A man standing on the periphery turned and saw O’Reilly. “Merry Christmas, Doctor.”
“Merry Christmas, Constable Mulligan.” Judging by his blue three-piece worsted suit, the village’s single police officer was off duty. “Have you seen the marquis?”
“Yes, sir, I seen him proceeding in an easterly direction toward the library, but he said he’d be back, like.”
O’Reilly recognized the man approaching the constable. The undertaker’s nose bore a large rhinophyma, a blockage of the ducts of the sebaceous glands. The result was a red bulb that O’Reilly thought might have made Rudolph envious.
“Merry Christmas, Doctor O’Reilly.”
“Merry Christmas, Mr. Coffin.”
“How’s about ye, Christopher?” The constable beamed and began engaging the undertaker in a spirited conversation. O’Reilly knew the two had struck up a friendship after Seamus Galvin’s going-away party in August. “Great to see a white Christmas, so it is.”
“Right enough, but I hope it goes quick. It’s a bugger to get a hearse through it . . .”
O’Reilly left the two men chatting happily. “Let’s mingle,” he said, taking Kitty by the elbow. His tummy rumbled. He caught a whiff of the delicate scent of a potpourri of dried flowers and noticed a ceramic pot on a side table near the fireplace. The table also bore full silver cigarette boxes, bowls of nuts, boxes of Bendick’s Bittermints from Bond Street, plates of shortbread, and marzipan-stuffed dates. O’Reilly had a soft spot for marzipan-stuffed dates. He changed course to head in their direction.
The Bishops were chatting to Sonny and Maggie. A large sprig of holly was tucked into the band of Maggie’s purple felt hat. He noticed that in honour of the occasion she was wearing her false teeth.
None of them had seen O’Reilly, who was intent on reaching the stuffed dates. He decided he’d stop to chat a little later, but he hesitated when Bertie Bishop said to Sonny, “Anyway, says I to your man, ‘If you think I’m paying two thousand pounds for that horse—two thousand—you need your head examined, so you do, because—”
A roar of laughter from the far side of the room drowned out the councillor’s words. Whoever it was who was so amused had a giggle that could fillet a herring at ten fathoms.
“You were just right, Bertie,” Sonny said and smiled at Bishop. “The brass neck of your man, to think he could put one over on you . . .”
So, O’Reilly thought, Bertie’s not the only one suffused with the Christmas spirit. He knew that Sonny did not hold the councillor in high esteem, and he had good reason not to, but for today anyway he was willing to let bygones be bygones.
“Fingal.” It was Barry’s voice. “I thought you could use some sustenance.”
O’Reilly turned and saw Kitty holding something in a white paper napkin. Barry had finished offering a plate of smoked salmon to her and was now holding it in O’Reilly’s direction. “Good lad.” He snaffled two slices of buttered wheaten bread covered with thin red portions of lox. He admired the pale green capers on top of the smoked fish and popped the first slice whole into his mouth. His words were muffled when he said, “ ‘For this relief much thanks.’ ”
“Hamlet,” said Barry. “Here. Have another.”
O’Reilly took one. It was a delicate soupçon, but he really fancied a stuffed date. He shoved on to his goal near the fireplace, confident that Barry and Kitty were following.
They skirted the loose group where Father O’Toole, Reverend and Mrs. Robinson, and Miss Moloney were listening to Fergus Finnegan, captain of the rugby fifteen.
“I reckon this new lad Michael Gibson’s going to turn out to be a better outhalf than Jack Kyle was.”
“I’m not so sure,” Miss Moloney ventured. “My father used to take us to the games before we went to India, and I kept going after I came back to Ulster. I went up to Belfast and saw Kyle at Ravenhill in nineteen fifty-three. He was at his peak then . . .”
O’Reilly waited. Anything to do with rugby football interested him, particularly when a woman had an obviously educated opinion on the subject.
“Against France?” Fergus said.
“That’s right. He made a break, sold two magnificent dummies, and scored a try that people still talk about.”
They did indeed, O’Reilly thought, impressed that Miss Moloney understood the game’s finer points. He’d been at Ravenhill himself, and to watch Kyle run, jinking like a snipe through the French defence, had been a moment he would never forget. And Jackie Kyle himself a doctor.
There was a note of respect in Fergus’s voice when he said, “Right enough, but I reckon we should give Gibson a year or two. That boy has talent. It’s sticking out a mile, so it is.” He moved a little closer to Miss Moloney. “Every year a bunch of the lads from the club charter a bus and go down to Dublin for the international games. Would you like to be put on the list, Miss Moloney?”
Her eyes sparkled. “I’d love it, if I can get away from the shop . . . and it’s Alice, by the way.”
Good for you, Alice Moloney, O’Reilly thought. He moved the last two steps to the table.
“My goodness,” Kitty said, looking around, “this is grand. This is very grand.”
“Nothing but the best if you travel with O’Reilly,” he said. “It is cosy, isn’t it?”
“It should be,” she said, “Look at the size of that fireplace.”
O’Reilly inhaled deeply, and the smell of burning wood mingled with the aroma of pipe tobacco and cigars.
A huge log burnt on black andirons in a cavernous fieldstone fireplace. The grate was flanked by inglenooks with benches. Two ceramic fire dogs, white-and-black painted Dalmatians, sat erect with supercilious grins on their glazed faces.
Kitty chuckled. “It makes the gas fire in my flat look a bit puny.”
The Four Seasons had finished. It had been replaced with another piece he recognized, Mozart’s Thirty-ninth Symphony. O’Reilly had to strain to hear because the noise level in the room was now much higher. Old Doctor Flanagan, who had sold O’Reilly the practice, had called alcohol the universal social lubricant. He was right.
O’Reilly helped himself to a stuffed date and looked around to see if he could find a waiter. He’d not object to a bit of oiling of his own gears. No luck. He reckoned he knew how the garrison must have felt in the besieged town of Mafeking during the Boer War: cut off from supplies and very thirsty.
He helped himself to another date and turned to see Kitty scrutinizing a portrait above the Connemara marble mantel. It was of a much younger marquis wearing the dress uniform of the Irish Guards.
“I think that’s an Annigoni.” Kitty’s voice had dropped to a whisper.
“It is. My father commissioned it,” the marquis said.
“Jesus, Your Lordship,” O’Reilly said, “don’t creep up on folks like that. As Kinky would say, you gave me such a surprise I near took the rickets.”
“I didn’t think anything could shock you, Fingal,” the marquis said with a grin.
“My lord.” Barry made a small bow.
“Laverty. Nice to see you, and it’s very nice to see you back, Miss O’Hallorhan. I recall you were here for Sonny’s wedding.”
“I was, and it’s Kitty, please, my lord.”
“Kitty. It’s a very friendly name.” He gazed at her face. “I must say you are looking lovely today.”
O’Reilly wasn’t quite sure whether to swell with pride or feel a tiny stab of jealousy. The marquis, who wasn’t much older than O’Reilly, had been a widower for eight years and was a charismatic man.
“Thank you, sir,” she said and smiled.
He noticed how graciously Kitty accepted the compliment. She didn’t blush. Kitty O’Hallorhan, he could tell, was well used to compliments.
“Now,” said the marquis, “I will try to get a proper word later, but soon I must go and greet my other guests. I think you know most of them, Fingal.”
“I’m sure I do, and if I don’t, haven’t I a mou
th between my nose and my chin?”
The marquis laughed. “I don’t think you’ll have to introduce yourself to that colleague of yours, Fingal.” The marquis nodded toward Ronald Hercules Fitzpatrick, who stood beside the decorated tree at the far end of the room where two of the marquis’s dogs, an Irish setter and an Irish wolfhound, slept beneath the branches. Good God, Fingal thought.
“I thought you might like to meet a fellow medical man under social circumstances. The Kinnegar’s not far, and it used to be part of the estate before my father sold it to pay death duties for his father. Grandpa lived to be a hundred and one, you know, and I’m afraid my dad didn’t outlive him by much.”
O’Reilly, stifling his surprise at seeing Fitzpatrick, looked at the marquis and saw in him a living symbol of the age-old history and permanence of a place like Ballybucklebo.
“I’ll have a word with him.” O’Reilly resolved to go speak to Fitzpatrick soon, but not until he’d had a drink. Fitzpatrick was talking to a very tall man with an aquiline nose who sported a monocle in his left eye. “Who’s that, John?”
O’Reilly had to wait to hear the answer. Once the laughter died, the marquis said, “Sir Aidan Creighton-Dwyer-MacNeill. He’s a baronet. We’re related distantly. His father was a MacNeill from the Antrim branch of the family. They have quite a large farm near Ballymoney. He married Annie O’Sullivan. She’s one of the O’Sullivans, and they boast John L. Sullivan, the boxer, from their Tralee branch and Maureen O’Sullivan, the actress, who comes from their Roscommon connection. She’s Mia Farrow’s mother, you know . . .”
The marquis frowned. “Sometimes I do go on about genealogy. Families here do tend to get a bit complicated. A second cousin of ours had to be sent to Purdysburn mental hospital about twenty years ago.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Barry said.
“It was a long time ago and”—the marquis chuckled—“Dolores really was quite gaga. She had a habit of presenting strangers with her dentures.”
Just a bit more speeding up. The marquis beckoned to a uniformed maid, who was carrying a tray of full glasses. “I really must circulate now, but please make yourselves completely at home, and a very merry Christmas to you all.”
“Jameson, Doctor O’Reilly?”
Mafeking had been relieved. O’Reilly grinned. “Of course, Margaret.” He helped himself. He recognized her because he’d treated her for mumps when she was eight.
The maid offered her tray to Kitty. “Madam?”
“Are those Buck’s Fizz?” Kitty pointed to champagne flutes with an orange-coloured liquid inside.
The maid nodded.
“Thank you.” Kitty took one. “Champagne and orange juice. Just the job for Christmas Day.”
“Sir?” The maid offered the tray to Barry.
He took a fizz. “Thank you.”
“Cheers,” Kitty said and sipped. “I like the marquis. He’s even more charming than he was at Sonny and Maggie’s wedding.”
O’Reilly decided, peer of the realm or not, when it came to Kitty O’Hallorhan he’d keep an eye on John MacNeill, 27th Marquis of Ballybucklebo.
“He is a good man,” O’Reilly said, and lack of mistletoe be damned, he encircled Kitty’s waist with his arm, pulled her to him, and gently kissed her lips. “Bless you, Kitty, for being here. I . . .” God Almighty, he was within an ace of telling her he loved her, but he couldn’t quite summon the courage. “I wish you a very merry Christmas.” Damn it, Fingal, he thought, tell her, you great lummox. But as he bent to say the words, he realized that Barry was within earshot and Sonny and Maggie were rapidly approaching. He decided to hold his tongue.
“Merry Christmas, Doctor dear,” Maggie said. “Doctor Laverty.”
“And you remember Miss O’Hallorhan?” O’Reilly said.
“I do.” Maggie cocked her head and looked at Kitty appraisingly. “It’s a nice outfit,” she said, “but I prefer the one you had on for my wedding.”
“If I’d known, Mrs. Houston, I’d have worn it.” Kitty chuckled.
O’Reilly was impressed that Kitty had remembered Maggie’s married name. “We popped in with Eileen Lindsay this morning. You’ll be glad to hear Sammy’s completely better and the Lindsays are having a wonderful Christmas.”
“That is good,” Sonny said. “Very good. I’m pleased.”
“You two were a great help when he was sick, Maggie. I mean it.” O’Reilly said.
“Och, sure, wasn’t it Doctor Laverty’s idea?”
O’Reilly saw Barry smile. And rightly so. The lad was learning there was more to country doctoring than making diagnoses and writing prescriptions. There was pleasure to be taken from helping folks get on with their lives.
“And anyway,” Maggie continued, “the babysitting was nothing. What made it for her was winning that raffle, so it was.”
O’Reilly nodded. He felt rather pleased with himself.
“Och, sure, and wasn’t it a Christmas miracle?”
“It was, Maggie.” O’Reilly picked up another stuffed date.
“And run by Donal Donnelly.” Her smile was very wide when she leant over and whispered, “And me never knowing that Donal was an angel.”
She knew it had been fixed, or more likely she knew Donal.
“But we’ll say no more about it, will we, Doctor dear?”
“Not a word, Maggie. Not a word.”
She winked at him and turned to Sonny. “Right, dear. Time we were running along. My turkey needs attention, and the General and your dogs have been on their own long enough.”
No doubt, O’Reilly thought, Sonny’s five dogs and Maggie’s battle-scarred cat, Sir Bernard Law Montgomery, would be dining on turkey today too. “Safe home,” he said.
“And to you, Doctor,” Sonny said, and with his arm protectively round Maggie’s waist, he started to steer her to the door. “We’ll see you all tomorrow, I hope, at the Bishops’ open house.”
“You will,” said O’Reilly. He turned to Kitty. “Could you make it down for that?”
She shook her head. “Sorry, Fingal. Some of us have to work.”
He shrugged but inside he felt as keenly disappointed as he knew Barry must be about Patricia not coming today. “Can’t be helped. I understand, and perhaps—”
O’Reilly got no further. He glanced around the room. The latest gale of laughter, a mix of guffaws, belly laughs, and giggles, seemed to be coming from a group surrounding the tall cadaverous-looking Doctor Fitzpatrick. The man was grinning like a mooncalf and clutching his pince-nez in his left hand.
“What the hell—?”
“I think,” said Barry, “that your old university friend is holding court.”
“We should go and listen,” O’Reilly said, taking Kitty’s hand. “Come on.”
“Excuse me, excuse me, excuse me.” He forced his way past several strangers. He knew that Kitty and Barry were following in his wake. He brought his party to a standstill at the back of the group surrounding Fitzpatrick.
“Merry Christmas, Father O’Toole.”
“Doctor.”
“Compliments of the season, Reverend, Mrs. Robinson.”
“Doctor O’Reilly. Doctor Laverty. Miss O’Hallorhan.”
He heard Barry saying, “I’m glad the iron pills aren’t causing you any trouble, Alice,” and then heard Miss Moloney wishing Barry a merry Christmas.
It was like a family reunion, and wasn’t that what Ballybucklebo was? And wasn’t he very glad to be a member of that family?
Fitzpatrick’s harsh voice carried. He was well into his story. “Anyway, the patient trusted the doctor, and he took his gunpowder every day, quite religiously . . .”
He took his gunpowder? What was Fitzpatrick doing?
“Every day . . . for six months . . . six whole months.”
O’Reilly looked around. The audience had grown and seemed to encompass every one of the partygoers. The marquis, his son, O’Brien-Kelly, and Sir John MacNeill were at the far side of
the crowd. There were Bertie and Flo. He smiled at them and they smiled back.
“And then . . .” Fitzpatrick lowered his voice. “And then the poor man died.”
There was a sudden communal in-drawing of breath, and the silence following was broken only by the notes of the final movement of the Mozart symphony.
“And do you know what happened next?”
O’Reilly was impressed. Fitzpatrick certainly knew how to hold an audience. He would be a difficult candidate to argue with in an election.
“They tried to cremate the corpse.”
“And a very good idea,” Mr. Coffin called.
“Wheest, Christopher,” Constable Mulligan whispered in a loud voice.
“You’re right, sir. It did seem like a good idea, but . . .”—Fitzpatrick swept his gaze around the room—“but to this very day they’re looking for the back wall of the crematorium.”
O’Reilly joined in the universal laughter and applauded with the others. He minded not at all that Fitzpatrick had pinched the line he himself had used when he’d chastised Fitzpatrick for using gunpowder as a treatment. Fair play to the man. O’Reilly let go of Kitty’s hand and shoved his way to the front. He grabbed Fitzpatrick’s hand and shook it. “Well done, Ronald. Well done.”
“Thank you, O’Reilly. Coming from you that means a lot.”
“Och, it’s Christmas Day.”
“So a Merry Christmas to you, Fingal, and I hope we all have a very happy New Year.” He slipped the pince-nez back on his narrow nose and swallowed so his Adam’s apple bobbed.
“I couldn’t have said it better myself,” O’Reilly said.
He felt a tapping on his shoulder and turned to see Kitty. “Excuse me, Ronald,” she said.
“Certainly, Kitty.”
“Fingal, it’s four thirty . . .”
“And we have to go, or Kinky will baste me instead of the turkey.” O’Reilly smiled at Fitzpatrick. “I’ve to go and say thanks to His Lordship; then we’ll be off. Enjoy yourself.”
“And when you get home,” said Fitzpatrick with a small bow, “please wish Mrs. Kincaid a Merry Christmas from me.”
“Presents,” I Often Say, “Endear. . .”
An Irish Country Christmas Page 46