Neither woman speaking, the intense despair hanging between them, Eleanor and Molly gazed out to sea. The tan little dog sat on Eleanor’s foot, the black one right beside her leg.
‘I hope it all works out for you, Eleanor. I’ll pray for you,’ Molly said, standing up and giving the black dog a rub. ‘I bet that one is called Patch,’ she said, and patted the little brown dog.
Eleanor smiled as the tan dog with the black patch on his eye jumped up on his hind legs again, dancing for another scrap of meat.
Chapter 21
Harp woke as her mother came in and opened the bedroom curtains. The bright sunlight filled the small room, and Harp sat up, rubbing her eyes sleepily. ‘Am I late to help with breakfast?’ she asked.
‘Well, I should think so – it’s after ten. Everyone is up and has eaten already, but you looked so tired after everything last night that I let you rest on. You needed it.’ Her mother sat on the edge of her bed.
‘Did you manage on your own all right?’ Harp asked, and Rose smiled and tucked a strand of hair that had come loose from Harp’s plait behind her ear.
‘Which of us is the adult?’ Rose gazed into her daughter’s eyes, and instantly Harp knew she had something on her mind.
‘What is it?’ she asked.
Rose sighed. ‘You’re uncanny. You know that, don’t you? An old soul, my granny used to say.’
Harp smiled. ‘I must be, but I don’t know. Maybe that’s why other children find me so odd.’ She shrugged. ‘Either way it’s who I am and I can’t change it, so I’d best get on with it.’
‘JohnJoe doesn’t find you odd,’ Rose reminded her.
‘It’s true, he doesn’t. It’s nice to have someone my own age to talk to.’ Then she remembered. ‘Oh…any news of Danny?’
‘Dr Lane called earlier. He brought Danny to the hospital last night and they sent word this morning that he was stable. He’s still weak and will take some time to recover, but he’s going to be all right, I think.’
‘Oh, that’s wonderful news. I’m so happy for JohnJoe – he was so worried.’
‘Indeed.’ Rose paused. ‘I wonder what is best to do now? I feel like I should contact someone, just to tell them that he’s with us and he’ll be taken care of. But from what he told us, his father is less than responsible and the uncle in America, well, he’s never even met the child, so I’m not sure.’
‘We can let him stay here until Danny gets out of hospital?’ Harp was delighted, liking the idea of her new friend staying around for a bit longer. ‘Not in a guest room obviously, they’re all booked up, but in the other room at the end of this landing. It’s small but he’d be fine and cosy in there.’
‘I suppose that’s best, until we can speak to Danny anyway. I wondered if I should send him on the ship with Eleanor, Sean and Gwen. They could take care of him on the voyage and perhaps the uncle would have someone meet him, but that would mean him leaving Danny here to recuperate. But I hardly know the boy, and we have no way of knowing if anyone would be there to meet him. And if not, Sean has an arrangement to go directly to a job, so he couldn’t be responsible for him, and Eleanor is taking a train west right away, so that wouldn’t be suitable either.’
‘And Molly’s not going now, but even if she was, I don’t think she could take him to a convent?’ Harp said with a wicked grin. ‘Her story would have been complicated enough without bringing a lone fourteen-year-old boy into it.’
Rose chuckled. ‘You have Henry’s wicked sense of humour. The absurd and the ridiculous you both find hilarious.’
Harp felt the familiar stab of pain. It happened within a few minutes of waking up every day, that sickening realisation that it had happened, that Mr Devereaux had died, that she and her mother were alone. For such a quiet man, he’d taken up so much of their lives, and her mother was right, he could be very funny sometimes. She was learning that grief was like that; it had phases but it wasn’t linear. It wasn’t as if one moved seamlessly from shock to anger to desolation and eventually to acceptance. No, it was something different. At first, it was all-consuming, an almost unbearable pain, a physical and emotional heartache. But then she’d feel lonely and bereft, and then she would forget and laugh and smile. But a smell, a word, a book, a sound – anything could trigger it, the ice wave of realisation. It was real; he was gone and he wasn’t coming back.
‘I miss him so much,’ Harp whispered.
Her mother drew her in for a hug. ‘I know, darling. I miss him too. But he’d be proud of us, wouldn’t he? All we’ve achieved.’
Harp nodded. ‘And he would have been fascinated by the high dramatics of last night.’
Rose released her and nodded, adding in a whisper, ‘Or horrified that we filled the house with mad strangers?’
‘There’s a book in this, isn’t there?’ Harp said. ‘All the comings and goings of a house like this.’
‘There certainly could be.’
Harp considered it. ‘I was thinking I would record somehow the stories of the people who stayed. Of course none would ever be as explosive as last night’s crowd.’ She laughed. ‘But it would be a nice way to remember, wouldn’t it? The people who slept here, before leaving for a new life in another world, this was their last night sleeping on their native soil.’
‘I think it would be a wonderful book, and you have the right pen and everything,’ Rose said, lifting the navy-blue box from Harp’s bedside locker and opening it. Harp hadn’t touched the box since the day she brought it to school; it was too hard to look and see the initials they shared engraved there.
Rose opened the velvet box, offering it to Harp. It was just as it was on the day Henry gave it to her, the pale-blue silk lining, pleated to give it a luxurious effect, the navy velvet swivel clasp ensuring the pen stayed snugly in the moulded groove, created for that exact piece. The elegance of it and the symbolism of their shared words, written words. Books and the love of them united her and Mr Devereaux, and they always would. She realised that though he was physically gone and his loss was a source of deep grief, while she lived, while they stayed in the Cliff House, while she had his books, he wasn’t gone, not really. She could remember him, hear his voice, see his writing in the margins. He was there, and she would never be alone ever again.
She took the box and with her thumb slid the clasp out of the way so she could lift the pen out. It felt heavy between her thumb and finger, and the silver barrel was polished so it glinted in the morning sunlight. She removed the cap, and the gold nib shone. Then she ran the pad of her thumb over the engraving. H. D.
‘I’ll write the story of this house, all the people who come and go, with this pen. Maybe it will become a book, maybe it will never see the light of day. But he loved this house and he loved me, and so that’s the best way to honour his legacy, I think.’ Her voice cracked on the words. ‘I think he’d like the idea of it.’
‘He would,’ Rose agreed. ‘This is your house now, your home. You were born here and you own it, so you should write its story.’
Harp was intrigued; it was the first time she’d ever heard her mother speak about her birth in any detail. ‘Which room was I born in?’ she asked.
‘The small room off the kitchen. But not long after you were born, I told Mrs Lenihan, the old housekeeper, I would be fine. It was the early hours of the morning by that stage, and the doctor and the midwife had gone home, confident that all was well with us both. You were sleeping peacefully in the crib, and I was tired and sore but relieved that you were here and all was well.
‘I just looked at you, your blond hair…and your eyes were blue then, not grey yet, but still an unusual shade, and you were so beautiful. I didn’t care that I was a mother without a husband. The worries I had about people talking, or the scandal, even though everyone seemed to accept the dead husband story, it all disappeared in an instant. It was as if the hard judgemental world outside these four walls didn’t exist.’
Rose sighed. ‘You whimpered a little, a
nd I lifted you out of the crib. I just gazed at you – I hadn’t even named you yet – and you gazed back, and then I placed my finger near your tiny hand and you curled your fist around it and I…’
To Harp’s astonishment, tears welled in her mother’s eyes.
‘I named you Harp then, and that night we eventually slept, snuggled up together.’
‘Why did you pick such an unusual name?’ Harp asked, her personal story fascinating to her.
‘Well, I told you you loved the harp, even when you were in my belly the sound of it would make you peaceful, but as well as that, I was down in the town one day, and there was an American woman there – oh my word, she was so pretty – and she was dressed in grey and silver silk. She was having a debate with her husband, a distinguished-looking fellow, and he was pleading with her to be reasonable. I heard him say, “Oh, Harp darling, you know I’d give you the moon if I could, but please, just listen to me…”
‘She could have made that man do anything, such was the adoration in his eyes for this remarkable-looking woman. She was poised and confident and she was playing with him really, but there was something about her, something unusual, that was entrancing. She seemed to have the world at her feet. They were boarding a huge liner and clearly had a lot of money, and I thought if I ever had a daughter, I would name her Harp. It was such an unusual name.’
Harp was enjoying hearing this; the subject had been taboo for so long.
Her mother went on. ‘Then you were born, and though I was a poor single servant girl, I just knew deep down you would be destined for something much better. I knew you were going to be different to everyone else in the whole world, so you couldn’t be called Mary or Jane or Kate. I remember old Mrs Devereaux was appalled when she heard your name. Though she never acknowledged she was your grandmother, so she got no say. But she thought, like everyone, that I had notions above my station. She was probably right.’ Rose chuckled wryly.
‘Whenever I think of her, Mrs Devereaux, I think of Catherine of Medici and how horrible she was to her daughter-in-law, Mary, Queen of Scots,’ Harp said.
Rose smiled and ruffled her daughter’s hair. ‘You are a unique child, Harp Delaney, that much is true, with a wild and romantic heart and a brain that will be the envy of the most learned of men. But I was nothing like a young queen, and she never saw me as a daughter-in-law or anything but a servant who had led her precious son astray. To her I was nothing more than the worthless daughter of poor people who would want nothing to do with a girl in trouble as I was.’ She patted the bed. ‘Now best get up. We have new guests arriving today and last night’s ones will be leaving for the embarkation station shortly. This week is so busy, the port has three ships leaving. You get dressed, and I’ll speak to JohnJoe and see what he would like to do. I’ll offer that he could remain here until Danny improves.’
Harp threw back the covers and began to wash in the water in her basin. Her mother was hovering, as if there were something else.
Harp looked up questioningly. ‘Is everything else all right, Mammy? Did Inspector Deane come back?’
Rose shook her head. ‘No – well, yes, he did. But nothing more will happen after last night. Danny doesn’t want to press charges, as the knife was his. And now that he’s going to be all right, it’s all going to be forgotten, I think.’
‘“All’s well that ends well”,’ Harp quoted.
‘A poem?’ her mother asked. Though she liked to read, she never pretended to be as well read as her child.
‘No.’ Harp grinned. ‘A ridiculous play by Shakespeare, where a very smart woman, Helen, a healer actually, cures the king of France of an illness, and in return he gives her the hand in marriage of a man she is in love with but who has no interest in her because of her low station. She spends the whole play trying to get him to want her.’
‘Did it work?’ her mother asked with a smile.
Harp shrugged. ‘She got him in the end, by pretending to be someone else and getting into his bed. She became pregnant with his child and so he finally agrees to marry her. So yes, Helen gets Bertram, but I think she was foolish to waste her mind on such a man, or any man. I’ll never marry. I’ll be my own boss.’
‘Ah, my dear girl, one day you may think differently,’ Rose said as she went out the door.
Rose left the bedroom, the letter still in the pocket of her cardigan. She’d decided she should not burden Harp with this worry no matter how grown up the girl had been of late. The thought of seeing Ralph Devereaux again made her stomach churn. Part of her, a small part, was excited, and she hated herself for it. She’d been such a foolish girl thirteen years ago, star-struck by the handsome young man who used her shamelessly and cast her aside. She should have had more respect for herself then, and certainly she should not be mooning over him now. She knew what she should feel was fear, and she did. He was coming back, the time of his arrival was looming ever closer, and what would happen then? A legal battle? Would he contest Henry’s will? Wouldn’t the people of Queenstown love to see that juicy story played out before their eyes? The thought made her sick.
She would have to be strong, stoic and full of resolve. She would do it for Harp, for Henry. Besides, hadn’t Mr Smythe said the will was robust? And that when combined with two affidavits confirming Harp’s paternity, it would be a difficult thing to challenge legally?
Still, she was sick with worry. It could sound so sordid, so terrible, though Rose decided she would rather people thought Henry was Harp’s father instead of Ralph. Ralph was a reprobate and a cad, whereas Henry was a decent, lovely man. But still, the thoughts went round and round of the speculation and hearsay being passed from the butcher counter to the church gate, from the shoemaker’s to the draper’s, a juicy titbit of gossip about a woman who always came across so high and mighty, too uppity to lean on a shop counter and trade scandal with the ordinary people. And her peculiar child with such notions of upperosity. There were enough rumours going around; she didn’t want to add fuel to the fire, and the arrival in Queenstown of Ralph Devereaux would most certainly do that.
Still, she thought, squaring her shoulders, there was little point in trying to anticipate what might happen. He said he was coming but didn’t say when, so they would work hard at establishing their business and let the future hold what it may.
She considered writing back, saying…saying what? That she was looking forward to seeing him? That his niece would be happy to receive him, in his own house, the one that should rightfully be his? That she, a girl from a two-roomed cottage in the country, would sit in the drawing room of this fine house, acting the lady of the manor, and take tea with the true heir?
Stop it, she admonished herself. This was silly and pointless. She would not write. Let him come.
Chapter 22
Harp was playing a particularly difficult piece in the corner of the drawing room after her breakfast as the sunshine flooded in, dust motes dancing on the warm rays. It was by O’Carolan and called ‘Lord Inchiquin’, and she closed her eyes, hearing Mr Devereaux’s gentle voice. ‘Just don’t think too much, Harp. Feel the music – let it come from your soul to your hands. Hear the tune in your head and just relax.’
She allowed the harp to rest on her shoulder and flexed her fingers once more, breathing into the tips and feeling the music. Her hands danced over the strings, and to her delight, she had it. It was one of Mr Devereaux’s favourites, and just for a fleeting second, she could feel his presence at a particular phrase in the piece. It was so fleeting it was almost imperceptible, but she remembered how his face would reflect his rapture as she played it. At that exact turn of the melody, he would smile, and it felt like that smile could light up the whole world.
The creak of the floorboard stopped her.
‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have disturbed…’ JohnJoe went to back out of the room.
‘It’s all right, come in.’ She turned. His eyes were red; he’d been crying obviously. No wonder. What a frightening pos
ition to be in. However woebegone she felt at the loss of Mr Devereaux, she had her mother and her home. Poor JohnJoe had been cast adrift. Her heart went out to him. ‘Did you meet my mother?’ she asked gently.
He shook his head.
‘She was looking for you. She was wondering what you wanted to do now?’
JohnJoe looked like a dazzled rabbit. ‘I should go. I don’t have any money to stay here another night…’ He was trying to sound confident, but the quiver in his voice gave him away.
‘You can stay here with us, for free of course, until Danny gets better, or else you could go on the boat today and hopefully someone would meet you? Eleanor and Sean will be travelling too, so you wouldn’t be alone.’
‘But what if nobody comes to meet me? They all have their own plans, and they’d need to get on with whatever they’re doing. I…maybe I should go back to my father…’ The dread at that prospect was written all over his face. ‘What do you think, Harp?’ He clearly trusted her, though he was two years older.
‘I would stay here, at least for now. JohnJoe, let’s try to be logical about this and look at the facts. Your uncle wants you to come so badly he sent Danny to fetch you and paid for you both and put you up here and got you fancy clothes and everything, so he must be wealthy. He can afford to buy new tickets or exchange those ones or something. If you go back to your father, he’ll return you to that awful place you were before, so that’s a terrible idea. And Danny is going to get better, but it might take a bit of time, so waiting here for him to recover is the best option, isn’t it?’
‘Well, it would be…’ JohnJoe said slowly, ‘but I can’t just stay here, with no money or anything. Like you and your mother are running a business, not a charity.’ He sounded unsure.
Last Port of Call: The Queenstown Series Page 22
