by Jane Arbor
‘Because I had found it first. That day, before you and I had met and long before I knew who Tara was ...’ The telling of her whole dilemma over the letter was easy now.
Dion protested at last, ‘But my poor sweet, you say Tara told you that we meant nothing to each other and even told you how I came to begin and abandon that thing? So, if you knew you loved me, why on earth—? At Lough Tulla, for instance? I kissed you—remember.’
She saw the puckish delight with which he was watching the deep colour sweep into her cheeks. She said, ‘I hadn’t talked to Tara then. And I thought you’d kissed me on a sheer light impulse. And then, because of Tara, you felt as guilty afterwards as I did. But you did your best to shoulder my part of the blame.’
‘I did nothing of the sort! You drew back as if you’d been stung, and you said you hadn’t wanted it to happen—out of loyalty, I suppose to Trent. I had a struggle to respect that. But I did then. It was later that same night I was hanged if I’d respect anything you were keeping for him...’
‘You were very angry then.’
‘Angry and frustrated and utterly disillusioned. But still desperate enough to try to snatch at what you wouldn’t give willingly. Why did you let me go, thinking what I did of you? Was it just pride?’
‘Only partly, I think. I was angry too. But I was afraid—of having to go on seeing you every day, loving you as much as I did, and never being able to show it.’
‘But afterwards—when Tara told you?’
‘You had gone then, and I didn’t think we were ever likely to meet again in any way that mattered. And Tara said you had been in love for a long time with another girl, who didn’t care for you.’
Dion bent suddenly and scrubbed his chin hard on the top of her head. ‘Did that hurt?’ he demanded.
‘Yes, quite a lot.’
‘Well, I shall do it again—or worse—every time in the future you repeat such a failure in the stout common sense I’ve always credited you with. My darling idiot, that “other girl” was you!’
She had known it of course with a deep instinct which had awakened only in that first melting moment in his arms. But how long ago had that been? A few minutes? An hour? Since then, time had seemed to stop for them ... Suddenly, remembering Jenny and the children, she knelt up in alarm.
‘Dion, I’d forgotten! Patrick was supposed to be bringing Jenny and Pegeen and Minna home to tea. They’re blackberrying over on Slieve Donell. But look, it’s getting dusk! Or is it the same sort of foggy mist which came down last night?’
He helped her to her feet and they went over to the window. Peering out, he said, ‘It’s the mist off the hills we get at this time of year. Slieve Donell, you say? That’s not too good. It will be wrapped in the stuff by now. But Byrd wouldn’t have them up there still. He knows the weather-signs as well as the next fellow.’
‘But he isn’t necessarily there with them—if anything had happened to delay him.’
‘Not there?’
‘No.’ Bridget explained, and saw Dion grow grave. He said, ‘Well, Byrd could have been held up in Dublin or anywhere on the road down, or the lot of them could be stranded between here and the slopes of Slieve Donell. That would be the best of it, of course—’ He broke off there, and Bridget did not have to ask him what would be the worst of it. She knew that it was that Jenny and the children might still be alone in the blackberry wood on Slieve Donell or even, despairing of Patrick’s coming, have set out to try to walk home through the wreathing, swirling mist.
Dion, dragging on a pullover which he had fetched from his car, answered her unspoken fears. ‘Jenny wouldn’t stir. She’d know Minna at least couldn’t do the distance. They’ll stay put all right. But we’d better take the road and see what signs of them or of Patrick there are.’
Patrick’s mission to Dublin, Bridget knew, had been to meet some boys, late school arrivals, off the Holyhead steamer. And after she and Dion had set out it occurred to her that they would have been wise to telephone from the O’Hanlons’ to Cion Eigel to see if he had arrived there at least. But Dion pointed out that if Patrick were able to reach or be reached by a telephone he would certainly have got in touch earlier. They both expected and hoped, in fact, to meet the little party either returning or stranded on the road.
For some distance their way took them along the road to Lough Tulla, and at the farm where they had been to the wedding party Dion drew up. ‘Shawn or Glenna Quin may have seen Byrd pass,’ he said. ‘And if not, it might be a good idea to take Shawn along with us in case there’s anything wrong.’ He left Bridget in the car and went into the farm, only to come out again almost at once. ‘Pegeen is here,’ he said.
‘Pegeen? Alone ... ? But how? And where are the others?’
‘I don’t know all the details. I came straight out to tell you. It seems that Jenny put her foot in a rabbit hole and sprained or strained it so that she couldn’t walk, and when Patrick was long overdue Pegeen came down from Slieve Donell to get help. Go in to her, will you, while I take Shawn on with me? She’s tired and a bit frightened, poor gossoon. She got here only a few minutes before we did, and Shawn was just going to harness his horse and take her back to guide him to the others. I left him asking where we may find them, and as we both know the wood from end to end we’ll have them very soon, don’t worry.’
‘Oh, I’m glad it’s no worse.’ Bridget scrambled out of the car. ‘I suppose there’s no news of Patrick?’
‘None before Pegeen came away, though she might have been better advised to stay put until somebody fetched them, even if he didn’t.’
Bridget reminded him, ‘You know what a conscientious little soul she is. She always wants to take burdens on to her own shoulders, even if mistakenly. She is happier that way.’
Dion nodded and pinched Bridget’s cheek. ‘Yes—acting by the light of her duty, at whatever cost. Funny that at first I wanted to resent the same thing in you when it cut across my will and until I saw it as part of the lovely uprightness that is you! Ah—here’s Shawn! Did you get our marching orders, Shawn?’
‘I did so. I have it almost to an inch where we should be finding your sister and the little one, lady.’ His slow smile of encouragement was for Bridget and then he took her seat beside Dion and they drove off.
Bridget found Pegeen being plied with seed-cake and milk by young Mrs. Quin. At sight of Bridget her face lighted in welcome, but she seemed anxious for approval of what she had done.
‘You see,’ she explained apologetically, ‘I made a mistake about how far I’d have to come. I saw this house as Mr. Byrd drove us past this morning, and I thought it was much, much nearer to our wood. Jenny let me come because I thought I could run down to it in ten minutes, but I still hadn’t found it when I had walked and run for ages. I did come to another house along the road, but it was rather a horrid one, and when I knocked at the door, someone shouted at me from inside, but nobody came.’
Over her head Glenna Quin nodded at Bridget. ‘The Widow Twigg’s cabin,’ she confirmed. ‘And though there’s a road from here up to the Slieve that’s but half a mile long, the way the little one took by mistake will be two miles or three.’
‘Oh, Pegeen,’ exclaimed Bridget in dismay, ‘you must be terribly tired!’
‘I was a bit, but I’m not now. You’re not angry, are you?’
‘Of course not, dear.’ Bridget thought it wise not to enlarge upon the risk she had taken, but she was thankful she had not known the child was doing such a distance alone and at dusk and by a road she had never travelled before.
Meanwhile she seemed none the worse, and was accepting more seed-cake with her usual politeness. Mrs. Quin pressed Bridget to take something too, but seemed to understand when Bridget felt she couldn’t eat until her anxiety about Jenny and Minna—also about Patrick’s whereabouts—was relieved.
Glenna Quin said comfortably, ‘You’ll be hungry surely presently,’ and began to slice and butter a loaf of crusty soda-bread. Next a large
ham appeared, then some beer-mugs and more milk, and finally the inevitable pot of well-brewed tea was drawn closer to the fire to heat up.
Glenna stirred the turf into a glow, apologising for the warmth of the room and adding, ‘You’ll not be needing a fire to cook by all the warm days, the way you have the electricity in Tullabor?’
‘No, but I love a turf fire,’ Bridget assured her. And then, as a sudden sweet memory flashed, she asked, ‘I suppose after your wedding, your husband lighted the first one on this hearth for you?’
Glenna, kneeling by the fire, sat back on her heels and laughed: ‘Sure, he did not. And why would he? I am able for lighting a fire for myself!’
Bridget hesitated, ‘Oh—I thought it was a custom which is supposed to bring good luck to a bride?’
‘And if it is, it’s one I never heard of. Who would be after telling you of it?’
‘Dion did—I mean Mr. Christie—’ Bridget broke off in confusion, realising that she had blushed.
‘Ah, then it might be true, for there’s little that Mr. Dion wouldn’t have had from your uncle about the old ways and times.’ Glenna paused and glanced a shy enquiry at Bridget, blushing faintly herself as she went on, ‘You’ll maybe not pardon the liberty, but could it be that Mr. Dion was telling you the story in the way of asking you to marry himself?’
‘No, it was before then—’ Their eyes met and they both laughed, and Glenna nodded her satisfaction. She said, ‘You didn’t mean to be telling me, surely, and Shawn will say that I had no right to ask what I did. But wasn’t he saying at our wedding that, from Mr. Dion’s manner with you, he thought the guests would soon be dancing at yours. And to-night, for all your worry about your sister, the quiet joy that’s laid like a cloak upon your shoulder is for any woman to see...’
They had both forgotten Pegeen, who now stared wide-eyed at Bridget over the rim of her mug? ‘Are you and Mr. Dion going to get married?’ she asked.
‘I hope so, Pegeen.’
‘You’ll be going away?’
‘I don’t think so.’ Bridget had already resolved to persuade Dion that the house at Tullabor which had brought them together should continue to be their home.
‘But what about us—Minna and me? You won’t want us any more!’
‘Of course I shall. If your parents and Mr. Steven will let you stay, there won’t be any difference at all.’
‘But people who get married have children of their own!’
Glenna reassured her, ‘Not all at once, mavourneen, and even then the best of them have love enough to spare—’ She broke off as they all heard the sound they had been waiting for. But when they ran out to see, there were two cars outside instead of one, and to Bridget’s relief it was Patrick who was carrying Jenny in his arms, while Minna trotted between Dion and Shawn, weighed down by a basket of blackberries which she offered to Bridget with pride.
Amid the excited explanations which followed Jenny claimed, ‘It wasn’t Patrick I was surprised to see. It was Dion—of all people I least expected to appear out of that beastly mist!’
Patrick threatened, ‘Just say my arrival was a mere anti-climax, and I’ll take you straight back again, sprained ankle and all!’
‘Darling, when you’re an anti-climax to me, you’ve my permission to take me to the top of Everest and park me there!’ From her position of vantage Jenny tweaked his ear and then demanded to be set down, in order to show that she could hobble alone if she must.
‘What did happen to you, Patrick?’ asked Bridget.
‘Oh, the proverbial chapter of accidents! There was fog in the Bay and the steamer couldn’t dock. When it did it was a couple of hours late, but I wasn’t much worried as I had given myself time to spare for the journey back. And then, on the one seven-mile stretch without a garage or a telephone, the car broke down and I had to send one of the youngsters with me to walk back to the nearest. By the time everything was put right and I had hared for Cion Eigel and dropped them, you and Dion must have left.’
Dion put in, ‘He was following on my tail up Slieve Donell, though I didn’t know it. Glenna, is that food I see before me? When do we eat? I’m starving.’
‘Arrah, Mr. Dion, so you must be, and all the others too! Wait now till I have the beer drawn in the cellar. And Shawn—be at cutting the ham this minute, will you?’ Glenna bustled away.
Under cover of the preparations for the meal Jenny reached for Bridget’s hand and squeezed it. ‘Bridgie darling, Dion has told me,’ she whispered. ‘And though I don’t understand one word of how it has happened with either of you, I’m terribly, terribly glad!’ Bridget whispered back, ‘I hardly understand it myself yet. Meanwhile, Jenny, you can’t possibly imagine how happy I am!’ And Jenny said, glancing at Patrick, ‘But I can ...’
They all settled to the meal hilariously, and when Bridget chose to drink milk instead of the dark brew of tea or anything stronger, Dion looked pointedly towards the aspidistra in the window. With a meaningly wicked wink at Bridget he said to their hostess, ‘That’s a fine plant you have there, Glenna.’ Glenna looked pleased. ‘It is so,’ she said complacently. ‘And it only an ailing and weakly thing, so Shawn says, until after we were married. But since then hasn’t it put out ten new leaves or twelve, the way it must surely have been needing a woman’s hand to tend it...?’
And no one knew why only Dion and Bridget laughed.
For a while, on the way home, the companionable hum of the car was the only background to their shared silence. Then Bridget said shyly, ‘Do you know what first made me wonder whether perhaps you didn’t despise me as much as I thought?’
‘No, alannah. What?’
‘That night you came over from Inisheer you dropped your wallet at dinner, and when Tara opened it, I saw that you were keeping a snapshot of me in it. It was one of those you’d taken of me on the day you left Tullabor...’
‘You saw it there?’
‘Yes. And yet I thought I’d thrown the whole spool away!’
‘How could you, when it was the one thing I cared to see should go safely with me?’
‘After you had gone I found a spool on the floor of the garden-room, and I supposed you had taken bad aim at the waste-paper basket with the one of me.’
‘So what did you do?’
‘I’m afraid I—finished the job!’
Dion threw back his head and laughed. ‘So that’s what happened to the film of young grebe which I took that day and which I hunted for in vain when I needed it later—thrown away by your wanton hand, indeed! Well, I can match that story by telling you just when I guessed you might not dislike me as much as you appeared to do. Do you remember how, on the day you and Jenny arrived, I lighted your first turf fire?’
‘Yes, and you said—’
‘—That you could count your first sight of the rising smoke to be lucky for you only if it should be your own man who had lighted the fire?’
‘I do remember. But when I asked Glenna Quin tonight, she’d never heard of it as an Irish custom.’
Dion chuckled. ‘How should she—when I hadn’t made it up until that minute.’
‘You made it up?’
‘I did, my gullible one. I flatter myself it sounded like a piece of vintage folklore, and it served my turn well enough when it told me that, even if only as a thorn in your flesh, I mattered to you even then.’
‘Dion, you wretch! As far as I know, I said nothing at all to show I’d taken notice of what you’d said.’
‘You did not. But you blushed. As, though you have the darkness to shield you at this minute, I know you’re blushing—just as adorably—now!’
Patrick, Jenny and the children, setting out ahead of them, had reached home first. And when they arrived there was a surprise awaiting them.
From the couch where Patrick had installed her Jenny announced, ‘Kate’s back!’
‘Kate? But she wasn’t due for another week!’
‘Well, she’s here. When we drove up, there she was get
ting out of Dan Burke’s cab and they were arguing about the fare from Ardvar station. She’s in the kitchen now, cooking herself some supper.’
‘But doesn’t she mean to take any more of her holiday?’
‘She says not. And do you know why?’ gurgled Jenny. ‘Her sister-in-law—the one all with the ailments, you know—is going in for a nature cure, and when there’d been nothing in the house for a week but nut cutlets and scraped carrot salad, Kate told her that when she was thinking of renting a cage at Dublin Zoo she’d say so, and came away!’
They all laughed, and Dion held out his hand to Bridget. ‘Let’s go and see that she has steak and chips, and tell our news,’ he said.
They found however, that Kate had heard it already from the children. She held out her arms in a motherly welcome to Dion and he went to put his own about her in a bearlike hug.
‘Well, Kate, do you approve?’ he asked.
‘Approve is it, Mr. Dion? Wasn’t it Mr. William’s will for you, and he working to that end without looking for my approval but only for your good?’
‘Are you telling me,’ protested Dion, ‘that I didn’t choose Bridget for myself?’
Unmoved, Kate nodded. ‘You did so—and it’s a wise, sweet choice that at one time I feared neither of you would be making. But it was Mr. William that brought you together, and it’s his blessing that you have now. And if I’m pleased for myself this minute, it is that you have put the mastery of Sarah O’Hanlon into my hands! For hasn’t she been holding it against me that neither Miss Bridget nor Miss Jenny had seemingly taken the eye of any man?’
‘And what are you going to beat Sarah with now, Kate?’
‘Arrah, what else but that in the fullness of time there’ll be two fine weddings on this side of the street? One this day and one another, or maybe a double wedding of the like that Tullabor hasn’t seen—with two cakes and two brides and the guests mingling, the way there’ll be no telling which lot is which...’