The Stone House (15 page)

‘And what about me?' asked Romy.

‘Romy pet, I'm still not out of the woods with you yet. Who forgot to unplug the hair-drier last month and nearly set fire to the house?'

‘That was an accident I was rushing out to . . .'

‘You've always been my wild child. Do you remember when you were small and every time you went to the beach you stripped off naked and refused to wear your swimming togs?'

‘I liked the sun on my skin.'

‘You've always had a mind of your own. Every time there was a row or an upset you'd pack up your bags and want to run away. You always seemed to be running away for some funny reason or other.'

‘I liked packing my bag and stealing biscuits and cake and bread and making a flask of orange squash and pretending I was going off somewhere exciting.'

‘One time yourself and that O'Grady boy disappeared for twelve hours. Sheila O'Grady and I were terrified you'd fallen in off the harbour. We'd all the neighbours and the guards out looking for you. Eventually we found you about a mile out the road by Ferguson's old mill asleep on the long grass.'

‘Don't remind me. Daddy took my blue bicycle off me as a punishment.'

‘You had our hearts scalded sometimes.'

‘Yeah, remember the time I got the kitchen scissors and gave poor old Lucky a cut?'

Moya almost dropped the spoon of
crème brûlée
she was eating, with shock. Kate automatically lashed out
with a well-placed kick on Romy's shin, incredulous that her sister could be so stupid upsetting their mother and reminding them all of that fateful day.

‘God, I'm so sorry, Mum,' mumbled Romy, appalled at herself. ‘I didn't mean to.'

‘I have to go to the bathroom.' Maeve excused herself, standing up instantly from the table and scrabbling around for her handbag. Kate and Moya attacked Romy the minute she'd left the dining room.

‘Of all the stupid things to say!'

‘Why did you have to go and ruin a perfectly good day, Romy? Do you enjoy doing it, is that it?'

‘I swear to God. I just wasn't thinking.'

‘You know Mammy's gone to the bathroom to have a cry, don't you?'

‘I forgot!'

‘How could you ever fucking forget?'

‘Listen, I'll go after her.'

‘No, don't you think you've done enough for one night?' said Moya sarcastically. ‘She's better left on her own.'

Romy sat at the table feeling miserable as her sisters glared at her, wishing she'd kept her mouth shut.

Maeve Dillon stared at herself in the wall-sized mirror of the marble and glass bathroom. She cursed the grief that still at times assailed and overwhelmed her. She threw water on her face and dabbed on a touch of foundation to cover the blotchiness of her cheeks and redness around her eyes. Trying to compose herself she took a deep breath before heading back to the dining room, stopping in her tracks at the sight of her future
son-in-law standing at the doorway of the hotel's bar deep in conversation with a tall blonde in a black suit. For a few seconds she stood just watching, noticing how attentive he was to the young woman and how she was glancing up at him, her hand resting on his arm. Smooth and charming, totally self-confident and aware of his attraction to the opposite sex, Patrick in some strange way reminded her of Frank. Physically they were very different, and a generation apart, but her future son-in-law's ways were something she was accustomed to. He might be more savvy and polished and educated but underneath the veneer he too was a womanizer.

Taking her time, she approached him.

‘Hello, Patrick,' she interrupted, smiling, noticing his reaction.

‘Oh Mrs Dillon. Maeve! What are you doing here?'

‘The girls and I are just finishing having dinner inside. I decided we all needed a treat after a long day's shopping.'

He made a perfunctory introduction, Maeve barely catching the girl's name and noting he didn't say a word about Moya, or the fact that she herself would soon be his mother-in-law. She was in two minds about mentioning the purchase of the wedding finery, but decided against it.

‘I'd better get back inside, Patrick, or they'll be sending out a search party for me.'

Back at the table she ordered a coffee, and was just about to forewarn Moya when Patrick sauntered into the large dining room, making a beeline for their table.
‘The beautiful Dillon girls,' he said slowly, fussing over them all and giving them each a kiss on the cheek.

Highly embarrassed, Kate almost pushed him away.

Moya was thrilled to see him, her eyes lighting up as she stood up and hugged him.

‘I met Maeve outside.' He smiled, gazing around the room and refusing the chair the waiter offered. ‘I was just having a drink with an old college pal, when I heard my beloved was here so I decided I'd better come in and say a quick hello.'

‘Funny the way we bumped into each other,' said Maeve. ‘You'd think we were back in Rossmore!'

‘Ladies, did you all have a good day's shopping?'

‘The best!' said Moya with a smile. ‘The dress, the bridesmaid dresses are all organized and we bought loads.'

‘The very best!' agreed the others.

Kate said very little and was relieved when Patrick Redmond at last politely excused himself and returned to the bar. As their mother settled the bill, she ordered a taxi.

‘What a lovely day we've had,' said Maeve. ‘I'm exhausted and my feet are killing me but I had a great time. Thanks, girls.'

‘Thanks, Mum,' added Moya, Kate and Romy. ‘For everything.'

THE STONE HOUSE
was in a state of near frenzy as the day of Moya's wedding dawned. Uncle Eamonn, their mother's brother, had arrived from Chicago. He was a parish priest in a place called Oakland and was delighted to have been asked to officiate at the ceremony and celebrate the wedding mass.

‘Sure, why wouldn't I come home to marry Maeve and Frank's eldest daughter, my beautiful niece Moya Teresa and her young man Patrick, and to enjoy the party and celebration afterwards?'

‘And how's my darling girl?' roared her uncle, wrapping Kate in a bear hug the minute he saw her. ‘I thought you were going to come out to the Windy City to see me last fall?'

‘I'm sorry, Uncle Eamonn, but I'd just started working and I couldn't get the time off.'

‘Well, next year maybe you'll come visit.'

Eamonn Ryan enjoyed visits from his family more than anything. Running a busy parish kept him occupied most of the day but at night when he sat down by
the fire and cooked a TV dinner for one or ordered in he realized just how solitary his vocation had made him. He had no regrets about working in the priesthood, spreading the Word of God, but sometimes did admit to a loneliness that prayer and books and the good people of his parish could not overcome. Coming home for a big family occasion like this was exactly what he needed to restore his spirits and renew old friendships in the town where he grew up. Kate had vacated her bedroom, which had once been his, and stepping across the threshold had provoked a whole load of memories of his childhood and youth. His initials E.R. were still carved in the wardrobe door, and the old apple tree was still bearing apples outside his window.

‘This place is a tip,' Kate protested as she moved her clothes down the corridor and into Romy's room. ‘How can you live with it like this?'

‘No problem,' jeered Romy, who had actually done a massive tidy before Kate moved her things. ‘I like it like this.'

The house was full of people as their father's brother Peadar and his wife Nuala from Galway were also staying. Their mother put them in the guest bedroom while their two kids Hannah and Jack were to sleep in Sean's old room.

The house had been cleaned top to bottom, Christy the painter coming in at short notice to repaint the hall stairs and landing.

Maeve Dillon had a notepad with a list of all the things she had to do. The fridge had been stuffed with eggs and rashers and sausages, and black and white pudding and pounds of butter, and Hannah and Jack
were dispatched to get fresh bread for the breakfast in the morning.

‘I feel like I'm running a guest-house,' she joked, trying to remember where she'd put the last two cakes of brown bread she'd made.

Frank was in his element talking to everyone, overseeing the erection of the huge marquee in the garden by Tony Taylor and his crew from Taylor Tents.

‘Mind my roses,' begged Maeve, abandoning the kitchen and grabbing a spade and wheelbarrow to move three precious rose bushes to the safety of the back bed. The caterers had been booked, the barmen organized, and her father was out shouting at the delivery driver from McHugh's pub as he unloaded beer kegs and crates of Guinness and Smithwicks and a whole range of wines and spirits and boxes of sparkling glasses.

‘God, this must be costing a fortune,' murmured their Aunt Nuala, watching her brother-in-law take out a wad of notes from his trouser pocket.

‘It's what Moya wanted. We looked at the Harbour and the Rossmore Inn and the Grand in Waterford, but she felt a smaller wedding at home was what she'd prefer.'

‘It's a lot of work.'

‘Aye, but I suppose Frank and I felt it would be nice to have it here. We got married in that old hotel in town, and well I'd always sort of regretted that we didn't have a nicer wedding. Here in the garden with some nice music should be lovely.'

After the church rehearsal the Dillon and the Redmond families joined together for dinner in the Rossmore Inn. Patrick's parents were staying in the hotel. Annabel Redmond, enquiring about the guest
list, had finally come around to accepting that her son's wedding was not going to be the big Dublin social event she'd hoped for but a relaxed gathering of friends and family at home. She was keen to be introduced to the rest of the family. Romy and Kate were as polite as could be, but decided to sit down one end of the table with Patrick's brother and sister.

Moya looked a bit pale and picked at her food.

‘Are you OK?' asked Kate.

‘I'm fine, just a bit nervous.'

Patrick was equally quiet while Frank Dillon and his father got involved discussing property prices in the area. Uncle Eamonn regaled them with disastrous funeral stories from the people in his parish, which included a local Mafia chief asking him to say a special funeral mass for one of his dogs.

‘That's outrageous, asking a man of the cloth to do that!' murmured their Aunt Nuala. ‘I couldn't say no,' joked their uncle. ‘The Lord would understand I didn't dare refuse a man like that!'

‘Would he have shot you?' piped up Hannah.

‘Well, I don't know but I'm here to tell the tale.'

Back at home, Maeve Dillon slipped into Moya's room before she fell asleep, noting how pale her daughter looked against the pillows.

‘Are you feeling all right, pet?'

‘Just a little nervous.'

‘You're sure about Patrick, Moya? Sure he is the right one.'

‘Mammy! What are you saying? I love Patrick, it's our wedding day tomorrow.'

Maeve Dillon sighed.

‘It's just that if you changed your mind, your daddy and I would stand by you, you know that. No-one is going to push you into something you are not sure about.'

‘Mammy, for God's sake. Are you cracked? No-one is pushing me into doing anything. No-one!'

For a second Maeve Dillon experienced that strange sense of
déjà vu
, remembering her own mother standing in front of her in her dressing gown saying almost the exact same thing. She smiled, for she hadn't listened either.

‘Don't mind me, pet, I'm just a sentimental old mother hen who hates losing one of her chicks,' she apologized, kissing her eldest daughter goodnight.

The wedding morning was frantic as everyone fought over showers and the bathroom. Moya, the only one who seemed calm and unruffled, lay in the bed relaxing as Romy and Kate and their mother screamed at each other.

The marquee was all set up, and there were fresh roses and sprigs of lavender from the garden on every table. A long narrow table was set up as a bar on one end of the patio, the other one inside the marquee.

‘Well thank God for the beautiful weather,' smiled their uncle, tucking into a plate of rashers and sausages.

The girls all disappeared to the hairdresser's with their mother and aunts. Gemma O'Leary and one of her juniors busily got them all washed and dried and arranged their hair. Romy and Kate each wore a simple spray of baby's breath creamy flowers wound through
a piece of finely plaited hair at the back of their heads. Cream roses were attached to the comb on Moya's dark hair, which looked so straight it was like satin.

The minute they finished they all chased back to the house to change, to find Frank and Uncle Peadar already in their morning suits.

‘You two look very handsome,' admired Maeve Dillon as she ran up to change into her own outfit.

Kate and Romy sat in their dressing gowns doing their make-up, for once putting their differences to one side and agreeing that they should wear the same ivory and beige eyeshadow and brown eyeliner, plus a coral-coloured lipstick with a layer of gloss on top.

‘Phew! I suppose we look kind of OK.'

They ran into Moya who was putting another layer of mascara onto her eyelashes, which she had curled to open her eyes and make them look even bigger. The three of them did their nails before finally putting on their dresses.

‘Mammy, come up for the dresses!' screamed Romy.

Maeve Dillon almost fell going up the stairs, nursing a bruise on her leg as she watched Kate and Romy help their sister into her dress and fasten up the bodice. It was even more exquisite than she had remembered and Moya looked radiant. Maeve, unwrapping the tissue, helped attach the gossamer-light veil to the comb at the back of her head.