When Stephen awoke the world spoke with birdsong and the buzzing of spring flies. He smelled the sweet tang of the garden's
annual resurrection, the slow stirring and secret life of the flowers not yet opened but breathing nonetheless in the open
bedroom window. It was the morning of the declaration of love. When he opened his eyes, he caught the tonic air of wild rhubarb
and was sharpened in his awareness that this was to be the beginning of new life. He would give himself to Gabriella and the
child, and if she would not marry him, he would take any job he could get and live near her and be whatever he could to her
for the rest of his days. He was filled that morning with such innocence. That morning, while he lay in the bed breathing
the spring, he had a view of a world beautiful in its simplicity: that we act on our hearts and follow the things that move
us. That it was outlandish and naïve and impractical, that it was the kind of thinking once expected of a child up to the
age of twelve, then ten, but now, in our days, no more than the age of eight, that innocence had diminished so and the world
become so old and weary that belief in such things had all but vanished did not bother Stephen Griffin. He lay on his bed
on the outskirts of that town in Kerry and dreamed like a saint of a selfless loving.
When he rose he saw Mary White hanging clothes on the line in the garden. The soft wind billowed the white sheets.
Down in Kenmare that morning the streets were lively with men and beasts. Cattle trailers and wagons moved slowly, and the
trapped cattle bellowed and stomped in the traffic. People watched them passing on their way to the spring mart and took the
soured air of the dung and urine as another emblem of the new season, the countryside awakening and descending on the town.
Wisps of straw litter were about the place, and there were children late going to school who had been drovers at dawn, leading
cattle with hose-pipe sticks to the loading. There was a buzz of excitement, the noise of engines and the salutes and waves
and cries of those leaning forward in their tractor cabs to call down to a neighbour some news of animal or man.
Into this throbbing Stephen walked. The streets of the country town were alive about him. Before he had reached the corner
where Nelly Grant kept her shop, he knew that his footsteps were bringing him to the doorway of his new life. He sensed the
enormity of it with the freshness of a child facing First Communion, and by the time he had arrived at the fruit and vegetable
stalls outside the shop, he had begun to shake inside his clothes. He took a moment to master himself. He raised his head,
opened his mouth, and swallowed full the host of redemption. Then he stepped into the shop and saw Nelly Grant raise her eyebrows.
“Stephen!”
She was holding two Seville oranges, and with them in her hands came forward and embraced him.
“She's here,” she whispered as she held on to him, taking the opportunity to smell the uncertain blended aroma of his hope,
anxiety, and love. “You have a new radiance,” she said, and stood back to admire his aura.
“Gabriella!” she called out before Stephen had even said a word to her.
And then, through the beaded curtain that separated the shop from the small back office, where the geranium oil was burning
and choral music playing, Gabriella stepped out.
“Stefano,” she said. She said it like a whisper. “Oh, Stefano.” She brought her hands to her mouth as if to hold in a cry.