‘I remember we did him in school,’ he said.
‘Who?’
‘Yeats,’ he said, nodding at the book. ‘It wasn’t all woodwork and metalwork at St Joseph’s, you know.’
‘I’m sorry if I insulted you, Donal – I didn’t mean—’
‘“The Lake Isle of Innisfree” – that was one of his, wasn’t it?’
‘It was indeed,’ she said, and picked up the book. ‘Yeats is someone I have a lot of time for, poor lost soul that he was.’
‘And he was the one who was in love with Maud Gonne?’
‘Besotted,’ she said. ‘And when she rejected him, he tried it on with her daughter.’
‘Jesus,’ he said. ‘Those bloody Protestants – you couldn’t trust them.’
He had made her smile and the pleasure of that was a slow heat spreading through him. He turned his face to the floor, his cheeks burning.
‘I’ll go and get the van now so I can get rid of this cot for you,’ he said.
‘I’m very grateful to you, Donal.’
He let himself out, and as he passed the window, he could see she had picked up that letter again and was reading it more
carefully, her eyes scanning every line, her lips moving as if she were whispering the words to herself. She had been thinking
about that letter the entire time he was there, and while he had been so alert to every movement her body made, she had not
looked at him once. And he wanted to turn around, to be back in that kitchen with her – to walk up behind her and gather her
hair into his hand, to turn it around his fist. He wanted her attention.
Chapter 7
Colette checked the flowers in the rearview mirror. An extravagant arrangement of yellow roses and eucalyptus and baby’s breath, it rocked back and forth with the motion of the car. She’d driven to Donegal Town to purchase them that morning, and to visit the off-licence there. Her not infrequent trips to restock on wine at the supermarket in Ardglas had been registered by Mrs Doherty. Often dour and reserved, on her previous visit, Mrs Doherty had taken her money with such slow and studied seriousness that Colette thought the great weight of her conscience might forbid her from completing the transaction. But of course she had, and Colette had decided there were better places to spend what little money she still possessed.
She refocused her attention on the road ahead as she approached the main street of Ardglas. Up on her left, a group of lads in the navy St Joseph’s uniform sauntered along the pavement. They moved with such synchronicity – shoulders rounded, hands stuffed in pockets, sliding along like a shoal of fish. It was only when she drew closer that she could distinguish her son as the centre of the group. She checked the clock on the dashboard – lunchtime wasn’t for at least half an hour. They were probably headed for the lane near the chip shop where lads from the school went to smoke. She drove past them and pulled up at the curb and almost didn’t recognise her son’s face in the mirror. A smile slung ear to ear, but so taut, so sly.
The group passed her and she rolled down her window. ‘Barry,’ she called, but not loudly enough. She started to move the car so that it hovered alongside them. She shouted again. ‘Barry Crowley, I know you saw me.’ One of the boys elbowed him and nodded in her direction and Barry careened off towards the car.
‘What do you want?’ he said.
He had a new haircut – grown out and choppy and the fringe almost down over his eyes. He looked like one of those Gallagher brothers from that band everyone was listening to.
She pulled the handbrake. ‘Barry, what are you doing out here at this time?’
‘What’s it to you?’
‘Barry – get back to school now or I’ll ring your father and tell him where you are.’
‘As if he’d listen to you.’
‘Barry, what did you do to your hair?’
He leaned in very close then, almost poking his head through the window, spittle collected in the corners of his mouth. He laid his hands on the window frame and she could see that each of his fingernails was rimmed with a little crescent of dirt. ‘Fuck off, you old slapper,’ he said, and walked away.
‘Barry, don’t think that you can talk to me like that and get away with it.’ She edged the car along the pavement. ‘Come back here now!’ But just as she said that, Charlie McGeehan stepped out of Doherty’s with a bag of shopping hanging from each arm and almost collided with the gang. Reeling, he swung in one direction then the other before raising his eyebrows at the departing group, and then at Colette. She put her foot to the accelerator and was on the far side of the town before she remembered where she was going. Checking the flowers again, she saw their little yellow heads peeping out above the fringe of brown paper.
She nosed the car over a narrow bridge and the road opened up before her onto a view of the bay, the lighthouse sitting squarely at its centre. Pulling up at Izzy’s house, she admired her view, which took in the entire length of the coastline to where it dropped off at the horizon. Across the bay she thought she could make out the chimney of the cottage, just visible beyond the brow of a hill. She took a moment to collect herself, determined to put this incident with Barry behind her. As a politician’s wife, Izzy would be used to people looking for favours, and it would require the full force of her charm to gloss over the strangeness of just showing up unannounced.
When Izzy opened the door, she took the flowers into her arms and admired them but Colette recognised the confusion in Izzy’s eyes, smiling and trying to pretend she wasn’t surprised by her arrival.
‘Come in, Colette,’ she said. ‘Go in there to the good sitting room and I’ll make the tea.’
Izzy went off down the hall and Colette walked into a long room that ran from the front to the back of the house. The room had a window at either end but it didn’t seem to get much light. There were two sofas and she seated herself on the one facing the door. The other was flanked by floor lamps with long tassels trimming the shades. An enormous glass-fronted cabinet took up a whole wall, one side filled with crystal vases and bowls and the other with colourful figurines – little boys in lederhosen and cherubic girls in headscarves. The side tables were covered with lace doilies where porcelain ballerinas jetéd and pliéd. On the table next to her a tall, slender girl in a pink skirt reached up as though to pluck a leaf from an invisible tree.
‘Ah, you’re admiring my Lladró,’ said Izzy.
Colette looked up and watched Izzy carrying a tea tray into the room. She knew the Spanish word was pronounced with a y but she thought better than to correct her. ‘I’m admiring this woman anyway,’ Colette said.
‘She’s my pride and joy.’ Izzy laid the tray on the coffee table. ‘God, it’s nearly dark already,’ she said, and went to turn on the main light. ‘There aren’t many hours in the day this time of year, Colette.’
‘Oh no, blink and you’d miss it,’ Colette said, and after so many hours alone in the cottage not speaking to anyone the shapes of the words felt strange in her mouth.
Izzy sat on the sofa opposite. ‘Thank you so much for the beautiful flowers. Such a treat. It does your heart good to have a bit of colour on a day like today. I don’t suppose you remember the flower shop I used to have up on the main street.’
‘Indeed I do. It was a great thing to have in the town.’
‘Oh, it was a lot of work too. And when kids come along, they change everything.’ Izzy lifted the teapot. ‘Do you like a strong or a weak cup?’
So much energy, Colette thought. ‘I’m not fussy.’
Izzy poured a pale stream into a cup and handed it to her on a saucer covered in colourful little petals.
‘You have so many lovely things, Izzy.’
