Maeve Binchy - Circle of Friends

"I'm not saying that she's not a very lovely girl . . ."

Jack's father shook his head. "You're shocked now and frightened.

Leave it. Leave it for a fewweeks."

"No, it's not fair on her. If we say we'll wait she'll think I've been persuaded to change my mind. I'm not going to let her think that."

"And what do her parents think of all this mess. . . ?"

"She's telling them tonight."

Brian Mahon was sober. He sat at his kitchen table wordless as Nan in an even tone explained to her father, mother and two brothers that she would be getting married to Jack Foley, a law student, in three weeks" time.

She saw her mother twist her hands and bite her lip. Em's dream lay broken into a thousand pieces.

"You'll do nothing of the sort," Brian Mahon roared. "I think it would be better for everyone if I did."

"If you think. . . I'm going to let you. . "he began, but stopped.

It was all bluster anyway. The damage had been done.

Nan sat looking at him cool and unflustered, as if she were telling him that she was going to the cinema.

"I suppose you knew all about this." He looked at his wife. "I deliberately didn't tell Em, so that you couldn't accuse her of covering things up," Nan said.

"And by God there's plenty to cover. He's put you up the pole, I suppose."

"Brian!" Emily cried.

"Well, if he has, he'll pay good and proper, for whatever we decide to do." He looked foolish as he sat there angry and red-faced, trying to be the big man in a situation over which he had no control.

"You'll decide nothing," Nan said to him coldly. "I decide. And our engagement will be in the Irish Times on Saturday morning.

"Janey Mac, the Irish Times," Nasey said. It was the poshest of the three papers, not often seen in the Mahon household.

"While you're living in my house. . . I tell you that I make decisions."

"Well, that's just it. I won't be living here much longer."

"Nan, are you sure that this is what you want to do?"

Nan looked at her mother, faded and frightened. Always living her life in the shadow of someone else, a loud drunken husband, a meanspirited employer at the hotel, a beautiful daughter whose fantasies she had built up.

Emily would never change.

"It is, Em. And it's what I'm going to do."

"But university. . .

your degree."

"I never wanted one. You know that. We both know that. I was only going there to meet people."

They talked, mother and daughter, as if the men didn't exist.

They spoke to each other across the kitchen, across the broken dream, without any of the accusations or excuses that would be the conversation of most girls in this situation.

"But it wasn't a student you were going to meet. Not this way.

"The other didn't work, Em. The gap was too wide."

"And what do you expect us to do, coming home with this kind of news.. ."

Brian wanted to put a stop to the conversation that he didn't even understand.

"I want to ask you a question. Are you prepared to put on a good suit and behave well for four hours at a wedding, without a drink in your hand, or are you not?"

"And if I'm not?"

"If I even think you're not, we'll go to Rome and get married there. I will tell everyone that my father wouldn't have a wedding for us."

"Go on, do that then," he taunted her.

"I will if I have to. But I know you, you'd like to blow and blow and boast to your pals and the people you sell supplies to that your daughter's having a big society wedding. You'd like to hire the clothes, because you're still a handsome man and you know it."

Emily Mahon looked at her daughter in amazement. Unerringly she had gone for the right targets. She knew exactly how to make her father give her a wedding.

Brian would think of nothing else. No expense would be spared.

"Go home with her for the weekend," Kit urged Eve.

"No, she has to do it on her own.

Knockglen was quick to judge, and it was important who began to spread the story. If Benny was there saying to people that her romance with Jack Foley was a thing of the past, then no serious whispers would begin. Benny was going to have to live with enough this summer without having to live with the pity of Knockglen as well. Eve was an expert on avoiding the pity of Knockglen.

Mother was still in the shop. It was after seven, and Benny had only looked in automatically and seen her there. Benny let herself in with the key she carried on her key ring.

"Glory be to God, you put the heart across me. Annabel Hogan was standing on a chair trying to reach something that had slid away on the top of a cupboard. Annabel was hoping that it was some nice rolls of paper with the name Hogan's on it. Eddie had bought it years ago, but it had proved impractical to cut. It hadn't been thrown out. It might be up here covered with dust.

Benny looked up at her animated face. Perhaps when people were older they did recover from things. It was impossible to believe that this was the same listless woman who had sat by the fire with the book falling from her hand. Now she was lively and occupied, her eyes were bright and her tone had light and shade.

Benny said she was bigger, she'd reach. And true there it was, rolls of it. They threw it down on the floor. Tomorrow they would dust it, see if it was usable. "You look tired. Was it a busy day?" Mother asked. It had been a day of heartache to walk the corridors and sit in lectures while the rumour about Jack and Nan spread like a forest fire.

Sheila actually came and offered her sympathy as one would for a bereavement. Several groups had stopped speaking as Benny approached.

But Eve had been right. Better let the other story spread too, the news that Benny was not wearing mourning. That she had been able to talk about it cheerfuly. There had been no sign of either Nan or Jack in college. Benny kept thinking that Jack was going to appear by magic, all smiles, tucking his arm into hers, and that the whole thing would have been a bad dream.

Mother knew none of this, of course. But she did realize that Benny looked worn out.

She thought she knew just what would cheer her up. "Come up and look at what Patsy and I were doing today. We've pulled around a lot of the furniture on the first floor. We thought it would be grand for your party before we get the place painted. Then you could make as much mess as you liked without having to worry about it. . . you could even have some of the boys stay here and the girls stay at Lisbeg. .

Benny's face was stony. She had forgotten the party. The great gathering planned for the weekend after Easter. She and Jack had talked of little else as they sat with their groups of friends over the last weeks. And all the time, every night possibly, he was saying goodbye to her and making love with Nan.

She gave a little shudder at how she had been deceived, and how he had said with his eyes full of tears that he couldn't help himself, and he was sorrier than he could ever say. She walked wordlessly up the stairs behind her mother and listened to the animated conversation about the party that would never be.

Gradually her mother, noticing no response, let her voice die away.

"They are still coming, aren't they?" she said. "I'm not sure. A lot of things will have changed by then." Benny swallowed. "Jack and Nan are going to get married," she said.

Her mother looked at her open-mouthed. "What did you say?"

"Jack. He's going to marry Nan, you see. So things might change about the party."

"Jack Foley. . . your Jack?"

"He's not my Jack any more. Hasn't been for some time."

"But when did this happen? You never said a word. They can't get married."

"They are, Mother. The engagement will be in tomorrow's Irish Times."

The look on her mother's face was almost too much to bear. The naked sympathy, the total incomprehension, the struggling for words.