That Gallagher Girl (31 page)

‘That's just what I thought. Who used to live here?'

‘Lots of people,' Río told him. ‘You wouldn't think to look at it that such a modern house could be haunted. But there are lots of ghosts banging about in there.'

The man raised an amused eyebrow. ‘Sounds intriguing,' he said. ‘Might you tell me about them over a drink in O'Toole's?'

Río hesitated, listening to the clamourous ghosts calling to her from the grounds of the house that was once known as Coral Cottage, hearing the voices of family and friends and kindred spirits: her mother, her sister, her son; the men she had loved, the men she had lost. Then she turned back to the tall dark stranger and gave him a level look.

‘I might,' she said.

Keeley was in her Dublin office, working late, listlessly going through her slush pile. The slush pile was full of wannabes. Wannabe Marian Keyes and Cathy Kellys and Sheila O'Flanagans, wannabe Stig Larsons and John Connellys. There was not a single voice calling out to her from that pile that said ‘Choose me! I'm different! I'm a notice box, and I'm very, very good!'

Relations with Camilla Featherstonehaugh had cooled since Keeley had not been able to produce Cat from the hat. She had felt like a complete tool when she'd finally had to 'fess up to the fact that her protégé had gone AWOL, and the wondrous
Catgirl
series with her. Keeley had tried and tried to contact Cat on her mobile phone, but without success. It was as if the girl had been a chimera, a figment of Keeley's imagination, a
pooka
.

Casting aside a typescript aptly entitled
These Foolish Things
, Keeley reached for her phone and pressed speeddial for Cat. This she had done on a random basis, every few days or so before she had moved into her smart new premises and got bogged down by business, never really expecting the girl to pick up. But, hey . . . what was this? There was something new about the ringtone. Aha! Catgirl was on the move, somewhere foreign, by the sound of it.

‘Hello.'

Keeley nearly dropped the phone.

‘Hello?' she bellowed.

‘Wrong number,' said Cat.

‘No! No, Cat! Don't put down the phone! It's me! It's Keeley!'

‘Who?'

‘Keeley Considine!'

‘Oh. Hello.'

‘Cat – where the fuck are you? I've been trying to get hold of you for weeks! Oh – thank God I've finally reached you!'

‘What's up?'

‘Listen up. I've fantastic news. I've set up an extraordinary deal for you, with a major publishing house in the UK. World rights to the Catgirl books, with illustrations by you!'

‘Oh, yeah. Raoul mentioned something about that.'

‘He did? So why didn't you get on to me right away?'

‘Why would I want to do that?'

‘Because this is
huge
, Cat! This deal has the potential to make you a very rich woman indeed!'

‘Like a millionaire?'

‘Yes!'

‘Well thanks very much for the offer, Keeley, but no thanks. I'm perfectly happy as I am.'

Keeley laughed. ‘Don't tease, Cat. I'm absolutely serious.'

‘So am I. The stories aren't for sale.'

‘What?'

‘They're my stories. They're mine, and nobody else's. My mama made them for me, and nobody else should ever have laid eyes on them.'

‘But Cat . . . don't you see the potential? We're talking a global phenomenom here – translation into countless languages! Movie rights! Audio books in Klingon! You could be as big as J.K. Rowling!'

‘Who's he?'

Was this girl for real? ‘Cat – listen to me. Please listen.'

‘No,' said Cat. ‘No. I'd rather not listen. Goodbye, Keeley.'

And there came the sound of what might have been a splash, and a fizzy noise, and then silence.

‘Cat? Cat!
Cat!
'

Keeley pressed ‘End Call' and then ‘Redial' with frantic fingers. Nothing happened. She pressed ‘Redial' again, and again, and again. Still nothing. Electric with panic, Keeley scrolled through her contacts, fingers going like Road Runner, until she found Raoul's number.

‘I'm sorry to bother you, Raoul,' she gibbered. ‘It's Keeley Considine here—'

‘Sorry. Who?'

‘Keeley Considine – the literary agent who wishes to represent your sister Caitlín.'

‘Oh, yes. I told her you'd phoned. Did you get in touch with her yet?'

‘Yes. We've just spoken, but I think her phone's on the blink, and I can't reconnect with her.'

‘What did she say?'

‘She said she was perfectly happy, and that she didn't want to do a deal. Can you believe it?' Keeley managed a shaky laugh.

‘Yes, I can. She
is
perfectly happy. I think you should leave her alone now, Keeley.'

‘What? You can't be serious! Have you any idea how much this deal could be worth? We're talking megabucks here! We're talking millions!'

‘That's not what it's all about, Keeley. It's about the work, ain't it? It's about getting a fair price for what you think your work is worth, and some things simply aren't for sale.'

‘Good God, Raoul – I can't believe you're saying this! Don't you see that this could set your sister up for life?'

‘She's well set up where she is. She's already told you that she's perfectly happy. I'd leave her alone now. Goodbye, Keeley.'

‘But Raoul—'

‘Goodbye.'

And Raoul put the phone down.

What! What the
fuck
were the Gallaghers up to? They were mad. Stark, staring fucking mad – all three of them. They were certifiably insane . . . they needed their thick fucking heads read.

Keeley was so infuriated that she sent her new iPhone skidding across the coffee table. It landed on the slush pile, not the floor, thank goodness. Marching into the little kitchen that adjoined her office, she poured an indecent amount of wine into a large goblet, then returned to the sitting room, wishing she smoked, or that the wineglass had been a cheap one. Then she could have smashed it instead of setting it carefully down by her cream suede upholstered armchair.

She needed something –
anything
to do, to stop her mind careering around that fucking Gallagher girl who had messed around with her life with such insouciance, with such fucking
aplomb
! Grabbing the jiffy bag at the top of the slush pile, Keeley ripped it open with such force that the contents spilled all over her maple wood floor. ‘An Ordinary Girl' she read on the title page of the typescript. Pah. Never mind the title, she told herself, hunkering down and gathering pages together. Feel the width.

And as she boxed the A4 sheets into shape (about 100,000 words, she calculated – just right), she saw the photograph. Wow! Bella was just that – a stunningly beautiful girl.
Bellissima
. She had golden skin, a mane of glossy hair, a tip-tilted nose, a crooked smile, and eyes that could melt a man at forty paces. ‘An Ordinary Girl', Keeley read again. ‘A Novel by Bella Blake'. Bella Blake was a name to conjure with. It had the ring of bestsellerdom about it. Keeley wondered was it a real name, or a pseudonym.

Stapled to the photograph was a resumé. ‘Bella Blake was educated at Kylemore Abbey International Boarding School, in the wild west of Ireland,' she read. Kylemore Abbey School. Keeley wondered was this Bella a contemporary of that Gallagher girl? It would serve Cat right if she was, she decided childishly – and if she, Keeley, was responsible for discovering her and turning her into a big star in the literary firmament. Ha! Cat would rue the day she turned down representation by Keeley Considine.

‘Bella holds a BA mod in history and psychology from University College, Dublin,' continued the resumé, ‘and a certificate in fluency in the Japanese language from Keio University, Tokyo. She has trained and certified as a Game Ranger in KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa, and is also a scuba-dive master. She is currently employed as a scuba-dive tourist guide in AQWA – Western Australia's largest marine life aquarium – where she gets to swim every day with nurse sharks, loggerhead turtles and manta rays. She has dreamed of becoming a published author since the age of fifteen, when she had her first piece of journalism published in the Irish
Evening Herald
. It was a glowing review of
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince
.'

Well, at least
she
knows who J.K. Rowling is, thought Keeley darkly, unlike that clueless Cat Gallagher. But can she write? This Bella Blake may be a PR person's dream, but even the dogs on the street know that you don't judge a book by its cover. Or, in this instance, by its author's biog and mugshot.

Keeley curled up in her armchair and took a sip of wine. Then she set her glass down, and started reading. ‘The little old lady on the balcony could not believe what she had just seen happen on the street below her . . .' she began.

Several hours later she had reached ‘The End', wishing it wasn't midnight. It was too late now to phone Camilla Featherstonehaugh. She would have to do it first thing in the morning. And then she would phone her brand new client in Western Australia and congratulate her. Because Keeley knew that by this time next year, beautiful, talented Bella Blake would be a household name.

Cat chucked her Nokia into the tide, rueing the day she had let Keeley Considine have her number. Now she'd have to fork out for a new pay-as-you-go.

At least she'd earned a few bob today, to cover the cost of replacing the phone. An elderly couple on the beach had admired her painting. It had been an acrylic of Catgirl at the helm of
The Minx
, and she'd let them have it for a hundred euro. She was glad she was able to mark her paintings down to a fairer price, now that she'd realised her dream of buying her own boat. She didn't feel quite so manipulative.

Manipulative! Now there was a word to conjure with. Had she allowed Keeley to persuade her that selling her mother's stories was a good idea she, Cat, would have become a manipulated creature. Raoul had told her that she'd have been the puppet of a big conglomerate, a product to push, a walking, talking mannequin. She'd have had to go to stuff like press launches and publishing lunches and gala this and celebrity that and be on her best behaviour, and Cat would
hate
that. Imagine having to smile at people you didn't even like! Imagine having to have your photograph taken with them! It was true, what the Masai and the native Americans said, that every time you have your photograph taken, a piece of your soul is stolen. No wonder the Western world had become such an arid, soulless place. People were taking pictures all over the place – she'd seen people taking pictures of their
food
in the local taverna! And imagine, just
imagine
having to wear proper clothes! High heels and sucky-in Spanx and underwired bras and tight belts and fitted this and tailored that. Ew!

Today Cat was wearing baggy cotton trousers, a matelot-striped jumper, espadrilles and trademark bandana. She looked like a cartoon cat burglar, she realised as she packed her paintbox away, slung her backpack over her shoulder, and hit the road that would take her to the top of the hill. Except Cat never stole anything. Cat earned her keep, just like the cat in the Rudyard Kipling story, the cat who had become her role model when she had been a little girl, when her mother had read her stories. Images came into her head now, of Catgirl swinging out of a kite, Catgirl sliding down a giraffe's neck, Catgirl cantering on the pig's back. That's where she was right now, she thought, fingering the two fifty euro notes tucked in the pocket of her trousers. Maybe they could afford to eat out tonight.

She reached the end of the road, and turned left on to a sandy pathway, at the end of which was a whitewashed house. High on a ladder, a beautiful dark-skinned boy was painting the window frames on the upper story in a vibrant Aegean blue, similar to the shade of acrylic paint she'd used earlier, for the sky in her picture. That mile high, bright blue Greek sky she'd dreamed about so often.

‘Hello there,' said the boy, looking down at her as she dumped her backpack by the front door and blew him a kiss. ‘How are you?'

How was she?
Who
was she? ‘I am the Cat who walks by herself,' she said. ‘And I wish to come into your house.'

‘That's nice,' said Andreas, with a smile, pushing a wing of dark hair away from his face. ‘Be my guest.'

And so Cat did just that.

 

THE END

Acknowledgements

If I allowed myself to be effusive, I would be a veritable geyser of praise for the following: my editor Kate Bradley and all the team at Avon HarperCollins: Sammia Rafique, Caroline Ridding, Helen Bolton, Rhian McCauley and Charlotte Wheeler. In Ireland, I would be lost without the support of Claire Power and Moira Reilly. I would like to thank Shay Healy for permission to quote from his Eurovision classic ‘What's Another Year', and Brendan Kennelly for permission to quote from his epic poem
The Man Made of Rain
. Thanks also to Patricia McGettrick for Cat's eyes; to Teresa O'Reilly for being such a brilliant wedding planner, and to Sarah Webb for her seafaring savvy. Thanks to my agent – Charlotte Robertson – for her insight, and to Sue Leonard for her journalistic nous. Special thanks must go to those gals with whom I walk and talk the most and whom I am blessed to call my friends: Cathy Kelly, Marian Keyes, Fiona O'Brien and Hilary Reynolds.

Now here comes the really fulsome bit. There are two people in my life whom I worship, and of whom I am not worthy. These are my husband, Malcolm, and my daughter, Clara. Namaste.

Read on for A Reader's Guide to Lissamore

A Reader's Guide to Lissamore

You wouldn't want to be in a hurry to get to Lissamore. The motorways that spew traffic out of Galway city will take you nowhere near it. These main arteries skirt the mountainous boundaries of Coolnamara, beyond which the small village nestles, leaving you to dawdle along the secondary roads that wind westward through some of the most mesmerising landscape you'll ever lay eyes on.

To the north, the mountain range rears: heather-clad in summer, in winter dusted with a layer of frosting-sugar snow; to the south, a patchwork quilt of pasture and bogland lies between you and the horizon; to the west can be caught the occasional tantalising glimmer of sea; to the east, behind you, the road leads back to industrial estates and identikit housing developments. For centuries the highway ahead led to an inhospitable domain with its own Brehon laws, ruled over by fierce clansmen and pirates. Today there is still a sense, as you travel westward, that you are entering a realm apart; a realm where the sands of time have shifted slightly, and life goes by at an easier pace. Take a deep breath of ozone rich air, feel the muscles in your shoulders start to unknot, and shift down a gear as you follow the twisting trail through Coolnamara.

As you approach Lissamore, you'll see on your left a dry stone wall bordering an estuary that broadens out into Coolnamara Bay. Beyond the sea wall the foreshore is submerged at high tide: peer over and you might spy an otter playing in the shallows with her cubs, or a heron frozen mid-arabesque, poised for a strike. At low tide cormorants perch on barnacled boulders so that the breeze may fan their outstretched wings. Further out to sea an occasional seal can be spotted snoozing on a sun-warmed rock. The bay is bejewelled with islands boasting circlets of golden beaches. On a calm day, waves lap at these beaches like kittens; in storm force gales, they stalk the shore like tigers. Most of the islands are uninhabited – although one stalwart Lissamore local has been known to take a shortcut in a currach to and from his cottage on Inishclare in all weather, even after an evening spent downing pints of Guinness in O'Toole's.

A little further on, on the outskirts of the village, a modern apartment building rears its ugly head. This is where showbiz entrepreneur Corban O'Hara once owned a penthouse: ignore it – it's the sole architectural eyesore in Lissamore, built at a time when a handful of short-sighted developers had more money than sense. Several of the luxury apartments are still for sale: you could snap one up now for half the original asking price.

In the heart of the village, the main street is flanked on one side by a terrace of pretty two-storey nineteenth century houses, washed in shades of pink and blue and primrose. They're the type of houses that epitomise the estate agents' cliché
‘oozing with charm'
, and tourists frequently piss the residents off by posing on the doorsteps for photographs. Halfway along this terrace, if you look up, you will see a balcony that in summer is riotous with clashing hues of fuchsia and geranium, and dripping with purple wisteria: this is the eyrie occupied by Río Kinsella.

On the other side of the street brightly painted fishing boats bob in the shelter of the harbour, where nets and lobster pots are stacked next to serpent-like coils of thick rope. The harbour is overlooked by O'Toole's, a bar and seafood restaurant where, in the evenings, privileged diners get to feast on the day's catch: crab claws or prawn tails, lemon sole or sea bass, or – it they're really lucky – lobster Fra Diavolo (some prefer it
au naturel
with melted butter). Upstairs, the restaurant with its big picture windows is awash with light that comes bouncing off the sea; downstairs, the bar with its smaller casements and centuries-old red brick floor, is cosier. The solid mahogany countertop wears a patina of age; framed marine charts and glass cases containing stuffed fish adorn the walls, and a fire burns in the hearth on all but the sunniest days.

Further along the main street, where the road branches left on to the quay, you will come upon a shop with a sign bearing the legend ‘Fleurissima', in Art Deco font. This is the boutique that belongs to Fleur O'Farrell (née de Sainte Euverte). Drop in and have a look around: Fleur always welcomes browsers, and if you fall in love with one of the costlier items on her dress rails, she may invite you to relax with a glass of complimentary Perrier Jouet and a copy of French
Vogue
while she cocoons your purchase in tissue paper spritzed with a little lavender.

Outside, around the corner from the shop and on a level with her duplex, is Fleur's deck. It's not the most private of suntraps, but that doesn't worry the proprietress of Fleurissima. It means she can lean over the rail and have a natter with whoever happens to be passing by on the quay. Fleur's a sociable creature, and more often than not on a summer's evening you might see her entertaining friends there, holding court with baby Marguerite on her hip, fingers entwined around the stem of a champagne flute.

Back on the main street, past one or two more pubs and opposite the post office, you'll find Ryan's corner shop. Mrs Ryan caters for all tastes: her stock includes baked beans, Sunny Delight and Jammy Dodgers as well as finest Manuka honey, Chateau-bottled Chablis and virgin cold-pressed olive oil. Scented candles can be located on a shelf next to cans of fly spray; cedarwood body brushes snuggle up to floor mops, and on the book carousel, Booker prize-winners rub shoulder with Mills & Boon bodice-rippers. Over by the counter there's an array of tourist information: attractions include a famine village constructed especially for
The O'Hara Affair
– a major motion picture that was filmed in the environs some years ago. Feel free to ignore the tourist info – you'd be better off asking the barman in O'Toole's for advice on where to go and what to do. And if it's gossip you're after – you'll find more of that particular commodity in this unassuming-looking corner shop than in all the copies of
OK!
and
Hello!
ranked on the magazine shelves.

On the outskirts of the village further to the west, leafy boreens wind their way here and there, seemingly directionless. But each will lead you to a random beauty spot, the most pleasing of which is so off the beaten track that you could skinny dip or sunbathe nude, weather permitting. If you look up you'll see the once resplendent Villa Felicity, but there'll be no one there to look back at you from its shuttered windows. The only person you might happen upon is Río. If she's not swimming or soaking up rays on the old slipway, she'll be combing the shallows for mussels, or gathering barrow-loads of nutrient-rich seaweed to keep her fruit trees thriving in the winter months. Introduce yourself, and ask if you might take a photograph of her orchard to put up on your Facebook page, alongside the pictures you took earlier in Lissamore of the mountainy man leaning on the windowsill of O'Toole's nursing his pint, the donkeys that came to greet you as you passed through their field, the heron rising skyward from the shore, and the clouds settling over the mountains like a Slumberdown quilt.

Tell Río I sent you. Tell her I said hello.

For images of Lissamore and its environs, please go to www.lissamore.com.