An Irish Country Christmas

by Patrick Taylor

  “Barry. That’s a tragedy. You said, ‘tragedies.’ What else happened?”

  “She lost someone she loved. I think she loved him very much.”

  “Did she now?” O’Reilly looked away from Barry and out through the rain-streaked window. He stared for a while, then turned back and asked softly, “And who would that have been?” Barry saw sadness in O’Reilly’s eyes.

  “A young army captain. He died of leukemia.”

  O’Reilly turned back to the window.

  Barry heard the phone ringing below. “I’m on call. I’ll answer that,” he said, glad of the excuse to leave O’Reilly alone for a few minutes, and hoping for the phone call he so much wanted.

  Kinky, wiping her hands on her apron, was on her way from the kitchen to answer the phone. “It’s all right, Kinky.” Barry lifted the receiver. “Hello? Doctor Laverty here.”

  “Barry?”

  “Patricia.” Barry was sure his heart turned over. “Where are you now?”

  “You’ll not believe this.”

  For a second he hoped she would say the ferry terminal in Holy-head, but he realized she couldn’t have got there in the few hours since they last spoke. “Try me.”

  “London. In Thomas Cook’s.”

  “The travel agent?”

  “Yes.”

  “Terrific.” She had finally kept her promise. As soon as he knew her arrival time, he’d get straight onto Jack to see about borrowing his flat. He wanted no more storms interrupting them. “Wonderful, darling. When can I expect you?” He held his breath.

  “Barry, I’m sorry. I don’t know how to say this.”

  “What? Say what?” She was dissembling again. There was another man. Barry’s palms sweated. His mouth felt dry. He took a deep breath and said as levelly as he could, “Just go ahead.”

  “It’s all my fault. I got so wrapped up in the fun I was having. I was selfish. I didn’t think. I didn’t bother getting on with buying my ticket soon enough.”

  Barry frowned. He wasn’t sure if he could believe her. “Patricia, if there is someone else, I’ll try to understand. Honestly.”

  “Don’t be silly. I love you, Barry. I love you.”

  “But you’re not coming, right?” Damnation. Bugger it. Well, by God, he might phone Jack anyway. Try to see him for a pint. Barry could use his friend’s advice and his comfort right now.

  “I’m afraid not. I’ve been to two travel agents in Cambridge. I’ve left it far too late to get a ticket. I am truly sorry, Barry. I really do want to see you. I love you.”

  Barry held the receiver away from his ear, looked at it, and wondered what the hell to say. He heard garbled, tinny noises coming from the phone. He put it back against his ear.

  “. . . Barry. Barry, are you still there?” He heard her urgency.

  “Yes. And I’ll not pretend I’m not disappointed, Patricia.”

  “I know. So am I, and I tried. I really tried. The Holyhead run was booked solid; so were both the Liverpool and the Heysham boats to Belfast. I even tried to get a spot on the Stranraer-to-Larne ferry . . .”

  “But it’s hundreds of miles from Cambridge to Scotland . . .”

  “I know, but it would have been worth it, Barry. I do love you, and I feel terrible. I didn’t know what to do. Jenny suggested we try Cook’s in London. She thought perhaps they might have bought blocks of tickets to resell. They’re the biggest travel agent in England. I’m here now. The agent was wonderful, but she said all their tickets were gone.”

  “At least you let me know straightaway. Thank you.” O thou that tellest good tidings to Zion, he thought. Some bloody tidings. He told himself not to be sarcastic—at least not out loud.

  “It was the least I could do. Not keep you hanging on hoping.”

  “Thank you.” But, he thought, if you’d booked before you tore off to see those bloody ducks.

  “The agent could see how disappointed I was, and when I told her why, she insisted I use her phone to make a quick call to you.”

  “Decent of her.” He couldn’t keep the edge from his voice. Jesus, five minutes ago he’d been fantasizing about making love to her.

  “Barry, don’t be like that. Please. I will call as soon as I get back to Bourn. Try to explain. Try to make it up to you.”

  From eight hundred miles away. Good luck. Barry rocked to and fro on his heels, inhaled, and then said, “Patricia, I’ve tried. God knows, I’ve tried to understand.”

  “Barry, I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

  “I can guess how new and exciting Cambridge is. I thought Belfast was pretty cosmopolitan after Bangor and a boys’ boarding school. I can see how you got carried away by all of that.” And I still want to know who he is . . .

  “Thank you, Barry. Thank you for trying to understand. I didn’t forget about you, back home waiting patiently.” There was a catch to her voice. “I do really want to see you. It has to be a ferry. I can’t afford—”

  “A flight. I’ve already offered to—”

  “Barry, I’ve tried to explain . . .” He heard her voice more faintly saying, “I’ll only be a second more. Please? Thank you.” Then she said, “Are you still there?”

  “Yes.” His voice was flat.

  “Easter isn’t too far away.”

  “Right.” The hell it isn’t.

  “The woman at Cook’s said the flights to Belfast are booked, but if I go to Heathrow on Christmas Eve I might get a standby ticket. They’re really cheap.”

  “It’s worth a try, I suppose.” Barry shrugged. He knew he’d not sounded very enthusiastic. He’d had enough of having his hopes raised and dashed.

  “Don’t you want me to?”

  “Patricia I can’t tell you what to do.” He’d almost snapped suit yourself. “I still want to see you.”

  “If I can’t get one, the next term doesn’t start until the fifteenth of January. Maybe I could come for the New Year . . .”

  “Fine. Just let me know if you are coming, but I can’t be bothered with more ‘I might be coming’ stuff. Please don’t do it to me anymore.”

  Her voice sounded stiff. “Very well. I won’t.”

  He waited. He could hear muffled voices, as if she had her hand over the mouthpiece and was talking to someone else. “The agent says I’ve had long enough on the phone. I’ll have to go.”

  “Fine. Have a lovely time at the Tate and the National . . .” Where the hell else had she said she was going to visit?

  “Barry, don’t sulk.”

  He ignored her and simply said, “Let me know what’s happening so I can plan, and if I don’t see you . . .”—and I know I bloody well won’t, Kinky notwithstanding—“have a very merry Christmas and happy New Year.” Although how happy for him it would be, if this was the preliminary symptom of a final rift, didn’t bear thinking about.

  “And you, Barry. I love you, darling.”

  “And I love you,” he said, trying to sound enthusiastic, “but if the Cook’s woman wants you off the phone, you’d better run.”

  He wasn’t sure if he heard a tiny sob just before she said, “All right. I love you, Barry. Good-bye.” The phone clicked dead.

  Christ, that good-bye sounded awfully final. Barry sighed, replaced the receiver, and stood for a moment staring into space. Then he trudged back up the stairs.

  I Feel My Heart New Opened

  Lady Macbeth was curled up asleep in his lap. O’Reilly sat gazing into the grate. He watched as the ember patterns rearranged themselves, as a piece of coal, finally reduced to ash, collapsed, and the lumps it had been supporting tumbled lower in the grate. Black coals, cherry-red glowing cinders, and grey ash seemed to be an Impressionist’s oils on a canvas and gave to his eyes the warmth the fire gave to his body.

  He thought wistfully of Deidre roasting chestnuts in their room in Portsmouth, holding the handle of a perforated, circular brass plate and giggling when a chestnut burst from the heat. Learning of Miss Moloney’s loss had brought his own grief b
ack, despite his resolve to try to let Deidre’s memory fade.

  He’d been able to think of nothing else since Barry had gone to answer the phone, and he hardly bothered to look up when his young colleague returned. “A call from the sick and suffering?”

  “No.” Barry’s voice was clipped, flat.

  O’Reilly turned to him. “Christ,” he said, “you look about as sour as an unripe gooseberry dipped in buttermilk. What’s wrong?”

  Barry shrugged but said nothing.

  “Barry. What’s up?” O’Reilly said. “Tell me.”

  “It was Patricia.” Barry said. There was no life in his words. “She’s not coming for Christmas.” He took a deep breath.

  “Not coming? Bugger.” O’Reilly sat so straight that he dislodged Lady Macbeth. “Why the hell not?”

  “I’m sorry, Fingal”—Barry snapped the words—“but if Kinky can’t find passage for Patricia on fully booked ferries or a seat on jam-packed aeroplanes, it’s a nonstarter, unless Kinky has a flying carpet in her cupboard. Patricia left it too bloody late to book.” By the way he spoke and stood, shoulders hunched, jaw thrust out, O’Reilly knew that Barry Laverty, usually a placid young man, was not so much feeling let down as angry.

  “I think,” said O’Reilly softly, “there’s more to this than just disappointment that she’s not coming. Sit down, Barry. Tell me about it.”

  Barry slumped in the armchair. “I don’t know where to start.” He sounded more resigned than angry now. He put his hands, one clasping the other, between his thighs, pursed his lips, and let his head droop.

  O’Reilly rose and walked to the sideboard. When he returned he handed Barry a whiskey. “It’s early for a Jameson, but this is for medicinal purposes.”

  Barry looked up and took the glass. “Aren’t you having one?”

  O’Reilly shook his head. “I’m not the patient. You are.” He sat again.

  Barry didn’t drink. “Fingal, you know how worried I was when she went to Cambridge? Worried we’d grow apart?”

  O’Reilly sat and looked at Barry. Let the boy talk, he told himself.

  Barry swallowed. “I think we have.” He looked into O’Reilly’s eyes.

  O’Reilly saw a young man pleading for reassurance that it wasn’t so. “Why would you say that?”

  “Because she’s not coming, and she promised she would.”

  O’Reilly frowned. “It’s hardly her fault she couldn’t get a ticket. That’s what you said.” With a bit of luck it was just a storm in a teacup. Perhaps Barry was reading too much into it.

  Barry clenched his teeth. “Not couldn’t. Didn’t want to.”

  “How do you know that? Did she tell you?”

  “She didn’t have to. First, she didn’t have the money for a plane ticket. She had to wait to see if her dad got a Christmas bonus.”

  “Sounds reasonable to me.”

  “I thought so too . . . then. I offered to pay her way.” Barry managed a wry grin. “You know the funny notions she has sometimes about men and women. I wasn’t entirely surprised when she refused my offer. Maybe I should have seen it coming then . . . or pretty soon after.”

  “Why?”

  “Why?” Barry held his glass in both hands and stared deeply into it. He shrugged.

  God, O’Reilly thought, getting him to open up was like pulling teeth without anaesthetic. “Come on, Barry. Why should you have seen it coming?”

  He looked directly at O’Reilly. “I had to suggest she might like to try for a ferry. She won a scholarship to Cambridge. She’s one very clever woman, but the thought had never occurred to her. Or she didn’t want to think of an alternative to flying. I really think she doesn’t want to come.”

  “Perhaps she was too preoccupied with her studies? You know how all-consuming a professional course can be.” O’Reilly knew he was searching for an explanation that would comfort Barry.

  “Right. All bloody consuming.” Barry snorted. “Fingal, the Cambridge Michaelmas term ended on December the first.”

  “Oh.” That was more worrisome.

  “She’d left it far too late to book. She’s just admitted that she got too wrapped up in herself.” Barry shook his head like a dazed boxer. O’Reilly’d seen that often enough in the ring. “Fingal, she could have been here a couple of weeks ago, but she’s made new friends over there. She wanted to go to some Wildfowl Trust place. She should have booked before she went there. It would only have taken a few minutes.”

  O’Reilly sat silently, his eyes never leaving Barry’s face.

  “She’s in London now for a few days. She’s going to art galleries, museums. Places like the Victoria and Albert Museum. What have we got in Belfast? A few mouldy dinosaur bones and a mummy in the Ulster Museum? We can’t compete. I don’t think I can compete.” He took a sip of his whiskey. “She’d like to do almost anything except come home to Ulster and see me. I’m not sure she isn’t glad she can’t get a ticket. For the last couple of weeks she’s been going to come, then she’s not going to be able to, then she is. I’ve been going up and down like a bloody yo-yo.”

  O’Reilly fished out his pipe and started to fill it. He needed a moment to think. Was Patricia simply being carried away by new experiences, or was Barry right? His own experience in practice had led him to believe that two people either grew together or grew apart. He didn’t want to ask the next question because Ulstermen like himself and Barry were notoriously reticent about discussing their feelings. He lit his pipe. Want to or not, it must be asked. “Is she still in love with you, do you think?” O’Reilly let both eyebrows move up, but otherwise kept his face calm.

  He thought perhaps Barry was going to say, “Mind your own business.” So it pleased him that after a few moments, Barry said, “She says she is. She says she does still love me, but she’s not behaving as if she did. If it were me I’d have been on the first available transport back home, unless I had a bloody good reason not to.”

  O’Reilly guessed what Barry feared that reason might be. It was time it was voiced. “And you’re not sure if there’s another fellah over there, are you, Barry? Is that it?”

  Barry blew out his breath. “She swears blind there’s not.”

  O’Reilly tapped his teeth with his pipe stem. “I don’t know the girl very well, but she struck me as somebody who’d not lie to you about a thing like that.” He waited to see if that would bring Barry any comfort.

  Barry shrugged. Took a drink.

  “Barry? How about you? Is there someone else for you?”

  “Don’t be daft.” Barry looked away. “I ran a nurse home after the dance I went to last Saturday. Pretty girl, but not much going on on the upper deck.”

  “I hesitate to ask, son. How about that schoolteacher? You seemed to be getting on well with her at the rehearsal.”

  “She’s a lovely-looking girl, and I’m sure she’d go out with me if I asked.”

  “Are you going to?”

  “Do you know, Fingal, I just don’t know. I’m so mad at Patricia I’ve thought about it.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with that. I was going out with a girl once; then I met someone else. It happens.”

  Barry looked at O’Reilly quizzically before he said, “I thought we were right for each other. I still half do, but there is something else. I know her horizons have widened. When I met her she told me she had too much that she wanted to accomplish to have time to fall in love. I think now that she’s had a taste of life beyond Ulster, she’s recognized how tiny the place is and maybe how uninteresting a country GP like me is.” He took another small sip. “I’m going to lose her.” Barry looked at O’Reilly. “I honestly believe I am, Fingal.” There was the kind of pleading in his eyes that O’Reilly had seen in the eyes of sick children who silently begged, “Make it better, Doctor. Make the pain go away.”

  O’Reilly stuck his pipe into his mouth. “You’re probably entirely wrong, Barry . . .”

  “For a time I was uncertain if it would mat
ter if I did lose her. There are other pretty girls out there. Three years, mostly apart, is going to be a hell of a long time. I wondered if the whole thing was worth the candle.”

  “And is it?”

  “I think so, Fingal, but—”

  O’Reilly was sure he understood Barry’s reservations, if only because he was having the same kind of feelings about Kitty O’Hallorhan. “But you wonder if you cut your losses now whether it might hurt less than it would if things fall apart later?”

  “That’s right.”

  “I’m afraid it will, Barry. There’s no cutting your losses once you’ve opened yourself to somebody. None at all.”

  Barry’s expression changed. His pained frown slipped into a look of concern.

  “And I know that you know what I’m talking about—”

  “But—”

  “It’s all right, Barry. It’s all right. Kinky told me a couple of months ago that she’d told you that I’d been married.”

  Barry’s eyes widened. He took a quick drink. “She what?”

  “She told me. I think her conscience got the better of her.”

  “What did you say to her?”

  “I thanked her.”

  “For breaching a confidence?”

  “Barry, when you’ve known Kinky Kincaid as long as I have, you’ll understand that woman never does anything without giving it a lot of thought. I knew if she’d told you it was because she trusted you and because she’d decided having you here was good for me.” O’Reilly leant forward and touched Barry’s knee. “She thought it would help you make up your mind to stay if you knew a bit more about the old ogre who ran the place.” That’s floored him, O’Reilly thought. He hasn’t suspected that I am well aware of how I often come across to people.

  “You’re not an ogre, Fingal. Far from it.”

  “I can be. Seamus Galvin thought so when I chucked him into the rosebushes. You thought so when you watched me chucking him.” O’Reilly chuckled at the memory and was gratified to see Barry smile.

  “I nearly bolted and went to look for a job somewhere else.”

  O’Reilly sat back. “I’m very glad you didn’t. Very glad.”

  “Thank you, Fingal. So am I.”