An Irish Country Family--An Irish Country Novel

by Patrick Taylor

  “If I can.”

  “Give you my uilleann pipes til Angus Mehaffey of the Highlanders—I’ve not the strength til work the bellows. They’re his til keep—Guffer’s busy looking after me.”

  “I will, of course.”

  She looked into his eyes. “Do you mind a big American—Burl Ives?”

  Barry nodded.

  She looked at Guffer. “He had a song. ‘Wayfaring Stranger.’ Mind the last two lines?”

  Guffer sang,

  I’m just a’goin’ over Jordan

  I’m just a’goin’ over home.

  “Aye. No one’s told me, but I know.” She gazed upward for a moment. “I’ll be going over Jordan very soon.”

  Barry held his peace.

  “When I’m gone—I want Angus til play ‘The Flowers of the Forest’ on my old pipes after the service.”

  Barry was close to tears.

  Guffer said, “Excuse me, Doctor.”

  Barry moved aside to let the man lean over the bed and hold his wife.

  Barry, who could see Guffer’s broad shoulders shaking, said, “I’ll leave you alone now. I’ll wait for you, Guffer, in the living room.”

  “I’ll be down in a wee minute til get you the pipes, sir.”

  As he went downstairs he thought of her request. “The Flowers of the Forest.” It was an ancient Scottish tune performed only in public at funerals or memorial services. Perhaps keeping the truth from Anne Galvin had been kindly meant, but she already knew her time was short, and was facing the inevitable with pride and dignity. Barry Laverty straightened his shoulders. He’d not cry for Anne Galvin. He’d control himself and show the same stoicism as his patient.

  Five minutes later, having put Anne’s precious uilleann pipes in the backseat, Barry climbed into his Hillman and headed for the extraordinary meeting of the Ballybucklebo Bonnaughts’ Sporting Club called by John MacNeill ten days ago.

  Barry turned right onto the Belfast to Bangor Road. Anne and Guffer would have enjoyed the events that Bertie Bishop and his committee envisioned for the club, but he knew Anne Galvin would not live to see the first one held there. And when she died, Doctor Barry Laverty would miss her, comfort her family, but recognise that all of it was a sad but ordinary part of being a physician who cared for his patients but now had the ability to cope.

  * * *

  Fingal O’Reilly held a chair so Sue could be seated, then did the same for Kitty before sitting himself at a table close to the platform at one end of the big room.

  They were early and the only other people to have arrived were Alan Hewitt and Lenny Brown, who were completing a game of darts.

  “How’s about youse, Doctor and ladies?” Lenny Brown said from where he had been keeping score on a blackboard near a circular darts board.

  “Afternoon, lads,” O’Reilly said. “Mind if we watch?”

  “We’re near done,” Alan said. “Both of us is close. I’m down til twenty-four and Lenny til twenty-three.” He squinted at the dartboard. “I’m going for a three and seventeen, and then I’ll double out on the two and win.”

  “And if you don’t double out”—Lenny smiled—“you’ll ‘bust’ and I’ll get my turn before you get another go to make twenty-four. Don’t count your chickens before they hatch.”

  Alan threw his first dart. It flew straight but instead of sticking in the 3 wedge, lodged in the immediately adjacent 19. He muttered, “Bugger. Sorry, ladies.”

  Lenny grinned, scratched out 24 and wrote 5 beneath it. “Remember them chickens now, Hewitt.”

  “Run away off, Lenny Brown. You’re dead meat, so you are. I can do it.”

  O’Reilly grinned. Those were the friendly insults of two old friends. One Catholic, one Protestant. He did the sums. “Alan can still win if he makes one, and double two.”

  Alan’s second dart hit the 1. “I hear cracks starting in them eggshells, Lenny. Wee beaks pecking til get out.”

  Sue and Kitty both chuckled.

  O’Reilly noticed folks starting to arrive. Last dart. Double out or bust.

  O’Reilly held his breath and so did Alan in the moments before he released. There was a solid thump as the point hit and stuck into the red line between the wires of the double two at the half past four position on the board’s face.

  O’Reilly applauded as a smiling Alan Hewitt said, “You were saying about chickens, Mister Brown?”

  Alan’s last dart had flown true and given him the win.

  “Aye. Well done, ould hand.” Lenny walked over, and they shook hands. “Well done. If there was no meeting to attend and the bar was open, I’d buy you a pint.”

  “Aye,” said Alan with a laugh, “and if we had any bacon we could have bacon and eggs—if we had any eggs. Next time in the Duck.”

  “Fair enough.” The two friends took a table close by.

  O’Reilly turned to Sue. “Interesting game, darts. I forget which English king in medieval times decreed that all able-bodied men should play darts after mass on Sunday to hone their archery skills, but it’s one thing us Irish were happy to pinch from the English. Darts is part of pub life.”

  “Looks complicated to me,” Sue said. “I really didn’t understand what was going on.”

  “Come on then and I’ll show you how to play before the place fills up.” He waved at Donal and Julie Donnelly.

  “You’re on, Fingal.”

  They walked to the blackboard where the score had been kept. O’Reilly wiped it clean and wrote “301” once beneath a letter S and again under F. “That’s you and me, Sue,” he said. “During the game, each of us in turn throws three darts. A turn is called a ‘leg.’ The object is to be the first player to reduce that number three hundred and one to exactly zero.”

  “Exactly zero? And how’s that done?” Sue asked.

  O’Reilly moved over. “Come and look at the board.” He pulled out three darts, each with a pointed steel tip, tapered barrel, narrow shaft, and flight of three feathers. He used the point of one to demonstrate. “Can you see how the circular green and red board is divided by radial wires into twenty numbered pie-shaped wedges? And each has a designated number?”

  “Yes.” Sue frowned. “And if a dart lands in a wedge it gets that score?”

  “Exactly. I’ll show you in a minute.”

  “What about those two circles in the centre of the board?”

  “The bulls. The outer green one’s worth twenty-five points and the red inner circle’s worth fifty. There are a few finer points, but let me show you.”

  He walked to a line on the floor opposite the board. “The line’s called the oche. It’s seven feet, nine and a quarter inches from the target. Stand behind it.”

  Sue did.

  O’Reilly was aware of the arrival of more people. As was customary, so as not to disturb the competitors’ concentration, folks made as little noise as possible. He handed her a dart.

  “It’s quite heavy,” she said.

  “Hold it and stand like this.” O’Reilly half turned, with his right shoulder pointing to the board. He leaned forward and raised his right arm, bent at the elbow. The dart’s barrel was gripped between thumb and fingers.

  Sue copied O’Reilly.

  “Now,” he said. “To begin the game you have to double in.”

  “Double in?”

  “See how the circumference is bounded by two narrow wires? A hit in there is worth twice the pie’s score, so a hit there in the twenty is worth forty, a ‘double top.’ Watch.” He sighted, drew back his arm until his right hand was level with his right ear, paused, then snapped his arm forward and released the dart. It flew straight—and hit the rectangular cork wall protector an inch away from the board’s edge.

  “Bugger,” he muttered. As he went to retrieve the dart, O’Reilly heard Alan Hewitt say to Lenny, “And nothing subtracted from three hundred one is?”

  “Still three hundred one.” Both men laughed.

  More people quietly filled chairs.

&
nbsp; O’Reilly said sternly, “It could happen to a bishop.” But he was smiling.

  “If bishops played darts,” Kitty said. “Which they probably don’t.”

  “Less of your lip, Mrs. O’Reilly.”

  Kitty replied by blowing him a discreet kiss, which he was quite sure was not standard darts procedure. He winked at his wife as he helped Sue adjust the position of her feet, corrected the angle of her elbow. “Now, sight along the dart, hold your breath, and snap your arm forward.”

  Thump.

  “I’ll be damned,” O’Reilly said. “Double top. You’re in.”

  Sue’s feat was greeted by applause.

  O’Reilly gave her another dart.

  Sue’s next throw scored nineteen. She grasped the third and final dart firmly, took her time sighting, flicked her arm forward and there, proud as Punch, the metal tip buried itself in the inner bull. “Fifty,” she said.

  She got another round of applause.

  O’Reilly said, “Plus forty is one oh nine, from three hundred and one is one hundred and ninety-two. Well done, Sue.”

  “Begob,” Alan said. “Mrs. Laverty, play like that and you could give last year’s News of the World Darts champion Bill Duddy a run for his money.”

  “I think it’s a classic case of beginner’s luck, gentlemen,” said Sue. “But thank you.”

  O’Reilly said, “That’ll have to be it for now, Sue. Look. The place is full to overflowing, but I must say”—O’Reilly grinned—“you’ve a good eye. Inner bull? You really nailed it.”

  “Aye,” said Bertie Bishop, who had arrived, accompanied by Flo, “and let’s hope we nail this vote.”

  30

  Of Some Distressful Stroke

  February 17, 1964

  Barry sat in the clinical room of ward 21, looking out the window and yawning, waiting for his shift to end. Twenty-one, along with ward 22, the neurology unit, were in Quinn House, at the westerly end of the hospital complex, facing east. It was shortly after sunset and his view was fading of the Royal Victoria to his left, Royal Maternity to his right, and The Huts in the distance between them. He smiled. He was fading like the light and never mind dinner. Bed beckoned.

  His three months on 5 and 6 had ended three and a half weeks ago, on the last day of January 1964. It had been an interesting time medically, and keeping busy had helped distract him from his sadness at losing Virginia Clarke. But he knew cardiology wasn’t for him. Sure, the admission, treatment, and discharge routine had been more satisfying than the “get ’em in and out” of casualty, but it was still so—Barry sought for the word—so mechanical. This was highly technical stuff and there was little time to understand his patients as human beings. He stretched and yawned again, thinking of the hours he’d spent here last night. Unlike the other wards, 21 was on permanent take-in for cases requiring immediate brain surgery. That could happen at any time, so a houseman must always be available. To allow junior doctors some leisure and rest, two were assigned to this rotation, and at present he shared the workload with Norma. He had every other weekend off, a fat lot of good now Virginia had gone, damn it.

  The door opened and Norma came in. “Hello, Barry. What are you up to?”

  “Having a rest.”

  “Heard you were busy last night. Anand told me.”

  Barry nodded. It was Anand Garg, the registrar here, along with John Geddes and Doctor Dennis Coppel, the anaesthetic registrar, who had been responsible for starting CPR on a man who had collapsed outside the hospital, got him to a side ward, and kept him alive until Doctor Pantridge had arrived with the defibrillator and treated the ventricular fibrillation. The case John Geddes had detailed to Barry as the start of the portable defibrillator programme.

  “We admitted an unconscious Mister Wilson Warnock at midnight,” said Barry. “He’d been hit with a bottle on his right temple and was unconscious. Drink and politics don’t mix. According to Wilson’s brother, who’d come to the hospital, they’d been in an illegal drinking club on the Falls Road, a general ruction broke out, Mister Warnock tried to intervene and got hit for his pacifist pains. Anand diagnosed a subdural haematoma, and sure enough when we opened the skull there was a pool of blood between the dura matter and the brain, the protective membrane. Anand ligated the torn middle meningeal artery and reckons the patient will make a complete recovery.”

  “That’s good.” Norma collapsed into the chair opposite Barry and sighed. “But I could never do surgery, never mind brain surgery.” She chuckled. “It takes a certain amount of nerve. I can’t see me sticking a scalpel into someone.”

  “Mister Warnock is a lucky man to have a skilled surgeon like Anand last night, but I agree with you about surgery. Particularly this kind. I’ve always found the nervous system puzzling.”

  Norma shook her head. “All of those cranial nerves, sensors for pain and temperature, and orientation in space. Nerves sending motor messages to make the muscles move. It’s bloody complicated.”

  “Can’t imagine trying to sort it all on the operating table. I’m pretty good at tying flies, but otherwise I’m a bit ham-fisted.”

  Norma smiled. “Our boss, Mister Greer, has fingers like sausages, but, boy, is he skillful. I don’t know how he does it.”

  “One of Jack Mills’s heroes. Rugby-mad, is Charlie Greer. A graduate of Trinity College Dublin. In the ’30s he played in the second row for Ireland at rugby football.”

  “Very rough game. Good way to get a subdural haematoma if you ask me. Did you ever play, Barry?”

  “At school. We had to, but I was a better scholar than an athlete. Jack played at Queens.” Barry yawned and covered his mouth with his hand. “Excuse me.”

  Norma glanced at her watch. “Quarter past five. Go on. Don’t wait ’til six. I’ll look after the shop. You’d a bad night.”

  “Thanks, Norma. Thanks a lot.” Barry rose and headed for the door. “I hope you have a quiet one.” He left ward 21 and was passing the entrance to ward 22 when he saw Jan Peters heading toward the unit. Her winter coat was buttoned unevenly and stray pieces of her usually neatly coiffed hair straggled out from under a blue tam. She must have left home in a hurry.

  “Jan, what’s up?”

  “Oh, Barry. I was at Mum and Dad’s getting ready to take them to the Cottars Kitchen for tea when Dad took sick again. He started slurring his speech. Said he had a blinding headache and passed out.”

  Barry didn’t like the sound of that. He was aching to sleep, but knowing his friend was in trouble acted as powerful a stimulant as a Benzedrine pill.

  “I had enough sense to call nine-nine-nine, but when the ambulance came, there was only room in it for him and Mum. I’ve just got here. I don’t know what’s happening. I’m scared, Barry.”

  “I’m so sorry. Would you like me to come with you?”

  “Please. I’d like that. So will Dad.”

  Together they entered 22. Jan went to speak to Sister Lynch at the main desk.

  Barry waited in the corridor. Not again. The poor man—and his family. Barry had derived great satisfaction from dropping in on Rusky Peters on ward 10 after his amputation in November, getting to know the man better. Rusky had been discharged in mid-November, to be followed up by physiotherapy and the department of prosthetics. Throughout it all he had been having regular bleedings. Jan, when they happened to meet, had given Barry bulletins about her dad’s progress. From what she had said, Barry had felt confident that Rusky was holding his own.

  She returned, frowning, her breathing shallow. “It’s not looking good, Barry.”

  “He may pull out of it. Your dad is a strong man, and he has a lot to live for.” Barry put a hand on Jan’s shoulder and she reached up to touch it before letting her hand drop. She sighed.

  “Thank you, Barry. I suppose that’s true. Sister Lynch says Doctor Millar is with my father now. He’s still in a—” She swallowed. “In a coma. We’ll get a better idea when Doctor Millar’s finished.” She pointed to a door. “Mum’s
in the quiet room. We’d better go to her.”

  Barry followed Jan into a small, gently lit, windowless room with several chairs and a central table adorned with a vase of flowers. Three tasteful seascapes hung on the daffodil yellow walls.

  Mrs. Dora Peters looked up from where she sat. “Oh, Jan,” she said. “I’m dead scared, so I am.” There were tear tracks down her cheeks. “They wouldn’t let me stay with Dad.”

  Jan knelt in front of her mother and they hugged.

  Barry stood silently. Patients with polycythaemia were prone to blockage of major arteries. If that artery happened to be one supplying the brain with oxygenated blood, the result would be serious brain damage. It was medically referred to as a cerebrovascular accident, better known as a stroke. Almost certainly all that could be hoped for now was that the residual permanent damage might be minor.

  Jan stood, motioned Barry to take a chair, and sat beside her mother.

  “I met Barry in the hall. Asked him to come with me for a bit of support.”

  “Hello, Barry,” Dora Peters said, looking up, then sniffed. “Please excuse me. I’m a bit of a mess.”

  “Dora, I understand. I know you’re worried sick. If I was an expert, I’d try to explain to you what’s going on, but you know I’m only a houseman.”

  “I understand.”

  “I can tell you that Doctor Harold Millar is a foremost neurologist. Rusky’s in very good hands.”

  “Dad really is, Mum. I work here with Doctor Millar every day. I know.”

  “Thank you, both,” Dora said. “And, Barry, you’ve been a great comfort to us ever since Rusky took ill.”

  Barry inclined his head.

  The door opened and a middle-aged, silver-haired man with a high forehead over dark-rimmed spectacles entered. “Mrs. Peters, I’m Doctor Millar—please, don’t get up.” He nodded acknowledgments to Jan and Barry.

  Dora Peters sank back into her chair.

  Jan held her mother’s hand. Both looked up at the consultant.