It was going better than she had dared to hope.

Nick arrived first. Clara saw him talking to his mother and had to steel herself not to go over and greet him. She watched as Hilary got him a gla.s.s of wine and introduced him to a couple of colleagues. He was tall and relaxed, as at home there as he would be anywhere. Would he be right for her troubled Linda?

Linda came in then. Clara saw her looking around the roaringly successful party in wonder. Clara felt a wave of pride at being able to show this to her over-critical daughter. Cake sale indeed!

She saw Hilary move Nick into Johnny's physiotherapy room and so Clara headed that way too with Linda.

"You need to look at these amazing exercise plans he has on the wall," she said. "I'll try not to be too long."

"You're great at hiding the signs of drink," Linda said grudgingly. "I thought you'd be on all fours."

Clara waved her winegla.s.s around airily. It was her first drink tonight, but Linda must never know this. "Oh, I fear I'm well over the limit," she said. "I'm glad I sound all right. I have two or three more people to talk to."

"Take your time, Clara." Linda was cheerful about it all. At least she wasn't going to have to carry her mother to the car. She was glad she had put on her black-and-white silk dress. It looked good on her and she had extremely uncomfortable shoes that went with it. She had dropped her sneakers into the trunk of the car as she pa.s.sed by. She would never be able to drive in these shoes. Linda looked around at the people there. She recognized one or two faces from the television. She saw politicians whose faces were familiar. Ah, G.o.d, why had she called this a cake sale? She wondered where this awful man her mother hated called Frank was, and she'd love to met this boringly angelic Polish girl who seemed to be everything a mother wanted wrapped up in one small hardworking parcel.

She noticed a pleasant-looking man across the room studying the exercise charts. He wasn't wearing a badge. He must be a visitor like herself. She thought he had looked at her admiringly when she came in. But then she must stop thinking things like that. Usually people weren't fancying her at all, just looking with a pa.s.sing interest at someone with long legs. It had been her downfall thinking that people were admiring her when more often than not there was no admiration at all.

It was Fiona who introduced them in the end. Clara told her to do it.

"Just say this is Nick Hickey This is Linda Casey. Please, Fiona, now."

"Why don't you or Hilary do it?"

"I'd tell you, but then I'd have to kill you, so it's better you just go and do it," Clara urged her.

"Ooh, is it a touch of matchmaking? Are we going to be talking about two weddings soon?" Fiona joked.

"If you mention anything like that, even remotely I will take you to one of those treatment beds and skillfully remove your entire heart and transplant it into someone else," she said, with such intensity that Fiona backed down.

"Yeah, sure, I get the message."

"This conversation is over and did not take place," Clara said.

"What conversation? You'll have to excuse me, Clara. I have a couple of things to do." Fiona escaped to Johnny's room to do the job.

She was very beautiful, Clara's daughter. She didn't need any mother trying to find her a fellow. And as far as Nick was concerned, he was so easygoing he didn't look like Last Chance Saloon either. Still, this was her mission.

"I came to pick up my mother because she's drunk," Linda said.

"So did I, in a way. Snap!" He laughed.

"Who is your drunken mother?" Linda asked.

"Hilary Hickey" he said. "She's the office manager."

"My mother is Clara Casey," she said grumpily.

"Oh, the head honcho," he said. "I see."

"She looks quite sober, though." Linda felt defensive now. She didn't want to let this office manager hear that Clara was a dipso or anything.

"Better to be sure though these days," he said approvingly.

"Are you involved in the clinic here?"

"Not enough," Nick said ruefully. "I didn't realize exactly how much they had all done here. I must say I'm impressed."

"Me too," Linda said. He hadn't said what he did for a living. Well, that was okay. She hated those people who immediately pinned you down and cla.s.sified you by your job. Her ex-boyfriend Simon said that you should always ask someone what they did for a living the moment you met them so that you wouldn't waste any time with n.o.bodies and losers. But that was very Simon. Not necessarily anything you'd want to live by.

This Nick was nice. And he revealed his job himself. He said he didn't get much exercise as he taught music, which was a sittingdown job, and he played in a club, which involved sitting around and then standing up to play in an intense atmosphere.

Linda said she worked in a record shop and told him where it was.

"They're terrific," Nick said. "They're starting a whole new jazz section."

"And I'm in charge of it," Linda said proudly.

"Never!" He was very impressed.

"Yes, I have a rack of Count Basie, Duke Ellington and Miles Davis already, and they've given me funds to get more."

"Will you have Artie Shaw," he asked, "and Benny Goodman?"

"Sure I will. I was going to get going with jazz women. You know, Billie Holiday, Ella ...?"

"And Lena!" he cried. "You'll have lots of Lena Horne."

"Oh yes, yes. My favorite, Lena is. More than you know."

"Mine is At Long Last Love,'" Nick said.

The guests were all leaving. Clara and Hilary, the two ostensibly drunken mothers, were peeping around the door.

Linda and Nick were oblivious to it all.

All the scheming ladies had done was to speed it up a little for them. And now they must stand back and hold their breath and never ever, as long as they lived, admit this little plan to either of the young jazz fans who stood in their own world in the middle of Johnny's exercise room.

Chapter Ten.

Fiona was invited to come to supper in St. Jarlath's Crescent. The twins wanted to cook a Greek meal and they had asked Molly if she'd mind if they used her kitchen.

"And did she?" asked Fiona, knowing how proud Molly Carroll was of her cooking skills, her roasts and her ca.s.seroles.

"Apparently she's delighted," said Declan. "She's talking meatb.a.l.l.s and kebabs with them as if she grew up on a Greek island."

"She's one dote, your mother," Fiona said affectionately.

"You made her what she is now. When I went to the hospital she was so difficult. I dreaded you ever having to meet her. Now you're the best of pals."

"Well, why wouldn't we be? Aren't we both mad about you?"

"So, when do you think we should give my mam a day out?"

"She has plenty of days out," Fiona said. "Weren't we up at the zoo, the pair of us, last week? She told me it had been years since she was there and I loved it too."

"You know full well what I mean," Declan said.

"Oh, a wedding day!" wedding day!" Fiona said, with a laugh. Fiona said, with a laugh.

"Yes, sweetheart, a wedding day wedding day ..." ..."

"Haven't we all the time in the world to arrange that?" Fiona said. "Would Wednesday be okay?"

"To get married?" He looked up gleefully.

"To go to supper with the twins at your house, you eejit."

Bobby Walsh told Declan that he and his wife were having a ruby wedding party That was forty years married. He sighed with pleasure about it, though Declan couldn't see why That sharp-tongued, restless, impatient Rosemary! Imagine being married to her for four decades. But maybe she hadn't seemed like that when they started out.

"So, we're having about seventy people to the house and I was wondering, would you and Fiona like to join us?"

Declan was taken aback. "Well, that's very nice of you, Bobby, but you don't want to be bringing dreary old doctors and nurses in on top of all your friends."

"On the contrary. I owe you everything. I wouldn't be here planning to celebrate if it hadn't been for you all. And there was was a bit of a misunderstanding between Rosemary and Clara." a bit of a misunderstanding between Rosemary and Clara."

"Ah, yes!" Declan looked calm and sympathetic. He had heard all about the "misunderstanding" from Clara. It had, in fact, been a shouted attack from Rosemary-but better let sleeping dogs lie there, he thought to himself.

"So, it's on the twenty-first, but I'll send you a proper invitation. That's really great, now. I'm so happy you'll be there."

And indeed he sounded happy, Declan thought.

"Rosemary with you today?" he asked, as they completed the blood tests and the chart filling.

"No. She's out talking to caterers. Carl brought me. He has a day off from the school."

"He's a great son. You must be delighted with him!" Declan said.

"Yes, he is, he's a great boy and he loves that teaching job. Of course Rosemary thinks it's not nearly good enough for him, tells everyone he's doing an M.A., but there'll be white blackbirds before that lad goes back to university. He'll go on at that school until he's drawing his pension."

"Great to have found something which makes you happy," Declan said, as he helped Bobby on with his coat.

"If he finds as good a woman as I did, then he'll be a lucky man," Bobby said.

Privately, Declan hoped that young Carl would find a much better woman than Rosemary, but his face showed nothing of this.

"We'd been waiting for him for over ten years. We'd almost given up hope. And then he arrived." Bobby was so good-natured and cheerful about everything, including his bad-tempered wife. It was fortunate that the boy they had waited so long for had inherited most of his father's characteristics rather than his mother's.

"Fiona will be thrilled," Declan said, as he shook Bobby's hand.

"And when are you two ...?" Bobby began.

"Don't ask," Declan whispered. "It's like not mentioning the war-everything functions fine if you don't start looking for a date for the Big Day or whatever. If you do, all h.e.l.l breaks loose."

"You're a wise man, Declan," Bobby said. "It will all turn out absolutely fine. Believe me."

Declan found it hard to believe anything from a man who was pleased to be married to Rosemary for forty years, but he smiled his thanks, as he did so often. It was easier than gut-wrenching confrontation. Sometimes he wondered, might he be a bit dull?

Ania knew that Clara and Hilary had a secret, but she didn't know what it was. Sometimes they giggled like schoolgirls. Other times they sat, heads together, making lists. But they never told her. She didn't mind. She hadn't told them all about Marek showing up and how she had got over him in just one minute, standing there in that restaurant when he was a.s.suming she would dance naked for men to make him money.

Maybe it was about Hilary's son and Clara's daughter, who had got together at the big reception. That had been a lovely night, Ania remembered wistfully. Carl had admired how well she looked. He had said her English was coming on by leaps and bounds, and he had laughed at her fondly when she paused to write down leaps and bounds. leaps and bounds. It was a lovely phrase, reminded you of a hare in the gra.s.s, leaping and bounding ahead. It was a lovely phrase, reminded you of a hare in the gra.s.s, leaping and bounding ahead.

He had even kissed her on the nose as he left.

"You are so sweet, Ania, and so clever. I wish I had students like you in my cla.s.s."

"I am not clever, Carl. Truly I am not."

"Excuse me. From where I stand you are very clever. And look, you can turn your hand to anything."

"That's only because I need to work hard to make money. I just have to try many things."

"This is what I mean. One moment you're running a laundry, the next you're running this clinic ..."

"I would not say that! Working here, yes."

"I have listened to you all evening. You're such a good amba.s.sador for the work that is done here. Then you work in a jeweler's-"

"I just clean there!"

"And in that international center. in that international center. And And you mind children. you mind children. And And you go round to people's houses and clear up after their dinner parties." you go round to people's houses and clear up after their dinner parties."

"That was was a good idea. I thought of that myself." Ania's eyes were shining. "It is nice for the hostess that she can go to bed and come down to a nice clean kitchen." a good idea. I thought of that myself." Ania's eyes were shining. "It is nice for the hostess that she can go to bed and come down to a nice clean kitchen."

"Yes, but when do you sleep, Ania? How many hours are there in the day for you?"

"Not enough," she had said seriously. "I would need forty hours in the day if I were to earn enough to give my mother the life she deserves."

"Maybe she just wants you to be happy," he had said. He wouldn't say all that unless he liked her a little. Would he?

Father Brian Flynn was having what he thought was an exhausting run with his friend Johnny, who thought it was a casual walk. They had taken the little DART train that went south from Dublin, out to Killiney on the coast, and then they climbed what Father Brian thought was a mountain and Johnny said was a slight incline and looked down over Dun Laoghaire harbor, where the boats came in from England and the rich yachtsmen moored their craft; then they descended from the mountain, or incline, to Dalkey and drank two pints in a friendly pub, after which they took the DART back to Dublin.

Brian was knocked out by it. Johnny, who must have had different muscles and sinews, felt no pain at all.