At times, Biddy’s behaviour when she was around lads worried Tara. She seemed to play up to anyone who would give her a bit of attention – even if she’d only been introduced to them. In the last year or so, Tara had heard rumours about Biddy too – terrible rumours about her going with men – which she had ignored.
She had ignored the stories because it was usually someone like her father who spread them, or some of the women gossiping in the doctor’s surgery or queuing in a shop. Her innate sense of privacy about her own life made her unwilling to listen to gossip about anyone else. Especially when that gossip was about Biddy – her only real friend in the village. Whatever was said about Biddy – whether it was the truth or lies – Tara would defend her to the last.
When she emerged back in the hall, trying to look casually round the place for her friend without looking desperate, Tara felt a hand on her arm.
“May I have the pleasure, Miss Flynn?” a familiar voice said. Tara’s legs suddenly felt weak. It was Gabriel Fitzgerald – looking like a film star in a navy corduroy jacket.
“I’ll just put my bag down on the form,” she said, attempting a casual manner.
In seconds she was back beside him and they stepped out on to the dance floor. “I didn’t know you were coming to the dance,” Tara said as they moved around the floor, in time to a slow waltz. “You never mentioned it when I said I was coming with Biddy.”
“That’s because I didn’t know I was coming,” he replied. “I didn’t know anything about the dance until you mentioned it the other night. The following day, a fellow from university – from Birr – rang me and asked if I knew of anything going on for New Year’s Eve.” He looked down at Tara and gave a little laugh. “And then I remembered the farmers’ dance.”
Tara looked at him with a mischievous glint in her eye. “I was telling the truth when I told Madeleine it would be full of farmers. I’ve danced with four of them tonight and I’ve got the bruises to prove it. All they could talk about was their grand cows and sheep, and how much land their families owned.”
“They must have been trying to impress you, Tara,” Gabriel said, laughing again. “Farmers never divulge how much land they have unless they have something to gain! I’d watch yourself there – they must think you’d make a grand farmer’s wife.”
“Go away with you!” Tara retorted. “Me with a farmer? Can you imagine it?”
He slowed down for a moment, then held her at arm’s length as though studying her carefully. “No,” he said in mock seriousness, “I don’t somehow see you as a farmer’s wife. It’s the legs. I couldn’t really see you in wellington boots somehow.”
Tara pushed him playfully and he caught her round the waist. His hands reached under her jacket, so that there was only the fabric of her dress between them, and pulled her closer to him. So close, she could feel his warm breath on her neck. Then she was suddenly conscious of the touch of his fingers. For a fleeting moment, it felt as though he was actually touching her bare skin and a strange, warm feeling spread throughout her body. So warm, she was afraid that Gabriel could feel it too.
As they danced round the floor, chatting and joking lightly with each other, Tara wondered if Gabriel had planned to meet up with her tonight, or whether this was just a casual thing to him. She had no way of knowing. She would just have to be patient and wait.
After what seemed like ages, the dance number finished, and almost as quickly another one struck up. They started dancing again – closer this time. Without a word being spoken, Tara knew that she was going to spend the rest of the evening with Gabriel Fitzgerald.
When it came to the break for tea and biscuits, Gabriel joined the queue for the refreshments and Tara went round the hall looking for Biddy. She found her in a corner, leaning up against a window-sill and still talking very earnestly to PJ Murphy.
“Are you okay, Biddy?” Tara asked, throwing a disapproving eye at her companion. “I looked for you earlier, but I couldn’t find you.”
“I’m sorry Tara. I got chattin’ to PJ. I saw you on the floor with Gabriel Fitzgerald, so I knew you were all right.” She looked across the hall where the queue was lined up outside the kitchen. “Have they started serving the tea yet?” she said, changing the subject. “I could do with a cup . . . I’m feelin’ a bit light-headed.”
PJ got to his feet rather unsteadily, showing signs of having indulged in a festive drink before coming into the hall. “I’ll fetch it for you,” he said thickly. “I’ll be back in a minute.”
Tara folded her arms and put her head to the side in an inquisitory manner. “Well,” she said, “what excuse did he give you for standing you up?”
“His feckin’ ould mammy!” Biddy said bitterly. “She says that PJ should be doing a line with somebody more suitable – one of the girls from the local farms.” Tears welled up in her eyes and she dropped her head and looked down at the floor. “She says I’m not good enough for him.”
Tara leaned against the window frame beside her friend, and put her arm round her. “Come on, Biddy – he’s not worth it. There’s plenty of boys like him around. Don’t go making a fool of yourself over him. You could do a lot better than him – there’s plenty of boys out there on the dance floor who would be interested in you.”
“But I haven’t got the time to waste on looking for another lad, and anyway, he likes me . . . he told me only a few minutes ago,” Biddy snivelled. “It’s only his ould mother that’s coming between us.”
“What’s the big rush?” Tara said lightly. “We’re only eighteen years old – sure we’ve got our whole lives ahead of us.”
“You might have plenty of time –” Biddy said, then she bit her tongue, realising that she was divulging more than she intended to.
Tara caught sight of Gabriel’s blond head weaving its way through the crowds. She signalled to him and he came over to the two girls. “Hello, Biddy,” he said warmly, “I haven’t seen you for a while.” He handed Tara a cup of tea and the one intended for himself he handed to Biddy. The small gesture wasn’t lost on Tara and she gave him a grateful smile.
“There’s more – there’s more!” he said in a jokey fashion, digging out several custard creams from his jacket pocket and handing them to the two girls. “You’re looking very well,” he said turning to Biddy. “That’s a lovely dress you’re wearing.”
“D’you think so?” Biddy managed a watery smile, always receptive to a compliment. “How’s Madeleine? I heard she’s not been too well in herself . . . I’m sorry to hear it.”
Gabriel dug his hands deep into his jacket pocket. “She’s grand at the minute, Biddy,” he said quietly. “I’ll tell her you were asking for her.”
PJ came back a few minutes later, with a half-cup of tea, having spilt the rest in the saucer on the way back. Seeing Biddy already with a cup, he proceeded to drink it himself.
A strained atmosphere which had not been there before descended on the group, and it became patently obvious that PJ was not at ease in either Tara or Gabriel’s company.
He didn’t seem anxious to be with Biddy either, Tara thought, from the way he kept watching the other girls in the dance hall. Tara quickly finished off her tea, and when the band struck up again for the second half of the night, Gabriel guided her back on to the floor.
“Biddy’s looking great these days,” he commented. “You’d hardly know her. I don’t mean any harm, but she was a sad-looking sight at school. I always felt rather sorry for her. It’s nice to see her looking so well.”
Tara nodded. “Yes, she does look well.” Privately, she thought that Biddy wasn’t quite herself tonight – it was probably all that business about PJ. “What about your friend from Birr?” she said, changing the subject. “Is he still around?”
“Oh, he’s fine,” Gabriel replied. “He came with a few others, so he won’t be at a loss. They have a car with them, so they can head off any time they like.”
“What about you?” Tara dared to ask, leaning bac
k slightly so that she could see the expression on his face. She had watched Biddy making a fool of herself with a man tonight, and she wasn’t about to make the same mistake.
“I’m in no rush home tonight,” he told her. Then, he pulled her closer to him once again, and kissed her full on the mouth.
Oh, Gabriel! Tara thought, as his lips pressed harder, and her heart started racing. This is what I’ve been waiting for all my life. This is why I’ve never let another boy near me. This is what I’ve worked every minute of the day for – to belong to you and your world!
A long moment later, after he had stopped to let her catch her breath, he whispered in her ear: “Do you know that you’re the most beautiful girl in this hall, Tara Flynn?” And when she laughed in embarrassed disbelief, he added: “You are beautiful – beautiful and elegant – and I only came here tonight because of you.”
The rest of the dance passed in a wonderful haze for Tara, and she stood in the packed hall clinging to Gabriel, hardly noticing when the bells were rung to herald in the New Year. Later, she caught sight of Biddy in the crowd, and pushed her way over to put her arms round her and wish her ‘Happy New Year’.
“I don’t feel as if it’s going to be a happy new year,” Biddy said, looking very woebegone. “I think it might be for you – but definitely not for me. I think it’s going to be the worst year I’ve ever had.”
“Don’t be so morbid,” Tara told her, the ecstatic happiness she felt shining in her own green eyes. “We’re young – we’ve got our whole lives in front of us.” She paused for a moment. “Look – I’ve had some awful things happen to me this past year. Losing my granda was the worst thing I could imagine . . . but I know he’d want me to be happy.” She touched her friend’s arm. “I know Lizzie gets you down at times, but she’s letting you out more – things will get better soon.” She looked over Biddy’s shoulder at the sullen-faced PJ “If he’s messing you about, then just forget him. There’s plenty more fish in the sea.”
Biddy dropped her eyes. “I know he’s not the best . . . but he’d do. If he would just have me – he would suit me fine.” The band struck up another waltz. Tara suddenly felt the urge to have Gabriel’s arms around her waist again, so she patted Biddy’s arm soothingly and told her she’d see her later.
The rest of the night flew by and suddenly Tara was standing hand in hand with Gabriel Fitzgerald while the band played the ‘Soldiers’ Song’ – heralding the end of the dance and the start of another year. They had another long kiss and, although the floor was now crowded with other courting couples, it was as if she and Gabriel were the only other people in the whole place.
Shortly afterwards, Tara went back into the cloakroom for her coat and scarf, keeping an eye out for Biddy as she went. But there was no sign of her or the skulking PJ. Arm in arm, she and Gabriel filed out of the smoky hall behind all the other dancers, then they went round the side of the hall to collect their bikes.
“Biddy’s bike has gone,” Tara told Gabriel in a surprised tone, as they wheeled their bikes out on to the road. “She must have gone on ahead.”
“Don’t worry,” Gabriel replied. “We’ll probably catch her up on the road somewhere.”
Biddy had gone on ahead with PJ, and they were walking out the Cappincur road – she pushing the bike and her escort on foot. She was glad when the dance had finished, because, on their own, she could demand his full attention. She also wanted to dodge Tara, because she knew PJ would take the chance to head off, if her ‘posh’ friends joined them again. Biddy also knew that she had to take this chance to sort things out about the baby. She couldn’t take the chance of anyone spoiling it again.
“Are you sure?” PJ repeated stupidly for the fourth time.
“I’m sure.” Biddy was getting fed up with his questioning. “I’ve been to the doctor’s and I’m due the end of May.”
“But we did it standin’ up against the wall,” he protested, giving her Dinny’s old argument. “It’s not supposed to happen if you do it that way.” He paused to light a cigarette to calm his nerves. “And anyway . . . surely you can’t be expectin’ after doin’ it for the first time? You said it was the first time – didn’t you?”
“What d’you feckin’ well take me for?” Biddy challenged. “A dirty little whore or somethin’? Of course it was the first time. You were a bit quick, that was all – but we definitely did it.” Her mind worked quickly. “I read about it all in a book, so I know for a fact.”
PJ drew deeply on his cigarette. “I never read books,” he said lamely.
“You should,” Biddy said, more kindly. “You learn a lot of things from books. Anyway, what are we goin’ to do?”
He shrugged, then turned his head away. “Me mammy will kill me stone dead,” he said in a low voice. “You don’t know what she’s capable of. She’s worse than any man when she starts.”
“What about me?” Biddy said. “What am I supposed to do? I’ve no family to help me out or anythin’. The priest says if there’s no lad to stand by me, then I’ll have to go into a convent for fallen women in Dublin.”
PJ hunched his thin shoulders and took another drag on his cigarette.
“You wouldn’t let that happen to me, would ye?” Biddy beseeched. “You’ll ask yer mother about us gettin’ married . . . won’t you?”
“Married?” he repeated in a horrified tone, picturing his mother if he told her. “Sure, I’m only seventeen years old. I’m too young to be married.”
Biddy threw her bike in the ditch. “You weren’t too feckin’ young when you had me up against the church wall,” she roared into his face. “Were you?”
“I can’t get married!” he roared back on the verge of hysteria. “We weren’t even courtin’ – sure, I hardly feckin’ knew you . . . and we were only at it the once.”
“It was long enough,” she said. “Just the once was enough to have me expectin’.”
PJ threw the half-smoked cigarette away and then he stared up into the sky, as though seeking divine inspiration.
Biddy reached out and tentatively touched his hair. When he didn’t move, she put her arms tightly round him. “It’ll be all right,” she said soothingly. “It’s just the shock – I was the same. I know we’re fierce young to be gettin’ married and everythin’ – but wouldn’t it be grand to have the baby, and still be young ourselves?”
PJ said nothing. He just stared over Biddy’s shoulder into the blackness of the night.
When Tara and Gabriel rounded the corner on their bikes a short while later, they came upon the other pair standing like statues, with Biddy’s arms still wrapped possessively round the boy she hoped would be her husband.
“C’mon, Biddy,” Tara called as she came upon her friend. “It’s after three o’clock and we’ve a good bit to cycle yet.”
PJ took the chance to extricate himself from Biddy’s grip. “I’ll have to go home,” he said, heading back in the direction of Tullamore. “I’ll see you.”
“When?” Biddy called back loudly, picking her bicycle up from the wet grass. “When will I see you?”
“Soon enough,” he replied, and then – without a backward glance – he disappeared into the darkness.
Gabriel cycled with the girls as far as the finger-post showing ‘Ballygrace – 1 mile’. Then, after whispering something in Tara’s ear and kissing her lightly on the lips, he turned off for Ballygrace House. Tara stared after him until his shape disappeared in the early morning mist.
“That was a good night, wasn’t it?” Tara said as she and Biddy got ready to start on the last leg of their journey. She buttoned her coat up to the neck and tied her headscarf tightly under her chin, aware of the biting cold for the first time since they left Tullamore. “The dance was great,” she said in a faraway voice, thinking back to the slow waltzes she and Gabriel had earlier in the evening. “It was a great idea of yours to go to the dance – thanks for buying me the ticket.”
“I’m glad you enjoyed it,” Bid
dy said over her shoulder as they mounted the bikes again.
“It’s hard to imagine that another year has started already,” Tara commented as they cycled along. “I wonder if there will be many changes ahead for us?”
“I wonder,” Biddy repeated.
Then, the two friends cycled along in silence, each deep in her own thoughts.
Chapter Fifteen
1950
If Rosie Scully still bore a grudge against Tara Flynn, she kept it well concealed on New Year’s Day as she served lunch. She and young Ella dished up roast beef and Yorkshire pudding – which Tara had never eaten before – thick slices of honey-coated ham and a selection of vegetable dishes. This was followed by sherry trifle and left-over Christmas cake. Although she liked to provide good, well presented food at all times, Elisha Fitzgerald did not like waste.
Mrs Scully kept a tight smile pinned to her face – even though she had earmarked the remaining quarter of the Christmas cake for herself – and offered the dishes to Tara in the same polite manner as she did to the members of the family. The sweetcake, she had planned, would accompany her nightly glass of sherry, which she had also purloined from the Fitzgerald household. No matter – she would make up for it with the tin of luxury chocolate biscuits she had hidden in the depths of a kitchen press, to be retrieved on her way out tonight.
Tara murmured a polite ‘thank you’ to the housekeeper as the meal was served to her, but avoided any eye contact with the older woman. Lying in bed that morning Tara had made several New Year’s resolutions, and one of them was to treat Rosie Scully with no more than the polite indifference she would accord a waitress in a tearoom. She would no longer care what other people thought of her – especially begrudging people like Mrs Scully.
As she sat across the table from Madeleine and her handsome brother, Tara thought over all the promises she had made to herself earlier on that day. Her main resolution for the coming year was to continue to improve herself as far as she could in all areas. She reckoned she could do this without spending a lot of money – apart from one major indulgence which she knew would shock both her family and neighbours. This year, Tara was determined to buy herself a good, second-hand piano. She urgently needed it to increase practising her music to gain the grades necessary to teach the piano to younger pupils. She hoped another year of intensive practice would get her to the required standard. This would yield her yet another source of income and ensure that her own musical skills continued to flourish.
Tara Flynn Page 21
