Tara Road (76 page)

And into the night they spoke of Gertie and how she was going to build a legend based on the dead Jack. They were both much more tolerant than they would have been a few weeks back. It wasn't just because Jack was dead. They sat in the beautiful front room of Number 16 Tara Road as the moonlight came in at the window, and they each thought about the need to have some kind of legend in your life. Ria knew that for good or evil Marilyn must go on for ever without knowing it was her drunken son who had killed Johnny and himself that day. And Marilyn thought that for better or worse Ria should not learn how the husband she still loved and the friend she still trusted had conspired to betray her for so long.

'Aunt Gertie's not as well off as I thought she was,' Sean Maine said to Annie.

'Does it matter?' Annie shrugged.

'No, of course it doesn't, except I was just thinking it might work to our advantage.'

'How's that?'

'WellGCa suppose I were to stay with herGCa you know, pay board and lodging and go to school here?'

'It won't work, Sean.' Annie was practical.

'Not next week when school starts, okay I know it won't, but after Christmas I can find out what courses I'd get credits forGCa organise a transferGCa'

Annie looked troubled. 'Yes, wellGCa'

'What is it? Would you not want me here? I thought you liked me.'

'I do like you, Sean, I like you a lot. It's justGCa it's just I don't want to sort of lure you on with promises of things we might do, I might do, once you got here. It wouldn't be fair to let you think thatGCa'

He patted her hand. 'In time,' he said.

'But probably not in a short enough time for you,' she said.

'I've never done it either,' Sean said. 'I'm just as confused.'

'Really?'

'It mightn't be as good as they say. But we could see what we thought,' he said, and then, looking at her face, 'Not now, of course, but when the time seems right.'

'I bet Gertie'd just love having you to stay,' Annie said.

'I'm taking on more private pupils this year, Mum, can I do it in your house?' Bernadette asked.

'Of course, Ber. If you're well enough.'

'I'm fine. It's just that I don't want to start them off in one place and then have to transfer them when we move from here.'

'Does he know when he's going to sell?'

'No, Mum, and I don't ask him, he has enough pressures.'

'Does he have great pressures about Tara Road? Is she on at him all the time?' Finola Dunne was always protective of her daughter against the ex-wife.

Bernadette thought about it. 'I don't think so, I don't think she's even been in touch since she came back.'

'I wouldn't mind seeing those children again,' Finola said.

'Yes, I'd like to see them too, but Danny says they're all tied up with this Marilyn until she leaves. They're mad about her apparently,' Bernadette reported gloomily.

'It's just because they stayed in her house which had a swimming pool, that's the only reason,' Finola tried to reassure her daughter.

'I know, Mum.'

'Do you mind if we have Gertie and Sheila around for lunch?' Ria asked Marilyn. 'Sheila's not staying long in Dublin and it would be nice for her to meet youGCa she's been in your house, remember?'

'Of course,' Marilyn said. She would have preferred to talk to Ria on her own. There were still so many things to discuss, about Westville and about Tara Road. About the future and the past. But this was Ria's life and lunch with these ladies came first. Marilyn had learned this. And Ria had learned something too.

'I'm not going to spend the whole morning getting something ready. They want to talk not do a gourmet tasting, let's you and I walk down to the deli and get something simple.'

They walked up the road past Number 26 and waved at the swinging seat where Kitty Sullivan sat in the garden with her mother. Sixteen, anxious and pregnant, she had suddenly found a way of communicating with Frances which they never had before.

'Let's hope Annie doesn't find a similar one,' Ria said wryly.

'Do you think she might be sexually active, as they say at home?'

'And as they increasingly say here,GCO Ria confirmed. 'No I don't, but mothers know nothing, you'd know more about Annie than I would.'

'I know a bit about her hopes and dreams, but I truly don't know anything about that side of things,' Marilyn hastened to say.

'And if you did it would be sacred, you wouldn't have to tell me,' Ria said, anxious not to appear curious and trying to beat down the slight jealousy that was always there. Why could Annie Lynch tell Marilyn her hopes and dreams? It was beyond understanding.

They looked into the grounds of Number 32.

'Does Barney own any of that still?'

'No, they sold it all at huge prices, it was the talk of the place at the time. Rosemary really knew what she was doing going in there.' Ria was pleased for her friend.

Then they were at Number 48A. No sign of Nora Johnson and Pliers; they must have gone on one of their many adventures. 'Your mother will miss you if you move from here. Hilary going to the west, now you going too.'

'It's not if we move away from here, it's when. This is Millionaires' Row nowadays. Weren't we so clever to move in here when we did?'

'You weren't being clever, you went after a dream, didn't you?'

'I suppose Danny did. He wanted a grand house with high ceilings and deep colours. Often nowadays when I think about it I don't quite know why, but that's what he seemed to want when he was young.'

They walked on, an easy companionable silence between them. They passed the gates of St Rita's.

'Future home of nice soft cakes,' Ria said, laughing.

'Nothing too difficult to chew,' Marilyn giggled. 'Not like those ginger biscuits I bought Brian and Annie first time, they were horrific.'

They turned the corner and saw that Gertie's launderette was busy.

'I dare not mention the deceased but would he have left any insurance?' Marilyn asked 'Gertie's mother paid some kind of a policy,' Ria said. 'I think it was just a burial one.'

'And will she be all right?'

'She'll be fine. She has the little flat upstairs there and of course she can have her children at home now that they won't be assaulted or have their poor nerves shot to pieces by that lunatic.'

Gertie was so used to cleaning in Number 16 Tara Road that it was hard to get her to sit down.

'Will I do a bit of ironing for you to have your clothes nice for packing, Marilyn?' she said.

'Lord, Sheila, don't you have the kindest sister. I simply hate ironing and Gertie often helped me out.'

'YesGCa she was born caring about clothes, I never was,' said Sheila and the moment passed. Once or twice Gertie rose as if to clear the table but Ria's hand gently pressed her back. 'Sean is so anxious to come back and study in Ireland after Christmas and find his roots,' Sheila said. The other three women hid their smiles. 'He has been around to all the various schools and colleges and of course I'd just love him to come back here,' Sheila said.

'And Max?' Ria wondered.

'There's not much looking for roots in the Ukraine, they all came to the States from that village. Max will be okay about it.'

Gertie was excited about the proposition. 'There will be a small room in our flat, it's not very elegant but it's convenient for schools and libraries and everything.'

'Stop saying it's not elegant,' Sheila cried. 'Your property is in such a good area. It's a wonderful place for him to stay, it's a happy home. I'm only sorry his Uncle Jack won't be there to see him grow up.'

'Jack would have made him very welcome, that's one sure thing,' Gertie said, without any tinge of irony. 'But we'll paint up his room for him to have it ready when he comes back. He can tell us what colour he'd like. And maybe he'd get a bicycle. You know,' Gertie confided, 'a lot of people have asked me would I be financially able to manage without Jack?'

Ria wondered who had asked that and why. Surely they must have known that poor Gertie's finances would take an upturn now that she didn't have to find him an extra thirty or forty pounds' drinking money a week by cleaning houses. And now that she could concentrate on her business. But then perhaps other people didn't know the circumstances.

'And of course I am fine,' Gertie continued. 'My mother's looked through all the papers and there was a grand insurance policy there, and the business is going from strength to strength. There will be fine times ahead, that's what I have to think.'

Suddenly Ria remembered something. 'Talking of what lies ahead, I wonder what happened to Mrs Connor!'

'She told me she couldn't talk to the dead when I wanted to, and that one day I wouldn't want to any more,' Marilyn said. 'I'd like to tell her that day has come.'

'She told me I'd have a big business, I'd like to know how big,' Ria said, 'and travel the world. I've already done that.'

Sheila said that Mrs Connor had said the future was in her own hands, and look at the way it had all worked out. With her boy wanting to come back to Ireland to his own people!

Gertie tried to remember what Mrs Connor had told her. She had told her that there would be some sorrow but a happy life, she thought. 'Well, that was true enough,' Sheila said, patting her sister on the hand.

'Will I make myself scarce while you meet Danny?' Marilyn asked as they cleared the dishes after lunch.

'No need, there'll be plenty of time after you've gone home. Let's not waste what we have.'

'You should talk to him as soon as possible, listen to what he has to say and add what you have to say. The more you put it off the harder it is to do.'

'You're right,' sighed Ria. 'Yes, but it's a question of don't do as I do, just do as I say!'

'I'm only telling you what I didn't do myself.'

'I suppose I should ask him to come over.'

'I have to go and buy some gifts for people back home. I'll go down to that place I saw in Wicklow and leave you the morning.'

'That's an idea.'

'And you know what we'll do as a treat tomorrow afternoon?'

'I can't guess.'

'We'll go see Mrs Connor,' said Marilyn Vine, who wanted to pay her debt to the woman who had told her the truth. That the dead like to be left asleep. They want to be left in peace.

'I have to meet Ria this morning,' Danny said.

'Well, it's better that you get it over with,' Bernadette said. 'Are you very sad?'

'Not so much sad as anxious. I used to laugh at middle-aged men who had ulcers and said their stomachs were in a knot. I don't know why I laughed, that's the way I am all the time now.'

She was full of concern. 'But you can't be, Danny. None of this is your fault, and you are going to be able to give her half the proceeds of that house which is very big nowadays.'

'Yes, true.'

'And she knows all this; she doesn't have any expectations of anything else.'

'No,' said Danny Lynch. 'No, I don't suppose that she can have any expectations of anything else.'

'Brian, will you go and play with Dekko and Myles this morning? Your dad is coming here and we need to talk on our own.'

'Is it just me that you don't want to be here?' Brian wanted it clarified.

'No, Brian, it's not just you. Marilyn's going down to that craft shop, Annie's showing Sean the rest of Dublin. It's everyone.'

'You won't fight, will you?'

'We don't now, remember? So will you go to Dekko and Myles for a bit?'

'Would you think it was okay if I went to see Finola Dunne? I bought her a present when I was in America.'

'Yes, of course, that's a great idea.' She laughed at his anxiety.

'That's not just me being awful and doing the wrong thing, is it?'

'You're wonderful, Brian,' his mother said.

'But a bit different?' This was too much praise, he wanted it tempered.

'Very different, that's for sure,' said Ria.

He came at ten o'clock, and rang on the front door.

'Haven't you got your keys?' she asked.

'I turned them in to Mrs Jackboot,' he said.

'Don't call her that, Danny. What would she have done with them, do you think?'

'Search me, Ria. Cemented them to a stone maybe?'

'No, here they are, on the key-holder at the back of the hall. Shall I give them back to you?'

'What for?'

'For you to show people around, Danny. Please let's not make it more difficult than it is.'

He saw the sense in that. 'Sure,' he said and held his hands up as a sign of peace.

'Right, I have some coffee in a percolator up here in the front room, will we sit in there and if you'll forgive the expressionGCa make a list?'

She had two lined pads ready on the round table and two pens. She brought the coffee over to them and waited expectantly.

'Look, I don't think that this is going to work,' he began.