Authors: Maeve Binchy
“We could see that a proportion of it comes this way …” Frank began, and Clara knew she had him on the ropes.
“This is where he wanted his money to go. It comes
here,”
she said.
“The art of the deal is knowing when to compromise,” Frank said.
“That's balls,” Clara said pleasantly. “Something is either right or it's wrong. I don't look at a patient and say his arteries are all clogged up and he needs angioplasty, but then, on the other hand, I don't feel able to do all the paperwork so we'll compromise and I'll ask him to come back in three months and we'll get it started then. That's not the way things work in the real world, Frank.”
“I'm sorry, that
is
the way.” He went on to raise his offer from
one-third of Jimmy's estate to half. He met nothing but a shake of Claras glossy head of hair.
“It's not a fair comparison,” he blustered. “You took an oath to help people. It's different for you.”
“I did take an oath and I'm keeping to it.”
“I didn't take any such oath,” he said.
Clara laughed aloud. “Oh, yes, you did. You vowed you would make life as difficult, as penny-pinching, nitpicking and bureaucratic as it could possibly be. You promised yourself that the spirit of a hospital should never be considered when the real thing, the letter of the law, can be brought into play But you picked the wrong one in me, Frank. I'm not going to lie down and roll over.”
“I didn't pick you at all. I was landed with you!” Frank had some spirit at least. “And I would remind you that this clinic didn't exist before and may well not exist after your time. You refer to it as if it were an important entity in its own right instead of very small potatoes, which is what this place is.”
“It's what this place
was
and would have still been if you'd been allowed your way. But it's not now and it's going to be even better and Jimmy's money will bring it to the next stage.” She was very angry now.
“The place is funded by the hospital—” he began.
“If you think, Frank Ennis, that I am going to waste one more minute of time arguing with you about whether we rent chairs for a lecture or buy them and store them, if you think that I will ever again go through the humiliating experience of pleading with you to pay what are very low fees to visiting experts for this series of lectures …If you think that I am going to spend hours talking to you and your bonehead colleagues about the feasibility—God, I hate that
word, feasibility
—of having a youth program so that schoolkids could come in and learn about their bloody hearts and how to keep them beating properly—”
“You never mentioned having children come in here!” Frank could see a thousand problems already.
“I didn't because I am weary to the soles of my feet dealing with
you on any subject, and so Jimmy's money will buy us time and freedom to set this up on our own.” She actually sounded weary.
“But you can't—”
“I can and I will, Frank. And now I'm going to a cookery demonstration. We have over fifty people waiting in Lavender's room, the dietitian's space which you said need only be a desk and a chair.”
“She's not cooking with a live flame, is she?” Frank said, horrified.
“I very much hope so, Frank. She has a two-ring gas grill and a big mirror behind her set at an angle.”
“And who paid for the mirror, if I might ask?”
“You might ask, even though it's actually none of your business. Hilary and I bought it at an auction. Johnny and Tim put it up on the wall for us. It cost you and the money boys and girls precisely nothing!”
Clara was moving purposefully toward the cookery demonstration. Frank could see other people in the clinic heading in the same direction. That red-haired doctor who had been in the bad car crash but had made a miraculous recovery. The two pretty nurses, Fiona and Barbara, the muscle man, Johnny, who looked as if he should be a bouncer outside a nightclub rather than working in a medical setting. Also that rather silent security man, Tim, who had been appointed here in a very high-handed way by Clara instead of taking part in the hospital's general security system. This whole place had become dangerously like a family, or even a province that was about to declare independence and call itself a nation. He had better go and see what horrific liberties she was taking with health and safety at this demonstration. He was amazed at the buzz of conversation. These people
had
formed a little community. It would have to be watched carefully.
Lavender was a born performer. She could have had her own television program. Clara's mind raced ahead. Maybe Lavender could have a slot on someone's talk show, “Five Minutes for Your Heart.”
There was a small lecture on salt and the Irish obsession with spreading a salt shaker over all food. Lavender suggested having no salt on the table. If you thought up enough other harmless seasonings there was no need. She took fillets of mackerel, showed them to the audience. You could buy packets or else ask a fishmonger to fillet them for you. In a glass you mixed the juice of an orange, a lime and a lemon and a spoonful of vegetable oil, and you brushed the mackerel with this and then grilled them.
They smelled terrific and as the plate was passed around for people to taste, Lavender was busy grilling more. Everyone would want a taste and some people were taking seconds. There was an easy salad that went with it and Lavender said that their hearts would thank them warmly for such food.
In spite of himself, Frank was impressed. The bright cheery room, the no-nonsense Lavender, the general air of hope and of being in control of their own lives. When this clinic had been first considered, that was the mandate, the mission statement; and for all her annoying ways, Clara
was
getting it done.
When the demonstration was over, Clara got a message to call her daughter Adi.
“Sorry, Mam. I was talking to Linda about something else and she said we're both to call you ‘Clara from now on. Is that right or is it just Linda being cracked?”
“It's Linda being cracked.
She's
calling me Clara. I said that was fine with me if she had something worthwhile to say. Do you know she said that the grand reception we're organizing here was a
cake sale?”
Clara's face got red with anger again.
“Yeah, she knows that was a mistake. She doesn't listen, Mam, that's all.”
“She'll need to learn to listen someday,” Clara said.
“She's sorry. She's cooking a dinner tonight to try and make it up, buying the things herself. It's so rare, Mam, I think we should sort of be there.”
“I don't want to sit and watch Linda mess up my kitchen and then say I'm organizing a cake sale.”
“She'll never say that again, Mam.”
“I don't want to go. Honestly, I
do
n’
t feel
like it. And look at all the times Lady Linda has done or hasn't done things because of how she feels!”
“Oh, Mam, I'm having a bad day too,
and
I had to persuade Gerry to come.”
“Well, exactly.” Clara felt a surge of affection for the silent Gerry.
“No, that's not it, Mam. How will there ever be peace of any kind unless four people can sit down to a one-off meal made by Linda?”
“She'll have things that you and Gerry won't eat,” Clara countered.
“No, she won't. She checked with me. It sounds lovely: chickpeas and tomatoes and garlic and things.”
“Terrific,” Clara said.
“And she's getting you a fillet steak. And Gerry and I aren't to start wrinkling up our noses at it and talking about dead animals, and we've all agreed to that.”
“I don't
want
steak. I'll eat her bloody chickpeas!” Clara roared as she slammed down the phone.
To her annoyance she saw that Frank Ennis was watching her from the door with a smile on his face. “Sorry, Frank, a bit of a domestic,” she said, trying to make light of it.
“No, no, please. I'm just glad to see that you lose your temper with other people as well as with me,” he said and left.
“Take no notice,” Hilary said. “He's just trying to get at you.”
“I know,” Clara said.
“I know, Clara, I know. Ania's gone out to get us a nice healthy lunch.”
“I don't want a nice healthy lunch. I want a plate of French fries followed by an ice cream and washed down with a huge gin and tonic.”
“Kindly remember where you are, Clara. You'll get a salad sandwich on wholemeal with a piece of fruit.”
“It still won't bring down my blood pressure,” Clara said. “The drug that could combat Linda Casey hasn't been invented yet.”
• • •
Clara brought a bottle of wine to the feast.
Linda looked very pleased and said there was no need, but she opened it immediately, so it was obviously better than what she had bought herself.
She had to admit that Linda had made an effort. There was a bowl of crudités on the table with a series of dips. Linda had chopped all those vegetables up herself. She had warmed up some healthy, stone-ground bread. She bent, flushed and worried, over her casserole. The main course was surprisingly good and she had made coffee to serve with the fruit platter afterward. Nobody, not a cardiologist or two vegetarians, could have anything but praise and support.
Clara was about to tell a story about Hilary at the clinic, and then she remembered that if their plot was to work Linda and Nick must never know that the two women were friends. So instead she asked about the record shop and was surprised to hear that Linda had been promoted and asked to expand a section on jazz.
She had been about to say, “I never knew that you knew anything about any kind of music.” Instead she said, “That's good. Nice to see your interests being rewarded.” And she saw her elder daughter smile at her approvingly. Peace had been created, for a time anyway, in their kitchen.
After dinner there was a surprise call from Alan. Clara had been expecting some calls about the reception, so she answered the phone.
“Oh, hello, love. Are you on your own?” he said.
“No, Alan, we're having a family dinner.”
“Family?” he asked, startled.
“Yes, Alan. Our two daughters, Adi and Linda, and Adi's boyfriend, Gerry. You
do
remember them, I hope?” She could hear the others giggling behind her.
“Don't be such a bitch, Clara!”
“Sorry?”
“So smart-arsed,” he said.
“No, I mean, sorry, Alan, did you want something?”
“I did, but no, not with you in that mood.”
“Right, another time then.” She was about to hang up.
“Clara, please. Please!”
“What, Alan?”
“Can you come and meet me somewhere?”
“Not tonight, as I said. Another time.”
“I need to talk tonight.”
“I can't tonight. The evening isn't over yet, and anyway, I've had some wine so I can't drive. Give me a ring at work one morning.”
“She's thrown me out,” he said.
“Cinta? Never!”
“Yes, I'm afraid.”
“But the baby, it must be nearly due now?”
“In two weeks. But she's giving it away to her sister who can't have children.”
“But, Alan, that's
your
baby too.”
“Do you think that's making a blind bit of difference? She says that I didn't get divorced in time to be married for the child's birth and so I have no say.”
“But that's not fair. You started the divorce proceedings once you knew she was pregnant.”
“Yes, around then. More or less.”
“So are you going to let her give your child away?”
“What choice have I, Clara? She holds all the cards.”
“And has she found somebody else?”
“No. No way. She's going to study, she says, and needs her freedom.”
“And did this all come out of a clear blue sky?”
“To me it did,” Alan said sadly.
“Well, to whom did it not?”
“To my friends,
our
friends, anyone who knows her. There was a bit of a misunderstanding about something a couple of weeks back,
but I thought it was all done and dusted. Apparently she was brooding about it. How was I to know?”
“Poor Alan.” She was actually sorry for him.
“So I was wondering …”
“No, Alan.”
“We are still man and wife. It's still my home.”
“Nonsense, Alan, there was a separation agreement. The divorce will be through shortly. You have no more right to come here than you have to go and stay with the president of Ireland up at Phoenix Park.”
There was a silence at his end.
“I wish you luck,” she said.
“I have nowhere to go, Clara.”
“Good night, Alan.”
The girls were looking at her with curiosity. Gerry had tactfully started doing the washing-up.
The questions hung in the air. Clara knew she must answer them somehow. He
was
their father: she mustn't be too flip and dismissive.
“It's complicated,” she began. “Your father doesn't change.”
“So he was caught at it again,” Linda suggested.
“Apparently,” Clara said.
“Will you take him back, Mam?” Adi asked.
“No, Adi. No, I won't.”
“And his baby?” Linda asked.
“Is being given away to the bimbo's sister.”
“And Dad isn't…” Adi could hardly believe any of this.
“No, darling, he isn't. It was different with you two. He really loves you both. Yes, in his funny, mad, complicated way he
does
love you.”
“And does he
love you,
Mam?” Adi asked.
“He loves the memory of me. He loves what I was twenty-something years ago. It's a kind of love.”
Linda spoke. “Clara's right. Alan is who he is. The sooner we all accept that then the sooner we can all move on.”
Clara stood up. “Talking of moving on, I suggest we have a liqueur as my treat. I think we've all earned it.” And she closed the curtains in case Alan drove by and looked in the window. He was a fool, but she didn't want to make his life a misery seeing what really had turned out to be a happy family dinner taking place in the household he had walked out of, causing so much pain and upset all those years ago.
“More cheerful?” Hilary asked the next day.