The O’Hara Affair (15 page)

‘Do!’ said Daphne. ‘What are we having?’

‘Egg salad,’ said Nemia.

‘I can’t,’ said Dervla. ‘I – um…can’t.’

The two women looked at each other. ‘I understand,’ said Nemia, after a beat. ‘Not everybody likes egg salad.’

And Dervla knew that she was being very gently let off the hook.

Turning away, Nemia started steering Daphne back up the driveway. ‘Look, Daphne!’ she said. ‘A pheasant!’

‘Where? Where!?’

‘You just missed it – it’s in the long grass over there. What a splendid day it is! I’m glad we decided on a jaunt to the beach today. It’ll be your first time in my new car! You can
sit and look at the waves dancing in the sun. And while there are showers forecast, the long-term weather forecast is…’

Dervla watched as Nemia and Daphne walked away, hand in hand, their voices receding. Nemia’s pace was measured to Daphne’s, her attention wholly centred on the old lady, her demeanour that of a guardian angel.

Dervla felt…inadequate.

Later, Dervla was sitting behind the counter in Bacchante, wishing that someone would come in. Beyond the window there was a lot of toing and froing: well-heeled tourists were window-shopping, backpackers were consulting their
Rough Guides
, locals were gossiping in shop doorways, a busker was playing a guitar. Ardmore was bigger than Lissamore – a town as opposed to a village. It was a popular tourist venue, and boasted several hotels, one of which – the five-star Demetrius – was situated directly across the road from Bacchante. The Demetrius was where most of the cast and crew of
The O’Hara Affair
were staying, and that was probably what was keeping Bacchante afloat right now: those movie people liked their wine.

There went one of them now: Corban O’Hara, no less. The valet had just pulled up under the porte-cochère in a limited edition BMW, and a porter was hooking a smart leather suiter onto the rear coat hanger. Funny. Dervla thought that Corban always stayed with Fleur when he came west.

Corban paused on the step of the hotel, said something to the porter and handed him a tip. Then he came across the road, and pushed open the door to Bacchante.

‘Good afternoon,’ he said.

‘Good afternoon, sir,’ replied Dervla. ‘May I help you, or would you just like to browse?’

‘I’m quite happy to browse, thank you.’

‘You’re welcome.’

Corban O’Hara strolled past the display shelves, pausing now and again to examine a label. He was a big man – well, powerfully built rather than big – and he exuded a confidence so rampant you could almost smell it. Dervla could see why Fleur was smitten: Mr O’Hara was a very sexy man. He bypassed the Burgundies, which Dervla thought was odd, given that his wine of choice at lunch last week had been a Meursault, and picked up a bottle of pink
prosecco
with a flamboyant name. It was a most
un
-Corban O’Hara wine, Dervla thought. Not just that, it was a most un-Fleur O’Farrell wine too. A woman as sophisticated as Fleur would never accept pink
prosecco
as a substitute for champagne.

Corban approached the counter and set the bottle down.

‘Anything else, sir?’ asked Dervla. She wondered if he might recognize her from Chez Jules, but he gave no indication that he did. She looked different, she guessed, with her hair pulled back and no make-up on, and anyway, he’d been too sidetracked by Shane’s young fans that day to notice her.

‘No, nothing else, thank you,’ said Corban O’Hara. His attention was diverted by the display rack of cards by the till. ‘Oh – you do cards.’

‘Yes. We giftwrap, too, at no extra charge. A lot of people buy wine as presents these days.’

‘It’s a good idea. Could you giftwrap it for me?’

‘Certainly.’

Dervla unfurled a length of wrapping paper, covertly watching Corban as he examined the cards. The one he chose bore the legend ‘For the Sweetest Thing!’ beneath a bubblegum pink cupcake.

‘That’ll be seventeen euros eighty-five, please,’ said Dervla, scanning the items.

She watched while he extracted his Vuitton card case. His cufflinks were gold, discreet but heavy. His jacket was Paul Smith, his shoes Italian leather.

‘Thank you,’ he said, and was gone. Dervla watched him through the window as he slid into the driver’s seat of his BMW, and took off.

‘Christian?’ she said, poking her head around the door that led into the back room, where her husband was busy doing his accounts. ‘If you had loads of wealth and a lot of taste and a mistress, what wine would you buy her?’

‘What kind of a question’s that?’ said Christian.

‘Just think for a moment. Would you buy her a bottle of pink
prosecco
?’

‘Absolutely not.’

‘Hmm. What kind of card would you pick for her?’

‘Dervla – is this some kind of stupid quiz on Facebook?’

‘No. I’m doing a bit of detective work. Would you give her a card with a cupcake on?’

‘My putative mistress? No. I’d give her one of those cards with a classy reproduction on.’

‘Like the Bonnard nude?’

‘Yeah – I guess so.’

‘Definitely not a cupcake?’

‘No. The cupcake’s more Megan than mistress.’

‘That’s what I thought.’

Christian’s phone went, and she left him to it. Looking at the display of cards, she reached for the cupcake one.
More Megan than mistress
. Megan was Christian’s eighteen-year-old daughter. Megan would probably love the cupcake card, if it came from a boyfriend. And she’d be delighted with the pink
prosecco
. But Fleur? Fleur most certainly would not.

‘Dervla! Fancy a walk?’

‘How funny, Fleur. I was just about to call you and ask that very same question.’

‘Serendipity! The beach? Or the bog road?’

‘The bog road,’ said Dervla. ‘Then we can stop off in O’Toole’s and have a drink on the way home.’

‘I’ll see you there in ten.’ Putting the phone down, Fleur moved to the door, switched the sign from ‘Open’ to ‘Closed’, and turned the key in the lock.

She threw an eye around the interior, checking that none of her precious stock was languishing on the floor. Fleur found the disrespect for garments that some customers displayed quite shocking. She never handled her beloveds with anything other than the utmost reverence. Tweaking here the strap of a charmeuse slip dress, there the zipper on a pencil skirt, Fleur moved through her shop, falling in love with it all over again.

Fleurissima had come into being as the brainchild of Fleur Thérèse Odette O’Farrell and Río Kinsella over two decades ago, shortly after Tom had left Fleur for his Canadian Mountie, and Río had broken her sister Dervla’s heart by hooking up with Shane Byrne. They had met at a music festival in Galway, she and Río, and had hit it off at once.
Both women were smart, independent and sassy, and – at the time – both of them dressed boho-style in second-hand threads. It had been fun in those early days, roaming the countryside in Río’s battered car, hunting for vintage clothes in house auctions and charity shops. But once Río’s baby boy had been weaned and was no longer portable, they had – reluctantly – gone their separate ways. Río was boho still and always would be, but Fleur had cultivated a classier look over the years, as the business took off and she found herself running it solo. Being
Parisienne
helped. Women tended to defer to her on matters of taste, and although half a lifetime spent in Ireland meant that Fleur had lost most of her French accent, she knew how to use it to effect when it suited her.

She had decorated the shop with Río’s help, in shades of ivory, cream and eau-de-nil. The interior had been inspired by the fin-de-siècle designs of Charles Rennie Mackintosh: a fusion of Art Nouveau flourish and Japanese simplicity. Carefully placed mirrors lent it the appearance of being larger than it was, and Fleur made sure the L-shaped space was never cluttered. She had designed a boudoir in the foot of the L – where she also displayed and sold Río’s paintings – and customers who spent a lot of time and money in the shop were invited to take their ease on a chaise longue with a copy of French
Vogue
, a dish of Fleur’s homemade chocolate truffles, and a glass or two of complimentary champagne. It worked every time. Invariably those pampered patrons helped themselves to one last frivolous purchase once the second glass of Laurent-Perrier kicked in.
‘What a darling set of lingerie!’ ‘Such sinfully divine mules!’ ‘I know I shouldn’t, but that little marabou-trimmed cardigan is just irresistible!’
Fleur couldn’t help smiling as she enveloped those precious last-minute items in tissue paper and sprinkled them with rose petals. An embossed Fleurissima card was always tucked
into the package for good measure. Fleur aimed to please, and she scored mostly bull’s-eyes. Patrons came back again and again, and brought new customers with them. To shop
chez
Fleur lent a gal
élan
. Her customers left the shop believing that some of the owner’s sophistication had rubbed off on them.

On completion of her inspection of the shop –
Merde!
What philistine had turned that embroidered silk tabard inside-out! – Fleur moved towards the back room to change into her walking gear. But a tap on the window made her turn. A boy in motorcycle leathers was standing beyond the window display. Giving her an appealing smile, he spread his hands.

‘We’re closed,’ Fleur mouthed at him.

The boy spread his hands further, and made his smile even more appealing. It worked. With a shrug and a look of mock-exasperation, Fleur moved back to the door and let him in.

‘Thanks a million,’ he said. ‘I won’t take up much of your time. I already know what I want.’ He indicated a pair of faceted gemstones in the display case. ‘Can you giftwrap them for me?’

‘Sure. Present for a girlfriend?’

‘No. It’s my mum’s birthday tomorrow – I nearly forgot about it. I can’t tell you how glad I am you let me in.’

‘Your mum’s a lucky lady. These are tourmaline.’

‘She deserves them. It’s her fiftieth.’

Fleur unhooked the earrings and reached for a length of tissue paper.

‘You’re Daisy’s aunt, aren’t you?’ the youth asked, setting his helmet down on the counter.

‘Yes.’

‘How’s she getting on in Africa?’

‘I haven’t heard from her.’

‘Neither have I. She’s not even updating her Facebook.’

‘Her father told me that there’s limited access to the internet where she is.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Yes. I think she has to get herself to a hill station to get online.’

‘She probably has better things to do with her time than fool around on Facebook,’ said the boy. ‘That was a really brave thing she did, giving up her career and all.’

‘Yes, it was. I’m very proud of her.’

As she unravelled a length of ribbon, Fleur glanced at the youth’s face. He was a cutie, with floppy dark hair and conkerbrown eyes. She guessed he was the boy who’d been riding the motorbike that had taken Daisy off on pillion, on the last Saturday morning she’d seen her in Lissamore. He was looking around desultorily at the stock on display: Fleur smiled to herself when she saw him eyeing a lace-trimmed polka-dot bra and panty set.

‘Are you here on holiday?’ she asked.

‘No. I’m working on
The O’Hara Affair
. I’m an assistant director. Well, I’m actually assistant to the assistant.’

‘Oh?’ Fleur was just about to ask if he knew somebody called Bethany O’Brien, when she realized that if he
did
know her, and word got back to Bethany that Fleur of Fleurissima had been asking about her, well, it would look very odd indeed. So she zipped her lip, and instead she said: ‘Do you know my friend Río? She’s working as a set-dresser on the film.’

‘Río the fox? Sure I know her. She’s great gas. Everybody loves Río.’

Fleur filed this tidbit of information away, to tell her friend later. ‘Are you paying by cash or credit?’ she asked.

‘Cash.’

‘In that case, I’ll give you ten euros off.’

‘Hey – that’s bloody decent of you! Why?’

Fleur shrugged. ‘You have a nice smile,’ she told him. He laughed. ‘So do you.’

As she handed over the giftwrapped package, there was a moment between them when something unspoken hung in the air, and then the door to the shop opened and Corban walked in.

‘Corban!’ said Fleur. ‘I didn’t expect to see you until the weekend.’

‘Surprise,’ was the laconic response.

Corban stood to one side, and the boy left the shop with a breezy, ‘Thanks very much! See you again!’ and a cheeky smile at Fleur. Then, producing a bunch of tulips from behind his back, Corban said, ‘For you.’ He strolled over to her, dropped a kiss on her mouth, and handed her the flowers.

‘Thank you!’

‘There’s more.’ He set a carrier bag on the counter.

‘You’ve been shopping in Dunnes?’

‘I have.’

‘But you never shop in Dunnes!’

‘There’s a first time for everything.’ Corban took a fruitcake and a packet of Cheerios from the carrier bag, and then he pulled Fleur into him and kissed her properly.

‘Tulips in mid-summer?’ she said, when he finally released her from his embrace. ‘How did you get hold of them?’

‘I ordered them specially.’

‘Why?’

‘They were the only flowers that could adequately express the way I feel.’

‘Er…you mean, you feel like a tulip?’

‘Exactly like a tulip.’

‘And the fruitcake?’

‘I feel like a fruitcake, too.’

‘The Cheerios?’

He grimaced. ‘They’re to say goodbye. I know we’d planned to spend the weekend in Coolnamara Castle, but something’s come up, Fleur, and I have to go to London instead.’

‘So you drove all the way from Dublin to bring me tulips and fruitcake and Cheerios? You are a crazy man.’

‘Crazy for you. Now shut up shop and come to bed.’

‘Oh, Corban – I can’t. I’ve arranged to meet Dervla for a walk.’

He raised an eyebrow. ‘You’d rather go for a walk than come to bed with me?’

‘No, of course not. But you don’t cancel an arrangement with a girlfriend on account of a man. You just don’t. It’s one of the first rules of friendship.’