An Irish Country Christmas

by Patrick Taylor

  Barry heard the concern in the man’s voice. Sonny had waited thirty-odd years to marry the woman he loved, and it certainly appeared to Barry that for Sonny the wait had been worth it. At the rate he himself was going with Patricia, he wondered if he’d have to wait thirty bloody years. It certainly was beginning to feel like it. And there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it.

  Barry stood. “I must be running, but I’ll speak to Eileen tomorrow.”

  “And you won’t need to come all the way out here, Doctor, to tell us what she says,” Sonny said, opening the lounge door. “We’ve had a phone installed. I’ll give you the number.”

  Maggie bustled past him. “Thanks, Sonny,” Barry said, returning his pen and notebook to an inside pocket.

  Maggie reappeared and handed him a small parcel. “Here you are, Doctor dear. A wee slice of cake to have with your tea. There’s enough in there for himself too.”

  Barry accepted the gift. “Thanks, Maggie.”

  Sonny stood beside Maggie, his arm draped around her shoulder. He inclined his head to the parcel and winked at Barry. Clearly, Barry thought, Sonny shared his opinion of Maggie’s cake, but perhaps that was part of the definition of true love—Sonny would eat it without complaint just to please her.

  “Good-night,” he said, letting himself out.

  The parcel seemed heavier than its size would suggest. He smiled. Arthur was in for a treat.

  As Barry walked down the path, he realized he was feeling a little smug, perhaps justifiably so. He was well on the way to solving Eileen’s problem, which although hardly a medical matter was as much a concern to him as it would have been to his senior colleague. And he had dealt with it as O’Reilly would have.

  He opened the car door and hopped in. Arthur was snoring in the backseat, and already Brunhilde held aroma of dog. Well, having a smelly car was a small price to pay for the opportunity to work here in Ballybucklebo. So different from impersonal Belfast. Here people knew each other, were ready to help out, and didn’t throw older folks on the scrap heap. He remembered with great pleasure how the whole village had pulled together in August to get Sonny’s house ready for the newlyweds.

  He started the engine and turned on the headlights. The beams didn’t penetrate the darkness very far, but it didn’t matter. He’d be driving slowly, and he knew where this road went. Perhaps that’s exactly why he was enjoying living in this rural village. Life was busy but the pace was still slow, and he knew where he wanted to be: right here in Ballybucklebo.

  Brunhilde bounced and rattled over a large pothole. Barry hoped his personal road would be less of an obstacle course. Still, there were some potholes to negotiate: the vague threat of Doctor Fitzpatrick and the nagging worry that Patricia’s not coming home for Christmas might be an omen for the future. Civil engineers had nasty habits of heading off to distant parts. Wasn’t his own father in Australia?

  He stopped at a crossroads to let a tractor go past, and in the distance he could see the lights of the village sparkling in welcome.

  Bugger it! he told himself, driving on. He wasn’t going to worry tonight. He was going to take Arthur for his promised walk and reward him with a lump of Maggie’s cake. Then, to give O’Reilly a bit more time on his own with Kitty, Barry would drop in at the Mucky Duck for a nightcap. Then he’d head back to Number 1 Main Street, the big house that was not only a large part of his working life but was well on the way to becoming his home.

  Barry and Arthur Guinness had enjoyed a brisk walk along Station Road, under the railway bridge, through the sand dunes, and out onto the firm shingle. The tide was out and he couldn’t make out the edge of the water, but he could hear the waves as each caressed the shore and made the pebbles rustle and rattle.

  The noise of the surf grew louder when one of the big freighters going to or leaving the port of Belfast at the head of the Lough sent its wake to crash ashore. It was then he was sure the salty scent of the sea was at its most pungent.

  Now all he could hear was the gentle surf, the scuffling of Arthur’s paws, and his panting as he raced to and fro. The burbling noise of the diesel engine of the Belfast-to-Bangor train, the train on which he’d first met Patricia, had faded, and there’d not be another for at least an hour.

  He relished the quiet, the serenity, and the darkness. The beams of the few street lamps in Ballybucklebo did not have the strength to reach out here. Across the Lough, the lights from Greencastle, past Greenisland, and onto Carrickfergus looked as if flickering candle flames were being reflected from a silver mirror. With measured regularity, the beams from the lighthouses at Blackhead on the Antrim side and from the Copeland Island light further down the Lough thrust questing fingers into the night.

  Barry looked up to a cold sky of polished, black obsidian. The moon had set early to the west of the Ballybucklebo Hills. The stars blazed in the clear frigid air, and he saw them as cleanly and as distinctly as he imagined Ernest Shackleton, another Irishman, would have seen them shining in the crystal skies of Antarctica. There in the northeast, low to the horizon, was Ursa Major, the Great Bear. The Plough, what the Americans called the Big Dipper, had all but slipped beneath the horizon.

  In August, when he’d walked Patricia from the station to her flat in Kinnegar, the whole of the Plough—the blade and the handle—had been high in the soft black velvet of a northwest sky, with the great stars of the handle—Alkaid, Mizar, and Alioth—blazing free.

  Tonight only Alioth, the one nearest the blade, could be seen. It was as if the Plough were sinking, and for a moment he hoped to God his love for Patricia wasn’t going to be sunk if she didn’t come home for Christmas.

  Then he told himself to get a grip and whistled for Arthur, making the big dog come to him. “Sit.”

  Arthur sat.

  Barry unwrapped the two large slabs of Maggie’s plum cake, shoved the paper in his coat pocket, and set the slices in front of Arthur.

  In the dim light he saw the Labrador’s square head move forward. He heard Arthur sniffing, scenting the offering. “Aaarf,” said Arthur, as if to say, “You’ve got to be joking.” Then he stood and wandered away.

  Barry chuckled and dug a hole in the shingle with the toe of his boot, shoved the cake in, and spread the shingle over it. As he did he muttered a line he remembered from The Burial of Sir John Moore after Corunna: “We buried him darkly by dead of night.”

  Satisfied that the evidence was well concealed, he called Arthur to heel, and together they strode for the Mucky Duck. He’d have a quick one there, waste a bit more time, and by then he’d have done his tactful duty, and more, by leaving Number 1 Main Street to O’Reilly.

  Will Someone Take Me to a Pub?

  The batwing doors of the Duck swung closed behind Barry and Arthur. After the quiet, crisp cold outside, this single low-beamed room with its noisy conversation and fug of pipe tobacco and damp undervest was a bright warm haven. The place was packed. Men leant elbows on the marble top along the bar. The tables were all taken by patrons in trousers, collarless shirts, and waistcoats, rust black jackets, and flat tweed dunchers, most smoking cheap cigarettes or stubby clay dudeens. Straight pint glasses of black Guinness and short ones of amber whiskey stood on the tables.

  Mary Dunleavy, the proprietor’s daughter, waved to Barry from behind the long bar. He smiled back and waited until two men standing with their backs to him turned, saw him, and moved sideways to give him room to get up to the bar. Barry recognized Fergus Finnegan, the bowlegged jockey, all four feet ten of him, dressed in jodhpurs and a tweed hacking jacket.

  Barry felt Arthur collapse in a heap beside his leg. Mary was moving along the bar to where he stood.

  “Evening, Doc,” Fergus said. “It’s a bit nippy out the night, so it is.”

  “Evening, Fergus.” Barry took off his gloves. “Chilly enough. It must be the lack of heat out there.”

  They laughed together; then Barry asked, “How’s your brother?”

  “Declan? He’s a b
rave bit less shaky since he’d that operation, so he is.”

  “I’m glad to hear that.” Declan Finnegan suffered from Parkinson’s disease.

  “And my eye’s never been better, Doc.”

  “Good.” Fergus had suffered from acute conjunctivitis.

  “Do you fancy a pint, sir?”

  “Thanks, Fergus, but I’m on call. I’ll buy my own tonight, and I’ve to get one for Arthur too.” The effects of the whiskey he’d had at dinnertime should be pretty well gone by now, he thought, but he did not want to get involved in the “I’ll buy you one—you buy me one” convention of drinking in an Ulster pub.

  “Hello, Doctor Laverty.” Mary, a plump twenty-two-year-old with a tawny mane, freckles, and a snub nose, stood across the bar. “What would you like, sir?”

  “Pint, please, and a Smithwick’s for Arthur.”

  “Right.” She busied herself at the pumps.

  “Glad to see you’re drinking stout, Doc,” Fergus said. He nodded to a table where four younger men were drinking paler beers.

  Probably Tennants lager or Harp lager made by Guinness and Company, Barry thought. Lager, particularly lager cut with a measure of concentrated Rose’s lime juice, was becoming popular with the younger folks.

  “Did you ever try one of them lagers, sir?”

  “Once in a while. On a hot day.”

  Fergus shook his head and took a healthy swallow from his own Guinness, then said very seriously, “I had one once. Do you know, sir, there’s more hops in a dead frog.” He finished his pint and said to Mary, “When you’ve a wee minute, I’ll have a half-un.”

  Barry laughed. “More hops in a dead frog.” He’d remember that one.

  “Take your hurry in your hand, Fergus,” he heard Mary say. “And here, earn your keep and give that to Arthur.” She handed Fergus a bowl of Smithwicks. “Sorry, Doctor, but you know it takes a wee while to build a decent pint.” She pointed at the two-thirds full glass on the countertop.

  “Of course. It has to settle.” He watched the mysterious cascades in the glass and couldn’t decide if the white bubbles were moving up or the black stout was moving down. “And so do I. Settle up, that is.” He put a note on the counter and waited until she rang it into the till and quickly made change.

  “You’ll not mind if I pour Fergus his whiskey while I’m waiting?” Her smile was impish. “I hear the estate of a fellah like him might sue the establishment if he died of thirst in a public house.”

  “I might,” said Fergus, straightening up from giving Arthur his bowl. “But sure wouldn’t I forgive you for one wee kiss now, Mary?”

  “Kiss is it, Fergus Finnegan? Kiss?” She handed him his whiskey. “That’ll be two and sixpence.”

  He took the glass and put the coins on the bar top. “Just one wee kiss?”

  She laughed. “I’d rather kiss a billy goat with bad breath.”

  “Och, Jesus, Mary, you’ve cut me to the onion,” he said, clutching the left side of his chest. “You’ve my heart broken in me, so you have.”

  “You don’t have a heart.” She grinned and gave Barry his pint. “There’s nothing in your chest, Fergus, but a big hard swinging brick. And it stunted your growth too.”

  “Well,” he said with a pretend leer, “you know what they say about short men.”

  “Away off and chase yourself.” Mary tossed her mane, stuck out her tongue at Fergus, and headed off down the bar to where another customer was beckoning to her.

  Fergus laughed and shook his head. “That’s a right sharp one there, so it is. She can give as good as she gets.”

  “She can that, Fergus. Mind you, she’d need to, working in a place like this.”

  “Not at all, Doc,” Fergus said, and Barry could see that the little man was suddenly serious. “A bit of craic with her’s all right, but God help the fellah that stepped over the line. The lads would murder him.”

  It might not be quite the mediaeval code of chivalry toward women, Barry thought, but the Ulster folk did have their own clearly defined standards.

  There was a sudden burst of laughter from further along the bar. Barry turned to see Mary standing, one hand on her hip, eyes bright, grinning fit to burst, and the men she’d been serving pointing at an obviously discomfited member of their number. All but him were laughing.

  “I see what you mean,” he said. The transformation in Mary Dunleavy since she’d quit her position as the henpecked assistant to Miss Moloney, the dress-shop lady Barry suspected of having anaemia, was quite amazing. He took a pull on his stout and ignored Arthur, who was making small “I’d go another pint” noises in the back of his throat.

  “Fair play to her,” Fergus said. “Her dad’s very lucky to have her as a full-time barmaid.”

  “Indeed he is,” said Barry. “In more ways than one.” Not so long ago, Councillor Bishop had been planning to take the Black Swan’s lease away from Willy Dunleavy. And he would have if Doctor O’Reilly hadn’t enlisted the help of Sonny and the marquis to put a stop to Bishop’s schemes and make sure Willy’s lease was renewed for another ninety-nine years. Once secure, Willy’d been able to give his daughter Mary a full-time job, and she’d quit her position at the hat shop, got away from Miss Moloney and her critical, domineering ways. Her transformation from a timid retiring girl to the self-assured one who now stood before him had been miraculous. Here she was, gaily asking if he’d like another pint and remarking to Fergus, “Tell me again what they say about short men, or are you the exception that proves the rule?”

  Fergus glanced down at the front of his trousers. Barry knew they were implying that there was an inverse relationship between a man’s height and the size of his organ. Now what would Mary say?

  Nothing, but her scalding laugh was a masterpiece of sarcasm.

  Barry and Fergus both laughed. “All right, Mary. You win.” Fergus finished all but the last sip of his whiskey. “Anyhow, it’s time I was for home.”

  Barry finished his pint. “Me, too,” he said. He set the glass on the bar top just as Fergus put his whiskey glass down.

  “I’m off, Doc,” he said. “By the way, will you be at the Rugby Club Christmas party?”

  “I hope so.”

  “Great. Then I’ll see you there. I’m captain of the fifteen.”

  “Are you not a bit short, Fergus?”

  “Bless you, not at all, sir. I play scrum half, so I do.” Barry heard the pride in the little man’s voice.

  “Scrum half? Good for you, Fergus.” Traditionally the player in that position was a small man. The scrum half was the rugby equivalent of the American quarterback. Barry had learned about American football in one of the old Francis the Talking Mule movies, which had revolved around a championship game of the American sport.

  “And I’ll be seeing Doctor O’Reilly there too, so I’ll wish the both of youse a Merry Christmas then. It’s early for that tonight with more than two weeks to go ’til the big day.”

  “Fair enough, Fergus.” Barry spoke to Arthur. “Come on, Arthur.” The big dog stood and followed Barry as he and Fergus walked to the doors.

  “Night, Doc,” Fergus said, as he turned to walk away. “By the way, how is Doctor O’Reilly? I hear he has a touch of the wheezles.”

  “He has but he’s on the mend.”

  “Good. Do you know if he’ll be at the club committee meeting?”

  “I doubt it.”

  “I’m sure we’ll manage without him, but tell him I was asking for him.”

  “I will, Fergus.” Barry sensed Arthur nudging his leg. “I’ve to get the dog home,” he said. “Good-night, Fergus.”

  “Good-night, Doc.” Fergus walked away, and Barry with Arthur at his heels headed for Brunhilde and home.

  With Arthur back in his doghouse, Barry let himself in through the kitchen door.

  “Evening, Doctor,” Kinky greeted him. She was wearing a pink felt dressing gown and fluffy slippers. Her hair was done up in paper curlers under a hairnet. She s
tood at the stove waiting for a kettle to boil. “I there anything you’d like before I head off to my bed?”

  “No thanks, Kinky. Away you go.”

  “I’ll just be a little minute, sir. I’m going to fill myself a hot water bottle.”

  “Go right ahead, Kinky. I take it there were no calls?”

  “Not a one, praise be.”

  “Is Doctor O’Reilly still up?”

  “Huh. Up and right back to his old self.” She sniffed. “Not ten minutes after that nice Miss O’Hallorhan left, didn’t I tell him it was time for some more friar’s balsam?”

  “And?”

  “A good Christian woman wouldn’t repeat what he said to me.”

  For a moment Barry worried. Could Fingal have overstepped the mark?

  The kettle whistled, and Kinky turned off the gas. “You doctors talk a great deal about symptoms, don’t you?” She started to pour the water into a cloth-covered rubber bag. “Well, there’s a symptom with himself I look out for. When he’s as carniptious as a wet hen”—she screwed the stopper in the neck of the hot water bottle—“he’s back to his old normal self.” She dried the place where the stopper was. “Sure it’s a great relief to me to have him better, so.” There was a small smile at the corners of her eyes.

  “And to me, Kinky.”

  “Well,” she said, “I’m for my bed, but run you up the stairs and see how he’s doing. He’s still in the lounge.”

  “I will,” Barry said, taking off his coat.

  “Doctor Laverty, would you do me one wee favour?”

  “Certainly.”

  “Don’t encourage him to have any more whiskey tonight.”

  He heard the concern again. “I promise.” He said. “Not a drop.”

  “Thank you, Doctor Laverty. Now be on with you.”

  “Good-night, Kinky.” Barry headed for the hall, and as he climbed the stairs he heard the massive sounds of the majestic final movement of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony.