Showered, shaved, and dressed for dinner, he opened the journal to his bookmark.
Fair
Having cured a sty on the eye of my own milch cow, the word has spread like brush fire-for everything from cow beetle to the infected teat, they are at me for treatment. No bastes, I tell them, no bastes! Old Rose McFee is determined I should deliver her calf.
Fair days-the men working at a pace-we shall take occupancy of Catharmore by early August or I’m damned.
I mark here Keegan’s report-that Balfour has twice made foul comments to the men about Aoife.
‘You’re all dressed.’ She limped from the bathroom on her crutch, steaming like a clam in the Darling Robe.
‘Why don’t you go visit in the library? Just come back in a half hour or so and give me a hand down the stairs.’ She leaned to him and fussed with the silk handkerchief in his jacket pocket, and he stood for any further improvements.
‘You’re looking very sexy,’ she said.
Until she came into his life, such a thing as looking sexy had never occurred to him-the notion would have seemed absurd.
There he’d been, tied up at the dock for better than sixty years, the waves occasionally swamping his boat, but safe at harbor, nonetheless. Then she’d moved next door and in no time at all he was unmoored completely. He was terrified of being dashed on the rocks, or adrift on the deep with no way to read the stars of his frightening passion-he was the old man ’way out at sea, in the thrall of a woman who found him romantic and clever. St. Matthew had asked, Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature? Ha. He had grown ten feet tall in the first months of his fumbling courtship.
‘I mean it,’ she said, kissing him for a fare-thee-well. She drew away and laughed. ‘You’re blushing.’
‘Tight collar.’
‘I haven’t wanted to say anything, but you’re a little out of control with your diet.’
‘I’ll watch it.’ He hated watching it, but she was right.
‘Thirty minutes, then? Don’t forget me.’
‘No chance.’
Pud accompanied him downstairs, shoe in mouth. On the landing, he peered out to the garden-the rain had ended, thanks be to God.
In the library, Pete O’Malley, looking sour and wearing a tie patterned with fishing lures.
‘How did it go today at the river?’
‘Was supposed to fair off by noon,’ said Pete, ‘but not a stir.’
He sat in a wing chair. ‘Where did the poker club do their damage?’
‘Lough Key. Hardly any rain at Key. Caught enough fish to sink a freighter-they could go commercial.’
‘They’re that good?’
‘Maniacs, those women. Cast a line, hook a trout, cast a line, hook a salmon…’ Pete swirled his drink, drained the glass. ‘I’m havin’ th’ Irish T-bone this evenin’. Medium rare.’
‘Come on. It’s the poker club’s night to shine.’
Pete looked repentent. ‘You’re right. I’ll have th’ T-bone tomorrow evenin’.’
‘That’s the spirit.’
Pud sat at his feet, unblinking. ‘Give it up, buddy. I’ll catch you tomorrow.’ Seducing aromas from the kitchen. Gray flakes of burned turf rising in the draft.
‘Maybe I should get a dog,’ said Pete.
‘You can tell dogs anything, and they’ll still love you.’
‘If I told a dog everything, that dog would be gone in a heartbeat. Guess it’s different with clergy, not much to tell.’
He laughed. ‘Guess you don’t know much about clergy.’
Pete adjusted his tie, eyed the stair hall. ‘We’re out of here Friday before sunup.’
‘Sorry to hear it.’
‘A pretty good life at ol’ Broughadoon. Like Ireland used to be. Anyway, I’ll be goin’ home to a Manx cat my wife left when she moved out, an’ a parrot named Roscoe that sings Beatles tunes.’
‘You’re kidding.’
‘Serious as a heart attack. Ol’ Roscoe lives at the office; my secretary treats him like Michael Collins resurrected. He’s been on th’ telly three times.’
‘What’s his specialty?’
‘Yellow Submarine. Want to see his picture?’
Pete pulled a cell phone from his jacket pocket, glowered at it, fiddled with it, handed it over. ‘Roscoe.’
A photo of a parrot looking grouchy. ‘Amazing, ’ he said. ‘No grandkids?’
‘It’s hard to get grandkids these days, have you noticed? My daughter has a pig that sleeps on her bed, my son has a wire-haired terrier-that’s all she wrote in that department.’
‘What do you do in Dublin?’
‘Insurance. Family company founded by my great-granddad in nineteen aught nine.’
‘Aught. Haven’t heard that in a while.’
‘I’ve been seein’ a lot of it on my bottom line. Too much stress in th’ business today-I remember what my dad used to say, he owned a cattle operation on the side-stress toughens th’ meat and sours th’ milk.’
‘I’ll buy that.’
Pete looked at him intently. ‘You’re a lucky man.’
‘Can’t say I believe in luck, but why do you think so?’
‘Your wife, she’s a great lady.’
‘She is. Thanks. Puts up with me.’
‘That’s bloody hard to find-somebody to put up with you-in spite of your mess.’
‘Putting up with somebody’s mess works both ways.’
‘I couldn’t put up with my wife’s mess-I don’t blame her for walkin’ out.’
A burst of laughter from the dining room; they were finishing the table setups. Something electric was in the air-something to do with Anna’s surprise, no doubt.
‘I have bad luck with women. But, hey, if I didn’t have bad luck, I wouldn’t have any luck at all.’ Pete manufactured a laugh.
He knew the feeling. Balding, overweight, and stuck in a remote parish at the age of forty, he had resigned himself to the fact that it was all over for him in the marriage department. What he couldn’t know was that twenty years later, a children’s book author with great legs would move next door.
‘You know what it’ll take to save my marriage? ’ asked Pete.
‘What’s that?’
‘A bloody miracle.’
They heard the poker club coming along the stair hall. He saw the hopeful look on Pete’s face, saw him close it down and try the sour look again.
‘Refill,’ said Pete, getting up and heading to the honesty bar.
In the dining room, newly starched linens; candles and garden roses on tables and sideboard; doors open to the summer evening. A pretty good life at ol’ Broughadoon-definitely.
Though the anglers were full of praise for the club’s fishing skills, they were quick to point out that ghillies and decent weather must nonetheless be given their due.
‘Whatever,’ said Debbie. ‘Slainte!’
Glasses lifted all around. ‘Slainte!’
He gazed with his wife at the lough, silvered in the gathering dusk. ‘Maureen calls this the moth hour,’ she said, half dreaming. ‘The moth hour…’
‘I’ve been thinking,’ he said. ‘I haven’t committed anything to memory in quite a while. You’ve inspired me; I’d like to memorize a poem. Maybe Patrick Kav’na. It would be a souvenir we don’t have to pack, and would last us as long as our wits hold out.’
‘Which we pray will be a very long time,’ she said.
Decked in his butler’s garb, Seamus on his night off from Catharmore was standing in for Bella on her own night off.
‘Fresh peach tart this evening, in a rosemary cornmeal crust…’
Seamus paused for effect.
‘… or Blackberry Semifreddo-ripe blackberries blended with fresh mint, verbena, homemade ricotta, and local sweet cream, frozen in a nest of dark chocolate.’
‘Now, that’s poetry,’ he told his wife.
He remembered being seven years old and working along the creek with Peggy in the blazing Mississippi sun. The handles on their tin buckets creaked; heat shimmered off the water.
Pick a berry, slap a chigger, pick a berry…
‘We gon’ be eat up,’ said Peggy.
‘I’m done eat up.’
‘I’m already eat-en up,’ she corrected in the voice that never sounded like Peggy. When he was old enough to know better, he realized she never corrected herself, not one time, it was always him she was after with the English lesson.
‘You gon’ beat me, you keep pickin’ so fast,’ she said.
‘I ain’t gon’ beat you, ’cause I be eatin’ all I pick after I get to right here.’ He tapped the bucket three-fourths of the way to the top.
‘Peoples say don’ eat while you pickin’. If you does, when you eats yo’ cobbler this evenin’, it won’t taste half as good.’
‘How come?’
‘’cause you done spoiled th’ taste in yo’ mouf out here on th’ creek.’
He looked up and rolled his eyeballs as far back in his head as they would go. That’s what he thought about that dumb notion.
Peggy laughed pretty hard; he liked to make Peggy laugh. ‘You know what you is,’ she said.
He did know. He was th’ aggravatin’est little weasel she ever seen…
‘The peach tart,’ said Cynthia.
‘The thing with blackberries,’ he told Seamus.
‘’t is a grand evening you’ll be havin’ in th’ library with your coffee.’
Cynthia adjusted her glasses and peered at their server. ‘You’re looking quite distinguished, I must say.’
‘’t is th’ candlelight-it softens th’ shine on my butler’s oul’ duds. We’ll bury you in it, Seamus, says Mrs. Conor. Aye, says I, for you’ll outlive me and all th’ rest.’
‘What would you know about the Mass rock?’ he asked. ‘Where is it located? O’Donnell speaks of it in the journal.’
‘You’ll have to ask Anna or Liam. I saw it years ago, but can’t remember whether it’s right or left of th’ lake path.’
When Seamus walked away he saw it coming.
‘Cream. Cheese. Chocolate,’ said his wife, reciting a litany of his offenses.
‘Righto. And mint, verbena, and fresh berries. Six of one, half dozen of the other.’
She raised an eyebrow.
‘Now, Kav’na. Look at all the fish I’m having. Very good for the diabetic. And all the fresh vegetables. Locally grown,’ he said, losing the battle.
The anglers’ table was engrossed in recitation of one sort or another.
Tom raised his glass to the room. ‘May the most we wish for be the least we get.’
‘Hear, hear! Slainte!’
‘Oh, give me grace to catch a fish,’ said Pete, ‘so big that even I, when talkin’ of it afterwards, may have no need to lie.’
‘Slainte!’
‘Slainte here, slainte there,’ said his wife, definitely in the spirit of things.
‘To look for a moment on th’ serious side…’ said Debbie.
‘As if there isn’t enough of that in the world,’ said Hugh.
‘… I have a question-what is work? I mean in th’ true philosophical sense.’
‘The true philosophical sense.’ Hugh looked blank. ‘Beats me. I haven’t hit a lick at a snake in three, maybe four weeks.’
He pitched in his two cents’ worth. ‘According to your man Oscar Wilde, work is the curse of the drinking classes.’
‘The answer is simple,’ said Moira. ‘Work is for people who don’t know how to fish.’
Laughter all around.
Pete raised his glass. ‘No offense to you, Tim. In your callin’, you’re fishin’ twenty-four/seven.’
‘Righto,’ said Hugh. ‘You’re off th’ hook in a manner of speaking.’
‘I’ve got a great idea,’ said Pete. ‘How about we all get together again next year, same time, same station? I’ll bring Roscoe.’
The door from the kitchen swung open-Maureen and Anna, flushed from the heat of the Aga, entered with William, who brought up the rear.
‘Hullo, everyone,’ said Anna. ‘We’re just going in to arrange the chairs. Enjoy your dessert, and please come along when you hear the bell.’
‘Need any help with th’ liftin’?’ asked Pete.
‘We’ve three strong backs for ’t,’ said William. ‘’t is your job to lift th’ fork.’
‘Th’ bane of my days,’ he heard Anna say as the trio walked up the hall. ‘I can do nothing with it this evening, nothing at all.’
And there was William saying, ‘’t is beautiful hair ye got from y’r own mother, Anna Conor. Stop aitin’ y’r face about it.’
At the sound of the bell, they left their tables and trooped to the library, happy to see the small fire poked up and lamps gleaming against the dusk.