by Jane Arbor
She speaks as if a business proposition which had looked favourable had disappointingly fallen through! thought Bridget wonderingly. But Tara was continuing, ‘I think he genuinely tried to analyse for me what he had felt. He said he’d loved having my confidence and feeling that I brought all my dreams to him. Heavens, how I blush now at all the idiotic things I told him! And he felt an elder-brother sort of tenderness for me which he wanted badly to believe was the real thing, because I was so vulnerable and he wanted to shield me from so much.
‘But he found,’ Tara’s story went on, ‘that he couldn’t put on to paper something that wasn’t deeply and personally true, and he knew in his heart that his need to shelter me wasn’t all that a man should put into marriage. So he couldn’t write the letter he’d meant to and he believed he’d destroyed all his attempts to start it. And soon afterwards I finally cut adrift and went to join Tom, which must have destroyed the last of Dion’s illusions about me anyway.’
‘You say he was gentle. But he doesn’t seem to have spared you much,’ commented Bridget.
‘I admit I took a jolt. I’d got used to the idea of marrying him and, as I’ve told you, I haven’t cared to meet him in the broad light of day since. But of all things, Dion is completely honest, and you’ve got to take him as you find him or not at all.’
‘You—you hadn’t come to care for Dion when you believed that he might still be in love with you?’
‘I don’t think so. I saw him as a possible second escape from Cion Eigel, that’s all. And I rather fancied the thought of being his wife when he is famous, as he will be one day.’
‘But you wouldn’t have married him just for—escape?’
‘I would. But there was never any chance of my getting away with it. Dion knows me too well. And anyway, as he said that night, a lot of water has flowed under the bridges in three years...’
Bridget started. ‘He said that to me!’
‘Did he indeed? So he has told you about the girl he has loved—really loved—since?’
‘N-no. We were talking about you, I believe. And I thought—’
‘As you told me—that he had forgiven me everything and was still in love with me?’
‘Something like that.’
‘Well, you were wrong. He did fall in love and knew this time that it was heart and soul and sinew for him, I gather.’
‘But he didn’t marry? He—he didn’t say any more?’
‘Nothing more. Only that this one had fallen for another man almost as soon as he’d met her, and that there wasn’t any likelihood that there’d be another girl for him—ever. And, Dion being Dion, I’d be inclined to believe that.’
‘Yes. So would I, I think,’ agreed Bridget slowly.
Kate returned soon after Tara had left with as little ceremony as she had come, saying that she had not yet packed in readiness for the journey the next day. Kate, it was clear, was in no good humour, and the reason soon emerged.
‘Would you believe that now?’ she demanded. ‘There’s Sarah O’Hanlon taking as much pride to herself over getting her niece married as if it were her own daughter, and she an old maid that no man ever looked at twice, so far as I ever heard tell! She says to me, “Isn’t it a pity, Kate Mann, that you have neither chick nor child of your own to be sewing and doing for at such a happy time? And wouldn’t it be a consolation to you if your Miss Bridget or Miss Jenny would be choosing themselves husbands, the way you could be having a wedding from your own house—or maybe two?”’
Bridget had to laugh. ‘What did you say to that, Kate?’
‘Arrah, I withered her. I told her you had come to Eire to set Miss Jenny up in health and to give the little ones a home. I said that the minds of good, serious girls weren’t turned only to thoughts of men, the way her own couldn’t have been when she was young, seeing that seemingly she had not put out her hand to get one for herself. And if either of you married, that would be a grand thing surely and Mr. William’s wish. But what had it to do with an O’Hanlon, would she be good enough to tell me, and I waiting breathless to hear?’
The acidity of this exchange would have shocked Bridget if experience had not told her that to-morrow in the shop Kate and Sarah would be arguing about the price of butter without ill-feeling on either side. And Kate went on to destroy her own victory by adding wistfully, ‘Not that a wedding on this side of the street wouldn’t be a happy thing indeed. One that Sarah could watch with envy from behind her counter, and she after ordering only two tiers to the cake, and the bride herself in mourning for her da, with no white wedding-dress at all!’
With the two boys as well as Pegeen and Minna to look after, Bridget’s days seemed to run into one another with busyness. And when Jenny went to stay with Patrick there was more to do than ever.
Jenny rang up every night. She loved Patrick’s mother, and his sister, who was only sixteen, had won a first prize for show-jumping at Dublin Horse Show and was teaching her to ride. She was adoring every minute she spent sailing with Patrick. She’d been sick the first time, but Patrick had held her head and had been perfectly sweet, and she hadn’t felt a bit ashamed of turning green in front of him. Didn’t Bridget think that was a good sign—just of friendship, of course, she added hastily.
If Bridget wasn’t working too hard, would it matter if she stayed a little longer at Black Rock? They all wanted her to, and Patrick was entering for the last regatta of the season. What had the children done to-day, and was Masterman being a Very Good Cat?
There came a day when Masterman, who had unearthed a colony of rats in the farmyard down the lane, proudly brought home three fine specimens of his kill for his own people to admire. But though Bridget saved this news for the evening’s talk with Jenny, somehow it was not told. For Jenny had news of her own. Patrick had asked her to marry him and she had told him that she couldn’t.
Bridget’s heart sank. ‘Are you sure you meant that, Jenny? You’ve sounded so happy with him.’
‘Yes, I have been.’ Over the line Jenny’s whisper only just shaped the words. ‘Sort of quietly happy, and not worrying all the while about the impression I’m making, as I did with Gordon. Only I’m so fickle, aren’t I? I mean, as little as a month ago there was Gordon and now there’s Patrick, but in quite a different way. I think I know that I want to spend the rest of my life with Patrick. But I’m so frightened, Bridgie, of changing again, and I couldn’t bear to hurt him...’
‘You’re thinking more of Patrick than of yourself, aren’t you?’ put in Bridget.
‘I am, I am! His happiness matters terribly, and I’m longing to be sure that I love him enough. But I thought I was sure about Gordon too.’
‘Well, Patrick knows about Gordon. Couldn’t you explain that you’re frightened and why?’
‘Do you think he’d understand?’
‘Don’t you know he would?’
After the quiet question there was a long pause from Jenny’s end. Then she breathed, ‘Yes, I do know. And that I needn’t ask him to wait too long for me to be quite, quite sure!’
A day or two later Bridget had a letter from Mrs. Steven. After saying that she had benefited so much from the Atlantic air that she was often up and out even before breakfast, she went on:
‘We hear from Patrick Byrd that Jenny is staying on for a time with his people. Lovely for them both, but both my husband and I feel that you should have a holiday too.
‘This is our plan, if you will agree to it. Miss Farran, our under-matron at Cion Eigel, who has no home of her own, has been with us here for a fortnight and would willingly make herself responsible for the children if you would bring them out here and accept our invitation to be our guest for the last week of our stay. The children would have a holiday, and you would get a well-deserved one from them! Doris Farran would take them back to Tullabor by train, and you could drive back with us.
‘Please say you will come, Bridget my dear. We should all love to have you, though you may not see more of Tara than we
do ourselves. For, believe it or not, Tara is film-acting!
‘There’s a whole film company out here on the coast, and Tara has joined the cast, as a character described as a “wild witch-girl of the isles!” Apparently the actress cast for this role lost heart somewhere between London and the coast of Clare and turned back. And when Tara was chosen to fill the gap, the director brushed aside even her stage experience in his raptures over her looks and the results of the screen-test they made of her.
‘Anyway, Tara is deliriously happy about it and we dare not spoil things for her by reminding her of the setbacks and almost certain heartbreaks ahead if she means to make it her career. She is believing in herself again, which is everything. When she heard I was writing she asked me to give you a message—“Tell Bridget I’m round my next corner and not looking over my shoulder.” Cryptic, but I expect you understand what she means. And I should like to add, Thank you for trying to help her, even if our plans for her did “gang agley.”
‘She does not seem anxious to see Dion Christie and we have seen nothing of him since he went out to Aran, though we believe he has made his base on Inisheer, the island which is nearest to the mainland and which often looks close enough to touch in the amazingly clear light there is out here on fine days.’
There followed another plea to Bridget to consider the invitation and the letter ended, ‘Simply say which day you hope to arrive. Sincerely yours, Mary Steven.’
Should she go? Bridget had longed to see the rugged beauty of the west coast ever since Dion had once described it vividly to her. It would make a change for the children before the winter and—she re-read the letter’s last paragraph—if there was little more risk of meeting Dion in County Clare than at the moment in Tullabor, she felt inclined to accept.
The children were thrilled, of course, and Kate fell willingly upon the colossal task of washing and ironing and packing for five people about to depart on holiday. She herself would stay to look after Masterman and Jenny’s hens and—under protest—would go for a holiday with her sister-in-law when the others returned.
They did the cross-country journey on a hot day, changing at Limerick and Ennis and reaching the coast in the cool of a lovely evening. Mr. Steven was at the station to meet them and to drive them along the winding coast road to the hotel which certainly was delightful. Bridget’s room faced due west across the sea and was radiant with the early evening sunshine. When Bridget had tipped the bellboy and closed the door upon him she went to fling the casements wide upon the glorious view.
Immediately below, the rocky terraced hotel garden stepped away towards the cliff-top from which it was bounded by a wind-beaten tamarisk hedge. North and south the cliff line ran jaggedly and there were small fishing-boats dotted about the sea.
She noticed the stout shutters to her window and realised the story they told of the lash and fury of the Atlantic gales. But this evening the sea was scarcely ruffled and was almost too blue to look at, a shining floor across which the island of Inisheer—where Dion was—did look incredibly near.
Doris Farran had taken charge of the children as soon as they arrived, and had put Minna to bed. As this was their first stay in an hotel, Pegeen and the boys were allowed to have dinner with the grown-ups, and the Stevens’ party was one of the largest and most hilarious in the dining-room.
Tara did not dine with them, as she had been invited to dine with the film director and his wife. But she joined them for coffee and afterwards took Bridget on an introductory round of her new associates, none of whom appeared to have surnames and who were as much ‘Darling’ to Tara as she was ‘Darling’ to them. Already, chameleon-like, she was vividly part of her new world and no longer of Cion Eigel nor of any of her past.
The company would be ‘on location’ for a few more weeks, she told Bridget. And when it returned to London, although her own sequences would be finished, she would go too.
‘What then?’ Bridget asked.
‘More screen tests. Then a contract, I hope. After that’—she spread her hands expressively—‘all the future before me.’
Bridget said impulsively, ‘I’m so glad for you, Tara. You are very happy about it, aren’t you?’
Tara turned candid green eyes upon her. ‘Happy now,’ she said. ‘To-morrow—who knows? But there are still a lot of corners ahead, and I don’t care if I do take some of them blind!’
The lovely weather held and Bridget swam with Mr. Steven every day, diving into deep, clear water, swimming or floating lazily and coming out to lie upon the sun-scorched rocks and then plunging in again. There were picnics with the children and cockle-hunting at low tide. Once or twice they all went to watch Tara’s film being made. But this soon palled when they found that a very little activity was punctuated by interminable pauses when there was none. They had only faith and Tara’s assurance that the cameras ever went to work at all.
Bridget found that she could not resist asking what communication there was between that part of the coast and the islands.
‘Only the fishing, and by rowing or motor-boat from here,’ Mr. Steven told her. ‘But a steamer goes out from Galway every day. We could drive over there and do the trip if you’d like?’
But Bridget hastily declined, saying that she was quite content to laze the time away where she was.
On their last day the weather changed. The sea’s intense blue became an oily, sinister green; the waves, capped by white horses, ran strongly in the Sound, and towards evening Inisheer and the dimmer outline of Inishmaan disappeared behind a driving mist of rain. No one cared to go out, but shortly before dinner Mr. Steven said that he had contracted for some lobsters to take back to Cion Eigel and must drive down to the harbour to collect them. As the children had been cooped up all day, they could go too if they liked.
Bridget had changed early for dinner and was alone in the lounge when the car returned. Pegeen and Minna scuttled at once for the front door; Bryan and Barney alighted heavily, humping between them a huge fishing-bass full, presumably, of the lobsters. But Bridget’s fascinated eyes were all for the tall figure backing out of the seat beside Mr. Steven’s.
Dion! She sprang back from the window-seat where she had been kneeling, gripped by sudden panic at having to meet him again so unpreparedly. At the memory of the savage hostility with which he had last left her, the deep colour ran up her throat and stained her cheeks beneath her tan. Surely he could not know already that she was here, or he would have made some excuse to Mr. Steven not to come up to the hotel? Or was that to assume that the souring of their relationship mattered as much to him as to her?
Minna ran in, chanting, ‘We found Mr. Dion down by the harbour! And what do you think? He never knew we were here!’ Dion followed, and Bridget had to summon all her poise to say conventionally, ‘We’ve been here with Mr. and Mrs. Steven for a week. But I expect you were surprised to see the children, weren’t you?’
‘I was,’ he replied as coolly. ‘But they tell me you’re off again to-morrow—and without visiting Aran. You shouldn’t have omitted that. Aran isn’t just a piece of geography. It’s an experience.’
‘Mr. Steven said it meant going by steamer from Galway, and it was so lovely here that we didn’t bother.’
‘The steamer goes to Inishmore. You could have crossed to Inisheer by boat from the harbour any day. But I can imagine you wouldn’t have thought that worth the trouble...’
Dion paused and Bridget, conscious of a quicksand, asked quickly, ‘Is that how you came over?’
‘Yes. With my landlord in his curragh.’ Bridget glanced from the window. ‘You chose bad weather.’
‘We couldn’t help it. Tim O’Keefe, whose wife is putting me up, got news that his brother was ill. I left Tim at his cottage below, and I was going to put in time for an hour or two when Mr. Steven and the children turned up.’
‘Are you staying for dinner?’
‘I’ve been invited.’
It was the clipped, non-committal conversat
ion of strangers. Bridget began again, ‘You’ll have heard about Tara...?’ And was thankful when, at that moment, Mr. Steven came to take Dion to the bar for a drink.
Mrs. Steven was entertaining several of the film executives for Tara, so their party for dinner was a large one. Tara, to Bridget’s envy of her self-possession, showed no embarrassment at all with Dion. Instead she kissed him lightly in front of everybody and introduced him as ‘someone I’ve adored since I was a kid and who bore all the worst of my growing pains for me!’
Conversation across the big table was general, and Dion had to answer a good many questions about Aran which none of the Englishmen knew.
He was describing the making of kelp—the collection, drying and burning of seaweed for the production of iodine—when a waiter brought a message for him.
He stood up, excusing himself to Mrs. Steven and thanking his host. ‘O’Keefe has come up for me,’ he explained. ‘He’d have stayed another hour, but with this sea running we may have difficulty in getting in at Inisheer if we don’t take the tide.’ His farewell greeting round the table singled out no one in particular and then he was gone.
His cover was taken away; someone moved up into his chair next to Tara and the talk flowed on. But suddenly Tara looked down and appeared to be brushing something from beneath her feet with the toe of her slipper. Her new neighbour asked: ‘Is it your bag?’ and stooped to retrieve it for her. But it was a man’s wallet that he picked up. ‘Not mine,’ he disclaimed, showing it. ‘Whose?’
Bridget thought she recognised it for Dion’s. But before she could say so Tara had taken it and was opening it.
‘It could belong to Dion. There’s sure to be an envelope or something to show,’ she murmured. ‘Let’s see. Money on this side, something written in short-hand—that’s a lot of help! What’s this snapshot? Oh—’ She paused and glanced curiously across at Bridget. Then, ‘Yes, it must be Dion’s. Look...’