by L. M. Hawke
Una was relieved to note that good, civilized paving overtook the old cobblestones just where O’Malley entered the road. She didn’t think she would survive the experience of juddering over cobblestones at O’Malley’s preferred speed. As he pulled onto the pavement and made for the high, green hill, Una turned to glance back at Kylebeg. The street was still brim-full of celebrants. The sounds of music and laughter were barely audible over the motor’s roar as the bike pulled well away from the town.
Once they rounded the curve of the hill, the village was all but forgotten. Pasture and farmland opened out to either side of the road. The world was a lush, summery green, with each peaceful plot of land delineated by neat, orderly hedgerows and stone walls. The land moved in gentle, sleepy ripples; in the distance, the whole scene was presided over by the blue-green peaks of the Galtee Mountains, which seemed to look out over the downs and glens with a stern, knowing air. The bike sped past several farm houses, set well off the road and reached only by narrow, deep-rutted country lanes.
At last, O’Malley slowed at a crossroads some half a kilometer from Kylebeg. He turned left. The road was twisty here, climbing a short distance up the foot of the great hill that loomed above the town. This was the back side of the hill—the side not visible from Kylebeg’s main street.
They didn’t have far to go. O’Malley turned in beside a moss-covered, half-crumbling stone wall. The land sloped down into a secret hollow, well hidden from the road and sheltered by the towering bulk of the hill and the spreading limbs of a nearby oak. A garden, sweet and vibrant with the blooms of early summer, seemed to fill up the entirety of the hollow—save for what little space was occupied by the stone house at the garden’s heart. The adorable, quaint home almost seemed tiny enough to be a doll’s house, or a good witch’s cottage from a fairy tale. The cottage looked as old as Ireland itself. Its gray stone walls and timber-framed windows were dulled and softened by the passage of countless years. All along its outer walls, Una could see pale hieroglyphics etched into the stone where creeping ivy had been pulled away, leaving only the scars of tenacious roots. The high-gabled roof was thatched with dark sticks and accented on either end by a pair of whitewashed brick chimneys.
O’Malley shut off his bike’s motor. “Here it is, then. Your gran’s house.”
Una climbed out of the sidecar and stood with her arms folded tightly about her, staring. Of course, she was shocked to learn that her gran was gone. But Una hadn’t seen Nessa Teig since she’d been a tiny girl. She had hardly exchanged more than a dozen letters with the woman throughout her life. Una hadn’t truly known her grandmother at all—More’s the pity, she thought—and so it felt senseless to mourn Nessa too much. But Nessa had been the last member of Una’s family… the very last one, since her mother had died in a car crash six years ago.
And now this strange little cottage tucked back in the hills—Middle of Nowhere, County Tipperary—was the only shred of family history Una had left. She blinked to chase the tears from her eyes, and these tears had nothing to do with riding in the sidecar.
“Thank you, Mr. O’Malley,” Una said softly. She didn’t know what else she could say.
O’Malley retrieved Una’s bags from the sidecar and carried them down the walkway toward the cottage’s front door. Una followed silently. The walk was made of flagstones, the cracks between overgrown with dense, springy groundcover dotted with tiny blue flowers. It led through a rickety wooden gate, flanked on either side by stands of hollyhocks and foxglove… and below the leaves of those flowering plants, tangles of mysterious herbs, the names and use of which Una could not begin to guess.
O’Malley swung the front door open. “It’s a safe bet that a door isn’t locked here in Kylebeg,” he said, sounding almost apologetic.
The cottage was just as humble on the inside as it seemed from the outside. plank floor was worn down by generations of feet and faded to sooty gray. A small sitting room, complete with an old-fashioned, red-velvet sofa and two wingback chairs, waited to one side of the cottage. On the other side was the kitchen, as rustic as could be. Hearths dominated each room, their simple oaken mantels darkened at their centers by God-knew-how-many years of wood fires and rising smoke. A narrow staircase stood between the two rooms—leading, Una assumed, to a bedroom upstairs. Below the staircase, she saw the open door of a tiny water closet.
“It has everything you need to live comfortably,” Mr. O’Malley said. “All the modern conveniences.”
Una bit her lip. She wasn’t sure a Dubliner could agree with a Tipperary rustic on the points of “living comfortably” or “modern conveniences.” But she was determined to remain calm. Her grandmother had written of a great and valuable inheritance. Was this cottage and its garden… all?
It certainly wasn’t Una’s idea of great or valuable, but she was in no position to be judgmental. City girl she may be, but that was only by default. She hadn’t felt at home in Dublin, either, had she? She had drifted through a couple of years at the university, ostensibly studying anthropology (because why not?). When the small reserve of money she’d come into after her mother’s tragic accident had run low, Una had dropped out of uni with a promise to herself that she would return to her studies one day, when she had the funds again.
On receipt of her grandmother’s letter, Una had felt some hope that the time had come at last to get back on the horse. No… it had been relief she’d felt, not hope. Una had no great love for school; it was merely something she did, something all respectable people were supposed to do. She had no idea how she might use a degree in anthropology in the future, nor did she feel any special passion for the discipline. When she’d come to the decision to put studies on hold, Una had been entirely ambivalent about the need to quit school and go to work. She didn’t miss her studies at all.
For almost two years, Una had drifted from one group of friends to the next, from one job to the next, one boyfriend to the next. The relief she’d felt on receiving Nessa’s letter was, in part, because now the decision would be made for her. What else would she do with an inheritance, except use it to resume her schooling? There was no more need to fret about her life’s direction, no need to wonder what would become of her if she didn’t make up her mind about where she belonged, what she ought to be.
Now she would finish her studies, graduate, and… and… and life would simply work itself out, one way or another. Everything would gel and solidify, at last. No more drifting, no more loafing about. Life would make sense; Una would make sense. She would find the place where she belonged, her purpose, her calling… and everything would finally, at long last, be all right.
“Your grandmother was a great one for gardening and putting up,” O’Malley said. “I was here only yesterday, looking over her estate—part of my work as barrister, of course. There’s a healthy stock of good, newly canned food in the pantry, all what Nessa grew herself. And of course, we have our market in town daily, even Sundays. You’ll find everything you need there. Whatever we don’t have here in Kylebeg, you can pick up at Thurles. It’s the nearest town of any real size. Someone’s headed out that way at least once a week; you can go along, or send them to fetch what you need.”
Una nodded, dazed and nearly dizzy. “Thank you.”
“I must get back to the village now,” O’Malley said with another of his quick, courteous bows. “Much to do today, it being Beltane and all. But I’ll send someone round to check on you and see that you’re settling in.”
Una watched from the front door as O’Malley sped away on his bike. When he was gone, there was no sound but the choruses of birds in the garden, and between their calls the silence felt thick and stifling.
“Drat,” Una muttered as she paced around the sitting room, then the kitchen. “Drat, drat, drat.”
As adorable as the cottage was, she was certain there was no money to be had here. Not enough to get back to Dublin and finish her degree, at any rate. Of course, Una told herself, there’s no special reas
on to return to Dublin. The city was simply where she lived… where she had lived all her life, until now. Should I stay in Kylebeg? Apparently I own a cottage here. Perhaps it’s best to stay.
Una dismissed the thought immediately. It was plainly ridiculous. Just because Nessa Teig, her last living relative, had called Kylebeg home, that was no good reason for Una to do the same. What would she do for work? How would she make her way? And for happiness—what could sustain her in Kylebeg? Would she just… exist here in this odd little cottage, all alone and perfectly content to be so, as her grandmother had done?
No. That’s just not my way. She paused in her pacing, listening to the refrigerator hum, and bit her thumbnail pensively. But what is my way, after all?
Una hadn’t had much success with any relationship, whether friendly or romantic, for many long years. Or ever, to tell the truth. But she did know that she wanted people around her—good friends, reliable companions, pleasant company. And a lover wouldn’t be half bad… a real kind and generous one, not like the blokes she had half-heartedly dated back in Dublin.
Can’t stay here, isolated and lonely. Can’t go back to the city, where I’m so blasted alone and miserable.
The hard truth was that Una didn’t belong anywhere. She might own this cottage now, but nowhere was her home, and with her grandmother dead, no people were her kin.
“Drat,” she muttered again. And then, brushing her hands together in a business-like way, she set about exploring the old stone cottage.
* * *
Two hours’ examination of the premises turned up nothing more exciting than a thick, leather-bound journal, filled with pages and pages of Nessa Teig’s neat, delicate hand.
The upstairs bedroom spanned the length of the cottage but had little useful space, thanks to its steeply pitched ceiling. However, the bed was exceptionally comfortable, outfitted with an old-fashioned down tick and covered with beautiful, hand-stitched quilts in lovely but faded colors. Una had lain in the bed gratefully, letting her exhaustion and worries slide away as she nestled deep into the cozy bedding… until she recalled that her grandmother had died in that very bed. Then, with a tingle of superstitious fear, she sprang out of it again. The room’s trunks and low closets, set back into the sloped walls, held nothing but knitted sweaters and old boiled-wool dresses, the sorts of things any country gran would wear.
The kitchen was as well-supplied as Mr. O’Malley had said, its pantry teeming with all kinds of preserves, pickles, and dried foods. Una even found a loaf of dark rye bread, well wrapped in sacking. It was fresh and fragrant; she thought it must have been made just hours before Nessa had died. She smeared slices of the bread with sweet butter from the 1950s refrigerator (“Modern conveniences,” Una chuckled to herself) and redcurrant jam from the pantry. It made for a very satisfying lunch. A sideboard stood in the kitchen near the simple round table with its four ladder-back chairs, but the sideboard’s several drawers and cabinets—explored while Una munched on her bread with jam—revealed nothing of value or interest.
The garden, too, turned up nothing, except for its exquisite beauty. It really was a lovely place. Its beds were lush with fragrant growth, its uncountable blossoms nodding in the warm spring breeze. Footpaths twisted here and there, leading to pretty alcoves and bowers where benches stood, or bird baths and feeders where Una paused to watch sparrows and finches tussle over worms and seeds. Best of all was the stone-lined pool in the garden’s heart. It was small and round and smooth as silk, reflecting the sky above in a shade of blue as deep and rich as sapphires.
Beautiful… but what was it worth to Una? Her grandmother had called this place a great and valuable inheritance. Clearly Nessa Teig had loved it as if it were the finest palace, and accorded it as much value.
I’ll have to try to see this place as she saw it, Una thought. I must find its greatness… love it as my grandmother did.
But the very thought made Una feel weighed down, impossibly burdened. She didn’t love this place. It was just a strange little cottage to her. Pretty, but too far off the beaten path, and impossibly lonesome. She couldn’t even contemplate staying here forever; the mere thought gave her the cold sweats. No, it would never do.
The sputter of an engine tore Una’s attention from the round garden pool. She had been staring at it fixedly, seeing nothing, preoccupied with her thoughts. She looked up to see Michael O’Malley’s red motorcycle returning, but it was clearly not O’Malley who drove it. Instead, it was commandeered by a young man of about twenty-five—Una’s own age—with tousled blond curls and the kind of bushy beard that was fashionable in the city. He wore faded, dirty jeans and a plaid flannel shirt—more rustic and functional versions of the skin-tight denim trousers and speckless plaid button-ups the stylish lads wore in Dublin.
The blond man circled the bike at the top of the property, next to the old stone wall. As he did so, he revealed the sidecar, which was not empty. A woman rode inside, her flame-red curls streaming out behind her. Even at a distance, Una could see her wide grin, and she couldn’t help but smile back.
The bike shut off. The red-haired girl cupped her hands around her mouth. “Halloo,” she shouted. The call bounced back at once from the nearby hill, repeating in an echo that made Una laugh out loud.
The pair of visitors came down the path with a directness that said they were quite familiar with the property. The man was already holding out his hand to shake by the time Una met them at the gate.
“Angus,” he said. “Angus Gallagher. Good to know you. I was real fond of your gran, you know. Real fond of her. She was quite a lady.” Angus was tall and broad-shouldered, the very picture of a country farmer.
“I’m Una Teig. Hello.”
“I looked after this place for Nessa, you know.” Angus gazed around the garden with a smile that said every flower and shrub was an old friend.
Una laughed in surprise. “Mr. O’Malley said a ‘lad’ took care of the place. I pictured a boy of twelve or thirteen.”
“Count on my da to say such a thing,” the red-haired, grinning girl said. “Every man is a lad to him, until they’re as old as he is. And he’ll still be calling me a girl until I’m fifty, I’m sure.” She offered her hand for a shake, too. “I’m Kathleen O’Malley. Pleased to meet you.”
Una invited them into the cottage. Kathleen and Angus had brought a few parcels: more food to see Una through, as well as a few other essentials. She thanked them profusely, then led them into the sitting room, where they all sank down on the sofa and chairs. Una felt as much a stranger in that space as any visitor may have felt.
“I’m terribly sorry for your loss,” Kathleen said. “We all loved Nessa so dearly.”
“Thank you,” Una replied. “But to tell you the truth, it doesn’t feel like much of a loss… not really. I hardly knew my gran. She was… well, she kept to herself, didn’t she? And so did we—my mother and I. I’m afraid you two knew her better than I ever did, and are feeling the loss more than I am. I think the whole town will feel it more, though based on the wild show I saw when I arrived, everyone seems happy enough.”
“Oh, that,” Kathleen said with a laugh. She had an infectious laugh, bubbly and spirited. “That’s just our Beltane parade. It’s a great tradition here; no one would miss out on it, no matter who died. And Nessa would have wanted us all to celebrate Beltane like usual, anyway.”
“We never had anything like that parade in Dublin on the First of May. Not that I knew about, anyway. Just a few maypoles in the parks, or in church yards.”
“You’re from Dublin?” Kathleen asked. “I’ve only been a few times. It’s so exciting there. So much to see and do.”
Una shrugged. “I suppose. Though I never did much while I lived there.” It never felt like home to me.
“Well,” Kathleen went on, “we keep the old ways in Kylebeg. Mostly. We’re a very traditional and superstitious lot.” She said it with a mischievous twinkle in her eye and a grin that invited carefree lau
ghter.
“I noted how strangely you all were dressed this afternoon.”
Angus leaned back comfortably on the sofa. “The old ways, like she says. It’s all a lark, of course… just ancient traditions the folks here still like to remember.”
One corner of Kathleen’s mouth quirked in a strange little smile. “Yeah, just a lark. But listen, Una. The whole town has a big bonfire, with dancing and music, on Beltane night. It is old-fashioned, but it’s great fun, too. Would you like to come down? Angus and I will be glad to show you about the village and introduce you to anyone you’d care to meet.”
Una hesitated. The thought of joining in a celebration like the one she’d witnessed earlier that day made her strangely uneasy. She wasn’t the religious type—not in the least—but one couldn’t be Irish without getting a little dose of Catholicism, whether you swallowed it intentionally or not. And she was so new here. She didn’t know exactly what Kylebeg’s “old traditions” entailed.
Kathleen and Angus seemed very friendly, though, and after her long, distressing day, Una felt she could just about stand to let down her hair. She shook off her apprehensions firmly and said with a smile, “All right. I’d love to go to the bonfire. What time should I be ready?”
3
The spring night was as dark as pitch, except where the bonfire’s light fell—and there, everything the light touched blazed in otherworldly hues of crimson, amber, and gold. Men and women, many of whom were still dressed in their costumes from earlier in the day, reeled in and out of the great ring of firelight as they gave themselves over to the Beltane celebration. The night was rich with the smell of wood smoke, the air clamoring with disembodied shouts, fragments of song, and now and then, from the fields well beyond the bonfire, the cries of couples in ecstasy. That particular sound made Una blush to the roots of her hair. She was glad for the darkness, so Kathleen and Angus couldn’t see her discomfiture. The last thing she wanted tonight was to offend her new acquaintances with her unintentional, but still very real, prudishness.