Better Together (26 page)

The other thing she remembered was the lemon scent of the burning bush plants in the garden, mingling with that of the mown grass. She remembered thinking how beautiful it was and how fortunate she was to live where she did. In fact her overriding memory of the morning of Elva’s death was one of happiness and satisfaction and feeling very, very blessed.

It had been wonderfully peaceful, and then Sean had come home in an absolutely foul mood and with a small, but deep, cut on the side of his face. Nina had fussed around him asking him what on earth had happened, which made Sean touch his face and then look at his bloodstained fingers.

‘Stupid accident,’ he said. ‘I’d better stick a plaster on it.’

He strode into the house, leaving her looking after him, a concerned expression on her face. His bad-tempered return had ruined her sense of contentment and serenity. A few minutes later he came downstairs again, a small plaster on his cheek, and muttered something about clearing ivy from the end of the garden.

She’d tried not to be annoyed with Sean for being in bad humour and spoiling her feeling of well-being. She asked him if Paudie had agreed to do the printing, and he’d said that the businessman hadn’t been there – obviously he had bigger
fish to fry these days than work for local people. Then he’d taken a hoe and garden shears out of the shed and set to clearing the ivy with a vengeance. Nina had left him to it and gone indoors, where she whipped egg whites for pavlovas and sang along to Roberta Flack’s version of ‘Killing Me Softly’, which she had on loud enough to hear over the electric beater. Later, when the pavlovas were in the oven, she starting preparing fruit for that evening’s dessert, and continued to sing along to the radio. She remembered getting strawberry juice on her white cotton top and going upstairs to change. And when she came down, Sean was standing in the kitchen, a frozen look on his face.

‘What’s wrong?’ Her immediate, visceral concern was that something had happened to one of the children. But then, from the corner of her eye, she saw both of them playing outside and she allowed herself a sigh of relief. ‘What is it?’ she asked.

‘Elva O’Malley,’ said Sean blankly. ‘Ellie. She’s dead.’

‘She’s what?’ Nina was absolutely stunned. She’d spoken to Elva only the previous day, when she’d met her in the delicatessen on Main Street. ‘How? What happened?’

She listened as Sean told her about Elva’s fall. PJ Dalton had been the one to phone him and tell him. PJ was Sean’s closest friend in Ardbawn and was the foreman at Paudie’s printing works.

‘But how did she fall?’ asked Nina. ‘Was she leaning out of the window or what?’

‘How the hell do I know?’ demanded Sean. ‘I wasn’t there.’

‘You were there earlier,’ said Nina. ‘Did you see her? Was she unwell? Did she maybe have a dizzy spell or something?’

‘I don’t know,’ replied Sean. ‘She was . . . she was fine when I saw her. A bit . . . No . . . she was fine.’

‘Poor Paudie.’ Nina felt a tear roll down her cheek. ‘He must be devastated.’

Sean said nothing.

‘Was it Paudie who found her?’

‘I don’t bloody know!’ cried Sean. ‘All I know is that she’s dead. OK?’

Nina stared at him. There was no reason for Sean to snap at her like that.

‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘It was a shock, that’s all.’

Nina put her arms around him. Sean was easily affected by people and events. He felt things more deeply than anyone ever imagined. She thought that perhaps it was part of his artistic nature. He leaned his head on hers for a moment and then moved away from her.

‘I’m OK,’ he said. ‘I don’t know why I’m so . . . so . . .’

‘She was an old girlfriend,’ said Nina. ‘Of course you’re upset.’

Sean and Nina had only once discussed the fact that Elva was an old flame of his. It had been shortly before their marriage, and she’d teased him about the number of hearts in Ardbawn that he’d broken in the past, and the ones that were about to be broken by his marriage. Sean had laughed and said that his exploits had been totally overhyped and that he was happy to be settling down with her. He’d told her he’d already forgotten every other woman he’d ever dated.

Nina only vaguely remembered Sean and Elva as a couple, although they’d made a striking pair walking along the main street together at the time; Sean dark and brooding and Elva blonde and graceful.

Sean’s words brought her back to the present. ‘We were only kids back then. Jeez, she’s been married to Paudie for, what, fifteen, sixteen years now, you can hardly call her an old girlfriend.’

‘Sixteen years sounds like for ever when you’re young, but it isn’t that long really.’

‘Yeah, right.’

‘Why did you break it off with her?’

It was a question she’d never asked him about any of his previous relationships. It had never been something she either needed or wanted to know.

‘It was a mutual decision,’ said Sean.

Nina raised an eyebrow. Everyone knew that Elva had been heartbroken when Sean had dumped her. It certainly hadn’t been a mutual decision.

‘We were too young,’ he said impatiently. ‘Although maybe it was me who was too young for her at the time. After all, she married Paudie soon after.’

‘But she threw herself into the river after you two split up, didn’t she?’

‘That old chestnut!’ He snorted. ‘She tripped and fell.’

‘How d’you know?’

‘I . . . Look, Ellie didn’t . . . Oh, this is ridiculous! It was years ago.’

‘Sorry.’ Nina realised she was probably being insensitive.

‘She’s . . . she was the sort of person who could get under your skin. She could overdramatise things sometimes. But I never thought there was any truth in that story.’ He swallowed hard. ‘Never.’

‘She wasn’t pregnant when she married Paudie, was she?’

‘Why on earth would you think that?’

‘It’s surprising, that’s all. You break it off with her, she’s devastated, and the next thing she’s waltzing up the aisle with him.’

‘She couldn’t have been pregnant when she married him. JJ was born much later. Look, Nina, I don’t want to talk about her any more. I’m going out to the ivy again. I need to do something physical.’

‘OK,’ she said.

She watched him as he strode down the garden, his shoulders hunched. The news about Elva had clearly shaken him. Which was understandable, it had shaken her too. She remembered her mother talking about her once. Dolores had remarked that Ellie Slater was a girl who thought too much of herself. She believed she was made for better things. Which, Nina supposed, in her marriage to Paudie O’Malley, she’d certainly got.

And she would have got even more if she’d lived, Nina thought now as the ringing phone brought her abruptly back to the present. She would have been part of the rich and glamorous set that wanted to welcome Paudie into its midst. After Elva’s death, Paudie had maintained a dignified silence despite innuendo in some of the less reputable newspapers that there had been something untoward about it. That thirty-eight-year-old women didn’t just fall from bedroom windows. That the gardai weren’t happy about the circumstances. No matter what was printed, Paudie said nothing. Until the day he sued one of the papers and got a substantial settlement as a result.

A clever man, Paudie, thought Nina as she picked up the phone.

Always was. Always would be. But sometimes being clever just wasn’t enough.

Sheridan was enjoying her conversation with Hayley Goodwin. Talia’s aunt was younger than she’d expected, and as elegantly groomed as her niece. Sheridan thanked her for telling Talia about the job, and told her that she was enjoying her stay in Ardbawn.

‘A bit quiet for you, I’m sure.’ Hayley’s blue eyes twinkled.

‘Different,’ said Sheridan.

‘Getting to know people yet?’

Sheridan thought of all the people she’d met over the last couple of weeks, but mostly about her upcoming date with Joe, and she couldn’t help smiling.

‘A bit,’ she told Hayley. ‘I’m staying with Nina Fallon.’

‘I know.’ Hayley grinned at her. ‘The younger people in the town like to think that Ardbawn has grown into more than a village, but the truth is that most of the time everyone always has a good idea about what’s going on. We only have a few deep, dark secrets.’

‘You hardly need a newspaper, so,’ said Sheridan while wondering about the deep, dark secrets.

‘The bush telegraph can be quicker,’ agreed Hayley. ‘But it’s nice to have your name in the paper. Well, depending on the circumstances, I guess.’

‘In your case, definitely,’ said Sheridan. ‘We’re doing a piece about your next play.’

Hayley chatted happily about
Blithe Spirit
, the play they were putting on for the Ardbawn Festival, and how the dramatic society hoped it would be their best performance yet.

‘A pity you don’t have your famous leading man for it,’ said Sheridan. ‘Or will Sean Fallon return to Ardbawn?’

‘I doubt that very much,’ said Hayley. ‘He hasn’t been here to rehearse with us. Besides, we wouldn’t dream of insulting Nina by asking him.’

I’m turning into a desperate gossip, thought Sheridan as she listened to Hayley talk about Sean and Nina, and how upset most people were for the guesthouse owner. I never used to care about people’s personal lives before. But since coming here, all I want to know is personal stuff about guys like Paudie and Sean!

‘But you must know it all already,’ finished Hayley, who’d repeated the story Nina had told with lots more embellishment about Sean’s appearances in Dublin nightclubs with Lulu Adams and other female members of the
Chandler’s Park
cast.

‘Is he a complete pig, then?’ asked Sheridan.

‘It’s a funny thing,’ said Hayley slowly. ‘He and Nina seemed an almost perfect couple. Which surprised everyone in the town, because she’s not at all the sort of woman he usually went for. There was a bit of talk at the time they got married that it was old man Fallon who pushed his son into it. The doc seemed to think that there was money in the Doherty family. Certainly the house and land was worth a lot.’

‘Hardly seems a reason for marriage, though.’

‘I’d be the last person to know.’ Hayley chuckled. ‘I’m an old spinster.’

‘Hayley!’

‘I know. Doesn’t it sound sad and lonesome and awful? But I’m forty-five and unmarried, so I’m not sure what else
you could call me. Except I love living on my own. I’d hate to be married. Hate to go through what Nina’s going through. I like my life far too much for that.’

‘Nina said she threw Sean out.’

‘She may well have done. In which case, I wouldn’t bet on him staying out.’

‘Why?’

‘Oh, there was gossip before about Sean Fallon having a bit on the side. The bush telegraph didn’t work as well as it might have, though, or else he was incredibly discreet, because it never came out one way or the other. But if he did, Nina forgave him, and I can’t help thinking she’ll forgive him now too, if that’s what he wants.’

‘And is it?’

‘Maybe not right now, when he’s behaving like a child in a sweet shop. But d’you seriously expect a girl in her twenties to keep someone like Sean Fallon interested? He may be a flirt and he might like a bit of extramarital sex, but he’s an intelligent man and she’s a total airhead.’

‘You know that because . . .?’

‘I saw her being interviewed. All smiles and giggles and simpering. She’s not a proper actress. She’s a silly tart.’

‘So no part for her in
Blithe Spirit
, then?’ joked Sheridan.

‘Absolutely not.’ Hayley looked wistful. ‘I wish that Sean had kept it in his pants. Then he’d be with us again this year,
Chandler’s Park
or not.’

‘Can’t have everything, I suppose,’ said Sheridan. She got up to leave. ‘I’ll be along for the first night.’

‘Of course you will,’ said Hayley. ‘We always have front-row seats reserved for the local press.’

On her way back to the guesthouse, Sheridan phoned Nina to say she was going to spend some time in the lounge that evening so that she could access the internet. Alo Brady, her ex-colleague on the
City Scope
, had emailed her wanting to know if she was still working on something about Paudie O’Malley and his business empire. Sheridan replied that she was still getting her research together but that she was hoping to interview him shortly (she didn’t say that she’d still no idea how to go about that, although she was hopeful that one of her increasing number of contacts in the town would eventually make it happen). Alo had then mailed her back to say that he was leaving the
City Scope
for a position with an online business news site. The way of the future, he’d said, and Business Today was becoming more and more influential. The news site was very interested in Paudie’s empire. If Sheridan thought she could put a good story with a personal interview together, it could be a potential winner to submit to the site’s editor.

When she read Alo’s email, Sheridan’s immediate thought was that, once again, she’d been beaten by an ex-colleague in the new jobs stakes. She was trying very hard not to brood on the fact that since everyone else was getting jobs, she must be the worst journalist in the world. It was like being home again, with Con and Matt taking all the glory and her in the background wondering why she didn’t succeed like them. But there are new opportunities on the horizon for me, she reminded herself. My horoscope says so, and it’s been right so far, even if I did write it myself.

One way or another she was determined to get an interview with Paudie O’Malley and reveal something about him that nobody knew. And when she did that, she would surprise all
those people who seemed to think that she could only write about a dismal League of Ireland match on a wet Friday in the back of beyond.

Sheridan was pleased when Nina suggested that she have dinner in the house before doing whatever she needed to do on the computer. Her appetite had returned (so much for love robbing me of a desire to eat, she thought, and looking more sylph-like when I meet Joe) and she was ravenous; the only food she’d eaten all day being the emergency Kit Kat she kept in her desk drawer. The thought of Nina’s cooking made her mouth water, and she remembered the half-eaten packet of fruit pastilles in her bag. She popped one into her mouth, not caring that it was green and therefore not one of her favourite flavours.