Trisha Telep: The Mammoth Book of Irish Romance

Tom needed no rainbow today. Good luck was already his. Dolly Keenan rode beside him on the compact wagon seat. Their arms and thighs collided as the springs bounced, and she didn’t shy away. Nor did she complain about the mist that dampened her cheeks and hair. They gossiped and bantered, talking of nonsense, of favourite foods and ancient legends. She laughed a lot, and so did he.

The mare clip-clopped over a twisting road rutted in some spots, soggy in others. Sheep dotted the knolls and bogs. Cows grazed in square green pastures divided by hawthorn hedges. Now and then an abandoned stone cottage, roofless and overgrown, provided a landmark that told Tom where he was.

The idea that Dolly had ridden this road by herself both impressed and worried him, yet she wouldn’t have been alone. Several cyclists passed them. They called out pleasant greetings, as did many foot travellers and the drivers of drays and donkey carts. Tom and Dolly waved cheerfully back.

Before they’d left Tobernalt, she’d shared the cheese and scones in her saddlebag, and he’d split his chunk of currant bread in half. While they’d eaten, he’d spotted the pearl ring on her right hand. He’d carried her bicycle from the woods thinking how she’d surely look down on him once she knew more about him.

She’d peeked inside the wagon when he opened the rear doors. «What’ve you got in there, Tom?»

«Tea.» He’d helped her to the wagon seat. The touch of her fingers thrilled him, and though he knew right well she didn’t have to, she leaned on him when she mounted the step. «I travel the counties selling tea.»

«Is that where you’re coming from now? A sales jaunt?»

«In Donegal and Tyrone, yes.» He’d settled beside her and tugged the reins. «Got as far as Strabane. There’s trouble up there. At the inn where I stayed, the landlady said I shouldn’t go out. Said the local lads were on the prowl for southerners.»

The idea still amused him, but furrows had appeared on Dolly’s forehead. «My father’s spoken of such goings on in the north, but I’ve never heard of them firsthand. Still and all, you don’t look like the sort anyone would be stupid enough to take on.» Her cheeks turned crimson, as if she’d said something she shouldn’t.

Tom had been delighted she’d said it at all and, thinking of it now, he sat taller on the seat. He guided the horse to the side of the road to let a northbound wagon pass. Once it did, he eased his hold on the reins and continued conversing with Dolly.

She’d recently returned from England, where she’d attended nursing school. She’d lived with her brother Lanigan and his wife.

«Lanigan’s a crackerjack carpenter, but he had to go to London to find work. My brother Maneen and sister Badie have emigrated to America. Mac is still in Tubbercurry. He’s a teacher, like my mother. Sissie was, too, but she died of consumption two years ago.»

Tom recognized the grief in her voice. «I’m sorry. There’s a lot of that about.»

«Too much. That’s one reason why I want to be a nurse. To help. I deliberately failed the teaching exam so I could go to nursing school.»

Tom’s delighted laughter echoed over the bogs. «It’s grand that you could. My father took me out after sixth grade to work the farm and do odd jobs.»

«That’s not uncommon. Most of my friends ended their schooling likewise. I’m lucky my parents let me go off at all, with twenty acres to manage. They were disappointed about the nursing. An unsuitable calling for a proper young lady, they said. Wanted me to stay home and teach, like Sissie and Mac. When Mac isn’t teaching, he helps my father about the farm. He’ll inherit the place some day.»

«So will I, though it’s little I want it.»

«I wondered about that, Tom. A Ballymote lad travelling all over Ireland. When you see other ways to live besides milking cows, it’s hard to go back to farming, isn’t it?»

Tom tightened his hold on the reins. He didn’t want to talk about cows, not now. «Your brothers and sisters have odd names. Nicknames, are they?»

«Yes. Jim is Lanigan, John is Maneen. Michael is Mac, and Annie’s called Badie. Kathleen was Sissie.»

«Is Dolly a nickname as well?»

«It is. They called me that because I was the youngest. My real name is Doreen.»

Hearing the name from his dream stunned Tom, though he recovered quickly. This was Ireland after all. And a fellow got used to such odd occurrences.

Awake or dreaming, he had no business befriending an educated young lady whose father held a good strong farm of twenty Irish acres. «The matchmakers will be hopping about like hungry hens over a girl as pretty as you.»

Dolly blushed again. Her lips pressed into a thin straight line, and she shook her head. «Marriage would be the death of nursing for me. I’m thinking of emigrating. To Boston, like Maneen and Badie. That’s why I was at the well. Looking for guidance, for something to help me find my way.»

The heart turned crosswise in Tom. He might convince her to stay, but how could he blame her for wanting to go? He wanted no part of a life here himself.

Locking his gaze on her sparkling eyes, he released one hand from the reins and dared to squeeze her fingers. «Someone told me once, you must find your way by the light of your heart.»

She squeezed back, an agreeable response indeed, and then she smiled again. «That’s lovely, Tom. You know, I feel we’ve met before. At a dance? Or in church, perhaps?»

It seemed she’d forgotten her time with the fairies. Had it really happened at all? Tom’s other hand slipped into the pocket that in his dream had held the golden bean. He felt nothing but the hard seam in the cloth.

A dream. It had all been a dream. «Somewhere like that, I suppose. I do get around.»

Her heavy sigh seemed to unleash a new round of showers. She leaned back under the overhang. «There’ll never be any light in my heart if my parents have their way. Mac says they’re going to forbid me to be a nurse. They thought I’d get it out of my system in London, but just the opposite occurred. Studying at the hospital and seeing all those ill and dying folk only made me more determined to help them.»

Suddenly jealous of every sick man in the world, Tom released her hand. She might hit him, but he couldn’t hold back. «I wouldn’t like to see you go so far away, Dolly Keenan. The light in my heart has grown brighter since I met you.»

Nor could he keep from seizing her and sliding his lips over hers, gently at first, gauging, sensing, expecting an outraged shove. Instead, she kissed him back with a fervour that unlocked a secret door in his soul.

Could he go with her to America?

His cousin had gone to Boston and found work as a train conductor. An aunt named Mary, his father’s own sister, had gone to Boston too. She ran a boarding house and made good money, a lot more than Tom made selling tea. With all the skills he had, he could do anything.

Could he leave Ireland and his family forever?

For Dolly Keenan he could, and her eager kisses said she’d have him.

«Good man yourself!» shouted a farmer leading a donkey laden with turf-filled panniers.

Tom backed breathlessly away from Dolly. He licked his lips, savouring the taste of her, entranced by the same perfume he’d smelled in her hair behind the silver oak tree. Dolly in turn looked away to the west, touching her smiling lips as if she couldn’t believe he’d kissed her.

Tom picked up the reins and tried to focus on the road. He’d sinned with a girl or two around Ireland, but he sensed no sin here. He loved Dolly, and she loved him, he knew it.

Maybe they wouldn’t have to leave. He’d speak to his father, have him send the matchmaker to Mr Keenan, convince the man that Tom O’Byrne could support his daughter well with his tea sales and roof thatching and all his odd jobs.