection there might be between these ill tidings and the advent of the bran? Bridgie, after a taste of the water, asked if she could have a “suppeen” of whiskey—“There’s some in the dining-room, Mrs. Jamieson.” Julia fetched it, and presently Bridgie began to mop her eyes, and took the glasses over to the sink; when Julia judged that she could be left she went through to the drawing-room, prudently taking the whiskey-bottle with her. After a few moments she heard Gerald’s step in the hall—she went out, and found him at the telephone.

  “Is Dr. Fergus in? Oh, where did he go, d’you know? To Keane’s, did he? Is it true that Timmie Kelly had an accident? Oh, that’s very bad!—I’m awful sorry. Thanks.” He rang off.

  “What did they say?” Julia asked.

  “Yes, I’m afraid he is dead.”

  “Oh dear! He was so nice.”

  “Come in and sit down” Gerald said, leading her back to the drawing-room. As they sat—“Why are you carrying that whiskey-bottle round with you?” he asked in surprise.

  “Oh, I gave Bridgie some—she was upset. I didn’t want to leave the bottle in the kitchen.”

  “Quite right!”

  “I am sorry for Mrs. Keane” Julia said. “Shall you go over?”

  “Presently. I think I’ll just ring up Father MacCarthy and see if he knows what happened.”

  “Gerald, tell me one thing—I know Timmie was a cousin, but is his name really Kelly?”

  “Yes, certainly.”

  “Then why did Bridgie call him Timmie Keane?”

  “Oh, they always do that here—refer to a person by the surname of whoever employs them—it’s one means of identification. I bet you anything you like that Bridgie is always spoken of as Bridgie O’Brien, locally, and Mac as Mac O’Brien.”

  “I should have thought that made things rather confusing.”

  “No, not really. In Gaelic there would probably be an inflexion of the surname implying the genitive, so that they would be saying ‘Keane’s Timmie’ or ‘O’Brien’s Bridgie’—but these shades of meaning get obliterated in English.” He got up. “Now I’ll go and ring Father MacCarthy.”

  Julia sat on, pondering this information, and thinking sadly of Mrs. Keane’s distress and loss, left with no support but that of the louts;—absent-mindedly she was still nursing the bottle of whiskey; when she heard Gerald saying goodbye she went through and put it back on the dining-room sideboard.

  “Yes, he was dead when the Father got there” Gerald said, returning. “He seems to have fallen off the tractor; Dr. Fergus told the priest he thought it might have been a heart attack—it seems he’d had heart trouble for a goodish time. I think I’ll just go and get a few roses, and take them over.”

  “Yes, and I’ll be getting back. Oh dear, I am so sorry.” She kissed him and went.

  Lady Helen was greatly distressed when Julia brought her the tidings of Timmie’s death.

  “Oh, poor Mrs. Keane! How terrible for her—he managed everything after Keane died. Did you hear when the funeral was to be?”

  “No, Gerald didn’t say. He was going to take her some flowers after I left.”

  “Oh well, I’ll ring Father MacCarthy. Day after tomorrow, I expect; and he’s sure to be buried from the Chapel at Kilmichan.”

  Both these surmises proved to be correct, and Gerald provided the further information that the “wake,” which in Ireland always immediately precedes the funeral, would take place at three P.M.

  “Yes, of course I shall go” Lady Helen said, in reply to her husband’s enquiry. “But I don’t think you need trouble, Michael.”

  “Certainly I shall come” the General said. “Keane was a very decent fellow, and she’s a good woman.”

  “Would you care to come, Julia?”

  “Yes, I’d love to.”

  “Anyhow you know her, and you’re going to be neighbours. I expect she’d appreciate it if you went.”

  So the Rostrunk party all drove down together. Julia had been wondering where on earth they would be able to leave the car, at the top of that narrow road; but a stretch of the dry-stone wall just short of the farm had been pulled down, giving access to a field which was already in use as a car-park—they left the car there and went to the house on foot. Mrs. Keane, all in black, met them at the door and greeted them with sad dignity; she at once led them to the far end of the room, where all that was mortal of Timmie lay in his open coffin—the large bed and the screen had been removed, and the table pushed to one side. Timmie lay looking exceedingly peaceful, but with that strange remoteness which death confers; Jul
ia was a little startled to see that he was neatly dressed in, obviously, his best suit, his tie fastened with a handsome gold tie-pin. Lady Helen crossed herself, dropped to her knees and said a prayer; when she got up Mrs. Keane said—“I knew he’d like to be buried wearing your tie-pin, Lady.”

  “Oh, bless you, Agnes” Helen said, a tear or two falling as she spoke.

  “Ah” said an elderly woman, who was standing at the far side of the coffin, “I never saw a finer corpse above board.”

  One of the Keane sons now came up with a glass of whiskey for the General, who was accommodated on a settle; the room was crowded with people, among whom Julia noticed the Fitzgeralds as well as O’Brien. There was a general murmur of conversation, but in lowered tones; the men were all drinking whiskey, not the colourless home-brewed “hard stuff,” but normal John Jamieson out of bottles, got in for the occasion. Lady Helen moved about, talking to this one and that, she obviously knew everyone—Julia, rather at a loss, remained close to the General; Mrs. Keane continued to greet any new arrivals at the door.

  After about half an hour the men, as by some common impulse, all went out and stood in the garden and the road outside, the General among them, where they began to smoke; Mrs. Keane and two or three younger women took up a couple of tea-pots from by the fire and poured out cups of tea which they handed round to the women; they were followed by three little girls who did the same with plates of sandwiches and cakes. While this was going on two or three men came in and began, unobtrusively, to place the lid on the coffin; Mrs. Keane, her tears now flowing freely, took a last sad glance at Timmie’s calm face, and then went on refilling tea-cups. Julia wondered if she was about to renew her acquaintance with her old adversary, the Martinstown hearse, but when the coffin was carried out it was placed on a farm-cart; the men, putting out their cigarettes, formed up behind it, and the long, sad procession wound down the road towards Kilmichan. Lady Helen managed to intercept her husband before he could join it—“Michael, please don’t try to walk it; please. Come in the car with us. It’s over a mile and a half.”