Ger Fitzgerald had fixed to pick Pat up from Mary Casey’s bungalow at six thirty but Pat knew better than to expect him on time. Not that it mattered, she told herself, but sometimes it would annoy you. She had given up her own car last year, so now she was no better off than poor Mary, who had never learned to drive. There was many another would have stayed on the road despite arthritic hands and failing eyesight, but Pat wasn’t one to take chances. And, unlike Mary who was always firing off texts to the neighbors, she could never bring herself to go round demanding lifts. To be fair, though, Mary lived out in the country, while she was in Lissbeg with all she could ask for around her. Ger had never liked the way she used to gad off in her own car, which was a gift from their eldest son, Frankie. Even these days he wasn’t too happy when she had a day out, though dropping over to Mary’s was an exception. Ger had always been fond of poor Tom, and, if truth be told, he’d once had an eye for Mary. It was strange in a way that he and Tom hadn’t fallen out over her, back when the four of them were at the nuns and the brothers together and ate crisps after school by the horse trough on Broad Street. The trough had still been full of water then, and one day when Ger had been prancing along the edge of it like a tightrope walker another lad shoved him in. Mary and Pat had pulled him out while Tom got hold of the other fellow by the neck and stuck his head under the water. That was the way it was with Tom and Ger, they always had each other’s backs. So in the heel of the hunt the four of them had remained good friends, and when Mary married into the post office in Crossarra, Pat had married into the butcher’s in Lissbeg. To be fair to Ger, she’d been lucky to get him, despite his persnickety ways. Tom had thrown all his money at Mary Casey’s whims, but Ger was a close man who by this stage could buy and sell half the peninsula. So, in a way, Pat had no regrets, having made the better bargain.
One thing she did regret, though, was the loss of her two younger boys, who were both off in Canada. Ger had never made any secret of how he was leaving his money. No more than his father before him, he said, he hadn’t worked all his life to see the business broken up by his sons. So while Frankie, the eldest, had taken over in Lissbeg, Jim and Sonny were sent to college; and as soon as they’d graduated they’d gone off to Canada, just as Ger had intended. Then, after a few years, they’d settled down and married in Toronto. As a result, despite phone calls, presents, and the occasional trip over to Canada for a First Communion or a Confirmation, Pat’s grandchildren had grown up half a world away. It was easier to keep in touch these days, with Skype and email, but each time she posted a photo on the Fitzgerald Family Facebook page set up for her by Sonny, Pat told herself that the damage was done and there was no going back on it. She tried hard to post things that would interest the grandchildren, but sometimes the photos would be up there for weeks with no comments. And then a smiley face or a comment like ‘Love you, Mom’ followed by three exclamation marks would appear under them beside a little picture of Sonny. Which only made Pat feel worse. The Fitzgeralds had never gone around saying that they loved each other, and none of Pat’s children had ever called her Mom. If she didn’t know better, she’d suspect that Sonny never looked at the Facebook page any more than his children did and that it was his Canadian wife who stuck the smiles and the comments up, out of pity. Her other son Jim’s children, who were now at college, apparently thought Facebook was “lame,” so they ignored the page completely. But at least they sent letters to thank Pat for their birthday book tokens, even if she was never sure that they got the warm scarves and jumpers that she knitted for them. It was fierce cold in Canada, she knew that, and you couldn’t beat wool for warmth.
Now, sitting in Mary Casey’s kitchen, Pat told herself it was a great place for a chat. As soon as Hanna had dropped them off at the bungalow, Mary had whipped the kettle onto the stove and produced a grand cake. It was coffee and walnut, the kind that Pat adored and they never had at home because of Ger’s dentures. Mary stirred her tea with massive disapproval and declared that it would take more than a couple of goats to make Maggie’s place habitable. Everything about it was disastrous and always had been. Hanna-Mariah could say what she liked, but there was a kind of a look that she got on her face when she thought things had got out of hand. Like a hare caught in headlights. Had Pat ever seen it? It would give you a fright. Mary lowered her voice portentously. “I’m telling you this now, Pat, and I’ll tell you no more. However she expected that place to be, it wasn’t the way that we found it.”
“Ah sure, you’d never get a builder to stick to a schedule.”
“But look who she has working for her!”
Pat felt that a bit of fairness should be injected into the drama. “Well now, by all accounts Fury’s a good worker.”
“He’s a chancer and he always was one.”
Dumping a large slice of cake onto a rose-patterned plate, Mary pushed it across the table. “And wasn’t he great with Maggie Casey fifty years ago?”
“You’re not saying . . . ?”
“Would you have a bit of sense, girl—sure Maggie was in her seventies! What I’m saying is there was a pair of them in it. Fury never has a civil word for a soul, and you know yourself the way Maggie was.”
Pat picked a walnut out of her slice of cake and nibbled it appreciatively. “You always had a down on that poor woman and, do you know what it is, Mary Casey, I’d say you were a small bit jealous of her.”
She cocked her head at Mary, stirred her tea, and waited for the fur to fly. Mary smiled grimly. “Name of God, Pat Fitz, how long have you and I known each other? Did you really think I’d rise to that one?”
Pat shrugged. “Didn’t Tom have an awful lot of time for Maggie?”
Mary rose to her feet, stalked to the fridge, and returned with a can of whipped cream. Giving it a vigorous shake, she released a foaming mountain onto the side of Pat’s plate and then did the same to her own. Then, sitting down again, she applied herself to her coffee cake. The truth was, she told herself, that Pat Fitz was right. Tom was the most attentive husband you’d find in a day’s walk. All the same, she had resented it when, instead of devoting his spare time to his poor wife who had a right to it, he’d be round at Maggie’s place stacking turf or earthing up spuds or sitting for hours by the fire to keep her company. It drove Mary mad, but of course she’d said nothing. A fine way she’d look, giving out about Tom minding his aunt when he was her only relative. But, as soon as Hanna was old enough, she’d started sending her round to give Maggie a hand, so the jobs got dealt with that way. Mary was well aware that Hanna disliked the cross old lady as much as she did; but, as she said to Tom many a day, it did the child no harm to make herself useful. What she told no one was that Hanna’s own claims on Tom’s attention were annoying her by that stage, so by sending her round to Maggie’s place, she was killing two birds with one stone.
A blob of whipped cream dropped from Pat’s fork onto the table and Mary whirled off to the sink to get a dishcloth. No one had any idea of how much she missed Tom. She knew well that they all thought he had spoiled her, and perhaps he had. But she knew, too, that he had loved her from the moment that he’d seen her across the school yard in Crossarra, and that the day she had agreed to marry him was the happiest day of his life. It was the last thing he had said to her in that awful cubicle in the hospital with the cow-faced doctor standing over him, claiming him for her own. They had tried to put Mary out but they couldn’t move her. Tom had a hold of her hand and she was going nowhere, not if the heavens fell on the two of them and the earth cracked beneath her feet. She stood her ground against the lot of them. Then Tom pulled her down to him and said that to her about their marriage. And then he was gone.