At the meadow, where Ned had said he would find them, Louis leaned on a gate and watched men scything the sweet smelling grass. He felt the tension of the morning melt away as he watched cow parsley blooms swaying crazily back and forth, bowing in unison under the weight of butterflies that landed and took off from their floral platforms.
He felt at peace for the first time since the bombing and knew that getting away from the arena of army life would put him back on an even keel. But more importantly, accepting Ned’s invitation gave him the chance to see Cat again.
As he stood watching he realised he was in a world that had evolved at a much slower pace. It was full of sweet smelling country odours and insects that appeared and then disappeared without warning.
The children here could run and play on soft green grass, not the harsh sounding cobbled streets of home in Plumstead. He was breathing air that was heavily scented by the smell of nearby milking cows, and the unmistakable aroma of burning peat wafting from the chimney at Monroe.
There was a quality of stillness in everyone’s activity and the only distraction to his sense of calm was the droning buzz of bees.
Afraid of dispelling the dream-like scene he silently opened the gate and stepped forward into long grass unwillingly trampling the emerald cover. He spotted Ned in the distance rhythmically moving from the waist, guillotining the crop with his scythe.
Then as though some intuition had told him of Louis’ presence, Ned looked up and waved.
Several people stopped and stared at Louis as he approached. Their faces were bronzed and weathered and the men greeted him by tipping their caps. As they did so, they showed their blue/black hair which glistened like magpie plumes under the white-hot sun, reminding him of peasants he had seen in Italy one summer. He thought how remarkably Mediterranean some of them looked. The women just stared and the youngest children clung to their mothers’ skirts, wary of the stranger.
Ned approached. 'Glad to see ye, Louis. C’mon over here and I'll introduce ye to me son.’ Ned let his scythe fall and went over to a tall, muscular, fair-headed man.
'Tom this is Louis, the English fella I was tellin’ ye about.'
Tom smiled, his eyes crinkling at the corners.
‘Hello, how are ye? So ye've come to find out how to cut hay have ye?'
'Yes, your father said he could use an extra pair of hands.'
'We've to get this lot in quickly before the weather changes. ‘’Twill spoil if we don't cut it today and it rains tomorrow.' He bent to tie up one of the hay-cocks.
Louis watched Tom’s huge hands deftly manoeuvre each bundle, and then he remembered the football match the previous week.
'By the way, congratulations on winning the cup last Saturday, I was sorry to have missed it.'
Tom straightened up and smiled, ‘Sure ’twas a grand match.’
Ned then asked Louis to follow him and they wandered down the rows of cut crops to where some of the others were tying and stacking hay-cocks.
Louis' eyes scanned the faces looking for the one he wanted to see most, but she wasn’t there. As Ned introduced them all, he felt he would never remember their names; it seemed to him that they were all called Tom, Neddy, or Mary!
Ned showed him what to do, then gave him his long-handled scythe and left him to it. Louis took off his jacket and tried to do as Ned had shown him, but however he angled the scythe, nothing was achieved. He just could not get the knack of positioning the blade at the right angle.
Feeling foolish, he called to Tom. ‘This sickle won’t cut the grass.’
Tom grinned and ambled over to him. 'Stand upright, Louis, then pull the handle in toward yer chest as ye swirl the blade.' Tom took the scythe and demonstrated the action once more.
Then, taking the scythe into his own hands exactly as Tom had, Louis began cutting.
He went slowly at first and then as he perfected the action he was afraid to stop unless he lost the knack, so he went down the field, relentlessly swinging the scythe back and forth beheading the crop. Pleased with himself, he worked his way to the end of the field and when he turned around sweating and laughing - he saw her!
She was walking toward him, the hem of her skirt kicking up in front of her boots. In one arm she cradled a stone jug and hanging on the other arm was a basket swinging to the beat of her body.
The Italians had told him that when the thunderbolt hit you, the woman would be the love of your life. He knew he had been hit by the thunderbolt!
Louis’ tension mounted as she drew nearer; then she stopped to chat to someone. He watched her laughing, throwing back her head, curls bobbing on the shoulders of her white blouse. Lucky curls, he thought. He absorbed the sight of her, distracted from his cutting and seduced by her presence. Now she was looking at him, shielding her eyes from the blazing sun, saying something he couldn’t hear.
He flushed and called back. 'Sorry, I didn’t hear you.’
Smiling, she repeated what she'd said; but when he couldn’t hear for the second time, she laughed and walked toward him. His heart pounded and he began practising his battle calming routine, remembering to wait until he saw the whites of her eyes before he moved. He had never felt such emotion, but then the thunderbolt had never struck him before.
As she approached he thought for a moment that he was going to rush forward, lose control, and take her in his arms. Instead he raised the scythe and picked off the grass sticking to the blade.
'How about stoppin’ for a bite to eat and drink?' She smiled at him, one hand moving self-consciously to her throat where the blouse button was undone.
Suddenly his life as a soldier, the prospect of a war, his home in England, the family, no longer mattered to him. He desired only to watch the flame of beauty burning brightly on her face.
Their eyes met.
She looked away blushing, and then walked quickly back to Tom and with trembling hands, unstopped the stone flask. After a while Louis followed her and flopped down beside Tom who offered him the drink.
'Here, Louis, this'll put hairs on yer chest.'
Louis took the flask and laid it down on the grass beside him as he watched Cat pulling off hunks of bread from a loaf. She passed the bread to Tom, avoiding Louis’ eyes.
'Give, Louis some of this bread, Tom and I’ll go see where Ellie's got to.'
She strode off across the field and disappeared through the gate while Louis absent-mindedly broke off a piece of bread and pushed it into his mouth to stifle his disappointment. He picked up the flask and took a gulp, then gasped.
'God in heaven, Tom, what the hell's this?'
Tom grinned. ’Tis Mummy’s poitín10. Careful now ye don’t want to drink too much on an empty stomach. Take some more bread with it.’
Louis sucked air into his mouth wiping away tears with the back of his hand while Tom shot him a sideways glance. ‘Drink some more, ye’ll be fine now ye've some bread inside ye.’ Tom reached for the flask and wiped the top with his shirt before taking a swig of the poitín.
Louis lay back on one elbow and tried to sound casual. 'Who's Cat engaged to?'
‘Nobody, why?’
‘Oh, I just wondered.’
‘Well,’ Tom said, ‘she was engaged to Paddy Hogan, but somethin’s gone wrong and she won’t see him.’
Louis felt a thrill of satisfaction. ‘That wouldn’t be any relation to Tommy Hogan who was killed recently was it?’
‘ Yes. ’Twas his brother. A terrible affair. But we don’t get involved in that kind of stuff. We mind our own business.’
Louis fell silent, then after a pause, changed the subject. ‘Who’s Ellie?’
'Oh, she’s one of me sisters. She's home for the weekend. She works out at The Grange cookin’ and waitin’ on the lady of the house.'
'So how many sisters do you have, apart from Cat and Ellie?'
‘Three. They run a little shop in Main Street, Peggy, Mary and Breda. They'll be along tonight after closin’ the shop. We're roastin’ a pig. Mummy’s roast pig is the best to be had hereabouts. D'ya like pig?'
'Yes, I do.'
‘Good, then ye’ll enjoy it after a hard day’s work.’ Tom stood up and continued cutting the hay.
Louis could hardly wait. In a few hours he told himself he would be able to see her for the whole evening; spend time with her; savour the vision of her. Such a small price to pay, he thought, for doing a little hard work.
Eventually the long day slipped its way into early evening as the final yield was bundled onto a donkey cart then pulled downhill to the barn. Swaying from side to side the cart wobbled like tea-party jelly, topped with children hitching a lift as it crossed the field and rumbled its way down the dusty boreen11.
* * *
As dusk stole unnoticed by the little gathering in the farmyard, the women carved up roast pig and delivered fat juicy slices to everyones’ plates. Chairs appeared in the yard as bats flew overhead and Ned settled down to play his flute to them. Cat began running through preliminary notes on a melodeon and Breda took her violin from its case.
Louis looked on fascinated by the trio, wishing he'd brought his own violin with him.
The trio played, filling the honey-suckled night air with a sweet sound that wrapped itself around the breeze, and was carried away across the valley.
Later in the evening, encouraged by drinking a large glass of poitín, Louis borrowed Breda's violin and played to the fascinated audience. They saw the arm that had held a rifle and shot men, rise to command the innocent bow; slowly and sweetly drawing it across the strings to produce the poignant notes of an intermezzo.
When he finished playing, he saw Cat was watching him. Their eyes met briefly before she suddenly looked away, but he had seen something in that look.
The moon coasted high in the night sky, radiating its silver sheen earthward, before it slipped slowly away behind Sleivenamon mountain. The fire beneath the remnants of the pig dimmed and people began to drift away home.
Everyone was thanked for helping and all agreed it had been a grand day. Sleeping children were lifted onto shoulders to be carried by parents who wouldn’t bother to go to bed because it was too hot.
Ned insisted Louis stayed on to share a nightcap and they sat talking about the state of affairs in Europe.
Louis sensed Ned was leading up ask him the question he did not want to answer, and eventually he did.
‘Will ye stay here long now or will ye be called back to England?'
Louis shrugged. ‘Anything’s possible,’ he replied, but did not add that in a few days they would be gone.
The men were silent when Cat and Ellie hurried past them giggling, and Louis watched them running down the pathway towards the river. He could hear them shrieking and frolicking in the water and it made him feel an agonising mixture of happiness - tinged with sadness.
Louis did not want this night to end or to leave this place and enter the theatre of war which now seemed inevitable. He sat deep in thought listening to their laughter as dawn broke, watching all the stars in the crimson and sapphire sky disappear, one by one.
10 Poitín - an Irish, highly alcoholic distilled beverage traditionally distilled in a small pot (pronounced potcheen)
11 Boreen - a narrow country lane (pronounced bore-een)