To Hear a Nightingale

by Charlotte Bingham

  On the plane back – Cassie’s first time up in the air – as Tyrone removed the final bits of confetti and rice from his hair and suit, and as America disappeared in the cloud below them, Cassie turned to the man who was now her husband and grinned at him.

  ‘Do you realise something, Tyrone?’ she said. ‘I know we haven’t known each other all that long, but even so, I’ve never actually found out what business it is you do.’

  ‘No you haven’t, have you?’ Tyrone replied, turning those deep blue eyes on her and kissing her cheek. ‘Not that it’s of any great importance. I train racehorses.’

  Cassie said nothing in return, beyond expressing a polite interest. But in her heart she felt her life was now complete.

  It was in fact only another beginning.

  Part Two

  Chapter Ten

  Claremore, Co. Wicklow, Ireland

  Spring, 1961

  When they finally arrived in Dublin, Tyrone took her to tea at the Russell Hotel on the corner of St Stephen’s Green, where they had platefuls of hot toast, with lashings of Irish butter. Tyrone then excused himself and said he had to go and do a few minutes’ business. Cassie remained behind in the hotel, re-reading the magazines she had bought for the flight. Tyrone’s few minutes of business turned into nearly two hours, so that by the time they left Dublin in Tyrone’s new green E-type Jaguar, which had been delivered to him at the airport, dusk was falling.

  Cassie caught glimpses of the charming old city as Tyrone hurried his way out through the traffic. She asked what certain places were and Tyrone told her: Grafton Street, the Bank of Ireland which used to be the old houses of parliament, the front gate of Trinity College, the rest of the university hidden from her gaze behind its high stone walls, the canal, and Fitzwilliam Square, where Tyrone had to stop briefly to have a quick word and a drink with a young bloodstock agent. Cassie was left sitting in the car.

  She didn’t mind because it gave her the chance to admire the beauty of the Georgian architecture. As she was looking with some wonder at the houses with their beautiful fanlights and elegant sash windows, some children tapped on the car window, since the hood was up and they couldn’t talk to her direct. Cassie was appalled. They were filthy, with running noses, ragged clothes and no shoes. There wasn’t one of them either who could have been over seven or eight years of age.

  She watched them through the glass as they tapped once more on the window. Then she wound it down.

  ‘Give us a penny, will ya?’ a boy asked her.

  At first Cassie had great difficulty understanding what he was saying, so thick was his nasal twang.

  ‘I said give us a penny, ma’am.’

  ‘A penny!’ Cassie said, smiling and opening her purse. ‘And what do you want a penny for?’

  ‘We’re havin’ a party,’ the child replied very seriously. ‘So give us a penny.’

  Cassie looked in her purse. Tyrone had already given her some Irish money, just in case.

  ‘I don’t have a penny, I’m afraid,’ she started to explain, but the little boy was leaning right into the car and looking in her purse.

  ‘That’s all right, ma’am,’ he said, snatching a florin from her purse. ‘This’ll do fine.’

  They fled down the street before Cassie could say another word. She turned and looked after them and saw them, as bold as anything, stop at the shop on the corner and go in. Cassie closed her purse and grinned, but decided to tell Tyrone nothing of the incident.

  When Tyrone returned and drove out of the square, the kids were all coming out of the shop smoking cigarettes. Cassie saw them and was horrified. She looked over her shoulder and watched them as Tyrone turned right across Baggott Street, heading the car out of town.

  ‘Something the matter, Mrs Rosse?’ he asked.

  ‘Those kids. They were smoking.’

  ‘Those kids were born smoking.’

  ‘That’s terrible.’

  ‘That’s Ireland.’

  Before long they had left the city far behind and were driving on headlights across a road which cut through the mountains. Even in the dark Cassie was struck by the majesty of the countryside through which they were driving.

  ‘Not far now,’ Tyrone told her. ‘About another fifteen or so miles. The house lies just this side of the border with Kildare.’

  Cassie sat back and watched as Ireland passed by.

  They must have been waiting for them to arrive, because as Tyrone turned the last corner of the drive, bringing Cassie into view of the house, it was as if the house burst into flames. At every window candles suddenly spurted and flickered, and at the doorways, lanterns were lit.

  ‘Don’t tell me you don’t have electricity?’ Cassie laughed.

  ‘Probably another powercut,’ he replied. ‘A couple of drops of rain and the whole damn thing goes phut.’

  Cassie stared back at the house, which looked like something out of a fairytale. The moon had risen behind it, and Cassie could see by its light that the house stood against a backdrop of mountains. It was just as Tyrone had described it: the old stone, the tall chimneys, the long shuttered windows and the flight of steps up to the half-glassed double front doors, where a welcoming party waited with lanterns in hand.

  Tyrone and his bride climbed out of the car. Something huge and hairy hurtled down the steps to greet Tyrone and nearly knocked him flying.

  ‘This is Brian,’ Tyrone told her as the wolfhound licked him all over his face. ‘You’d best hold on to your hat.’

  The dog then turned to Cassie on whose shoulders, since she was so small, he had no difficulty whatsoever in placing both paws. He sniffed her then licked her, smack on the nose.

  ‘You’re elected,’ said Tyrone, and preceded her up the steps.

  ‘So you’ve arrived at last, have you?’ said an older man holding up a lantern. ‘Six o’clock indeed.’

  ‘I’d business in Dublin, Tomas. I’m lucky to be back at all tonight.’

  ‘And what about your poor young bride?’ the man who was Tomas persisted. ‘Have you no thought for her at all?’

  Cassie had now climbed the steps and joined Tyrone and the white-haired man, who smiled shyly at her. Cassie could see by the lantern light that although his hair was shock white, his face was as smooth as a baby’s.

  ‘Pleased to meet you, ma’am,’ he said, extending a strong gnarled hand. ‘I’m Tomas.’

  ‘How do you do, Tomas?’ Cassie said as they shook hands. ‘Mr Rosse has told me all about you.’

  ‘Has he bedad?’ Tomas wondered. ‘Has he bedad?’

  ‘Put the light up, Tomas!’ someone called from the back. ‘So we all may look at her!’

  Tomas held the lantern to Cassie’s face. There was a silence.

  ‘Thank God!’ another voice said. ‘She’s as pretty as a picture!’

  A cheer went up as Cassie smiled, and Tomas led them to the front doors.

  ‘They was afraid you’d be an ugly old hawk,’ he said, grinning back at her. ‘Most of ’em have never seen a Yank.’

  Then he held open the doors and Cassie stood about to enter Claremore. But not on her feet. For Tyrone swept her up in his arms and carried her over the threshold.

  ‘Cead mile failte, Mrs Rosse,’ he said, setting her down in the candlelit hall. ‘A hundred thousand welcomes.’

  Then he kissed her, to further cheers from the assembled throng.

  Cassie looked around her, at the beautiful hall with its sweeping staircase, at the wood fire burning in the huge grate, at all the faces looking back at her over their lanterns. Then a large woman in an apron stepped forward and introduced herself.

  ‘I’m Mrs Muldoon, ma’am, Tomas’s wife, and the cook. And this here’s me daughter Erin, who works here with me.’

  From the ranks behind her she pulled forward a round-faced girl with a pile of frizzy hair brushed into a knot on the top of her head. She had so many freckles, Cassie thought, that she looked as if she’d been splashed by a paintbrus
h.

  Cassie smiled at her, and Erin grinned and nodded, before dropping back in line.

  ‘Well?’ said Tyrone in that now familiar way of his. ‘Are we just to stand here dying of thirst?’

  Tomas grinned and, shaking his head, threw open the doors to the dining room and to the drawing room, both large rooms with fires blazing, and both set for a party. In the dining room there wasn’t an inch of table space which wasn’t taken up with food and drink, and in the drawing room every table was ablaze with jugs, vases and jars filled with spring flowers. Cassie gasped and took Tyrone’s hand.

  ‘There’s been nothing but to-ing and fro-ing the last two days,’ Tomas grumbled happily. ‘You may have been wedded in America, Mr Rosse, but ’tis here at Claremore it’ll duly be celebrated.’

  ‘Will you just look at those wonderful flowers?’ Cassie cried.

  ‘Sure the women have been walking up to the house all day with the first of the spring flowers,’ Tomas told her. ‘I dare say there’s not a daffodil left standing in the whole of the county. And as for the cooking, I don’t think Mrs Muldoon has been in bed for a week. Least not so as I would notice.’

  ‘It looks wonderful,’ Cassie told Tomas, before Tyrone led her away to get them some drinks.

  ‘All they did was grumble about our getting married over the water,’ he said. ‘So rather than have another civil war on my hands, I said we’d have a hoolie on our return. I hope you’ve no objection?’

  Cassie, who on the drive to the house had secretly thought of curling up early in her wedding bed, quickly put aside such thoughts from her head as soon as she saw the joyous expectation on all the faces present.

  She followed Tyrone to a sideboard, where he was making the drinks and, leaning up, kissed him on the cheek.

  ‘You really don’t mind, Cassie, love? About the party? They’d have murdered me otherwise.’

  ‘Mind?’ said Cassie. ‘I’ve never seen anything lovelier.’

  ‘I have,’ Tyrone replied. ‘It’s standing looking at me.’

  He touched her glass with his and drank his whisky.

  When they had all eaten, the men first served by the women, and then the women themselves, the carpet in the hall was rolled back for dancing. Fiddles were produced, a side drum and an accordion, and an instrument which Cassie didn’t recognise.

  ‘Irish bagpipes,’ Tyrone told her. ‘You’re to have them played at my funeral.’

  Cassie turned and stared at him.

  ‘That’s a funny thing to say at a time like this, isn’t it?’ she asked.

  ‘Good Lord no,’ Tyrone replied laughing. ‘Haven’t you heard that the Irish are in love with death?’

  Then he took her by the arm, away to watch the dancing. Cassie watched with fascination as the men and women danced Irish jigs, the girls with their arms held stiff by their sides, their feet weaving intricate patterns and movements, catching the reflection of the firelight in their shiny shoes, while the men danced likewise around them. Cassie watched it all, anxious to remember every moment of the celebrations. She knew tomorrow was already knocking on the door, but until it was formally here, she wanted to remember the candlelight, the faces and the flowers, and the sound of the celebrations, rising with the cigarette and pipe smoke, high into the ceiling. She wanted to remember the women from the village in their best black dresses and the handsome faces of the men, shining above their stiff white shirt collars and their unaccustomed neckties. And she wanted to remember all the beautiful children, dressed in their Sunday best, some of them dancing very seriously, others sitting in the corners of the hall just watching, their precious glasses of lemonade clasped in their two hands, or their empty dinner plates balanced on their stretched-out legs.

  Halfway through the evening a priest arrived, who was greeted with due respect, and immediately given what Cassie heard described as a ball of malt. Cassie was led over by Tyrone to meet him.

  He was a tall man, very tall, built like one of Gina’s football players, with shoulders so wide you would swear they were padded. He was handsome, too. Not as handsome as Tyrone, but enormously good-looking, with a head of thick curly hair, and a very open expression to his face.

  ‘I’m delighted to meet you, Mrs Rosse,’ he said to her, ‘even though you denied me the privilege of marrying you.’

  Cassie made her apologies and explained the reasons why they had decided to marry in New York, but while she was doing so, she got the impression, as she always did with priests, that he wasn’t really listening so much to her, but looking into her, straight into her soul, as if through a window. It took her back to her first day at the convent, when the nuns had frightened her so much with the intensity of their stares. Her excuses for not getting married in Ireland were beginning to sound feebler by the moment, as she faltered under Father Patrick’s gaze.

  Tyrone came to her rescue.

  ‘If I’d brought this child back with me unmarried, I couldn’t have taken the risk,’ he said. ‘You can see how beautiful she is, Patrick. Why, you might have forsaken your orders and run off with her yourself!’

  Father Patrick nodded and laughed, and the ice was broken. Then Tyrone made his excuses and took Cassie out into the hall to teach her how to jig.

  ‘They’ll be gone soon enough, Cassie McGann,’ Tyrone said in her ear. ‘And once they’re all gone I’ll carry you to bed, and make love to you such as you never dreamed of.’

  Cassie looked up at him and smiled. She couldn’t imagine what that would be like. Not just being made love to by Tyrone, but lying in her own bed. In her own house. With her husband. She couldn’t begin to imagine any of it.

  He didn’t say a word to her as he carried her upstairs and along the corridor to what was to be their bedroom. He carried her easily into the darkened room, lit only by the one candle Cassie held in her hands. He put her down gently, and took the lit candle, placing it by the bed. Then he took both her hands and kissed her slowly and tenderly, then, putting his strong arms around her, more passionately, and for longer. She put her arms around his neck and his hand in her hair, and whispered to him softly to take care. And he murmured back to her that he would, that he would, as he undid the back of her dress, and let it fall down over her new silken underwear. He took her breasts in his hands, and a delicious shock ran through her body as he touched both her nipples. Then he carried her to the bed, as she undid his shirt. He laid her down, and took off the rest of his clothes, sliding under the cold linen sheets beside her. She could feel the softness of his skin against hers now, his arm around her back as he pulled her towards him; then she became aware of the whole of his body, as he explored the whole of her own. She shivered and groaned softly, very softly lest she might upset him, as he delicately searched her every area, anxious to find and to touch the places which would please her the most. And all this time they kissed, their lips against each other’s, or against each other’s necks, or chests, or breasts, or stomachs. Then gently, slowly, oh so gently he took her, and her back suddenly arched high and she gasped and cried; but he kept kissing her and telling her he loved her and to trust him. She found herself kissing him back with a ferocious passion, with a hunger she didn’t know she felt, with a desire which suddenly inflamed her. She ran her hands through his hair and pulled hard, and his head came back as he was deep inside her. He laughed with delight and pleasure, putting his arm round her arching back and holding her suspended with this enormous strength of his, high above the bed. She gasped and cried and bit into his shoulder, hard, hard and ever harder when she suddenly became aware of him moaning and shuddering. His arm was now releasing her, and she found herself falling such a long, long way down, down slowly on to the bed far below and on to him as he turned and caught her endlessly falling body in both his arms, twisting her round to him but now so tenderly, so that their mouths met and kissed again softly in the dark as the candle sputtered and died. They lay there spent, he on his back and her face down on his chest, her arms under his shoulde
rs, his arms round her body and the rest of her life.

  Now the dim light of day crept under Cassie’s tired eyelids, as she began to wake. She could hear the sound of steady rain, and the bed was empty and cold beside her. Tyrone was already up and gone. He’d warned her that this would be so, that this was his routine, up every morning at six to supervise the first string, and home for what he called a late breakfast at half past eight when the second string had returned and were back safe and, it was to be hoped, all sound in their boxes. Cassie sat up and looked about her, hugging the bedclothes around her as she suddenly felt the cold.

  She looked towards the windows, thinking that Tyrone with his love of fresh air must have left a window open. But no, the two long windows were both quite shut. Cassie blinked against the morning light, and reckoned that the least Mr Rosse might have done was to leave the drapes closed. Then she saw that there were no drapes, just large wooden shutters which were already folded back. She pulled the bedclothes even more tightly around her and reached for her robe, then looked for something to put on, but her case stood still packed in the corner. Pulling the quilt from the bed, she wrapped herself up in it, and ran over across the bare boards to grab her small overnight bag; then she ran back to the bed where underneath the already chilling linen sheets, with teeth chattering, she slipped into her nightgown and wrap. She looked again at the room, which was her first view of Claremore by the light of day. There was rain against the windows, and down the chimney came the sigh of the wind. The room looked very different from the room they had hurried up to by candlelight a few hours previously, when the last of their guests had staggered home singing their way down the long drive. It looked very bare and cheerless.

  It was large, too large, much too large for comfort. It was hardly furnished either, for that matter. There was one big wardrobe, its doors open and revealing a mess of male clothes within it, one chest of drawers, an upright chair, and the bed. The bed was very grand, with its headboard of carved cherubs, and its ornate wooden scrolling, but it only helped to emphasise the vastness of the room. And not only was there no carpet, there wasn’t even a rug anywhere.