Maeve Binchy - Circle of Friends

There was a pause while Heather tried to work something out.

"Who did you come to see?" she said, after some consideration.

Eve looked at her with admiration. The child was trying to ,iork out whether E&e was for the master or for the staff. She had phrased the question perfectly.

"I came to see Simon Westward," she said. "Oh, sure, well come in."

Eve walked behind the little figure through the hall, full of dark pictures, hunting prints maybe. It was impossible to see.

Heathen Heather? She didn't know of any Heather in the household, but then she didn't really keep up with who was who in this family. If people in Knockglen spoke of them she didn't join in the conversation.

Sometimes the nuns mentioned them, but Eve would toss her head and turn away. Once she came upon an article about them in the Social and Personal magazine and she had turned the pages on angrily in case she would find out any more about them and their goings-on. Benny had always said that if the Westwards had been her family she would have wanted to know everything about them and would probably have made a scrapbook as well. But that was Benny all over. She'd probably have been doing their errands for them by now, and thanking them for everything instead of guarding the cold indifference that Eve had nurtured for so long.

"Are you one of Simon's girlfriends?" the child asked conversationally.

"No, indeed," Eve said with no emotion. They had reached the drawing room. The Sunday papers were spread out on a low coffee table, a sherry decanter and glasses stood on a silver tray. Over by the window in his wheelchair sat Major Charles Westward, his shoulders sloped down, and it was obvious even from a distance that he was not really aware of his surroundings. A rug over his knees had partly slipped to the floor.

This man was Eve's grandfather. Most people hugged their grandfather, they called them Grandad, and sat on their knee.

Grandfathers gave you two-shilling pieces and took pictures of you on First Communion and Confirmation days. They were proud of you and introduced you to people. This man had never wanted to see Eve, and if he was in the whole of his sense he might have ordered her out of his house, as he had done her mother.

Once upon a time she had thought he might see her from his horse or his car and ask who was that lovely child. She had a look of the family about her. But that was long ago. She felt no sense of loss looking at him, no wish that things had been different. She was not embarrassed by his infirmity nor upset by looking at him closely after the years of rejection.

Heather looked at Eve curiously. "I'll go and find Simon for you now.

You'll be all right here?" she said.

The child's face was open. Eve found it hard to be stif with her.

"Thanks. Thanks a lot," she said gruffly. Heather smiled at her.

"You don't look like his girlfriend usually look."

"No?"

"No, you look more normal."

"Oh good." Despite herself Eve smiled. ÀThe child was still curious.

"Is it about the mare?"

"It's not about the mare. I wouldn't know a mare from a five-bar gate.

Heather laughed good-naturedly and headed for the door. Eve surprised herself by giving the information the child had been looking for.

"I'm not one of his girlfriends," she called. "I'm one of his cousins."

Heather seemed pleased. "Oh, then you're a cousin of mine too.

I'm Simon's sister."

Eve said nothing because of a slight lump in her throat. Whatever she had thought would happen when she went to Westlands it was not this.

She would never have believed that any Westward would have been pleased to see her.

Mother Francis told Kit Hegarty that there was no need for her to hurry back to Dublin. She could stay as long as she liked, a week maybe.

"Don't go back too soon. The peace of this place could wear off you if you went back to the city too quickly."

"Ah, that's country people for you. You think Dublin is all like O'Connell Street. We're out in County Dublin you see, by the seaside.

It's a grand place full of fresh air."

Mother Francis knew that the peace of Knockglen had nothing to do with it being in the country or the city. The advantage was, the place was far from the home where Frank Hegarty would return no more.

"Still, stay here a while and take our air."

"I'm in the way."

Kit had sensed Eve's eagerness to have Mother Francis to herself.

"On the contrary. You are very helpful in that Eve needs time to talk to other people before she commits herself to any plan.

There's no point in she and I going round in circles. Much as I hate it, I realise that she has to make up her own mind."

"You would have made a marvellous mother," Kit said. "I don't know.

It's easier one step removed."

"You're not removed. You just manage not to do what all the rest of us wish we didn't do.

You don't nag."

"I don't think you were a nagger either," Mother Francis smiled.

"Did you not want to marry and have children?" Kit asked.

"I wanted a wild unsuitable farmer's son that I couldn't have."

"Why couldn't you have him?"

"Because we hadn't a farm of land to go with me. Or so I thought. If he had really wanted me he'd have taken me, farm or no farm."

"What happened to him?"

"He married a girl who had legs much better than Bunty Brown, and who did have a farm to go with her. They had four children in five years, then he found another, as they say.

"And what did the wife do?"

"She made a fool of herself the length and breadth of the county.

That's not what Bunty Brown would have done. She would have thrown him out, started a guest house, and held her head high."

Kit Hegarty laughed. "Are you telling me you are Bunty Brown?"

"Not any longer. Not for a long time."

"He was a fool not to take you.

"Ah, that's what I said too. I said it for three years. They didn't want to take me in the convent at first. They thought I was just running away, trying to hide from the world."

"And do you regret it, not waiting for a different farmer's son?"

"No, not a bit."

Her eyes were far away.

"And you've had everything, in a way," Kit said. "You've had all the joy of children in a school."

"It's true," Mother Francis said. "Every year, new children, every year new young faces coming in." She still looked sad.

"It will work out for Eve."

"Of course it will. She's probably talking to him now."

"Who is she talking to?"

"Her cousin, Simon Westward. Asking him for fees. I hope she doesn't lose her temper. I hope she won't throwit all away!" eather had left the room as soon as her brother came in. Simon went over first to the figure in the wheelchair, picked up the rug, and knelt to tuck it in around the old man. He stood up and came back to the fireplace. He was small and dark, with a thin handsome face, dark-eyed, and his brown hair fell into his eyes.

He had had to shake it away so often it was now a mannerism. He wore riding breeches and a tweed jacket with leather cuffs and elbows.

"What can I do for you?" His voice was cold and polite.

"Do you know who I am?" Eve's voice was equally cold. He hesitated.

"Not really," he said.

Her eyes blazed. "Either you do or you don't," she said. "I think I do. I asked Mrs. Walsh. She said you were the daughter of my Aunt Sarah. Is that right?"

"But you know of me, surely?"

"Yes, of course. I didn't recognise you coming up the drive, so I asked."

"What else did Mrs. Walsh say?"

"I don't think that's relevant. Now can I ask you what this is about?"

He was so much in command of the situation that Eve wanted to cry. If only he could have looked ill at ease, gilty about his family's treatment of her, confused and wondering what lay ahead.