Epilogue June 1987
Epilogue
The doorbell rang. Helen wiped her hands on a tea towel, left the kitchen and headed for the front door. It took quite a while. Dust sheets and builders’ equipment lay scattered in the hall.
She opened the door.
‘Con! My God! What on earth are you doing here?’
‘Ah, well, maybe I just had an urge to come back and see the place I used to call home and visit my old friend Helen.’ He opened his arms and embraced her awkwardly over the paint pots on the floor by the door.
‘Come in if you can,’ she smiled.
‘Major renovations, eh?’
‘Er, that’s the plan. The builders started six months ago, promising to be out by the summer.
So far I think they’ve managed to dry-line one damp wall, but then, this is Ireland.
I’m beginning to suspect they just use my house to store their equipment until they need it elsewhere.
Anyway, it doesn’t matter. Moneywise, the longer they take, the better.
Come through to the kitchen. It’s antique but there is room to sit down. ’
Helen brewed some tea and Con sat at the table.
‘You look good, Helen. You’ve lost an awful lot of weight.’
‘Ah, ’tis worry, Con Daly. For the first time in my life I’m counting the pennies rather than the pounds.’
‘To be honest, I’ve never seen you look happier.’
Helen brought two steaming mugs of tea to the table. ‘You’re right. For some cockeyed, unexplainable reason, I am happy. Maybe it’s age, my expectations becoming more reasonable. Maybe it’s this place. Having hated it as a child, I now love it with a passion. Thank God I never sold it.’
‘What are your plans, Helen? You must have some.’
‘Of course. In the fullness of time, I plan to open this house as a bed and breakfast. And I want to restock the stables. I always loved horses.’
‘I remember.’ Con sipped his tea.
‘So what about you? How was the tour? I’m afraid I don’t read the papers and the picture on the television is chronic. I’m completely out of touch.’
‘The tour was grand. Hard work but great fun. I think we all decided at the end it was a one-off. We’re all too old to sleep in our seats on tour buses then give one hundred per cent to an audience of forty thousand the following day.’
‘And the others? How are they?’
‘In good form. Ian is doing a course in organic farming, Derek has decided to move to Spain, and Todd is in the States.’
‘Really? On business?’
‘Lulu business.’
‘I see.’
‘She’s giving him a hard time as always, but there’s no denying he loves every second of it.’
‘And you? What are your plans?’
‘Well, there were two reasons I flew over. The first was to visit Sorcha’s mother. I thought, after all this time, I should.’
‘Oh, Con, Mary O’Donovan died last year, just before I came back.’ Helen shook her head. ‘She went to her grave thinking I murdered her daughter.’
‘I know she’s passed away. They told me in the village last night. Ah, well, if she’s up there, she’ll know the truth.’
‘Well, I’m afraid I gave up believing in all that a long time ago. Anyway, what’s the other reason you came back to Ballymore after all this time?’
‘Well now, Helen, as I said when I arrived, I wanted to speak with you.’
‘What about?’
He told her.
When he had finished, she stood up to boil the kettle. Halfway through filling it, she stopped. ‘Bugger it, how do you fancy a glass of whiskey?’
She fetched the bottle and two glasses and sat down at the table again.
‘Now let me see if I’ve got this clear. You want to start a foundation to give help and assistance to talented young musicians, particularly young Irish musicians. And you want me to run it for you?’
‘That would be about the size of the thing, Helen, yes.’
‘Why me?’
‘Because I know of no better business brain. And I hate to see it going to waste.’
‘My choice, Con. Brad offered me my directorship back at Metropolitan a year ago. I didn’t want it.’
‘I know. Helen, I would hate to interfere with your grand plans for this place, but I can hardly see you rising at dawn and slapping bacon and eggs in a frying pan for the rest of your life.’
‘If it does well enough, I’ll employ someone to do that for me,’ she grinned, taking a sip of her whiskey.
‘I was thinking, with grounds of this size, how well a small recording studio would fit into one of the old barns.’
‘Were you now?’
‘Yes. And with all these bedrooms, how it might be possible to run music masterclasses and seminars, invite professional musicians to come away down to Ballymore to give our young talent the benefit of their experience.’
‘Con, it seems you have all the ideas. Why on earth can’t you run this project yourself?’
‘Well now, Helen, that’s because I don’t intend on being around.
Not on a daily basis anyway. But that’s another story.
Listen, let’s get down to basics. If you’re keen on the idea, I’d be prepared to pay to renovate this house from top to bottom, fit out a recording suite in one of the barns and turn the house into a centre of musical learning.
You could employ as many staff as you wanted, which would mean involving the village.
In fact, it would put Ballymore on the map.
And you wouldn’t have to search far for your talent.
I was in a bar in town last night and I heard a young female singer who has the potential to be the next Alison Moyet. ’
Con’s eyes were sparkling with excitement.
‘This idea really has caught your imagination, hasn’t it?’
‘Yes. Helen, I’ve more money than I know what to do with. This would give me a chance to give something back, help the next generation. With our joint experience and connections, we really are in a position to make a difference.’
‘Oh, Con.’ Helen rubbed her forehead. ‘I don’t know, really I don’t.’
‘Then I’ll keep talking until you say yes.’
It was past eight in the evening before Con left the house.
It had taken a lot of persuasion, but he’d at last got Helen’s agreement in principle.
The finite details could be worked out in the fullness of time.
He wouldn’t be around for much longer, but he knew Helen.
Once she got the bit between her teeth, she wouldn’t need him.
Con strolled down the hill towards the sand dunes.
The sun was sitting on the horizon, a mass of orange, picture-postcard perfect.
He walked across the dunes and saw his old hut, half the roof missing, the windows boarded up, but still standing in defiance of the weather that assaulted it without mercy.
All Con Daly had ever wanted was to make something of his life, to escape the hut, and Ballymore. He had done that, but at a terrible cost.
He sat down on a dune and gazed out to sea.
‘Sorcha, I love you. I always will.’
The wind whipped up around him suddenly. He shivered slightly, sensing her presence strongly. It was time to go. Where? He wasn’t exactly sure. But it would be remote.
‘Goodbye, Sorcha, my love.’
Con began to gently sing her song. The last love song.
‘Losing you, after all these years of loving you,
Is the hardest thing I’ve ever been through.
And it’s true, after all the things I’ve said to you,
And the way that I’ve been cruel to you,
What else could I expect you to do?
Losing you, losing you.’
Con stood up and walked away from the beach.