by Maeve Binchy
“Dad never says thank you when you bring him home beer from the supermarket. He never brings you home a present.”
“He’s not the worst,” Fran said. “It’s not a great life with your head stuck down pipes and round S bends all the time.”
“Will you get married do you think?” Kathy asked her once anxiously.
“I’ll wait until you’re a grown-up, then I’ll put my mind to it.” Fran laughed when she said it.
“But won’t you be too old?”
“Not at all. By the time you’re twenty I’ll only be thirty-six, in my prime,” she assured her sister.
“I thought you were going to marry Ken,” Kathy had said.
“Yes, well I didn’t. And he went to America, so he’s out of the picture.” Fran was brisk.
Ken had worked in the supermarket too and was very go-ahead. Mam and Dad said that he and Fran were sure to make a go of it. Kathy had been very relieved when Ken had left the picture.
AT THE SUMMER parent-teacher meeting Kathy’s father wasn’t able to go. He said he had to work late that night.
“Please, Dad, please. The teachers want a parent there. Mam won’t come, she never does, and you wouldn’t have to do anything only listen and tell them it’s all fine.”
“God, Kathy, I hate going into a school, I feel out of place.”
“But Dad, it’s not as if I had done anything bad and they were giving out about me, I just want them to think you’re all interested.”
“And we are, we are, child…but your mother’s not herself these days and she’d be worse than useless and you know the way they go on about smoking up there, it sets her back…maybe Fran will go again. She’d know more than we would anyway.”
So Fran went and spoke about her little sister to the tired teachers, who had to see legions of parents in a confessional situation and give a message of encouragement laced with caution to all of them.
“She’s too serious,” they told Fran. “She tries too hard, she might take more in if she were to relax more.”
“She’s very interested, really she is,” Fran protested. “I sit with her when she does her homework, she never neglects any of it.”
“She doesn’t play any games does she?” The man who was going to be the new headmaster was nice. He seemed to have the vaguest knowledge of the children and spoke in generalities. Fran wondered if he really remembered them all or was making wild guesses.
“No, she doesn’t want to take the time from her studying, you see.”
“Maybe she should.” He was brusque and good-natured about it.
“I don’t think she should continue with Latin,” the nice, pleasant Mr. Dunne said.
Fran’s heart fell. “But Mr. Dunne, she tries so hard. I never studied it myself and I’m trying to follow it in the book with her and she really does put in hours on it.”
“But you see, she doesn’t understand what it’s about.” Poor Mr. Dunne was trying hard not to offend her.
“Could I get her a couple of private lessons? It would be great for her to have Latin in her Leaving. Look at all the places she could go with a subject like that.”
“She may not get the points for university.” It was as if he was letting her down lightly.
“But she has to. None of us have got anywhere, she must get a start in life.”
“You have a very good job yourself, Miss Clarke. I see you when I go to the supermarket, couldn’t you get Kathy a job there?”
“Kathy will never work in the supermarket.” Fran’s eyes were blazing.
“I’m sorry,” he said quietly.
“No, I’m sorry, it is very kind of you to take such an interest. Please forgive me for shouting like this. Just advise me what would be best for her.”
“She should do something that she would enjoy, something she wouldn’t have to strain at,” Mr. Dunne said. “A musical instrument, has she shown any interest?”
“No.” Fran shook her head. “Nothing like that. We’re all tone-deaf, even the brother who’s working for a pop group.”
“Or painting?”
“I can’t see it myself, she’d only fret over that, too, to know was she getting it right.” It was easy to talk to this kind man, Mr. Dunne. It was probably hard for him to tell parents and family that a child wasn’t bright enough to get third-level education. Maybe his own children were at university and he wished that others would also get the chance. And it was good of him to care that poor Kathy should be happy and relaxed. She hated being so negative to all his suggestions. The man meant so well. He must have great patience, too, being a teacher.
Aidan looked back at the thin, handsome face of this girl who showed much more interest in her sister than either of the parents could summon up. He hated having to say that a child was slow, because truthfully he felt guilty about it. He always thought that if the school were smaller, or there were better facilities, if there were bigger libraries, extra tuition when called for, maybe then there would be far fewer slow pupils. He had discussed this with Signora when they planned the Italian classes. She said it had a lot to do with people’s expectations. It took more than a generation of free education to stop people believing there were barriers and obstacles in the way.
It had been the same in Italy, she said. She had seen the children of a local hotelier and his wife grow up. The village had been small and poor, nobody ever thought that the children from the little school there should do more than their fathers or mothers had. She had taught them English only so that they could greet tourists and be chambermaids or waiters. She had wanted so much more for them. Signora understood what Aidan wanted for the people around Mountainview school.
She was such an easy person to talk to. They had many a coffee as they planned the evening classes. She was undemanding company, asking no questions about his home and family, telling little of her own life in that Jerry Sullivan household. He had even told her about the study he was making for himself.
“I’m not very interested in possessions,” Signora said. “But a lovely quiet room with light coming in a window and a desk in good wood, and all your memories, and books and pictures on a wall…that would be very satisfying indeed.” She spoke as if she were a gypsy or a bag lady who might never aspire to something so wonderful, but would appreciate it as a reward for others.
He would tell her about this Kathy Clarke, the girl with the anxious face trying hard because her sister expected so much and thought she was clever. Maybe Signora would come up with an idea, she often did.
But he took his mind away from the pleasant chats he had with her and so enjoyed and back to the present. There was a long night ahead of him. “I’m sure you’ll think of something, Miss Clarke.” Mr. Dunne looked beyond her to the line of parents still to be seen.
“I’m very grateful to you all here.” Fran sounded as if she meant it. “You really do give your time, and care about the children. Years ago when I was at school it wasn’t like that, or maybe I’m only making excuses.” She was serious and pale-faced. Young Kathy Clarke was lucky to have such a concerned sister.
Fran went to the bus stop hands in pockets and head down. She had to pass an annex on the way out and saw a notice up advertising Italian lessons next September. A course to introduce you to the colors and paintings and music and language of Italy. It promised to be fun as well as educational. Fran wondered whether something like that might be a good idea. But it was too dear. She had so many outgoings. It would be very hard to pay a whole term in advance. And suppose Kathy decided to take the whole thing too seriously, as she had taken everything else. Then it might be a case of the cure being worse than the disease. No, she would have to think of something else. Fran sighed and walked to the bus stop.
There she met Peggy Sullivan, one of the women who worked at the checkout. “They’d put years on you these meetings, wouldn’t they?” said Mrs. Sullivan.
“There’s a lot of hanging about certainly, but it’s better than when we were yo
ung and no one knew where we were half the time. How’s your own little fellow getting on?” As manageress Fran had made it her business to know personally as many of the staff as possible. She knew that Peggy had two children, both of them severe trials. A grown-up daughter who didn’t get on with the father and a youngster who wouldn’t open a book.
“Well, Jerry’s not going to believe this but apparently he’s much improved. They all said it. He’s started to join the human race again, as one of them put it.”
“That’s a bit of good news.”
“Well, it’s all down to this cracked one we have living with us. Not a word to anyone, Miss Clarke, but we have a lodger, half Italian half Irish. Says she was married to an Italian and he died, but that’s not true at all. I think she’s a nun in disguise. But anyway didn’t she take an interest in Jerry and she has him a changed man it would appear.” Peggy Sullivan explained that Jerry hadn’t understood that poetry was meant to mean something until Signora came to the house and this had made all the difference. His English teacher was delighted with him, and he hadn’t understood that history really happened and now he did, and that had made all the difference.
Fran thought sadly that her own sister, on whom she had lavished such attention, had not realized that Latin was a language people spoke. Perhaps this Signora might open doors for her, too. “What does she do for a living, your lodger?” she asked.
“Oh, you’d need a fleet of detectives to find out. A bit of sewing here and a bit of work up in a hospital, I believe, but she’s going to be teaching an Italian class here in the school next term and she’s high as a kite over it. You’d think it was the World Cup she’d won all by herself, singing little Italian songs. She’s spending the whole summer getting ready for it. Nicest woman that ever wore shoe leather, but off-the-wall I tell you, off-the-wall.”
Fran decided there and then. She would sign up for the course. She and Kathy would go there every Tuesday and Thursday, they’d bloody learn Italian, that’s what they’d do, and they’d enjoy doing it, with this madwoman who was singing songs and getting ready for it so excitedly. It might make the poor nervous, tense Kathy relax a bit, and it might help Fran to forget Ken, who had gone to America without her.
“They said Kathy was a great girl,” Fran said proudly at the kitchen table.
Her mother, despondent over some heavy losses at the machines, tried to show enthusiasm. “Well, why wouldn’t they? She is a great girl.”
“They didn’t say anything bad about me?” Kathy asked.
“No, they didn’t. They said you were great at your homework and that it was a pleasure to teach you. So now!”
“I’d like to have been there, child, it’s just that I didn’t think I’d get off in time.” Kathy and Fran forgave him. It didn’t matter now.
“I have a great treat for you, Kathy, we’re going to learn Italian. Yourself and myself.”
If she had suggested they fly to the moon, nothing could have surprised the Clarke family more.
Kathy flushed with pleasure. “The two of us?”
“Why not? I always fancied going to Italy and wouldn’t my chances of picking up an Italian fellow be much better if I could speak the language!”
“Would I be able for it?”
“Of course you would, it’s for eejits like myself who haven’t learned anything, you’d probably be top of the class, but it’s meant to be fun. There’s this woman and she’s going to play us operas and show us pictures and give us Italian food. It’ll be terrific.”
“It’s not very expensive, is it, Fran?”
“No, it’s not, and look at the value we’ll get from it,” said Fran, who was already wondering was she verging on madness to have made such an announcement.
During the summer Ken settled himself in the small town in New York State. He wrote again to Fran. “I love you, I will always love you. I do understand about Kathy but couldn’t you come out here? We could have her out for the holidays, you could teach her then. Please say yes before I get a little service flat for myself. Say yes and we’ll get a little house. She’s sixteen, Fran, I can’t wait another four years for you.”
SHE WEPT OVER the letter, but she couldn’t leave Kathy now. This had been her dream, to see one of the Clarkes get to university. True, Ken had said wait until their children were born, then they could plan it from the word go, to give them all the chances in the world, but Ken didn’t understand. She had invested too much in Kathy. The girl was not an intellectual, but she was not stupid. If she had been born to wealthy parents, she would have had all the advantages that would cushion her. She would get her place in university merely because there would be enough time, there would be books in the house, people would have expectations. Fran had raised Kathy’s hopes. She couldn’t go now and leave her to her mother, who would look up vaguely from the gambling machines, and her father, who would mean well but see no further than the next cash-in-hand job for the few simple comforts he wanted from life.
Kathy would drown without her.
IT WAS A warm summer, visitors came to Ireland in greater numbers than before. The supermarket arranged special picnic lunches that people could take out to the park. It had been Fran’s idea, it was a great success.
Mr. Burke at the bacon counter had been doubtful. “I don’t want to go on about being in this business man and boy, Miss Clarke, but really I can’t think it’s a good idea to slice bacon and fry it and serve it cold in a sandwich. Why wouldn’t they make do with nice lean ham like they always did?”
“There’s a taste now, Mr. Burke, that people like their bacon crispy and you see if we keep the pieces nice and warm and fill the sandwiches as they come in, I can tell you they’ll want more and more.”
“But suppose I cut it and it’s fried and nobody buys it, what then, Miss Clarke?” He was such a nice man, anxious and very willing to please but fearful of change.
“Let’s give it a three-week trial, Mr. Burke, and see,” she said.
She had been totally correct. People flocked for the great sandwiches. They lost money on them, of course, but that didn’t matter; once you got people into the supermarket they bought other things on the way to the checkout.
She took Kathy to the Museum of Modern Art, and on her day off they went on a three-hour bus tour of Dublin. Just so that we know about where we live, Fran had said. They loved it, the two Protestant cathedrals that they had never been inside, and they drove around the Phoenix Park and they looked on proudly as the Georgian doors and fanlight windows were pointed out.
“Imagine, we’re the only Irish people on the bus,” Kathy whispered. “This is all ours, the others are visitors.”
And without being too bossy Fran organized the sixteen-year-old to get a smart yellow cotton dress, and to get her hair cut. At the end of the summer she was tanned and attractive-looking, her eyes had lost the haunted look.
Kathy did have friends, Fran noticed, but not close, giggly friends as she had known when she was young, what seemed like a whole generation ago. Some of these friends went to a noisy disco on a Saturday, a place that Fran knew about from the youngsters at work.
She knew enough to know it was not at all well run and that drugs circulated freely. She always happened to be passing by at one o’clock in the morning to collect her sister. She asked Barry, one of the young van drivers in the supermarket, to pick her up on several of these Saturdays and to drive past the disco. He had said it wasn’t a place for a youngster.
“What can I do?” Fran shrugged at him. “Tell her not to go and she feels a victim. I think I’m lucky that I can have you to act as an excuse to get her home.” Barry was a great kid, mad for overtime since he wanted to buy a motorbike. He said he had saved enough for one third of it, as soon as he had half the price he’d go and choose it, and then when he had two thirds he would buy it and pay the rest later.
“And what do you want it for, Barry?” Fran asked.
“For freedom, Miss Clarke,” he sai
d. “You know, freedom, all that air rushing past and everything.”
Fran felt very old. “My sister and I are going to learn Italian,” she told him one night as they waited outside the disco edging the advent of his motorbike nearer.
“Oh that’s great, Miss Clarke. I’d like to do that myself. I went to the World Cup, I made the greatest of friends, the nicest people you’d meet in a day’s walk, Miss Clarke, much the way we’d be, I often think, if we had the weather.”
“Maybe you’ll learn Italian too.” She spoke absently. She was watching tough-looking people come out of the disco. Why did Kathy and her friends want to go there? Imagine the freedom they had at sixteen to go to such places compared to her day.
“I might if I have the bike paid for, because one of the first places I’m going to take it is Italy,” Barry said.
“Well, it’s up in Mountainview school and it begins in September.” She spoke in a slightly distracted tone because she had just seen Kathy, Harriet, and their friends come out. She leaned over and hooted the horn. Immediately they looked over. The regular Saturday lift home was becoming part of the scene. What about the parents of all these girls, she thought. Did any of them care? Was she just a fusspot herself? Lord, but it would be such a relief when the term started again and all these outings were over.
THE ITALIAN CLASSES began on a Tuesday at seven o’clock. There had been a letter from Ken that morning. He was settled in his little apartment; a flat didn’t mean a flat, it meant a flat tire over there. The stock control was totally different. There were no deals with suppliers; you paid what was asked. People were very friendly, they invited him around to their homes. Soon it would be Labor Day and they would have a picnic to define that the summer was over. He missed her. Did she miss him?
There were thirty people in the class. Everyone got a huge piece of cardboard to put their names on, but this marvelous woman said they should be called by the Italian version. So Fran became Francesca, and Kathy, Caterina. They had great games of shaking hands and asking people what their names were. Kathy seemed to be enjoying it hugely. It would be worth it in the end, Fran said, putting the memory of Ken going to Labor Day picnics out of her mind.