In the Company of Others (25 page)

Feeney returned to the bench, sat with his hands on his knees. ‘As Liam said, she talks of dying, hopes to die. She thinks it would serve her right, which is why I was gobsmacked to hear her say she wants to live. And yet, faced with the liver business and the very thing she’s been keen to do, she’s terrified.’

He needed to make sense of this. ‘A spark to the laundry and then the chairs smoldering ...?’

‘Exactly,’ said Feeney. ‘They may have died of asphyxiation long before she opened the door.’

‘But she opened the door.’

‘Yes.’

‘Her remorse haunts this house,’ he told Feeney.

‘As it does the house above. I’m sorry to tell you all this, but it seems you should know.’

‘I’m glad you told me, it changes things.’ The truth always changed things. He wondered how much more Evelyn Conor had confided to her doctor and erstwhile bridge partner, but he said nothing.

‘You’ve been good medicine for Broughadoon, Tim.’

He had no idea what to say to that. ‘Mass tomorrow. Will Cynthia be up to it?’

‘Good for the soul, bad for the ankle. I wouldn’t pester it in the least if I were you.’

‘Perhaps you’ll give me Tad’s phone number, ’ he said. ‘I’d like to see him before we leave.’ But would they ever leave? If it wasn’t frogs and flies, it was hail and locusts.

‘He’s just off to his brother in Wales for two weeks. His annual August retreat.’

‘Too bad. I’d hoped to see more of him.’

Pud returned, shook himself, followed them into the library to the bookcases with their fluted pilasters, to lamplight and peat burning against the night, to two gray heads bent over the board. The Labs looked up at them, lay down again, slept.

Only a while ago, he’d wanted the comforts of home. Yet now he felt keenly the kind and solemn spirit of this room, and knew again that he was supposed to be here, that the easy familiarity of Fig Newtons could, if only for a time, be sacrificed.

Twenty-five

William appeared dubious, distracted; Seamus refired his pipe. The proverbial pin could have been heard dropping as he and Feeney watched the progress of the checkers game.

‘Phone call, Rev’rend.’ Liam gave a high sign from the hall. ‘From th’ Dub.’

‘O’Malley!’

‘Says he has good news an’ bad news.’

He sat at the desk in the kitchen; Liam worked on a laptop at the table; the smell of coffee lingered in the room.

‘Hey, Tim, how’s it goin’ at ol’ Broughadoon? ’

‘We’re missing the riffraff, Pete. Great to hear your voice.’

‘She’s back.’ Pete breathed into the phone.

‘And?’

‘For four days. A trial run. But get this—it’s scarin’ me to death. When I think about it,
ask th’ Collar
is th’ message I get. I need your help, Tim—I don’t have a clue what to do.’

This was a phone with a cord, which meant he couldn’t go trotting off to another room for the private affair of counseling.
C’est la vie
—family night is family night.

‘You’re asking me to tell you what to do?’

‘That’s why I’m callin’. I’d appreciate it.’

‘You’re sure of this?’

‘Dead sure.’

He crossed himself, breathed out, dived in. ‘How about doing nothing?’

‘Oh, yeah?’

‘Don’t tell her you’ve changed or finally gotten your act together or everything’s going to be different. That’s what they all say, and then it doesn’t happen. It takes time for good stuff to happen.’

Pete’s ragged breathing was a minor gale.

‘And whatever you do, no flowers, no mushy cards.’

‘You can count on no mushy cards, but I thought flowers for sure.’

‘Don’t do it,’ he said.

‘I don’t get it.’

‘Think about it. You send flowers now, make a big noise, and that’s the end of it, you go back to doing the same old, same old. Best not to say or do anything you can’t live up to down the road.’

He was breaking a sweat. Marriage was serious business, and Pete had taken him by surprise. He’d actually trained for marriage counseling—not because he wanted to, but because he needed to. During his first couple of years in Mitford, marriages were breaking apart like ice caps—mother, father, children, floating off on solitary floes into the ether, and he with nothing much to offer but unctuous prayer for reconciliation.

He’d worried that his counsel wouldn’t be taken seriously, anyway—what did a bachelor priest know of such desperate matters?

The more he observed the wreckage, the more anxious he became to effect genuine healing—most anybody could do a Band-Aid, he was in for stanching the hemorrhage. How did the dynamics of marriage differ from other relationships, anyway? What did God want for marriage in the first place? He prayed about it as if his life depended on it, searched the scriptures, attended a series of weekend seminars in Asheville. He received a certificate to hang on the wall, some assurance, perhaps, to the wretched souls who sat on the bench in the church office and spilled their guts.

Over time, he counseled quite a few couples in mild distress, and a total of eight in desperate straits. Ten years later, he’d done a discreet check on the eight. Two were lost on the floes; six were hanging in there, which was way above the national average. When he rejoiced over the results of this survey, however unscientific, Emma had raised an eyebrow and pointed up. It’s not like it was all
you
, she said, which went without saying.

‘If I can’t say or do anything I can’t live up to,’ said Pete, ‘what am I gonna say an’ do? I was thinkin’ maybe a great dinner in th’ kind of place that fries your Amex; I could live up to that when the economy takes a little uptick. An’ maybe a nice bottle of champagne, a little foie gras ...’

‘Fish and chips,’ he said.

‘Come on.’

‘Don’t show off, don’t flash anything around. Go easy. Besides, you probably did all that the last time she left you and came back for a trial run.’

‘You’re right.’ Pete sounded depressed.

‘Forget what it does to your Amex, it takes a lot of energy to go out for fancy dinners and be the hale-fellow-well-met and keep flowers rolling in. For now, how about spending that energy on her, focus it all on her? Just love her, and let her know it. Hold her hand, tell her how much she means to you, and here’s a big one—listen to what she has to say, Pete. If you let her talk, and if you really listen, she’ll tell you everything you need to know.’

A stricken silence in Dublin.

‘Have you tried any of this stuff?’ asked Pete.

‘Pretty much all of it. But hey, no guarantee on anything. Just my two cents’ worth.’

‘I don’t know. The big dinner an’ th’ flowers—that was goin’ to be my best shot. But I could prob’ly do a bracelet if I have to.’

‘Maybe you need to fork over a few euros to a professional.’

‘No way. I’m lookin’ for a freebie here.’

‘Okay, all the strategies I just suggested—that’s the small stuff. Here’s the big one.’

‘Shoot.’ Pete heaved a sigh that cleaned out the phone line.

‘Ask God every day to give you the wisdom and courage to be all he made you to be—for your wife, for yourself, for him. If you give God a chance in this and do the best you can, he’ll help you do the rest. When you were here, you said it would take a miracle to save your marriage. Unless there’s something you haven’t told me, you don’t do miracles.’

The dishwashers beeped—cycles ended.

‘And, Pete . . .’

‘Yeah?’

‘While you’re at it, please pray for your wife—she needs wisdom and courage, too. You’re a team—think like a team.’

‘You’re askin’ a lot, Tim.’

‘I won’t kid you—it’s going to take a lot.’

‘If you would say a, you know, prayer.’

‘Consider it done, call me anytime. And regards to Roscoe.’

He drew out his handkerchief, wiped his face. He’d just been through the scrub cycle. ‘A desperate man,’ he said to Liam.

Liam was amused. ‘While at it, he asked my opinion.’

‘What was your opinion?’

‘A couple weeks in Ibiza.’

‘That, too,’ he said.

‘Great plug for fish an’ chips, Rev’rend.’

In the library, the laurel wreath had fallen to Seamus.

‘Th’ man of th’ hour,’ said William, poking up the fire. ‘Says ’t was like makin’ hay on a soft day.’

‘Aye, but tomorrow, Willie, you’ll be makin’ hay of your own.’ Seamus held up his comb—‘Th’ oul’ flea rake,’ he said—gave his mustache a drubbing. ‘Well, gentlemen, I vowed I’d unload th’ dishwashers before goin’ up th’ hill.’

‘I’ll come along and have a visit with Liam,’ said Feeney. ‘I’ll give you a lift.’

‘Ever th’ comin’ an’ goin’,’ said William.

He would stir his bones and run along the lake tomorrow; he’d go farther this time, and definitely to the Mass rock. He sat in a favorite wing chair, checked his watch, wondered at Bella’s long stay.

William lowered himself into an adjoining chair, the usual light gone from him.

‘Could I have your ear, Rev’rend?’

‘With pleasure.’

‘Ye heard tonight what’s come to th’ lass from Collooney—ould an’ ruined by th’ drink. She needed me in a desperate way with somethin’ that happened to her mother an’ sisters, but I let her down. I was on th’ pig’s back in those days, I wanted th’ whole world for myself. Do ye understand?’

‘I do.’

‘I was th’ young buck beatin’ men to bloody pulp and livin’ to boast of it. As you might imagine, I found th’ girls numerous as fairies in Mayo. I thought any woman would wait for William Donavan ’til he got his name in lights.’

William bowed his head, examined his palms as if seeing some truth there.

‘And so I married Roisin, Anna’s mum, while I still had feelin’s for Evelyn McGuiness. Roisin was pretty as a speckled pup; worked like a man at th’ turf field, yet gentle as a lamb in her ways. A lovely woman—an’ could play th’ oul’ tunes on th’ fiddle.’

‘Bella gets it from both sides, then.’

‘A double dose, as ye heard th’ other evenin’. When Koife plays, Roisin comes back to me, but I don’t deserve her company.’ William looked up, his blue eyes gray. ‘In th’ end, I was faithless to two women.

‘’t was a hard thing to reckon what my selfish pleasures laid waste. Th’ regret is like a cancer still growin’, an’ no way to cure it.’

The fire smoldered; Pud snored at his feet.

‘I hope this is not considered a confession, Rev’rend, for I can’t take pardon from a Protestant. ’

‘I’m just hearing you,’ he said.

‘I thank ye for that.’ William sat back in the chair, stared at the fire. ‘I made a right hames of it all. An’ now I’m an oul’ man with all my fortunes spent an’ gone, an’ nothin’ left of th’ fled days but regret.’ William withdrew his handkerchief and did what he had to do, which seemed to cheer him in a small way.

‘Regret an’ gratitude, I have to say. Gratitude for my Anna an’ her lovin’ ways; Anna, who’s made us a comfortable livin’ out of this place. Gratitude for Koife, who herself has felt th’ blade twisted deep. Aye, an’ for Liam, who’s put th’ stamp of success on deer farmin’ an’ sheep raisin’ like you never saw. They’re eatin’ our lamb an’ venison all th’ way to Belfast an’ callin’ for more.

‘We always got on famous, Liam an’ me, but th’ last couple of years ...’ William shrugged. ‘In th’ end, I regret th’ bit about me livin’ here ’til I’m carried out in a box. It’s made Liam th’ bosun in what was to be his own ship.’

He wanted to ask what happened when William returned to Lough Arrow those years ago—he wanted Liam and Anna to know the truth. But how could even William know it?

Evelyn Conor was the only one truly intimate with such a truth.

‘Ye need to know I dearly loved Anna’s mum, but in a different way. We can’t love every woman as I loved Evelyn McGuiness, or ’t would kill a man, burst open ’is heart, so. Thank Jesus there’s never but one like that in a man’s life.

‘Pray for Evelyn McGuiness, if ye’d be so kind. I’ve seen those as try to give up th’ drink, an’ ’t would make ye weep to witness such persecution. ’

He heard voices—Feeney, Seamus, Liam—coming quickly along the hall. Nothing so bad it couldn’t be worse, he thought, seeing the look on Liam’s face. Feeney and Seamus were nearly running for the door.

‘Paddy called—it’s Mother. Will you go, Rev’rend?’

‘Cynthia,’ he said.

‘I’ll send Anna up, please God.’

At the entrance hall, he turned and looked at William, whose face expressed a plea for them to fix things if they could.

‘The stepstool, of course,’ said Feeney as they crunched across the gravel to the car. “Had to happen. Bloody inevitable.’ Feeney tossed his house call bag onto the backseat. ‘Paddy said she wasn’t drinking; she swears that’s why she fell.’

‘God love ’er,’ said Seamus.

‘They’ll be wanting you home nights, Seamus. But you’ve been expecting that.’

‘Aye.’

‘What do you need me to do?’ he asked Feeney.

‘Be there. Just be there.’

Twenty-six

He waited in the entrance hall, eyes closed, praying.

Voices at the end of the hall.

‘Did you get her off the floor?’

‘Aye.’

‘Who is that person?’

‘The Rev’rend Tim Kav’na,’ said Seamus.

‘What’s he doing here?’

‘Dr. Feeney asked him up.’

‘Why in God’s name would Feeney ask up a Protestant ...?’

‘Th’ gravity of the matter at hand, I believe, and ’t was all we had. Dr. Feeney wants him riding with your mother in th’ backseat, no need to get the ambulance out, he says. I’m just after ice to keep th’ swellin’ down.’

‘Have you packed her things?’

‘I’m comin’ to that.’

A door slamming.

He was willing enough to be all they had, to be here, waiting.

He looked at the broad staircase rising to two floors of ruined and vacant rooms and thought how Fintan O’Donnell’s own rooms abovestairs had stood vacant. He wondered whether the O’Donnells had kept a fire on the hearth in this great hall, how they found comfort in the pestering drafts of winter. He thought of the kitchen smells coming out to greet the senses of those who waited here generations ago.

Someone had said a house is a history book, his own former homeplace near Holly Springs being an example from 1853. He had often felt the temper of past occupants in the house and fields, and had, on rare occasion, smelled the cook fires of the slaves who had lived and labored there long before his arrival. Once he had heard laughter—not the ordinary sort of laughter heard from the living, but laughter from a time long vanished. It had seemed as known and familiar as the cooking smells, a palpable link to those gone before.

Feeney came up the hall, charging the air with haste.

‘I need you to ride with her in the rear seat, we’re taking my car. It’s both wrists, and some injury to her left leg, I’m not sure what. It needs the three of us to get this done.’

He followed Feeney along the dark hall to her room. A single lamp burning; a muted television in the corner; the old Lab on a cushion next to a bed with many pillows, and Evelyn Conor sitting in a chair in a nightgown, shocked by pain.

‘What’s to bundle her in, Seamus?’ Feeney had bound her wrists with what appeared to be kitchen towels.

Seamus brought a shawl from a chair, placed it around her shoulders; took an afghan from the foot of the bed and handed it to Feeney, who swaddled her in it, carefully tucking her arms close. She moaned, cried out.

‘God above,’ Seamus whispered.

‘I’ve given her morphine for the pain. Because of the leg, we’ll have to carry her. Slippers? We need slippers.’

Seamus went down on both knees, searched along the side of the bed, brought up slippers, gently placed them on her feet. ‘My God!’ she said, agonized.

‘Tim, go ahead of us to the car, get the rear doors open, clear the seat of my jumble; we’ll bring her down. And ask Paddy to come and speak to his mother, for God’s sake.’

‘Where will I find him?’

‘First door on th’ left as we pass up th’ hall,’ said Seamus.

Seamus and Feeney lifted her; it was a clean maneuver. She did not cry out, but was wrenched and silent, tears shone on her face.

He passed quickly along the hall and through the open front doors and down to the Rover as the Labs came racing up the driveway from Broughadoon. He did as Feeney asked, tossed the jumble behind the rear seats, left the doors open, and headed back to the house at a pace, passing them on the steps.

‘Water,’ said Feeney, ‘bring a bottle of water. And my bag from her bedroom, and her things in the duffel.’

He knocked; there was no answer. An angry blood beat in him and he opened the door. Paddy Conor—standing in the middle of a paneled room lined with empty bookshelves— grim, glass in hand. It was the man in the portrait, in the flesh.

He said what Feeney had said. ‘Come and speak to your mother, for God’s sake.’

He went to the kitchen and looked in the refrigerator. No bottled water. In the corner, an open case of it. He put a bottle in each jacket pocket, one for the injured, one for the resident diabetic, then crossed the hall to her bedroom, to the open leather bag with its antiseptic breath of injury and healing, snapped it shut, and collected it with the duffel.

Paddy waited in the hall, affronted. ‘There’s Seamus and Feeney and yourself. You’ve no need for me.’

‘Come,’ he said, meaning it.

He crawled into the backseat. Seamus stowed the bags, closed the door, signed the cross. The dogs sat watching. On the other side of the Rover, Paddy peered through the closed window. ‘Mother,’ he said. She didn’t hear or see him.

Feeney took it easy along the rain-pocked lane, but held nothing back on the highway to Sligo.

In his years as a priest, he’d driven or accompanied more than a few sick and suffering to the hospital. Each ride had been desperate in its own way, but this seemed something more—or perhaps something other.

‘Reverend,’ she whispered.

He knew this was not an appeal, not a conversation opener, but some way of connecting with the man who rode beside her, their bodies nearly touching, the heat of their flesh intermingled.