Rosewater and Soda Bread (9 page)

Saturday afternoons, as always, found Ballinacroaghs Bible study group huddled in the dusty environs of the Reek Relics shop. Milky tea and plain digestives served to fortify the ladies, along with a regular diet of gossip and prayers.

Currently the topic was one of Joan Donnelly's twin sons, the elder by three minutes, and his affair with the junior hairstylist at Athey's Shear Delight.

Joan sniffed in contempt. “Far be it from me to give my opinion on a co-worker,” she started, pausing dramatically when she saw teacups poised in the circle around her. “I'm only at the salon half days now, but I still have my professionalism to keep.”

Dervla Quigley pursed her lips. “You're among friends, Joan. Don't hold back on your feelings. Purge if you need to, so.” She nodded at her sister, Marie, who remained as she usually did, silent and concentrating on her uneaten digestive biscuit.

“Purgin won't be necessary,” said Joan. “But a mother knows what a mother knows—that snippet won't be right for my Peter, that's what. From the moment they got together I was unhappy about it all.”

“Sure, I hear her people are from the North,” commented June Nolan.

“She could hail from Timbuktu, for all that matters. She can't look after my Peter like he deserves.” Joan sipped at her white tea and continued. “He's got to think of Michael as well. The poor lad's been off to the wayside ever since those two got together.”

“At least you can say he sowed his oats. It's time for the proper way of things, from this moment on,” said Dervla, no doubt thinking of her late husband Jim's tendency to sow voraciously and well into his sixtieth year.

“I'll say this about Evie: she may be a bag of bones, but at least she's not some street Arab like you know who.” Joan shook her head in relief. “Thanks be to God that little floozy didn't get her claws into either one of my boys.”

Antonia agreed. “Sure, it's not five minutes that Thomas's boy is down from Dublin she doesn't have him to the Beach, doing God knows what.”

June commiserated. “Cheap, that's what. No faith to guide her.”

“That's what happens when you're brought up a heathen.”
Dervla uncrossed and crossed her legs, placing a hand over the Bible on her lap. “You'd think those three had a scent for our men, all the way from wherever it is they came from.”

“Iran,” Marie Brennan whispered from her corner.

“The wild-beasted desert, that's what,” her dominating sister interjected.

The clink of teaspoons gave way to a momentary pause. The gathered women drank their tea in deep thought. Another round of digestives was in order before June spoke up.

“I hear that Marjan's now making the rounds,” she huffed. “Got her eye on the Muir clan, from what Siobhan tells me.” June arranged her knobby cardigan around her large center with an indignant air. “As if a man like Julian Winthrop Muir would give the time of day to the likes of her. Imagine!”

“My Peter says he's moving into the Hall with his men Monday at daybreak. Going to patch the big house up to all its former glory. Think of it now, a proper family in these parts again.”

Dervla looked over her cup with disdain. “You can keep your big house empty, for all the sin it brings. Those Muirs have a lot to be shameful for, starting with that Julian there. Julian
Winthrop
Muir.”

Her sister looked at her quizzically.

“Don't look at me with those big eyes of yours, Marie. As if you don't recall that summer clearly.”

Assumpta Corcoran leaned in, followed by the rest of the women. “What summer was that, then?”

“The year of my Jim's passing, God rest his precious soul. July 1965.”

Antonia squinted her eyes, traveling back. “Nineteen sixty-five … July.” She sat up. “Oh, now,
that Muir
boy.”

“That's right,
that
Muir boy. Sort and the same. The whole clan of them staying in Jarleth House up on the Bay. He and his
Dublin kin did a right number on that poor laddeen from Clare.”

Antonia nodded now, remembering. She turned to the other women. “Strung the boy up on a tree. Left him naked and hanging from his limbs the entire night. Near caught his death, that young one. What was his name?”

“O'Cleirigh. Dara. Island Gerry's boy.”

“That's right. O'Cleirigh. The boy didn't say boo for a whole year after the torture.”

“The shame,” said Dervla, shaking her head. “And not one of the guards doing mite about it. Makes a person want to take the law into their own two hands, it does. Vigilents law, that's what they call it in America. Isn't that right, Marie?”

Her sister nodded. “Vigilante,” she corrected, softly. “Vigilante law.”

“That's what I said. Vigilantes. Taking matters into their own hands. It's what needs to be done at times, ladies.”

The women of the Bible study murmured their agreement and reached for more digestives.

A KNOCK CAME FAINTLY through the bedroom wall, causing Estelle to spring up in her chair. She scanned the room in alarm, her eyes passing from the bed to the door and back, adjusting to the limited light.

When the sound came again, she quickly covered the girl's bare legs with the down-filled duvet and moved around the foot of the bed. By the time she reached the bedroom door, Marjan was already in the hallway.

“Estelle! Oh, thank God. I've been knocking on the front door for a while. Are you all right?”

Marjan stooped to place the heavy basket of food she had brought on the ground. She blinked to readjust her eyes to the dark passageway, which when lit showcased a gallery of framed sepia and cream photographs.

“Oh, darling. I forgot you were coming,” Estelle whispered, closing the bedroom door softly behind her. She moved down the hallway, tiptoeing nearly.

Marjan followed. Even in the diminished light, she could tell her friend looked drained of every last ounce.

“I brought
the gormeh sabzi
I promised,” she said. “And some chickpea cookies. I made an extra batch.”

She was about to tell Estelle about the pistachio halvah she had also packed when the old widow's peculiar behavior stopped her.

Bringing her index and middle fingers up to her pursed lips, Estelle blew a silent shush and shook her head. She then waved her left hand back and forth as if swatting a stubborn mayfly.

Before Marjan had a chance to speak again, Estelle pushed her gently into the nearby kitchen.

The room's periwinkle blue cabinets and daffodil-colored walls compounded the cheerful effect of the interminable sunshine streaming in from a large south-facing window. The light revealed purple shadows under Estelle's eyes, casting shadowy wrinkles not usually seen on her vibrant Mediterranean face.

Estelle lowered her fingers from her lips, but not before Marjan caught a glimpse of the state of her hands: sandpaper red, they were stiffened into large, immobile claws.

“I knew you weren't feeling well,” Marjan said, guilt flooding over her. “I should have come up to see you last night.”

Estelle tsked. “I am fine, darling. It is not me that is sick.” She might have sounded more convincing had she not begun to sway on her heels, her bandy knees wobbling dangerously.

“You need to sit down,” Marjan said, pulling a kitchen chair
beneath the widow. The old lady sank into it immediately, sighing with relief.

“I wish you had told me how you were feeling sooner.” Marjan grabbed the tin kettle off the stove and filled it up in the sink. She positioned it back on the front burner, the gas licking its sides until it burnt out a bright orange-blue flame. “You promised me you'd call whenever you felt this weak,” she said, turning to her friend.

“You look tired too, darling.”

Marjan waved away Estelle's concern. “Not at all. The café's been really busy lately. That's all.” She opened a cupboard and took down a large ceramic mug. “You're the one who has to take it easy. All right?”

Estelle was so tired that her eyes seemed to forget their ability to blink.

“Estelle?”

The widow shook her head abruptly. “Oh, sorry, darling. I think I just fell asleep with my eyes open.” She smiled weakly.

“Let's forget about the tea,” Marjan said. “I want you to get into bed and I'll bring you a cup of hot milk. Come on now.” She prodded Estelle's arm.

“No, no. I have to tell you something. Something about what is in my bed,” Estelle insisted. “Sit, sit.” She patted the wooden hearth chair next to her.

Marjan bit her lip and settled reluctantly into the seat. She turned to the widow, who without further ado began her story. The story of the mermaid on the shores of Clew Bay.

“IN THE INLET?” Marjan asked, as Estelle concluded her tale.

Estelle shook her head solemnly. “Terrible, absolutely terrible. I could not believe it myself, but it's true.”

Marjan looked down for a moment. It was too much to take in. “Do you think someone did something to her?”

“I think this at first. I was about to call the guards, but then I look more.” She paused. “I look at her body, at her belly, and I saw more.”

Marjan frowned, missing the meaning behind the widow's words. “So this girl you found, you think she was trying to kill herself by drowning? In the Bay?”

“A person can kill themselves in many ways. It is not always physical, you know. You can kill your heart, your hope, your future, if you don't believe that life is a gift.”

Estelle paused, aware that her explanation was more enigmatic than she had intended. She peered into Marjan's puzzled face. “I don't know if she was trying to kill herself, darling,” she said. “But I am very sure she was trying to kill her baby.”

BEING THE MIDDLE-BORN
had its advantages, Bahar told herself. There was so much more scope for the personality, if you really stopped to think about it. Without the responsibility that came from being a trailblazing eldest, or the encumbrance of always playing the baby, a middle child could really find the freedom to discover her true self. And, if occasion called for it, to properly reinvent herself, as she, Bahar Aminpour, was getting ready to do in a few months' time.

Bahar stared at the bowl on the table before her. Twenty radishes, washed and piled one on top of the other, sat ready for her knife. As she always did when prepping vegetables, she took a moment to square her shoulders, draw a deep breath, and observe the task at hand. When she was ready, she reached over and plucked one of the pinkish bulbs. With a snip of her sharp paring knife, she set about making a quick incision into its magenta skin, her lips pursed with concentration.

Round and round the blade went, producing petals that opened one on top of the other, white against the red. Ribbons fell from the knife's edge, curling around her crossed legs. And so it went until all twenty were done, the radishes cleared of their perky heads, their bodies floating in a bowl of chilled water like a delicate bouquet. No longer ordinary root vegetables, they were now brilliant roses carved to blooming age.

The radish roses made pretty garnishes on the many cheese and herb plates that went out during the hungry hours of afternoon. They were also tangible, not to mention edible, proof of one of Bahar's greatest talents to date: hands that were extraordinarily agile, and arms of immense strength.