The other couples speculated about her a lot. Was she happy in a life where she seemed to get little appreciation either in the home or outside it? Sometimes they wanted to kill Martin for being so unobservant, for never praising her cooking, for not admiring her appearance. They also wanted to kill Lola, who took Grace for granted.
And now, when everyone else was dithering about New Year’s Eve plans, Grace had come up with the perfect place for them all to go.
Four couples in their twenties and thirties, no children yet, any of them. They could have gone to any of a dozen parties, but this seemed a much better idea, two nights away in a very prestigious place. Good to talk about; other people envied them. And Grace had made it easier for them; every month she would manage to collect some money from them, and now at the end of the year the whole festivities had been paid for very painlessly. They now felt they were having this lavish New Year’s outing almost free!
“I’m glad we did pay her each month,” Anna said to Charles. “We’d find it hard to raise that kind of money just at the moment.”
“It’s only temporary,” Charles said hastily. He didn’t like thinking of the gambling losses that had mounted up so frighteningly. This weekend would be a godsend; he couldn’t think how else they could have seen the New Year in in any style.
“Poor Grace … you know, darling, she does all this fussing and organizing because she literally has nothing else in her life,” said Olive to Harry. Olive was wrongly very contented and even smug about her own life, which she felt was full of people but did not realize was also full of Harry’s girlfriends.
“Oh, I don’t know—fine-looking bird,” Harry said ruminatively. Grace had never responded even mildly to his flirtations and he had hopes that the New Year’s weekend might yield something.
Sean and Judith had spent the last six weeks debating whether or not they would go on the weekend. In the end it always came down to Grace. She would be so utterly disappointed if her dream were to fall apart. They didn’t feel they could let her down, even though they really did need time out together alone. It was absurd, this loyalty to Grace, when they should be trying to work out whether they would separate after four years of marriage.
“How can we even think of her when our whole future is up for discussion?” Sean asked.
“Right, you can be the one to tell Grace, then,” said Judith, and they knew that they would go on the weekend, like everyone else.
Lola needed the boutique open for a couple of days between Christmas and New Year’s. Lots of business, she said, dizzy women who had nothing to wear for the Punchestown races, they would make a mint of money. Lola couldn’t come in herself, but she hoped that Grace could. Martin hardly noticed that she wasn’t at home.
A lot of four ball games had been arranged at the club; he could always grab a sandwich and soup.
Grace stood in the shop, sold expensive clothes to rich women and thought back on the well-organized but exhausting Christmas with her mother and Martin’s parents and assorted aunts. Why did she do it? she sometimes asked herself. They thought it was easy, that the turkey basted itself, carved itself and created all its own accompaniments. Had Martin enjoyed it all? Hard to know—he said so little these days. They saw each other so little.
Unlike Anna and Charlie … they were always off to the races together or going to poker parties. Never apart.
And even Olive and Harry seemed to be more companionable, Harry often with his arm draped around Olive’s neck. Martin wouldn’t do that in a million years. Everyone knew that Harry had a wandering eye, of course, but Olive didn’t appear to notice.
She wondered had Judith and Sean enjoyed their Christmas? They seemed tense recently, something to do with Sean being offered a job in the Gulf States and Judith not wanting to go. Still, it would all sort itself out at New Year’s Eve.
As she hung dresses back on hangers and filled the till with credit card slips for Lola, Grace thought of the wonderful oasis she had created for them all on Friday. There would be a light afternoon tea when they had all had their swims and walks, then they would retire to their rooms, all with four-poster beds, and get ready for the feast.
Thinking about beds made Grace wonder whether all the other couples might try out the four-posters before dinner, and make love. It wasn’t likely in her own case. Martin was tired a lot and might well sit in an armchair and read the newspaper or a golf magazine. Still, it would all be wonderful, Grace told herself, as she totted up the day’s takings and rang Lola just before she turned off the lights and headed for home.
“You were right, Lola—much better than we hoped,” she said, reading her boss the figures.
“Thank you, Grace. You’re very good.” Lola did not seem her usual confident self; in fact, she sounded rather down.
“And a very Happy New Year, Lola, and everything.”
“Yes, well …”
Grace didn’t say any more; she had already told Lola many times about their own magical New Year’s plans. She had heard nothing in return. They wished each other well and Grace set all the burglar alarms and went home.
Martin was at the dining table with a lot of papers spread in front of him.
“You’re not working, are you?” she said sympathetically. Imagine—when everyone else was taking two weeks off, he had office stuff with him.
“You were too,” he said, holding out his hand to her.
She was pleased.
“But surely you don’t need to do all this?”
“Well, you’re only as good as your last client thinks you are.” He smiled at her.
Grace loved him so much she wished she were a better, more entertaining wife. But at least she ran his life smoothly for him, and surely that’s what he wanted.
“Oh, there was a message from that hotel we’re going to tomorrow. They wanted us to call; I waited to let you do it.”
Grace was pleased. She knew what it was about. She had asked them to put a New Year’s candle and a half-bottle of Champagne in each room; there was money left over in the kitty for that. They would be ringing to confirm.
She was totally unprepared for the news. Everyone in the hotel had come down with flu—the chef literally could not leave his bed, the waitresses just as bad. The family who ran the place had been advised most sternly by their doctor that it would be both irresponsible and impossible to open. They were so very, very sorry, and of course though naturally every penny would be refunded, they would never be able to apologize …
Grace didn’t hear the end of the conversation. The phone sat in her hand as she contemplated what lay ahead. Everything was in ruins. It was all her own fault. Why had she set out to be the perfect organizer and the one in charge? She had phoned from the kitchen so that Martin would not hear of her little surprise arrangement.
Grace had no idea how long she had sat there by the phone when Martin came out. He knew that something was very, very wrong. Wrong enough for him to pour her a brandy.
“I’ll phone the others,” he offered.
“No. I invited them, I’ll uninvite them,” she said grimly.
“We’ll get in somewhere else,” he said uselessly.
“Sure, Martin … a booking for eight people New Year’s Eve, twenty-four hours’ notice. No problem.”
“So what will we do?” He looked at her. Grace, the unflappable Grace, who had a solution to everything. But not tonight.
“Could we eat at home?” he began.
“I’ve defrosted the freezer.” Her voice was flat.
“There’ll be places open tomorrow.”
“Sure,” she said in this strange voice. “I’ll call everyone now.”
Martin stood by watching helplessly as she spoke in a listless, beaten voice to Anna, and Olive and Judith. He could only guess at what they were saying at the other end of the line. It seemed to be reassuring. She was suggesting that they all come around to this house the following night at eight o’clock.
“We’ll
think of something,” she said in a doom-laden tone before she hung up.
Martin tried to help. “It’s worse for the people with the bad flu,” he began.
“Much,” said Grace. “I’m going to bed now.”
“Don’t we have to plan what we’ll well … um … do?” Normally Grace liked to plan things down to the bone.
“No point,” said Grace. “Goodnight, Martin.”
When she had gone upstairs he rang the couples himself.
“What’ll we do, Charlie?”
“Four to one she’ll be up in five minutes drawing up lists and rotas,” said Charlie, who wondered would they get their money back; it would be very handy.
“What’ll we do, Harry?”
“I don’t suppose we could leave the women to it and sort of cruise the bars—lots of talent out on a night like that,” said Harry hopefully.
“What’ll we do, Sean?”
“Should we all just sit in our own homes and discuss the future with each other?” Sean asked. It was what he dearly longed to do himself. This could be the excuse he had been dreaming of.
In three homes that night they discussed the problem.
“We must be owed a fair crack each—that wasn’t a cheap hotel,” said Charles.
“This is not the time to ask for it back,” Anna warned. “Poor Grace is almost certain to be in therapy over all this.”
They knew a dead cert for the races after the weekend. If they had a couple of thousand it would see them right.
Olive and Harry were talking about it all too. Olive thought it was possibly no harm—they were not going to be in a place with people falling out of their swimsuits into Harry’s willing hands. But she didn’t say this. She said that Grace was quite likely to have a nervous breakdown. Organizing was her only skill, after all. If that was gone, what else remained?
Judith and Sean said now they had all the time on earth to talk, there was nothing to say. So they didn’t have to pack all their clothes and get ready. They didn’t have to face, with what would have been a forced jollity, this group of friends so as not to let Grace down. Now she had been let down by the hotel instead.
“It will be a lonely New Year’s for her,” Judith said sympathetically.
“It’s a lonely one for me if I know that you won’t come to the Gulf with me,” Sean said simply.
“And for me if I know you don’t believe that I can’t leave my parents and my job,” Judith said.
They had got no further; there was no more to be said.
The women all rang Grace next morning: what could they do, what should they bring?
“I don’t know, I don’t mind … whatever you think,” she said in tones so different from her own they were all alarmed. They didn’t know where to begin; Grace would have organized them all, should have organized them all. She knew where things were, she would have phoned the stores, but Martin said she had gone to bed with a detective story.
Martin was getting Champagne, Harry was getting wine, Sean was getting spirits and Charles went out and sold his stamp album to buy mixers and beers.
Anna got bags full of potatoes because even though they were labor-intensive, they were cheap. She made three different kinds. Olive hit the shops only when everyone was closing and she got kilos of sausages and huge flat mushrooms. Judith got ice cream and three dull, tired-looking apple tarts and shared half a bottle of Calvados among them all.
They telephoned Grace and asked whether they should stay the night with her and Martin.
“I honestly don’t mind whether you do or not,” Grace said pleasantly.
They put their duvets and pillows in the car. They knew the house—there were plenty of sofa cushions. When they arrived, Grace was still in bed. She greeted them pleasantly but distantly, as if they were people she hadn’t really known at all.
The women assembled the food in the kitchen. The men were setting out the glasses and the drink. Grace lay in her bed and turned the pages of her book. For the first time in her life they were all aware of her. She could hear them whispering and wondering when she would join them. Martin, most of all.
On Christmas Day, Grace the Organizer had served a meal to eleven people, unaided, unthanked and unappreciated.
Now, just six days later, she was lying in bed doing nothing and they were all anxious for her even just to acknowledge them. Was there some kind of moral here? Some lesson that she had never learned in her whole life until now?
“Would you like another cup of tea?” Martin pleaded. Casual, distant, uncaring Martin, whom she had been trying so hard to please.
“Shall I run a bath for you?” Anna begged. Wild, bohemian Anna, who was at every race meeting and every card table in Dublin.
“Should I plug in your heated rollers?” asked Olive. Smug, complacent Olive, so sure of her Harry, so confident in everything.
“I could iron a dress for you, if you like,” Judith offered. Judith, so happy in her independence, her good job, her freedom to make her own decisions always.
Grace accepted everything, tea, heated rollers, scented bath and dress-ironing. Then she asked for the phone. They heard her dial and speak.
“Lola, I forgot to say there are a few people gathering here tonight in case you’re free to join us.… No, nothing formal. I’ve no idea what time we’re eating, or even what we’re eating. Something, anyway.… You will? Good—see you later, then.”
And Grace, who was no longer sure that it was only her organizational skills that kept her as a functioning member of society, as Martin’s wife and as everyone’s friend, sat back to enjoy the last night of the year. She didn’t care that they never found the matching cutlery, the good napkins, the electric plate warmer or the saltcellars. Instead she sat back and watched and listened and smiled. She couldn’t quite see how, but a lot of things seemed to get sorted out, things that might never have been sorted out had they been able to go to the hotel as they had long, long planned.
Sean was not going to the Gulf for another year and only then if Judith had found a job in the area that suited her.
Harry told everyone that he fancied the whole of womankind, he thought all women were gorgeous, but he loved only Olive.
Anna and Charles said that they would like Grace to hold half of their money when the refund came from the hotel; they were a teeny bit into gambling, they admitted.
Lola came and sat on the floor and sang Joan Baez songs. She said that Grace was the hardest worker in the world and said that she, Lola, would like to stay the night here with her new friends since there was nobody in her flat on Chestnut Street. And Grace said that would be fine but didn’t rush to get linen and blankets. Lola eventually slept under her fur coat on a sofa.
And best of all, Martin said she was marvelous. He said it six times. Four times in front of people and twice just into her ear.
Beside her bed Grace always kept a notebook so that she could write down ideas; this was part of being organized. Tonight she wrote herself one message:
“Send thank-you flowers to the hotel.”
She would know in the morning exactly why she must thank them for being delivered from the tyranny of being organized and for being able to join the human race.
Nan at 14 Chestnut Street heard about the builders from Mr. O’Brien, the fussy man at Number 28.
“It will be terrible, Mrs. Ryan,” he warned her. “Dirt and noise and all sorts of horrors.”
Mr. O’Brien was a man who found fault with everything, Nan Ryan told herself. She would not get upset. And in many ways it was nice to think that the house next door, which had been empty for two years, since the Whites had disappeared, would soon be a home again.
She wondered who would come to live there. A family, maybe. She might even babysit for them. She would tell the children stories and sit minding the house until the parents got back.
Her daughter Jo laughed at the very idea of a family coming to live in such a small house.
“Mam, ther
e isn’t room to swing a cat in it,” she said in her very definite, brisk way. When Jo spoke she did so with great confidence. She knew what was right.
“I don’t know.” Nan was daring to disagree. “It’s got a nice, safe garden at the back.”
“Yes, six foot long and six foot wide,” Jo said with a laugh.
Nan said nothing. She didn’t mention the fact that the house in which she had reared three children was exactly the same size.
Jo knew everything. How to run a business. How to dress in great style. How to run her elegant home. How to keep her handsome husband, Jerry, from wandering away.
Jo must be right about the house next door. Too small for a family. Perhaps a nice woman of her own age might come. Someone who could be a friend. Or a young couple who both went out to work. Nan might take in parcels for them or let in a man to read the meter?
Bobby, who was Nan’s son, said that she had better pray it wouldn’t be a young couple. They’d be having parties every night, driving her mad. She would become deaf, Bobby warned. Deaf as a post. Young couples who had spent a lot doing up their house would be terrible. They would have no money. They would want some fun. They would make their own beer and ask noisy friends around to drink it with them.
And Pat, the youngest, was gloomiest of all.
“Mam will be deaf already by the time they arrive, whoever they are. Deaf from all the building noise. The main thing is to make sure they keep the garden fence the height it is and in good shape. Good fences make good neighbors, they say.”
Pat worked for a security firm and felt very strongly about these things. Jo and Bobby and Pat were so very sure of themselves. Nan wondered how they had become so confident. They didn’t get it from her. She had always been shy. Timid, even.
She didn’t go out to work because it was the way everyone wanted it. They needed Nan at home. Their father had been quiet also. Quiet and loving. Very loving. Loving to Nan for a while, and then loving to a lot of other ladies.