An Irish Country Christmas (24 page)

Barry saw O’Reilly leave his side of the car and open the back door for Arthur Guinness. The big dog piled out, sniffing the air, his tail wagging. He headed off at a gallop, only to be called back by O’Reilly’s “Here, sir. Come.”

To Barry’s surprise the usually unruly beast obeyed at once.

“Come on, Barry,” O’Reilly yelled, as started to walk toward the fairy ring. “Heel, you.” And the big dog stayed at O’Reilly’s side, his muzzle not one inch in front of his master’s leg.

Barry ran to catch up, his breath puffing in the still air. He wanted to know how O’Reilly planned to help Eileen Lindsay restore her fortunes.

From overhead came a plaintive
pee-wit, pee-wit
. Looking up, he saw a flock of green plover, their head crests obvious, against an eggshell blue sky, flapping their langorous way home with the peculiar wing beat that gave them their Ulster name, lapwing.

O’Reilly and Arthur had reached the edge of the fairy ring. O’Reilly stood legs astraddle and commanded, “Sit.”

Arthur obeyed, his nose twitching, scenting, questing. He made little excited mutterings somewhere in his throat, and his tail swept from side to side, clearing a pie-wedge shape of clear grass in the frost.

Barry caught up with them. “Fingal,” he said, “I asked you what your plan for Eileen was.”

O’Reilly frowned, seemed not to have heard the question. “Those whins are full of rabbits. Watch this.” He pointed to the gorse bushes. “Hi lost, Arthur,” he said quietly.

The big dog took off, nose to the ground. He quartered back and forth, and Barry knew he was attempting to cut across a scent trail. Arthur stopped dead, spun, and took a straight line to the edge of the bushes. Then he stopped and looked back at O’Reilly.

“Push ’em out, boy. Push ’em out.”

The bushes crackled and swayed as Arthur thrust his way in beneath, belly close to the ground. He disappeared, and for a few moments all Barry could hear was a crashing in the undergrowth; then the crashing was replaced by a hurried rustling. Three rabbits, brown-and-beige furred, ears flattened to the backs of their heads, tore from the cover and bolted across the field.

O’Reilly grinned. “If I’d had my shotgun, we’d be having rabbit pie tomorrow night.”

Barry felt a moment of sympathy for the rabbits but realized that he’d not have objected, not one bit, to tucking into one of Kinky’s game pies. He stared at the bushes, expecting Arthur to appear, but instead he heard a renewed crashing heading deep into the thicket. He rubbed his hands. They were getting chilly. So was the tip of his nose. He’d
like to go back to the car and head off to the warmth of the Parish Hall as O’Reilly had suggested at lunchtime. And he’d like an answer to the question that was still niggling at him. “Fingal, about Eileen’s money. How are we going to get it back for her?”

O’Reilly shrugged. “To tell you the truth, Barry, just at the moment I haven’t the foggiest notion.”

“But you sounded so sure back at the house and—”

With the suddenness of the explosion of a landmine underfoot, the whins rustled, and a staccato clattering of stubby wings was accompanied by a hoarse cry of
kek, kek, kek
. A cock pheasant hurled himself into the sky above the bushes, his emerald head iridescent in the sun, his long striped tail feathers streaming behind as he clawed for height. Barry flinched, then collected himself.

O’Reilly yelled, “Come in, Arthur!” Then he turned to Barry. “Did you see that big fellah?”

“Hard to miss him.”

“It’s unusual for a pheasant to be so far from the marquis’ estate,” O’Reilly remarked, “but once in a while the unexpected happens.”

Arthur reappeared, and O’Reilly called him to heel. “Come on, Barry. Let’s head on to the Duck. We’ll look in on the pageant some other day.” He started back toward the car, and Barry followed, wondering if the exertion and the cold had tired his usually indefatigable older colleague. “You feeling all right?”

“Couldn’t be better,” he said, but he shivered. “I just fancy a pint. I haven’t had one since Monday.”

It would kill the big man to admit to any weakness, Barry thought. “Fair enough and . . . Fingal?”

“What?”

“You really don’t have a plan for Eileen, do you?”

“Not a clue, but remember the pheasant. The unexpected has a habit of happening.”

“So you are going to reassure everybody and simply hope that something turns up?”

“No.” O’Reilly opened the car’s back door and waited for Arthur
to jump in. “I leave those nonspecific upturning aspirations to Mr. Micawber.”

“Dickens.”

“I know that.
David Copperfield
.” He slammed the rear door. “No, I said I’d think of something, and I bloody well will.” He opened the driver’s door. “But I’ll think a damn sight better with a pint in my hand. So trot off and open the gate like a good lad.”

And Barry, vaguely reassured, did just that.

Matters of Fact . . . Are Very Stubborn Things

The weather had held until Saturday, and when Barry came down for breakfast, sunlight was dancing in the facets of the cut-glass decanters on the sideboard and bouncing from the silver-domed cover of a chafing dish. The aroma of fresh coffee was being overpowered by the smell of poached kippers.

O’Reilly, sitting at the head of the table, waved his fish fork in the general direction of the dresser. “Morning, Barry. Help yourself. I’ve left you a brace.” He shoved in a mouthful and added, “Not like certain dumplings I
could
allude to.”

“Morning, Fingal.” Barry yawned, ignoring the jibe coming from the man who not so very long ago had consumed a whole roast duck meant for both of them. He opened the chafing dish and stepped back to let a cloud of fish-scented steam dissipate.

He was pleased that Fingal was on call today. Yesterday had been hectic after lunch. He’d dropped in on Sammy and Maggie, and he’d visited Jeannie Jingles and arranged follow-up visits for her Eddie who, his pneumonia on the mend, had been discharged that day from Sick Kids. Then he made three other home visits.

Now that the steam cloud had vanished, he used a wide-bladed fish server to put the golden-hued, oak shaving–smoked herrings on his plate. He took the plate to his place and returned to pour himself a cup of coffee. Patricia should be phoning at any minute. Maybe by now she’d be able to tell him she’d be coming home. Maybe she’d
caved in and would accept his offer to pay for the ferry ticket. He bloody well hoped so.

“Pour me one while you’re on your feet.” O’Reilly handed Barry his cup and pushed his plate, laden with kipper skeletons, away.

As he poured two cups of coffee, Barry counted four backbones. O’Reilly had not stinted himself. Kinky reckoned the return of O’Reilly’s irascibility was a sign of his recovery. So was the return of his appetite. Barry handed O’Reilly his coffee. “Here.”

O’Reilly accepted the cup and saucer. “Thanks, Barry. How was your night?”

Barry returned to his place and took a big swallow. “Busy.”

“Oh?”

“Aye. I’d to go out at two. Judge Egan was having chest pains.”

“He’s got angina,” O’Reilly said. “Was he having a coronary?”

“I don’t know, but his nitroglycerine tablets weren’t stopping the pain, so I gave him a quarter grain of morphine and sent for the ambulance. I’d to wait until they got there.”

“Good lad,” said O’Reilly, buttering his third slice of toast. “Eoin’s a decent man. He’ll be seventy-three next Thursday.”

Barry shook his head. He could swear O’Reilly carried around every scrap of useful information about every one of his patients in his big, craggy-faced, shaggy-haired head. Barry set to work to separate the filet from the bones but stopped when O’Reilly said, “He suits his name.”

“Eoin? Why? It’s just archaic Irish for John. Most folks today use Sean.”

O’Reilly shook his head. “I’m not talking about Eoin. I’m talking about his surname, Egan. It’s derived from
MacAodhagáin
. The family were the
brehons
, the hereditary lawyers and judges, to the chieftains of Roscommon.”

“I’ll be damned.” Barry chuckled and returned to filleting his fish. “That would make him Judge Judge . . . just like that bloke Major Major Major in
Catch-22
.”

“Joseph Heller. Bloody funny book.” O’Reilly, who had finished his toast, eyed the toast rack.

Barry slid the slice of fish, now bone-free, to the side of his plate. “We had a research registrar who was working with urinary incontinence. Poor chap’s name was Leakey. It suited him. He was a real drip.”

O’Reilly guffawed long and hard, and that was why Barry didn’t realize that the phone was ringing in the hall until Kinky came in and said, “Your Miss Spence is on the line.”

Barry came out of his chair like a greyhound from the starting gate, jostled past Kinky, grabbed the receiver, and said, “Hello, Patricia?”

“Barry, how are you?”

“Fine. How are you . . .”—he lowered his voice—“darling?” The dining room doorway was open.

“You’ll have to speak up,” she said.

He turned his back to the open door, cupped his hand around the mouthpiece, and said a little more loudly, “I love you.”

He heard her chuckle. “I love you too, Barry. I really do.”

That was a relief. He wanted to ask her if she was coming back to Ulster, but instead he said, “Where are you? The Residency?”

“No. I’m in Bourn. I’m spending the weekend with Jenny.”

“Jenny who?” He wished to hell she were spending the weekend with him.

“Jenny. Jenny Compton. I told you about her.”

“Right.” The girl Patricia would go to for Christmas if she didn’t come back to Northern Ireland.

“Her folks have pots of money. Her dad’s a stockbroker and says I can chat as long as I like on his phone, and hang the cost. He can write phone calls off as part of his business expenses.”

“Must be nice,” Barry said. “Still, being able to have a decent blether makes a change from a quick two minutes on the phone or the odd letter.”

“I’m sorry, Barry,” she said, “but my study load is very heavy. I just don’t have time to write epistles every night.”

“I understand that,” he said, thinking that he
still
owed his folks a letter. “I’m as guilty as you are. But I do miss you, Patricia.”

“And I miss you . . . particularly in my little room at night. It’s
quite chilly at this time of the year.” There was a husky edge in her voice.

Christ, he longed to hold her. He was about to tell her how much he’d like to be there to keep her warm, but she ploughed ahead.

“My bedroom’s lovely and cosy here. Jenny and her folks live in a cottage. Thatched roof, old oak beams. It was built in sixteen forty-three.”

“Sounds very rustic.” How could she do that to him? Make a sexy remark, then change the subject. He wished she would stop prattling and tell him what he wanted to know.

“It is. It’s just a wee ways from the local manor house, Bourn Hall, and that’s a fascinating place.”

“I’m sure it is.” So was her mouth and her breasts, and he ached for her.

“It was owned by the De La Warr family . . . the one the American state Delaware is named for.”

“Patricia . . .” He smiled at Kinky as she headed back to the kitchen. Barry’s smile faded. Patricia wasn’t usually the garrulous type. She was rabbitting on because she had something unpleasant to tell him. He could sense it.

“The same family own property with a big wood, and that was the very spot A. A. Milne called the Hundred Acre Wood in the Pooh stories.”

“Really?” He started to let his tone show his disinterest. He was certain she was using all this trivial chitchat as a smoke screen to avoid having to tell him she wasn’t coming home. “That’s interesting.”

He heard her chuckle. “Speaking of Pooh, darling, you sound a bit like Eeyore.”

Barry took a deep breath. “Look, Patricia, it’s great to chat, but I need to know so I can work out on-call schedules with Fingal . . . are you coming home?”

He heard the edge of irritation creep into her voice. “I still don’t know.”

Barry tried not to let his own disappointment show. “If you still don’t know, why did you call?”

“Because, Barry, I like to hear your voice”—her tones were measured—“and I knew Jenny’s dad wouldn’t mind. I miss you, and I was happy we would be able to talk.”

“Christ. I like to talk to you too, but I’d rather be doing it face to face.”

“So would I.”

“Did you find out about the ferry?” He waited to see how she would respond. Nothing. “Patricia, are you still there? Did you find out about the ferry?”

“Not yet. I’ve been busy.”

“Too busy to make a phone call? Damn it, Patricia, I’ll pay for the ticket; it can’t be that much.”

There was a long pause before she said flatly, “I’m not sure I’d like that, Barry.”

“Why the hell not? I’m working. Making money. You’re a student. I love you. I want to see you. I presume you want to see me?”

“Don’t be silly.”

He pursed his lips. “Why is offering to pay for your ticket silly?”

“I meant of course I want to see you, and if you think I don’t, you’re being silly.”

“Then let me pay for your ticket.” He waited.