Chapter 23
The warehouse on Laundry Lane, where the knitting circle was now encamped, was a hive of activity.
Finnuala was sitting behind what looked like two old school tables pushed together, two laptops open in front of her.
Another woman was explaining something to her, pointing at the screen and moving the cursor around.
There was a standard lamp which looked like it had been taken from someone’s home or from the Goodwill, a peach floral shade with a fringe.
Eddie and another man were pushing along a piano.
‘Need to have a bit of a sing-song,’ Eddie said, as they shifted it along on wheels.
‘This thing was hanging around in one of the houses. They were only too glad to get rid of it.’ They paused to get their breath. ‘Kerry-Anne, have you met Matty Moran?’
Matty shook my hand. ‘Delighted to make your acquaintance. It’s great all this, isn’t it? We need a bit of action. It’s all go.’
‘Matty says he’s going to have a go at the old knitting malarkey,’ said Eddie.
Matty nodded confidently. ‘I don’t see why I shouldn’t. I can tie any kind of knot, and isn’t knitting just knotting with a vowel change?’
Eddie laughed. ‘It’s not as easy as it looks. Believe me, I tried. My mam taught me and Mary, who was a whizz, but I kept making a hames of it. Clumsy hands, you see.’
Matty surveyed him. ‘I reckon us old dogs can still learn new tricks. I’ll be clothing the population of Sandycove in no time. But first I want a scarf for meself. By the time winter is locked in, I’ll be kitted out.’
There was a sofa in the corner where three women were sitting, their feet perched on a small tapestry stool, hands whirring away with needles, the ball of wool bobbing beside as they stitched away.
Mary and Betty were unpacking bags of sweaters at another table and a woman was stacking a pile of large padded envelopes.
There was even a sink, worktop and a kettle.
Sheila was standing by it, holding a large tin of biscuits.
‘I recommend the pink wafers,’ she said. ‘They tend to go first, so delve in. You probably can’t get these delicacies in America. They’re an Irish special.’
I looked down at the lurid Barbie-pink biscuit. ‘People eat these? They look fake.’
‘Oh, they’re real all right. And absolutely delectable. I will save you one.’ She gave me a wink. ‘Unless Finnuala sniffs it out. She’s like a bloodhound when it comes to pink wafers.’ She glanced at me, up and down. ‘The shorts look very good on you. You have very good knees.’
‘I do?’
‘Knees are much undervalued.’ Sheila spoke with real feeling. ‘Wait until you are my age and you need two new ones, then you appreciate all the work they do. Now, hot drop of tea?’
Eddie and Matty took a mug of tea each. ‘Just what the doctor ordered,’ said Matty.
Eddie laughed. ‘My doctor has ordered me to take it easy,’ he said. ‘No excitement. No surprises. And no fun.’
‘Sounds like my life,’ said Sheila. ‘Your doctor would be very happy with me.’
At the other end of the room, another group of women were setting up tables and organising the room into some kind of distribution hub. One was pinning a hand-written sign to the wall behind them, ‘The all-new knitting circle in memory of Antoinette and Lolly DeCourcey.’
I recognised the names from one of the newspaper articles I had read over breakfast. Wasn’t the special cup for the regatta named the Lolly DeCourcey Cup?
There were old black-and-white photographs mounted on card and also pinned to the wall, and there were images of a previous knitting circle.
In the middle was a severe-looking woman, her hair cut short in a bob with bangs, and a young girl with her arms around her neck, her long hair falling over her shoulders, laughing into the camera. ‘Is that Mrs DeCourcey?’
‘It is indeed,’ said Matty. ‘And that’s her daughter, Lolly. She was a pal of us all here. But she died far too young. Lovely looking, wasn’t she?’
‘She was,’ I agreed.
‘They only had each other,’ said Lucy, coming over and peering again at their faces. ‘They were as unalike as chalk and cheese but they were as knitted together as one of our jumpers.’
‘We all still miss Lolly,’ said Eddie. ‘It was a terrible shock to lose a pal so young. We were still teenagers and it was an accident. One of those things.’
‘Now,’ said Matty, more brightly, ‘we need to discuss the regatta and the renaming of the Lolly DeCourcey Cup. I’m dead against it, as you know, but there is only two of us on the committee holding out and it has to be unanimous, but William Richmond has some serious heft.
He’s bringing a whole load of the committee out on a golfing trip to Albufeira.
I think we might lose this one. No one except our generation knows who Lolly DeCourcey was.
’ Matty was looking at me. ‘You know,’ he said, ‘you remind me of someone. I can see it.’ He peered more closely. ‘Doesn’t she, Eddie?’
Eddie glanced up, nodded, and looked away. ‘Maybe.’
Finnuala, clutching a clipboard, a pen tucked behind her ear, came over and met me.
‘Well? What does our great gooroo think? We’re up and running.
Today Sandycove. Tomorrow the world! You’ve heard of the gathering of the clans, haven’t you?
This is the gathering of the grans!’ Whipping the pen from behind her ear, Finnuala began looking at her notes.
‘We have Ellen on quality control. She is seeing if any jumpers which are being brought along to be sold are worthy of inclusion. We only need knitters with what we are calling exceptional skills, and there’s a few of them around.
We are collecting those jumpers over there…
’ She used her pen to jab in the direction where one of the women was sitting, holding a sweater up to the light, peering at it, like a pawnbroker assessing gold.
‘Maggie over there is sewing on labels… wait, I’ll show you…
’ She reached into her trouser pocket and brought out a large square embroidered label: ‘Handmade by the Knitting Circle, Sandycove’, and a small woven symbol of a small sailing boat on a pair of crossed needles.
‘Do you like them? Lucy designed it for Mary and we had them done by a crowd in Dún Laoghaire, they make labels for school uniform and the like and they were only too happy to do a batch overnight. They were dropped in to us just now.’
‘I love them. The harp on the sea is lovely.’
‘Isn’t it just?’ Finnuala beamed at me, just as Sheila came over to us.
‘Happy with everything, Ms Daly?’
‘So far.’
‘I’m giving Kerry-Anne a tour,’ explained Finnuala to her.
‘Let me know if I forget anything. Right. And then we have Kathleen and Sarah-May on the computers. They will be dealing with the orders and all of that. And we’ll have a packaging and sending-off area.
But the most important thing is supply and stock. So, that’s what Sheila has been doing.’
Sheila nodded. ‘We have three designs currently in three colours: black, navy and grey. And various sizes. We thought we would keep it simple. Now, it will take time to have the stock to sell, but I’ve been around visiting a few knitting groups in the area and they all want to take part.
In a few days, we should have enough to start selling. ’
‘This is wonderful,’ I said.
‘Now, we’re not professional yet,’ said Finnuala. ‘But we will be. Give us a month or so and we’ll be properly up and running.’
‘But what about money and upfront costs?’ I asked.
‘We have everything on a loan,’ said Sheila. ‘Wool costs will be invoiced in six months. Needles, et cetera, ditto. Taxes LPT, and VAT TBC.’
Finnuala looked impressed. ‘You’ve a rival, Kerry-Anne. We have another business honcho in our midst. But Sheila did do a BTEC in Dún Laoghaire college in business, didn’t you?’
Sheila nodded. ‘And worked for ten years in Blake’s Beers in the accounts department, so I’m not totally green around the gills.’
Another woman came towards us. ‘I’ve been on to the packaging people,’ she was saying to Finnuala.
‘They can provide brown paper envelopes for sending everything out. The Post Office can provide a special rate, which is for community enterprises, which is doubled for community enterprises run by retired folk.’
‘Very good,’ said Finnuala. ‘Diana, may I introduce our gooroo? Kerry-Anne Daly, meet Diana Duffy.’
The woman turned to me, smiling, holding out her hand.
‘Pleasure to meet you and it’s so wonderful to have you among us.
And revitalise the knitting circle. My mother and two aunties were in it.
Made some money they wouldn’t have had otherwise, kept the wolf from the door.
Mam would put the money in a jar every week and we’d save for a week in Wexford in a caravan every August.’
‘So you were in the old knitting circle, with Mrs DeCourcey?’ I asked.
‘I was indeed,’ said Diana. ‘I was one of the young ones. Wasn’t allowed to knit, of course.
My skills back then weren’t up to scratch.
They are now. Back then, I worked the weekends and before school for Mrs DeCourcey, cleaning up, sorting through the wool, helping with the packaging and all of that.
I was a child when the first knitting circle was established.
I was tasked with winding wool, sweeping up, picking up the odds and the ends, that kind of thing.
I made tea for the women, as well. At 3 p.m. every afternoon, I pushed around a trolley, cups and saucers, plate of biscuits, and woe betide me if the tea was lukewarm.
Piping, it had to be. Mrs DeCourcey’s orders. ’
‘She was a stickler, wasn’t she?’ said Mary.
Diana nodded. ‘It would be my job to load up this very large and unwieldy handcart every Friday evening, to catch the last post before the weekend, with all the jumpers we were sending out. That cart was the bane of my life. It would often be doing its own thing, deciding where to go, not me, not wanting to go straight, things would topple off. I have my Fiat Punto now, so it will be a great deal easier.’
I smiled at her, turning to the three women. ‘This is a great start,’ I said. ‘You’ve all done really well.’
Diana snorted. ‘A start? It’s a mere continuation. The ebbs and flows of life. Finally we’re flowing again.’