Songs of Love and War (5 page)

‘Yes, she did,’ Maud replied. ‘I’ve practised with her but you know young people, they read much too quickly.’

‘I understand she will soon be leaving us for London.’

‘I don’t know how I shall make do without her,’ said Maud, who always managed to swing every conversation round to herself. ‘I shall be quite bereft with only Elspeth for
company.’

‘You will soon have Harry back for the holidays and of course you still have—’ He was about to mention Kitty but Maud cut him off briskly.

‘One pays a heavy price for a good education,’ she said solemnly. ‘But it is the way of the world and Harry is happy at Eton so I shouldn’t complain. I miss him terribly.
He is worth ten of my daughters. God didn’t see fit to give me more sons,’ she added reproachfully, as if the Rector were somehow responsible.

‘Your daughters will look after you in old age,’ said the Rector helpfully, draining his glass of sherry.

‘Harry will look after me in my old age. My daughters will be much too busy with their own children to think about me.’

At that moment Adeline joined them, her sweet smile and twinkling eyes giving the Rector a warm feeling of relief. ‘We were just saying, Lady Deverill, how daughters are great comforts to
their mothers in old age.’

‘I wouldn’t know, my daughter having crossed the Atlantic without a backward glance,’ said Adeline, not unkindly. ‘But I’m sure you’re right. Maud is quite
spoiled with three daughters.’ Maud averted her eyes. Adeline had an unsettling way of looking right through her as if she recognized her shortcomings for what they were and was even slightly
amused by them.

‘There’s a good chance Victoria and Elspeth will marry Englishmen and leave Ireland altogether. My hope lies with Harry for, whomever he weds, he will live here.’

Adeline looked steadily at Maud. ‘You’re forgetting Kitty, my dear.’

The Rector grinned broadly, for he was very fond of the youngest Deverill. ‘Now
she
won’t be leaving Ireland, not Kitty. I’d put a lot of money on her marrying an
Irishman.’ Maud tried to smile but her crimson lips could only manage a grimace.

Adeline shook her head, her special affection for Kitty undisguised. ‘She’s quite fearless. She’ll do something surprising, for certain. I’d put good money on
that.’
Maud felt she was expected to add something to the conversation, but she didn’t really know what her daughter was like. Only that she had the same flame-red hair as
Adeline and the same unsettling knowing in her eyes.

At last O’Flynn appeared in the doorway to announce that dinner was now ready. Maud found her husband discussing the next hunt meeting with his father, who was already on his third glass
of sherry. Lord Deverill always managed to look moth-eaten. His grey hair was wild, as if he had just arrived at a gallop, and his dinner jacket looked as if it had been nibbled at the elbows by
mice. As hard as Skiddy tried to keep his master’s clothes clean and pressed, they still appeared to have been pulled out of the bottom of a drawer – and he refused, doggedly, to buy
new clothes, ever. ‘May I have the pleasure of escorting you in to dinner, Maud?’ Hubert asked, taking pleasure from her beautiful face. Maud, who could always rely on her
father-in-law’s support, slipped her hand under his arm and allowed him to lead her into the dining room.

Bertie escorted the Shrubs on either arm, allowing their excited chatter to rise above him like the unobtrusive twittering of birds. The Rector walked in with Adeline, their conversation having
been reduced to a one-sided lecture by him on women’s suffrage, to which Adeline listened with half an ear and even less interest.

They stood to say grace, Hubert at the head, Adeline at the foot, with the Rector on Adeline’s right side, next to a furious Maud. They bowed their heads and the Rector spoke in the low,
portentous voice of the pulpit. The moment it was over the door burst open and Rupert, Bertie’s younger brother, stood dishevelled and obviously drunk with his hands on the door frame.
‘Is there a place for me?’ he asked, appealing to his mother.

Adeline didn’t look at all surprised to see her middle child, who lived in the house previously occupied by her late mother-in-law, the Dowager Lady Deverill, a mile or so across the
fields, overlooking the sea. ‘Why don’t you sit between your aunts,’ she said, sinking into her chair.

Hubert, who had less patience for his hopeless son and believed he would have done better to have joined his younger sister in America, found a wife and perhaps made something of his life, gave
a loud ‘Harrumph’ and said, ‘Cook’s day off, is it?’

Rupert smiled with all his charm. ‘I heard my dear aunts Hazel and Laurel were coming for dinner, Papa, and I couldn’t resist.’ The Shrubs blushed with pleasure, unaware of his
slightly mocking tone, and moved apart so O’Flynn could slip a chair between them.

‘What a delightful evening this has turned out to be,’ gushed Laurel. ‘Don’t you think, Hazel?’

‘Oh, I most certainly do, Laurel. Come and sit down, Rupert my dear, and tell us what you have been up to. You lead such an exciting life, doesn’t he? In fact, we were only saying
yesterday what it must be to be young, weren’t we, Laurel?’

‘Oh yes, we were. We’re so old, Hazel and I, that all we can do is enjoy the little titbits you give us, Rupert, like crumbs from the rich man’s table.’

Rupert sat down and unfolded his napkin. ‘What has Mrs Doyle cooked up for us this evening?’ he said.

It was past midnight when Bertie and Maud drove back to the Hunting Lodge. Maud vented her fury to her weary and pleasantly tipsy husband. ‘Rupert is a disgrace, turning
up uninvited like that. He was smashed, too, and poorly dressed. You’d have thought he’d have the decency to dress properly for dinner, considering the amount of money your father
lavishes on him.’ She fell forward as the carriage went over a pothole.

‘Mama and Papa don’t care about that sort of thing,’ he replied with a yawn.

‘They should care. Civilization is about standards. This country would descend into barbarism if it wasn’t for people like us keeping the standards up. Appearances matter, Bertie.
Your parents should set an example.’

‘Are you suggesting they’re poorly dressed, Maud?’

‘Your father’s eaten by moths. What harm would it do to go to London and visit his tailor once in a while?’

‘He’s got more important things to think about.’

‘Like hunting, shooting and fishing, I suppose?’

‘Quite so. He is old. Leave him to his pleasure.’

‘As for your aunts, they’re ridiculous.’

‘They’re happy and good and kind. You’re a harsh judge of people, Maud. Is there no one you like?’

‘Rupert needs a wife,’ she added, changing the subject.

‘Then find him one.’

‘He should go to London and look for a nice English girl with good manners and a firm hand to smack him into shape.’

‘You’re bitter, Maud. Was tonight really so bad?’

‘Oh, you had a splendid time in the dining room, drinking port and smoking cigars, while we languished in the drawing room. Do you know, your mother and her sisters are going to hold a
séance here at the castle? They’re a trio of witches. It’s absurd.’

‘Oh, leave them to their fun, my dear. How does it affect you if they want to communicate with the dead?’

Maud realized her argument was weak. ‘It’s ungodly,’ she added tartly. ‘I don’t imagine the Rector would think much of their game – no good will come of it,
mark my words.’

‘I still don’t see how it affects
you,
Maud.’

‘Your mother is a bad influence on Kitty,’ she rejoined, knowing that Kitty’s name would carry more weight.

Bertie frowned and rubbed his bristly chin. ‘Ah Kitty,’ he sighed, feeling a stab of guilt.

‘She spends much too much time talking nonsense with her grandmother.’

‘Might that be because
you
don’t spend any time with her at all?’

Maud sat in silence for a while, affronted. Bertie had never complained before about her obvious lack of interest in their youngest. Besides, it was customary that young children should be kept
out of sight and in the nursery with their governesses. Then it came to her in a sudden flood of pain: Grace Rowan-Hampton must have mentioned it to him. By keeping her enemy close she had allowed
a spy into her home.

The carriage drew up in front of the Hunting Lodge and stopped outside the front door. It was lightly drizzling, what the locals called ‘soft rain’. A strong wind swept over the
land, moaning eerily as it dashed through the bare branches of the horse chestnut trees. The butler was waiting for them in the hall with an oil lamp to light their way upstairs. Feeling more
discontented than ever, Maud followed her husband up to the landing, hoping he would notice her silence and ask what was troubling her. ‘Goodnight, my dear,’ he said, without so much as
a glance. She watched him disappear into his room and close the door behind him. Furiously she went into hers, where her lady’s maid was waiting to unhook her dress. Without a word she turned
her back expectantly.

The following morning Kitty breakfasted with Miss Grieve in the nursery then dressed for church. The Sunday service, in the church of St Patrick in Ballinakelly, was the only
time the family all gathered together. The only time Kitty really saw her parents. Miss Grieve had put out a fresh white pinafore and polished black boots and spent much longer than necessary
combing the knots out of her hair without any consideration for the pain she caused. But Kitty fixed her stare on the grey clouds scudding across the sky outside the window and willed herself not
to shed a single tear.

While her parents and grandparents rode in carriages, Kitty and her sisters sat in the pony and trap with Miss Grieve in the front beside Mr Mills, who held the reins. Victoria was pretty like
her mother with a wide, heart-shaped face, a long, straight nose and shrewish blue eyes. Her blonde hair fell down to her waist in lustrous curls as she sat with her back straight and her chin up,
much too aware of her own beauty and the admiring looks it aroused. Elspeth was more modest and less attractive than her elder sister. Her hair was mouse-brown, her nose a fleshy button, her
expression as submissive and dim-witted as a lap dog’s. The older girls ignored Kitty completely, preferring to talk to each other. But Kitty didn’t mind: she was much too busy looking
around at the fields of cows and sheep. ‘Mother says I have to have new dresses made for London,’ said Victoria happily, holding her hat so it didn’t fly off in the wind.
‘She has already sent my measurements to Cousin Beatrice. I can hardly wait. They’ll be the most fashionable designs for sure.’

‘You’re so lucky,’ said Elspeth, who had a tendency to elongate her vowels so that her voice sounded like a whine. ‘I wish I were coming with you. Instead I’m going
to be all alone with no one to talk to but Mama. It’s going to be frightfully dull without you.’

‘You had better get used to it, Elspeth,’ said her sister sharply. ‘I fully intend to find a husband.’

‘That’s what it’s all for, I suppose.’

‘Mama told me that if one doesn’t find a husband it is because one is ugly, dull or both.’

‘You are neither ugly nor dull,’ said Elspeth. ‘Fortunately neither of us inherited Grandma’s ginger hair.’

‘It’s not ginger,’ interrupted Kitty from beneath her bonnet. ‘It’s Titian red.’

Her sisters giggled. ‘Mama says it’s ginger,’ said Victoria meanly.

‘It’s very unlucky to have red hair,’ Elspeth added. ‘Fishermen will head for home if they see a red-haired woman on the way to their boats. Clodagh told me,’ she
said, referring to one of the maids.

‘You’d better keep it under that bonnet of yours then,’ said Victoria. She looked down at her youngest sister and Kitty lifted her grey eyes and stared at her boldly. Victoria
stopped laughing and grew suddenly afraid. There was something scary in her sister’s gaze, as if she could cast a spell just by looking at someone. ‘Let’s not be unkind,’
she said uneasily, not wanting to incite Kitty’s wrath in case she somehow jinxed her first London season. ‘Red hair is all right if it’s combined with a pretty face, isn’t
that so, Elspeth?’ She dug her elbow into her sister’s ribs.

‘Yes, it is,’ Elspeth agreed dutifully. But Kitty was no longer listening. She was watching the local Catholic children walking back from Mass, looking for Bridie and Jack
O’Leary.

Ballinakelly was a quaint town of pretty white houses that clustered on the hillside like mussels on a rock, all the way down to the sea. There was a small harbour, three
churches (St Patrick’s, Church of Ireland, the Methodist church and the Catholic church of All Saints), a high street of little shops and four public houses, which were always full. The local
children attended the school, which was run by the Catholic church, and gathered at the shrine to the Virgin Mary most evenings to witness the statue swaying, which it very often did, apparently
all on its own. Built into the hillside in 1828 to commemorate a young girl’s vision, it had become something of a tourist attraction in the summer months as pilgrims travelled from far and
wide to see it, falling to their knees in the mud and crossing themselves devoutly when it duly rattled. The children were greatly amused by the spectacle, running off in their pack of scruffy
scamps, hiding their fear beneath peals of nervous laughter. It was whispered that horses sometimes baulked when passing it, foretelling a tragedy.

The pony and trap made its way slowly through the town. Kitty eagerly searched the rabble of Catholic children walking towards her. They were pale with hunger, having fasted from the evening
before, and dazed with boredom from the service. At last she saw Bridie, treading heavily up the street with her family. Her face, half-hidden behind a tangle of knotted hair, was grim. Kitty knew
she didn’t like going to Mass. Father Quinn was a severe and unforgiving priest, prone to outbursts of indignation in the pulpit and quite often reproachful finger-wagging as he picked on
members of the congregation whom he felt had, in some way, transgressed. The poorest among them received the worst of his tongue-lashing.