Chapter 35
Sorcha stood next to her mother at the graveside as they watched Seamus’s coffin being lowered into the earth. She glanced at Mary’s face. Her mother was pale, but dry-eyed. Seamus’s sister was sobbing, but then Sorcha remembered that Orla cried buckets at weddings and christenings too.
‘All right, Mary.’ Father Moynihan spoke softly. ‘You can go forward now.’
Mary took a couple of steps, knelt down, and picked up some earth from the pile that would eventually cover her husband for ever.
She threw her handful into the hole and it splattered on top of the highly polished cedarwood coffin.
Sorcha found herself thinking what a waste of a hundred pounds it had been, and that a shroud really was much more practical.
Stop it, stop it! A voice in her head told her she should feel remorse – something – but in truth, she was empty. She squeezed her eyes closed.
Forgive me, God. I can’t pretend I loved him when I didn’t.
She opened her eyes and watched as the rest of Seamus’s relations filed by the grave, each throwing in a handful of earth.
‘Will you?’ Mary whispered.
Sorcha acquiesced to please her mother.
‘Right. That’s all over now, Mary,’ said Father Moynihan. ‘I’ll escort you and Sorcha back to your car.’
‘Thank you, Father. You’ll be coming back to the house for a glass of sherry, I hope?’
‘’Twould be grand, Mary.’
Sorcha followed her mother and Father Moynihan through the crowd of mourners. There were certainly many familiar faces. She kept her head down, not wishing to make contact just yet. After all, most of them would be coming to the house for the wake.
A photographer from the local paper stood by the entrance to the graveyard. He’d been hovering when the cortège had pulled up in front of the church and had watched hopefully as Sorcha and Mary climbed out.
‘Is your husband not here with you, Mrs Daly?’ he’d asked Sorcha as the driver had closed the door of the car behind her.
‘No.’
Sorcha had hurried past into the church.
Now he came forward, aimed his camera and took a photograph of the three of them walking towards the car.
Sorcha turned in anger. ‘Have you no scruples?’
‘Pardon, Mrs Daly, but we don’t get many wives of world-famous pop singers in the vicinity.’
Sorcha did not reply as she followed Mary and Father Moynihan into the back of the funeral car, which pulled off on the start of its short drive to the square. Mary reached for Sorcha’s hand and squeezed it.
‘Okay?’
‘Yes. You?’
‘Yes. It’s nearly over, Sorcha.’
She could hear the relief in her mother’s voice.
Once they arrived home, Sorcha installed Mary and Father Moynihan in the sitting room with a restorative glass of sherry, while she went into the kitchen to oversee the food preparation. Two of Mary’s friends had been working away since the early morning to provide a feast for the mourners.
Mrs Hurley, whom Sorcha had known since she was a baby, spoke shyly to her. ‘Sorcha, could you possibly pour the sherry? Then Eileen and I can hand it around as people start to arrive.’
‘Of course I can. And as you’re doing such a grand job in here, why don’t I hand it around as well?’
‘Of course, Sorcha. Whatever you want.’
For the next hour, Sorcha did her duty and furnished the assembled company with a glass of sherry or orange squash if they preferred.
People she had known since childhood – who had chastised her for almost knocking them over in the street or making too much noise as she played with her friends – now talked to her shyly, as though she was some strange alien being.
Their attitude upset her more than her father’s death.
It underlined her complete lack of identity and the fact that she didn’t seem to fit in anywhere.
As the sun beat down relentlessly, windows were opened, sandwiches consumed and more sherry sent for from Mrs Connolly’s store.
With Seamus properly laid to rest, the men removed their jackets and black ties, the ladies their hats, and everyone began to relax.
Sorcha wished they would all go home, but she knew that it was unlikely the last person would leave until late in the evening – and the chances were that they’d be carried out.
The sitting room was stifling. Sorcha’s head began to spin.
She needed some fresh air. Her mother was deep in conversation with Georgie O’Hea, one of the town’s shopkeepers, her face flushed from the heat and the sherry.
Sorcha determined it was safe to leave for a while.
She hurried down the staircase to the front door.
The air outside was cooler, and Sorcha gulped some into her lungs before walking across the road towards the square. She hadn’t even reached the gate when she heard her name being called.
‘Sorcha Mary O’Donovan! It is you!’
Sorcha turned around. There, running across the street towards her, was Maureen.
‘Sorcha!’ As she reached her, Maureen opened her now plump arms and threw them around her shoulders.
‘Ah, Sorcha! I was so afraid I might have missed you. I couldn’t get here any earlier ’cos I had no one to mind the kids but .
. .’ Maureen tried to catch her breath. ‘Ah, Sorcha, ’tis grand to see you again. ’
‘And you, Maureen. You look wonderful!’
‘Do I? Three little ones and as many stones, but I was never built to be Twiggy, was I now?’ She smiled. ‘Where are you going?’
‘To sit in the square and get some fresh air.’ Sorcha indicated the open first-floor window of her home. ‘It’s hot and squashed in there.’
‘Grand. It’ll give us a chance to have a chat.’ Maureen tucked her arm into Sorcha’s and they walked towards a bench in the middle of the deserted square.
‘So,’ Maureen said as she sat down heavily and patted the seat next to her, ‘tell me everything, right from the beginning. I’m desperate to know how one minute you were with me at the convent and the next you’d run off to England with Con Daly!
’ Maureen dug Sorcha hard in the ribs. ‘I was fierce hurt you didn’t confide your secret in me. I was supposed to be your best friend.’
‘I’m sorry, Maureen, really. Things happened so quickly. The only reason I didn’t write was that Con thought it best to make a complete break.’
‘Well, I can’t say I wasn’t tempted to steam open the letters you sent to our house to pass on to your mammy.
To find out what really happened, like, but I managed to control myself.
She never said anything to me when I’d drop the letters round, mainly because your daddy was always lurking in the background.
’ Maureen gave a gentle shrug. ‘I suppose I can forgive you. At least it gave us girls something to gossip about. We spent months speculating,’ she giggled.
‘The story went that you were pregnant by Con. Was that the truth?’
‘No,’ smiled Sorcha wistfully. ‘It wasn’t. All that happened was that my daddy found out Con and I were seeing each other. He forbade me to see him again and so we decided to run away.’
‘And you get married and he becomes rich and famous and . . . oh,’ sighed Maureen dreamily, ‘it’s like something out of a romance story.
Is Con with you, Sorcha? The whole village is hopping with excitement.
The rumour was that the whole band might come.
I’d hoped so. I think that Todd Bradley is fierce gorgeous. ’
‘No, he’s not. The band are very busy in London. They fly to the States in a few days’ time.’
‘For the concert in Central Park. I know. I’m a member of their fan club,’ Maureen chuckled.
‘So,’ said Sorcha, desperate to move away from the subject of her errant husband, ‘tell me about you.’
‘Oh, there’s nothing very exciting or unusual to tell. Not like your life, Sorcha. Perhaps your mammy told you I married Tommy Dalton a few months after you left?’
Sorcha smiled. ‘Yes, she did.’
‘We live in the flat over the shop with our three babies: Tommy Junior, Sean and Teresa, my dote of a little girl. Tommy works downstairs all the hours God sends and I work some he doesn’t,’ sighed Maureen.
‘It’s been a struggle to compete, what with the big new supermarket opening up at the end of the village, but things are fine now.
We’ve saved enough money to buy a plot of land.
We’ll start building our bungalow there next spring.
It’ll have a kitchen with a separate dining room, a sitting room and three bedrooms, can you believe?
At the moment we’re only having one – bedroom that is.
The kids have that and Tommy and I sleep on a put-you-up in the sitting room.
Ah, Sorcha, I can’t wait to move in. Think of all that space! It’ll be just grand.’
‘It sounds it, Maureen. So, you’re happy?’
‘Whatever happy is.’ She shrugged. ‘I mean, we all had so many dreams about the glamorous lives we’d lead when we were grown, how different they’d be to our mammies’ and daddies’, but they were dreams. I’ve stayed in Ballymore, I’m the wife of a grocer and I have three kids.
Almost identical to my mammy’s life . . .
Except I think I’ll stop at four or five little ones and get Tommy to tie a knot in it.
’ Maureen smiled. ‘I understand now why Mammy always looked so tired. There were ten of us!’ Maureen raised an eyebrow at her old friend.
‘I read in my fan magazine that you and Con don’t have any little ones yet. ’
‘No, but we hope one day we will have.’
‘Ah, you simply must have some. They’re the lifeblood of a marriage. Sometimes, if I’m feeling a bit low in the evenings, I go into their bedroom to see their angelic faces and it somehow makes things worthwhile.’
The two girls sat in silence for a few seconds.
‘And what of Katherine? And Mairead?’
‘Mairead married that awful John Donohue. You remember, the one who smelt of manure and had the terrible acne?’
Sorcha giggled. ‘I remember. How could Mairead fall for him?’
‘Because he started taking a bath once in a while and the spots disappeared almost overnight. He’s grand and handsome now so, Sorcha.
They live on his parents’ farm outside the town.
We meet up from time to time but she has two under three and no car of her own so it’s hard.
And as for the beauteous Katherine . . .
’ Maureen lowered her voice. ‘Well now, there is an interesting one.’
‘What happened?’
‘Well, Katherine got into Trinity College, as everyone expected she would. She was all set to go up there in the autumn when she turned round and announced she was marrying Angus Hurley.’
‘Angus Hurley? We once went to the cinema together. I never knew Katherine liked him!’
‘Well now, nor did my brother. She was walking out with him at the same time she announced her engagement to Angus.’
‘Oh dear. What did your brother say?’
‘He was in a desperate state. Mammy packed him off to stay with my auntie and uncle in Dublin. He never came back. Got himself a job as a salesman and has his own flat in Ballsbridge alongside a brand-new car. He’s a partner in the company now.
It’s an ill wind, as they say. He’s never married, mind. I think Katherine broke his heart.’
‘And you’ve never asked her why she married Angus?’
‘I only see her at mass. You know what the Hurleys are like – above themselves, thinking they’re grand because Daddy Hurley owns the factory and they’re rolling in it.
Katherine’s become one of them. They live in the old rectory overlooking the sea.
’ Maureen tutted. ‘She always looks like a fashion plate but her face is as long as Father Moynihan’s sermon.
So, that’s the three of us up to date for you.
How long are you staying in Ballymore, Sorcha? ’
Sorcha had begun to daydream about the past. ‘What was that?’
‘I asked how long you were staying.’
‘Oh, I really don’t know. I have to be back in London for the weekend. Con and I fly off to New York on Tuesday.’
‘All that jet setting. And I suppose you live in a wonderful big house?’
‘Yes, our house is big.’
‘And have money to buy anything you want?’
‘I suppose.’
‘Then why aren’t you radiant with happiness, Sorcha?’ Maureen studied her.
‘I—’
‘’Tis your daddy’s death, I suppose,’ she mused. ‘Ah well, it comes to us all. Listen, if you’re free tomorrow, why don’t you come for tea with us? You can meet the babies, and Tommy, if I can drag him out of the shop.’
‘I’d love to, Maureen, really, as long as my mother will be all right on her own. I was thinking I’d stay at least tomorrow.’
‘Of course. Well, I have to be off now to see to the babies. I promised Deirdre I’d only be a few minutes but I did so want to see you.
If there’s a problem, drop into the shop.
If not, I’ll see you at half past six tomorrow.
’ Maureen stood up. ‘I really am sorry altogether about your daddy, but at least it means I got to see you again, Sorcha. Goodbye.’
‘Bye, Maureen.’
Sorcha watched as her former schoolfriend hurried across the square in the direction of the high street. From behind, she looked the image of her mother.
Sorcha sat for a few minutes longer, listening to the poignant strains of a mourner singing an old Irish ballad. Standing up, she walked back to the house and opened the front door.
She passed by her father’s office and paused, wondering if she should go inside and telephone Con. She was torn. A part of her was desperate to speak to him, but her pride was preventing her. After a while, she carried on up the stairs.