Polly's Angel (9 page)

The two children were in the cramped little spare room, getting ready for bed. Polly, already clean and nightgowned, was watching Ivan as he dabbed at his face with a wet flannel and then hastily rubbed himself dry on the towel which hung beside the washstand. When she saw that he had finished with the water she turned towards the tiny dressing table with its small square of mirror on top and picked up her hairbrush.

‘Mebbe he doesn't fancy the t'ought of bein' alone wit' Monica again, when he's had us for her to grumble at,' Ivan said with surprising shrewdness. ‘When we're here, she can nag about us. What's she got to nag about when we ain't here but him, eh?'

‘They're married, so it's different,' Polly pointed out. She began to brush the tangles out of her curls, wincing and squeaking whenever the brush got stuck, which happened frequently. ‘Mart's her husband, so he is, and husbands have to get used to bein' nagged at.'

‘Don't call him Mart, he's got a decent Christian name and I like to hear all of it, please,' Ivan squeaked, in a very fair imitation of his sister-in-law's mincing vowels. ‘Oh, jeez, Polly, I don't care what Martin wants, I want get to our new house this very minute if it means that Monica will keep whinin' at us.'

‘And I've not heard a word from Tad, would you believe?' Polly said, as though her small brother had not spoken. She had got rid of most of the tangles in her hair and now began to brush steadily, counting beneath her breath as she did so. ‘Forty-five, forty-six, forty-seven . . . and I telled him special to write back at once. Forty-nine, fifty . . .'

‘He'll write,' Ivan said comfortably. ‘Sure and doesn't he always, in the end?'

‘Ye-es, he does,' Polly admitted. ‘Ouch! Fifty-three, fifty-four . . . I 'spect he's busy, wit' Christmas comin' up, and them wit'out their daddy to help save up for presents an' that.'

‘Their daddy spended all the money, I've heared you say so,' Ivan reminded her briskly. He sat on the bed to remove his last garments – his socks – and then struggled into his striped nightshirt. ‘The fellers at the school in the village didn't wear nightshirts, they went to bed in their kecks,' he informed his sister succinctly. ‘Wish Mammy would let me do that.'

‘They never does!' Polly said, shocked. ‘That ain't decent, Ivan.'

‘Well, mebbe not, but it's warmer, an' they can dress quick as quick in the mornin's, because they're already in their school t'ings,' Ivan pointed out. He yawned, stretched, then snuggled down. ‘Come on, Poll, it ain't fair if I warms the bed an' then you colds it again, comin' into my lovely warm part wit' your cold old feet.'

‘Ninety-eight, ninety-nine, a
hundred
,' Polly shouted triumphantly. She threw the brush down on the dressing table and leapt the short distance on to the bed, heaving the covers off Ivan and then disappearing beneath them like a rabbit into its burrow. ‘Well, if Mammy knew what those boys at our old school had telled you, she'd have took us away from the crossin' cottage anyway,' she said in a voice muffled by blankets. ‘I hope the new school's nicer than that.'

‘Oh, it'll be grand,' Ivan said. ‘Tell you what, Poll, I bet your letter comes tomorrer. I bet you a penny!'

‘Haven't got one,' came the muffled reply. ‘I'll bet you a ha'penny, though. Mammy gave me a ha'penny to spend for doin' a message for her. She said I could buy sweeties, only I'm savin' it for Christmas instead.'

Ivan began to speak, then his voice unaccountably stopped. And presently, Polly poked her head out of the covers to look at her small brother. As she had guessed, he was sound asleep, his lashes lying on his cheeks, his pink mouth a little open and tiny snores escaping from him now and then.

Lucky chiseller, to be able to sleep like that, between one word an' the next, Polly thought . . . and was asleep herself before Deirdre came stealing in to turn out the light.

If Ivan had remembered the bet next morning he would have been a ha'penny the richer, but as so often happened he had no recollection of what he had been saying just before he slept, so Polly, who wanted all the ha'pennies she could get to buy her daddy a Christmas present, kept her mouth shut on the subject.

‘Me letter's arrived,' she said triumphantly, however, thinking that it was only fair to give Ivan a chance to get his money, but Ivan, up to his eyebrows in porridge and making a pathway across it which he promptly filled with buttermilk, merely grunted. Deirdre, who had put the letter down by Polly's plate, was more interested.

‘You can read it when you've et your breakfast,' she said, eating her own porridge neatly, and not playing swamps and dinosaurs, as the children did. ‘And come to t'ink, 'tis a lucky t'ing indeed that the letter's come today because we're movin' tomorrer.'

Polly started to speak with her mouth full, spluttered, and Ivan ducked as porridge flew everywhere. Fortunately Martin and Monica had departed for their respective places of work some time before so Deirdre, clucking, went and got a cloth from the sink to clean up the mess whilst Polly and Ivan clutched each other and jigged around the table, their breakfast forgotten.

‘Tomorrer! We're movin' out of here tomorrer!' Polly squeaked, picking up the envelope with Tad's writing – and a good deal of porridge – on it and waving it in the air. ‘Aren't I just so glad, Ivan! Oh, a house of our own again, an' me darlin' Delilah an' me dearest Lionel back in me arms where they belong! An' school, instead of bein' stuck here all day tryin' to be tidy an' not make a mess or a muddle!'

‘I didn't mind missin' school that much,' Ivan observed, taking his place at the table once more and beginning to spoon porridge furiously. ‘But it'll be good to have Bev back, I agree wit' you there.'

‘Oh, Bev's nice, but he's not like dear Delly. And now I'm goin' to read me letter,' Polly announced, putting a finger under the flap. ‘You said I could, didn't you, Mammy?'

‘I said after breakfast, so have you finished? Then you can wash the dishes, Polly, and Ivan can wipe them. And then you can read your letter, alanna, but not before.'

Polly heaved a huge, exaggerated sigh but obediently began to carry the dishes over to the sink. And presently Deirdre went up to tidy the bedroom and get their outdoor things and Polly and Ivan began to play a vigorous game in which the porridge spoons waged war on the delft, and a good deal of water got scattered on the floor and splashes appeared on Ivan's flannel shirt and on Polly's grey skirt.

But the game was over and all the washing-up done and put away by the time Deirdre came downstairs. She flicked a quick glance over the room, tightened her lips a little over the splashes, and then held out their coats. ‘Play out for an hour whilst I do the floor in here, kids,' she said briskly. ‘'Tis chilly out, so keep movin' . . . Oh, if you want to read your letter first, alanna, take it through to the parlour. Monica won't mind you readin' it in there – well, she won't know. Off wit' you now.'

Almost reluctantly, Polly trailed through into the parlour where she sat in the window, slit open the envelope, pulled out the single sheet of paper it contained, and began to read.

Deirdre had washed the kitchen floor when Polly reentered the room and was just polishing the taps over the sink with a wash-leather. She looked round and smiled as Polly tiptoed across the wet linoleum. She thought her daughter looked rather pink and wondered what Tad had said to upset her; clearly there was something wrong. ‘Well, alanna,' she said carefully, ‘what's Tad got to say, then? Any interestin' news?'

‘He's got a new pal called Angie. She's got yellow hair – he doesn't say that, but that's what he means – and all he talks about is her,' Polly said in an injured tone. ‘Mammy, Tad's
my
pal, what does he want this Angie girl for?'

‘I guess he misses you, and is lonely for company,' Deirdre said gently. ‘You had plenty of pals when you lived in the crossin' cottage, and you'll have friends again once you're in school and we're in our own house. You mustn't grudge poor Tad wantin' a pal too.'

‘Ye-es, but when I write letters to Tad I don't go on about me other pals,' Polly said, pouting. ‘Honest to God, Mammy, you'd t'ink there never was a girl born like this Angela! She's come from Limerick because her daddy's got a job on Grafton Street and would you believe, the spalpeen lives in our old house in Swift's Alley, in the very rooms we had, Mammy, when we lived in Dublin!'

Deirdre turned away to hide a smile, then turned back to take both Polly's small hands in hers. ‘Me darlin' child, what could be more natural than that Tad would make a pal of a child who lived where his best friend ever had lived?' she asked. ‘I expect this Angie was lonely too, if she'd not lived in Dublin long, and was glad of Tad's company. Why, I daresay she's like yourself, and not even in school yet.'

‘She's in school all right,' Polly said broodingly. ‘She's at the convent, like I was . . . I guess she's probably Sister Andorra's favourite too, the same as me. Only – only she isn't me, Mammy, and – and I don't want Tad lovin' anyone else!'

‘I don't suppose he loves her like he loves you,' Deirdre said rather helplessly. What could she say to comfort her little girl, who was taking her pal's defection so very hard? ‘But she's a new friend, and he t'ought you'd be interested . . .'

‘Huh!' Polly said crisply, but with a curling lip. ‘He goes on about her yellow hair, an' her big blue eyes, an' her pretty dress . . . Mammy, he says when he first saw her he t'ought she was me guardian angel!'

The last words came out as a wail and Deirdre hid her involuntary smile by taking Polly into her arms and hugging her. ‘Alanna, you're jealous! You should know better – you know what Tad's like wit' the letter-writin', he simply can't t'ink what else to say once he's said
Dear Polly, how are you, I am doing awright but missing you
,' she reminded her daughter. ‘He's talkin' about this Angie for something new to say, not because he's t'inkin' much about her.'

For answer Polly wriggled out of her arms and thrust the letter into her hand. ‘Read it,' she demanded. ‘Just you read that letter, Mammy, an' then you can see if the eejit's in love wit' Angie Machin or not! And I'm goin' out to play wit' Ivan, an'
Mr Donoghue
can whistle for a letter from me, I'm tellin' you!'

And with that Polly grabbed up her navy coat and her pixie hood and slammed out of the house and could be seen running down the pavement and struggling into coat and hat as she went.

Deirdre sat down at the table and began to read the ill-spelt and extremely ill-written letter.

After she had read it through twice, Deirdre leaned her elbows on the table and seriously considered the letter. Tad was clearly smitten with this Angie, and Polly was obviously both upset and furious because of it. Deirdre admired many things about Tad and liked the boy too, but she had never taken the friendship as seriously as her daughter had. Polly was still a child so time, and distance, she had always believed, would mean that in a few more years the two would think of each other as old playmates rather than as the future bride and groom. But then she had never believed that Polly and Tad would continue to correspond for two and a half years, so perhaps the sudden advent of Angela Machin – he spelt that right as well, she thought inconsequentially – might be a very good thing, even if Polly found her old pal's sudden defection painful at first.

Having made up her mind on that point, Deirdre folded the page, put it back into the envelope, and got her own coat off the back of the kitchen door. She got her big marketing basket and her handbag and her hat, for it was still very cold out, and set off down the short garden path. Once in Nelson Street, she could see Polly and Ivan playing Piggy beds with a round tin filled with garden earth as the Piggy, the beds marked out in chalk on the paving stones. Even from a distance, Deirdre could see the dogged, mulish way that Polly kicked the Piggy along; she was still cross, then.

But when she reached them, Polly took her hand and gave a couple of skips before announcing: ‘Well, I've made up me mind, Mammy!
I'm
goin' to have a pal of me own just as soon as I get to school – not a girl-pal, Mammy, but a boy-pal, because there's boys go to St Sylvester's school as well, in the boys' half – and I'm goin' to write to Tad an' tell him he needn't write back no more if he don't want to, because we'll mebbe never meet each other again in this life, so what's the point?'