To Hear a Nightingale

by Charlotte Bingham

  Tomas put the mare’s leg down, and patted the animal on her flanks.

  ‘I’ll get Kevin to have a look at it tomorrow,’ Tomas said. ‘He’s coming to take Fairyglade’s hind shoes off, so I’ll get him to look in here before he goes on to Major Parker’s. We’d a mare with a foot like this when Mr Rosse’s father was alive, and we had her built a special shoe.’

  Tomas bolted the bottom of the half doors, and turned to go back to his cottage. Cassie hung back, anxious to have a last look at her horse. Then she patted the mare goodnight on the neck and followed Tomas up the track.

  ‘She’ll be foalin’ before you, Mrs Rosse,’ Tomas said.

  ‘Well before me, Tomas,’ replied Cassie. ‘I’m not due till the end of May.’

  ‘And this’ll be your first foal.’

  ‘This is my first horse.’

  ‘And may it not be your last,’ Tomas wished her, as they arrived at his cottage.

  Refusing his kind offer of tea, Cassie said she must get home, or Tyrone would be worried. Tomas insisted on driving her up to the house. On the way Cassie fell silent, remembering how when she was small every night she used to pray for God to send her a horse. And now she had one at last. She had a horse of her very own: a beautiful bay mare called Graceful Lady.

  Leonora was just leaving Claremore when Cassie arrived back. They bumped into each other in the hall, as Cassie was hurrying into the drawing room to find Tyrone and warm herself in his arms by the fire.

  ‘Leonora.’

  Cassie couldn’t keep the surprise out of her voice. She hadn’t seen Leonora since the end of the flat, and when last heard of she was skiing in St Moritz – or rather, knowing Leonora, après-skiing.

  ‘Cassie darling,’ Leonora greeted her, kissing her on the cheek and at the same time exhaling the last smoke of the cigarette which she had just stubbed out on the floor. ‘Congratulations. I hear you’re in foal again.’

  She hooted with laughter then looked back over her shoulder. Cassie followed her gaze and saw Tyrone wandering out into the hall, his tie half undone round his neck, pulling his old Aran cardigan back on.

  ‘Cassie,’ he said, ‘I was beginning to get quite worried about you.’

  Cassie looked from one to the other of them, and began to wonder if she’d even been missed.

  ‘Leonora dropped by to discuss plans for the season. We thought we might run Slang in the Lincolnshire. He’s thrown in at the weights.’

  ‘Why not?’ Cassie said, then with a tight smile hurried past Tyrone into the drawing room to get warm.

  Leonora looked at Tyrone and shrugged, then walked away from the door of the drawing room.

  ‘I’m on my way, Mrs Rosse,’ she drawled, ‘because I have a dinner party, and Christ – why didn’t I ask you two! I must be crazy. It’s going to be a hoot. We’ve got Peter Sellers, and hopefully, if he remembers, and if he’s still alive, Brendan Behan, who’s just back from New York. Jesus I’m going to be late. I’ll ring you, Cassie. ‘Bye.’

  Leonora blew Cassie a kiss and was gone. Cassie heard Tyrone talking to her at the front doors, then the sound of her car driving away. Tyrone came back into the drawing room, and joined Cassie by the fire.

  ‘I didn’t know Leonora was calling,’ Cassie said.

  ‘Neither did I, Cassie McGann,’ Tyrone replied, rubbing his hands together in front of the fire. ‘She said she was just passing by, and dropped in on the off chance.’

  ‘Passing by on her way where?’

  ‘I haven’t the slightest idea, Cassie.’

  ‘Could I have a drink please?’

  ‘Great idea.’

  Tyrone poured himself a whisky, and Cassie a white wine, while she stared silently into the fire. She knew that what she was feeling was irrational and ridiculous, because Tyrone couldn’t stand Leonora. But there it was. She was feeling jealous.

  She took her drink from Tyrone and then went and sat in a chair by the fire rather than on the sofa. Tyrone looked at her, shrugged, then went and stretched himself out on the sofa.

  ‘You’re not very talkative, Mrs Rosse.’

  ‘Sorry. I’m just rather cold and tired. I think I’ll go and take a bath.’

  ‘Did you stay till the end of the sales?’

  ‘I had to. Tomas’s car wouldn’t start. Didn’t you get the message?’

  ‘Of course I got the message. I was just wondering if you had to stay till the end, how much that three-year-old of John O’Connor’s fetched.’

  ‘The chestnut by Merry Times? Four hundred guineas.’

  ‘Not bad.’

  ‘Not bad? He’s got a bowed tendon.’

  Tyrone looked round at her in surprise. Cassie ignored the look, finished her drink and went up for her bath. She lay soaking in the steaming water and thought how unfair life could be. She should at this moment have been feeling so good, excited about the secret purchase of her very first horse and happy to be safe at home, carrying the baby of a husband she adored and who adored her in return. Yet all she could think of was Leonora Von Wagner.

  Perhaps Tyrone was attracted to her unknowingly because he had loved her mother. Perhaps he’d always been attracted to her, from the day he first met her. Men found Leonora irresistible. Even if they didn’t fall in love with her, they inevitably fell for her. And it was perfectly obvious what Leonora felt about Tyrone from the way she looked at him.

  The baby inside her womb suddenly kicked her and shifted position. Cassie looked down at her large rounded stomach, and ran both her hands slowly over it. Maybe she wasn’t so much jealous, as afraid. Afraid that as she grew larger and larger in the next two months, and then struggled for another three months after the baby was born to regain her figure, that Tyrone would grow bored and impatient, and fall into Leonora’s bed in a moment of sheer frustration.

  She ran some more hot water until the bathroom was once more full of steam, and wondered if while she was lying in hospital having her next baby, Leonora would again pass by Claremore, and drop in, just on the off chance.

  The Lincolnshire Handicap was now just a week off, and the yard at Claremore was back in full swing. Slang had gone so well in all his work that he was now, barring accidents, a definite runner, It had been a very wet March, so the going had come in his favour, and he was all set and expected to run a big race. Tyrone was so preoccupied that he didn’t notice Cassie’s increased absences during the day, and sometimes even when he returned to the house in the evening. He’d be by the fire with a drink in his hand, as Cassie would come in, her cheeks flushed from the fresh air, and her eyes aglow with happiness. Tyrone put her healthy look down to all the walking she seemed to be doing, and the look in her eyes to the thought of the impending birth. He was right on both counts, except that the birth Cassie was so eagerly anticipating was not yet that of their own offspring, but that of her now beloved mare Gracie, as she had since been nicknamed.

  Tomas had told Cassie that it was any day now, and Cassie had insisted that she was to be told the moment the mare started. Even if it was in the middle of the night she was to be called.

  ‘How?’ Tomas had asked her. ‘For if I telephones you, himself will be sure to answer.’

  ‘Don’t use the telephone,’ Cassie had instructed him. ‘Not if it’s late. Send Erin up on her bicycle and tell her to throw a pebble up at my window. Mr Rosse is a very deep sleeper, and he won’t even know that I’m gone.’

  Fortunately, and Tomas put it down to the sudden cold spell that started in the weekend before the Lincoln, Gracie held on to her foal until after the raiding party had left for Doncaster. Tyrone was quietly confident about Slang’s chances, particularly after he’d seen the horse’s last bit of fast work. His only worry was that the cold snap would last and the ground would dry out. Leonora was to fly over on the day of the race.

  The telephone rang at Cassie’s bedside at half past ten, just as Cassie was about to put her light out. It was Mrs Muldoon to tell her that the mare had started. Cass
ie jumped out of bed, and dressed as quickly and as warmly as she could. She called into Erin’s room to tell her that she was going to her father’s, probably for the whole night, and then left. She hurried down the drive on foot, shining her torch all around her, and arrived at Tomas’s cottage, which was about another half a mile on beyond the yard, just after eleven.

  The mare was down, and Tomas, in his shirtsleeves, was kneeling in the straw beside her.

  ‘How do you know when they’re starting?’ Cassie whispered, as she knelt in the straw beside him. ‘It’s not as if they can tell you. Not like us girls.’

  ‘Restlessness is the first sign,’ Tomas replied. ‘The mare’ll move about all the time, and her belly will sag as the foal gets ready to be born.’

  ‘Not so different from us after all.’

  ‘I wouldn’t know, Mrs Rosse. Whenever Mrs Muldoon started her labours, I was away to O’Leary’s.’

  The mare scrambled to her feet again, and kicked at her belly as if she had colic. Then she started to wander round in an aimless fashion, sometimes stopping to gaze at her flanks. Once when she stopped, Tomas lifted the mare’s tail to check if her vagina was relaxed, and if there was any sign of her water bag. Then with a shake of his head he dropped her tail and gently stroked the side of the animal’s belly.

  ‘You like horses more than humans I suspect, Tomas,’ Cassie smiled.

  Tomas nodded once, and sat back on his haunches to light a Sweet Afton cigarette. He stayed there, resting his buttocks on his heels, his back against the wall, cigarette stuck in the corner of his mouth, while they waited for the next stage of the birth. It followed after an unbroken succession of five Sweet Aftons.

  ‘We’re away now,’ Tomas suddenly announced, deftly stubbing his present smoke out between finger and thumb and shoving the stub behind his ear, as the mare suddenly dropped to the ground and groaned. There followed a series of increasingly violent contractions until Cassie could see a bladder-like swelling appeared between the lips of the mare’s vulva.

  ‘Stand back now, Mrs Rosse!’ Tomas ordered, ‘unless you want to be drenched.’

  Cassie did as she was told and was back against the wall just before the mare’s water bags burst, and gallons of liquid poured out. Tomas ordered Cassie to throw down some fresh straw as he removed the wet material, then checked the mare’s pulse in a vein under her chin. The mare, although breathing much faster, was now altogether calmer, and for a good twenty minutes to half an hour just lay there, seemingly at ease, even though Cassie could see what looked like the foal’s forefeet and muzzle forming a kind of cone in the end of the animal’s genital canal. Tomas relit his cigarette, and Cassie sat down on a straw bale enthralled, while they waited for the next and final stage of the birth to start.

  Suddenly the mare whinnied and seemed to brace herself for the next stage. She had now rested sufficiently, and regained enough strength to deal with the powerful and violent pains which she must have known were imminent. Almost at once the contractions started again, exerting all the animal’s strength upon the passive foetus as she tried to drive it out of her womb. Suddenly the foal’s head appeared, and Tomas gave a great whoop of joy, although they were still a long way from the winning line.

  ‘Come on, me old love!’ he cried. ‘Push! Push!’

  Cassie watched, as the mare’s back arched more and more in her efforts to give birth. The foal’s head and forefeet remained sticking out, and for a while nothing seemed to be following. And then, after a contraction which caused the mare to whinny, the thorax and shoulders of the foal were driven through the horse’s pelvis and out.

  ‘Good, good!’ cried Tomas. ‘’Tis perfection so far! Now come here, Mrs Rosse, and take hold of the foal’s legs! Gently now! Towards the old girl’s tail! But out behind – and now down!’

  Tomas explained later that he’d asked her to do that so that the foal’s withers could clear the mare’s pelvis, and ease the rest of the birth – which it obviously did, for with only one more contraction, the rest of the foal appeared and it dropped to the ground, rupturing the umbilical cord as it fell.

  ‘Perfect!’ declared Tomas, patting the mare’s sweat-stained neck. ‘Perfect, you clever old article! But then I dare say this is not the first time you’ve done this!’

  Then in a second he was down on his knees by the foal, checking that its nostrils were free of membranes, and that its breathing was unrestricted. Cassie stood staring down at Gracie and her foal, full of wonder and happiness. The mare was resting herself, lying breathing deeply and quietly, while she recovered from her agonies, while the foal was being inspected for its sex by Tomas.

  ‘’Tis a colt!’ he looked up and said exultantly. ‘Isn’t that just fine and dandy? A beautiful, beautiful, bay colt!’

  But Cassie hardly heard him. So that’s what it was like, she wondered. That’s how it is to give birth. She put her hands to her stomach, and was suffused with wonder and an odd terror. It was all so mysterious, so ancient a rite, so primal an event. And now the foal was up on its feet, standing on half-buckling legs, and staring at a world unseen and unknown to it only seconds ago.

  Gracie suddenly raised her head off the straw and looked round for her young. Seeing him, she whickered and then got to her feet at once to start licking and cleansing her foal.

  ‘He’ll be on her any minute,’ said Tomas, ‘just you watch.’

  And sure enough, it wasn’t long before the foal had found his mother’s teat and was beginning to take his first drink of milk.

  Afterwards, they sat and drank strong tea in Tomas’ kitchen. The rest of the proceedings had passed smoothly and without hitch, the mare expelling her afterbirth in due course, and Tomas cleaning out the box and laying fresh bedding. By half past three in the morning, they had left a proud mother with her son, both doing well.

  ‘By Facade out of Graceful Lady,’ said Tomas, rubbing his stubbled chin. ‘I’d be stuck to find a name now for that one.’

  ‘I thought of Celebration,’ Cassie ventured.

  ‘I’m damned if I see the connection,’ Tomas replied, ‘savin’ your presence.’

  ‘There isn’t any. It’s just I like the name, and I feel that that’s what it is, the birth of the foal I mean, any birth I feel it’s a celebration, don’t you? Of life. And it also fits in with what Mr Rosse has to say about Derby winners.’

  ‘Ah it’s the Derby he’s to win now, is it?’

  ‘Of course. And Mr Rosse says that the name has to fit in with the sentence: the year so and so won the Derby. And I think the year Celebration won the Derby kind of works, don’t you?’

  Tomas looked at her, sniffed and rubbed his chin once more.

  ‘The year Celebration won the Derby,’ he repeated. ‘The year Celebration won the Derby. You know, you’re right there. It does have a sort of ring about it.’

  Cassie thought so too, as she repeated it to herself all the way back up the drive in the cold March dawn.

  The year Celebration won the Derby. The year Celebration won the Derby. The year Celebration won the Derby.

  He’d have to have a stable name as well, though. But Cassie’d already decided on that as she watched him being born. She may have christened him Celebration, but to her he’d always really be known as Prince.

  Chapter Thirteen

  She learned of Slang’s victory in the Lincolnshire the next morning in the Sporting Life. She read all about his pillar-to-post victory, and how Dermot Pryce had slipped his field to make the most of his light weight, long before the telephone rang in the hall. As she made her way slowly out to answer it, she wondered why Tyrone hadn’t rung her at once from the course. Or failing that, from his hotel in the evening.

  ‘It’s Tyrone.’

  ‘Hi, Mr Rosse. And well done.’

  ‘Wasn’t it great? He won on the bridle.’

  ‘I’ve just read all about it in the Life.’

  ‘Listen. I tried to ring you from the course—’

&nbs
p; ‘Yes?’

  ‘I couldn’t get near a blasted telephone.’

  ‘There must have been one at the hotel.’

  ‘There were plenty. But we couldn’t get a line. There was some problem with our local exchange. As always.’

  Cassie thought for a moment, trying to remember if anyone had phoned the night before. Yes of course. Tomas had.

  ‘And then when we did get a line,’ Tyrone continued, ‘just after half ten, there was no answer. Where were you? Out dancing with Tomas?’

  ‘Almost,’ Cassie answered. ‘Actually I slept in Josephine’s room, because she was very restless. I can’t have heard the phone.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Tyrone. ‘Anyway. Isn’t it great?’

  Cassie was about to ask him what flight he was catching home, when she heard him ask her to hang on. Then Leonora came on the line.

  ‘Hi there, Cassie Rosse!’ she said. ‘What about this husband of yours then?’

  What about him? Cassie thought. But didn’t say so.

  ‘I know,’ she replied instead. ‘Congratulations.’

  ‘Congratulations? Jesus, Cassie, we’ve just won the goddam Lincolnshire Handicap! You should be dancing on the table!’

  ‘I would, except, if you remember, I’m over seven months pregnant. Is that what you’re doing? Dancing on the table?’

  ‘It’s what we’ve been doing, sweetheart! This husband of yours is a genius! I just love him! We’re coming back on the midday flight, and we’re going to pour champagne all over you! Here’s Tyrone.’

  Cassie thought this was a good time to practise her deep breathing, so she did, holding the telephone away from her ear until Tyrone had called her name at least three times.

  ‘Cassie – where did you go?’

  ‘Nowhere, Tyrone. There must still be a fault on the line.’

  ‘Cassie McGann. You sound cross.’

  ‘Sorry. I guess I’m a little tired. After dancing all night with Tomas.’

  And she put down the receiver.

  She found she was shaking. Shaking with an inner rage. And burning with that dreadful, gnawing jealousy again. Where were they ringing from? Tyrone’s room? Leonora’s room? Their joint room?