Music from Home

by Geraldine O'Neill

  “Don’t remind me!” his mother said. “We were finding bits for weeks afterwards.”

  Maria watched as Ambrose laughed heartily at the memory, laughing so hard that his mirth became contagious and Sister Theresa started to laugh along with him. And, as tears ran down Ambrose’s face, Maria suddenly found herself laughing along with them. As she did so, she wondered at how her pitiful-looking uncle had inspired her to smile within minutes of meeting him, and on that same day was now making her laugh when she thought she would never laugh again.

  Sister Theresa sat down in the leather armchair next to Ambrose and then Eileen Donovan brought a kitchen chair over for Maria so the three were close together. When Maria glanced at her she could tell that, although her grandmother was not joining in with the laughter, she was not unhappy with the lighter atmosphere in the house. The jigsaw was duly unpacked and piled up on the table, then all three set about sorting out the pieces under Ambrose’s military-style direction.

  “Now,” he said, his face most serious and his hands gesturing towards the table and the puzzle, “first we have to look at the picture carefully, and then we have to find the four corner pieces, and then we have to find the straight-edged pieces that make up the border and start with those.”

  There was silence as everyone studied the picture of six classic scenes from the city of London, featuring the Houses of Parliament, Tower Bridge, Nelson’s Column, Tower of London, Piccadilly Circus and Buckingham Palace. Then, hands moved to scatter the pieces and all three started sifting through to find the required straight-edged ones.

  Every now and again, Maria became conscious of her grandmother’s quiet presence as she moved about in the background, switching on the radio to a programme with low music, sweeping the stone floor, lifting the lid on the bacon to check it wasn’t over-cooked and falling to bits, and then slicing up freshly baked bread and covering it with a clean tea towel. At one point when she had finished the chore she was doing, she came over to silently place a wooden tray with three glasses of red lemonade on the stone ledge of the fireplace. On a couple of other occasions she stopped to just watch Ambrose and his helpers as they built up the border and then started on the individual pictures.

  When she slipped on her raincoat and wellingtons and went into the yard, Ambrose paused and looked at Maria and then said in the direct way she was now becoming accustomed to, “Sister Theresa probably wants to explain to you that she’s not really a nun. I’m saying this now when my mother is out, because she doesn’t like me talking about things like this. Myself, I prefer things to be above board and more open, and I know my good friend Theresa is exactly the same.”

  Maria looked over at Theresa, not quite sure how to react to this piece of news.

  “Well,” Theresa said, smiling over at her, “I suppose Ambrose is right, as you will no doubt find out from other people eventually. The reason I’m referred to as Sister Theresa is because I was away in a convent in New York for a number of years training, and I did go through postulancy and the novitiate and took my temporary vows.”

  New York confirmed Maria’s thoughts about the American accent.

  “But you never took your final solemn vows,” Ambrose chipped in. “Isn’t that right?”

  Maria felt a smile coming to her lips and pursed them tightly together to stop it.

  “Indeed it is,” Theresa said, reaching over to add another piece to the Buckingham Palace picture.

  “I had my doubts for a while about whether I could live such a restricted life and when it came to taking my final vows I decided that I wanted to be a part of the bigger world outside of the convent. I went into teaching for a number of years in schools in New York and Boston and then, when my mother was ill, I decided five years ago to return to Ireland permanently to help look after her. In truth, I wasn’t too well myself at that point, so it suited me too.”

  “That must have been a big change for you,” Maria said.

  “Oh, believe me, it was,” Theresa laughed. “It was an awful shock altogether coming from a multiracial, very modern society like New York back to a small town in the middle of Ireland.” She raised her eyebrows. “Not to mention the weather.”

  Maria felt a tight feeling in her chest. “Did you find it hard to settle?”

  “Yes, at first I did,” she admitted, “but as time passes, you realise that people are people the world over. It’s just a case of adapting and getting used to their different ways. It was a nine-day wonder when I came back, as people wanted to know why I had left the convent and that sort of thing, because most of them thought I was a fully committed nun. It’s understandable as they had seen me wearing my habit and had been calling me Sister Theresa on the few visits I had made back home over the years.”

  “But they still call you that,” Ambrose said.

  “Well, I’d prefer it if they just called me Theresa, but it doesn’t really matter. Most people treat me very nicely and that’s the most important thing.”

  “I’ll call you Theresa from now on,” Maria said.

  “And I,” Theresa said, “will do everything I can to help you to settle here until you are able to look after yourself and live wherever you want.”

  “Do you think that, after a while, I might be able to go back home?”

  “Of course you will.”

  “Nobody can stop you when you’re eighteen,” Ambrose said. “You’ll be a full adult then. You can do what you like. It’s not as if you’re like me, a weak individual who will always be dependent on others.”

  Her heart gave a little twist at her uncle’s words, but she couldn’t help but take some reassurance from them. And, for the first time since leaving England, she sensed that a tiny light had been switched on somewhere at the end of the nightmarish tunnel she felt she was now living in. The relief that it brought made her bow her head as she felt the tears welling up inside her again. Then, she felt Theresa’s hand on hers.

  “There are good things and good people here too, Maria. It’s not going to be as bad as you think. And I, who have had to move and settle, only to move again, know exactly how you feel.”

  “And I,” Ambrose said, “who have been nowhere worth talking about, am happy that you have come to live here, be it long or short.”

  Maria’s eyes swam again, and she knew if any more kind things were said to her she would start crying and not be able to stop. She pushed her chair back. “I must go upstairs for a few minutes . . .” Then, without looking at either of her companions, she quickly went out of the room.

  Chapter 37

  The following morning, the beginning of Maria’s first full day in Ireland, she got up out of bed and went quietly across the floor to her cases. She had taken a few things out of them, but they still remained largely unpacked. Although she knew she would eventually have to take things out and hang them up in the big old wardrobe or put them in the chest of drawers by the window, she was not ready or willing to do it yet. The fear still remained that if she were to lift her dresses and blouses and skirts and hang them in the dark depths of the Victorian wardrobe that she might somehow disappear inside with them and never be seen again. And although she knew it was impossible, while the case remained on the old chest, there was a chance that someone might come and tell her that things had changed and she was going back to live in Stockport after all.

  She suddenly remembered a writing set that Diana had given her before she left and she unzipped the compartment in the lid of the case and took it out and laid it on the bed. Going to the hook on the back of the door, she got her dressing-gown and put it on, then climbed back into the warmth of the bed and started to write the first of the three letters she intended to post today. Although writing was the last thing she really felt like, she forced herself to start because she had promised everyone important to her that she would. She also reasoned that she could not expect to receive any letters from home if she did not first write to them.

  She started off with Paul but, after wr
iting only the barest introduction, she put the pen down trying to think of something to say that was neither sad or depressing. After a few minutes she picked it up again and started writing a short diary of all the major events that had happened to her in the two days since she last saw him. She started off telling him about the airport and then the plane journey, and after that she gave her first impressions of Dublin. She wrote down only practical details, omitting any references to her feelings about leaving England and all her friends behind.

  She went on to describe the big old house and her room and the view she had from her window. Since Paul had already met her grandfather and Jude, she mentioned little about them but, when she went on to introduce Ambrose and Theresa, she found herself smiling.

  But it was when she came to ask Paul in the letter if he had any news, and mentioned Stella and Tony and some of the other people from the stables that she found herself becoming sad again, and she wondered if this would always happen every time she thought of Manchester and her old life. Apart from missing Stella, she was worried about her. It was hard to imagine that she was so ill and so thin because she actually chose not to eat. Maria could understand someone being upset when something awful happens, and not feeling like eating – as she herself still did now – but she could not imagine anyone not wanting to eat for months and months with no good reason. There was obviously something seriously wrong with Stella.

  When the smell of bacon and sausages permeated through the upstairs, she knew that it was time to go down and join her new, strange family again. In only one day she had already learned that the atmosphere in the house was lighter when the men were in. It wasn’t that her grandmother was much cheerier in herself, more that her grandfather and Jude lifted things when they joked with Ambrose or talked about general things that were happening in the news or locally.

  Maria glanced down at the few pages she had written so far and decided, instead of rushing the ending of Paul’s now, that she would wait until after breakfast. The other two letters she knew would only take half the time as she would merely copy out parts of Paul’s letter, giving the same details of her journey and arrival in Ireland. She put her writing set carefully on the bedside cabinet and then moved out of bed to get ready for this first long day.

  As they sat at the breakfast table, a big dish of sausages and bacon and eggs in the middle, Jude looked over at Maria. “Have you any plans for the day?”

  “Not really,” she said. “None that I know of.”

  She saw her grandfather look at her grandmother and raise his eyebrows in question. Her grandmother finished the piece of bacon she was eating and then dabbed her mouth with her napkin. “Sister Theresa said you might go down to her cottage later this morning – she wants to chat to you about school and that sort of thing.”

  Maria put her knife and fork down and then her hand came to rest at her throat. She hoped no one was going to try to persuade her to go to a school here in Ireland. She had already made that plain to her grandfather and Jude when they were in the hotel, and then later again the day of the funeral when Franco and Diana were there too. She was sixteen years old and, as far as she was concerned, school was finished. Hopefully she had gained enough O-Levels so that, when the time came, she would be able to get a job doing something reasonable.

  Ambrose sat forward in his chair. “Will I go with her? Maria can push me down in the chair.” He looked at Maria. “Is it okay if I come?”

  “Of course,” she said. “I’d like your company.”

  “As long as you don’t talk too much and don’t interfere,” his mother said. “They have important things to discuss.”

  “I’ll bring my comics down and sit quietly reading.”

  Jude smiled over at her. “Well, it sounds as though you have an outing today whether you like it or not.” He leaned forward to the dish and speared an egg with his fork. “There’s a dance on in Tullamore on Friday night if you fancy it.”

  There was a sharp intake of breath, then Eileen Donovan swung round to her older son. “Jude, for God’s sake! If you can’t make a sensible suggestion then don’t make any.”

  “What have I said now?” Jude asked, his eyes wide.

  Ambrose looked across at him and made eyes and then shrugged.

  “You know well,” his mother said. “The poor girl has only just arrived and the last thing she needs is to be paraded around the dance halls for everyone to gawk at.”

  “Sure there are girls her age at the dances, and I’d be there to keep an eye on her. What harm would it do?”

  “Wouldn’t it look good now if she was seen around Tullamore for the first time at a dance and her father only cold . . .” She halted and then lowered her eyes. “At times I wonder . . .”

  Maria did not move or look at anyone.

  Her grandmother turned towards her. “I’m sorry now,” she said, although her voice sounded more strained than apologetic, “but Jude wasn’t thinking, and I didn’t mean to go upsetting you by mentioning . . . anything like that.”

  Maria took a deep breath. She knew that her grandmother wanted her to say that it was all right and she was okay, but she did not like the harsh way she had spoken to Jude and she was not going to make her feel better.

  “You’ll like Sister Theresa’s cottage,” Ambrose suddenly said. “That will cheer you up. It always cheers me up when I go down there.”

  “Sister Theresa is a great woman,” his mother said, and then she started gathering up the plates.

  Patrick Donovan sighed and then he looked around the table at Ambrose, Jude and finally at Maria. Then he said, “Things will change again. They always do. I’ve seen it all before. This time will pass and there will be better days ahead.”

  “Let’s hope there will be better days,” Jude said, “for all of us.”

  Maria thought he was making it clear that he was not happy with his mother’s attack on him.

  Then Jude looked over at her and smiled. “We might leave the dance this time and maybe have a night out at the pictures instead. What do you think?”

  “Now you’re talking,” his father said, his voice a touch too jovial to be genuine. “The pictures would be ideal, don’t you think, Eileen?”

  “Whatever they like now,” she said.

  “I think I saw in the local paper that there was an Elvis film on,” Jude said. “Do you like Elvis?”

  Maria lifted her eyes. “Yes, I do.”

  He winked at her. “I’ll check it out later this evening, so.”

  The last thing Maria would have thought of was going to an Elvis film, but, with the way her grandmother was, it was better than staying a long night in at home. It was, she thought, any port in a storm.

  Chapter 38

  A decidedly cool breeze hit Maria when she stepped outside the house, and she wondered had she been so numb to everything when she first arrived in Ireland that she had not felt the change in the weather. Her grandfather and Jude lifted the wheelchair out with Ambrose well wrapped up in an anorak with fur around the hood, a thick sweater and fleece-lined boots. Maria thought her poor uncle looked like someone dressed for an Arctic expedition as opposed to a short walk down a lane in the middle of autumn. Her grandmother stood by the door watching quietly as Patrick hooked the two small walking-sticks over the handles of the chair.

  “Begod, it’s got nippy enough out here!” Patrick said. “It’s the coldest I’ve felt it recently – you’d think we were in the middle of winter. Maybe you’d be wiser staying at home, Ambrose. We don’t want you catching the flu again or anything like that.”

  “I’m grand,” Ambrose said, only the tip of his nose visible from the hood. “Sure, we’ll only be five minutes out in the air and then we’ll be back inside again. I’m hardly likely to catch anything in that short time.”

  His mother came out into the yard to look in at him. “Keep yourself well covered now,” she told him.

  “I’m grand, I’m grand,” he repeated, a stubborn note in
his voice. “Sure, ye will have Maria thinking I’m a complete invalid the way ye are all going on.”

  Eileen looked over at Maria. “Are you sure you’re warm enough now?” We don’t want you catching anything either.”

  “I’m fine, thanks,” Maria said. She needed to get out of the house for a while. “I’ll warm up when I start walking. She moved the rainbow-coloured scarf higher around her neck.

  “We need to get moving now,” Ambrose said. “Sister Theresa said she would do an American dish for us, and I don’t want it getting spoiled.”

  “You surely can’t be ready to eat much after that big breakfast you shifted?” Jude said. “That would nearly keep a grown man going for the rest of the week.”

  “Go away, you!” Ambrose laughed. “I’ll eat what I like.”

  Jude looked at Maria now. “Do you want me to push Ambrose up as far as the cottage?” he checked. “You’ve not been up there before and there’s a good few bumps and potholes.”

  “Maria’s well able to do it,” Ambrose said, “and I’ll give her the directions so she avoids the worst bits.” He waved his gloved hand. “Ye can all go in and enjoy the peace and quiet without us. We’ll be grand.”

  They went out onto the main road and walked a few minutes along before turning down the small, hedge-lined laneway up to Sister Theresa’s. Maria thought it looked like a country farm track rather than a lane with grass growing at the sides and in between where the wheels went. The lanes she was used to around the stables were well-kept and had smooth tarmacadam on them, and any small holes were quickly filled by the grounds-men. This one was narrow and bumpy and every time the wheelchair hit a stone or pothole, Maria checked that Ambrose was okay, and each time he assured her that he was.