The Matchmaker (35 page)

Some friends had holiday homes and apartments in Marbella and Alcudia and the Algarve, but they were blessed with having Annabel’s cottage to come to, Leo’s childhood haunt. Unspoilt and easy and relaxed, overlooking the beach and rocks, it was the perfect getaway. Leo had adored the place and summer after summer and on school breaks and holidays they had packed up the car and fled west. Sometimes Annabel was here, other times she would let them have the place to themselves as she visited friends and relations in England and far-flung places. The children had grown up with Gull Cottage, learned to swim here, and play tennis and sail and surf. It was a place for firsts. Lying here on the rug brought back a flood of memories of other summer days: Sarah learning to walk across the sand; Anna jumping off the rocks and breaking her leg; Grace spending hours making intricate castles and houses of sand. Her memory was of summers of ice-creams and warm bottles of lemonade, Tayto potato crisps, buckets and spades, sandals and towels, wet hair and togs, long walks on stormy days with anoraks and caps, watching the constantly changing colours of the water season after season and the roll of the sea as year after year passed. They had always planned when Leo retired to spend more and more time here, pottering around. The locals were lovely and Annabel Ryan had been a much-loved member of the community, involved in the village and devoting herself to reading and painting and gardening. Inheriting the house from her mother-in-law had been such a lovely gift and, despite Leo’s death, his brother David, who lived in Seattle, had been glad to see the old summer house stay in the family.

‘Are you getting in for a swim, Granny?’ coaxed Evie, standing over her. She’d been swimming for ages, and it never failed to amaze Maggie how small kids never felt the cold.

‘I’m just in a good place in my book.’

‘You weren’t reading: I was watching you! Come on, please. I want to show you my backstroke.’

Maggie smiled. Evie was like a little fish and now that her cast was off was making the most of being able to swim.

‘OK! OK!’ she relented, standing up, taking off her sunglasses and sunhat and leaving her book with the page marked as she took Evie’s hand.

Evie was such a good kid and an absolute joy in her life. She made being a grandmother easy with her sweet disposition and funny ways.

The water was cold and her toes curled with fright at the chill of the waves lapping around her feet.

‘Come on!’ urged Evie rushing in.

‘Give Granny a chance,’ warned Sarah who had waded in ahead of her. ‘It’s better to dip down quickly and get it over with,’ she advised, diving in and disappearing under a wave.

Maggie walked a little further out, the water lapping against her knees and thighs and hips, freezing the blood in her veins. Taking a deep breath she dipped right in and began to swim.

Evie popped up beside her like a porpoise. ‘Granny, watch, watch!’

She trod water chatting to the girls as Evie turned around and began to do a very good backstroke, arms and legs kicking in perfect time. They all clapped and she beamed with pride, her dark hair sleek and clinging to her head.

‘Good girl,’ said Sarah, proudly hugging her.

Anna ventured out deeper, then turned and swam parallel to the shore, her strokes even and strong, back and forward. Maggie swam along with her for a few minutes, before turning back for the beach as the cold water began to chill her.

‘I’m getting out before I freeze,’ she called as they swam on. She wrapped herself in the towel, scrubbing at her skin, drying herself off a bit, and then took off for a brisk fifteen-minute walk along the strand so the sun could warm her up.

The others were drying off, huddled on the rug sharing some chocolate she’d left hidden in her beach bag, when she got back. She took a square. Evie was sitting on Sarah’s knee regaling them with silly jokes she had heard in school.

‘Rob’s coming over for dinner tonight if that’s OK,’ said Anna. ‘I’ll cook.’

Maggie smiled, catching the knowing glint in Sarah’s eye. ‘That’s great, love. He’s a nice guy. Your grandmother always relied on Rob and had a lot of time for him.’

It surprised her to see the sudden affinity Anna had developed with the place. She was relaxed and at ease with herself here; the landscape and its simplicity had a hold on her and falling for Rob O’Neill had certainly had a great deal to do with it. Whenever he was around Anna it was clear to see that they meant a huge amount to each other. She didn’t want to interfere but if Anna was serious about him she was going to have to make some decisions.

‘Grace will be here on Friday; she’s coming straight from work,’ Anna reminded them. ‘Rob said he might hold a barbecue on Saturday in his place if everyone is free.’

‘That would be lovely.’ Maggie smiled, thinking how well things were working out for Anna and Sarah. The only one she had to worry about was Grace. Whatever was going on between her eldest daughter and Mark was a mystery!

‘Angus is going to come up on Saturday; do you think Rob would mind him joining us?’

‘The more the merrier,’ Anna said as she lashed on some sun block. Her skin was the fairest in the family and she didn’t want to look like a boiled lobster.

‘Angus has never been to the west of Ireland, he thinks it might be like the highlands! He wants Evie and me to go to Scotland with him for a long weekend at the end of the month before Evie goes back to school.’

‘So you’ll get to meet the Hamilton clan,’ exclaimed Anna, tightening the lid on the bottle of sun lotion.

‘Yes. It’s a bit scary, I suppose.’

‘And we might see the Loch Ness monster,’ added Evie, kicking the sand with her feet and burrowing with a small piece of driftwood.

‘We’re only going for three days,’ Sarah reminded her, ‘so I’m not sure we’ll be anywhere near there!’

‘If his family are even half as nice as Angus you’ll be fine,’ Maggie reassured her. She could see Sarah was nervous of Angus presenting a girlfriend with a child but any time she had heard him chat about his parents they seemed kind, good-hearted people.

‘Things must be getting serious!’ teased Anna.

Sarah flung a flip flop at her. ‘You’re a fine one to talk!’

Maggie picked up her book. She was saying nothing; she had interfered enough. At this stage it was up to them!

Anna stood in the centre of Rob’s kitchen chopping tomatoes and slicing peppers and cucumbers for the salad while he checked the marinated chicken pieces and rubbed a little crushed garlic on the steaks. His parents, Pat and Sheila, and his sister Dee and her family had all arrived about half an hour ago. Sheila, in a denim skirt and linen blouse, was outside wandering around looking at the plants in the garden. She’d brought Rob a pot of rosemary which he’d placed out on the kitchen step.

‘A few sprigs are great when you’re roasting a bit of lamb or a chicken,’ she encouraged him.

‘Great match in Thurles today,’ ruminated Pat, pouring himself a glass of red wine. ‘Galway should get through to the quarter-finals now.’

‘Tony Fahey was on fire,’ agreed Rob, and the two of them began a deep discussion on the merits of the GAA football game.

Watching him she could see the two of them had an easy relaxed relationship and a similar outlook on life. Dee was small and plump with mischievous dark eyes and a great sense of humour. She worked part-time as a nurse in the local hospital and her husband Luke and two boys were sitting in the garden. The salads done, Anna carried them outside in three big ceramic bowls and, grabbing a glass of wine, joined the others. Dee was on sparkling water as she was expecting again in December.

‘The boys are so wild, I don’t know how we’ll cope if we have another,’ she joked as seven-year-old Tim and younger brother Ferdia wrestled fiercely and tumbled on the grass.

‘Hey, you two, behave!’ warned their grandmother, plumping on to a sun-chair beside her.

From the road outside Anna heard the sound of a car stopping and ran to welcome her own mother and sisters and Angus, leading them inside to meet everyone.

‘Wow!’ said Grace admiringly the minute she saw the house, taking in the tall windows and magnificent sea views.

After fixing a drink for everyone Rob proudly gave them a quick tour of the place while Anna made the salad dressing and checked the potatoes they’d tossed in oil and herbs that were roasting in the oven.

Angus was very impressed and made Rob give him a blow-by-blow account of the conversion from country schoolhouse to such a stunning home.

‘You’ve done an amazing job!’ Grace was full of praise. ‘It’s spectacular and Anna tells me that you’re doing a similar job on the old Corry Lighthouse.’

‘It’s a totally different project, but it’s great to be involved in restoring rather than bulldozing a place!’

Sheila and Maggie, the two mothers, were getting on like a house on fire, gossiping about the neighbours and poor Angela Reynolds who lived on her own in the village with a little Yorkshire terrier and was ill and refusing to go into a nursing home.

At first Evie had hung back and clung to the grown-ups but once she got talking to Tim and Ferdia she forgot about her shyness and was soon racing like a lunatic after the football that Ferdia had discovered under a bush, the dog barking and racing alongside them.

‘She’s having great fun!’ Sarah was delighted, her eyes shining.

Rob had heated up the barbecue and in no time the smell of beef and chicken and sausages cooking filled the air.

Anna had already set the table and soon Rob was handing out the meat and tasty big fat sausages. The kids immediately smothered them in ketchup. Anna passed round the bowl of piping hot potatoes.

‘Compliments to the chef!’ teased Luke as he tucked in.

Anna grabbed a seat beside Grace who she could tell was feeling rather out of it.

‘This place is perfect,’ Grace said softly, ‘and so is he.’

‘Sssh.’

‘Anna, I mean it,’ said Grace seriously, gazing into her eyes. ‘Rob is perfect for you!’

‘I know,’ she admitted, glancing up the table to where he was sitting laughing with Angus and his mother and telling some crazy fishing story. ‘Sometimes I just can’t believe it, we’re complete opposites but somehow it seems to work.’

‘You’re lucky.’ Grace smiled a little enviously.

‘What about you?’ she coaxed. ‘Any word from Mark?’

‘He’s still away,’ confided Grace, ‘but last week he sent me a text to say he’s thinking of me. I’m not exactly sure what it means but it’s something. He doesn’t phone or call or email me, just this silly three-word text!’

‘At least he got in touch with you,’ Anna said consolingly as she took a sip of her wine. She glanced around the garden and terrace; everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves. She’d been dreading having both families for a meal and if Rob hadn’t insisted she wouldn’t have agreed to it. Now she was glad that they had made the effort. Sitting here looking out over the waters of the Atlantic sharing food and wine on a summer’s day with those they both loved made her feel somehow complete.

Later, after everyone had gone home and they’d washed the dishes and tidied up they lay in bed watching the moonlight shimmer on the water, her body a little on top of his, replete, passion spent, wrapped in each other’s arms.

‘I want you to stay,’ he said.

‘I am staying.’ She laughed, pressing her knee against his thighbone.

‘No, I mean I want you to stay always. Not just some weekends and holidays and nights here and there. I want you to stay here with me, live with me, move in with me and . . . the dog.’ He had sat up a bit, leaning forward, watching her reaction.

She could see his eyes and the way his stubby dark eyelashes made them seem bigger, and the scars from when he was a teenager and had acne, and the small dark freckle on his neck.

By rights they had nothing absolutely nothing in common. Rob was a builder who had left school at sixteen, she was an acknowledged expert in Anglo-Irish literature; he hated poetry and namby-pamby books, while she lived for language and words; he was a country guy and she a city girl. Yet she knew that she couldn’t live without him and that every separation was a little like dying, killing her. She had hated the real world, wanted only the type of romance and love written about in literature; now all she wanted was this warm, loving, ordinary man. Before Rob she had wanted to close her eyes to the world, enjoy her silence and solitude, but he, like a knight of olden times, had rescued her from the high walls she had built around herself. Now when she woke there was coffee and laughter and talk about the day and the future and everything that life held . . .

‘Yes,’ she said softly for she wanted it as much as he did. She had wasted enough years. She had no idea how they would make it work. Her career, work, finances, her house back in Dublin, the possibility of applying to Galway University to get some lecturing work . . . It was all up in the air but the logistics didn’t matter, the important thing was that she was going to move in with Rob and spend her life with him. She reached up and kissed him, wrapping her arms around his neck as slowly they took turns showing how much they loved each other.

Maggie took a deep breath as she took in the sweeping driveway and magnificent view of Anua, the low building of wood and glass and stone that was perched overlooking the tranquil waters of Kilcara’s lake. A lazy heron spread its wings and took off in flight across the water.

The luxury spa in its Wicklow setting was beautiful. It deserved the accolades heaped on it, she thought as she drove along the wooded avenue and came to a halt in the discreetly planted hidden car park.

She could curse her sister Kitty for coming down with a strep throat in the middle of the night and backing out of their planned two-day break. She had sounded dreadful when they’d spoken earlier and Harry, worried by her high temperature, had got a doctor to call to the house. She was on high-dose antibiotics and prostrate in bed. Poor thing! No doubt the stresses and strains of organizing Orla’s upcoming wedding were taking their toll.