Breakfast at Darcy's (2 page)

‘I’m not too sure … ’ I hesitate; this guy seems a bit odd.

‘It’s just,’ he looks about him again, gesturing for me to do the same. And indeed, although the others in the room are trying
to look like they’re sipping at their tea and deeply in conversation with their partners, pairs of eyes are swiftly darting
in our direction, then just as swiftly darting away again. Ears are definitely being tilted towards us and hearing aids adjusted,
as Niall and I stand awkwardly together on the other side of Molly’s kitchen. ‘What I have to tell you is of a somewhat delicate
nature. I really don’t think it needs broadcasting around the room and across the whole of the village in ten minutes flat.’

‘Perhaps we could go somewhere a bit quieter, then.’ I glance around me. ‘How about we step outside?’ I suggest seeing my
aunt’s garden through the kitchen window. ‘I doubt there’s anyone out there today, it’s too cold.’

I slip on my charcoal-grey military coat, which I’m secretly quite pleased to be wearing again. I’ve only recently acquired
this Vivienne Westwood gem online – a steal at seventy-five per cent off. I’d hummed and ha’ed at the time whether to buy
it, but on this freezing-cold January day it’s been well worth its price tag.

We escape out into the back garden one at a time, so as not to arouse any more suspicion. There is a definite chill to the
air as I step outside, and a strong wind immediately begins to gust around me, lifting my long hair up from my shoulders and
twisting it in knots around my face.

Damn wind
. Of all weathers, I hate it with a passion. It always attacks me, usually when I’ve just done my hair – in my case, this
means my long blonde hair, smoothed and
straightened to within an inch of its life. Then, just as I step outside, a strong wind will be lying in wait for me in the
sky above, like one of those cartoons of weather you see in children’s books. It grins down wickedly at me before beginning
its assault on my newly created coiffure. At least with rain you can try to put up some sort of fight with an umbrella. But
wind prevents even the use of that form of protection, so making it much the more powerful of the two evils.

The great outdoors and I aren’t generally the best of friends, in January, full stop. But after the stuffiness of the overflowing
house, even I’m glad to feel the cold, fresh air encircling my face and filling my lungs as I begin to talk to Niall.

‘So what’s the big secret, then?’ I ask politely, as I try and tuck my hair under the collar of my coat. This is all very
clandestine, meeting like this in Molly’s garden. It’s a shame Niall isn’t better looking, then this furtive outdoor meeting
with a stranger might be quite exciting.

I check myself. I must get out of this habit I’ve got into since I started working on
Goddess
magazine, of immediately judging everyone on their appearance. I know that’s what everyone does – forms their opinion of
someone in the first so many seconds of meeting them. But working in the beauty industry as I do, where your appearance counts
for everything, it makes this habit so much worse.

Besides, it isn’t Niall’s fault he’s, well, how can I put it kindly … let’s just say he’s no oil painting. The suit he’s wearing
consists of a plain grey single-breasted jacket and trousers, and he’s teamed it with a white shirt and a plain burgundy tie
– hardly the most exciting of combinations. He’s about five foot
seven tall, slight of frame – OK, he’s skinny. He wears plain-rimmed silver spectacles. And he has wavy, mousy-coloured hair
cut into a neat a short back and sides – all very appropriate for a young up-and-coming Dublin solicitor. He isn’t really
ugly, I decide upon further inspection, but then he isn’t really attractive – he’s just … plain-looking.

‘No big secret, Miss McCall,’ Niall says, interrupting my thoughts. ‘I just need to arrange a meeting with you, that’s all.’

‘Why?’

‘To go through your aunt’s will.’

At the moment, I’m slightly distracted trying to prevent my Louboutin heels from sinking into the soft muddy grass. Just because
I bought them brand new off eBay from a woman who was selling them to pay for her daughter’s wedding, doesn’t mean I want
to dig the garden with them. ‘Molly left a will?’

‘Yes, and a very thorough one, if I may say so. She knew exactly what she wanted to happen with her estate when she passed
on.’

‘Her estate?’ My ears prick up: solicitors only usually use the word ‘estate’ if there’s a fair bit of money involved. ‘So
she had some money tucked away under her mattress, did she, my Aunt Molly?’ I joke, smiling at Niall.

‘Please, Miss McCall,’ he says, looking at me sombrely over his spectacles. ‘The reading of a deceased’s will is never a matter
to be taken lightly.’

‘No, of course not, Mr Kearney, I … I mean, Niall.’ I attempt to look serious and businesslike. ‘So when is the reading?’

‘That depends on you, Miss McCall.’ Niall scouts around
him in that same stealthy manner he had earlier, back in the house. Then, as he tilts his head towards me, his pale blue eyes
dart around him one more time. ‘Because,’ he says in a tone so hushed I have to strain to hear him properly, ‘I’m pleased
to inform you, Miss Darcy McCall, that
you
are the sole beneficiary of Miss Emmeline Ava Aisling McCall’s entire estate.’

‘I’m
what
?’ I exclaim so loudly that a robin perching on a nearby holly bush in search of winter sustenance is forced to take shelter
on some guttering. It eyes us carefully, trying to decide whether the two interlopers to its garden are a threat to its winter
foraging.

Niall waves his hands at me in a shushing fashion. ‘Miss McCall,’ he hisses. ‘Please, we don’t want to draw attention to ourselves.’

‘Why?’ I demand, trying to push my hair – which has escaped from my collar and is still billowing around my head again – back
off my face. ‘What’s the problem?’

Frantically Niall looks about him again to check no one else has appeared in the garden with us. But only the robin watches
from his perch on the rooftop, his head cocked to one side in amusement.

‘Because I don’t want any of the others in there’ – he nods in the direction of the house – ‘hearing what we’re talking
about out here. There’s a few people in your aunt’s house that might have expected to have been included in her will, and
they might not be too happy when they find out they’re not.’

‘Oh,’ I say, turning my gaze away from the house and back to Niall again. ‘
Now
I get it.’

‘
Good
,’ Niall pushes his glasses back up his nose. ‘I’m glad we’ve got that established at last. So now you understand what’s going
on, when can we meet to go through all the formalities?’

‘Formalities?’

‘The reading of the will.’

‘Right, of course. Well, when would you like to?’

‘How about tomorrow at my office?’

‘But I fly home tomorrow – to the UK.’

‘I see … What time?’

‘My flight is at eight-thirty in the morning.’

Niall pulls a face. ‘Ah. That makes it somewhat tricky, then.’

‘Can’t you just tell me now?’ I suggest, thinking maybe he could then simply pop a cheque in the post to me, or something.
After all, if I was the only beneficiary – which I still find difficult to believe – it’s not exactly going to be complicated,
is it?

‘Miss McCall, the reading of a deceased’s last will and testament is a matter that has to be dealt with in the proper manner,
with the proper procedures. We simply can’t perform a significant and meaningful act such as this between the two of us in
the deceased’s back garden!’

I manage to keep a straight face as Niall recites all this to me. He doesn’t appear to see the funny side of what he’s just
said at all – his face remains serious and solemn throughout. But as the corners of my mouth twitch a little, he realises
that the words he has chosen to demonstrate his point could be
misconstrued, and his cheeks begin to flush a shade to rival that of our friendly onlooking robin’s breast.

‘I … I’m so sorry, Miss McCall,’ he stutters. ‘I didn’t mean … Of course it would never cross my mind … and at a funeral!
Not that you’re not a very attractive woman … Oh goodness.’

‘Niall,’ I say calmly, resting my hand gently on his arm. ‘Please, its fine, honestly. I understood what you meant. Look,
can I make a suggestion that may solve our problem?’

Niall nods hurriedly as his colour dulls to a salmon pink.

‘It may not be the usual,
correct
place where
proper
procedures like this normally happen, but I believe it’s where lots of procedures and decisions get made in Ireland. So how
about we meet down at the local pub, later on?’

Niall looks unsure.

‘I don’t see that we’ve got a lot of choice,’ I say, having to let go of Niall so I can gather my hair back in my hands, the
wind has got so strong. ‘The wake will probably continue now until teatime-ish, and then I leave first thing tomorrow. Or
you could always come to my hotel?’ I raise my eyebrows, and he blushes again. ‘But I don’t know what the local gossips would
say about that.’

‘No,’ Niall replies in a voice which, up until a few minutes ago, he’s been trying to lace with an air of authority, but is
now reduced to a mere squeak. ‘No, Mulligan’s down the road here will be just fine, Miss McCall. Say I meet you there about
sevenish?’

I nod. ‘Seven’s fine, Niall. Can I ask you to do one more thing for me, though?’

‘Yes, Miss McCall,’ he replies, looking apprehensive again.

‘Can you just call me, Darcy, please?’

Mulligan’s pub has comfortable fixtures and fittings, serves good, wholesome Irish food and, among many other alcoholic beverages,
the all-important pint of Guinness to its large and ever-changing clientele. It’s a traditional Irish pub; but not in the
way many an Irish-themed bar would try to have you believe, with shamrocks festooned every which way you turn, and tricolour
flags hanging from the optics. Neither is it the opposite: so traditional that there are wood shavings on the floor, and old
men propping up the bar like a couple of the pubs I remember my aunt slipping me into as a child, when she wanted to indulge
herself in a couple of bottles of beer on a Friday night. I don’t remember minding too much, though; I’d be treated to a glass
bottle of Coca-Cola complete with straw, and a packet of salt and vinegar Tayto crisps – both of which would keep me amused
for a good while in those days. I smile now at that memory, and the feeling of doing something naughty, hiding out in that
pub, knowing full well that if my
mother had had any notion of where my aunt was taking me, my regular holidays in Ireland would have been quickly curtailed.

I’m pleased I’m allowing some childhood memories to filter back into my brain; too many of them are filed away in my inner
box marked ‘Do not disturb’. My parents divorced when I was seven, and most of my early memories consist of listening to shouting
matches from my bedroom upstairs, or doors banging when my father would storm out of the house after an argument. The worst
one was when the door banged and he never came back. My mother was never quite the same after that. I do remember some things
about my time with Aunt Molly, though; those were happier times. I really must start working on that internal filter, so that
my memories of Molly don’t get padlocked away with all the other stuff. Aunt Molly was one of the good things about my childhood,
and sitting in that church today listening to the priest talk about her life, it’s hit me now, when it’s too late to do anything
about it, that I’ve allowed her to get locked inside that box, when where she should have been was close by my side.

I take a swift gulp from my glass and find I’m having to swallow down more than just the rich black liquid of a mouthful of
Guinness. Taking another gulp, I place the glass on the mat and take a few deep breaths.

No, a pub is not the place for tears
, I tell myself sternly.
If you were going to cry, why didn’t you do it in the church?

I’d wanted to cry in the church, really. As I sat at the back of the church and watched the hunched shoulders in front of
me sobbing and dabbing at their eyes, I felt the deepest sorrow. Sorrow at the loss of my aunt’s life, sorrow for the grief
of the
people sitting around me and sorrow that I hadn’t made more effort to keep in touch with this woman who had meant so much
to me when I was a child. But for some reason, the tears just didn’t appear.

But now as I’m sitting in a pub of all places, I can feel tears desperately wanting to fall from my eyes. And as hard as I
try not to let them, I can also hear my mother’s shrill voice ringing in my ears: ‘We do not show our emotions in a public
place, Darcy.’ I really don’t want to be seen sitting in the corner of the local bar sobbing and looking like the village
drunk, so I cast my eyes around the room in an attempt to distract my emotions and am relieved to see Niall appearing through
Mulligan’s big wooden door. He stands just inside the doorway and looks nervously around the room.

‘Niall, over here,’ I wave, beckoning him towards my table by the fire.

As he hurriedly makes his way over to me, I notice he hasn’t changed out of his formal funeral attire, as I have. I’m now
wearing a pair of gorgeous faded black Diesel jeans, a baby-pink French Connection soft wool jumper and a pair of black leather
Jimmy Choo boots, with heels so high you need to take flying lessons to wear them (thank heaven for sales and credit cards!).
Shame – I was quite looking forward to seeing what he’d choose as a casual option. But I also notice he’s now carrying a large
leather briefcase to complete his solicitor look, which is suddenly a much more interesting prospect.

‘Miss McCall,’ he inclines his head towards me.

I raise my eyebrows.

‘Oh, my apologies – Darcy, I completely forgot.’

‘Much better.’ Smiling, I gesture for him to take a seat at my table. ‘Can I get you a drink before we begin, Niall?’