by Liz Nugent
I thanked them for their hospitality and hugged Bridget, arranging to meet her before I got the bus back home. I set off on my quest to find Annie. I told the shopkeepers, pub and café owners that I had found this silver-framed photo at the bus station and wondered if they knew the girl in the photo. It was the only story I could think of. Because of the harelip, people might remember Annie. Her photo hadn’t featured in the press for more than a few days after the initial investigation. Other young women who had gone missing all over the country sparked annual appeals and renewed press coverage, but I guess that because of her background Annie’s case was never reopened.
A few of the people I asked thought she looked familiar, ‘except for the mouth’, but most didn’t recognize her at all. In a hairdresser’s, I suggested that it was probably an old photograph, that she could have changed her hair colour. The salon owner looked at me suspiciously and I realized how weird my story sounded. The receptionist at the Prince of Wales Hotel advised that she could be from anywhere, as Athlone was a bus changeover spot for travellers from Cork, Limerick and the West.
Athlone was a pretty small town, and after four hours I had visited every single business premises, including the ones out on the Roscommon road and the Galway road. At a petrol station on the outskirts of town, I was showing the photo to people when one of them pointed out I’d already been into her jewellery shop with it that morning. ‘You’re going to an awful lot of trouble to track down a stranger,’ she said with a hint of mistrust in her voice. At that stage I didn’t care.
I went to the garda station and baldly asked if anyone knew the face in the photograph. The guards shrugged but insisted on keeping the framed photograph. The frame was worth something, they said, so whoever lost it would report it lost to them. That was stupid of me.
At three o’clock I met Bridget in a café.
‘No luck?’
‘None.’
‘I’m sorry, but it’s a needle-in-a-haystack situation. She could be living miles out of town in a quiet place, nearer to Mullingar or Ballinasloe. She could be anywhere.’
My fury with Annie had not abated. Hours of tramping around the rain-sodden streets, holding Annie’s photo in my hands, had given me time to think about what I would say to her if I came face to face with her. I couldn’t even imagine myself being pleased to see her, even if she was safe. I wanted to smack her for everything she had put us through.
I rang home from a phone box and told Ma and Da the bad news, but I said I was going to cover another part of the midlands next week. I’d cover the whole country if I had to. I was going to find Annie. She owed us an explanation.
When I got home that evening, I had dinner with my parents. None of us said much. Da was annoyed that the guards now had his silver photo frame. We had loads of photos of Annie. We’d had hundreds printed at the time of her disappearance. It was the frame that bothered him.
‘I bought it specially, after she …’
‘Ran away?’ I suggested.
‘Yeah.’
The next morning Yvonne rang in a state of high excitement.
‘I hope you’re feeling better. Because guess who’s going to Rome?’
‘I’m much better, thanks, but what’s this about Rome?’
‘It’s a new perfume – Gilt. They want you as the face of Gilt!’
‘Guilt? That’s a weird name for a perfume.’
‘It’s Gilt. Without the “u”. Gilt. And they want you in Rome next Saturday. I knew you were going to be the one. I knew it all along! Do you realize how big this is?’
It was exciting but I had planned to go to Mullingar. And then I realized how foolish I was being. I had the chance to go to Rome, and I was thinking about not going because of Annie? I could wait. Annie could wait. She’d waited six years to tell us she was still alive.
‘That’s fantastic!’
‘Is your passport in order?’
Dessie and I had been to the Isle of Man the previous summer, so my passport was up to date. Yvonne said I should call to her office and collect all the details.
When I left there later that day with all the information, I had an urge to ring Bridget and tell her this great news, but maybe it would be rubbing her nose in it. I wanted to tell someone. I wanted to tell Laurence.
I rang him in the office. I updated him on the futile search for Annie. His voice was comforting, concerned. I told him about my trip to Rome.
‘Wow! That’s fantastic. Rome.’
‘Have you been?’
‘No, never. My mother doesn’t like to travel, so we never did foreign holidays, or even domestic ones for that matter.’
I said it before I even realized it had come out of my mouth. ‘Come with me.’
There was a slight pause and then he said, ‘OK. I will.’
16
Lydia
Malcolm was one of my psychiatrists during my confinement in St John of God’s. He had seen me at my very worst, semi-comatose and unresponsive. I had one-to-one sessions with him. He knew of my reluctance to mix with others, my miscarriages, and that I had been desperate to have another baby. He did not, of course, know how desperate. Even in my weakened, drug-induced state, I had never told him about Annie. It would have been a betrayal of Andrew. However, I trusted Malcolm. I think Daddy would have liked him. I had even told him about Diana and how I had drowned her on our ninth birthday. It’s funny, because I had never told Andrew those details, just that she had tragically drowned. Malcolm insisted that I had been a child and that I should not feel responsible for something I could not have understood at that age. Malcolm could not accept that I had wanted to kill her. He wanted to believe the best of me.
So when I met him at the florist one afternoon four years later, he greeted me cautiously and remarked how well I looked and seemed. He invited me to go for a coffee. I’m sure it was against some patient/doctor rule, but I didn’t mind. I like to be admired. And besides, he was no longer my doctor. Nowadays, I only saw my GP from time to time. Menopause had come and gone, and medication kept my moods stable and my thoughts calm.
Malcolm’s German wife had died some years previously. We were both single. We started to date tentatively. He would make love to me and I would close my eyes and imagine that he was Andrew. He came to the house sometimes when Laurence was out. I wanted to keep him a secret from Laurence. I needed Laurence to know that there was nobody I loved as much as him.
But the problem with Malcolm was that he never stopped trying to fix me, even when I did not need to be fixed. Outside of our earlier therapy sessions I never spoke of Diana, and yet, when we were dating, Malcolm would bring it up from time to time. When he was in Avalon, after dinner one evening, he asked where the pond was. I thought my freezing silence would stop his curiosity, but he was oblivious to my iciness.
‘You really are one of the most interesting cases I ever had. The fact that you kept all this guilt hidden away from your own husband for what, twenty-odd years? I think it’s quite unhealthy to keep these things bottled up. You should be talking to someone about this. Not me now, obviously, but you would be amazed the difference it could make to your sense of freedom if you were able to talk about it. It might give you the liberty to leave the house overnight, to go on a holiday. I’m sure it’s at the root of all your issues.’
‘One of your cases? Is that all I am?’ I said, trying to ignore his comments. I went to prepare a tray for coffee, but when I returned to the dining room, he wasn’t there. The front door was wide open. I found him in the back garden.
‘I can’t find the pond,’ he said.
I pointed to the raised paved area with the bird bath on top. ‘Daddy filled it in afterwards. Come in and get your coffee while it’s still hot.’
He took my arm and admired the shrubbery as we crossed into the house.
‘You don’t have to talk about it, Lydia, but I think it would do you some good.’
When Laurence was going to spend the weekend in Athlon
e, I knew I would be desperately lonely, so I invited Malcolm to stay with me on Saturday.
He arrived at lunchtime, bringing a surprise guest with him. She had aged badly, but I recognized her immediately. I have always kept myself in shape and taken pride in my appearance. We were the same age, she and I, but her hair was short and grey, her face wrinkled, her navy clothes shapeless. I noticed the crucifix around her neck and realized she was a nun.
‘Amy Malone,’ I said, and I clutched on to the sideboard in the hall and then my knees could no longer support my weight and I fell to the floor.
When I came round, Malcolm was waving a cushion over my face and Amy was still there.
‘Have a cup of sugary tea, dear. I know it must be a terrible shock.’
Amy had watched me sit on my sister’s chest and extinguish her life.
‘Oh, Dr Mitchell, you should have warned her. I wouldn’t have come if I thought you hadn’t prepared her!’
I sat up and waved away their ministrations. ‘Please.’ When I was able, I sat on the sofa and drank a cup of sickly sweet tea.
‘Now, Lydia, you remember Amy, of course you do. She is Sister Madeleine now, with the Loreto nuns. And I brought her along to talk to you.’
‘Malcolm, how dare you? I don’t want –’
‘Sister Madeleine knows it wasn’t your fault, don’t you, Sister?’
I walked past them and went straight to the drinks cabinet while they babbled behind me in a blind panic.
‘We were so young, Lydia. We were children. You couldn’t have known that Diana was going to die. It was an accident and you were not to blame in any way. It was God’s will. The Good Lord would never want you to feel guilty. You never intended her to die.’
‘There, you see? I thought it would be a good idea to bring you two together so that you could talk about that day and lay old ghosts to rest.’
‘It’s not a day I’ll ever forget, God bless her soul. It was a childish row that got out of hand. You couldn’t have understood that she might die. It was just one of those things, Lydia, and you know I get down on my knees every night, and I pray for you and Diana.’
‘Why don’t I leave you to it for twenty minutes? And when I come back, perhaps Sister Madeleine could lead us in a prayer at the site of the old pond? What do you say, Lydia?’
I did not turn to face them but drained the glass of brandy and then refilled it.
‘Please leave,’ I said.
‘But, Lydia, Sister Madeleine has come all the way from Sligo to see you –’
‘Leave.’
‘I’m so dreadfully sorry, Lydia. I had no idea this was going to be a surprise for you. Dr Mitchell, please take me back to the station.’
‘There’s no need –’
Amy and I both turned on him then, and they left together in a burst of embarrassment.
Malcolm telephoned later but I hung up on him. I drank the rest of the bottle of brandy and wondered how Laurence was, and if he was missing me. I wondered what Bridget’s family home would be like, and knew that it couldn’t possibly compare to ours. I raised the blind in the kitchen and looked out at Diana’s grave. I knew it was Annie’s, but I liked to think it was Diana out there, and that she was sitting on the edge of the pond, waving at me, beckoning me to come and join her outside. I raised my hand and waved. I climbed up on to a stool and tore down the blind. I put back the original curtains. Laurence would have to get used to it.
Malcolm came to Avalon the next day to apologize. I didn’t let him past the hall, but I allowed him to think he might some day be forgiven, and fortunately Laurence came home and interrupted us. Malcolm made small talk and then left. Laurence’s mission had been successful. The letter had been safely posted.
In the evening, Laurence received a phone call and then reported that he had just broken off his relationship with Bridget. I knew it would never last. I was surprised it had gone on so long, but I assumed that seeing the drab little lives of others had opened his eyes. He must have realized that he could never be with someone like Bridget. Things would settle down now.
My mother-in-law, Eleanor, came for dinner. She was irritatingly punctual. If she was invited for seven, she would arrive early and hover on the porch outside until the grandfather clock in the hall chimed before she rang the doorbell. After Andrew died, she had insisted on coming once a month whether I invited her or not, so in the end I was forced to make the last Sunday of the month a regular fixture. I always made sure Laurence was there. After all, she hadn’t come to see me.
She was very pleased that Laurence had been able to keep weight off for over a year, as if he had achieved it on his own. I could see that she was fond of him, but he was still quite wary of her. He told me how she had treated him when I was in the clinic. He certainly did not love her as much as he loved me. I wasn’t going to tell her about Malcolm, obviously. Each time she visited, she stopped and looked at every single photograph of Andrew on the mantelpiece. After Laurence had ‘found out’ about Annie, he had wanted to put away all those photos, but I insisted they stay. Eleanor often made comments about the big old draughty house we lived in, implying that it was way too big for the two of us. She often talked about how lonely I must be and how boring it must be to spend days by myself. It was perfectly clear she wanted to move in. She had been increasingly frail recently, and I think she felt the cottage in Killiney was a little too remote.
‘And Laurence will be moving out sometime. Won’t you, dear?’
‘I hope so,’ said Laurence.
‘Maybe you will be planning a family of your own. When am I going to meet this Bridget girl?’
I could see Laurence squirming with embarrassment.
‘I don’t know.’
‘Do you like her, Lydia? Is she good enough for our handsome Laurence?’
‘Nobody’s good enough for our Laurence,’ I said, and changed the subject to spare his blushes.
I thought that the letter would be enough, that it would put a stop to things. It infuriated me that her family could not just leave things be. Laurence had done an excellent job of throwing the Doyle family off course. He pretended to help Annie’s sister, and took over the really crucial parts of her search. He told her that there was no record of Andrew’s car, that it must be a red herring. I told him that he should find photographs of people of note who wore trilby hats, but Laurence would not countenance putting anybody else in the frame of suspicion. The letter was supposed to put an end to all the subterfuge. But now, Annie Doyle’s sister was furious with her and wanted to track her down to confront her. How ridiculous.
And then Laurence announced out of the blue that he was going to Rome for a holiday in three days’ time. He had once been on a school rugby trip to Marseilles when he was in Carmichael Abbey but had never expressed a desire to leave the country before. I told him that it was a ridiculous idea and that we couldn’t afford it, but he sharply reminded me that he was earning our income. Laurence was by then in management in the dole office. The cream rises to the top. Still, his salary wasn’t even a third of what Andrew’s had been. I could not understand why he had made this sudden decision, and why Rome?
‘I just need a break.’
‘Are you going alone?’
A slight pause. ‘Yes.’
‘But why, and for how long?’
‘A week.’
‘A whole week.’ I was feeling quite hysterical now. I had never been on my own for a week before.
‘I’ll come with you.’
‘Mum, no, you hate travelling, you hate leaving the house. Why would you want to come to Rome?’
‘What will I do here on my own?’
‘What you always do.’
‘On my own?’ I couldn’t believe he was being so selfish.
‘Mum,’ he tried to use a soothing voice with me, ‘Mum … I think sometimes … that you have always lived a very sheltered life. You have always had someone to take care of you, but the world has moved on. Most
women are out in the world now, holding down jobs and fighting for their rights, but it seems as if you don’t want any independence. You are not bad … or wrong at all, you’re just … unusual.’
‘Old-fashioned?’
‘A little. You don’t have to change if you don’t want to, but I live in the new reality and I like it.’ He paused. ‘You could ring your friend Malcolm. I’m sure he’d like to keep you company.’
I turned my face away.
‘It’s OK, Mum, for you to have a … friend. He seems like a very nice man.’
‘We … it’s not like that.’
‘Well, why don’t you ask Granny to come and stay for a few days? I’m sure she’d love to be invited. She’s always hinting at it.’
‘Oh, Laurence, if Granny came, we’d never get rid of her. She doesn’t even like me.’
‘Mum, I will move out sometime. I can’t live with you for the rest of my life. It might be an idea to think about Granny moving in, for company, like. If she were to sell the cottage, the proceeds would probably be shared between you and Uncle Finn. Think about it.’
I had already thought about it. I had talked to Eleanor about the cottage and what might happen to it if she died. She and I had an understanding. I had been of the opinion that Laurence understood too, that he would stay with me always, like I had stayed with my father. There was absolutely no need for him to move out. This whole recent business about Annie Doyle and Laurence’s involvement with her family was a huge mistake. I was beginning to think that Laurence no longer trusted me.
He made his travel plans regardless. He left the phone number of the hotel he was staying in. He urged me to call Malcolm, Finn and Rosie, or Eleanor if I was lonely. Two nights before his departure, his old girlfriend Helen turned up at dinner time.
‘How’r’ye, Mrs F!’ she said in her usual uncouth manner. ‘Laurence said you’d be on your own next week, so I’m going to call over and check you out while he’s away.’