In the Company of Others

by Jan Karon

  'Yes, yes,' he said, gawking. A flame of pride shot up in him. 'You're a wonder.'

  'Do you mean it?'

  'I absolutely mean it.'

  'Would Henry like it?'

  'He'd be thrilled. I'll finish up his letter tonight, we can send it off tomorrow.'

  'And this is the dear lady who'll be doing our laundry.'

  Bad teeth, radiant smile, thinning hair. The face of suffering, the face of courage.

  'Maureen McKenna. She helped Anna work on putting this place back together. Born with a deformed leg. Can cook, iron, clean, and sing. She's the sunshine of Broughadoon, Anna says.'

  He turned the page.

  The girl who had brought the hot towels around. Scornful. Beautiful in a menancing sort of way.

  'Bella,' she said. 'Bella Flaherty. Anna's daughter by a first marriage. Plays the fiddle--a trad musician.'

  'Trad?'

  Traditional. Plays the old tunes.'

  He was strangely unsettled by the portrait. 'You've been busy.' He stooped to kiss her forehead. 'How did you learn all this?'

  'It's a very talkative household.'

  'You can say that again.'

  'Broughadoon is the perfect place at the perfect time, sweetheart. I love being here.'

  'Ah, Kavanagh, what don't you love?' It was another of their mantras.

  'The spelling of Jane Austen's surname with an i. Cold showers. Fake orchids.'

  How she came up with this stuff without a moment's hesitation was as unfathomable to him as how to extract nickels from someone's ear.

  'How's your ankle?'

  'Hurts. But I took something for pain; it'll be fine.'

  He dumped stamps and pocket change on the dresser. 'It was all that sitting for so many hours.'

  She sneezed.

  'Bless you.'

  While in the Rover, he'd thought of calling Robin, the Irish distant cousin who gave the tea party those years ago. He'd entered her number into his cell phone, not sure whether the number would even be current. And Dooley--he should call Dooley. His cell phone . . . where was it? Maybe in his blue jacket. He should probably look for the charger and the connector thing, and get some juice in it when the power came back.

  She took a handkerchief from her jeans pocket and sneezed.

  'What's with the sneezing?'

  'When you left, I was dying to go back to bed. But I couldn't. After I sketched the view, I felt compelled to get dressed. Thought I'd visit the beech grove, and watch the chickens pecking at their kitchen scraps.'

  She liked her birthday present; he relished seeing the pleasure in her.

  'But I got no further than the library, which is where I found this--beneath a stack of books in the corner. It spoke to me, somehow.'

  She reached to the table beside the chair and hauled a large volume into her lap--it was a whopper. 'Being the private journals of Cor-mac Padraigin Fintan O'Donnell, MD, Lough Arrow, County Sligo,' she read from the fly-leaf. 'And be warned--the dust of the ages is gathered here.'

  She had a pretty volatile allergy to the dust of old books. 'Should you be doing this?' he asked.

  'I have to do this,' she said.

  She put on her glasses, opened the leather-bound book, and read to him.

  14 March 1860

  Freezing winds off the Lough

  A late Spring of blistering cold yet Caitlin & I are besotted with comfort in our rude Cabin near the Lough--Thick walls, an agreeable hearth & a dirt Floor warmed by Uncle's Turkey rugs have made it more than hospitable.

  No draft can seek us out in our alcove bed--my Books line the walls on racks I joined myself & are a fine insulation into the bargain. For a Surgery, God in his mercy has given us a Turf Shed attached to the Cabin, a scantling of a room--it serves well enough though difficult to heat in frigid weather.

  We have been spoiled these many years by the comfort of Uncle's grand Residence in Philadelphia to which we repaired at his urging from our wedding sojurn in Italy. He spent such little time in his well-furnished Home that we had it nearly to ourselves & four servants into the bargain. C eventually assumed the running of his Household for which he esteemed her very highly. Uncle did not discuss where he often lodged--we assumed it was with someone rumoured to be his mistress, of whom he never spoke--at least to myself. We did not learn the surprising truth until his death.

  C & I wonder yet why he declined to marry--surely it would have been socially beneficial to his many Enterprises. As well, we wondered at his refusal to attend Mass though we exhorted him on many occasions to come with us to Old St. Joseph's. I confess that we never fully understood Uncle but had a profound affection for him as did countless others. For all the resentment of Irish in that city, he was admired & respected by Catholic & Protestant alike.

  Working by Lantern to complete the Drawings--careful to restrain any impulse to vainglory though this in no way owing to Balfour's summon to modesty. Such a consuming task could not be carried forth without Uncle's rare & valuable books on architecture--Palladio and Inigo Jones being the masters who inspired the design of his fine house in the township of Philadelphia. Thanks to God for many felicitous hours spent with him as he labored over the drawings--often seeking my opinions and observations though they issued from rude instinct only.

  Must amputate Danny Moore's gangrenous leg on the morrow--he is but eighteen & the provider for his Mother, Grandmother, & four Sisters. Caitlin and I will travel horseback to their cabin for the surgery taking a basket of food, chloroform & a flask of Whiskey--what thin comfort can be offered at such a grievous time.

  A desperate Circumstance--Heaven help this decent son of Ireland.

  'Here's the backstory,' she said. 'Fintan O'Donnell was the bright, devout son of a poor tenant family who lived near Lough Arrow.'

  'Liam gave me a quick bit on O'Donnell. But keep going.'

  'Turns out he had what we've all dreamed of at one time or another--a rich uncle. So the uncle, who lived in Philadelphia and was busy making a fortune in shipping, said he would sponsor the brightest boy of his sister's four. The family proposed Fintan, and off he went at age seventeen, frightened out of his wits. I was sorry for the brothers, how it must feel to be the unchosen, but they absolutely didn't want any part of it and practically shoved him onto the boat.

  'He trained as a physician, had a very successful practice, and married a nurse whose family had immigrated from Roscommon. But he mourned the hunger years in Ireland and the evictions and the fevers and all the rest--he said he could sometimes audibly hear the tolling of the death bell and the lamentations of his people.

  'He wrote this in the frontispiece:

  I hereby stand with the venerable William Stokes who said when elected President of the College of Physicians: Loving my unhappy Country with a Love so intense as to be a Pain, its miseries & downward Progress have lacerated my very heart.

  'When he was fifty years old, he came home to Lough Arrow with his wife, Caitlin, to devote himself to the poor. His uncle had died some time before and the estate passed to Dr. O'Donnell. In light of that and the money he'd earned in his practice, he had deep pockets to fund a free clinic.

  'Timothy? Are you all right or shall I stop?'

  'Don't stop; I'm with you.' He moved to the wing chair; he would just rest his eyes . . .

  'The doctor and his wife were looking for land in these parts and made the acquaintance of Lord Balfour, an Englishman who'd built a big pile up the road from Broughadoon. Good timing, or maybe not, Fintan saved the life of the lord's ten-year-old daughter, and made some headway with the old boy's dysentery. So Balfour gave the doctor roughly two hundred acres of his own immense property, but with the caveat--get this--that O'Donnell wouldn't put on airs in the architecture of his house. O'Donnell thought it would be grand to accept the land.' She sneezed. 'Want me to stop?'

  'No, no. Go on.'

  17 May

  S. O'Connor came with his wife last night at a late hour--having no pony, S. walked t
he four miles in the traces of his cart, pulling her along--her abdomen swollen & tender, much vomiting.

  Attempted to remove Appendix but too late--expired ten minutes past midnight, S. distraught, keening, alarming the dogs--Caitlin managed to hold the poor man down as I dosed him with Laudanum--he slept warm in Surgery beneath one of the Turkey rugs.

  S. returns the corpse home after noon this day--the putrid smell from the rupture pervades the Surgery & cannot be kept from the Cabin though the windows be thrown open.

  A cruel cold rain at seven this morning--we pray heaven would stanch it for the cart to pass home dry.

  Moira O'Connor, mother of four living & two deceased. May God rest her Soul.

  She turned pages, searching passages.

  20 September 1860

  The people of these Parts take great pride in the building of the House. Caitlin & I recently met a lad down the shore who held his hat over his heart as we passed--twas not ourselves he saluted, but the Irish house that rises in his view.

  As we went by Canoe yesterday to O'Leary the Shoemaker, Keegan & I looked up and saw the bold silhouette against the mackerel sky--as Months have passed since I viewed it from such a vantage point I was surprised to find the new Garden walls giving the look of a Fortification. Even in its yet skeletal form, the house appears defensible & mighty on its high prominence & gives the People a sense of being protected by their own. I admit that seeing it thus has warmed me with pleasure.

  Though the worst years of Famine have recently passed, we are Haunted yet by the devastation which appears to have no end. Mark this. It is not merely a well-made house by the Lough, but a Proclamation to the Irish people that it is an Irish house built by Irish resolve--on Irish soil sanctified by Irish blood.

  May it proclaim that day when our Bonds be thrown off & our people free to govern our Destinies.

  'You're fading, sweetheart. Get in bed; we'll do this later.'

  He hauled himself up and undressed and did as he was told, eager for the consolation of the pillow. 'Get in with me,' he said, patting the blanket.

  'I'm right behind you.'

  She sneezed, blew her nose, pulled off her sweater.

  'Very sad to think of those times, though heaven knows, what had passed and what was coming was fearful in the extreme. Anna says Liam read a few pages when Paddy's work crew found it; it was stashed behind a wall.'

  'It belongs to Catharmore, then?'

  'Anna says Paddy had no patience for it and turned it over to Liam for the library. She's never read it, the ink is too faded. Of course, the doctor's handwriting isn't the best, either, but now that I've got the hang of it, it's flying along.'

  She stepped out of her jeans. 'What does his house look like, Timothy? Is it beautiful?'

  He heard the hope in her voice.

  She slipped in beside him, and he turned to her and touched her cheek.

  'In its own way,' he said. 'In its own way.'

  Six

  Dinner progressed with several toasts to the anglers' skill and good fortune. Slainte, meaning good health and pronounced slawn-cha, sounded in the room more than a few times.

  'By the way,' Cynthia said to Bella Flaherty, who was taking dessert orders, 'who cleaned all those fish? I cleaned a fish once, it was a terrible job.'

  'I cleaned the fish. Fileted them as well. 't is nothing. There are two desserts this evening: Moroccan figs poached in a syrup of ginger and honey, with Anna's lemon verbena ice cream--'

  'I love figs,' said Cynthia. 'I'll have the figs, thank you.'

  'You haven't heard the option.'

  He liked it when his wife raised one eyebrow.

  'Anna's rhubarb tart with raspberry puree and creme fraiche.'

  'I'll have the figs,' said Cynthia.

  While he'd lodged here with Walter and Katherine, Anna had sent them off on a day trip with a rhubarb tart, still warm in its swaddle of white napkin. The fragrance of brandied fruit and baked crust had filled the car, touching him with a grave longing for something he couldn't name.

  They'd driven as far as the highway when Katherine braked the car, turned to the backseat, and snatched up the basket which rode next to him. No one spoke as she unwrapped the tart, broke it into three pieces, passed out their portions, ate her own in roughly two enormous bites, wiped her mouth on the hem of her skirt, and declared: 'There. That's the way I want to live for the rest of my life.'

  Hooting with laughter, they were truant children on the run from authority.

  Speaking above the throb of the generator, he gave Bella his order. 'I'll have the tart, please.' Then, hopeful, 'Is it served warm?'

  She looked at him with hooded eyes. 'Anna's tarts are always served warm.'

  The kitchen door swung shut. 'Who does Bella remind you of?'

  'I was just thinking that,' he said. The thrown-away boy at age eleven, when he landed on the doorstep of the rectory--their adopted son, Dooley.

  In the library before dinner, he and Cynthia had exchanged introductions with the Atlanta contingent, who were seated now at the next table.

  'We hear you're a travel club,' said his wife.

  'We started as a book club,' said Moira. 'But we never got around to discussin' books.'

  'We drank wine and talked about men,' said Debbie.

  Laughter at the club table.

  'I still cannot believe,' said Lisa, 'that I took th' trouble to read War and Peace cover to cover, even the epilogue, and never once got a chance to discuss it.'

  'That's when I was havin' work done,' said Moira. 'I did not feel like readin' a book that weighed more than my firstborn.'

  'So, anyway,' said Lisa, 'we switched over to a poker club, with all winnings goin' to charity.'

  'Great idea,' he said.

  'We played every other Wednesday night, and everybody brought a covered dish.'

  'It was just way too much,' said Tammy, 'to, you know, every other Wednesday come up with a new dish.'

  'Takeout,' said Cynthia.

  Debbie lifted her glass to Moira. 'So Moira reorganized us as a travel club, she is very good at travel plannin'.'

  'We've been friends for forty years,' said Tammy. 'We met in a Scrabble club. We're crazy about Scrabble.'

  He noticed Tammy wore bracelets which did a good bit of jangling.

  'So, y'all like to fish?' asked Pete.

  'All our husbands trout-fished,' said Lisa. 'We never did, we were too busy raisin' kids. While Johnny could still talk, it was throat cancer, he said, Lisa, honey, learn to trout-fish.'

  'Good advice,' said Pete.

  'He said it was great for th' central nervous system.'

  Tammy put on a swipe of lipstick without looking in a mirror. 'Moira's husband, bless 'is heart, had fishin' on th' brain 'til th' minute he passed.'

  'Check out Lough Arrow, he said, plain as day.' Moira dabbed her eyes with her napkin. 'Those were practically his last words.'

  'His last words,' Pete said, reverent.

  'His parents brought him here as a boy and he came twice after college. We had fishin' husbands in common, for sure.'

  'Had,' said Pete.

  'We're all widows,' said Lisa.

  'Sorry,' said Pete.

  'Right,' said Tom. 'Real sorry.'

  Hugh nodded, respectful.

  'Another thing we have in common,' said Lisa, 'is . . . guess what.'

  'They'll never guess,' said Debbie.

  'You're all Irish,' said Cynthia.

  Debbie shrieked. 'How did you know?'

  'A hunch.'

  'Third generation,' said Moira. 'County Tyrone.'

  'Fifth generation,' said Debbie. 'County Mayo.'

  'Maybe fourth, maybe Sligo,' said Lisa. 'I'm not totally sure.'

  Tammy sighed. 'I have no clue, but my great-grandmother was named O'Leary--not th' one with th' cow.'

  Hugh raised his glass. 'Limerick. Fourth generation.'

  Tom raised his. 'Sligo. Third.'

  'All my connections are p
retty much Sligo,' said Pete, 'except for a crowd on my mother's side that moved up to Tyrone. Okay, here's one for you. What's th' connection between us lads that has nothin' to do with fishin'?'

  'You're all losin' your hair?' asked Debbie.

  'Cousins!' Cynthia and Moira chorused.

  'Slainte!' said Pete.

  There ensued a discussion of emigration dates, the sprawl of kin over counties and continents, the Kavanagh bloodline, fife-playing in general.

  'I'm wonderin' why y'all turned up here,' said Pete. 'Out in th' sticks an' all.'

  'We took the advice of a dyin' man,' said Tammy. 'Googled World's Best Trout Fishin', then Googled Lough Arrow and found Broughadoon. Liam and Anna were great to work with, and ta-da'--Tammy's bracelets jangled--'here we are.'

  'Ready to fish like maniacs,' said Debbie.

  Pete turned his chair to face the club table. 'Where do you fish back home? New England? Colorado? Montana?'

  Moira looked Pete in the eye. 'Th' country club lake.'

  'Catch a lot of golf balls that way,' said Hugh.

  Dessert was served amid a bombast of lectures by the anglers--Spent-gnat, Sooty Olive, Connemara Black, Invicta, Green Peter, feeder streams, buzzer hatches, Bibio, murroughs . . .

  'What are they talking about?' whispered Cynthia.

  'We don't need to know,' he said.

  'So,' Pete inquired of the club table, 'how about some help with your gear in the morning?'

  'We have ghillies coming, thank you.'

  'Well, then, ladies'--Pete hoisted his glass--'may it be yourselves bringin' home our dinner tomorrow evenin'. We'll just be sleepin' in, if you don't mind.'