The Last Lost Girl

by Maria Hoey

  The photographs were jumbled up with old diaries, a long-expired passport, a broken comb, a ball of twine and old currency coins. None of them were of Lilly. All the same, he had kept one near him, she was sure he had. Her eyes turned to the bookshelves. One by one, she lifted up the books and shook them gently before replacing them on the shelf. Things drifted to the floor and piled there, old bus tickets and receipts, torn envelopes and betting slips, scraps torn from newspapers, a Mass card memorial to his sister – Lillian the First, the long-dead beauty whom Lilly was reputed to have favoured. From The Complete Works of William Shakespeare a brown envelope floated and Jacqueline bent and picked it up.It had an English stamp and had been addressed in large block capitals to Frank Brennan. She slid her finger under the flap and tipped the contents into her hand: a book of matches and a picture postcard. The matchbook cover had a black-and-white sketch of a sprawling house – Victorian, by the look of it. There was a phone number underneath and a name, Sea Holly Villa. Jacqueline flipped the cover – the matches were still there, pink-tipped and intact. The postcard was a scene from an English seaside town, the name scrawled in glossy red lettering across an unfeasibly blue sky. Jacqueline turned it over – it was unused. She returned the matchbook and the postcard to the envelope and replaced it inside the book.

  The photograph fell from the pages of Tess of the D’Urbervilles. She might have known. It had always been his favourite. The photograph had been taken in the back garden. She examined it for a moment then turned it over. Someone had pencilled a date on the back: June 1976. She had not realised it had been taken that year. She turned it over again and looked at the three of them, longhaired and long-limbed, squinting into the sun. That summer everyone had squinted, hiding secrets behind their eyes. She moved her thumb softly across the images, Lilly outstandingly the beauty of the three, Gayle’s soft-featured prettiness, even her own querulous little face stamped with the cellular beauty of the young. Her eyes went back to Lilly’s eyes and she stared at them as though they might contain a clue.

  She looked at the heap on the floor of the things that had fallen from the books. Her eyes strayed to The Complete Works of Shakespeare again and she went to the bookshelf and picked up the book. Her fingers moved over the cloth cover. The dark-blue fabric was unravelling at the spine – the thread barely held front and back together any longer. Jacqueline opened it to the flyleaf.

  August 1974

  This book belongs to:

  Lilly Brennan

  Blackberry Lane

  Ballinreel

  Co Dublin

  Ireland

  Europe

  Earth

  The World

  The Universe

  Age 14 – Happy Birthday to Me!

  Jacqueline’s fingers moved slowly over the loping blue-ink scrawl. She became suddenly aware of the too-loud ticking of her father’s alarm clock and then, for no reason she could clearly identify she had a memory of him saying, “There are only two unforgivable sins in this world; sleeping late in the mornings, and putting any winged creature in a cage.”

  She closed her eyes for a moment and then opened them again and carried the book to the stripped bed. As she sat down, a picture came to her, of her parents rolled together in sleep, perhaps long after they would have wished it that way. She looked around her at the room where they had shared their nights for so long. There was nothing left here of her mother except the black-and-white wedding-day photograph on the wall. She imagined him lying here alone, after her mother had gone, rolling into that furrow that they had made together. She thought of Gayle saying, “They’re together again after all this time,” but Gayle was a comfortable person who believed comfortable things. Jacqueline wished she could believe comfortable things, but she could not. And besides, their mother had removed herself body and mind from this house and all it had come to stand for, by her own free will – why would her spirit, if spirit there was, wish to do otherwise?

  Jacqueline bent over the book in her lap, opened it and let the pages fall as they would. She looked at the passage marked by a pencilled asterisk:

  “The crow may bathe his coal-black wings in mire,

  And unperceiv’d fly with the filth away;

  But if the like the snow-white swan desire,

  The stain upon his silver down will stay.”

  When she closed her eyes, she saw them at the kitchen table, her father with the book in his hand, Lilly frowning deeply.

  “Now what do you think he was getting at there, Lilly?”

  “How would I know? Maybe if he wrote in proper English, I might know what he means.”

  Jacqueline flipped the pages and found the envelope. She inspected it more closely. The ink of the date stamp was faded but she could make out the month and year. July 1983. She turned to the flyleaf of the book again and placed the envelope on the opposite page. She stared from the scrawling inscription to the carefully written address on the envelope; she couldn’t be sure.

  She dragged herself backwards on her hands until she was sitting upright against the wall to the side of the bed; it felt cool against her back and solid. She reached out and picked up the envelope. Her thumb moved in a slow circle over the faded postmark.

  She stayed there until the room darkened around her and when she got up she felt stiff and chilled. She walked to the window and looked down on the moon-silvered orchard. She shivered and turned away.

  “Do you remember that boy?”

  “Yes, I remember him.”

  Jacqueline sighed into the phone. “I haven’t even told you which one I mean yet, Gayle.” Gayle, understanding the loneliness of unshared memories, always insisted on keeping her company – even in the past.

  But Gayle surprised her. “I think I know the one you mean. Is it the boy from the carnival, the one who was in charge of the swing boats?”

  Words are wizards, reassembling the past like some magic unshattering of glass, all the jagged shards rising up into the air, dancing together, reknitting the pattern of the lost thing. Jacqueline heard it, the whoosh of flying boats in the darkness. She saw a flash of Lilly’s eyes, darkly glittering in the lights from the carnival as she looked down on the figure of the boy moving about below them. Saw the faded blue of his denim shirt open at the neck, showing his dark skin, saw his black hair glistening and his white teeth gleaming when he smiled. And he smiled and smiled, and the thin gold ring in his left ear shimmered and everybody was dazzled.

  “Do you like him, Lilly?”

  “Who?”

  “Luke.”

  “Not Luke – Luca. He’s alright.”

  “Because I think he likes you.”

  “Yeah? Big thrill!”

  “Yes, he’s the one,” said Jacqueline. “Luca.”

  “Was that his name?” said Gayle. “I couldn’t quite remember. Why do you ask?”

  “No particular reason. Where was it he came from – can you remember?”

  “God, I don’t know, Jacqueline, what does –”

  “It was somewhere in England,” said Jacqueline, “and it was somewhere beside the sea. I remember because once, when Daddy was having a go at her, Lilly said she was going to go and live there with him and open a chip shop on the beach.”

  “I remember,” said Gayle. “Daddy nearly went mad.”

  “Can you remember the name of the town?”

  “Not off-hand.”

  “Did he go back there afterwards?”

  “I don’t know – I don’t know what happened to him,” said Gayle.

  “Do you think you could find out? Maybe Goretti Quinn would know.”

  “She’s probably forgotten, like the rest of us,” said Gayle. “Why do you want to know?”

  “I just do. Where is she these days, Goretti Quinn, do you know?”

  “Not really – I haven’t seen her in years. She moved when she got married, to Wexford or Waterford, I can’t remember which. Ask Regina if you really want to know.”

  �
�I never see Regina,” said Jacqueline.

  “You saw her at the funeral, Jacqueline – I saw her hugging you.”

  “Did I? Oh right, of course.” Jacqueline remembered her surprise when a middle-aged woman with hair the colour of mouse, having muttered the requisite “Sorry for your loss”, had thrown her arms around her and pulled her close. Regina Quinn; she had hardly recognised her. “I don’t suppose you have Regina’s number, do you, Gayle?”

  “No, I don’t, I’m sorry.”

  “Let me know if you remember where it was. That town where Luca came from.”

  “Okay. I will. But, Jacqueline, why do you want to know? What’s going on?”

  “Nothing’s going on.” She paused. “Gayle, did Daddy ever … do you think he could have found something out and not said?”

  “You mean about Lilly? Found out what?”

  “I don’t know. Anything.”

  “Why, do you?”

  “No. I don’t think so.”

  “Then why did you ask? Did he say something?”

  “No, nothing.”

  “Then why would you think he was keeping something back?” said Gayle.

  Jacqueline stared down at the postcard in her hand. “I don’t. I was just thinking aloud. How’s the baby getting on?”

  “She’s doing really well, thanks. Getting stronger all the time. Alison thinks they’ll be able to bring her home in a week or so.”

  “That’s great news.”

  “Yes, it is. Jacqueline, are you alright there on your own?”

  “Yes, I’m fine.”

  “You don’t sound fine. All that stuff about that boy, about Luca …”

  “I told you, Gayle, that was nothing – I was just thinking out loud.”

  “All the same, it didn’t feel right leaving you there all on your own.”

  “I live on my own, Gayle” – in a cave apparently – “and you have your family to see to.”

  “You’re my family too. I wish you’d come over here …”

  “I don’t know …”

  “Will you think about it?”

  “Of course.”

  “No, really think about it this time, because you know we’d love to have you stay with us.”

  There it was: the us that brought them again to a full stop.

  Chapter 11

  1976

  It is Ireland’s hottest day in the whole of the 20th century and Lilly Brennan is a streetwalker.

  Jacqueline’s mother says, “That’s no way to talk about your own daughter, Frank.”

  “It’s easy to tell you didn’t see what I saw,” says Daddy. “Leaning up against the church wall they were, her and that Quinn girl with a shower of rock apes swarming round them, like bluebottles round shit.”

  “Don’t be so vulgar, Frank.”

  “Mam, I swear,” says Lilly, “we were just talking to a few fellas. He’s making it sound like a crime or something.”

  “I know a streetwalker when I see one,” says Daddy.

  “That’s enough, Frank. And your daddy has every right to be annoyed with you, Lilly – you were supposed to be at Mass, not hanging around with boys.”

  “I was at Mass,” says Lilly, “but it was scorching and I felt like I was going to faint with the heat and –”

  “Don’t give me any of your excuses,” says Daddy.

  “It’s not an excuse, it’s a reason,” says Lilly.

  “And don’t give me any of your lip, either.”

  Lilly runs out of the kitchen and bangs the door behind her.

  “You don’t have to take the door off the hinges!” Jacqueline’s mother yells after her. “Is it any wonder I’m always getting headaches?”

  Lilly does not come down for her dinner and Jacqueline has to do the dishes.

  “But it’s Lilly’s turn – it’s not fair!”

  “Lilly is upset,” says Jacqueline’s mother.

  “Then why can’t Gayle do them?”

  “Gayle has to go running.”

  “Gayle always has to go running.”

  “Yes, she does, so just do the dishes and stop giving out. In the time it takes you to complain about it, you could have them done.”

  “No, I couldn’t,” says Jacqueline. “It takes ages to do the dishes and it only takes a minute to complain about it.”

  “Well, your minute is up. Now do the dishes and be quiet, Jacqueline.”

  All the time she is washing the dishes, Jacqueline is thinking about how much she hates her mother and her sisters.

  She has just finished when her mother comes back. “Here’s Regina come to play with you, Jacqueline.”

  Jacqueline and Regina Quinn stand and stare at one another.

  “Are you not going out to play with Regina, Jacqueline?”

  “I don’t want to play,” says Jacqueline. “I was going outside to read.”

  “Well, you can go outside and play instead,” says Jacqueline’s mother. “You spend your life reading. And you have a guest now.”

  “She’s not my guest,” says Jacqueline. “A guest is someone you ask to come. I didn’t ask her to come. I never ask her to come.”

  “Jacqueline Brennan, don’t you be so rude! And with poor Regina standing right in front of you. I wouldn’t blame her if she decided she didn’t want to play with you after all.”

  Jacqueline looks at Regina again. For a wonderful moment, she thinks that maybe Regina will decide she doesn’t want to play, but Regina just giggles and covers her buck teeth with her hand.

  “Oh, alright then, come on if you’re coming,” says Jacqueline.

  The door opens and Lilly comes in. Her eyes are all puffed up and red.

  “I did your turn at the dishes, Lilly,” says Jacqueline. “So you better do mine.”

  “Oh shut up!” says Lilly, and flings herself into a chair.

  “Why was Lilly crying?” asks Regina, as soon as they are outside.

  “Because she’s a streetwalker,” says Jacqueline.

  “Jacqueline Brennan, imagine calling your own sister a hoor!”

  “I didn’t call her a hoor, I called her a streetwalker. At least, Daddy did.”

  “Same thing,” says Regina. “Why did he call her a streetwalker then?”

  Jacqueline tells Regina about Lilly, Goretti, and the boys.

  “Were they kissin’ and stuff?” asks Regina.

  “Don’t be stupid, of course they weren’t kissin’ – they were outside the church and Lilly said they were only talking.”

  “But your da called her a hoor, and in the Bible hoors do sex and stuff.”

  “Are there hoors in the Bible?” asks Jacqueline.

  “Loads of them, only they don’t call them hoors – they call them Jezebel and harlots. Have you got a Bible? I’ll show you.”

  “Somewhere,” says Jacqueline. “I’ll go and get it and meet you in the orchard.”

  In the kitchen, Lilly and her mother are sitting close together at the table. They stop talking when Jacqueline comes in.

  “What do you want?” says Jacqueline’s mother. “You only just went out.”

  “Where’s the Bible?” asks Jacqueline.

  “What do you want a Bible for?”

  “We want to read about something, that’s all.”

  “Books, always books,” says Jacqueline’s mother. “I don’t know where it is – somewhere on the shelf in the sitting room, I suppose. Just make sure you put it back where you find it.”

  “Mrs Quinn says the Bible is sacred and should have pride of place in the house,” says Jacqueline.

  As the door is closing behind her, she hears Lilly saying, “Little freak.”

  She finds the Bible under a stack of Daddy’s National Geographic – Jacqueline thinks that Mrs Quinn would not approve. She picks it up and carries it very quietly into the hall. She stands and listens but all she can hear is a man on the radio saying, “What’s the recipe today, Jim?”

  Her mother smiles when she co
mes back into the kitchen. “You found it – good girl. Now off you go and play, or whatever it is you’re doing.”

  “Weirdo,” says Lilly. “Who plays with a bible?”

  “Now, Lilly,” says Jacqueline’s mother, and she smiles at Jacqueline again.

  Jacqueline knows they are just waiting for her to go outside so they can start talking again.

  In the orchard, Regina Quinn is lying on her belly under the oldest apple tree. Jacqueline lies down next to her and, while Regina looks for hoors, Jacqueline wonders what Lilly and her mother were talking about.

  “Here’s a bit about Jezebel,” says Regina. She reads aloud slowly, her finger moving along the page from word to word. “‘She painted her eyes and adorned her head.’”

  “Lilly paints her eyes,” says Jacqueline. “I don’t think she adorns her head but she’s always washing her hair. What else?”

  Regina flicks through the pages but she can only find something about an adulteress. “An adulteress is the same thing as a harlot,” she tells Jacqueline.

  “Here, let me see,” says Jacqueline. She reads aloud. “‘As bitter as wormwood and sharp as a double-edged sword.’ What’s wormwood?”

  “I don’t know,” says Regina. “Will I find the abominations for you?”

  “What are the abominations?”

  “Things you’re not allowed to do, or God will smite you. Give it back and I’ll find them.”

  Regina finds the abominations and hands the Bible back to Jacqueline. Jacqueline reads for a moment then looks up. Regina is watching her with a delighted smile on her face.

  “Are there any that aren’t about periods or lepers?” asks Jacqueline.

  “There are lots about the things you can and can’t eat,” says Regina. “Keep going.”

  Jacqueline keeps on reading. “I’ve found it – there are an awful lot of things you’re not allowed to eat. Listen to this – ‘camels, bats, badgers, eagles, mice, hares, vultures, buzzards …’”

  Regina rolls over onto her back and closes her eyes, while Jacqueline goes on with the list.