“Bertie. Flo. Good of you to come.”
“Merry Christmas, Doctor,” Bertie said, and proffered a wrapped present that had the distinct feel of a bottle.
“Thank you,” O’Reilly said, setting it on the sideboard. “Now what’ll you have, Flo?”
She giggled. “Would you have a port and brandy, Doctor?”
“For you, Flo? Say no more, and as your medical advisor, Bertie, I’m sorry but you’re on the bottled stout.”
“Can’t be helped,” Bertie said.
He handed the drinks to Bertie. “Do me a favour, Flo?”
“Aye, certainly, Doctor.”
He handed her the wrapped bottle. “Pop that under the tree.” He indicated a fully decorated fir standing between the room’s corner and the bow window. Parcels wrapped in Christmas paper lay beneath and a gold star of Bethlehem at the tip leaned at an alarming angle to starboard.
“I will, so I will.” She trotted off.
“Cheers, Bertie,” O’Reilly said, feeling at home now with the portly little man who had, particularly with his promise of a university scholarship for Colin Brown, continued to emerge as a decent human being after all.
“Cheers, Doctor.” Bertie drank and said, “And wasn’t that the quare gag, Donal selling them funny-looking dogs?”
“It was indeed,” said O’Reilly, deadpan. “More things have come out of Australia than Dame Nellie Melba and the greatest cricketer of all time, Sir Donald Bradman.”
Bertie cocked his head to one side, lowered his voice, laid a finger alongside his nose, and remarked, “Or out of a greyhound and a Chihuahua?”
O’Reilly tried to keep a straight face.
“I was having a jar with Willie Dunleavy in the Duck—his gout’s well mended now—and I got to wondering. See that there Brian Boru? And Donal with his grue dog bitch? Them Woolamarroo quokkas have the look of a bit of both. And the age of the pups? Makes you think, doesn’t it?”
In young human couples it was an Ulster national sport matching the wedding date with the date of birth of the first child. A surprising number of very big “premature” weans arrived every year. It was no surprise that Bertie would do the canine gestational sums. O’Reilly shrugged and said nothing.
“Aye, well. It’ll go no farther,” Bertie said with a smile. “Them rich folks in Belfast were all happy as pigs in you know what with their wee bow-wows. After you and Donal left that night, two got resold for thirty quid apiece.”
O’Reilly whistled.
“I’d be the last man to sicken the buyers’ or Donal’s happiness.” Bertie raised his Guinness.
There was a time, O’Reilly knew, when doing just that would have given Bertie Bishop a great deal of pleasure. And yet his assurance seemed genuine. “I believe you, Bertie, though thousands wouldn’t. Cheers, Councillor,” O’Reilly said. “And Merry Christmas.”
Bertie laughed and trotted off to give the drink to Flo, who was now chatting with Sue.
O’Reilly had finished his first whiskey and was pouring himself another. He smiled at Kitty as she appeared bearing a tray. “My love,” he said, and kissed her.
She smiled and returned the kiss. “Put that drink down, would you, pet? And please put these plates of hors d’oeuvres round the room.”
He took the tray laden with plates of sausage rolls, chipolata sausages, chicken vol-au-vents, stuffed mushroom caps, Scotch bantam eggs, cheese straws, and eggs mayonnaise. “Where?”
“Put the warm dishes on the metal tray over the Sterno burners and the cold ones on the coffee tables.”
“Right.” And he did, having to move aside a plate of marzipan-stuffed dates, a box of After Eight mint chocolate thins, a bowl of cashews, a plate of candied ginger, and a silver cigarette box full of Gallagher’s Greens cigarettes strategically placed beside a silver-and-walnut Ronson table lighter.
“Are Archie and Kinky coming up?”
She frowned. “Archie’s feeling a bit shy. He knows the marquis and his sister will be dropping in.”
“Bah,” said O’Reilly, “humbug. Kinky and Archie are as much family as you and Lars, Arthur and her ladyship, and Barry and Sue.” He looked at the youngsters. “You and I would have been proud to have had a son like Barry and a daughter-in-law-to-be like Sue.”
Kitty squeezed O’Reilly’s hand. “We certainly would and that’s a lovely thing to say, you dear old bear,” and she whispered, “I love you.”
“And I love you, Mrs. O’Reilly. Now go and tell the Auchinlecks to have a titter of wit and if Kinky gets stubborn tell her it’s not just me that wants the pleasure of their company. Everyone does.”
“Right.”
Kitty, leaving with the tray under her arm, passed Ronald Fitzpatrick in the doorway.
“Ronald,” O’Reilly said as he moved to greet the new guest, “welcome aboard and a merry Christmas to you.”
Ordinarily the man’s prominent Adam’s apple would have bobbed, but it was hidden behind a beige, spongy, sorbo-rubber high collar. His neck still needed support.
“And to you, Fingal. Thank you for asking me.”
“Still on the mend?”
“Oh yes, and looking forward to getting back to work and to our new arrangement. I hear you’re hiring a new lady doctor?”
“We are. Nonie Stevens. She’s coming on three-months’ probation and you’ll have your say too if she doesn’t seem to be working out, but I’m sure she’ll be fine. But we’ll not worry about work now. Let me get you a drink. Come on.”
They walked to the sideboard.
“Half-pint shandy if I remember from the last time you were here?” O’Reilly asked.
“Oh, blow,” Ronald said, “It’s Christmas, for goodness’ sakes. I’ll go the whole hog. A bottle of beer, please.”
It was a miracle that O’Reilly stopped himself from slapping Ronald Fitzpatrick on the back. “Good man-ma-da,” he said instead, and poured a bottle of Bass Pale Ale, identifiable by the big red triangle on its label, into a glass before picking up his own whiskey.
“I see you’ve made Budai look festive.”
O’Reilly chuckled. “That was Kitty’s idea. I like the sprig of holly behind him and the cotton wool snow at his feet.” The fat little carved man was surrounded by Christmas cards.
One, with a naval motif, was the same kind O’Reilly had been receiving every year since 1942. It was from the gunnery school in Portsmouth and was signed by Commissioned Gunner Alf Henson and Mrs. Alf (née Elsie Gorman) Henson and family. Alf Henson had recovered, been fitted with a prosthetic hand, and, courtesy of a confidential conversation O’Reilly had had with Admiral A. B. Cunningham, had been appointed as a petty officer gunnery instructor to HMS Excellent Whale Island. O’Reilly remembered tending to Alf, doing his damndest to see that he got into the gunnery school, helping him with his loss. That and looking after his other patients had helped Fingal to hide from his own pain, at least for a short time.
“Merry Christmas, Finn.” O’Reilly turned to see both Ronald and Lars regarding him with a mixture of amusement and curiosity.
“Been away with the fairies?” said Lars, and grinned.
“Excuse me, Ronald. May I introduce my brother, Lars O’Reilly.” He watched as the two men shook hands, and then as Ronald headed to where the others were laughing at something Flo Bishop had said.
“What have you been up to, brother?” O’Reilly asked.
“Queen’s University yesterday,” Lars said. “Some of the documents about the estate follow Brehon law, the early Celtic juris prudence. Quite fascinating. It’s all written down in a book called Corpus Luris Hibernici. The earliest documents are from the eighth century. Myrna’s been a help,” he said, his voice taking on a slightly strained tone. “She’s looked after the family archives for years, you know.” He glanced round the room. “Is she coming tonight?”
O’Reilly again heard something in his bachelor brother’s voice. Trepidation perhaps. Because of the spat they’d had the night th
ey met?
“She is. She and her brother should be here any minute. Now let me get you a whiskey and water, and drinks for Archie and Kinky and Kitty.”
All three had appeared, with Kinky bringing the plates, Archie the cutlery, and Kitty napkins.
“What’ll it be?”
“You’re sure it’s all right, Doctor?” Archie asked. “Us being here, like?”
“You, Archie Auchinleck,” O’Reilly said, “didn’t marry Kinky Kinkaid. You married her and her northern family here at Number One Main. Clear? And any family member of mine is as good as the next man, even if the next man is a peer of the realm.”
“Well said, Doctor,” said the twenty-seventh Marquis of Ballybucklebo, appearing at the doorway of the lounge. “And, Mister and Mrs. Auchinleck, may I introduce my sister, Doctor Myrna Ferguson?”
O’Reilly was so taken aback by the marquis’s sudden appearance he dropped the water jug in his hand, soaking his trouser cuffs and socks. “Bugge—” Too many ladies. He cut himself off.
“I’m sorry, Fingal. My mother always said I had a bad habit of sneaking up on people. Once, when I was seven, I caused a footman to drop a tureen of cream of tomato soup on Mother’s favourite Persian carpet.”
“Welcome, John, Myrna. Come in. Come in.” The marquis and Myrna were already circulating, shaking hands and laughing. “Och,” he said to Lars, “I’ll not melt, and this is only water, not soup, but I’ll need to change. Look after the drinks, please? Make sure everybody’s got one and a plate full of grub by the time I get back?” And he headed for the bathroom to get a towel before going to the bedroom, peeling off his shoes, trousers, and socks. He grabbed a clean pair of pants from the wardrobe and opened his sock drawer with an almighty tug, in his haste pulling the drawer off its tracks. He grabbed it, but not before it deposited its contents on the floor. He looked down. Lying at his feet were two things he had shoved to the back of the drawer, hidden but never forgotten. His ghost.
Kitty wasn’t alone in having a ghost from the war years. His wife had laid hers in Barcelona in the restaurant El Crajeco Loco, the Crazy Crab, when she’d met a girl called Consuela who still called her Tia Kitty.
O’Reilly’s ghost hid in a glass ball and a velvet-covered box in the sock drawer, but its outline had softened, its old chill turned to warmth.
He lifted the ball, shook it, and watched the blizzard falling on the little village. He could see Deirdre clapping her hands and laughing like a little girl on Christmas Day twenty-six years ago in a flat in Alverstoke and him saying, “Merry Christmas. You can think of me when you make it snow in the glass ball in July.” She never saw another July.
Her mother had given it to Fingal after the war. It was the only one of her personal possessions that had been recovered from the wreckage.
He set the ball on the eiderdown and picked up the box with the medal he hated to wear. His Distinguished Service Cross that Admiral Cunningham had told him on May 24, 1941, had been awarded for gallantry. That had been moments before he had told an unbelieving O’Reilly that Belfast had been bombed.
In O’Reilly’s mind’s eye, he saw Deirdre wrapping the ball in a page from the Daily Mail. A front page with a photograph of St. Paul’s Cathedral, the great dome and one spire like defiant islands surrounded by a sea of smoke. All around the foul stuff writhed and boiled, and above the dome, brilliantly illuminated even in the black-and-white picture, the undersides of the clouds above threw back reflections of the flames raging below.
He heard Admiral Cunningham saying, “It seems your wife didn’t suffer.”
Later in his cabin he’d imagined the Templemore Avenue hospital burning like the houses round St. Paul’s and hoped to God the admiral had been right. Every time he’d looked at the ball, he’d seen not a blizzard, but a firestorm.
He hung his head and wiped away a single tear, then he smiled. I miss you yet, Deirdre.
But the years had dimmed the pain. Kinky had been a mother to him since he’d come back to the practice. Old Arthur Guinness was always a source of undying, undemanding love. Lars, solid, humourless, and shy, had been there when he needed his advice. The ache had been numbed, the grief had faded.
And Kitty, wonderful, forgiving, loving Kitty, who had come back to him after twenty-eight years and given him the love, the love deep like Deirdre’s, that he had craved in the empty years without her. Kitty has dulled the pain. Made me live again. Kitty, I love you so.
And O’Reilly felt no guilt as he thought, Deirdre, Deirdre, I’ll never forget you, but I know, I know, you’ll be happy for me if you can see me now.
He picked up the ball. The storm was over and it was only a child’s toy.
Ball and medal went back into the drawer. And the drawer fitted back into the dresser. He’d wear his DSC next Remembrance Day with pride and as a tribute to all who had fallen—like dear Bob—those had had been maimed—like Alf Henson—and those who had served. None must be forgotten.
O’Reilly finished dressing, washed his face, combed his shaggy mop, and with a smile headed back for the party, secure in the knowledge his ghost would not sadden Fingal Flahertie O’Reilly’s heart ever again, but live there all his days content as he, at rest, at peace.
AFTERWORD
by Mrs. Maureen “Kinky” Auchinleck, lately Kincaid, née O’Hanlon
Christmas, and it seems that fellah Taylor spinning his yarns come once a year and here I am again back in my own kitchen, pen in fist, putting down more recipes, and not just traditional Irish ones either, though you can’t get much more traditional than Dublin Coddle.
Homity pie is one Doctor O’Reilly brought back from the war like his corned beef curry. Crème brûlée was taught to me by an Irish girl who’d worked in the Café de Paris before she took service with his lordship. Eton Mess comes from the same lass. It’s very highheejun and served at the Eton and Harrow cricket match. Mind you, I’ve no time for cricket. Give me a good game of hurling or camogie any day.
And my own ma showed me and my two sisters, Sinead and Fidelma, the making of the orange sponge cake.
Have fun with the recipes and I hope you enjoy the results.
DUBLIN CODDLE
This is a traditional Irish dish and was often made on a Thursday evening to use up all the leftover meat products in the days when Catholics were not meant to eat meat on Fridays. Doctor O’Reilly remembers seeing and indeed smelling it being cooked when he worked for Doctor Corrigan in Dublin in the 1930s, and he tells me that the great Irish writer James Joyce made several references to it in his books.
This is a very simple one-pot meal and can be cooked on top of the stove or in the oven. Just make sure that the pot has a tight-fitting lid.
Here’s what you need:
500 g / 1 lb. pork sausages cut into ½-inch pieces
250 g / 8 oz. rashers of bacon, roughly chopped
300 mL / 10 fluid oz. chicken stock
2 onions, sliced
8 medium potatoes, cut into thin slices
½ stick / 2 oz. butter
Salt and pepper and a good handful of chopped parsley
If you plan to cook the coddle in the oven, preheat it to 180ºC / 350ºF.
Put the sausage, bacon, and stock into a pan and boil for about 5 minutes. Remove the meat from the pot, reserving the stock.
Spread a layer of sliced onions on the bottom of a casserole dish and continue with a layer of potatoes. Next half of the bacon and sausage mixture, and season well with salt and pepper. Repeat the layering process again, and pour the stock in last. Add half of the chopped parsley and dot the top with butter. Cover with a tight-fitting lid and cook for about an hour. Finish with the remaining parsley and serve with some nice bread. My Guinness bread is particularly good with this (see A Dublin Student Doctor).
HOMITY PIE
This recipe was given to me by Doctor O’Reilly when he came back from the war. He said that Mrs. Marjorie Wilcoxson used to make it and that it was invented by the Land Gir
ls, using ingredients they could grow in the fields.
The pastry recipe is my own. I started using in it 1948 when Doctor O’Reilly bought us a fridge with a shmall-little freezer. He was a terrible man for keeping some of his medicines in the fridge, so.
Pastry
113 g / 4 oz. butter
180 g / 6½ oz. plain flour
Pinch of salt
Pinch of baking powder
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
85 g / 3 oz. strong Cheddar cheese, grated coarsely
2½ tablespoons ice water
1½ tablespoons cider vinegar
Cut the butter into small, ¾-inch cubes. Put into a plastic bag and freeze until solid. Place the flour, salt, baking powder, and cayenne pepper in another plastic bag and freeze for at least half an hour.
I used to beat the pie crust dough with my old Sunbeam cake mixer, but today’s cook should place the flour mixture into a food processor and blend for a few seconds to combine. Add the cheddar cheese and pulse for about 20 seconds. Now add the butter and pulse until the butter cubes are as small as a pea. The mixture will be in particles. Add the water and the vinegar and pulse again. Spoon it all back into the plastic bag. Hold the open end of the bag closed and knead the mixture with your other hand until it all holds together in one piece and feels stretchy when pulled. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 45 minutes, but better if you can leave overnight.
Line a deep 8-inch pie tin with the pastry and leave covered in the refrigerator until needed.
Filling
800 g /1 lb. 12 oz. potatoes, peeled and cut into quarters
25 g / 1 oz. butter
1 tablespoon sunflower oil
3 onions, chopped
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
110 g / 4 oz. spinach or broccoli
175 g / 6 oz. strong Cheddar cheese, grated coarsely
2 tablespoons chopped parsley
Pinches of nutmeg, black pepper, and salt
250 mL heavy cream/½ pint/10 oz.
Cook the potatoes in boiling water for 15 minutes or until just tender. Drain them and slice them and set aside to cool.