Rose of Tralee (43 page)

‘I don’t know as I’m in the mood to dance,’ Lily said heavily, but when everyone joined in the plea and Rose added that they could not possibly go off without her she consented to join them. So the women went to their rooms and presently, suitably gowned and made-up, the three of them joined Colm, Tommy and Mr Dawlish who went and flagged down a taxi so that they could travel in style.

But as she whirled in the dance and sipped a soft drink, Rose’s heart was heavy. No matter how one might try to pretend that a cat-burglar had been at work, they must all know that this could not possibly be true. Whoever had stolen the necklace had been an opportunist – and this time, they could not hope to put the blame on the window-cleaner’s lad. Someone had to have been in the house alone for long enough to rifle through her mother’s dressing-table. It was an inside job, which meant that she could no longer look at any of their lodgers without wondering ...

Except for Colm, of course. She knew him far too well to suspect that he would ever take anything which did not belong to him. He was honest through and through and in any case would never have taken advantage of her mother in such a way. Lily Ryder had been good to all her lodgers though – and one of them ...

It occurred to Rose, as she and Colm were dancing the last waltz together, slowly and dreamily circling
the floor, that her mother might well not have looked into her little jewel case since they had moved in, and at first they had had lodgers who had only stayed for a matter of weeks. It was far likelier that one of them had walked off with her mother’s necklace, and she had only just missed it.

Rose told Colm how her thoughts were going and he cheered up. ‘Sure an’ that’s a likelier t’ing, so it is,’ he said with obvious relief. ‘I can’t bear to t’ink any of us would take such a wicked advantage of your mammy’s kindness. Yes, tell your mammy your thoughts; it’ll cheer her.’

Accordingly, Rose asked her mother if such might have been the case and Lily, after some thought, admitted that it might. ‘Because I’ve not so much as looked at it since we moved in,’ she admitted. ‘Well, if I never get it back, chuck, at least I can have the satisfaction of believing that we’re all innocent of the theft.’

So it was a happier party who made their way home again in the starlight of the first day of the new year. And it was not until she was in bed and cuddling down that Rose had another, less pleasant, thought. Money, both small sums and large, had been going missing now for three or four months. They had blamed her mother’s absent-mindedness at first, but it had not been the case when what she now thought of as ‘the window-cleaning money’ disappeared. Was this just a weird coincidence? Uneasily, she admitted to herself that she did not think so. Someone in the house, she concluded unhappily, was a thief and unless they worked at it they might never find out who it was.

January 1932 Liverpool

Sean came up Dale Street, looking round him at the great blocks of offices as though he had never seen them before. Ahead of him loomed the technical school and beyond it the free library, huge, impersonal places when compared with the homely Dublin streets, always crowded with people and warmer, to his mind, than the streets of this great, imposing city.

He had been away for two weeks, but it seemed a great deal longer, and he could not help reflecting that he was coming back to hard work and a lonely bed. Yet he knew, really, that he would soon settle down again, get into the habit of writing to Eileen and the child, slip back into his responsible job and his way of life without too much pain. But right now, at this very minute, with the wind following him up Dale Street and nipping spitefully at the back of his neck, he felt completely alien and simply wanted to be back in Dublin, walking the Quays, crossing Halfpenny Bridge, admiring the Custom House and the Law Courts, and believing them to be the biggest and best buildings in the world – until he saw the Liver Building for the first time, that was.

It was late afternoon and the streets were empty because the shops and offices had not yet spilled their staff onto the pavements and in the bitter cold and with Christmas behind them, few had ventured out.
A solitary tram rattled along and its golden windows looked comforting; Sean’s bag was heavy and he thought about catching it, then changed his mind. He would walk briskly and warm himself up and hopefully, by the time he reached St Domingo Vale, he would be feeling more cheerful and would be able to give a good account of his Christmas.

For he had had a marvellous time, there was no doubt about it. The Christmas presents from both himself and Colm had been received with rapture, all the little extras which he had saved so hard for had made every day special and he had sunk back into his home as into a soft featherbed, loving every moment, not allowing himself to remember that he would be leaving them, returning to the city where his work was.

Work, he reminded himself robustly now, was good. He crossed Byrom Street and went on into William Brown Street. He might as well get a tram, now he thought about it. He could pick up a number 13 and be home a good deal quicker, and once home, he could be sure that Mrs Ryder would put the kettle on and get him a good cup of tea, and probably some bread and jam, or toast. He hadn’t eaten since early morning and then it had only been a boiled egg; he had felt too unhappy to eat, though Eileen had done her best to jolly him along with reminders that summer would soon be here and she was saving hard for that dream home, as was he.

When he came level with the next tram stop he joined the few cold, dark-clad people clustered there, glad now it came to the point to put his bags down for a moment. He hadn’t taken all his things home because most of them wouldn’t be needed – none of his working clothes, for instance – but one bag was
heavy with more Christmas gifts for Colm and he had brought back a couple of loaves of Eileen’s soda bread, because no one made it better, and a heavy pat of salted butter from the dairy round the corner, to say nothing of two jars of Eileen’s gooseberry jam and another of the clover honey she particularly valued. ‘Take two spoonfuls in hot water, wit’ a good squeeze o’ lemon, before you go to bed,’ she had instructed him. ‘It’ll keep colds an’ the flu away from ye. Caitlin’s been fit as a flea this winter wit’ lemon an’ honey before bed.’

Sean, accepting the honey, had not admitted that he intended to eat it on hot buttered toast – and to share it with the Ryders and his fellow guests. He seldom ailed and saw no reason to waste good honey by watering it down, but he was by far too fond a father and husband to say so. It pleased Eileen to think, when his work was done in damp and darkness, that no Englishwomen could possibly know any good remedies for his health, so why should he tell her that Mrs Ryder, too, used honey and lemon for colds, as well as various other cures. It would only make his wife resent his landlady more.

For Eileen, he had realised quite quickly, whilst paying lip-service to his good luck in finding such a decent home for himself and Colm, had preferred it when he had lived in Lavrock Bank, with Mrs Caldicott’s rough-and-ready housekeeping. Sean, not fully understanding the workings of the female mind, had told Eileen enthusiastically all about Lily Ryder and her pretty daughter, and had afterwards regretted it. He was cross-questioned as to Rose’s suitability to walk out with her beloved son and, at his first mention of Gulliver, Eileen had said, with a satisfied nod, that parrots were dirty critturs, so they
were, and she’d thank him to keep well clear of it and not to bring any traces of it back home to Ireland with him. ‘I’d never entertain keepin’ a cage-bird,’ she said. ‘A cat now, that’s different. Cats is clean – ask anybody. But parrots ... aren’t they always usin’ foul language now and bitin’ at folks if they get near to the cage? And they do their doings t’rough the bars as like as not. Oh aye, a decent, God-fearing woman would send that parrot to the rightabout, I’m tellin’ ye.’

After that, Sean had not talked about the Ryders or about St Domingo Vale, and they had got on very much better. And the fun they had! Visits to the theatre, strolls round the markets looking for bargains and meeting old friends, evenings before the fire, telling stories of the tunnel, of his workmates. Then there had been a day trip, with a picnic, out to Finglas, to examine the cottage where the very old couple lived and to tell themselves what they would do with it when they moved in, how they would plant the garden, fish the river, harvest the hedgerows.

The weather had not been as bitterly cold as it was in Liverpool, either, or so Sean convinced himself now, standing shivering at the tram stop with his collar turned up and his muffler wrapped twice around his face. But presently the tram pulled up and the waiting people climbed aboard, and Sean jammed his bags into the space beneath the stairs and sat where he could watch them. He glanced around him as he did so, but there was no one he knew aboard; it was too early for the home-going rush and most shoppers had gone earlier, driven indoors by the icy wind. The conductor took his fare and Sean shrugged his muffler down – he would not feel the benefit if he
remained wrapped up in the comparative warmth of the tram – and watched dismally as the city streets fled by. He wondered what Colm was doing now and also what Mrs Ryder was going to cook for their supper; then he remembered that Mona had been using his room and hoped that she had already vacated it. By the time he had got round to reminding himself that Eileen had packed, in addition to the soda bread, some of his favourite oat cakes, the tram was coming to a halt at the junction of Breck Road and Oakfield Road and he was heaving his bags out from under the stair, wrapping his muffler round his mouth once more and jumping down.

It was only a short walk now up Oakfield Road to the bottom of St Domingo Vale, where he turned left and began, for the first time since leaving Dublin, to think that life wasn’t so bad after all. The house was grand and so were the Ryders. He got on well with Pete Dawlish and thought Tommy good company. So he opened the small wooden gate and walked up the path feeling a good deal happier than he had felt on arriving in the city. He was a lucky feller, now he came to think about it. He had good digs, a good son and some real friends at work. He enjoyed going along to the Sandon Hotel on the corner of Oakfield Road and Houlding Street, and usually managed to make a pint last most of the evening. Yes, compared with a good few of their neighbours – and friends – in Dublin, he was doing all right.

Arriving at the front door, he rat-tatted. Usually, like everyone else, he went round the back, but it would be easier by far, burdened with bags as he was, to go straight across the hall, up the stairs and to his room. There, he could unpack the things he wanted to take straight down to the kitchen, tidy himself,
maybe wash, since he had spent more hours than he cared to remember hanging onto the rail of a ship which tossed and laboured across the restless foam-flecked waves of the Irish sea, and eventually settle in once more.

His knock was answered by Mrs Ryder, who welcomed him with a hearty handshake and told him she would put the kettle on at once, if he’d like to leave his luggage in his room and come straight down.

‘Miss Mullins has moved out?’ he said. ‘I was sure she would, but then it occurred to me she might t’ink I was catchin’ the last ferry . . .’

‘She moved her things out yesterday,’ Mrs Ryder said briefly. She tried to carry one of his bags but he wrested it away from her, it was heavy, as he well knew. ‘There’s . . . there’s been some changes, Mr O’Neill, but we’ll talk when you come down to the kitchen.’

Agreeing that would be best, it occurred to Sean, as he climbed the stairs, that Mrs Ryder was not looking her usual self. In fact, she looked downright pale and peaky, not at all like a person who had enjoyed a happy and relaxing holiday. Of course, she would have been cooking and cleaning just the same, since only himself and Dawlish, so far as he knew, had been away for Christmas, but even so ...

He reached his room and found it immaculately clean and very welcoming. Mrs Ryder had put a vase with some rust-red chrysanthemums in it on the washstand and there was a new bedspread, blue with a scattering of flowers. It was the work of a moment to take off his outer garments and go along to the bathroom for a hot wash, then he returned to his room, took off his boots and put on his slippers, hung
his coat on the hook behind the door and began methodically to unpack his bags.

Presently, with the food and some other oddments in a paper carrier, he left his room, shutting the door carefully behind him, and set off down the stairs. The clock in the hall showed that it was still not five o’clock, so no one else would be home yet. He decided he must ask, tactfully, whether his landlady was quite well, for he did not think he had ever seen her looking less like herself, and when he went into the kitchen and began to pile his things on the table, he saw at once that her attention, which would have been riveted on his doings once, kept wandering. She looked at the fire, at the stove, at the sink, moving restlessly and answering him more or less at random when he asked about her Christmas. So, being Sean, he asked the question direct: ‘Lor’ love ye, Mrs Ryder, what’s been happenin’ here whiles I was at home in Dublin? You look pale as a wraith, so you do, an’ you’ve not been listening to a word I’ve said, which is not like you. I hope there’s been no trouble?’

Mrs Ryder poured tea into two mugs and took them over to the table. Then she opened the biscuit barrel, sat herself down and gestured to the chair opposite. ‘Yes, something has happened,’ she said heavily. ‘Sit down, Mr O’Neill, an’ I’ll tell you as much as I know meself.’

She began, quite simply, with the New Year festivities which had taken place just over a week earlier, and went on to explain the missing necklace. ‘Tommy fetched the police,’ she said tiredly. ‘They was nice enough, but they said it were an inside job an’ they searched all the rooms ... everyone was very good, but the necklace didn’t turn up. Oh, Mr O’Neill, it just about ruined me Christmas and we’d had a real
good time up till then. I went to the Daulby Hall wi’ the kids, but me heart wasn’t in it, and once midnight had struck and we’d sung “Auld Lang Syne” I couldn’t wait to get home here. You see, the necklace was real old, it had been in me husband’s family a long time, an’ . . . an’ I felt I’d let him down, because there’s no denyin’ that I’m careless wi’ things. I’d not even looked into me jewel case since we left our old house an’ arrived here . . . an’ I can’t, I just
can’t
, believe that one of me lodgers is ... is a thief.’