Daughters of Castle Deverill (43 page)

Bertie put the money on the counter and turned to face the man the Royal Irish Constabulary had wanted in connection with the fire but had later set free. If Bertie felt any animosity towards
Michael Doyle he was too polite to show it. ‘Good morning, Mr Doyle,’ he said evenly.

Michael’s eyes fell upon the child and his face softened. ‘Good morning, Lord Deverill.’ He took off his cap, freeing a halo of wild black curls. ‘And this would be young
Master Jack Deverill?’ he said with a smile.

JP nodded. ‘I’m JP,’ he said politely. ‘How do you do?’

Michael hadn’t properly laid eyes on the child since he had carried him down on the train from Dublin. He had been a small baby then. Now he was a handsome boy with a twinkle in his eye.
But in spite of his red hair he was a Doyle.
That
was certain. Michael could see it in the strength of his jaw and in the light sprinkling of freckles that covered his nose. He saw Bridie
in his wide forehead and in the sweetness of his curved upper lip, but he recognized himself in the directness of the boy’s gaze. For sure, JP was a bold, fearless child, just as
he
had been. He felt a surge of pride.

Bertie thanked Mr O’Casey and lifted the paper bag of supplies from the counter. ‘Come on, JP,’ he said. ‘You and I have work to do.’ He nodded at Michael and
Michael took off his cap again as Lord Deverill opened the door then followed his son into the street. The little bell tinkled once more and the door shut behind them. Michael watched the boy climb
into the car. He had already forgotten Michael and was chatting happily to his father. A moment later the car motored off and Michael was left with a strange sense of loss. JP was his nephew, but
the boy would never know it.

Michael bought the items he had come for then left for home in the car they had bought with Bridie’s money. He wondered whether Grace would be sitting in his kitchen, praying with his
mother and grandmother. He was quite used to her now. She had come enough times – and ignored him enough times – to convince him of her sincerity. At first he thought it a ruse to
entice him back into her bed, but as the months passed and she received regular instruction from Father Quinn, attending Mass in the Catholic Church in Cork, he realized that her conversion to
Catholicism had nothing to do with him. She genuinely wanted to find peace with herself and God. He understood that and respected her for it. Once they were together in sin; now they were together
in Christ. Yet he could not quite forget her voracious passion and her burning skin.

As he drove off into the hills he thought of Kitty Deverill. Until he had her forgiveness he’d never lie with anyone again.

Grace sat on the sofa in her sitting room while Father Quinn filled the armchair with his black robes, a glass of whiskey in his hand. Grace had stalked her prey like a patient
snake with a cunning rat. She had always known it would take time. Father Quinn wasn’t going to betray a secret so readily, but she knew him well enough to know that if it served his
interests he would betray his own mother. He had to be coaxed, lured and gently persuaded – he had to believe that he was doing God’s work. First and foremost he had to trust Grace.
After all, they had plotted and schemed during the War of Independence so Father Quinn knew better than most that Grace could keep a secret. And he was well aware that she and Michael had been firm
allies in the fight against the British in spite of the vast differences in their births. She was confident that she could use guile to wheedle out of Father Quinn the terrible crime Michael had
committed in his past of which he was so ashamed.

She pushed the whiskey bottle across the table. ‘Please, Father Quinn, you need fortification in your job,’ she said and she listened with half an ear as he railed against the young
people and their lack of commitment.

‘In our day we had a cause to fight. That united us and drove us,’ she said. ‘God knows, I wouldn’t want another war, but the struggle for freedom was a cause I believed
in with all my heart and I was willing to risk my life for it.’

‘You were a brave lady,’ Father Quinn said, refilling his glass.

‘But I did terrible things,’ she said, lowering her voice in confidence. ‘I’ll go to Hell for some of the things I did.’ She looked at him squarely.

‘
Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out
,’ Father Quinn quoted from the Bible.

‘I lured Colonel Manley into the farmhouse. If it hadn’t been for me, Jack O’Leary would never have plunged the knife into his heart. I am as guilty of murder as he is,’
she said in a soft voice and her eyes welled with tears. ‘Can God forgive me for that?’

‘If you truly repent, my dear Lady Rowan-Hampton, the Lord will forgive you and wipe clean the slate.’

‘I truly repent, Father, with all my heart. I regret the things I have done. The things Michael and I did.’ She pulled a white cotton handkerchief out of her sleeve and dabbed her
eyes. ‘How I admire him, Father. He was the worst kind of sinner – oh, the things he did in the name of freedom – and yet, he turned his life around and is as pious as any
priest.’
And as celibate
, she thought bitterly, but she kept that complaint to herself. ‘If I can be half as devout as he is I shall be happy, Father Quinn.’

‘Michael did indeed turn his life around. He gave up the drink, you see. It awakened the Devil in him and drove him to sin.’

‘He told me, Father Quinn, he told me about . . .’ She began to sob. ‘Oh, I can’t believe he could have . . .’ She hesitated, barely
daring to breathe, hoping he would finish the sentence for her.

‘But my dear Lady Rowan-Hampton, his sins are not your sins.’

She turned her face away sharply. ‘I know that, Father, but can God forgive such depravity?’

‘Indeed he can. If Michael truly repents then the Lord will indeed forgive him. Even for that.’

She gazed at him with wide, shiny eyes. ‘Even for that?’ she repeated, desperate to know what
that
was.

Father Quinn leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. He stared into his glass and shook his head. ‘God will forgive him, but he wants more than that. He will not rest until he
receives forgiveness from Kitty Deverill.’

Grace let out a controlled breath and nodded gravely. She did not show her surprise nor did she reveal her delight at having snared the rat and induced him to squeak. She kept her expression
steady and unchanging. ‘I pray that she will find it in her heart to forgive, Father.’

He looked at her and frowned. ‘If there is anything you can do, I would be very grateful.’

‘As you know Kitty is a dear friend,’ she said, slipping the handkerchief back up her sleeve. ‘She took me into her confidence many years ago. Leave it with me. Now I know that
Michael is ready to beg forgiveness I will see what I can do to help. I only want the best for both of them. I ask God to give me tact. It will not be an easy task.’

‘Indeed not,’ Father Quinn agreed. ‘But if anyone can do it, you can, Lady Rowan-Hampton. I have great faith in your abilities.’
So do I
, she thought smugly.

When Father Quinn left, weaving his way to his car, which was parked on the gravel outside the house, Grace withdrew to her bedroom. She closed the door and went and stood by the window. There,
in the privacy of her room, she let out a low moan and gave in to a sudden shudder that rippled across her entire body. So, Kitty Deverill was the reason Michael had rebuffed her. All these years
she had imagined countless different reasons, but she had never for a second imagined this. Of course she didn’t believe that Michael had violated her, which Father Quinn had implied. Kitty
must have seduced him, for certain, and wracked by guilt he had taken to drink. It was all Kitty’s fault. Michael was a wild and passionate man, Grace reasoned, but he wasn’t a
rapist.

It took her a while to quell the jealousy that rose in her like a tide of putrid water, stealing her breath. She had to use all her strength to control her movements because her instinct was to
pick something up and throw it against the wall. But Grace was a woman who had spent years practising the art of self-discipline. She focused on the garden and tried to push away the picture of
Michael thrusting into Kitty which clung to her mind as if her thoughts had got stuck on one image. At length she managed to internalize her fury by hatching a plot. There was nothing like a plan
to make one feel less impotent. If Grace could persuade Kitty to forgive Michael, he might return to her bed.

That evening Laurel returned from an afternoon hacking across the hills with Ethelred Hunt. Ever since he had suggested that she would cut a dash on a horse, she had flirted
with the idea of riding again. Indeed, she had been an accomplished horsewoman in her day, brave even, out hunting, and she wasn’t planning on doing anything reckless. Hazel had thought her
ridiculous; after all she was only a few years off eighty. But why should her life taper towards the end? she thought defiantly. Surely, she was as young as she felt. Ethelred Hunt certainly made
her feel like a girl again, and today, riding over the cliffs with the sea crashing against the rocks below and the seagulls circling above, she had relived a moment of her youth.

Laurel was passionately in love. There was no distinguishing it from the breathless, invigorating feelings of longing that she had experienced as a twenty-year-old. She might be an old lady now
but her heart was still tender, like a rosebud opening with the first gentle caress of spring. She didn’t believe herself foolish, after all, why should love be the privilege of the young? If
Adeline were alive she would say that it is just the physical body that grows old, the soul is eternal and therefore cannot age. Laurel might look like a grandmother, but when Ethelred Hunt had
gazed into her eyes and pressed his lips to hers he was seeing a woman.

She inhaled and closed her eyes, reliving for a wonderful moment the feeling of his mouth on hers. She could still smell the spicy scent of his skin and feel the soft hair of his beard on her
face. Oh, it had been like a dream, a beautiful dream. She would never forget it for as long as she lived. ‘We must keep this to ourselves,’ he had told her, unwinding his hand from
around her waist, or from where her waist had been when she was young. ‘Or we’ll upset Hazel. I think she’s sweet on me,’ he told her. Laurel had glowed with delight. After
years fighting her sister for attention from this irresistible silver wolf he had chosen
her.

‘Oh, I can keep a secret from Hazel,’ she had reassured him, and indeed she would.

She walked into the house, closing the door softly behind her. She hadn’t seen her sister since that morning, when they had both departed, Hazel to Bertie’s for a morning at the
bridge table and
she
to the hairdresser. The sound of the gramophone came wafting down the corridor from the sitting room. Laurel was surprised and wondered whether Hazel had company. It
wasn’t usual for her to play music just for herself. She found her sister standing by the window, gazing out onto the wintry garden where they put bird food for the hardy little robins. One
hand wound around the back of her neck, the other was on her hip and she was humming distractedly and swaying slightly, Laurel thought. ‘Hello, Hazel,’ said Laurel breezily, unpinning
her hat.

Hazel turned, startled. ‘Oh Laurel, you’re back.’

‘Yes I am. It was such fun to be out riding again. I feel rejuvenated.’ She looked at her sister and realized that
she
wasn’t the only one to feel rejuvenated.
Hazel’s cheeks were pink and her eyes sparkled.

‘At least you didn’t fall off,’ she said in a blasé tone, as if she wasn’t very interested one way or the other. Hazel didn’t ask her about Ethelred and
Laurel was relieved; she didn’t want to betray his kiss with a schoolgirl blush.

‘What have you been up to?’ She perched on the arm of the sofa and placed her hat on her knee.

‘This and that,’ Hazel replied vaguely. ‘Bridge was entertaining as usual. This afternoon, well . . .’ She sighed dismissively. ‘I haven’t done
anything this afternoon except watch the birds. Aren’t they perky?’

‘Who was at bridge?’

‘Just the usual crowd. Bertie and Kitty and I partnered Ethelred.’ She went and rang the bell for the maid. ‘Let’s have a cup of tea and finish off that porter
cake.’ She didn’t catch Laurel’s eye as she passed her. ‘Tell me, what is it like to be in the saddle again? Were you afraid?’

Laurel shrugged off her sister’s shifty behaviour and went to sit closer to the fire. ‘Not afraid, no,’ she said, smiling at the memory. ‘It was the most exciting thing
I’ve done in years.’ And for once neither tried to outdo the other with florid tales of Ethelred Hunt. In fact, his name was not mentioned again and the cordiality with which they had
always treated each other returned in eager chatter and cheerful laughter. But every now and then both women ran their fingers over their lips and smiled secretively into their hands.

As much as Celia tried to distract herself from the cold reality of her father’s death and the terrible debts Archie had left her with, she was unable to ignore the fact
that she had to find money somewhere, and soon. Her father was no longer around to help her and, if he had been, she now realized that he wouldn’t have had the resources. She put on smiles
for her children, for the friends who came calling and for the members of her family who were always popping in to check on her, but her anxiety lay in the pit of her stomach like cement. There
were moments when she stood at her bedroom window, gazing up at the stars and remembering the Deverill Castle Summer Balls of her childhood when she, Kitty and Bridie had watched the carriages
arriving, bearing Co. Cork’s finest, and wished that she could wake up as a little girl again, with no fears or worries. The skies had always been clear on those magical nights, darkening
gradually as twilight receded into night with the faint glimmer of the first star.

She dreaded having to sell the castle. This was her home now. She had placed her heart in the heart of Ballinakelly and there it would stay.