by Maria Hoey
“Right,” I said absently, because a vivid memory had just sprung into my head. “She was there on the day of your fifteenth birthday party, wasn’t she?”
“Yes, Grace was there,” he said.
“I remember I saw a dark-haired girl first at the gate, when I arrived with my parents, and later on I saw her standing next to Alexander’s pram. I noticed her because she behaved so oddly – guiltily. And you were angry about it, I remember that too. You asked me if I knew who she was and, when I said I’d never seen her before, it was as though you didn’t quite believe me.”
“I probably didn’t,” said Robbie. “But that was because I knew who she was by then and I was sure that everybody in the town knew it too. I kept imagining them all whispering and sniggering behind my back.”
“Not everyone knew,” I said. “I certainly didn’t, although I think some people may have known.” I had a sudden memory of my mother nudging my father as Grace rushed past us on the Duffs’ avenue.
“I have no doubt they did,” said Robbie. He eyed me uncertainly. “So you’ve never actually heard anything about Grace then?”
“I heard there was a child, but not what happened to her. I remembered our neighbour, Mrs Nugent, talking about Mrs Duff having lost another child but I suppose I thought that the child had died.”
“It was Grace,” said Robbie.
“So what happened to her? Did your mother give her up, was that it?”
“Something like that,” said Robbie. “When my mother fell pregnant with Grace she was packed off to one of those mother-and-baby homes but under the pretence of having gone away to work. After Grace was born, my grandmother made it a condition of my mother returning home that the child be left behind. It seems my mother refused and stayed on at the home where she was farmed out as a domestic help. Eventually she was sent to work for my grandmother, but the role was a live-in one. While she was there, her child, Grace, was placed in a foster home without my mother’s permission.”
“But surely they couldn’t do that?” I protested.
“I think we all know they could pretty much do anything they pleased back then,” said Robbie dryly. “Anyway, whatever happened between my mother and father happened and they were married. And it seems that the decision was made to leave Grace where she was.”
The decision was made, I thought bitterly, but who had made it? I had a sudden memory of smiling, avuncular, absent-minded Mr Duff waggling his ear in perplexity and I wondered.
“But surely they could have ... I mean why didn’t they ...?”
“I don’t know, Kay,” said Robbie. “I don’t know why things were done the way they were. Most of what I do know, I heard from Grace herself. My mother was never fully comfortable discussing that part of her life with me, or with anyone else either. I believe that for her it would always be something she would think of as shameful. I only know that Grace was sixteen when she discovered the identity of her birth mother. She came looking for her, took to hanging around the grounds of the house – you saw her there yourself. She went as far as to get a job in the town so she could be close to my mother, and at some point she approached my mother and told her who she was.”
“And how did your mother take it?”
“Not particularly well at first, I gather. But over time things improved and they began to meet up and so got to know one another a little better, all of it in secret of course. But then Alexander died and that changed everything.”
“Yes,” I said quietly. I stared through the windscreen of the car, through the bars of the gate ahead and into the field beyond. “That changed everything.”
“I’m sorry, Kay,” said Robbie, very gently. “That has to be a painful memory for you as much as for any of us.”
I shook my head as though I could shake off the shadow of that day on Bone Bridge, before turning back to him.
“So what happened?” I said. “How did Grace end up working for Rosemary?”
“Well, as you know we packed up and moved away, but unfortunately in the process Grace was entirely forgotten. No forwarding address was left and so she had no way of knowing where we had gone and no way of contacting my mother. Frankly my mother was too ill and depressed to have cared. The only thing she cared about for a long time after that was her lost baby boy. But time passed and it seems she began to think about her other lost child. She began to ... well, pine is the word that springs to mind, she began to pine for Grace.”
Robbie fell silent and I waited until he was ready to continue with his story.
After a while he turned to me and said, “Have you ever seen a person pine, Kay?”
“I don’t know, I don’t think so.”
“You’d know if you had,” said Robbie. “Kay, remember that day when we met at the gates of the house when you were still at school?”
“Yes?”
“Well, one of the reasons I had come back to Ireland was to find Grace and deliver a letter to her, from my mother.”
“Ah, I see.”
“Yes,” said Robbie. “Well, it wasn’t difficult to find her as she was still living and working in the town. I gave her the letter and she wrote to my mother and it all started again. At first it was just letters but then it was arranged between them for Grace to fly over – and so ...”
“And so they came together again?” I said. “I’m glad your mother had that.”
Robbie smiled at me. “Yes, she had that. Not for very long as it transpired, but I like to think it gave her some comfort, and from the way she kept Grace near, I think that it did.”
“I’m sure of it,” I said. “So what then? When Rosemary-June needed someone to help with the children, your mother recommended Grace, was that it?”
“She went further than that,” said Robbie. “My mother provided Grace with fictitious references lauding her skills. She sold her to Violet-May as the perfect fit for Rosemary, Violet-May sold it to Justin and after that it was all settled very quickly. Grace moved in with Justin and Rosemary.”
“But under false pretences,” I said.
“Yes, I know. It was a bad idea but, I like to think, done for all the right reasons. And in fairness to my mother, she always intended to come clean at some point. It was just unfortunate that before she could do that Violet-May found out in the worst way possible. And then the cat was truly among the pigeons. She confronted Grace. She had got it into her head that my mother favoured Grace over her, the first-born child, all that sort of thing. She was extremely jealous and resented Grace fiercely. There were a lot of nasty accusations and tears and tantrums and what have you.”
I bet there were, I thought, and was tempted to ask if Violet-May had danced on her handbag.
But another part of me could understand how Violet-May must have felt at the deception that had been practised on her, at least to begin with.
“It’s a wonder Grace stuck around,” I said, “if Violet-May was that nasty to her.”
“Maybe she thought it was worth it to be near her mother and her family,” said Robbie. “But she left shortly after my mother died and came back to Ireland.
“Of course, she was there when your mother died,” I said.
“Yes, Grace was there, and I think losing my mother again was a big blow to her.”
“It must have been,” I said. “And so, when you bought back the house, you asked Grace to come work for you?”
“Absolutely not,” said Robbie shortly. “That was Grace’s idea, after I’d told her that the girls were coming to stay with me for a time and bringing the children with them. Frankly I felt quite uncomfortable about it. Somehow the idea of having my sister come in to cook and clean for me ... well, it just felt wrong. No, I invited her to make her home here. Let’s face it, the place is big enough.”
“But she refused?”
“She refused. She said she preferred to keep things on a business-like basis for the time being.”
“I see,” I said, although I didn’t really.
Robbie sighed. “It’s not exactly an ideal situation, is it?”
“No, it’s not. Not with Grace in a position where Violet-May can take every opportunity to take a swipe at her.”
Robbie turned to me, his eyes narrowing. “Has there been some unpleasantness you haven’t told me about, Kay?”
“No, no,” I said quickly. “But, Robbie, knowing how badly Violet-May took being deceived about Grace’s real identity, has it occurred to you that leaving Rosemary in the dark about it is just storing up more of the same trouble in the long run?”
“Of course it has,” said Robbie. “But right now that’s how it has to be. It’s just best that Rosemary doesn’t know for the moment.”
His worried gaze held mine and I said gently, “I understand that you think it’s for the best, Robbie.”
“But you don’t. OK, I respect your being honest with me, Kay, but I have my reasons for wanting to wait to tell Rosemary about Grace. Can I ask you respect that?”
“She won’t hear it from me,” I said.
“Thank you, Kay.” He smiled but almost immediately sighed. “I wish I didn’t have to go away again so soon, but you have no idea how good it will be to know there’s someone like you at the house, someone down-to-earth and ordinary and uncomplicated.”
He was smiling again now and I smiled too and so I could hardly blame him if he was completely oblivious to the effect of his words upon me. Ordinary. The word hit me like the flick of a whip and I was silent all the way back to the house while I nursed my wound.
Chapter 23
If there was a row about Oliver’s adventure, I did not hear it, but I had deliberately taken myself up to the attic room so that Robbie and his sisters could feel free to shout to their hearts’ content. But perhaps they did not shout at one another ever – after all, what did I know about how siblings interacted? What did I know about anything? I was still feeling sorry for myself and I took it out on my keyboard, banging out the words furiously and telling myself that if Violet-May had a go at me for telling Robbie about what had happened to Oliver, I would just pack my bags and move out. Why I had ever agreed to move in in the first place was beyond me. What good was I doing? I hardly ever saw Rosemary, though I spent time with the children, yes, and I loved every minute of that time. But they had Grace, Grace who belonged to them by blood while I, when you came down to it, was just some stranger. It was true that I had peace and quiet up here at the top of the house to write and I got to see Robbie. Robbie who thought I was ordinary.
And what if he did, I asked myself? What, after all, was Robbie Duff to me? I reminded myself that I hardly knew him. I had developed a childish crush on him when I was ten years old, seen him for all of an hour as a moony-eyed adolescent and, if I had now allowed those feelings to reignite, then more fool me. It could only be because I had happened to meet him again at a time in my life when I was particularly unhappy and vulnerable. And when all was said and done, nothing at all had happened between us – we had gone on one date, which was not even a date. And so what if that day in Malahide had been one of the happiest I remembered for a very long time? So what if he made me laugh, if being with him made me feel good about myself, made me want to reach out and touch his face and wonder how it might feel to have him touch me?
I stopped typing, jumped up and hurried down to my room. I grabbed my jacket and keys and went down the stairs and out into the afternoon sunshine. I needed to see my father, I needed to be with someone who valued me and loved me, who thought I was anything but ordinary.
Arriving back at the house, after visiting my father, Robbie himself met me in the hall. He apologised for how he had been earlier about my not telling him about Oliver. I made light of it, but he was adamant that he had been out of order.
“Aside from everything else,” he said, “Grace has been telling me how much time you’ve been spending with the children. I think she’s half jealous of how attached they’ve become to you. I appreciate it very much, Kay. Oliver is at that age where he’s starting to get into everything and it’s nice to know there’s an extra pair of eyes looking out for him, especially as I’m going away again.”
“It’s not exactly a chore,” I said, more spicily than I intended. “I do it because I enjoy spending time with the children.”
“I know you do,” said Robbie. “I’ve watched you with them.”
The expression in his eyes was gentle and, as always, I felt the charm of him. He thinks I’m ordinary, I reminded myself, and the thought acted like a cup of cold water thrown in my face.
“So how long did you say you’ll be away this time?” I said in my best matter-of-fact tone.
“Five days,” said Robbie, with what I thought was a rather rueful smile, considering where he was going.
“You could look happier about it,” I told him. “Five days in Crete is not exactly a punishment, you know. Think of all that Greek sunshine and those wonderful blue seas.”
“There is that, of course,” said Robbie, his smile returning. “But I will actually be working, and for part of the time we’ll be away from the coast in the mountains. As I mentioned before, we may run into problems with phone signals for a while – there are some local dead spots in the more mountainous areas of Crete.”
“And that worries you,” I said more gently.
“I like to think I’m contactable, that’s all.”
“I understand that,” I said. “But everything will be fine here, Robbie. Rosemary has Grace as well as me now to help her with the children.” Realising I had left somebody out I added as a hasty afterthought. “As well as Violet-May of course.”
“Of course,” said Robbie.
He still did not look particularly happy and I considered telling him about the decision I had made to do my writing in the evenings in future, after the children had gone to bed. But that, I thought, might imply that I was discommoding myself in some way, and so give him something else to fret about. Besides, if Robbie were to ask me why, I was not at all sure I would know how to explain my motives. I only knew that on some level I had satisfied myself that it made sense to spend my days with the children, who at least seemed to enjoy my company, then write in the evenings instead of sitting in the drawing room watching Violet-May knocking back wine and Rosemary sitting almost trancelike smiling at the television screen. They barely spoke to one another let alone to me.
“So you just concentrate on your trip,” I said.
“I’ll try,” said Robbie. “You know, I think you’d enjoy coming along, Kay. Not on this sort of thing, this is just a field trip, but on a real dig. Perhaps one day you might think of ...”
He stopped as my phone rang. Glancing down I saw that it was Dominic again. I looked up quickly, intending to tell Robbie that I didn’t need to take the call but he was already turning away and motioning to me to carry on.
I set off up the stairs in a temper. I was almost certain that Robbie had been about to invite me along on one of his trips. The phone in my hand kept on ringing and out of pure frustration I answered it.
“What, Dominic, what do you want?”
“Kay?”
“Yes, it’s Kay, who else would it be? Why do you keep on ringing me, Dominic? Can you not take a hint? I don’t want to talk to you. I never want to talk to you again.”
“I know you don’t mean that, Kay. Where are you anyway? And don’t tell me you’re at your dad’s, because I know you’re not.”
“How can you know?” I said.
“Because I’m here and you’re not. Nobody is, and nobody was here last night either. So where are you, Kay?”
“Here?” I asked, alarmed. “You mean at my father’s house? What are you doing there?”
“Kay, are you going to stop asking idiotic questions and tell me where you are?”
“I’m staying at an old friend’s place, not that it’s any of your business.”
“What old friend?”
“Why do you want to know? His na
me wouldn’t mean anything to you in any case.”
“His name – it’s a guy? So who is he?”
“I just told you that you don’t know him, Dominic.”
“So what’s the big deal about telling me then?”
“There is no big deal, Dominic. I just don’t feel like it, that’s all. Are you happy now?”
“No, I’m not happy, Kay. So you’re staying with this guy instead of at your folks’ house? Come on, Kay, what’s going on? I know I screwed up, but don’t pretend you don’t miss me.”
Did I miss him? I had certainly thought about him a good deal since we split up, mostly at night. But if I was really honest, I had to admit that it was not so much Dominic himself I missed, so much as the comfortable rhythm of our shared lives, the familiarity of his warm, clean-smelling body, the comfort of his breathing as he lay next to me in bed at night.
“Kay? Kay, are you there?”
“I’m here, Dominic.”
“I miss you, Kay, I miss you more than I thought I would.”
“Ever the flatterer. So what’s happened to Matchstick Meg then?”
