by Dorothy Eden
At the end of the street there was a small plaque set in the stone wall. It was carved into the shape of a puckish smiling face, and bore the inscription that in the year 1718 one Sean O’Halloran had been stoned to death for using unconventional methods of healing. There was a strong smell of sheep. This small square, Cathleen realized, was probably the market place.
It all fitted in with the furtive faces behind lace curtains, the whispering about a lost baby up at the castle, the tales of violence or imagined violence. This was a town where they had stoned an innocent purveyor of medicine to death. The stain obviously lingered.
Two priests, one grey-haired and inquisitive, the other bland and smiling, paused in their stroll to glance at Cathleen. With deliberation, Cathleen walked down the street under their gaze into the uninviting hotel, the Brian Boru.
A frosted glass door led into the bar, and at it Rory O’Riordan was standing.
The opportunity to prove or disprove Peggy’s story was being offered her more promptly than she was prepared for.
“Well, Mrs. Lamb,” said Rory pleasantly, “in need of something better than Mary Kate’s abominable coffee? What will you have? Our national drink?”
He waved a glass of brown liquid covered in yellow froth. Cathleen thought that it looked revolting.
“Could I have whisky?”
“By all means. Scotch, I presume?”
“If you’re suggesting I don’t like Irish things, that isn’t true.”
“I didn’t say it was. Don’t be so aggressive.”
“I’m supposed to be shopping,” Cathleen said. “I only came in here because—” She hesitated, wondering how to tell him Peggy’s preposterous story.
“You’re looking for local colour? You thought Ireland would be full of leprechauns and whimsical little men telling tall stories, and you’re disappointed. You’ve found only the O’Riordans.”
“They’re not exactly dull,” Cathleen murmured. She was aware that the woman behind the bar washing glasses had a stillness about her that suggested she was listening avidly to every word, no doubt to be repeated in the town afterwards.
“Anyway, I thought you were busy with the haymaking.”
“We finished this morning. I’m on my way to Galway. I’ll drop you back at the castle first. Why didn’t you bring the Rolls?”
“It’s scarcely far enough.”
“You mean Aunt Tilly told you to walk. She’s becoming a miser. Tell me—”
He stopped. His black eyes brooded. He had changed his mind and didn’t intend to say anything more.
Cathleen was both intrigued and piqued.
“Yes, Mr. O’Riordan. There was something you wanted to ask me?”
He grinned suddenly. He had turned on a young and irresistible charm, like a light. It was so unexpected that it had the effect of making Cathleen completely distrust him, although her heart bumped with treacherous pleasure.
“Only quite personal things, and there’s time for that. Run along and do your shopping and I’ll take you home.”
He was hurrying her. Was he afraid of what she might hear if she lingered in this town? Was he the kind of man who would deliberately keep a child out of its inheritance? She looked at him and just didn’t know.
CHAPTER FIVE
THE LITTLE SHAGGY DONKEY stood placidly asleep in the shafts of his cart—a tinker’s cart, for it was loaded with pots and pans and bits of junk that looked entirely useless to all but the most thrifty and ingenious person. Rory’s car was parked next to it.
Cathleen got in, expecting Rory to appear at any moment. She could hear someone whistling an old Irish ballad. Where had she heard it before?
She remembered at once. It had been in the streets of Dublin. Someone had been singing the song, but when she had gone up to the beggar on the bridge over the Liffey she had found that he didn’t sing, he merely played his creaky accordion.
There’s a colleen fair as may,
For a year and for a day…
I have sought by every means her hand to gain…
The whistling stopped. A dark face appeared inside the car so suddenly that Cathleen jumped.
“Will ye ever buy one of my pots, lady? Or a nice shiny kettle?”
The man was as shaggy as his donkey. His hair hung over his forehead. His brilliant dark eyes gleamed. He was smiling ingratiatingly, but strangely he seemed to be laughing.
He was the man who had done the same thing to her outside the hotel in Dublin. His hair seemed longer and untidier, the handkerchief knotted round his neck dirtier. But she was certain he was the same man.
“You’ve had a long journey,” she said.
The man stared blankly.
“Only since dawn, lady. From the bog in Connemara.”
A donkey with its little mincing steps, like a stout lady in high heels, couldn’t have come a hundred miles from Dublin in twenty-four hours. Perhaps all tinkers looked alike…
“Only two and sixpence for a fine kettle, lady.”
“What the divil are you doing!” came Rory’s angry voice. “Take your head out of my car.”
The man continued to smile as he withdrew. Again Cathleen thought she must be fanciful, or else the tinkers in Ireland were in a state of revolt against those who drove cars. For in spite of his smiling lips, there was a look of hate in the man’s gleaming eyes.
“A safe journey to you, please God.”
His fawning voice didn’t betray any other feeling. As he walked away he began to sing softly, “And if ’tis heavens decree that mine she may not be…”
He had a fine tenor voice. It was a pleasure to listen to it. As Rory backed his car out Cathleen craned back to see the tinker swing a leg over the side of the little cart and whip up his sleepy donkey. They were much too far off now to see, but she thought he was still smiling.
“Have you seen him before?” Cathleen asked Rory.
“Not that I know of. All tinkers and gypsies look alike to me, black-faced rogues.”
“He looked at you as if he hated you.”
“He probably did. I gave him short shrift.”
“No, a more personal dislike.”
“Why not? I have a car, he has a donkey. Well, what else did you discover?”
Cathleen looked at him in surprise.
“Why, nothing?”
“Don’t tell me you haven’t been discovering things all day.”
“What makes you say that?”
“I have the feeling that you’re an inquisitive person. Didn’t you begin by exploring in the middle of the night? In a strange house you had to look for a crying baby which, even if you had found it, had nothing to do with you. And I don’t really think you wanted that whisky, you know. You thought the locals might gossip to you, knowing you came from the castle. Now you’re cross-examining me about a tinker whom I’ve never seen in my life, imagining he has some personal hate for me.” He looked at her keenly. “Am I wrong about all this?”
“As it happens,” said Cathleen coolly, “you’re absolutely right. But if you don’t like me talking to anybody, you must be afraid of what I’ll hear.”
He laughed with perfect good temper.
“I don’t care what the devil you hear. You’ll no doubt find we’re all murderers before you’re done. But I won’t have anyone who lives at the castle joining in idle village gossip. You might have heard of the Irishman’s marvellous ability to embroider a story with phantasy. So if they’re saying that I stood by and witnessed my brother Shamus’s death, or even assisted it, don’t believe a word of it!”
“But you weren’t there that night. You were in Galway.”
“So I was. And do you believe that, Mrs. Lamb?”
Cathleen looked into his face which was suddenly taut and angry. It must be that his story had been questioned and suspected.
“How should I know what to believe? I don’t even know you. And it’s not my business, as you pointed out. But I’m telling you here and now—” Cath
leen clenched her hands, “—if I hear any more rumours about a baby unfairly treated or in danger I shall do my utmost to find out if they’re true. I mean it.” She was almost crying. She had to get over this emotional state of identifying every baby with Debby. Her compulsive search was for a ghost. “I’m sorry if I’ve seemed rude and inquisitive. I only want to be assured that these rumours are false.”
Rory had slowed the car, and they were driving at a crawl down the narrow road with its stone walls that were strips of dull grey across the green fields.
“Rumours about a baby,” he said in a low voice, and she had the astounded feeling that this was the first time he had heard them. Which meant that they must be very new because no rumour in Loughneath could surely go for long unheard by everyone.
“Never mind your social duty, Mrs. Lamb. Tell me what you heard.”
“Just that your brother Shamus’s wife might have had a baby. In which case—”
“In which case it—and it’s a boy, of course, don’t let’s deny the scandal-mongers that satisfaction—will be the heir to Loughneath under the entail. Well now, what do you make of that?”
He was recovering himself. But she was sure he had had a moment of cold shock. That there might be such a child? Or that the rumour had begun?
“Do you really believe,” he went on, “that any mother would keep such an important child out of sight?”
“No, I don’t. Unless she was forced to.”
He gave a short bark of laughter.
“Now we really are getting into the realms of melodrama. So the mother is being bribed—”
“Or threatened.”
“And you think I might know something about this?” His voice held no trace of its previous good humour. It was hard and angry.
“I’m only telling you what’s being said in the village. And I didn’t want to hear it, if you must know!”
“But why am I being blamed for this fictitious crime?”
“I suppose, because you’re the obvious person.”
He had swung the car into the drive.
“Yes. I see that. Because of Shamus’s death Loughneath castle is mine. I believe I’d stop short of murder, but I’d do a great deal to keep it. Now make of that what you will.”
He stopped the car on the sweep of gravel outside the front door. Scarcely pausing to open Cathleen’s door for her, he went striding inside calling, “Mary Kate! Where’s my aunt?”
He was taking the rumour up to Aunt Tilly. He was putting on a fine pretence of being startled and indignant. Cathleen looked after him, willing his attitude to be genuine.
“Well,” said Liam beside her, “how did you persuade my brother to be civil enough to give you a lift?”
He didn’t want me gossiping in the village. Cathleen was on the verge of saying. She checked herself.
“We were both having a drink in the Brian Boru.”
Liam smiled at her. He was dressed in riding clothes. There was a vague look of Aunt Tilly about the length of his face, but in no other way. Aunt Tilly didn’t have those bright interested eyes, or that particularly intimate smile.
“I hope you’ll let me take you to a more attractive place than the Brian Boru one evening. Will you come down to the stables and see my horses?”
“I’d love to. But I must do some work just now. I’ve been away long enough.”
“Aunt Tilly wouldn’t mind. I know the secret of managing her.”
He very probably did, with that soft way of talking, but Rory didn’t. Cathleen could imagine the old lady, wakened from her afternoon nap to hear the latest outrageous scandal.
“A rumour in the village. It upset me, too.” She bit her lip. “I can’t stand the thought of this lost baby.”
Liam put his hand on her arm.
“What rumour?” There was an edge to his voice.
“Do you mean you haven’t heard it either? About this child of Shamus’s that is supposed to be hidden away. Isn’t it an impossible story?”
Liam’s reaction was entirely opposite to Rory’s. He simply put his head back and laughed. But only after the dark flicker of some private thought had shown in his eyes. An infinitesimal unreadable flicker.
“Would you believe it? What will they think of next to say about us? So poor Shamus lies dead for three years before they discover that such a situation would be highly intriguing, and provide pub gossip for months to come. Cathleen, my dear, you must get to know the Irish.”
“Then you don’t believe it?” Cathleen said with relief.
“Good God, no. Rory’s ruthless, but not that ruthless.”
“He was upset about it,” Cathleen said. She had to admit Liam’s light-hearted enjoyment of the situation eased her own tension.
“He takes himself too seriously,” Liam answered. “If you ask me, being the owner of this estate is more of a burden than a pleasure to him. He acts as if he’s guilty.”
“Guilty?”
“Just in a manner of speaking. Shamus is dead, he’s alive. He wants a more light-hearted approach to things. Don’t you agree? Look here, you can take half an hour off to see my horses. I’ll fix it with Aunt Tilly. Come along.”
Not unwillingly, Cathleen let herself be persuaded. After Rory’s tenseness and suspicion, Liam was easy. She enjoyed him taking her arm in a friendly way, and walking her down to the old grey stone stables, where the two handsome colts and the filly put their heads out of their loose-boxes to look with interest at their visitors. There was a smell of fresh straw and the pungent smell of horses.
Liam told her the youngsters’ breeding. He had particular hopes for the oldest colt, which he expected to sell at a high price in Dublin shortly.
“I’m not selling the filly,” he said. “I intend to keep her for breeding. I’m breaking her in now. She’s very gentle. Do you ride?”
“I had a pony once.”
“Macushla is as easy as a pony. I ride her sire, Red Rover. He’s a bit of a brute, but he lets me handle him. Come and see him.”
Liam opened another loose box, and Cathleen drew back as the stallion snorted and reared inside. He was a splendid creature, his neck arched high, his chestnut coat gleaming. Liam fondled him and he was quiet at once.
“No airs, Red, if you don’t mind. This is a friend. We’ll be taking her riding. That’s the good fellow.”
For a moment it seemed to Cathleen that Liam’s gentleness had gone and he was a match for the stallion, taut, highly-bred, nervous, strong.
Then he sauntered out, closing the door, and said, “You look very pretty standing there,” and kissed her.
She drew back more sharply than she had drawn back from the rearing stallion.
Liam still held her, but now at arms’ length.
“Didn’t you like me doing that?”
“No. I didn’t.”
She hoped her voice was quite steady. She hadn’t been kissed since Jonathon had died. Her emotions were too confused for her to understand her aversion.
“I’m sorry. We’ll try again, another time.” He looked at her sideways, his eyes very bright. “That’s a promise.”
He held her hand all the way back to the house. She didn’t object to that. Her fingers curled within his quite contentedly. Yet under her skin that aversion lingered. Was she afraid of new emotions?
In one of the upstairs windows a face was looking down. Cathleen noticed it only because at their approach there was a sharp movement of the curtains. Like the watchers in Loughneath, peering at her furtively.
It was Kitty. She had caught just a fleeting glimpse of her face.
Lonely Kitty. Liam was her favourite brother. If he fell in love she was afraid she would lose him. Already, apprehension was making her an enemy.
Cathleen took her hand away from Liam’s. Rory was right. She had come here to work. She mustn’t get involved.
CHAPTER SIX
APART FROM HER VISIT to Mrs. O’Riordan’s room in the night, Cathleen had kept to the rooms s
he had been shown. But that evening something made her go to the billiard room where Shamus had met his accident.
With its billiard table, its leather armchairs and hunting trophies, it was a masculine and curiously attractive room. There were leopard skins, one magnificent tiger skin and sundry weapons on the walls, a hunting scene over the fireplace. The floor was bare except for a sheepskin rug in front of a dying fire. The treacherous carpet had been taken up, and the desk pushed against a wall.
Cathleen walked slowly across the floor, reflecting.
“What are you doing? Looking for bloodstains?” came Mary Kate’s sharp voice, making her start.
“No. I only wondered—” Cathleen looked at Mary Kate’s little round figure and felt foolish. “There’s a fire. Who uses this room?”
“Mr. Rory does. He always did, as well as Mr. Shamus. And Mr. Liam. It would be the natural place for me to ask the young lady to wait that night, wouldn’t it?” She had accurately read Cathleen’s thoughts. “Seeing her business was with the men.”
“But I thought it was only Shamus she wanted.”
Mary Kate nodded. “It was.” She made no effort to correct her mistake, and Cathleen was left wondering whether it had been deliberate. Or not a mistake at all.
Mary Kate’s faded eyes, a milky colour in the apple red of her face, were bland and guileless.
“I saw you coming in here, miss. I came to warn you.”
“Warn me?”
“Mr. Rory doesn’t like women in this room. Not even his sister. He does his accounts here and he reads of a winter’s evening.”
In other words, it was his escape route. And why not, if he wanted it?
“What was she like?” she asked impulsively.
Mary Kate pursed her lips and seemed about to refuse to reply. She knew well enough whom Cathleen meant. But the fascination of that eventful night was too much for her.
“She was a pale little thing. Seemed scared. She was dressed in a green coat, not at all stylish, and her hair was like a bonfire. You had to turn and look at it. And underneath was her pale face and her scared eyes. I knew that whatever she was up to, she hadn’t wanted to come. Then I never did see her go. She might have been a fairy, do you know, vanished into thin air. But Paddy Ryan from the cabin down at the crossroads did say he saw a young thing waiting for a bus. He said she was sitting on the bench there crying. I don’t know the truth of it. Plenty of girls might shed a tear, having to go home alone from a dance. And there was a dance in Loughneath that night. But that’s the spot the Dublin bus goes by.”