At last she saw the White House through the trees. It was positioned up a drive on a hill, with a clear view of the sea. She climbed down and tethered her pony to the gate post. As she walked up the drive she wondered what had become of Jack. Kitty had married her tutor, the man she had written off as dull and humourless. She wondered why she hadn’t eloped with Jack. The fact that she hadn’t gave her a small sense of triumph, a malicious feeling of satisfaction. Neither of them had been able to have him. There was a certain justice in that.
Suddenly she heard the sound of voices. A woman’s laughter and a child’s squeals of delight. Bridie walked towards it. As the sounds grew louder she realized that she hadn’t dared breathe. She was holding her breath in dread and fear and anticipation. Then she saw him and she let out a deep moan. A little boy in a pair of brown trousers and a white shirt, a cap on his head like the one Jack used to wear, trotted along beside a woman, holding her hand, but it wasn’t Kitty. Bridie clutched her heart and stopped walking, taking in the sight of this small stranger who carried her blood in his veins. He was handsome and his smile broke her heart all over again. Then Kitty appeared in the doorway. She opened her arms and grinned. The little boy shouted ‘Kitty’ and ran unsteadily towards her. With a whoop of delight Kitty swept him up and cuddled him against her bosom. She took off his cap and put it on her own head. The boy giggled and reached up to grab it. Before Bridie could digest the scene, Kitty had retreated inside, taking the boy with her.
Bridie stood rooted to the ground with a deep and searing pain burning in her chest. The woman who had been holding Jack’s hand turned and saw her. Bridie must have cut an unlikely figure there on the drive, alone, clearly distraught. The woman shielded her eyes from the sun with her hand and walked towards her. ‘Hello?’ she said. ‘Can I help you?’
Bridie struggled to find her voice. ‘I’m sorry. I think I’ve come to the wrong address,’ she managed before turning and fleeing down the drive. The woman frowned as she watched her disappear in a hurry through the gate at the bottom.
Once out of the gate Bridie slumped onto the grass, put her face in her hands and sobbed. Her hope had turned to vapour. In her dreams she had imagined him a baby still. But he was a little boy and in his eyes Kitty was his mother, even though he hadn’t called her by that name. Had she really believed that Kitty would rejoice at seeing her and hand the child back? Had she really been so foolish as to expect Kitty not to love the child as her own? Bridie might be the boy’s natural mother but Kitty was his mother in every other way and with that thought her heart twisted with a fierce and desperate jealousy. She clutched her stomach and let her despair engulf her.
After a while she stood up shakily. As she untied the horse’s reins she heard the sound of footsteps behind her. She turned. It was Kitty, pale and serious in the sunlight. ‘Bridie?’ she said, stepping forward. ‘Is that you?’
Bridie stared back at the woman who had once been as dear to her as a sister and recognized the fear in her eyes. It was wild and undisguised, like the foxes people had always likened her to, and it opened a canyon between them. ‘Aye, it’s me, Kitty.’
‘You’ve come back,’ Kitty croaked.
‘I’ve come back for my son,’ Bridie replied with emphasis, lifting her chin, and Kitty noticed how the years in America had hardened her face almost beyond all recognition.
‘You’ve been gone a long time,’ Kitty reminded her. ‘He’s a little boy now.’
‘He’s my little boy.’
‘You gave him to me, Bridie. You left him on my doorstep and I vowed to raise him and love him as my own. I sacrificed everything for him, for you.’
‘I didn’t give him to you,’ Bridie replied tightly. ‘Michael did.’
‘Michael?’ The mention of her brother’s name made Kitty shudder.
‘The nuns took him away from me. They stole my child.’ Bridie’s voice rose a tone in anguish. ‘Michael rescued him and put him into your safekeeping so that, one day, when I was able, I could come back and find him. Well, I’m here now. He’s my child, Kitty. Where is your compassion?’
‘It was compassion that propelled me to give up the man I loved and do my duty for your son. He was left on my doorstep because he’s a Deverill. My father has recognized him. He is my brother and he belongs with me.’
‘But I am his mother,’ Bridie insisted.
‘You gave birth to him but you abandoned him.’
‘I was left no choice.’
‘Jack believes he doesn’t have a mother, Bridie.’
Kitty’s words, although delivered softly, dealt Bridie a mighty blow. Her hand flew to her throat and she stifled a cry. ‘You told him I was dead?’ she gasped.
‘What would you have had me do? I could not have told him that his mother abandoned him in a convent.’
‘There had to be another way?’ Bridie groaned.
‘He prays for you,’ Kitty said softly, suddenly suffering a pang of guilt at the sight of Bridie’s distress. ‘He prays every night for his mother who looks down on him from the stars.’
‘God save us,’ Bridie wailed.
‘I’m only thinking of Jack.’
Bridie rounded on her friend with fury. ‘You’re only thinking of yourself, Kitty. You stole Jack O’Leary and now you have stolen my son as well!’ she cried.
‘Don’t bring Jack O’Leary into this,’ Kitty retorted, any sympathy for Bridie suddenly evaporating. ‘He never belonged to you in the first place.’
‘Well, now he belongs to neither of us,’ said Bridie with grim satisfaction. ‘I will not let this matter go, Kitty. Do you hear? This is not over.’ She climbed into the trap and shook the reins. ‘The years in America have given me not only great wealth but great strength. Jack Deverill is my son. He belongs to me. I had to leave him once, but I won’t do it a second time.’
When she had gone, and only when she had gone, did Kitty give in to her pain. She fell to her knees, wrapped her arms around her body and howled.
Bertie put down the telephone and stared into his glass of whiskey with an aching sense of hopelessness. So, the castle was sold. Just like that. It hadn’t taken long. The buyer was very insistent that the whole business be done as quickly as possible, according to his solicitor, and in the utmost secrecy. He had paid the full price. He hadn’t even tried to negotiate. Bertie wasn’t sure why the buyer wanted the purchase to be secret, but he didn’t enquire. He was so full of sorrow he just wanted the deal signed so that he didn’t have to think about it any more.
‘The castle’s sold? Already?’ Maud exclaimed into the telephone. ‘Who’s bought it, Bertie?’ When she hung up she strode into the sitting room where Victoria and Eric sat in evening dress, drinking sherry. ‘Can you believe it, somebody’s already bought the castle!’
‘Good Lord,’ said Eric. ‘That was swift.’
‘The buyer is very keen to have it as quickly as possible,’ Maud informed them. She sat down and picked up her half-drunk glass of sherry. ‘Well, so long as we get our money, I don’t care.’
‘Do we know who’s bought it?’ Victoria asked.
‘No, Bertie says it’s a secret.’
‘How silly. Why would anyone want to keep the purchase of a castle secret?’ Victoria sniffed.
‘I don’t know but we’ll find out in the end,’ said Maud.
‘Perhaps he thinks you won’t sell it to him if you know who he is,’ said Eric, scratching his beard.
‘That’s a good point,’ Victoria agreed. ‘Who wouldn’t we want to buy it?’
Maud shook her head. Her white-blonde hair, cut into a stylish bob, didn’t move. ‘I don’t think I’d mind who bought it.’
‘Really?’ said Victoria. ‘Oh, I think you’d be a bit peeved if a member of the family bought it. Like Digby, for example.’
‘Well, of course I wouldn’t like Digby to buy it, because if a Deverill is going to live in there it’s going to be Harry. But Digby doesn’t want it. Beatrice certainly doesn
’t want it, either. They have Deverill Rising. Why on earth would they want a pile of old stones?’
‘Kitty?’ Victoria suggested.
‘They don’t have the money,’ said Maud meanly.
‘Grace?’
Maud turned to Victoria and blanched. ‘Grace Rowan-Hampton? Is that a joke?’
Victoria shrugged. ‘She’s rich enough to buy it.’
‘Why would she want it?’
‘Because it’s beautiful,’ said Victoria. ‘I wouldn’t want it because I don’t want to live in Ireland, but, if you love Ireland like she does, you’d prize Castle Deverill above everywhere else. Of course she’d want it.’
Grace loved Bertie so it would make sense to rebuild his castle. Maud put her fingers to her lips and gasped. ‘Do you think . . . ?’ The implications were too horrible to consider.
Digby returned to the dining room where his wife was enjoying dinner with Stoke and Augusta. ‘Somebody’s already bought the castle,’ he said, sitting down and flicking his napkin over his knee. ‘But Bertie says he doesn’t know who.’
‘How wonderful for Maud,’ said Beatrice. ‘She must be delighted it’s all happened so quickly. You know she was looking at a house in Chester Square only yesterday.’
‘What’s poor Bertie going to do?’ Stoke asked. ‘He can’t abide the woman.’
‘I don’t imagine they’ll have the money to buy two houses,’ said Beatrice. ‘They’re just going to have to learn to live with each other again.’
‘Maud is a very avaricious woman,’ said Augusta. ‘I could have told him that before he married her and saved him all the trouble.’
‘They were happy at the beginning,’ Digby argued.
‘But then they weren’t,’ Augusta added firmly. ‘It’s no good being happy at the beginning. Life has a middle and an end. I’m near the end now and I can safely say, can I not, that in spite of all I have suffered Stoke and I are still happy.’
‘Blissfully happy,’ Stoke agreed unhappily.
‘One mustn’t allow one’s eye to stray,’ Augusta continued stridently. ‘You see, Maud was much too beautiful to remain devoted to one man. Wasn’t it Eddie Rothmeade who caught her eye?’
‘Eddie Rothmeade?’ Digby repeated. ‘I’ve never heard such tripe.’
‘Oh yes, it was indeed. Adeline and I discussed it a great deal. There was a moment I thought they might run off into the sunset and never be seen again. Maud was that sort of woman. But Eddie tired of her. Now Bertie has tired of her too. Vain women like that eventually wear a man down. A woman must give as well as take in a marriage but Maud doesn’t know much about giving.’
‘Good Lord, Augusta, you never told me about that,’ said Stoke, his winged moustache twitching like a walrus’s snout.
‘That’s because Adeline would have killed me. Now she’s dead, she can’t.’
Augusta dabbed her lips with her napkin. ‘I’m a deep well of information, Stoke dear. But I’ll take all my other secrets to the grave, I suspect. Pity. I do hope I live long enough to find out who has bought the castle. I’m frightfully curious.’
Chapter 38
Co. Cork, Ireland, 1925
The little boys looked at each other in bewilderment. The woman had clearly stated that she was going to rebuild the castle. That would mean an end to their games. They listened harder. ‘To think I used to play in those rooms. I used to watch the glamorous ladies arriving for the Summer Ball in their fine gowns and sparkling jewels and marvel at the beauty of it all. Because it really was beautiful then. I don’t think there was anywhere else in the world more beautiful than Castle Deverill at that time of the year, on that night, when the sun was setting and turning it all to gold. You can’t imagine how magnificent it was. But I remember. I’ve always remembered. That’s why I wanted to preserve it. I couldn’t bear to see it go to anyone else.’ She sighed and shook her head. ‘But now it’s mine. I will rebuild it stone by stone, brick by brick and bring back those glory days. We’ll bring them back together because this wouldn’t have been possible if it hadn’t been for you. Oh, Archie, you’re just wonderful to me.’ Celia took his hand. ‘And our children will play with Kitty’s just like we used to do. History will repeat itself. One big happy family.’ Archie put his arm around her and smiled. ‘One big happy family,’ she repeated with pleasure, conveniently forgetting the centuries of family curses, brutality, greed and self-indulgence. ‘Just the way it should be. A Deverill’s castle is his kingdom, after all.’ And so it was that Deverill money had gone full circle because when Digby had rescued Archie Mayberry in return for taking back his disgraceful wife he had given him the means with which he would eventually show his gratitude for their unexpectedly happy marriage. In some ways, one could say that an empty-headed girl wearing nothing but a pair of white silk gloves had saved Castle Deverill.
Epilogue
Connecticut, America, 1925
The little girl with dark hair and freckles lay on her stomach on the lawn and stared at the yellow flower. Around it danced a tiny, quivering orb of light. She smiled. Every time she blinked the orb moved somewhere else, as if it enjoyed the game. The child reached out her hand and tried to catch it but the orb jumped away. She tried again: this time she thought she had it. But when she opened her fingers there was nothing there. The orb remained, hovering around the flower.
‘She’s been staring at that flower for ages,’ said the child’s mother from the window of the house. ‘Is that normal?’
‘She just loves nature, Pam darling, I wouldn’t worry.’
‘I’m not worried, Mom. It’s just, you know, when you adopt a child you never quite know what you’re getting.’
‘She just loves flowers,’ said the older woman.
Pam frowned. ‘Perhaps. But it’s as if she sees something else. Something more than just the flower. Look how she’s trying to grab it.’
‘It’s probably a little bug.’
Pam shook her head. ‘No, it’s not. I’ve watched her before. She has an imaginary friend.’
Pam’s mother smiled. ‘All children have imaginary friends. Children are very inventive. It’s very normal that an only child should invent a buddy to play with. After all, she is a twin, don’t forget. Perhaps she senses the loss of her brother.’
‘I don’t know . . . I have a funny feeling she sees things other people don’t see.’
‘She’s happy, right?’ said Pam’s mother.
‘Yes, she sure is,’ said Pam.
‘Then you don’t need to worry, darling. So long as she’s happy, everything will be just fine.’
‘I’m sure you’re right,’ Pam agreed with a sigh. However, she continued to frown as she watched her little daughter. ‘I feel so blessed. It was a miracle that a newborn baby girl should be available at the very moment we arrived in Dublin. Sister Agatha was so kind to let us take her. You know, she said it was breaking every rule but Larry can be very persuasive.’
‘Once he’d promised to embellish their dreary little chapel with the biggest golden cross Ireland has ever seen she was ready to give you as many babies as your heart desired,’ said Pam’s mother archly. ‘I really don’t think luck, or God, had anything to do with it.’
The child gave up trying to catch the nature spirit. She raised her eyes to the kind woman with red hair who was Adeline Deverill. ‘Hello, Grandma,’ she said and smiled.
BANTRY BAY
As I’m sitting all alone in the gloaming,
It might have been but yesterday
That we watched the fisher’s sails all homing,
Till the little herring fleet at anchor lay.
Then the fisher girls with baskets swinging,
Came running down the old stone way.
Every lassie to her sailor lad was singing,
Ah welcome back to Bantry Bay.
Then we heard the pipers sweet note tuning,
And all the lassies turned to hear.
As they mingled with a soft voic
e crooning,
Till the music floated down the wooden pier.
‘Save you kindly, colleens all,’ said the piper.
‘Hands across and trip it while I play.’
And the tender sound of song and merry dancing,
Stole softly over Bantry Bay.
As I’m sitting all alone in the gloaming,
The shadows of the past draw near.
And I see the lovely faces round me
That used to glad the old front pier.
Some have gone upon their last logged homing,
Some are left, but they are old and grey.
And we’re waiting for the tide in the gloaming,
To sail upon the great highway.
To an isle of rest unending.
Called peacefully from Bantry Bay.
Acknowledgements
How I have adored writing this book! It’s been such a challenge but so invigorating – and it fills me with immense joy to know that I’ll follow the characters I have created here into two more novels!
I really have to thank the angels first, because by some wonderful magic a man called Tim Kelly was inspired to email me about one of my novels just as I was thinking about writing this one. After some fabulously funny correspondence, because really, Tim is just so witty, it transpired that he was born and raised in Co. Cork, the place I had started researching for my novel. Tim is a deep well of knowledge and wisdom; he has an eye for the absurd, an almost photographic memory for detail and a sharp understanding of human nature. He soon became my mentor, my adviser and most importantly, my friend. I genuinely could not have even considered writing this book without him. Therefore I have dedicated the novel to him, with my love and gratitude. I am so lucky to have found him!
I would like to thank my Irish friends Emer Melody and Frank Lyons for inviting me to their home in Bandon, Co. Cork and for driving me around the wild and beautiful countryside so that I could get inspired. We visited the most compelling ruined castles, burned down by the rebels during the Troubles, and went for long walks up and down vast white beaches accompanied only by sea birds and the wind. I returned to London full of excitement and itching to start writing about a country that has taken hold of my heart.
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