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‘We will make enquiries,’ her father said. ‘That is all I am offering to do at this point. And you can take that smirk from your face, Tom, for I have a mind to ask the man if he could teach you a few tunes on the tin whistle.’
Tom looked at his father in amazement. He was not averse to learning the tin whistle. In fact, if his opinion had been asked, he’d have said that he was quite pleased, but he did wonder when he might get time to practise anything he learned because he and Aggie, being the eldest, were kept hard at it.
His doubt was reinforced when his mother said to Aggie, ‘And don’t you look so pleased with yourself. If we allow you to go to this dancing it will be on top of your duties, not instead of them, and the same goes for you, Tom, and the tunes you learn.’
‘Don’t you be giving out to Aggie and Tom before they have done anything wrong, Biddy,’ Thomas John chided. ‘Neither are slackers, but there is no point in Aggie learning the dancing and Tom the tunes if they are not given time to practise. Haven’t I Joe to help me – and we mustn’t forget Finn, of course,’ he added, ruffling the hair of his youngest son.
Biddy said nothing more. Really, she expected she would have a houseful of sons by now – not that she was keen on children herself, not even her own, but she knew sons were essential on a farm. But she had gone six barren years after the birth of Joe before she produced Finn. She had really thought her childbearing days were over.
Thomas John couldn’t understand why she worried over the lack of sons. ‘What is the problem?’ he would ask, in genuine bewilderment. ‘You have a daughter to help in the house, a wee one to dandle on your knee and gladden your heart with his smile, while I have two fine, strapping sons to help me about the farm. Many would be satisfied with far less.’
Biddy never answered this, but both Tom and Aggie could have told their father that their mother was easily dissatisfied and discontented. The two of them, and to a lesser extent Joe, had borne the brunt of her ill humour time and enough, meted out by the stick that she kept hanging up to one side of the hearth.
In the New Year the dancing lessons were held each Saturday afternoon in St Mary’s church hall, the older ones going to the later class. The church had had to be put at least a mile outside the town, as decreed by the British, who had controlled Ireland at the time it was built. It was in a district called Cockhill. The Sullivans’ farm was also in Cockhill and a little over a mile away from the church so it was no problem for Aggie to get there.
McAllister owned a gramophone, a magnificent thing with a big golden horn. It was his pride and joy, and when he put records on it and lifted the needle over, tunes came out of it. Aggie and the other girls were enchanted, for they had never seen anything like it before in the whole of their lives.
‘I thought he would play the tunes on the fiddle for you,’ her father said when she told her parents about the gramophone, ‘or, indeed, the tin whistle, for he has a fine hand with them both.’
‘He said he couldn’t play and teach us properly, and using the gramophone is better,’ Aggie said.
‘And you enjoy it?’
‘Oh, yes.’ But much of Aggie’s enjoyment was down to the fact that she had been attending the classes only a little time when she fancied herself in love with McAllister.
‘I can’t understand why his wife complains about him so much,’ she said to Tom one day, after she had just come from a lesson. ‘She should be grateful to be married to such a handsome man and one that seems to be in good humour all of the time.’
‘Maybe that good humour is Guinness- or poteen-induced?’ Tom suggested with a grin, and added, ‘That’s what Daddy said, anyway.’
‘Tom,’ Aggie said angrily, ‘how can you say such a thing? Isn’t he doing a grand job with you and the tin whistle? And what’s wrong with a man taking the odd pint of Guinness or nip of poteen anyway? Our own daddy does the same thing now and again.’
‘I was only repeating what Daddy said.’
‘Well, don’t!’ Aggie retorted. ‘Isn’t the man giving up his time freely?’
It wasn’t exactly freely, though no money changed hands. However, as he taught Irish dancing to the butcher’s daughter he got his payment in kind, and he had similar treatment from the newsagent for teaching his daughter so that he had all the tobacco he needed. The various farms around provided him with other produce and so, with their own grocery store as well, his wife was well enough pleased.
The teaching of the tunes was done in the children’s own homes and the payment for this was usually in the shape of a bottle of poteen, which was distilled in the hills of Donegal. It never seemed to affect McAllister’s ability to teach, however much he drank, and he rode from farm to farm on the horse that was also used to pull the cart for the shop.
Philomena once said to Biddy that half the time she didn’t know how he made it home and it was a good thing his horse knew the way. She wouldn’t be at all surprised to find him fallen into a ditch somewhere one day, having slid from the horse’s back.
Biddy knew exactly what Philomena meant, for the man had often been well away when he left their house. If she ever complained about this, however, Thomas John would always maintain there was no harm in the man, that he just had a terrible thirst on him.
Aggie thought there was no harm in him either. In fact she thought him wonderful and strove in all ways to please him. With her love of dancing she soon progressed, and after she had been at it a year McAllister declared her a gifted little dancer. Soon after this, he asked her and Cissie to go for extra lessons on Wednesday evenings, to which Thomas John readily agreed.
He was delighted with McAllister. Tom had got on so well with the tin whistle that Joe had asked to learn too, and Tom had begun to learn the fiddle. Each week, McAllister would listen to them playing the tune he had taught them the previous week, which he expected them to master before he would teach them another. They soon had a fair collection of material and would often entertain their parents in the long winter evenings. They would play for Aggie too, and she would roll back the rugs and dance on the flagged floor of the cottage, her brown eyes flashing, her dark brown plaits bouncing to each side and her feet fair flying along. Afterwards her cheeks would be flushed and pink, and Tom realised with some surprise one day that Aggie was very pretty.
Afterwards, those pictures would often come back to haunt Tom. They were a time of innocent pleasure that would never return – before his life and Aggie’s were touched by evil.
As Aggie began to develop, her infatuation for McAllister grew stronger. In her own home, as he taught her brothers, she was able to study everything about him, like his fine head of hair, so black it sometimes shone blue in the lamplight. He had wonderful masculine hands too, with a dusting of hairs on the backs of them, and long and very flexible fingers with square nails. She watched the movement of his mouth, with his fine, full lips, listening to the lilting timbre of his voice and the way he threw his head back when he laughed, as he did often.
Tom wondered if Aggie knew that her eyes went all dopey and dreamy in this scrutiny of McAllister. It worried him slightly, though he barely knew why, and he hoped that the man himself had never noticed.
But, of course he had, and it pleased him greatly to have a young, nubile girl lusting after him. As yet she was but a child, anxious to please him and do things for him. When she was a little older, maybe he would see just how far she would go in pleasing him, for she was turning out to be a very fetching little thing.
Not long after Aggie had passed her fourteenth birthday, Biddy announced to the family that she was having another baby. She was unaccountably excited about this pregnancy, different from the way she had felt about the others. At first she said Aggie had to give up the dancing for she would need her full help in the house. It was Thomas John who said she needn’t do that.
‘Sure, it is the only place she goes, unless you count Mass. It doesn’t take her out of the house much all told, and the girl needs some distraction.’
Biddy never argued with Thomas John, the only person that she ever listened to and took heed of. Aggie knew that, and she gave a sigh of relief at her father’s words and hugged herself with delight.
Her little sister was born on a blustery day in February 1900 when the wind howled so fiercely around the cottage, it sounded like a creature in torment. It rattled the windows and caused the fire to splutter and smoke. All that ceased to matter to Aggie as she held in her arms the little sister that she had helped the midwife bring into the world. She felt a special bond with her. She was overwhelmed when Biddy asked her if she would like to be the child’s godmother, and the baby was christened Nuala Mary when she was less than two weeks old.
The whole family was charmed by that one small baby – even wee Finn, who would spend hours just gazing at her.
‘Don’t you try lifting her out of there,’ Biddy said to her small son one day, catching him by the side of the crib.
Finn looked quite astonished that his mother might think he had such a notion. ‘I wouldn’t,’ he said. ‘I might hurt her.’
‘You could well,’ Biddy said grimly. ‘And that goes for you too, Tom and Joe. Don’t you two be thinking of playing with her, for you are too big and too rough altogether.’
Tom thought his mother didn’t need to say that to him. He had left school now and was at work full time alongside his father. With his hands chapped and callused he wouldn’t touch the child at all, and as for holding her, she was so petite and delicate-looking, he would be afraid that she would break.
‘They are stronger than you think,’ Aggie told him one day when he said this.
She was lifting the child as she spoke and Tom marvelled at the easy way she did this. She laughed, but gently, at the look on his face. ‘It’s easier for a woman,’ she said. ‘And that’s how it must be, of course, for I will probably have my own weans one day.’
‘Aye, and meanwhile you are mooning after him, McAllister …’
Aggie flushed with embarrassment and guilt but she denied the accusation vehemently. ‘I am not.’
‘Yes you are,’ Tom maintained. ‘You just be glad that Mammy hasn’t noticed.’
‘There’s nothing to notice,’ Aggie said heatedly. ‘This is all in your imagination.’
‘No it isn’t,’ Tom said. ‘And for the life of me I don’t see what the attraction is. He is an old man and a well-married one too.’
‘You don’t understand,’ Aggie said, and as Tom shook his head at her, Aggie hid a smile. At home she was just good old Aggie to her father and brothers, and an extra pair of hands to her mother, especially now, and her life one of boring drudgery.
Twice a week she was Agnes Sullivan, talked and listened to as if she wasn’t a child any more, especially when she attended the special Wednesday evening dancing classes with Cissie. And that was all down to McAllister. He wasn’t exactly old either – not like her daddy was old, anyway – but he was mature. The lines on his face just added to his character, and he had the darkest brown eyes. But what was the point of saying any of that to her brother? He’d laugh himself silly if she tried.
Of course, when he was in the farmhouse, teaching her brothers or drinking with her father, he had to be far more proper towards her, seeming to know without her having to say anything that her parents wouldn’t like any sort of familiarity. If he addressed her at all, he called her ‘Aggie’ and she called him ‘Mr McAllister’, but on Saturday, after the younger children had left, and especially on Wednesday evening, she was Agnes and he was Bernie. He also kissed her and Cissie on the cheek when the class was over, making them blush at first, before they began to enjoy it, but the two girls were sensible enough to say nothing about this at home.
Aggie did daydream about Bernie McAllister sometimes, and her nights too were punctuated with fantasies about him. Sometimes, she would imagine that he would hold her in his arms and kiss her properly. She had no idea what a proper kiss was; she just knew people seemed to hold great store by it, as a sign that one person liked another. She never allowed herself to go further than that kiss, though, and yet in the morning she would be ashamed of herself. She never even whispered these thoughts and dreams to Cissie, fearing she would be shocked.
It was more than three weeks before Christmas when Aggie got to the church hall one Wednesday evening to find that Cissie hadn’t arrived. That was strange, as she was always there before Aggie. Usually, as Aggie was going out the door, her mother would find another job for her to do, for though she wouldn’t openly defy Thomas John and forbid Aggie to go dancing, she resented it bitterly. She particularly disliked the Wednesday evening sessions and so would deliberately make Aggie late, and she would arrive red and out of breath, having run every step of the way.
That night was no exception. As she stood framed in the doorway, McAllister’s breath caught in his throat. She was truly beautiful, with her flushed cheeks, heaving bosom and dancing eyes. Cissie was a bonny enough girl, but she didn’t hold a candle to Agnes, and the girl was totally unaware of it too.
‘Where’s Cissie?’ Aggie asked, scanning the room.
‘Cissie isn’t coming tonight,’ McAllister said, crossing to stand beside her. ‘She has the measles. Her mother caught me in the town and told me, but I came on here to wait for you.’
‘How awful for her,’ Aggie said. ‘Poor Cissie.’ And then disappointment trickled through her body as she said uncertainly, ‘Well, I had better go then.’
‘Why?’ McAllister said, drawing her into the room and closing the door with his foot. ‘Do you want to go?’
McAllister’s face was very close, and Aggie said, ‘No, not really but—’
‘You are very lovely, you know, Agnes,’ McAllister said, cutting across her.
No one had ever mentioned loveliness to Agnes and her eyes opened wide. ‘Am I?’
‘You are,’ McAllister said emphatically. ‘Did no one ever tell you that before?’ he asked, knowing just how unlikely that was.
‘No, never.’
‘Anyone ever tell you how your eyes sparkle brighter than the stars in the sky?’ McAllister asked. As Aggie’s face flushed further with embarrassment he added, ‘And that you look so enchanting when you blush.’
‘Oh, Bernie, really,’ Aggie said, flustered. ‘Please don’t say such things.’
‘Why?’ McAllister asked. ‘Don’t you wish to hear them?’
‘No, not really. I’m sure it is wrong to make a person think too much of themselves, especially when the things said are not true.’
‘Who said they were not true?’
‘Exaggerated then …’
‘Not a bit of it,’ McAllister cried. ‘Look into a mirror, Agnes, my darling girl, and you will see it all for yourself.’
‘You have me all of a dither.’
McAllister caught up her hand and said, ‘Don’t be ashamed or embarrassed, for as you grow up you’ll hear many such comments. And you must learn to accept them gracefully and thank the person applauding you so.’
‘Oh, I do thank you, Bernie,’ Aggie said earnestly. ‘It was just that it was so unexpected. I am not at all used to hearing people say such things about me.’
‘That’s all right,’ McAllister smiled. ‘And now to show you that I really mean the things I said, I will give you a wee kiss!’
Aggie returned the smile and, expecting the type of kiss that he gave both her and Cissie when they were leaving each Wednesday evening, she said, ‘All right.’
McAllister caught Aggie’s face up between his hands and kissed her mouth gently and then, as if Aggie’s arms had a life of their own, they encircled his neck. His kiss became more ardent and demanding, and Aggie’s whole being began to shake, and she knew she wanted that kiss to go on and on for ever.
When they broke apart at last, both were breathless. Aggie dropped her arms and pulled herself from McAllister’s embrace before allowing herself to look into his eyes. She saw the yearning there and though she didn’t understand it, she was a little alarmed by it. But what was more worrying by far were the strange longings she had coursing through her own body, feelings the like of which she had never had before and wasn’t sure they weren’t downright sinful.
‘Oh, Agnes,’ McAllister said, ‘that was truly wonderful.’
‘I know. But I don’t think we should have done it.’
‘And why not? Don’t say you didn’t enjoy it, for I shall not believe it. It wasn’t a stranger’s arms that came about my neck, or a stranger’s lips kissing me so hard.’
‘I know,’ Aggie admitted, her face flaming again, but this time with shame. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me.’
‘Don’t be sorry. Did I push you away?’
‘No, but …’
‘For two pins I would repeat the experience,’ McAllister said, reaching out for Aggie, but she twirled out of his grasp.
‘No, no!’ she cried. ‘We mustn’t.’
‘We mustn’t,’ McAllister mimicked, but gently. ‘Mustn’t touch, mustn’t kiss, and mustn’t have fun in any shape or form.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Stop being sorry. Stop saying you’re sorry,’ he snapped. He seemed to think for a moment and then suddenly said, ‘Well, if a kiss and cuddle is out, then we must dance. Take off your shawl and boots and we’ll make a start.’
Aggie looked at him and knew that while one part of her wanted to go into his arms willingly, the other part was urging her to bid the man good night and go home. She did neither, and as she removed her shawl she said, ‘I can’t dance without Cissie,’ because the two girls had been practising a duet they were to perform in the Christmas concert put on by the Church.
‘Aren’t you the girl for finding problems where there are none?’ McAllister said. ‘We will do dances that need not include Cissie.’
‘We will?’
‘Yes, we will. They are called polkas. They’re fun to do and a chance for me to hold you in my arms legitimately. What do you say?’
‘I say maybe I should go home.’
‘You disappoint me, Agnes.’ McAllister shook his head sadly. ‘Really you do.’
Aggie thought of her home and knew she wouldn’t be right in the door before her mother would be roaring at her for something and there would be a list of jobs waiting for her. And if she went, she would upset the man she admired before all others. Anyway, she wanted to stay in the church hall, lit softly by the paraffin lamps, and she knew too she would be warmed further by McAllister’s arms around her as they moved to the music.
‘I’ll stay,’ she decided, facing him, and he beamed in approval.
‘Good girl.’ And he took her in his arms.
Aggie loved the polkas, the tantalising and evocative music, and dancing in McAllister’s arms was just heavenly. They danced for ages, stopping only when the gramophone needed cranking up. Eventually they were completely out of breath.
‘Sit down and recover before you attempt the walk home,’ McAllister invited. ‘And tell me about yourself.’
Aggie couldn’t remember opening her soul as she did that night with McAllister. The man listened to the child – she was little more – who was at it from dawn till dusk just because she had the misfortune to be the elder girl in the family.
‘That’s why I love dancing, you see,’ she said. ‘It is a chance to get out. Mammy would have stopped me ages ago if Daddy hadn’t put his foot down.’
‘I’m glad he did then.’
‘Mm, so am I. Have you any family? Brothers, sisters?’
‘I have three brothers older than me who hightailed it to the States, and an older sister, Gwen, living in Birmingham,’ McAllister told her, taking a hip flask of poteen out of his pocket as he spoke and taking a long drink. ‘I was the baby.’
