To Hear a Nightingale

by Charlotte Bingham

  ‘Tyrone,’ she said quite simply, ‘I have to tell you. Even though we might be dead at any time. I’m pregnant again.’

  Tyrone turned and looked at her for a long time. Then he got up and stood looking down into the fire, the way he always did when something was preying on his mind.

  ‘It doesn’t seem too good a time to be bringing another child into the world,’ Cassie continued.

  ‘Every time is a good time,’ Tyrone replied. ‘Besides, babies bring their own good fortune.’

  He stood still staring down at the fire, then coming and sitting back down beside her, smiled at her ruefully.

  ‘Jesus, but you’re fertile, my girl.’

  He looked away, then took a drink from his whisky.

  ‘Did you want this child, Cassie?’

  ‘No,’ Cassie replied quite truthfully. ‘Not, that is, until I became pregnant. I didn’t want to become pregnant again is what I mean. I was going to talk to you about it, but—’

  Tyrone looked at her and she took his hand.

  ‘Somehow I didn’t get round to it,’ she smiled.

  ‘You should have told me, Cassie McGann. There are ways round these things, you know.’

  ‘Not according to the Catholic Church there aren’t.’

  ‘There’s a perfectly acceptable method approved by the Church.’

  ‘Perfectly acceptable to whom, Tyrone?’

  Tyrone fell silent again, and brooded into his whisky. Cassie leaned against the back of the sofa and stared upwards.

  ‘This is ridiculous,’ Tyrone said finally. ‘We’re talking now about one unborn baby, when any minute the whole world could be in flames.’

  Cassie stared at him hopelessly.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said.

  ‘What are you sorry for?’ Tyrone asked, putting his arm round behind her and drawing her to him. ‘You can’t be sorry for getting pregnant.’

  ‘No,’ Cassie replied. ‘No. I don’t know. At least I don’t know what I mean. I’m just – sorry, somehow.’

  They sat for most of the rest of the evening in silence, holding on to each other, and staring into the dying fire. Then they went to bed and fell asleep in each other’s arms.

  As the prospect of nuclear annihilation diminished over the next few days, and Jack Kennedy, in one American columnist’s words, ‘won his manhood from the Russians’, Tyrone and Cassie were able to get the expectation of another child into proper perspective. Tyrone was, he admitted, overjoyed, as long as Cassie herself was happy. Cassie said that of course she was happy. She was overjoyed too, as long as Tyrone was happy. The Russian ships were sailing for home, and even though winter was on the breath of the wind, there was a curious sense of rebirth about. So it seemed that with every day that the world and they survived, there could be worse times to be pregnant. It was a pregnancy to celebrate their continuing existence.

  ‘I’ll tell you one thing,’ Tyrone said one morning when they were out walking. ‘If it’s a boy, we’re not calling it Jack, or Nikita.’

  ‘Or Fidel,’ Cassie added, laughing.

  Tyrone’s happiness infused Cassie completely. She was so comfortably pregnant this time, with no terrible sicknesses or nausea, and she felt so fulfilled, that for the middle period of her new pregnancy she didn’t at all dread the prospect of more children. In fact, when she saw how happy it was making Tyrone, as she watched Josephine growing bigger with each day, and as Tyrone walked the grounds with her, with his arm round her swelling waist, the thought of them both surrounded by six or seven children once again seemed the culmination of their mutual dream.

  And then she fell in love.

  Whenever she thought about it afterwards, she still didn’t know what got into her. She could only explain that it must have been like the way Tyrone described his first meeting with her. A coup de foudre: a clap of thunder. Love at first sight. And once she was committed, just as Tyrone had explained how he felt about her, Cassie found there was no way out.

  Besides the fact that it cost her a lot of money she could ill afford.

  It happened at a horse sale. Not an important one, but one at which Cassie just happened to find herself. She’d gone with Tyrone, who’d concluded his buying then disappeared off on business, leaving her in the charge of Tomas. They’d stayed on at the sale because it was pouring with rain, and there seemed no point in getting any wetter slogging through the mud back to the car which Tyrone had parked miles away because the ground was so waterlogged.

  So Tomas and Cassie sat in the leaky stand, watching the rain bouncing off the assembled umbrellas, which occasionally bobbed up and down when the owner decided to make a bid, and running down the backs and flanks of the horses as they were led in and out of the ring.

  It was February, and the sale was of some very mediocre horses in and out of training. Tyrone had come to buy one, which he had done before disappearing, so to pass the time until the rain eased enough for them to get back to the car without fear of drowning, Cassie read through the rest of the catalogue. One or two of the few other women who were present eyed her curiously. Not because she was now well and visibly pregnant, but because Cassie most certainly was not one of their number. The other women were all well past their breeding years. They were large women, creatures which Tyrone delighted in calling ‘the third sex’, with sharp Anglo-Irish voices, thick tweed coats tightly buttoned up and odd hats pulled firmly down over their short hair.

  Cassie stared at her catalogue and tried to make sense of the breeding of some of the horses which were passing in and out of the ring so quickly. She had started reading up secretly about horses and breeding again, knowing that since she faced another fairly inactive nine months, she needed another hobby or at least an interest. It was only natural that she should return to the first love of her life, although she kept the fact well concealed from Tyrone. Not that she was secretive by nature, but because she didn’t want Tyrone to feel that she was trying to muscle in on his act.

  The first thing she’d tried out was riding. One day when Tyrone had gone north, and the yard was slack because the season was over, she’d persuaded Tomas to saddle her up Old Flurry, Tyrone’s hack which he rode when supervising work. Tomas refused point blank at first, saying it was more than his life was worth. But Cassie worked on him, and he finally allowed her up on the horse, but first only inside one of the barns they used for schooling the horses. Once he saw how competent she was, he agreed to allow her to hack out up into the hills, but only in his own company. And under a veil of total secrecy.

  They rode across the estate, down the lanes, and headed for the hills. Along the side of one of the fields, there was a good, steady grass gallop. Cassie, although she hadn’t ridden since she was last at Mary-Jo’s, seemed dying to have a canter. So Tomas sent her on ahead, then kicked his horse on behind Old Flurry, who, belying his name, had got hold of his bit, and was galloping up the field like a two-year-old. Cassie was sitting on him well, and managed to pull the old boy up at the end of the gallop a little out of breath but none the worse for wear. They then walked the horses round the foot of the hills to cool them off, and returned home. Cassie thanked Tomas after she’d put Old Flurry away, said how much she’d enjoyed it, then walked back to the house where she drank a large brandy in one and then immediately after was violently sick.

  She’d completely lost her nerve.

  She’d read about it happening to girls, as soon as they’d had a baby, but she had never thought it would happen to her. She remembered it all now as she stared down at her sales catalogue. How as soon as she’d thrown her leg across the horse, her heart had started racing. At first she thought it was just the old excitement. Then as they trotted up the lanes, she realised she was frightened. Frightened of riding. Frightened of Old Flurry. Frightened of falling off and leaving Josephine an orphan.

  Cassie should have turned for home then, but she didn’t, still hoping that as soon as she cantered the fear would go and the old thrill would retur
n. But the horse had taken hold, probably knowing that the rider was fearful, and for one terrible moment as he galloped away with her up the side of the field towards the four-foot stone wall at the top, Cassie thought she wasn’t going to be able to stop him, as the horse was pricking his ears and shaping up to jump. Cassie knew that on the other side of that wall was a good six-foot drop, because she and Tyrone often walked Brian up along this field. But she got Old Flurry back and stopped him, by sitting down and reining him back with all her strength, so that by the time Tomas caught them up, laughing about how the old horse was enjoying his day out, Cassie had recovered her composure sufficiently to deceive her escort.

  But she had never gone back for more. Once or twice Tomas had winked at her and whispered should he get the old horse ready? But Cassie, pleading her new pregnancy, allowed the matter to drop. Instead she once more took up her interest in horse breeding, and spent the hours when Tyrone was out of the house reading everything on the subject in his library.

  Besides the need for an interest to sustain her through her second pregnancy, she had taken it up again because she seemed to have nothing to do with her days. Josephine had more or less been taken out of her care, by Erin’s subtle process of emotional erosion. Tyrone took a great interest in her, of course. Babies delighted him the same way that foals did. He took a studious interest in Josephine’s growth in just the same way as he did with every youngster in his yard. He wanted to know if she was eating all her food, how her weight was, if she’d enjoyed her exercise, and how her teeth were coming on. Sometimes, Cassie thought with a smile, she half expected him to ask if she’d started wind-sucking or crib-biting yet.

  Erin and her mother were twice as bad. At least Josephine was Tyrone’s child, but the way the Muldoon women went on, Cassie thought, you’d think she was theirs, too. Every aspect of the child was discussed and aired, so much so that Cassie felt overpowered by it all. She knew it was all well intentioned, but it left her with little say as to what happened to her baby, and consequently little to do with her increasingly inactive days.

  Hence her interest in horse breeding, and her presence at the sales. The crowd was beginning to drift away now; the best of the lots had passed through and there were only a few odd mares in foal left now to be auctioned. Tomas stretched and asked Cassie if she was ready for the off, and Cassie found herself saying she wanted to stop and see lot 83. Tomas looked in his rain-sodden catalogue and shook his head in wonder.

  ‘Whatever for, Mrs Rosse? We’ve seen the best of ’em, if that isn’t over-describing what we’ve seen.’

  ‘It’s only the lot after this one, Tomas. I don’t know why, but I just want to see her.’

  Tomas breathed in deeply and for want of something better to do, restudied the breeding of the mare. She was a ten-year-old bay, by Le Levanstell out of a mare by Peeping Tom, a winner of eight races on the flat, and in whose pedigree – as Cassie well knew but Tomas did not – St Simon appeared three times in the first four generations. St Simon retired unbeaten in the 1880s, and he was to go on to be the leading sire of winners nine times, dominating, with his own sons, the list of winning sires for over a quarter of a century.

  Which was why Cassie, who’d done her homework, was curious that a mare with such notable breeding should be the last lot in on a rainy day at a minor sale of horses in and out of training, Particularly as she was reported to be in foal by Facade. Curious perhaps, but quite unprepared for the coup de foudre she was about to suffer.

  The mare simply walked into the ring and stopped in front of her. She stood just below Cassie and stared at her, with big genuine eyes, and twitching the largest and floppiest pair of ears Cassie had ever seen on a thoroughbred. The lad leading her round tugged on her lead-chain, but the mare stood rooted to the spot. Cassie was astonished and stared back at her, as if she too was hypnotised.

  ‘Ah, these damn old mares,’ Tomas sighed, ‘saving your presence. Why can’t they stale before they come into the ring?’

  ‘She isn’t staling, Tomas,’ Cassie replied. ‘She’s just standing there.’

  Cassie was right. The mare wasn’t answering nature, she was simply rooted to the spot. Then she suddenly decided, regardless of her lad’s promptings, that she’d walk round again, and ambled off round the rain-sodden ring.

  ‘What am I bid on lot 83?’ the auctioneer called, and half-heartedly tried to raise some interest by recounting the mare’s breeding.

  But what few spectators there were soon left the ring, once they’d caught sight of the mare. Cassie was surprised, because the animal looked well nourished, and well in herself. Yet there was no interest in her whatsoever. She asked Tomas why this should be so Tomas shrugged and said he hadn’t the foggiest.

  The only interest was being shown by a lean and tough-looking customer wearing an old riding coat and a cap turned round back to front to keep the rain from running down his neck.

  ‘Meat,’ said Tomas, rising. ‘Come along, Mrs Rosse, we’d best be on our way.’

  ‘Meat,’ Cassie replied. ‘They surely can’t be buying that lovely mare for meat?’

  ‘Sure there’s no one else bidding.’

  Cassie sat tight. The thin-faced man had answered the opening call for twenty guineas. The mare stopped again in front of Cassie. Cassie put up her hand.

  The auctioneer looked at her slowly.

  ‘Is that a bid, ma’am?’ he asked. ‘And if so, how much?’

  ‘Two hundred and fifty pounds,’ Cassie found herself saying.

  ‘It’ll have to be guineas, ma’am,’ he corrected her.

  The thin-faced man took off his soaking cap, slapped it on his leg, stared at Cassie as if she was mad, and wandered out of the ring. The mare was knocked down as fast as the auctioneer could drop his hammer to Cassie for two hundred and fifty guineas.

  ‘It appears you’ve just bought yourself a horse,’ Tomas told her, ‘God help you.’

  ‘Why should God help me?’ Cassie enquired. ‘I’ve just saved a horse.’

  Tomas stood her up beside him and pointed below them to where Cassie’s new purchase now stood.

  ‘Saved her for how long?’ Tomas asked. ‘Sure the bloody old mare’s a club foot! Savin’ your presence.’

  Cassie rang home and left Tyrone a message should he arrive back before them that Tomas’s car had broken down. By the time she got back to the sales ring, Tomas had arranged transport for the mare with a farmer local to Claremore who was returning home with an empty lorry. There had been a small difficulty over the matter of payment, because of course Cassie was not carrying anywhere near that amount of money, and had no other means of securing the mare since, not having her own bank account, she didn’t have a cheque book.

  Tomas had come to the rescue, as always. He knew the auctioneer, and once he had quietly informed him of the identity of the buyer, credit was at once arranged. Cassie noticed, however, that Tomas slipped a few pounds to the auctioneer and touched the side of his own nose before returning to collect her.

  ‘What was the backhander for, Tomas?’ she asked.

  ‘Sure you’ll not be wanting Mr Rosse finding out, will you?’ Tomas replied. ‘So I told him to mark the sale down to cash.’

  ‘You think of everything, Tomas.’

  ‘I never thought we’d be walking out of here with a broken-down pregnant old mare, did I?’

  On the drive back, ahead of the farmer’s horsebox, Cassie wondered aloud why a well-bred mare who was obviously just about to foal, regardless of the fact that she had a club foot, should be sold at auction. Particularly since there were the necessary papers with her to prove that Facade was indeed the covering stallion.

  ‘Her owner’s just died, God rest her soul,’ Tomas answered. ‘So John Mulligan the auctioneer told me. And her family want nothing at all to do with her horses. She had ten, and they’ve all gone under the hammer. Three of them went for meat, and one of them a decent sort of hunter.’

  Cassie looked back over
her shoulder at the box following, and then round to Tomas, who as usual was driving very slowly and sedately right down the middle of the road.

  ‘Tomas, are you sure you can keep her?’ Cassie asked anxiously.

  ‘You can hardly keep her at Claremore,’ Tomas replied. ‘Mr Rosse’d have a blue fit.’

  ‘I could find a farm somewhere.’

  ‘You could, you could. But won’t she be better off tucked away behind me cottage where we can keep an eye on her? I’ve a decent little barn there, where she’ll have room enough to foal.’

  ‘I’ll never be able to thank you enough, Tomas. You know that.’

  Tomas just grunted in reply, and took both hands off the steering wheel to relight his pipe. Then he took a sideways look at Cassie sitting beside him, staring out of the window at her invisible purchase, and grinned to himself in the dark.

  Tomas had the mare settled into the barn in no time. He made her a deep bed of fresh straw, and filled up a couple of large buckets with water. Cassie stood stroking the beautiful bay mare, pulling at her big ears, and rubbing her soft brown nose. The mare sighed, then shook herself, before deciding to rub the side of her face up and down against Cassie’s tweed coat.

  ‘I’ll fetch her some hay now, which’ll see her through to morning,’ Tomas said, running his hand under her belly, ‘then tomorrow I’ll feck some feed from the yard, and get some Guinness for her from the village.’

  ‘I’ll pay you for all the feed and everything, Tomas,’ Cassie told him.

  ‘For what I don’t get from the yard you can,’ Tomas replied, carefully lifting up the mare’s bad foot.

  ‘Do you really think we should steal her fodder from the yard?’ Cassie asked.

  ‘Sure you’re not stealing it! ’Tis already your own and paid for!’ Tomas snorted, then bent lower over the mare’s food. ‘And this foot’s a damn sight worse then we first thought, saving your presence.’

  Cassie bent down to have a closer look.

  ‘Do you see there? Listen, half the foot’s nearly off.’