He grinned at them but would say no more, save that Mr McBride’s horses were famous throughout the land so they were, and that the guests who came to the big house were generous and appreciative.
Polly and Ernie hung about the forge for a while, but the blacksmith had a horse waiting to be shod and did not address them again, so they began to walk back towards the O’Briens’ cottage, chatting over the information they had gleaned as they went.
‘If you ask me, Dana’s father must have been badly injured, but is now able to run his home and his business once again,’ Ernie said. ‘It’s odd that the blacksmith didn’t want to talk about it, though. And did he say the accident was six years ago? He spoke so broad and so fast that I couldn’t always understand him. I think, Poll, that all we can do when we’re back in Liverpool again is to advise Dana very strongly to come home.’
‘Right,’ Polly said. ‘And we can tell her that we’ve visited Castletara and everywhere was just lovely. The gardens were perfect, and the walled one, where Enda said they grow all their own vegetables and fruit, was even better than Dana had described. But the oddest thing was when she told us that Mr and Mrs McBride took in visitors. If I understood her correctly – and it was jolly difficult because her brogue was even broader than the blacksmith’s – then most of their money comes from these parties of Americans who come over to see the
country of their ancestors and pay large sums for the privilege of staying in an ancient castle. But as for the accident, and Dana running away, they just won’t talk about it and that’s final.’
As they had promised, they spent that night in the O’Briens’ cottage, but the next day when Polly wanted to return to Castletara, in the hope of seeing for herself that Mr McBride was alive and carrying on his business, Ernie was against it. ‘What do you think you’ll achieve apart from getting slung out and told never to return?’ he asked. ‘Don’t be a fool, Poll. I hope to God our poking around hasn’t already come to the wrong ears. Leave it now, will you?’
But Polly shook her head until her little blonde ponytail wagged. ‘I forgot to mention that Con feller and I mean to find out how he feels about Dana before I leave,’ she said obstinately. ‘Ralph is really fond of her, you know; it wouldn’t surprise me if he asks her to marry him before he goes into the air force; or at least to get engaged,’ she amended, seeing the sceptical look on her friend’s face. ‘However, it’s my belief that Dana is only going around with Ralph because he reminds her of this Con. So if I can see him – I’ll know him because he looks like Ralph – then I mean to give him Dana’s address and tell him if he don’t get in touch, she’s going to make the mistake of a lifetime and marry the wrong feller.’
‘And how are you going to do that? You can’t just walk up to a castle and start quizzing folk,’ Ernie pointed out. ‘Have some sense, Poll. Let’s turn for home. We’ve still got three whole days of our week left and we know which buses to catch …’
But Polly was shaking her head again, her eyes
sparkling with mischief. ‘I mean to go up to the castle saying that a party of Liverpudlians are going to do a tour of Ireland next spring. I shall say I’m looking for houses which can accommodate a dozen couples at least, and I shall insist on a tour of the premises.’ Her grin widening, she produced a businesslike shorthand notebook and pencil. ‘I shall take notes on the number and size of bedrooms, the capacity of the dining room, the cleanliness of the kitchens, and so on, and that should be enough to get me admitted. No one can turn business away and the Depression ain’t over yet.’
Ernie could not help smiling, though when he agreed to wait outside the castle walls for her he did so grudgingly. ‘I’ve a darned good mind to turn for home myself and leave you,’ he told her. ‘I really don’t approve of you actually snooping into Dana’s old home, honest to God I don’t.’
This threat, however, did not worry Polly at all. ‘You won’t let me down. I know you, Ernie Frost, and you aren’t the sort to rat on a friend,’ she said cheerfully. ‘See you later, pal!’
But when they met up again, Polly had only failure to report. ‘Dana’s mam was very polite and showed me round, but I don’t think she believed my story,’ she told Ernie as they began the walk back to the village. ‘At one point she said, very kindly mind, “Are you lookin’ for work, alanna? Because if so, we don’t tek on live-in staff and digs in the village would cost half of any wage we might manage to pay.”’
Ernie chuckled. ‘So she saw through you,’ he said approvingly. ‘Told you so!’ And I bet you didn’t see a twin to our boss, either.’
‘If you mean did I see Con, then I didn’t,’ Polly admitted. ‘But I’m sure he was there. I saw Mr McBride, though. He’s tall with black curly hair and a thin, strong sort of face. Now he did look a bit like Ralph, come to think, though an awful lot older, naturally.’
‘Right. And did Mrs McBride look like Dana?’ Ernie asked idly as they turned into the lane which would lead them to the main road. ‘I suppose you’re satisfied with our adventure, queen? Do you mean to break it to Dana that her father’s still alive? Because if you’re wrong you could break Dana’s heart all over again and from what you heard it’s been broke pretty badly already.’
Polly considered the question, then sighed and shook her head. ‘No, because you’re quite right. But there is a mystery surrounding the accident and Dana running away, don’t you think? What do you suppose it can be? Answer me that, Mr Know-it-all!’
‘Can’t; don’t pretend to have second sight, nor I don’t want it,’ Ernie said at once. ‘Then if you aren’t going to tell Dana that you think her father may still be alive, what are you going to do?’
He had quickened his pace as they walked so that now Polly was almost running to keep up and when she spoke it was breathlessly. ‘I’m going to tell her that we saw her home and it’s in good heart. Then I shall say she simply must go back because her family needs her. You see, I think there could be another relative by the name of McBride who stepped into the breach when Dana wouldn’t. Perhaps this other McBride had the money to start putting the castle to rights, which may make Dana feel that she’s not needed. But I think she won’t be happy again until she’s seen that she really is necessary to
Castletara. Oh, not as a worker, it’s in excellent heart, but as the rightful daughter of the house.’
Ernie slowed his pace and slipped his arm round her waist. ‘You’re a kind girl and a darned good friend,’ he said approvingly. ‘Dana’s lucky to have you. Now as I remember we got off the bus quite near that big old oak tree so we’re on the right road, and I’m telling you I don’t mean to sleep rough for the next three nights. We’ll get ourselves lodgings like respectable people do. Agreed?’
‘Okay, agreed,’ Polly said rather doubtfully, just as she heard the rumble of a bus’s engine coming up behind them. She waved anxiously, for in Liverpool it was not unknown for a driver whose vehicle was already well laden to ignore would-be passengers in between stops, but this was Ireland. The bus drew up beside them with a screech of brakes and the conductor took their haversacks and ushered them into his vehicle.
‘Next stop paradise,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Where’s you going, young lady and gent?’
Chapter Eleven
3 September 1939
ON A SUNDAY
, Polly and Dana usually had a bit of a lie-in and Dana always relished the chance to get up slowly, discussing with Polly what they should do with their free day. If the weather was fine they usually either picnicked in one of the parks or caught a bus out into the real country. If it was wet they employed themselves indoors, darning stockings, ironing, and cooking for the week ahead. Today, however, was different. Today Mr Chamberlain, who had a year earlier promised ‘peace for our time’, would be telling the nation either that Mr Hitler had agreed to pull his troops out of Poland, or that he had ignored the British demand for him to do so, which would mean that the country was at war with Germany for the second time in twenty years. So Dana had got up at her usual time and roused Polly, who had apparently forgotten the importance of the day and had sworn at her friend and tried to heave the covers back over her head. Dana, however, would have none of it. ‘Chamberlain’s making his announcement at quarter past eleven,’ she said brusquely, heaving the covers off Polly’s curled up and reluctant form. ‘Do get up, Poll. You invited Ernie round for Sunday dinner, remember, so you can jolly well give me a hand with the vegetables. I got a
really nice piece of New Zealand lamb which was going cheap late last night, and Mrs Bicknell gave me a bunch of mint which she said wouldn’t last till Monday, so we can have a really good meal.’
Polly opened one reluctant eye. ‘You say I invited Ernie but I’m sure you asked Jake if he’d like to come too, so you’ll have a guest as well,’ she mumbled. ‘You said he’d be lonely because Ralph’s off at some training camp or other and won’t get any leave for six months. What’s the time, anyway?’
‘It’s half past ten,’ Dana said glibly and also untruthfully, for it was only ten o’clock. ‘And Jake refused our kind invitation. I’m going to leave you now, Poll, but if you dare go back to sleep you shan’t have so much as a mouthful of the apple crumble I mean to make. Well, no one will, because I’ve not got time to peel, core, and slice all the apples as well as preparing the vegetables.’
‘Oh, all right; fair’s fair I suppose,’ Polly said swinging her legs out of bed and standing up. ‘Sorry, Dana; the fact is me and Ern didn’t come straight home when the last house was over last night. We had a bit of a walk around and a chat and then I asked Ern in for a cup of cocoa; you know how it is.’
‘Yes, I know how it is,’ Dana confirmed, turning her head so that Polly should not see she was smiling. When the young couple had returned from their trip and airily confessed that they had actually gone to the Emerald Isle, had even visited Castletara, she had pretended indifference, shrugging when Polly had told her that her old home was immaculate, a far cry from the run-down and neglected place of her dreams.
‘I know,’ she had said unguardedly, and had had to
lie and say that in her more recent dreams Castletara had regained its old splendour. By the look of her, Polly had intended to carry her questioning further, but Dana had noticed that Polly had been uneasy ever since her return from her holiday, and it had seemed like a good time to find out why.
Accordingly, she had changed the subject adroitly from her old home to why Polly seemed worried by something which had occurred during her holiday. ‘One minute you’re being very sweet to Ern, kissing and cuddling when I’m not supposed to be looking, and the next you’re pushing him back, acting outraged if he so much as tries to hold your hand,’ she had said. ‘What’s up, Poll? Surely you can tell me. I won’t say we’re like sisters ’cos quite often sisters fight like cat and cat, but we’re really good pals, wouldn’t you say?’
The two girls had been getting their breakfast before going off to a nearby fair with Ernie and a couple of other friends and Polly had begun to deny that there was anything wrong, before suddenly bursting into floods of tears. ‘Oh, Dana, I’ve been such a fool,’ she hiccuped. ‘And now I suppose I’ve got to marry Ern and I’m too young! But I’ve been a bad girl and now I’ve got to go through with it!’
‘Go through with what?’ Dana had been about to ask Polly just what she meant when Polly said something about sharing a bed which had Dana’s eyebrows climbing rapidly towards her hairline. Scarcely had she framed a tactful question, however, before someone had knocked at the door and it opened to reveal Ernie’s pink and cheerful face. He had let himself in, then raised his brows as Polly’s noisy sobs turned into wails. ‘Now what’s the
matter wi’ you, our Poll?’ he had asked, coming into the room and trying to put his arm round her shoulders, though she shrank away from him as though he had been about to strangle her. ‘We’re off on a grand day out, ain’t we? So why the tears?’
‘Because – because I were a bad girl and now … and now … Oh, I can’t say it,’ Polly had wailed as she rushed out of the room.
Dana’s eyebrows could not climb any higher; she had stared at Ernie for a long moment before speaking and then she did so with some care. ‘Ernie, did – did anything happen between you and Polly while you were in Ireland? She’s been a bit weepy several times over the past couple of weeks, but I thought it was just because she loved the Irish countryside and knew it would be a long while before she could afford such a holiday again. Now it appears I was mistaken.’ She had put both her hands up to her hot cheeks. ‘Oh, Ernie, she thinks you’ll have to get married. And I trusted you to take care of her!’
‘And so I did,’ Ernie had said indignantly. ‘We had a few kisses and cuddles, of course we did; does she think that could give her a baby?’
Dana had decided that frankness was her best approach. ‘No, she thinks sharing a bed might do it, and so it might,’ she had said baldly. ‘Did you share a bed, Ernie? Did you—’
‘Course we shared a bed. Couldn’t afford a bed each, lerralone a room,’ Ernie had said at once. His worried look had faded to be replaced by a grin. ‘Honest to God, Dana, we telled the landladies we was brother and sister and they give us a bolster to put down the middle of the
mattress. We each kept to our own side, I swear it on me mother’s life …’ He must have seen the sceptical look on Dana’s face for he amended that to ‘Polly’s life then’. He had turned as Polly, red-eyed and miserable, came back into the room and put a brotherly arm about her shoulders. ‘Whatever’s the matter with you, me little sugar plum?’ he had enquired gently. ‘I told you there were no harm in sharing provided neither of us jumped over the bolster. Dana will tell you the same if you still won’t believe me.’
Polly had turned swollen, tear-drenched eyes from one face to the other, and then a little smile had dawned. ‘Oh, good,’ she had said faintly. ‘It ain’t that I don’t want to marry you, Ernie, ’cos I think that might be quite fun, but havin’ babies hurts. The girls at the YW said your tummy splits …’
‘All right, all right, that’s quite enough of old wives’ tales,’ Dana had said hurriedly, seeing poor Ernie’s pink cheeks becoming white as a sheet. ‘And now we’ve cleared that little mystery up let’s get on with our breakfast. Oh lordy, lordy, the porridge has caught and if there’s one thing I hate it’s burnt porridge. Polly, dry your eyes for goodness’ sake and start toasting some bread!’