Rose of Tralee (28 page)

‘That’s as maybe, Mona,’ the woman addressed as Auntie Lil said. ‘But we’ve got this young feller to thank for catchin’ him. Could you bring him in here an’ put him in his cage, please?’ She flung open a door and gestured into the large and comfortable furnished room within, then turned to Sean. ‘Oh, Mr O’Neill, me wits have gone beggin’ ... this’ll be your son Colm, what’s thinkin’ of takin’ a room here. Oh, whatever will he think of us, actin’ like mad things an’ our Rosie screamin’ like a fishwife an’ swearin’ like ... like nobody’s business!’

‘It’s awright, anyone would swear – an’ scream – over a parrot on the loose,’ Colm said, smiling forgivingly at the youngster. He had been annoyed with her for speaking to him as though he, and not she, were the younger, but the mere presence of the vision had made such things of no significance. He had already made up his mind that come hell or high water he would take the room. The vision had taken
off her macintosh to reveal the sort of figure normally only seen in advertisements or on the silver screen.

She was really something – to live in the same house as her would be – well, it would be really something as well!

‘Oh well, Gully’s awright now,’ the girl Rosie said, as Colm put the parrot carefully into the cage and as carefully shut and latched the small wickerwork door. She had accompanied him into the room, presumably feeling some responsibility for the bird and for his handling of him, and now she looked quickly down at her feet and up at Colm. ‘I’m sorry if I were a bit sharp, like,’ she said grudgingly. ‘I lost me rag back there. An’ I’m sorry he bit you an’ all; I don’t think he’s ever bit anyone before.’

‘Sure an’ that doesn’t matter,’ Colm said mildly. ‘For I’ve not been bit be a parrot before. But I don’t bear a grudge.’ He bent over the cage and put a finger through the bars, rubbing the bird’s colourful red-and-blue head. ‘T’was fear which made him strike, not wickedness.’

Sean, who had not opened his mouth whilst all this was going on, said deprecatingly: ‘Gully’s a nice bird, so he is. Him an’ me’s gettin’ to know one another, eh Gully?’ The bird, seeming to notice him for the first time, cocked his head on one side and sang, in a deep, cracked baritone which Colm recognised at once as his father’s voice, ‘Cockles and mussels alive, alive-o!’

Everyone laughed and Sean pushed a peanut through the bars and turned to the small group standing in the doorway. ‘Well an’ hasn’t it been a meetin’ an’ a half, now?’ he enquired. ‘An’ me son simply wantin’ a quick look at the room, so he does.’

‘And so he shall,’ Mrs Ryder said at once. ‘And he’ll
stay to supper an’ all, him havin’ saved our bacon so to speak over Gully here. What I’d ha’ done if he’d gorrout of that door ...’

‘Well, he didn’t, Mam,’ the girl called Rosie said. She spoke rather pertly, Colm thought. ‘Shall I tek Mr O’Neill – Mr Colm O’Neill I mean – up an’ show him the room for you? Only you’ll be wantin’ to get the supper on the go, what wi’ Mr Garnett poppin’ by later an’ all.’

‘Thanks, Rosie,’ her mother said with obvious relief.

But the older girl spoke up at once, taking the younger gently by the arm and holding her back when she would have begun to mount the stairs. ‘Don’t you bother yourself, Rosie. I’m goin’ up to change out of me shop stuff, I’ll show Mr O’Neill the room.’

‘Thanks, Mona,’ the younger girl said at once, and followed her mother out of the hallway and into the kitchen, but Sean came up the stairs in his son’s wake, much to that son’s disapproval. He did not think he would be able to make much headway with the beautiful vision whilst his father was about. But then, if he was going to live in the same house he need not rush, nor show his hand too soon.

Accordingly, the two men followed the swinging bob of golden hair up the first and second flights of stairs and into a pleasant room, then glanced about them. The window was uncurtained, but the panes sparkled with cleanliness and the walls, though bare, were whitewashed icily bright. The narrow bed was covered by a gaily coloured patchwork quilt and there was a washstand complete with ewer and basin in blue-and-white china, a white-painted wooden chair, a chest of drawers with a square of mirror on
the top and a line of hooks on which, presumably, one hung one’s jacket and trousers.

‘Sure an’ isn’t it a dacint room now?’ Sean said, glancing at his son. ‘Look at the view, Colm!’

To avoid having to say anything Colm went over and stared out of the window. It was a view, too – he could see hundreds and hundreds of patched and vari-coloured roofs and, away in the distance, the faint blue line of distant hills. ‘It’s a grand view,’ he said obediently and meant it. ‘And it’s a good little room an’ all, Miss Ryder.’

‘I’m not Miss Ryder, I’m Mona Mullins,’ the young woman said. ‘Me an’ Rosie’s first cousins – our mams are sisters. An’ you’d best call me Mona, anyways, ’cos we’s goin’ to have to call you Colm. Can’t manage wi’ two Mr O’Neills, you know!’

‘Colm’s just fine,’ Colm said at once. ‘So you don’t live here, Miss ... Miss Mona?’

‘I do so,’ Mona said at once. She fluttered enticingly long lashes at him in a wink whilst Sean was still admiring the view. ‘Right above you, that’s where me room is. Me an’ Rosie share the attic,’ she added quickly, as Sean turned back towards them. ‘Me mam moved away an’ Auntie Lil took me in, so I live here along o’ the Ryders now.’

‘Aye, don’t you remember me tellin’ you that a young leddy as lived nearby had recommended me to her aunt?’ Sean put in. ‘I told you when I moved in, so I did.’

‘Yes, probably,’ Colm said vaguely. The truth was that he often didn’t listen when his father was talking to him, going off into a dream as the gentle brogue went on and on. ‘But anyway, ‘tis a grand room for me, an’ I’ll be glad to take it.’

‘You haven’t asked the rent,’ Mona said demurely,
casting him another of those exciting glances beneath her sooty lashes. ‘Don’t be
too
eager, Mr Colm.’

‘I know the rent,’ Colm said at once. ‘Me daddy telled me when your aunt said she’d a room ready. I can move in at the end of the week if that’s awright wit’ Mrs Ryder.’

‘We’ll go downstairs an’ tell her right away,’ Sean said. Colm could hear the muted excitement in his father’s voice and was glad that he had been able to give pleasure so easily, for now that he had met Mona Mullins he felt sure he would be extremely happy and comfortable in St Domingo Vale. And from what he could remember of his father’s talk he approved of the family. Indeed, the girl had greatly taken his fancy; Sean had said she was hard-working and sensible, so surely he could only be delighted when he saw where his son’s inclination was leading him?

They went downstairs – just the two of them for Mona went up to her own room to change – and into the kitchen. The youngster was cutting a large loaf of bread into generous slices and buttering them, whilst her mother drew from the oven a meat pie topped with wonderfully fluffy, crisped mashed potato. She saw Colm and straightened, pushing the hair out of her eyes with one hand and deftly angling the pie onto the kitchen table, which was covered with a checkered tablecloth.

‘Seen all you want o’ the room? Good, then you’re just in time for tea. It’s shepherd’s pie, bein’ as we had roast mutton last night, with green peas, an’ a nice suet puddin’ wi’ treacle sauce to follow. I know how hungry you fellers get, though, so we allus do a pile o’ bread an’ butter.’

Colm smiled blissfully whilst his father looked smug. A real meal and served decently, not just
slapped down for everyone to help themselves. Oh, his father had been right to persuade him to come over and take a look for himself. He and Sean washed their hands over the sink and as they finished and turned away the kitchen door opened and another man came in. He was very dark-haired, of medium height and had a ready smile, which he turned enquiringly on Colm.

‘This is Mr O’Neill’s boy, Colm, Mr Dawlish,’ Mrs Ryder said. ‘He’s thinkin’ about the little room. Colm, this is another of me gentlemen... Mr Dawlish works down at the docks in shipping.’

‘I told you me son were thinkin’ of makin’ a move, so I did,’ Sean remarked as the three of them seated themselves at the table. ‘Well, he likes the room, do you not, Colm?’

‘Rosie, go an’ call your cousin, tell her I’m dishin’ up,’ Mrs Ryder interposed. ‘I might tell you, Mr Dawlish, that poor Colm walked into a desperate situation when he come round here. That Gulliver had gorrout of his cage an’ was shriekin’ an’ divin’ round our ears like an eagle. Indeed, if Colm hadn’t collared it, I don’t know where it ’ud be by now.

‘Oh, you’d ha’ got the ould feller safe,’ Colm said easily, watching the spoon dig into the richness of the crisped potato topping to reveal the hot, golden-bubbled meat below. ‘What wit’ your daughter keepin’ nix on the kitchen door an’ your niece about to come in, you’d ha’ caught him soon enough, so you would.’

‘He bit you, though,’ Rosie remarked, coming back into the room, closely followed by the vision. Mona was wearing a pink dress with a cream lace collar and very shiny black patent-leather pumps. She looked like a girl who was going dancing and Colm’s heart
sank a little. Did she have a young man, then? Was she spoken for? But the glance she shot across at him as she sank into her place heartened him. It was a teasing look, the sort, he now knew from experience, given by a girl to a young man who interested her. ‘Did you put somethin’ on them bites, Mam?’

‘He barely grazed me knuckles,’ Colm lied, keeping his hands below table level. ‘It ’ud tek more than a wee bird to get t’rough skin as tough as mine I’m after t’inkin’! Thanks, Mrs Ryder.’ This last as a well-piled plate was put before him. He turned back to Mona. ‘Are you goin’ dancin’? That’s a rare pretty frock.’

Mona smiled and thanked him, and Rosie said, with an edge to her voice: ‘Not in the middle of the week, she isn’t! We’re both goin’ to our evenin’ classes to try to better ourselves.’

‘Rosie’s doin’ a business course,’ Mona said. ‘I’m studyin’ modelling gowns.’ She tossed her golden bob and took a large forkful of shepherd’s pie, then spoke rather thickly through it. ‘I’d like to work in Lewis’s, showin’ their dresses an’ that, but so far I’m only a sales assistant in Gowns.’

Colm opened his mouth to say he’d a friend who had worked in Gowns over in Dublin, then thought better of it. Mr Dawlish was telling Mona what a fine mannequin she would make and how she’d out-earn them all once she got onto a commission basis and Rose was asking if anyone wanted more bread and butter, whilst Sean ate solidly, his eyes going from face to face as the conversation progressed. It occurred to Colm, taking another slice of bread, that this was like being at home; people helped themselves, his father, seeing Mrs Ryder’s cup of tea empty, had earlier simply got up and refilled it for
her. An easy household and one he very much wanted to join. He knew, now, that even had Mona not been living here he would have wanted to become a lodger in St Domingo Vale.

Satisfied, he finished his shepherd’s pie and passed his plate along the table to Rose, who was clearing. Then he watched with delighted anticipation as the suet pudding was brought out of the pan of boiling water, untied from its cloth, tumbled onto a serving plate and cut into generous slices. Mr Backhouse, Colm knew, would be serving his own idea of a pudding about now. It would probably be a large slab of bought cake, stale, of course, because if he waited until it was stale he got it cheaper, covered in custard made with water. And everyone would be so hungry that they would dive eagerly for the bit left over.

‘Awright for you, Colm?’ Mrs Ryder had gently placed before him a very large slice of the pudding and Rose, standing up, pushed a steaming jug towards him.

‘Help yourself to treacle sauce, chuck. It’s easier than me askin’ you to tell me when I’ve poured enough,’ she said, as though she were forty and he a mere stripling. ‘Anyone want another cuppa?’

‘D’you like him? That Colm O’Neill feller?’ Rose asked later that evening, as she and Mona made their way to their evening classes in the Kirkdale Senior Evening Institute on Walton Road. She chuckled. ‘I didn’t half bawl him out when he come through the front door, but I said sorry after. An’ he caught Gully, acourse,’ she added. ‘Mebbe if I’d not shrieked he’d not ha’ caught the ole feller.’

‘Oh, I like him awright,’ Mona said with somewhat studied casualness, Rose thought. ‘Good-lookin’, but
then a good few of the paddies is that. But he’s a sight too young for me – bet he’s no more’n twenty.’

‘Well, you’re only twenty-two,’ Rose pointed out. She wondered whether to tell her cousin that she suspected Colm was, in fact, rather less than that, but decided not to do so. It would make her sound as though she was trying to put Mona off him. He
was
good-looking, though, with his father’s deep-set blue eyes, a strong, jutting chin and the dark hair which curled crisply about his well-shaped head. But, Rose reminded herself as they crossed Sandheys Street and headed for the building, exchanging greetings with other class members as they went, she was not interested in acquiring a young man, especially not one who lodged with them. She wanted to be able to apply for Miss Rogerson’s job as Mr Lionel’s personal secretary when she left to be married in a year or two, and that meant studying hard at both shorthand and typing, always being on time, forever being obliging and never forgetting her goal for one moment. Sometimes Rose remembered wistfully that she had once yearned to become a journalist, but such ambitions had been impossible once her father died. She had had to get a job, and she realised how lucky she was that she had found work with Patchett & Ross, which suited her so well, with advancement perfectly possible. Now, she enjoyed both typing and shorthand, knowing that her mastery of these skills could take her to the very top of the secretarial tree – and that could mean good money and security, too.

She and Mona went dancing occasionally, and of course they met young men and spent the evening with them, but for her own part Rose was always careful to keep such things on a merely friendly footing. Mona was clearly looking for something or
someone a bit more permanent, but Rose told herself firmly that she wanted a life, not a feller, and continued to flit from flower to flower. Besides, she was a great deal younger than Mona, not quite seventeen, and what with evening classes, her work with Patchett & Ross and helping her mam in the house, life was quite full enough without the additional complication of a young man.