An Irish Country Love Story

by Patrick Taylor

  “Oh, Barry, I love you too, and it’s lovely, lovely to be home. I’ve missed you so. I’m home for good now. No more exchange teaching for me.” It was her turn to kiss him before saying, “Now let’s get my bags and head on down to Broughshane. I’m dying to see Mum and Dad too.”

  * * *

  “I must say, Barry,” said Selbert Nolan, “your colleagues and the nurses in the Waveney were all powerful nice to me, but I’m very glad they let me out two weeks ago. My Irene’s cooking beats the hospital kitchen’s by miles. That lunch really hit the spot. Them brown trout came straight out of the Braid. The season opened last month and your man Fred Alexander’s a dab hand with a fly rod. And never you worry, son. Any time you want onto my water, just ask.”

  “Thank you, Selbert,” Barry said. “I’ll take you up on that one day soon.”

  Selbert Nolan laughed. “Fishing’s one way to get outside, and right now for me it’s great til be in the fresh air after being cooped up in thon hospital.”

  Barry and he sat on a bench at the side of a field that had been set up as a practice arena for training horses to compete in shows. Several jumps with red-and-white-striped cross bars were arranged in a circle where they alternated with fencing hurdles made of woven withies.

  Sue, wearing a black hard hat, green cotton shirt, jeans, and riding boots, sat astride Róisín, her Irish Sport Horse. For the last half hour, while Barry had chatted with his father-in-law-to-be, he had been torn between trying to listen to words, not hooves on grassy ground, and keeping an eye on Sue. As he watched with his heart in his mouth, she and Róisín had soared over the jumps.

  “Thon wee girl of mine sits a horse very well,” Selbert said. “I started teaching her when she was six. She won a fair wheen of jumping trophies when she got older. I think she misses it, but I know her job takes up a lot of time.”

  “It’s only a forty-minute run from the bungalow we hope to buy to Broughshane,” Barry said. “She can come out any time she likes if she needs to ride.”

  “I’m pleased to hear that,” said Selbert, rising. “Thanks for bringing her from the airport, Barry.”

  “My pleasure,” Barry said, “and I’m sorry I’m going to have to take her away tomorrow, but Doctor and Mrs. O’Reilly are having a party to celebrate the rebuilding of their dining room.”

  “You two go on and have fun, hey. I know she’ll be down to see us again soon.”

  “She will.”

  “Good. Now you and Sue enjoy the rest of the afternoon. I’m away off home for my nap. We’ll see you at teatime.” And with that, he began his walk back to the farmhouse, leaning on a blackthorn stick. Barry studied his soon-to-be father-in-law. The man was taking measured paces. They weren’t the long, businesslike strides Barry remembered from when he and Selbert had taken walks together before the man’s heart attack, but nor were they an old man’s shuffle. Barry reckoned Selbert was making a good steady recovery.

  He turned back to watch Sue. At last. Apart from the drive down in the car when in the midst of all their catching up he’d taken the opportunity to park for a moment on a side road so he could kiss her properly, Barry’d not really been alone with Sue since she’d arrived. Tactful of her dad to take himself off.

  Barry rose as Sue walked Róisín over to him. She dismounted and, holding the reins in one hand, kissed Barry. He was excited by the taste of her, but her faint perfume was overpowered by the strong smell of horse sweat. Róisín tossed her head and whinnied.

  “Come on,” said Sue, “let’s take a walk down to the bluebell wood. The flowers don’t come out for another month or so and it’s very beautiful then…”

  “You are very beautiful now,” Barry said, kissed her, and took her hand. “Come on, show me the way.”

  They left the paddock and wandered beneath a cloudless sky along a dry earth lane. Grass grew along its middle and the blue flowers of speedwell trailed from gaps in a dry stone wall on one side. Two small tortoiseshell butterflies, their red wings edged by black spots at their fronts and blue spots round the sides, sunned themselves on one of the wall’s upper stones. A little grey rabbit—soft and round and toylike, very different from the athletic hares he’d seen boxing earlier—hopped along ahead. The blackthorn hedge on the other side of the lane was leafless but covered in masses of white, star-shaped flowers and the warm air was heavy with their delicate scent. A small flock of birds perched in the hedge, each about six inches from beak to tail, with bright yellow heads, darkly streaked backs, and yellow underparts. One sang “A little bit of bread and no cheese,” increasing the volume and length of the last two notes.

  “Yellowhammers,” Sue said. “Pretty wee things.”

  Barry was quite content simply to hold her hand and walk beside her in silence. They turned off the lane and onto a path through a wood where buds were ripening on broad leafless beech trees. The ground was springy underneath.

  “You go ahead,” Sue said. “There’s not room for us and Róisín side by side.”

  Barry led and Sue, with her horse walking behind her, followed until they came to a grassy clearing surrounded and screened by the trees.

  Sue moved beside Barry. “You should see this place when the flowers are out,” Sue said. “Acres of the brightest blue.”

  “Let’s come down and see it next month,” Barry said, feeling the nearness of her.

  “Yes. Let’s.” Sue stopped and loosely wrapped Róisín’s reins round a low branch.

  At once the horse began cropping the grass, making tearing noises as she pulled bunches free.

  Sue turned to Barry and looked into his eyes.

  He was speechless, drinking in the loveliness of her: copper hair, sparkling green eyes, soft lips with a hint of coral pink lipstick smiling over even white teeth. Lips opening for a tender kiss that became more urgent by the moment.

  He held her to him, gently at first, his hands on her back feeling the muscle beneath her shirt, then more tightly, his chest against the soft firmness of her.

  Together they sank to the grass and he felt its softness a springy cushion where the white-starred flowers of wood anemones and wild garlic gave their scents in counterpoint to Sue’s light perfume.

  He took off his sports jacket and made a pillow for her head and lay beside her, propped on one elbow, marvelling at the radiance of the woman he loved.

  He stroked the side of her face and said, “Sue Nolan. I love you. I have loved you from the evening I saw you at the school Christmas pageant, although I didn’t recognise it then. I knew it the day you nearly drowned…”

  “And you rescued me,” she said.

  “Because I couldn’t bear the thought of a world without you. I loved you then, I love you now, and I will love you forever.”

  “Thank you, darling Barry,” she said with longing in her voice. “And I love you, from the bottom of my soul.” She crooked one arm around his neck and pulled his lips onto hers.

  And Barry Laverty made love with Sue Nolan on a bed of grass under a blue sky etched with a tracery of bare branches as an unconcerned horse ignored them and dined at her leisure.

  40

  Our Revels Now Are Ended

  Barry finished knotting his black Old Campbellian tie with its narrow green-and-white diagonal stripes and boar’s head motif, turned down the collar of his white shirt, and put on his blue blazer. “Will I do?” he asked.

  Sue, looking lovely in red heels, taupe tights, a red tartan pleated mini, and cream angora sweater, was perched on a chair in Barry’s quarters at Number One Main Street, thumbing through a book. The light from the window sparkled from her engagement ring as her fingers moved.

  She cocked her head, scrutinised him, and said, “Very nicely, sir. I think I’ll keep you.”

  “Eejit,” said Barry with a grin. He turned and noticed what she was reading. “Interesting?” She had been flicking through a tome entitled The Masting and Rigging of English Ships of War. 1625–1860 by James Lees. It had been Ronald Fi
tzpatrick’s gift to Barry last month, along with Morning Flight and Wild Chorus by the naturalist Peter Scott, beautifully illustrated with the author’s own oils of wildfowl for Fingal and the 1966 Impressionism and Post Impressionism, 1874–1904 for Kitty. The books for Nonie and Jenny Bradley had been chosen with equal care.

  “Not really,” she said. “Not my cuppa, fore t’gallants, buntlines, and mizzen backstays, but I know how much you enjoy your modelling. You made a fantastic job of your Rattlesnake. I’m proud of you.”

  The finished model sat in all its three-masted glory inside a perspex display case crafted by Donal Donnelly.

  He crossed to her, took her hand, and gave her a chaste kiss. “Thank you. My next project’s going to be HMS Victory, Lord Nelson’s flagship at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805.”

  “No,” she said, “your next project’s taking me to the party. Come on.” She opened the door to the kitchen, where Kinky and Archie were putting the finishing touches to the nibblers for the evening’s affair. “Can we help you with anything, Kinky?” Sue asked.

  Kinky whipped off her apron and smiled. “Thank you, Miss Susan. If you’d be good enough to carry through that plate of cocktail sausages, and you, sir, those stuffed mushroom caps, I’d be grateful. Archie and I’ll see to the rest when we come through.” She heaved a sigh of deep contentment. “It does be a great relief that old Number One is as good as new and won’t be pulled down.”

  “And right and proper,” Barry said, “that you and Archie are coming to the party as guests.”

  “Well,” said Kinky, “we’d have been pleased to serve, but everything’s ready, folks can help themselves, and Donal’s going to be barman, so there’s not much for us to do. And it is an honour to be invited, so.”

  “After thirty … how many?” Barry said.

  “Thirty-nine years since I first came here to look after old Doctor Flanagan. It was 1928 and me only nineteen,” Kinky said.

  “After that long it’s no more than your due, Kinky Auchinleck. You’re family.” Barry lifted the plate. “See you soon,” he said, and with Sue by his side, headed for the hall.

  The door to the surgery was shut and the surprise for Kitty that Barry, at O’Reilly’s request, had bought today was hidden in there. On his boss’s signal, it would be presented to Kitty.

  The dining room door was open and the smell of fresh paint not yet gone. As he’d promised, Bertie Bishop’s construction crew had started work the day after the council meeting. It hadn’t been much of a gamble. The Ministry of Transport had ratified the council’s recommendation within three days. For ten days, the house had rung to the sounds of hammering and sawing and smelled of wet cement, wood shavings, sawdust, fresh paint, and turpentine.

  Barry let Sue precede him.

  “How’s about youse both?” Carroty-haired Donal stood beside a sideboard laden with drinks and glasses. He wore green elastic garters to hold his shirt cuffs up and a white tied-at-the-waist apron. “What’ll youse have?”

  “Sue?”

  She shook her head. “I think later, Donal, thanks.”

  “Me too. How are you, and how’re Julie and Tori?” Barry did a quick calculation. Julie’d be twenty-five weeks now.

  “I’m grand and Julie’s blooming, so she is. Tori’s growing like a dandelion in springtime and she’s impatient til meet her baby brother.”

  Barry refrained from suggesting that Julie might be carrying another girl. “Gotta put these down, Donal.” He moved to where the old bog oak table held pride of place in the centre surrounded by six chairs and set down his plate beside Sue’s. “Kitty found a near match in a Belfast antique shop for the chair that got smashed by the lorry.”

  “Quite the spread,” she said, cocking her head and surveying the array of dishes.

  “Any time you ask Kinky to cater,” O’Reilly’s words preceded him through the door, “you’d think she’d started with five loaves and two small fishes and ended up with enough to feed five thousand.” He wore the trousers and jacket of his tweed suit, but was tieless.

  “I’ll not bore you with chapter and verse,” Barry said, still enjoying their duelling quotations game, “but the story is the only miracle to be reported in all four gospels.”

  “But Matthew and Mark also reported the feeding of four thousand,” O’Reilly said, with a look on his face which said, “Game, set, and match.”

  Barry laughed and shook his head.

  “Evening, Doctor,” Donal said. “The usual for yourself and Mrs. O’Reilly?”

  “Please,” O’Reilly said. “And your hands are empty, you two.”

  “A glass of white, please.” Sue turned to Kitty and said, “Where did you get that dress? It’s quite stunning.”

  Barry had to agree. The jade-green silk set off Kitty’s eyes and silver-tipped black hair to perfection. While the women chatted on about fashion, Barry put in his order for a small Jameson. “I’ll go,” he said when the front doorbell rang.

  “Come in,” Barry said, greeting the Bishops, the first guests to arrive. “Good to see you both.” Neither wore coats, but Flo sported a white conical hat like those once worn by Chinese coolies, tied under her chin with a diaphanous white scarf. The evening was mild as April approached. The sun had just sunk beneath the distant blue Antrim Hills, leaving a soft glow of early twilight to limn the steeple of the Presbyterian church across the road against the satin evening sky.

  “Grand evening for the time of year it’s in, Doctor,” Bertie said, ushering Flo into the hall.

  She took off her hat with some ceremony and handed it to Barry, who carefully hung it on the hatstand. He wondered if the creation was one of Alice Moloney’s and then saw the woman herself walking toward him from the direction of her flat over the shop and saw Doctor Fitzpatrick’s angular shape coming the other way. He was wearing his protective collar. “Go on into the dining room,” Barry said to the Bishops. “I’ll welcome some other guests.”

  Barry heard the greeting noises, glass clinking on glass behind him, as Ronald Fitzpatrick doffed his trilby and bowed to let Alice go before him through the front door.

  “Good evening to you both,” Barry said. “May I introduce you to Doctor Fitzpatrick, Miss Moloney?”

  Alice smiled and said, “Pleased to meet you, Doctor.”

  Fitzpatrick nodded, stooping his tall frame into a small awkward bow. “It is my pleasure.”

  Barry pointed to the dining room. “Please go through,” he said. He’d seen Lars’s motorcar turn into the lane and knew he and Myrna would let themselves in through the kitchen. The only invitees missing were Lord John MacNeill, who had had to attend an emergency meeting in Belfast for one of his many charities, and Nonie, who with graciousness had offered to take call tonight and was out on a maternity case. Her medication was still doing its job.

  Barry went into the now-crowded dining room to pick up his drink. Donal was serving O’Reilly his second. “Wee Colin Brown was out the other day with Murphy til visit Bluebird,” he overheard Donal saying. “‘I’m going til Bangor Grammar School in September,’ says he til me. And says I til him, ‘You work hard like a good man. You was quare and smart getting your Eleven Plus, so you were. It’s no time now to be resting on your sorrels.” He nodded at his own sagacity.

  O’Reilly was turning puce trying not to laugh.

  “My whiskey, please, Donal,” Barry said.

  “Here y’are, Doctor Laverty, sir.” Donal handed over the glass.

  Barry glanced around and then said softly, “I was sitting beside Doctor O’Reilly at the meeting on Monday and I nearly died when you yelled out what you did. Then I thought I saw Bertie Bishop grin in your direction. Just between you and me and the wall, did Bertie put you up to it?”

  Donal sucked in his cheeks and cocked his head. “Mister Bishop did have a wee word before the meeting,” he said, sotto voce. “Says he til me, ‘Donal, I need a hand for til get at your man Doran the night. You and me’s going til get the vote in D
octor O’Reilly’s favour.’ ‘Aye?’ says I. ‘I love a good caper, so I do. You know that, sir, and I’d do anything for Doctor O’Reilly after all he’s done for me and mine. Ask away, sir.’ Says Mister Bishop, ‘After Doran’s had his say, and he’ll be supporting demolition of Number One, you yell out you want til know why he’s picking on our Doctor O’Reilly. That’s all. He’ll rise til the fly and swear he’s not, and then I’ve something he said that’ll half scupper him. He’ll have til deny it.’ I said to Mister Bishop, ‘It’ll be your word against his then. No harm til you, sir, but I don’t see how that’ll help much.’ Mister Bishop laughed. Says he, ‘Will the council doubt his lordship’s word too?’ ‘Bejizzis,’ says I. ‘You’re setting up the ould one-two punch, aren’t you?’ I reckoned they must have had something cooked up between them. Anyroad, a wink’s as good as a nod til a blind alley. ‘I’m your man,’ says I, and between the three of us, we put Doran back in his box, so we did.”

  Barry chuckled. “And nailed the lid shut. Thanks for telling me, Donal. It’ll go no farther.” It wouldn’t be Ballybucklebo if Donal Donnelly wasn’t wrapped up in some scheme or other. Barry turned and surveyed the big room. Kitty and Sue were in conversation with Bertie and Flo in the recess of the bow window. New curtains were bunched with ties at their middles to tethers on the walls.

  Ronald Fitzpatrick, with a glass of Bass ale, and Alice Moloney, holding a Cantrell and Cochrane brown lemonade, stood deep in conversation nearby. He seemed to be hanging on her every word. “And you actually met Mahatma Gandhi? In person? How positively intriguing. You must tell me all about it. I’m fascinated by the Orient. I grew up in China.”

  “Hello, Barry,” Lars said. “Dry sherry and a whiskey water please, Donal.”

  “Lars. Myrna.” Barry’s eyes widened. Myrna, whom he had always taken for a bit of a blue stocking, had had her hair done: short, curling under her chin with a parting on the left and a fringe diagonally across her forehead. She wore a lilac pantsuit with a hint of cleavage between wide lapels and slim trousers over flat heels. Elegant yet sexy. Lars, Barry noticed, was hovering protectively over her and smiling frequently.