Dinner progressed with several toasts to the anglers’ skill and good fortune. Slainte, meaning good health and pronounced slawn-cha, sounded in the room more than a few times.
‘By the way,’ Cynthia said to Bella Flaherty, who was taking dessert orders, ‘who cleaned all those fish? I cleaned a fish once, it was a terrible job.’
‘I cleaned the fish. Fileted them as well. ’t is nothing. There are two desserts this evening: Moroccan figs poached in a syrup of ginger and honey, with Anna’s lemon verbena ice cream-’
‘I love figs,’ said Cynthia. ‘I’ll have the figs, thank you.’
‘You haven’t heard the option.’
He liked it when his wife raised one eyebrow.
‘Anna’s rhubarb tart with raspberry purée and crème fraîche.’
‘I’ll have the figs,’ said Cynthia.
While he’d lodged here with Walter and Katherine, Anna had sent them off on a day trip with a rhubarb tart, still warm in its swaddle of white napkin. The fragrance of brandied fruit and baked crust had filled the car, touching him with a grave longing for something he couldn’t name.
They’d driven as far as the highway when Katherine braked the car, turned to the backseat, and snatched up the basket which rode next to him. No one spoke as she unwrapped the tart, broke it into three pieces, passed out their portions, ate her own in roughly two enormous bites, wiped her mouth on the hem of her skirt, and declared: ‘There. That’s the way I want to live for the rest of my life.’
Hooting with laughter, they were truant children on the run from authority.
Speaking above the throb of the generator, he gave Bella his order. ‘I’ll have the tart, please.’ Then, hopeful, ‘Is it served warm?’
She looked at him with hooded eyes. ‘Anna’s tarts are always served warm.’
The kitchen door swung shut. ‘Who does Bella remind you of?’
‘I was just thinking that,’ he said. The thrown-away boy at age eleven, when he landed on the doorstep of the rectory-their adopted son, Dooley.
In the library before dinner, he and Cynthia had exchanged introductions with the Atlanta contingent, who were seated now at the next table.
‘We hear you’re a travel club,’ said his wife.
‘We started as a book club,’ said Moira. ‘But we never got around to discussin’ books.’
‘We drank wine and talked about men,’ said Debbie.
Laughter at the club table.
‘I still cannot believe,’ said Lisa, ‘that I took th’ trouble to read War and Peace cover to cover, even the epilogue, and never once got a chance to discuss it.’
‘That’s when I was havin’ work done,’ said Moira. ‘I did not feel like readin’ a book that weighed more than my firstborn.’
‘So, anyway,’ said Lisa, ‘we switched over to a poker club, with all winnings goin’ to charity.’
‘Great idea,’ he said.
‘We played every other Wednesday night, and everybody brought a covered dish.’
‘It was just way too much,’ said Tammy, ‘to, you know, every other Wednesday come up with a new dish.’
‘Takeout,’ said Cynthia.
Debbie lifted her glass to Moira. ‘So Moira reorganized us as a travel club, she is very good at travel plannin’.’
‘We’ve been friends for forty years,’ said Tammy. ‘We met in a Scrabble club. We’re crazy about Scrabble.’
He noticed Tammy wore bracelets which did a good bit of jangling.
‘So, y’all like to fish?’ asked Pete.
‘All our husbands trout-fished,’ said Lisa. ‘We never did, we were too busy raisin’ kids. While Johnny could still talk, it was throat cancer, he said, Lisa, honey, learn to trout-fish.’
‘Good advice,’ said Pete.
‘He said it was great for th’ central nervous system.’
Tammy put on a swipe of lipstick without looking in a mirror. ‘Moira’s husband, bless ’is heart, had fishin’ on th’ brain ’til th’ minute he passed.’
‘Check out Lough Arrow, he said, plain as day.’ Moira dabbed her eyes with her napkin. ‘Those were practically his last words.’
‘His last words,’ Pete said, reverent.
‘His parents brought him here as a boy and he came twice after college. We had fishin’ husbands in common, for sure.’
‘Had,’ said Pete.
‘We’re all widows,’ said Lisa.
‘Sorry,’ said Pete.
‘Right,’ said Tom. ‘Real sorry.’
Hugh nodded, respectful.
‘Another thing we have in common,’ said Lisa, ‘is… guess what.’
‘They’ll never guess,’ said Debbie.
‘You’re all Irish,’ said Cynthia.
Debbie shrieked. ‘How did you know?’
‘A hunch.’
‘Third generation,’ said Moira. ‘County Tyrone.’
‘Fifth generation,’ said Debbie. ‘County Mayo.’
‘Maybe fourth, maybe Sligo,’ said Lisa. ‘I’m not totally sure.’
Tammy sighed. ‘I have no clue, but my great-grandmother was named O’Leary-not th’ one with th’ cow.’
Hugh raised his glass. ‘Limerick. Fourth generation.’
Tom raised his. ‘Sligo. Third.’
‘All my connections are pretty much Sligo,’ said Pete, ‘except for a crowd on my mother’s side that moved up to Tyrone. Okay, here’s one for you. What’s th’ connection between us lads that has nothin’ to do with fishin’?’
‘You’re all losin’ your hair?’ asked Debbie.
‘Cousins!’ Cynthia and Moira chorused.
‘Slainte!’ said Pete.
There ensued a discussion of emigration dates, the sprawl of kin over counties and continents, the Kavanagh bloodline, fife-playing in general.
‘I’m wonderin’ why y’all turned up here,’ said Pete. ‘Out in th’ sticks an’ all.’
‘We took the advice of a dyin’ man,’ said Tammy. ‘Googled World’s Best Trout Fishin’, then Googled Lough Arrow and found Broughadoon. Liam and Anna were great to work with, and ta-da’-Tammy’s bracelets jangled-‘here we are.’
‘Ready to fish like maniacs,’ said Debbie.
Pete turned his chair to face the club table. ‘Where do you fish back home? New England? Colorado? Montana?’
Moira looked Pete in the eye. ‘Th’ country club lake.’
‘Catch a lot of golf balls that way,’ said Hugh.
Dessert was served amid a bombast of lectures by the anglers-Spent-gnat, Sooty Olive, Connemara Black, Invicta, Green Peter, feeder streams, buzzer hatches, Bibio, murroughs…
‘What are they talking about?’ whispered Cynthia.
‘We don’t need to know,’ he said.
‘So,’ Pete inquired of the club table, ‘how about some help with your gear in the morning?’
‘We have ghillies coming, thank you.’
‘Well, then, ladies’-Pete hoisted his glass-‘may it be yourselves bringin’ home our dinner tomorrow evenin’. We’ll just be sleepin’ in, if you don’t mind.’
Laughter at the fishermen’s table.
‘By the way,’ said Tom, ‘when we registered our catch in the fishing log, we saw Tim Kavanagh’s name, but no record of your catch.’
‘Fishing log?’
‘The fishing log by the dining room door. What was it, now, a fifteen-pound salmon?’
He felt the heat in his face. ‘Good Lord! I thought I was signing the guest register.’
Laughter all around; he was laughing himself.
‘Reverend,’ said Liam, ‘may I speak with you a moment?’
‘Of course.’
‘Excuse us, Mrs. Kav’na. Only a moment.’
They passed Pud, stationed at the door with his shoe, and walked up to the library. Coals simmered in the grate.
‘I went out to the power box to see if I could make heads or tails of this thing,’ said Liam. ‘The lines have been cut.’
‘Nothing to do with the storm?’
‘No, no. Cut clean through.’ Liam appeared stricken. ‘I don’t want to alarm the household; I don’t know what to make of it.’
‘Looks like you’ve enough candles to go around, and I believe you said the power company comes tomorrow.’
‘But who would do such a bloody wicked thing?’
That was the trouble with being clergy-people often believed you knew it all. Then there were those who believed you knew nothing, which had its own set of aggravations.
‘I’m sorry, I can’t imagine.’
‘Of course, of course, righto.’ Liam furrowed his brow, dazed. ‘But thanks. It helps to tell somebody.’
‘Anything I can do?’
‘Don’t say anything, please; ’t will alarm th’ house. I’ll try to get the ESB out first thing tomorrow, and the Garda, as well. ’t is a right cod.’
Coffee was served in the library, where William had taken up residence at the checkerboard. Seamus arrived from his walk downhill, bringing a scent of pipe smoke and hedges into the room. He felt a certain completeness in this patchwork company.
‘Figs are my favorite,’ Cynthia said when Anna joined them by the fire. ‘And your ice cream with verbena… I can’t find words. It was the loveliest of desserts. Thank you.’
‘So glad you enjoyed it. We want you to be happy here.’ Anna lowered her eyes and said, ‘I’d like to apologize.’
‘Whatever for?’
‘For Bella’s attitude. She’s not as gracious to guests as we’d wish. She’s… in training, you might say. I hope you’ll overlook any faults.’
‘You needn’t apologize,’ said Cynthia. ‘We shall pray for things to go well.’
Anna glanced up sharply. ‘Yes. Thank you.’
‘Your father is a handsome fellow,’ he said.
‘He’s an oul’ dote, yes. He was quite the prize-fighter in his day, and a fine storyteller when you get him started. He also likes to tell of seeing Mr. Yeats’s funeral cortege when his body came back to Dublin in ’48.’
William and Seamus had set up their board and were leaning over it, each with a pint by his elbow.
‘Da has his one pint of Guinness each evening, as does Seamus. They’re two of our more temperate guests.’ He thought her smile engaging, a giving out of herself.
‘By the way,’ said Anna, ‘how’s your jet lag?’
‘I thought we’d cured it with a long nap this afternoon,’ said Cynthia, ‘but I’m fading again.’
‘Let’s go up,’ he said. He would finish the letter tonight and post it tomorrow with the drawing. Henry would be eager to hear and to see.
They said their good nights to all and walked along the stone-flagged corridor and up the stairs. Shadows cast by the chamber stick leaped ahead of them on the walls.
‘This is a dash too Wuthering Heights,’ she said. ‘Maybe I’m ready for the power to come on.’
‘Maybe I am, too.’
He opened their door and set the stick on the night table, grateful to see their bed had been turned down.
‘Tell you what. I’m going to run back and get a flashlight, the one I used this morning wasn’t top-notch. Back in a jiffy, okay?’
‘Okay,’ she said. ‘Should I close the window?’
‘Leave it open; it’ll be good to have a little fresh air after the turf smoke.’
He had reached the foot of the stairs when he heard her scream. It pierced his heart like a knife, froze him to the spot.
Again, she screamed.
He was up the stairs and across the landing and up the second flight in what seemed an instant.
‘My God!’ he shouted into their darkened room. ‘Are you all right?’
A pale light shone from the hall sconces; she was clinging to the bedpost.
‘Are you all right?’ He took her in his arms.
‘A man in the armoire, he jumped out the window.’
‘Are you hurt?’
‘My ankle,’ she said. ‘When he came out, I stepped back and knocked the candle off the table, it was dark…’ Her body was racked by violent trembling.
‘Reverend!’ Liam with a flashlight. ‘Did we hear a shout?’
‘There was a man in the room, he came out of the wardrobe.’
‘God above! Are you all right?’
‘My ankle,’ said Cynthia.
‘Where did he go?’
‘Out the window,’ he told Liam. ‘What’s down there?’
‘The herb garden. What did he look like?’
‘He was covering his face with one hand,’ she said, ‘but I know he was tall. It was so dark…’ She shook like a jackhammer; her teeth chattered as he held her.
‘I’ll send Anna up, and get Dr. Feeney out to have a look-or should we drive you to hospital?’
‘No, please. No.’ She was crying, soundless.
‘The candle is somewhere on the floor. Could you look it up and get a light going?’
‘Righto. For th’ love of God.’
The wick flamed; the room came dimly back to them.
‘I’ll ring the Garda. ’t will alarm the house but can’t be helped. I’m sorry, Mrs. Kav’na, Reverend, I have no idea… Jesus, Joseph, Mary, an’ all th’ saints.’ Liam crossed himself, and disappeared into the shadowed smudge of the hallway.
He helped Cynthia to the green chair, his heart still racing, then turned to shut the window. The smell was familiar to him from his mother’s Mississippi gardens-it was the heavy, languorous scent of crushed mint.