Page 5 of The Last Love Song
SEAMUS O’DONOVAN, SOLICITOR
Her father used the three large downstairs rooms for his practice. The family lived above on the next three floors. Sorcha turned the key and headed for the stairs.
‘I’m home, Mammy,’ she called, divesting herself of her hat, blazer, gloves and scarf. She walked down the corridor and opened the kitchen door. A wonderful smell of bacon filled her nostrils as she went to the scrubbed oak table and kissed her flour-covered mother.
‘Hello, darling. Did you have a good day? There’s a hot drop in the pot.’
‘Thank you. I did have a good day. Do you want a cup of tea?’
‘No, thank you. I need to finish this pie. Helen is coming for supper.’
Sorcha bristled. ‘Oh, Mammy, does she have to?’
‘Yes, you know she does. Poor thing, with no parents to love her. It’s the least we can do. And don’t be forgetting that she’s a distant cousin of your daddy’s, Sorcha.’
Helen McCarthy was in Sorcha’s class at the convent, even though she was almost eighteen. Her parents had died in a car accident when she was five, leaving their large house and fortune to their only daughter. Since their death, Helen had been taken care of by an elderly aunt.
Sorcha never mentioned Helen’s monthly visits to her schoolmates. Helen’s mother had been English and a Protestant, uninvolved in the church community in the village. The family had always kept themselves separate; as a small child Helen had gone to a private primary school in Bandon, only joining the convent at the age of twelve. As she had a larger frame than most of her classmates, wore glasses, and was slower academically, she was an easy target for bullies.
Once a month, Helen came to the O’Donovans’ for supper. Seamus managed Helen’s trust and his practice took care of matters relating to the ten-bedroom mansion and two hundred acres which would come to Helen on her eighteenth birthday, as stipulated in her parents’ will.
Sorcha often confessed to Father Moynihan that she’d been cruel and thoughtless and would try to talk to Helen in the future, or join her for lunch in the refectory where she sat in a corner alone every day. But she never quite managed it.
‘Try and be friendly, Sorcha,’ begged her mother. ‘’Tis only a few hours, one evening a month. She is in your class, after all.’
‘Mammy, I’ll do my best, I swear.’
‘Like the good girl that you are. Off with you and finish your homework before Helen arrives.’
Supper was as difficult and uncomfortable as it always was. Helen sat there, focused on her food and little else.
‘So, Helen. Any thoughts on what you’re going to do when you leave school?’ asked Seamus in his friendliest voice.
‘I’m not sure,’ replied Helen, looking momentarily lost, before returning her attention to the plate.
‘Well, I’ll be wanting to have a talk with you very soon. It’ll be only a few months before the Lissnegooha estate is in your control.’
‘Yes,’ said Helen as she absentmindedly tore a piece of bread apart.
Pudding seemed interminable. When Mary stood up and began to clear away the dishes, Sorcha followed her.
‘I’ll help you.’
‘No, I’m grand by myself. You take Helen up to your room for a while.’
Sorcha gave her mother one of her special looks, then gritted her teeth and said, ‘Come on, Helen. Let’s go upstairs.’
Helen followed up the stairs behind Sorcha and took a seat on the edge of her bed. Sorcha pulled out her desk chair and sat on that.
She couldn’t think of a thing to say.
Helen’s hand began to tap nervously on her leg. She summoned her courage and spoke.
‘Are you going to hear the band at the GAA hall on Saturday night?’ she ventured.
‘How did you know about that?’
‘I’ve seen the flyposters in town and I heard you discussing it in the classroom this morning.’
