Where Old Ghosts Meet - Kate Evans [47]
“Don’t go payin’ no heed to the like of that.” She looked in his direction and decided to take her time before trying again. The following evening, however, he appeared at the kitchen door, all cleaned up and looking like he was ready to go out somewhere.
“You’re going out?”
“No.”
“Oh!”
“I thought I might have a try with the child again.”
“Oh! Right. Well, you’ve come at a good time, she’s just about asleep. Come and sit here in Father’s big chair and I’ll settle her.”
He crossed the room and sat on the edge of the seat.
“Just take it easy now. Sit back in the chair and make a crook with your arm, like this, see. That’s it.” Firmly, but with great care, she laid the sleeping child in the cradle of his arm.
He stared for a long time in disbelief. Then he looked up into Peg’s face. “I can feel her warmth,” he said softly.
“I’ll never forget the picture of the two of them that night, Nora. He sitting there so still, his long fingers, splayed out so protectively around the tiny body. He had a little poem he used say sometimes to put her asleep. I heard it that night for the first time.”
“Do you remember it?”
“I don’t know if I can remember all of it but it was something like this: House, be still, and ye little grey mice, / Lie close tonight in your hidden lairs. / Moths on the window, fold your wings, / Little black chafers, silence your humming. /Things of the mountain that wake in the night-time, / Do not stir tonight until the daylight whitens!
“I can’t remember no more but he could say it so beautiful. Sheila loved that poem best of all. No matter what stories he had to tell, she’d still go on to him, ‘Say the one about the mice!’ He got to care for that youngster in his own way, and she for him.”
“What do you mean, ‘in his own way’?” Nora was frowning.
“Oh, you know, looked out for her. Got her little treats.”
“So what became of her? Does she live in the cove?”
“No, my dear, she’s long gone. Married an American boy with the armed forces she met down to Argentia. There was all kinds stationed here in the forties during the war and many of them married Newfoundland girls and took them off back to the States when the war was over. They went to California, where he was from. She’s still there and has three children of her own.”
“And do you ever see her?”
“Oh, yes. From time to time she comes home to see us all, and I’ve been to California to see them too. Yes, my dear, I got to see a bit of the world after all.”
Nora put the car in gear, turned around, and headed cautiously into the fog.
13
They left the fog and rain behind at the cape but the sky had clouded over, taking the blush off the day. Since leaving the headland, they had driven along in silence. Nora wanted to ask Peg about people’s reaction to the living arrangement at her house, but when she glanced across, Peg’s head was nodding forward onto her chest. The woman needed her lunch and a rest, not more chatter, so she let her be.
Nora tried to imagine the set-up. They must have made an odd group back in those days: an attractive young widow, a small child deprived of her mother at birth, and a good-looking lodger who turned up from time to time and lived with them. It would certainly have caused a stir where she came from, but in the small island community, having the parish priest firmly on your side no doubt had helped. Without his approval there would have been no refuge for Matt Molloy at Peg Barry’s house, certainly not after her father died. The whiff of scandal would have found its way to the door, and only Father O’Reilly’s unqualified acceptance of the situation could have stilled the wagging tongues. The priest would have been like God in such communities, and somehow Matt Molloy had gained his trust.
“My dear, I’m nodding off. Where are we?”
“We’re almost home, another ten minutes or so and we’ll be there. Is Father O’Reilly still alive? It might be interesting to meet him.”
“He is indeed, and I