Cecelia Ahern - One Hundred Names

‘I’ll pay your fee,’ Birdie said suddenly, and everybody looked at her in shock.

‘No, no,’ Achar and Jedrek protested. ‘It is too much. We cannot allow you to pay.’

‘After today I can pay whatever I want,’ Birdie smiled mischievously, then looked at the adjudicator. ‘Name your price and I will pay you,’ she said, chin high.

‘It’s not about the fee,’ he said starting to break out in a sweat. ‘It’s about the protocol. Your record attempt must be cleared in advance so that I can have the certificate ready to present to you—’

‘You can send us the certificate when it’s ready,’ Achar interrupted. ‘You don’t have to give it to us tomorrow.’

Suddenly everybody started talking at him, trying in their own way to convince him, but he couldn’t possibly make out everybody’s pleas and instead they all bled into one. He held his hands up in defence.

‘I’m very sorry, I can’t,’ he apologised sincerely. ‘But I wish you the best of luck with your attempt tomorrow.’

There was a silence, an awkward one, and it was obvious he felt awful.

‘Kinsale Pier, 2 p.m. tomorrow,’ Kitty said firmly. ‘Please come.’

And he was finally dragged away to the small stage where he prepared to present the certificate for most people dressed as eggs in one area. As everybody gathered to face the podium, Kitty and her crew pushed in the opposite direction, making their way back to the bus, their spirits crushed.

Across the city, Kitty and Steve arrived just in time, breathless, sweating and dizzy, to hear Ambrose’s name announced in a lecture theatre to speak about her much-anticipated report. Five hundred applauded. But there was no sign of her. People looked around, the speaker looked behind him, confused.

Kitty saw Eugene stand up from the front row and make his way backstage. He returned and climbed onto the stage and had a word in the speaker’s ear.

Kitty’s heart fell. ‘Oh, no,’ she whispered, and to her surprise felt tears welling in her eyes.

Steve, the man who hated personal contact, put his arm around her shoulder and gave her a squeeze.

‘Ladies and gentlemen, I believe we’ll be a further two minutes, if you wouldn’t mind bearing with me.’

People relaxed a little and fell into conversation with each other. Five minutes passed and the speaker was looking uncomfortable.

‘Should I go back there?’ Kitty asked Steve, worriedly. Just as she stood to make her way towards the stage, the speaker looked behind him and nodded.

‘And I believe we are ready to go now. So once again, speaking on one of our most beautiful butterflies, the Peacock, known to most of you as Inachis io , our treasured member of Butterfly Conservation, Ambrose Nolan.’ There was polite applause.

Ambrose, her hair down in front of her face, head down, made her way to the podium.

She stood up and cleared her throat, which reverberated around the room loudly through the microphone.

‘My apologies for the delay. My partner told me to tell you I was very much like the Aglais urticae , most commonly known as the Small Tortoiseshell, which is fast, vigilant, but extremely wary and difficult to approach closely.’

Everyone laughed at the inside butterfly joke, and the atmosphere became much more relaxed. Ambrose looked up, saw Kitty, and took a deep breath. And then she began to talk.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Ambrose and Eugene were on a high, and despite the failed adjudicator kidnap, spirits were buoyant on the bus as they listened to Eugene’s proud retelling of how Ambrose had entranced them all with her discoveries, and Steve was able to show his photographs on the camera, which Ambrose swiftly put an end to. When Eugene had told the story enough times, they turned to Birdie’s impending win.

Birdie hadn’t been exaggerating when she said she was from a small town. Nadd was in the foothills of the Boggeragh Mountains and had a population of just over one hundred and seventy people. It consisted of two pubs, one which doubled as a guesthouse, the other which tripled as a shop and betting office, and also a church and a school. On the outskirts of the village a housing scheme to encourage and attract young families into the area had begun and stopped halfway, leaving pastel-coloured summer houses standing unfinished with smashed windows.

‘Ooh, there it is, Birdie,’ Mary-Rose sang as they passed the bookies and added more hairspray to Birdie’s perfect hair-do, much to Edward’s disgust as another coughing fit took him over.

Molly took delight in seeing this.

It was decided that everybody would wait in the guesthouse garden to give Birdie privacy while she went inside the bookies, but Kitty was honoured to be asked to go inside with her. Birdie linked arms with Edward, while Kitty and Steve waited in the background, Steve subtly taking photos.

The bookies, attached to the pub, was a small room that resembled a living room. On the right-hand side of the O’Hara pub was a newsagent shop, on the left was the bookies. Inside, two men were sitting on stools and watching a small television in the corner of the room. They were wearing tweed caps and suit jackets, and smelled like they hadn’t washed for a few weeks. Behind the protected glass was a man in his thirties. He looked up and when Birdie laid eyes on him she took an audible intake of breath. Kitty assumed she knew him and waited for a flicker of recognition to pass his face but it never came and Birdie composed herself.

‘My name is Bridget Murphy,’ she said, a slight shake in her voice, which definitely had more of a hint of her Cork accent than before.

The two old men looked away from the television screen to stare at her. Edward put his hand supportively around his grandmother’s body.

‘Sixty-seven years ago I placed a bet with Josie O’Hara and I’m here to collect my winnings,’ she said.

Kitty almost felt emotional hearing Birdie say those words. How often had Birdie said them to herself, as a teenager desperate to leave the town but equally desperate to prove she could come back, as a young mother, as she hit middle age, and then in her old age? How often had she thought of this moment, and now it was here?

The young man stood from his stool behind the counter. ‘Have you got the slip?’

She retrieved a plastic sleeve from her handbag and with shaking fingers slid it under the counter. Kitty wasn’t sure if the shake was from nerves or old age, but she hadn’t noticed it before. The young man studied the slip, looked back up at her, at Molly and Edward by her side, then back down at the slip again. He smiled, then he laughed.

‘I can’t believe this,’ he said. ‘Sixty-seven years ago!’

Molly and Kitty grinned but Edward’s voice showed concern.

‘You’ll give her the money?’ he asked.

Birdie’s not receiving the money had never entered Kitty’s mind. It had always been a question of how much they would give her with the changes in currency in all of those years. Her original bet surely no longer followed the ordinary rules.

‘A bet’s a bet,’ the man said, his smile large on his face. ‘You know, Josie was my great-grandfather,’ he sounded excited. ‘He died when I was young but I’ll never forget his … hold on.’ His smile quickly faded and he brought the old slip closer to his face. ‘One hundred to one?’ he read the odds, shocked.

Birdie nodded. ‘That’s what Josie gave me.’

‘I’ll have to … I’m not sure I can … I don’t have the authority to … hold on just a minute, please.’

He took the slip and disappeared out the door, leaving them standing there. One of the old men was staring at them.

‘Are you Thomas’s girl?’ he asked.