Page 242 of The Missing Sister
‘What do you do?’
‘Why don’t you guess, Merry?’ he challenged me.
‘Well, you’re wearing a suit and tie, which wouldn’t mark you out as a circus performer, so we’ll cross that one off the list.’
‘Correct.’
‘You have a leather document holder with you, that’s useful for putting papers in when you have meetings.’
‘Correct again.’
‘And the third and most important clue is that you were studying law at Trinity, then doing your articles when I last saw you. You’re a lawyer.’
‘Correct. You could always read me well, couldn’t you?’ he said as he picked up his espresso and eyed me with amusement over the top of the cup.
‘Perhaps, but why don’t you try to do the same with me?’
‘Ah, now that’s far harder. So... let me see.’
I felt his eyes scan over my face and my body, and for my sins, I blushed. ‘Clue number one: even though women tend to age far better and are able to keep themselves much fitter than they could in the old days, it would not strike me that you followed your own mother down the path of having nineteen children, or however many it was.’
‘Seven, actually. Correct. Continue.’
‘Given the fact that you are wearing a wedding ring, I assume you’re married.’
‘Wasmarried. My husband died some months ago, but I’ll give you that.’
‘I am sorry, Merry. I had a similar tragedy when the woman I’d lived with for ten years died. Anyway, given I already know you haven’t been resident here on the island of Ireland for many years, or London in fact, or ended up in Canada as we’d planned – I’ve checked the register – I’d reckon, taking all the circumstances of thirty-seven years ago into account, that you went elsewhere. Somewhere far flung, like Australia, maybe.’
‘Ooh, you’re hot,’ I replied, then felt a further blush rise to my cheeks, as it wasn’t appropriate to call someone ‘hot’ these days.
‘New Zealand then.’
‘Correct. Very good.’
‘Perhaps you pursued an academic career at one of the universities over there?’ he said. ‘It was certainly where you were heading in those days.’
‘Wrong, completely wrong. You’ve failed, Mr Lawyer,’ I smiled. ‘I actually built and then ran a vineyard with my husband down in the back of beyond on the South Island.’
‘Okay, even if I couldn’t have ever guessed that, I suppose it does sort of fit,’ he said. ‘I mean, you were brought up on a farm in West Cork. That was the back of beyond too, and you’re certainly used to working on the land, although it’s a shame that you didn’t pursue your academic career, Merry. You were destined for great things.’
‘Thank you for that. Life had other plans, but yes, I’d be lying if I said I don’t sometimes regret not following my dream.’
‘If it makes you feel any better, Ididfollow mine and – especially recently – I’ve begun to regret it. Don’t get me wrong, it’s provided me with a very good income and quality of life.’
‘But?’
‘When I qualified, I chose to go into corporate law, which was the golden nugget financially. I moved to London and worked my way up to being an in-house adviser at a large oil and gas company. Spending my days telling them how they could achieve X-million pounds in tax breaks every day for twenty-five years was probably not the right career choice for a self-proclaimed aesthete, but hey, it bought me a nice suit, didn’t it?’ Peter gave a ‘grin-mace’, as we’d always called his ironic smile.
‘I thought you were all set on becoming a barrister?’
‘I was, but my father talked me out of it. Said it wasn’t secure in comparison to taking articles and becoming a solicitor in a nice steady job, not just being as good as your last case in court. Everybody has regrets, I fear, by the time they get to our age. I was pensioned off at fifty-five, so I decided that I’d finally do my bit for my fellow man and ended up here in Belfast.’
‘Really? And what do you do here?’
‘I’ve actually been working in an advisory capacity for what’s now known as the Titanic Quarter of Belfast. There’s a massive regeneration project in progress on Queen’s Island, and in fact, not that you’d probably know about it, as you haven’t been around in Ireland recently, the tourism minister, Arlene Foster, has just announced that the Northern Ireland Executive is going to provide fifty per cent of the finances for the Titanic Signature Project, with the other fifty per cent coming from the private sector. We’ve got an incredible American architect who will come on board and hopefully create something to reflect the great shipbuilding history of the city. You know, of course, that theTitanicwas built here,’ he added.
‘Somewhere in the back of my mind I did, yes. Wow, Peter, that all sounds fascinating.’
