The Four Streets: The Ballymara Road Part 24

'I don't know what he's worried about,' said PC Shaw. 'No one is going to let anything like this concerning a politician get out to the public. It will definitely all be covered up. It will all be pinned on the policeman now. He's a goner with those lab results, and that's for sure.'

But when PC Shaw opened an envelope of photographs, he blanched in horror.

'And here we have it,' he said. 'Yet another link. Jesus, someone is shaking that tree pretty hard. They are falling like leaves.'

'Let me see,' said Howard. 'Well, what do you know? Here they are, both together, very cosy, the priest and Simon. So now we have it, the link that binds them together, that and a b.l.o.o.d.y mallet.' Howard sounded sorrowful when he added, 'Simon can only be hanged once, but hanged he will be, for both.'

There was something painfully sad and disappointing about the fact that Simon was one of their own. PC Shaw drained the last of the whiskey bottle into two mugs and handed one to Howard.

'Here, drink this,' he said. 'Makes it all much easier to stomach.'

22.

MRS MCGUIRE SAT in the window seat of the hotel foyer, looking out onto the main road, drinking her tea and pondering. What a strange situation it was indeed that, because of Mary's new affluence, she could now afford to do this.

Some of the local children were walking past, on their way home. They stared in at the three-tiered plate, piled high with fancies and millionaire's shortbread, just as she and Maisie had done when they were girls.

A scruffy-looking young boy, who looked as though he hadn't seen soap and water for a month and wearing a jumper with more holes than st.i.tches, his face full of envy and resentment, put out his tongue at Mrs McGuire.

She was far from shocked. Sure, didn't me and Maisie do the same, she thought, as she leant forward and put out her own tongue back at him. The other boys laughed and pushed the cheeky boy to move him along.

'Sorry, Mrs McGuire,' shouted a boy she recognized, but for the life of her, could not name.

She smiled back, to let him know, she took no offence.

I've been away for too long and missed too much, she thought, as she sipped her tea and waited for Mary and Alice to return.

Mary had been delighted that Sister a.s.sumpta was happy to hand over the contract signed by Kitty.

'All we have to do now is get ourselves to Dublin. We will talk to this Rosie O'Grady and then we can find the girl who gave birth to my baby. I know that, no matter what, she will want to help. Who wouldn't, Alice? No one would deny a child the gift of life, now, would they? I will make it worth her while. I bet she is just a poor girl from the country.'

'Of course she will help. Anyone would,' Alice replied. 'When do you think we should leave for Dublin?'

'Tonight, if Mammy agrees. We don't have hours to waste, never mind days.'

Alice was distracted. She wished she could speak to Sean. She knew who the mother of the baby was and, what's more, she knew where she lived. There was no need for any visit to Rosie O'Grady.

The baby was dying and only his parents could save him. Alice knew for sure that one was already dead. Alice was part of the conspiracy, an accomplice in that parent's murder, a murder that would never be spoken about.

And the other parent was Kitty. She could get them to Kitty Doherty within a couple of days.

'Oh G.o.d, this is awful,' Alice groaned.

'What is?' asked Mary, unwrapping the shawl from around the baby and laying him on his back on her knee. Holding his little feet in her hands, she smiled at him and blew him kisses. Her heart felt lighter than it had since the day she had first received his diagnosis.

'Oh, it's nothing, I'm just tired,' said Alice, pressing her forehead on the cold gla.s.s and looking out of the window.

How could Alice explain that Kitty lived on the four streets, doors away from Alice's own son, Joseph?

'No woman who leaves her son has the right to call herself a mother,' Mrs McGuire had said to Alice when she had first arrived in America. She was right. Alice had no business thinking of herself as a mother, but that didn't stop her heart from breaking every day for the baby boy she had never wanted, had finally learnt to love and then had left behind in running away with Sean. And now Sean wanted her to have another child, as though Joseph had never existed. Alice had never wanted children but she knew in her heart that Joseph had taught her to love. She might have left him, but she would not desert him. He would remain her only child.

If she told Mary where Kitty lived, she would have to return to Liverpool and face her demons. If she didn't tell Mary, this Rosie O'Grady would lead them straight there anyway.

A baby was dying. Alice would be obliged to tell Mary that she knew who Kitty Doherty was. It was going to happen. Alice would have to return to the four streets. The thought made her stomach clench and her heart scream, for a sight of Joseph. Sean no longer occupied all her thoughts. She was smart enough to realize that things were not as she had expected them to be. She loved America, the freedom and the way of life, but she was also beginning to acknowledge, if only to herself, that she no longer loved Sean.

Mrs McGuire watched the taxi pull up outside the window and asked the waiter to bring another tray of tea for Mary and Alice.

'Well, h.e.l.lo there, and how is the little man?'

Mrs McGuire stood up, to take the baby from Mary.

'He is grand, so he is, and so are we,' said Mary, grinning.

'Well, that's the first time I have seen a smile on your face for some weeks. So the visit must have been worthwhile then?'

'It was, Mammy. We have the name of the girl and the name of a midwife in Dublin who sent her with her family to the Abbey. All we need to do is travel to Dublin, find the midwife and then we will have the address of where the girl lives. It has all been much easier than I thought. I'm famished. Are those cakes for us?'

Mrs McGuire smiled. Tea and cake. Always her daughter's favourite. There wasn't a problem in the world that she and her Mary couldn't solve, over a cuppa and an almond tart.

'They are delicious fancies, so they are. Tuck in, Mary. And you, Alice. Sit down now while ye tell me, what was the Abbey like? Was it nice to see the Reverend Mother again? I bet she and Sister Celia made a great fuss of this little fella, didn't they just?'

Mary and Alice exchanged a glance that Mrs McGuire missed as she lifted the baby into the air and bounced him up and down in her arms, making cooing and gurgling baby noises at him.

'I will speak to Porick. He and his da will take us to Dublin to see the midwife. What hospital's she at, then? What is her name?'

Two waiters began to offload the contents of a trolley onto the low table, placing teacups and saucers in front of them. Alice felt as though they were taking forever, deliberately hovering, to eavesdrop on their conversation. The clinking of the china and the babbling of Mrs McGuire's chatter grated. She willed the waiters to hurry and felt her heart beating faster in panic. Her mouth became dry. The sooner she did it, the better.

'Mrs McGuire,' said Alice.

She hadn't realized that it would come out as a dry croak. Mrs McGuire didn't hear.

Alice tried again. 'Mrs McGuire, Mary.' She reached out and touched Mary's arm, to attract her attention. 'I know who the girl is. I know the name on the contract and, Mrs McGuire, so do you.'

Mary and Mrs McGuire stared at Alice, waiting for her to continue.

'Is this why you have been acting strange since we left the convent?' asked Mary. 'Who is she then?'

Alice stared Mrs McGuire straight in the face.

'It's Kitty Doherty, Mrs McGuire, Maura and Tommy's daughter.'

'My G.o.d, no,' Mrs McGuire replied.

'Well, Mammy, is that not good? It saves us the visit to the midwife. We can go straight to wherever the girl lives,' said Mary, sounding encouraged. But now, for reasons beyond her understanding, the atmosphere tightened as hope took flight.

Mrs McGuire looked pale. 'Kitty's mammy, Maura, was one of Brigid's best friends. They live on the four streets. But I am afraid I have bad news for you both. Kitty Doherty is dead.'

'What do you mean, dead? She can't be.'

Alice felt as though she had been hit. Tears sprang to her eyes and, for no apparent reason, an image of Bernadette, Maura's closest friend, leapt into her mind. Bernadette, whom Alice had usurped before her body was even cold in her grave, was here, in her mind's eye.

Alice spoke again. 'How do you know she is dead, anyway? I'm sure you must be wrong. Kitty is only, what, fifteen at the most? She can't be dead.'

'She is. She drowned in the river near Kathleen's farm on the Ballymara Road, about six months ago. By my reckoning, if she is his mother, it must have happened only days after she gave birth to this little fella, although no one knows about him and that's for sure.'

Mrs McGuire blessed herself as she laid the baby over her shoulder, hugging him tight.

Quietly, her voice loaded with sorrow, Alice asked, 'How do you know all this, Mrs McGuire?'

'Because today I visited the woman who is truly married to my son, the woman who carries my family name and who is the mother of my Sean's children. I didn't visit my friends. I travelled to see my daughter-in-law, Brigid, and she told me. She was at the wake in Liverpool. She rushed to the side of her friend as soon as she heard the news.'

Mary picked up the teapot and stared at her mother. The consequences of what she had just said sank in. The baby's mother was dead and no one knew who the father was.

Mrs McGuire took control.

'We will set off for Liverpool in the morning, Mary. The doctor said we needed a family member for a match, did he not? Well, Maura is this little fella's grandmother and Tommy is his grandad, and their children, Kitty's brothers and sisters, are his family too, and nicer people you could not meet. Maura is from Killhooney Bay and Tommy, well now, he is from Cork. And you, Alice, can come with us. Maybe ye would like to see your own little lad, while we are there.'

Now it was Alice's turn to cry.

Mrs McGuire slid the cup of tea that Mary had poured across the low table towards Alice, and handed the baby to Mary.

'Here, drink this,' she said, pa.s.sing a cup to Mary and lighting herself a cigarette.

She felt compelled, always, to make Alice suffer for what she had done to her family, but, being a kind woman at heart, she felt bad afterwards.

Leaning back in the chair and taking a deep pull on her cigarette, she thought through what tomorrow would now hold. We will have to leave early, she thought. I have tonight. I have this one night finally to get even with Maisie.

While she pondered, she looked across the road and watched Mr O'Hara as he locked up the butcher's shop. It was why she had chosen this table. She and Maisie used to stare at this very table and imagine which cakes they would order, when they were ladies, taking afternoon tea in the hotel.

She was meeting him again, tonight, at O'Connolly's pub.

The lives, and the demands, of the younger generation were exhausting her. She was too involved. They were far too dependent upon her. Most of the time, she didn't mind at all. But the arrival of Sean, with Alice, in America had altered things. He had let her down, broken her heart. Mary's willingness to be complicit in their deceit had surprised her. The disappointment she felt in her son, for leaving his wife and daughters, never faded.

She had spent too long being a hands-on grandmother and, in the process, had lost much of her own life. Tonight, she would take some of that back. She would be daring, do something that no respectable woman, at sixty years of age, would even consider. If her friends in the village knew what she was planning, they would disown her.

To h.e.l.l with them, she thought. Just one night, that's all I want. Just one. I want to remember the last time I ever slept with a man. I want to grow old, thinking: that was it. It was him. It was there and it was then and I loved it.

She looked at her daughter and at her fake daughter-in-law. Mary was tucking the blanket around the baby in the carrycot.

'Right, Mammy. I'm off to pack. Alice, are you OK?'

Alice looked anything but OK.

Mrs McGuire answered for her.

'She has to face her own healthy little boy, Mary, and the women she deserted and the families she destroyed and the stepdaughter she left distraught and stunned into silence by her own grief when Kitty died. Where was Alice then? Why shouldn't she be all right? I hear Alice has always been good at getting her own way, so she shouldn't worry. Liverpool will be a breeze, won't it, Alice?'

'Mammy, enough, stop. You are only acting like this because Sean isn't here.'

Mary was shocked at the way her mother was behaving. Mary didn't like what Sean and Alice had done any more than her mother did. Every time she attended ma.s.s she prayed for their forgiveness, and she saw her job as acting as referee, to keep the peace as far as that was possible. It had been Mary's idea to bring Alice along. It was an act designed to involve her and make her feel part of the family.

'I for one am very glad you are here with us, Alice.' Mary threw a look to Mrs McGuire that said, stop, now.

Alice didn't bother to say anything. She thought of the fifty thousand dollars she had drawn from her bank account and had used to line her suitcase. Sean had entrusted her with the money that Henry had paid them for the house. She didn't have to return to America at all, nor put up with the likes of Mrs McGuire, nor Sean's demands for another baby. Fifty thousand dollars was a huge sum of money. With that amount she could be set for life in England. Even as she had placed the bundles in her suitcase, she had failed to acknowledge to herself that this was her intention all along.

As the lift door closed on Mrs McGuire, Alice whispered, 'Go to h.e.l.l, you witch.'

That night, as Alice lay in bed, she hatched her plan. There was no court that would refuse a mother custody of her child. She would return to England with Mary and then claim back her son. Mrs McGuire might be no Kathleen and Sean no Jerry, but Alice had burnt her boats. She knew that neither Kathleen nor Jerry would ever want to know her again. She was alone now. She would take Joseph away and the two of them would find a little house, over the water in Birkenhead, or one of those nice suburbs, and they would live a quiet, gentle life, just Alice and her boy.

He already had her drink waiting when she arrived at O'Connolly's.

He was sitting at the corner table, as far away as possible from the toilets and the jukebox. For the first time since they were kids, she thought he looked nervous.

'I got ye a gin and orange squash, the same as before. Is that all right, now?'

He had stood up to greet her and removed his cap as she approached the table. Waiting for her reply, he stubbed his cigarette out in the ashtray, rolled up his cap and stuffed it deep down into his pocket. His black waistcoat strained against b.u.t.tons that threatened to pop. The thought crossed her mind that it had been many a year since he had last worn it.

'Aye, that's grand, thanks. If you don't mind me saying, I need that right now and another to follow, after the day I have had.'

He picked up his Guinness. 'Aye, well, for a long time now mine has been much the same as every other day. There are never any surprises for me. It does always come as a great shock, I suppose, when a customer dies and hasn't paid their bill, but that is as bad as it gets.'

They both burst out laughing. She realized it wasn't something she did very often any more. Laugh. She was often concerned, busy, useful, needed, but not for herself, always for someone else. As their laughter abated, she looked into his eyes. She didn't see a sixty-year-old face, laughing back at her. She saw the face of over forty years ago, just the same. Unaltered. Hidden by extra weight and some wrinkles, it might have been, but she looked through that to the boy she had known before.

Be bold. Be bold. The words raced through her mind as they weighed each other up.

He still has nice eyes, she thought.

She has the figure of a woman half her age, he thought.

She knew he would be shy. He would have no idea of her wild thoughts or crazy intentions. If she weren't bold, she would lose her nerve and change her mind.

Be bold.

She leant across the table to say the most daringly outrageous words she had ever uttered, but, even as she began to speak, she had no idea what those words would be.

He surprised her and spoke first.

'Ye are a sight for sore eyes and one that hasn't left my mind for these forty years gone, now, do ye know that?'

'But you married Maisie,' she replied, very matter-of-fact.