Maeve Binchy - Circle of Friends

"Whatever that one says to you, Bunty, remember that her people were tinkers."

"They weren't."

"Well, dealers, anyway. That should give you the upper hand dealing with her.

It hadn't, of course, any more than it should have. Mother Francis had a grim face as she waited in the big church for the funeral party to arrive. She didn't know why she was there; it was as if she wanted to represent Eve.

Nan Mahon went out on the bus to Dunlaoghaire and stood among the group at the back of the church. She was instantly spotted by Jack Foley who went to join her.

"That's nice of you, to come all the way out," he said. "You did too.

"I came with my father. But do you see that group there, those are fellows who worked with him in the summer. That's Aidan Lynch - he was at school with me, and a whole lot more. They were all canning peas together."

"How did they know?"

"His picture was in the paper, and there was some kind of announcement at the engineering lectures today," he said.

"Where's Benny? Did you see her today?"

"Yes, but she couldn't come tonight. She has to go home, you see, every evening on this one bus."

"That's hard on her," Jack said. "It's very foolish of her," Nan said.

"What can she do about it?"

"She should make a stand at the outset." Jack looked at the attractive girl beside him. She would have made a stand, he knew that. He remembered the big soft-featured Benny.

"She stood up to that awful fellow with the white face who tried to take her off with him yesterday."

"If you couldn't stand up to him you shouldn't be allowed out," Nan said.

"This is Eve Malone," Benny said, as Nan sat on the end of the hospital bed.

She wanted Eve to like Nan, to recognise that Nan could have been anywhere but had chosen to come and see Benny's friend. Benny had heard this fellow Aidan Lynch almost begging Nan to come and have lunch with him.

Nan had not brought flowers or grapes or a magazine; instead she had brought the one thing that Eve truly wanted, a college handbook. All the details of registration, late registration, degree courses, diplomas. She didn't even greet the girl in the bed. Instead she spoke about the matter which was uppermost in Eve's mind.

"I gather you're trying to get into college. This might be of some use to you," she said. Eve seized it and let her thumb rifle through the pages. "This is just what I need, thank you very much indeed," she said.

Then her brow darkened slightly.

"How did you think of bringing me this?" she asked suspiciously.

Nan shrugged. "It's all in there," she said. "No, what made you think I'd need it?"

Benny wished Eve wouldn't be so prickly. What did it matter that Nan Mahon knew her hopes? There was no need to be secretive.

"I asked, that's all. I asked what you were doing and Benny said you hadn't enrolled yet."

Eve nodded. The tension was over. She fingered the book again with gratitude and Benny felt a pang of regret that she hadn't thought of something so practical. Little by little Eve was losing her look of wariness. And as Benny watched the girls talk easily she realised they were kindred spirits.

"Will you have it sorted out fairly soon do you think?" Nan was asking.

"I have to go and ask a man for money. It's not easy but won't get any easier by delaying," Eve said. Benny was astounded. Eve never talked of her business to anyone and the matter of approaching the Westwards for money was one she had only barely acknowledged to Benny herself.

Nan was unaware of this. "Will you play up the being injured bit?"

she enquired. Eve was on the same wavelength. "I might. I've been considering it, but he's the kind of fellow who might regard that as weakness and snivelling. I'll have to work out how to play it."

"What's it all about?" Nan asked with interest. And as Eve began to tell her the story of the Westwards, the story never spoken aloud to anyone, Benny realised with a shock that Nan was in fact pretending to Eve that she hadn't heard any of this already. She had asked Nan to be discreet, and she certainly had followed the instructions to the letter. And Judging by the way Eve was confiding, the instructions had been unnecessary. It had been harder to deel with Mother Clare than Mother Francis would ever have believed possible. Sometimes Mother Francis talked directly to Our Lady about it and asked for immediate and positive advice.

"I've said I was sorry, I've said that we will look after Eve from now on, but she goes on and on and says it's her duty to know what plans are being made for the girl. Why can't she just stay out of it? Why, Holy Mother, tel me?"

As it happened, Mother Francis got an answer which she presumed had come from the Mother of God, even though it was spoken by Peggy Pine.

"What that auld rip wants is to be able to prance around like the cock of the walk saying "I told you so, I told you so . She wants you to humble yourself, then she'll give up on it and start torturing someone else." Mother Francis agreed to use the tactics of humbling herself.

"You were right all along, Mother clare," she wrote in the most hypocritical letter she had ever penned. "We were wrong to ask you to take on someone like Eve who had been given a wholly exaggerated set of expectations by our small Community here. I can only say that I boa to your wisdom on this as in so many other matters and hope that the Sisters were not unduly inconvenienced by the experiment which you knew was destined to be full of pitfalls."

It had been the right approach. The regular bewildered and hurt interrogations from Mother clare ceased.

And just in time too. Eve was pronounced fit to leave hospital a week to the day after she had been admitted.

"I'll come on the bus, with Benny," Eve had said on the telephone.

"No, you won't, there's half a dozen people who'll go and collect you.

I don't like to ask Peggy again but Mrs. Healy will be going up."

"Please, Mother."

"All right, Sean Walsh? No, don't even tell me.. !"

"I've caused you enough trouble. I'll go with anyone you say, though I would rather go on the bus."

"Mario?"

"Marvellous. I love Mario."

"All right, we'll see you tomorrow. I'm so glad you're coming home, Eve. I missed you."

"And I missed you, Mother. We'll have to talk."

"Of course we will. Wrap up warmly, won't you." When Eve hung up Mother Francis sat for a moment. It was true they would have to talk.

Talk seriously. As she sat there the telephone rang again. "Mother Francis please?"

"Speaking."

There was a pause.

"Mother, in a fit of generosity you said to me.. I mean u wondered if I'd like.. and isn't it odd, in the middle of everything I kept remembering it. I wonder would you think it strange if I did come to see you.. ? The woman's voice stopped again hesitantly. A great smile lit up Mother Francis's face.

"Mrs. Hegarty, I'm delighted to hear from you. This weekend would be lovely. You tell me which bus and I'll walk over and meet you.

It's only a couple of minutes from the convent gate. I'm very pleased you're going to come and see us."

She wondered where she would put the woman to sleep. She had thought of her as staying in Eve's room. But there was the extra parlour that they had always been meaning to do up as a guest room. All it needed was curtains. She'd get some material from Peggy and ask Sister Imelda to ask the senior girls to run them up at domestic science class.

She'd get a bedside light from Dessie Burns and a nice cake of soap in Kennedy's chemist.

Eve's going home today," Benny reported when she met Nan for coffee in the Annexe as she did every morning. "I know. She told me last night."

"What?"

"Well, it's at night she really wants people to go in and see her, and you've long gone so I took a couple of fellows to cheer her up."