The Glass Lake (56 page)

T
HE
postcard from Kit of the Blarney Stone had been a breakthrough as far as Lena was concerned.

There was no reason for it. It wasn't thanking for anything…not in any real sense. And Kit had asked her to look after herself. The girl who had run from her in disgust all those months ago had softened enough to ask her to take care. It was a ray of hope. Lena kept these letters carefully in a drawer in Ivy's kitchen. Sometimes she took them out to read them again. The last one was definitely full of promise.

Lena waited until she left London to send Kit a card. She and Dawn went to talk to Sixth Formers in four different cities. It meant spending the night in Birmingham. Lena bought a postcard of the Bull Ring and addressed it.

I'm here spreading the good news of our agency to schoolgirls. Very exhausting but satisfying all the same. I think maybe I should have been a schoolteacher. All I know is that I was extremely foolish to have had no career for so long. Have you got a date for your exams? And I'd be so interested to know about your brother's too, of course
.

I hope you are well and happy.
Lena
.

She debated putting “love” but decided against it.

“Are you sending a card to Mr. Gray?” Dawn asked her.

“Hardly, Dawn. I'll be home to him tomorrow night.”

“He's so nice, Mr. Gray. Great fun and everything…he was the life and soul at the Dryden.”

“I forgot you knew him then.”

Lena had forgotten. Dawn had been with her so long in Millar's she had almost forgotten the tempestuous short-lived series of appointments they had found for her in offices and hotels, and where there was some incident of Dawn being highly fancied by the most unsuitable men in the company. As far as she knew that hadn't happened in the Dryden. James Williams was not the type.

“Did you like Mr. Williams?” she asked Dawn.

“I can't say I remember him, Mrs. Gray.” Dawn's big blue eyes were unaware of a lot of people who had passed through her life.

“Oh, well, it's a long time back now.”

“That's true.”

Dawn looked around the dining room in the hotel. They were the center of many appreciative glances, the blond girl and the dark, handsome woman. Nobody could quite place what they were doing there. They looked too respectable to approach and yet surely Dawn's eyes promised a lot of fun.

Lena smiled to herself to think how the great James Williams would feel to be so instantly forgotten by a pretty little secretary like Dawn Jones.

But then with the familiar turn of her heart she remembered that Dawn hadn't forgotten Louis Gray or what fun he had been. “The life and soul at the Dryden” was how she'd put it.

         

Back in the office she found herself looking speculatively at the blond girl she had thought was such an asset to Millar's Employment Agency. She had, of course, been quite right in insisting that a young attractive girl would sell the whole idea better than any other approach from a different generation. She must beat down this absurd and dangerous suspicion. She could not be jealous of every single woman who had ever worked with Louis.

Pausing to pick up some papers in an outer office, she heard Dawn talking to Jennifer, the receptionist on the desk.

“…honestly she was so nice, and she's done so much for me. Sometimes I feel guilty, dead guilty about her husband.”

Dawn noticed Jennifer staring horrified over her shoulder and she met Lena's smile. “Oh, Mrs. Gray…” Dawn's face reddened. Lena said nothing, just stood there with the smile nailed on her face. “Mrs. Gray, you know what I mean. It was all a bit of fun, nobody meant anything by it.”

“I know indeed, Dawn…a bit of fun is what it was.”

“And you're not upset…?”

“About Louis having a big of fun…heavens, what do you take me for?” she said, and left them.

She barely got to the bathroom basin in time to throw up. Louis and this girl, this girl whom he knew had been sent to his hotel by Lena. Lena rinsed her face and reapplied her makeup. She returned to her desk and managed to avoid Dawn for the rest of the day.

That evening she went to Jessie's office and said she would like to dismiss Dawn Jones.

         

“I missed you when you were in Birmingham,” Louis said that night to her.

“I wasn't away for long.”

“No, but any time is long.”

“It was hard work,” she said. “Dawn and I were almost hoarse at the end of it.”

“Dawn?” he said.

She looked at him. He probably didn't remember Dawn. Truthfully. The bit of fun had been so passing, so fleet, that it had not stayed in his mind.

“Dawn Jones, remember she used to work for James Williams once?”

“Oh, yes.” Now he did remember. “And how did she get on there…with you?”

“Fine, just fine. I think she's leaving the agency though.”

“Oh, is she? Why's that?”

“I'm not really sure,” Lena said, turning off the light.

R
ITA
was well established now in the car-hire company in Dublin. She was walking out with one of her colleagues. He came from Donegal, far far away. She thought of the gypsy who had said she would marry a man from far away. His name was Timothy and one day soon he was going to introduce her to his mother.

Rita had told him she didn't come from important stock. Not from any people you could speak of. Her father and mother had lost interest in her when she had gone as a girl to work as a maid for the McMahons. She didn't want Timothy to have any false impressions.

Timothy told her that nothing mattered less. He said that all that old nonsense was changing in Ireland and about time too. Once or twice Rita wondered whether she should ask Kit if she might meet Timothy. It would give her a bit of standing if a lovely, confident young hotel management student appeared as her friend.

But Kit had enough to do and Rita would not abuse their friendship. One day she would meet Timothy and that would be fine.

         

Emmet went up to Kellys' to tell Anna about his trip to Dublin. Kit was going to meet him at the train and he would stay with Philip O'Brien, who had improved beyond all measure apparently. They were going to the pictures and on a little train out to Bray to the amusements. And Kit had a friend who was a law student who was going to take them to see a prison and a tattooist.

It was going to be a fantastic weekend, everything he'd want to do. He hated leaving Lough Glass and Anna, of course, but then, she'd had so many outings recently…there was a school trip here and a careers talk there and he had not really seen her for ages.

Lilian Kelly opened the door. “Hello, Emmet,” she said, surprised. There was something about her voice that alerted Emmet. He said nothing, just grinned. “I thought Anna was with you,” she said.

         

It was awkward telling Father and Maura that she didn't need any money to entertain Emmet in Dublin. Kit would've liked to buy them presents too with her unexpected windfall. But she thought it would cause too much trouble if she explained it.

She waved and he saw her. “Come on, we'll get the bus back. Quick, to the front seat,” she said, taking his hand, and they ran together to board the bus for the city center.

“Imagine you knowing Dublin so well.” He seemed wistful.

“Well, you will too next year, won't you?”

“Yes.” His voice sounded a bit down. But perhaps he was just tired after the journey.

“I'll show you my flat first,” Kit said, determined she wouldn't start looking for problems where none existed.

Emmet said he thought it was great. Imagine all this whole place of her very own. Kit was touched by that.

It was so small, even her bedroom in Lough Glass was bigger than the area where she slept, sat, ate, studied, and washed at a sink. But it was very central, there were no bus fares, she was even so near one of the cinemas that she could look out her window and see whether the queues were lessening.

“We could go to a dance, seeing it's Friday night,” Kit said. “And I'd be happy to bring you to one of the places we go, but they're very hot and sweaty. And honestly, as it's your first night I thought we might go somewhere less noisy.”

“That would be nice,” he said.

He did sound flat. Kit was not imagining it.

“What do you think of an Indian restaurant?” she suggested. “There's one up in Leeson Street. It's great, and I've been there a couple of times so I know what to order. And then we'll meet Philip and he'll take you home.”

He said it sounded great. They walked together through O'Connell Street, past crowds of people.

“I've never been here at night,” Emmet said.

“No. It's changed completely.” They stopped and looked at the Liffey flowing under O'Connell Bridge.

“It's not smelly,” Emmet said. “People are always saying it is.”

“It is a bit, to be honest, in the summertime but not now,” Kit agreed.

They went past Trinity College, and Kit pointed out students coming and going through the main gate.

“Are they very posh? English and upper class?” Emmet asked.

“I don't think so, I used to think that, but apparently it's just lots of foreigners and people who aren't Catholics…but ordinary just the same.”

“It's cracked Catholics not being allowed to go there. Brother Healy says it's right, he says that for years when we wanted to they wouldn't let us in.”

They walked up Grafton Street and looked at all the expensive things in the windows. They went by St. Stephen's Green, all dark and shadowy now at night, and then up to Leeson Street.

“There's a student pub here on the corner. This is where we'll meet Philip afterward,” Kit explained.

“I'm glad he's not coming to dinner with us,” Emmet said unexpectedly.

“Yes, well, he has improved but not so much as you'd want him round all the time. It's just his parents are so awful it rubs off on him, you know.”

They went into the Indian restaurant and Kit picked a corner table. She advised Emmet about the menu.

“Suppose you have the mutton and I have the kofta curry—that's meatballs.”

He nodded. His eyes were fixed on the menu as if he were trying to summon up the courage to say something. “This is quite dear, Kit. Are you sure we can afford it?” he asked.

“No problem,” she said.

“But all this and the pictures tomorrow and the tattoo parlor.”

“That won't cost any money. Honestly, Emmet, don't worry.” She put her hand to pat his as reassurance and to her horror his eyes filled with tears. “Oh, Emmet, what's wrong?” she cried.

“Kit, I want you to do me a big favor. Will you do something for me, it's a huge thing?”

“What is it?”

“Promise first.”

“I can't promise until I know. That's not fair. I'll try, you know I will.”

“You have to promise…”

“What
is
it?”

“It's Anna. She's keen on Stevie Sullivan and he's taking her out. She doesn't want me anymore.”

“It's only a crush, she'll get over him.”

“No, they meet all the time, she's crazy about him.”

“He's too old for her. Much too old.”

“I know, but that makes him more interesting than ever.”

“But he can't feel the same about her, can he?”

“Yes, he's crazy about her.”

“What about Dr. and Mrs. Kelly? I bet they're furious.”

“Yes, but all this makes it even more…I don't know, dramatic.”

“What can I do…tell me what kind of favor could I possibly do you? Hypnotize her? Kidnap Stevie Sullivan?” Kit looked at him mystified to know what role he could see for her in all this.

“You're not bad-looking, Kit. Fellows are always saying that you look terrific. Could you sort of set yourself at him and get him? Distract him from Anna…then she'd come back to me.”

Her first instinct was to laugh. Kit McMahon a Mata Hari who could attract the desire of any man away from a little blond beauty like Anna Kelly!

Then she saw his face and she didn't laugh. Emmet was near breaking point. And he really believed she could do it. Poor, poor Emmet. Imagine feeling so strongly as this.

Kit had never loved anyone to the extent that she would admit it so openly, so wretchedly. She didn't know anyone who could, except in books. Then with a shock she realized the only other person who had loved so foolishly and recklessly that she didn't consider anyone else was Helen McMahon. Their mother. She looked at her brother, stricken.

“Will you do it for me please, Kit?” he begged.

“I'll try,” she said.

The least she could do for him was try.

Chapter Eight

P
ADDY
Barry apologized profusely. The man he had been going to visit in prison had been released.

“It was very bad luck,” he said over and over.

“Good luck for him, I suppose,” Kit had said.

“Yes, but bad for your brother.”

“I don't mind,” Emmet said. “Is the tattooist still there?”

Paddy's cheerful freckled face lit up. “Emmet boy, he is still there and we're going to meet him this morning.”

“There's no question of any of us getting things done on our arms is there…?” Kit regarded Paddy with some awe and anxiety. Anyone who could trick Fingers O'Connor into such craven submission was a force to be reckoned with.

“I might have a very small anchor done myself…I'll see,” Paddy said. “No obligation on the rest of you, of course.”

“Does it hurt?” Emmet asked.

“Excruciating, I believe,” Paddy said.

The tattooist was a very small man with an anxious face. “Any friends of Mr. Barry's are welcome here,” he said, looking doubtfully at Kit and Emmet.

“See, I told you.” Paddy was triumphant.

It had never been clear what particular service Paddy Barry had done for the tattooist. Kit didn't really want to know. She felt it may not have been on the right side of the law that he was learning to uphold. It had something to do with giving him a warning about smuggled cigarettes from sailors. Whatever it had been it had been a matter deserving great gratitude.

“Would you all like tea?” the tattooist offered, and provided it out of grimy enamel mugs.

He showed the needles and the fluids and a book of designs, as well as letters from satisfied clients.

Kit looked at Emmet. He was utterly delighted with the experience. This had been a brilliant idea. She could hardly recognize the troubled face that had sat opposite her last night in the Indian restaurant as Emmet toyed with his food and begged her support.

They had agreed that Kit would give it her best. But in her own time and in her own way. Emmet must not keep inquiring how it was going, he must make no efforts to help. They had shaken hands on it and he had cheered up in time to meet Philip in the pub.

Philip had wanted to come to the tattooist as well but Kit had said that the thing was sufficiently like a circus already…they didn't want to have to sell tickets for the visit. What about lunch? Philip had wondered. That was no use either. Emmet and Kit were meeting Rita and her boyfriend.

“Rita who worked for you?” Philip said.

“The very same.”

“What would you have to say to each other?” he asked. It was uncanny the way he sounded like his mother. You really could hear Mildred O'Brien in some of the things he said.

“We have lots to say to each other,” Kit explained. “Rita brought us up.”

Philip had felt the reproof and regretted his attitude but it was too late. He wouldn't be able to see Kit and Emmet until the evening when they would meet for the pictures.

Kit brought her mind back to the conversation taking place in the tattoo parlor. Emmet seemed to be pricing a small heart with a four-letter word inside it.

“Don't consider it for two seconds, Emmet,” she cried.

“It would be discreet,” the tattooist said.

“And a sign of how much I cared,” Emmet said.

“You wouldn't want to commit yourself to one name at too early a stage though.” Paddy Barry was wise in the ways of the world.

“I'll never want any other name,” Emmet said in a voice that chilled Kit to hear it.

         

“This is my friend Timothy,” Rita said, and introduced the man from the car-hire firm.

Rita looked well. She had her hair cut smartly and she was wearing makeup. She wore a bright uniform jacket, as did Timothy. They worked Saturdays so were only free for a short lunch hour. Rita asked Kit all about the people in Lough Glass and Timothy told Emmet about the cars.

“Not a sign of his stammer. Isn't it wonderful,” Rita said when she knew she couldn't be overheard by Emmet.

“It comes and goes when he's upset,” Kit said.

“Well, there's probably not too often that happens. And Maura's running the house all right with Peggy?”

“Nothing to the way you did,” Kit laughed.

They both knew that was only a politeness. Maura McMahon managed their home magnificently.

“Is this the real thing?” Kit jerked her head toward Timothy.

“I hope so, Kit, he's very good to me. He's mentioned marriage several times.” Rita looked pleased and proud.

“Can I come to the wedding?” Kit whispered.

“Of course you can, but it may not be for a while, we have to save a bit first. Perhaps I'll be at yours before then.”

“I doubt it,” Kit said. “I'm not great with the fellows at all.”

“Too choosy more like it, you have them all admiring you.”

Kit hoped this was true. If she could just get Stevie Sullivan to admire her for a bit, that would honor her promise to Emmet. She wondered would it involve going the whole way. Kit swallowed nervously at the thought of it. Surely nobody could be expected to do that just for a childish promise to a brother.

“I often meet Clio on a Sunday,” Kit said to Emmet. “Would you like that or not…?”

His eyes lit up. Even the thought of being close to Anna's sister was a delight. “And don't forget, her family know nothing of her meeting Stevie…”

“So why don't we let her get caught, make more trouble for her? Clio would help with that.”

“No, you don't understand.” Emmet's face had the tight tense look again. “She came and told me honestly, she made me promise as a friend that I'd not tell tales on her.”

“And you promised?”

“I did of course,” Emmet said.

“Heigh-ho,” said Kit.

         

“I hope my mother doesn't hear you've had Emmet up here for a weekend,” Clio grumbled on the phone when Kit rang.

“You can be sure she will, they hear everything in Lough Glass,” Kit said.

“She'll think I should be having the dreadful Anna.”

“Well, why not? It would be nice for her.” Kit was being very cunning. Perhaps it was an opportunity to get Anna away from Lough Glass and Stevie.

“We've always said that she and Emmet are two different species. Are they still in love with each other, by the way?”

“Hard to say,” Kit lied. “You know boys don't talk much about that sort of thing.”

“Anyway she's working very hard. Horrible little sneak that she is, she'll get much more honors in her Leaving than I did. Apparently she's off studying all the time.”

Kit nodded glumly. She knew about all this studying and what form it took.

         

Clio couldn't stay long, she said as soon as she arrived. She was going to Michael O'Connor's house. It was his sister's birthday and there was a family lunch party for them.

“They're very family-conscious,” she said proudly to Kit. Clio loved being included in the O'Connor rituals. “Mary Paula is allowed to choose what she wants for lunch and it's made in one of the hotels and then served in the house.”

“Will there be champagne?” Emmet wanted to bring news home to Anna when he saw her as a friend.

“No, I don't think so. Mr. O'Connor has probably had to make a few economies recently. He had to pay out unexpected sums of money.”

Clio glared at Kit, who giggled, pleased at the joke. It was as far as Clio would go, she would not risk the story getting home. It would reflect no credit on the beloved O'Connor family.

         

Philip and Kit said that Emmet would have to be on the train in good time, it got crowded early and there were a lot of people going home after spending a Sunday in Dublin. They went to have chips in a cafe first.

The girl at the cash desk in a bright green tentlike dress looked familiar. All three of them looked at her with interest and then they spoke at the same time.

“It's Deirdre,” said Kit.

“Deirdre Hanley,” said Philip.

“And she's pregnant,” said Emmet.

Deirdre was delighted to see them. “Imagine you lot being old enough to go out on your own,” she said. “I'll get them to give you bigger helpings.” She called to the man in the white apron: “Gianni, these are friends of mine, huge helpings.”

“
Molto grande
,” Gianni cried enthusiastically.

“That's my Gianni,” she said proudly to Kit. “He owns the place.”

“He's very nice-looking,” Kit said admiringly.

“Yes, he's not bad,” Deirdre said.

“Emmet came up for the weekend, Philip and I are doing hotel management.” Kit felt that Deirdre might not be up-to-date with all the details of their lives.

“You're in Patsy's year, Emmet, aren't you?” Deirdre said. Patsy was the entirely different younger sister. All the mistakes Mrs. Hanley considered she had made with her eldest were being righted in her second daughter. Patsy was watched like a hawk.

“That's right, I often see her,” Emmet said. He hardly noticed Patsy Hanley, if the truth were told, but he was being polite.

“When did you and Gianni get married?” Kit asked. It was something she had never heard at home, and Mrs. Hanley was great with news and information. Surely the eventual settling down of her troublesome daughter with an Italian who ran his own restaurant was worthy of mention.

“We didn't actually get married,” Deirdre said. “You see, there's this business…Gianni has a first marriage which has to be annulled. It will, of course, but it all takes time.”

“I know, I know.” Kit nodded sympathetically. She wished she hadn't mentioned the word.

But Deirdre didn't seem at all put out. “So the bambino may well be able to come to the wedding,” she laughed.

Emmet and Philip were amazed at the conversation that was taking place.

Gianni came to shake hands with them. “Deirdre tells me everyone in Lough Glass is old and old-fashioned,” he said, stroking the bump on her stomach. “But this is not so.”

“Not at all,” gasped Philip.

As they went to the station Kit said to Emmet: “Maybe you shouldn't necessarily mention…”

“About Deirdre? I wasn't going to,” he said.

“No, indeed. Wiser not,” Philip said.

But Kit knew that Mildred and Dan O'Brien would be told.

“I
SN'T
‘Slough' a funny word?” Lena said to Louis, shuffling some papers around. Normally she took very little work home, he hated to see her working.

“Why is it funny?”

“I thought it was pronounced
sluff
, you know, like enough, like to slough something off…”

“And what made you think of it?”

“I have to go there on Saturday to talk to a couple of schools.”

“Dawn going with you?”

“No, she left. Remember?”

“Oh that's right.” He hadn't remembered. But at least it meant that Dawn hadn't contacted him and said that she had been fired because of her past.

Dawn had more style than that, Lena thought regretfully. The girl was a loss to them. They were grooming Jennifer but she didn't have the same appeal.

“I'm going on my own…but you're off that day, why don't you come with me?”

“Much as I'd love to wander round a few girls' schools, I don't think it's really my scene.”

“No, it's only a couple of hours for me…then we could go and stay somewhere.”

“It's all buses and trains,” he grumbled. He would love to have had a car.

“There must be nice places…we deserve a bit of a treat, a night out, a night away. The two of us.”

“All right, I'll look into it. I'll ask James, he knows everywhere and everything.”

Louis sounded a little restless these days. She had hoped that the mention of a change in their routine would brighten him up, but it seemed just another wearying chore. She wished that her location had been somewhere more glamorous than Slough.