The Glass Lake (89 page)

Lilian Kelly certainly never expected her first daughter's wedding to take place under such a cloud. Many times in her mind she had planned it. Always seeing it taking place in her own hometown, with the reception in the Castle Hotel. This anonymous Dublin church and the same hotel as poor Maura had chosen all seemed very second rate.

Clio wore a white dress but Kit looked extremely casual in that outfit. The girl was pretty, there was no gainsaying that, and her big soft white hat with the long ribbons was elegant.

It was some scant consolation to Lilian Kelly to know that Kit's disgrace was even greater than Clio's. All right, so everyone might suspect that Clio's wedding had been somewhat rushed, but at least she was marrying into the O'Connor family. Kit was hanging around with that teddy boy, the boy with the terrible reputation, son of poor old Kathleen and her mad drunken husband. That was a seriously unacceptable thing to do.

Stevie was a great addition to the wedding party, as Kit had known he would be. He talked to Michael's aunt about Belfast, told her of his visits there on motor-related business, promised to look out for a good secondhand Morris Minor the next time he was up there. He asked Mr. O'Connor educated questions about the hotel business, promised Father Baily about the possibility of getting a car for a raffle. He spoke to Maura in such clear terms about the visit to London that she was reassured that there had been different rooms in the guesthouse.

“How did you find it?” she asked innocently.

“Oh, in this business you're always finding fellows who know places,” he said.

He spoke to Kevin about the great night on New Year's Eve.

He told Martin McMahon about his plans to expand the garage. “I don't want to be ruining life for all my good neighbors if I do get more business…I'll move down the town to more open space,” he said, allaying a worry Martin had been keeping to himself for some time.

And then he approached Mary Paula and Louis. Louis was so warm and easygoing Stevie felt a lump in his throat. It was for this man that Kit's mother left home, allowed a drowning to be believed. She had lived with him and with his betrayals for so long until it had almost cost her her mind.

Louis spoke of his own car, a Triumph Herald he had got in London. He had had it awhile now but it still looked good and was no trouble. No, he had bought it new.

The bile rose in Stevie's throat as he heard the story unfold. How Mary Paula had first met him when he was driving it to a seminar. She had admired the man in the white Triumph. “I said to him, ‘That's a nice car,' he said to me, ‘Let's take it on a test drive, then,'” and neither of them had gone to the seminar at all.

“Don't tell that to my father-in-law though,” Louis whispered. “He might think I was unreliable.” Mary Paula giggled.

“And you're not?” Stevie said stonily.

“No.” Louis looked alarmed. The boy was looking at him oddly.

Stevie moved away very quickly. Kit had been watching. “Please,” she whispered in his ear. “Please, for her sake, we must say nothing. For Father, for Maura.”

She looked across at Louis, her eyes full of hate.

Was he a moron that he didn't know who they all were? He knew that Lena was married to Martin McMahon, pharmacist from Lough Glass. He knew that Clio was from Lough Glass. Did he just not care? Was his life with Lena so much in the past that it didn't matter that her husband and daughter turned up at a festivity where he was with his pregnant wife?

Of course, he thought that they all thought Helen McMahon was dead, drowned in the lake and buried in the churchyard. But surely it must have cost him something to face these people.

Lena had never mentioned his name to Father. That much Kit knew. She had always said that she had loved another man. She had never pronounced his name because it made it too real. She had written it, of course, in the letter. But that was the letter Martin had never got.

There would be no singsong, no extended drinking in the bar of this quiet hotel. The proceedings would end earlier than most enthusiastic Irish wedding guests would have expected. Clio went to change.

“That was wonderful,” Kit lied as she helped her friend out of the dress.

“It was diabolical,” said Clio.

“You're wrong, wait till you see the pictures.”

“Wait till I forget the look in everyone's eyes, that's more like. Jesus, isn't Mrs. O'Connor a pill? Her own daughter's pregnant and there's not a word about it. But I'm the one who led her son astray, it's written all over her face.”

“Stop now. It was great,” Kit soothed her.

“Stevie certainly behaved himself.”

“Good,” said Kit in a clipped tone.

“He sort of moved around and talked to people as if he's used to it.”

“He probably is, in the car business.” Kit kept herself in control with dignity.

“No, I meant used to people like who were here.”

There would be no throwing the bouquet. Just a few more minutes showing off her going-away costume and then Clio and Michael would leave. The rest would follow soon after.

Louis Gray looked around him. The wedding had not been a huge social success. Even his practiced charm had seemed not to work. He was very uneasy about the whole connection with Lough Glass—of all the villages in Ireland, it was surely bad luck to get involved with this one. Still, he reassured himself, nobody there would have any suspicions; and he would have to face the place sometime. Probably sooner than later. And he would have to talk to Lena's daughter as well. Might as well be now.

Louis came over to join Kit as she knew he would. He knew she was the daughter of Lena but he had no idea that she knew of any connection at all.

She wanted to be as far as possible from him, but it would be rude not to return his warm smile. “Great day, isn't it?”

“Yes indeed.”

“But nothing between you and the best man? This won't be the making of another wedding, I'm not going to get another lovely sister-in-law?”

“No, no. Kevin's going out with my friend Frankie.” The words came out slowly, she felt very uneasy. She moved away.

Slightly at a loss, Louis turned to talk to someone else. Young women didn't normally walk away from him like that. Stevie had been watching, he saw the way Louis had laid his hand on Kit's arm with his easy, familiar charm. It had made Stevie rage inside.

The crowd were gathering near the door to wave good-bye to the bride and groom. Louis and Stevie were on the edge of the crowd. “You're from Lough Glass too, Clio tells me. It sounds a good place, we must go there sometime,” he said.

Stevie put his face very near him. In a slow and deliberate voice he said: “You've been to Lough Glass.” There was a pause. And then with a heavy menace he said: “And if you know what's good for you you won't go again.” Then he moved away.

Louis had gone white. What did the fellow mean? He saw Stevie put his arm around Kit's shoulder and she held his hand tightly. Kit McMahon, Lena's daughter. And her boyfriend. But they didn't
know
, for God's sake.

None of them
knew
.

L
ENA
was in Manchester, she wrote. The people were so friendly and they seemed to have more time for each other than in London, they weren't always rushing off. And if you met someone you were likely to meet them again. More like Dublin really, though of course one met too many people in Dublin. Lena only vaguely remembered meeting Rita, but she knew Kit must have handled it. She wondered had she had a blackout or had she gone mad for a time.

It didn't matter now. All that mattered was that she be there for her daughter as much as Kit needed her.

Lena realized that she had to give up on Emmet. She had lost too much of his life to see him now. She had left when he was a child, a real child. Now he was old enough to hold a girl in his arms and tell her he loved her. There was no way she could come back into his life, and she was finished with fantasy…there would be none of that anymore.

She was even going to get herself a small flat in Manchester. Peggy Forbes lived with her mother and anyway it would not be a good idea to share a flat with someone from work. Peggy was divorced, fortyish, wonderful with people. When next Stevie and Kit came to England they should come to Manchester. Peggy would show them all what life in the North was like.

         

Sometimes Kit showed parts of the letters to Stevie.

“I don't like reading what she's written to you, it's meant to be private.”

“I only show you bits, I keep the private bits.”

“Are they about me?”

“Sometimes.”

“Warnings, like don't follow her down the primrose path?” He looked at her anxiously. He really wanted to know.

“They used to be. Not now.”

“When did she change?”

“When she met you.”

         

Clio and Michael moved into Maura's flat almost immediately after the wedding. The price had been arranged very quickly. Fingers had written the check without haggling.

“But Pa, I'm sure that's just the asking price,” Michael said. “She'd probably come down a couple of hundred if you start to bargain.”

“We'll pay what's asked.” Fingers had had enough reproofs from Maura Hayes and her stepdaughter Kit to do him for a long time. There would be no haggling and drawing their wrath on him.

         

“You must come round and see it,” Clio said. “You can even bring Stevie if you want to.”

“No thanks. I'll come round some evening he's not in Dublin.”

“Are there many of those?” Clio asked.

“Well, he does live and work in a place two hours journey away from here.” She knew she sounded defensive and sarcastic. Only Clio brought this out in her.

         

Clio was in very grumpy form the evening she did go around to the flat. “Have you had your tea?” she asked ungraciously.

“Well, no. But I'm not hungry,” said Kit.

“I didn't think…”

“It doesn't matter.” Kit wondered how you wouldn't think, if you asked someone to visit you at six o'clock. Most people had something to eat in the evening.

Kit admired the place and the wedding presents. Some of them still unpacked stood around in boxes.

“I think I'm getting
pre
natal depression,” Clio said. “Did you ever hear of that?”

“No,” said Kit truthfully. “I heard you were meant to be excited and thrilled and knitting things and getting dinner for your husband and your friends.”

Clio burst into tears.

“Tell me, tell me,” Kit said. She knew she was going to hear some story of woes. Should Clio be shaken until her teeth rattled? Should this have been done years ago? Dr. Kelly and his wife had always let her get away with murder.

“Everything's absolutely terrible. Michael was out all night on Wednesday, there was a party up in the hotel where he's working and none of them got home. Louis didn't even go back to the house that he lives in beside the hotel. And Mary Paula's absolutely furious even though Louis gives her flowers every day. Michael's given me no flowers, he just says I'm a nag. Already! I'm only a few weeks married and I'm a nag.”

“Shush, shush. He doesn't mean it,” Kit said.

“And Daddy's no help, nor Mummy. I said I'd like to go down and stay a few days there and they said no. All this about making my bed and having to lie in it. And I hate this place, it has Aunt Maura written all over it…Everyone's in such bad tempers, Kit.”

“I'm not.”

“That's because you're being screwed silly by Stevie Sullivan and you can't think of anything else.”

“I'm not, as it happens.”

“Well, maybe you should be.”

“Clio, you're the one who's upset. Talk to me. Let's look at the good points. Michael stayed out only one night and he was with…your brother-in-law, so you don't think he was up to no good.”

“I don't know,” Clio said darkly. “Mary Paula told me there were other girls there, fast girls.”

Kit wondered wildly whether Mary Paula and Clio, who had both been pregnant brides in recent months, were actually in a position to be calling other girls fast. But she let it pass.

“What other good points are there?” Kit continued doggedly. “You have a lovely home, Michael's got a job. You're going to have a baby.”

“Which means I can't have a job,” Clio complained.

“You didn't
want
a job. You said you were going to college to get a husband. Now you've got one.”

“Nothing's the same as it was,” Clio wept.

“No, it's different, but we've got to change too. I suppose that's it.”

“I wish we were young again, going to Sister Madeleine, coming home for tea.”