Maeve Binchy - Evening Class

'But I couldn't.' Bernie Duffy's voice was gentler now.

'You could have said you'd come back the next day. You just laughed. I couldn't bear that, and then you got crosser and crosser and said awful things.'

'I wasn't talking normally because I wasn't talking to a normal person. I was really shaken by you, Lizzie. You seemed to be losing your mind. Truly. You weren't making any sense. You kept saying that the last six years you had been like a lost soul…'

'That's just the way it was.'

'You were seventeen when I left. Your father wanted you to go to Galway with him, you wouldn't… You insisted you were old enough to live in Dublin, you got a job in a dry cleaner's, I remember. You had your own money. It was what you wanted. That was what you said.'

'I stayed because I thought you'd come back.'

'Back to where? Here?'

'No, back to the house. Daddy didn't sell it for a year, remember?'

'I remember, and then he put every penny he got for it on horses that are still running backwards somewhere on English racetracks.'

'Why didn't you come back, Mummy?'

'What was there to come back ro? Your father was only interested in a form book, John had gone to Switzerland, Kate had gone to New York, you were running with your crowd.'

'I was waiting for you, Mummy.'

'No, that's not true, Lizzie. You can't rewrite the whole thing. Why didn't you write and tell me if that was the way it was?'

There was a silence.

'You only liked hearing from me if I was having a good time, so I

told you about the good times. On postcards and letters. I told you when I went to Greece, and to Achill Island. I didn't tell you about wanting you to come back in case you got annoyed with me.'

'I would have liked it a hell of a lot more than being hijacked, imprisoned…"

'And is it nice where you are in West Cork?' Again Bill was being conversational and interested. 'It always sounds a lovely place to me, the pictures you see of the coastline.'

'It's very special. There are a lot of free spirits there, people who have gone back to the land, people who paint, express themselves, make pottery.'

'And do you specialise in any of the arts… er… Bernie?' He was owlish and interested, she couldn't take offence.

'No, not myself personally, but I have always been interested in artistic people, and places. I find myself stifled if I'm cooped up anywhere. That's why this whole business…'

Bill was anxious to head her off the subject. 'And do you have a house of your own or do you live with Chester?'

'No, heavens no,' she laughed just like her daughter laughed, a happy peal of mirth. 'No, Chester is gay, he lives with Vinnie. No, no. They're my dearest friends. They live about four miles away. No, I have a room, a sort of studio I suppose, outhouse it once was, off a bigger property.'

'That sounds nice, is it near the sea?'

'Yes, of course. Everywhere's near the sea. It's very charming. I love it. I've been there for six years now, made a real little home of it.'

'And how do you get money to live, Bernie? Do you have a job?'

Lizzie's mother looked at him as if he had made a very vulgar noise. 'I beg your pardon?'

'I mean, if Lizzie's father didn't give you any money you have to earn a living. That's all.' He was unrepentant.

'It's because he works in a bank, Mummy.' Lizzie apologised. 'He's obsessed with earning a living.'

Suddenly it became too much for Bill. He was sitting in this house in the middle of the night trying to keep the peace between two madwomen and they thought that he was the odd one because he actually had a job and paid his bills and lived according to the rules. Well, he had had just about enough. Let them sort it out. He would go home, back to his dull house, with his sad family.

He would never be transferred into international banking no matter how much he learned about 'How are you' and 'beautiful buildings' and'red carnations'. He would not try any more to make selfish people see some good in each other. He felt an entirely unfamiliar twitching in his nose and eyes, as if he were about to cry.

There was something about his face that both women noticed at the same time. It was as if he had opted out, left them.

'I didn't mean to laugh at your question,' Lizzie's mother said. 'Of course I have to earn money. I do some help in the home where I have my studio, you know, cleaning, light housework, and when they have parties I help with the… well, with the clearing up. I love ironing, I always have, so I do all their ironing too, and for this I don't have to pay any rent. And of course they give me a little spending money too.'

Lizzie looked at her mother in disbelief. This was the arty lifestyle, mixing with the great and the rich, the playboys and the glittery set who had second homes in the south-west of Ireland. Her mother was a maid.

Bill was in control of himself again. 'It must be very satisfying,' he said. 'Means you can have the best of both worlds, a nice place to live, independence, and no real worries about how to put food on the table.'

She searched his face for sarcasm, but did not find any. 'That's right,' Bernie Duffy said eventually. 'That's the way it is.'

Bill thought he must speak before Lizzie blurted out something that would start them off again. 'Perhaps sometime when the weather gets finer Lizzie and I could come down and see you there. It would be a real treat for me. We could come on the bus, and change at Cork city.' Eager, boyish and planning it as if this were a social call long overdue.

'And, are you two… I mean, are you Lizzie's boyfriend?'

'Yes, we are going to get married when we are twenty-five, two years' time. We hope to get a job in Italy so we are both learning Italian at night.'

'Yes, she told me that amongst all the other ramblings,' Bernie said.

'That we were getting married?' Bill was pleased.

'No, that she was learning Italian. I thought it was more madness.'

There seemed little more to be said. Bill stood up as if he were a normal guest taking his leave of a normal evening. 'Bernie, as you may have noticed it's very late now. There won't be more buses running, and it might be difficult to find your friends even if there were buses. So I suggest that you stay here tonight, at your own wish of course, with the key in the door. And then tomorrow when you've both had a good rest, you and Lizzie , say goodbye to each other nice and peaceably and I probably won't see you until next summer when it would be lovely if we could come and see you in West Cork.'

'Don't go,' Bernie begged. 'Don't go. She's nice and quiet while you're here but the moment you are out the door she'll be ranting and raving and saying she was abandoned.'

'No, no. It won't be a bit like that now.' He spoke with conviction. ' Lizzie , could you give your mother the key? Now Bernie, you keep that and then you know you can come and go as you please.'

'How will yon get home, Bill?' Lizzie asked.

He looked at her in surprise. She never usually asked or seemed to care that he had to walk three miles when he left her at night.

'I'll walk, it's a fine starry night,' he said. They were both looking at him. He felt an urge to say something more, to make the peaceful moment last. 'At Italian class last night Signora taught us a bit about the weather, how to say it's been a great summer. E' stata una magnifica estate .'

'That's nice,' Lizzie said. ' E' stata una magnifica estate .' She repeated it perfectly.

'Hey, you got it in one, the rest of us had to keep saying it over.' Bill was impressed.

'She always had a great memory, even as a little girl. You said a thing once and Elizabeth would remember it always.' Bernie looked at her daughter with something like pride.