An Irish Doctor in Peace and at War Read online

  “It’s good to have you back, Kinky. We missed you.”

  “It was a lovely holiday, so. Archie is a grand man for the hiking. He near had the legs worn off me charging right up to the top of Slieve Donard, but the view from up there?” She looked dreamy. “You’d think you could reach up and touch Heaven.”

  O’Reilly wondered how Kinky might feel if she ever went up in an aeroplane. “It’s impressive,” he said. “On a fair day you can see a goodly bit of southwestern Scotland.” But not quite as far as Greenock and the Firth of Clyde, he thought.

  “You can, so, but it does be good to be back home and to have Rory on the mend too. It was a frightful shock to Archie and me when you told us, sir. It’s not right that a good Irish boy should get a foreign disease that I can’t even pronounce. Them people should keep their ills to themselves. We’ve plenty enough of our own to go round and we don’t be giving them to foreigners, so.” She managed a small smile. “It was a great comfort, sir, to have you explaining all about it so that Archie, God love him, could rest easy until we got Rory home. He’s been home a week now. The nice doctors at Purdysburn said he’d need three weeks’ convalescence so he still has two to go.”

  “How’s he doing?”

  “He has been very well looked after, so, and he’s to report back to his own medical officer in two weeks. There’ll be some kind of panel to see if he’s fit to return to duty.” She inhaled. “He’s concerned that they’ll not pass him A1, and he does love his soldiering.”

  “I’m sure he’ll be fine,” O’Reilly said. “The army looks after its own.”

  “Thank you, sir,” she said, “that’s good to know. And now I’d better get going with my work.” Kinky lowered the vacuum cleaner’s handle to the sweeping position and switched it on. The machine roared. Lady Macbeth screeched. The machine’s bag inflated. Lady Macbeth’s tail did the same. She wriggled, howled, and clawed at O’Reilly’s jacket.

  “All right,” he said, “all right,” and set her on the floor. Howling like the banshee, the little cat rocketed off, heading for the kitchen. “Sorry, your ladyship,” he said. “I’d forgotten you had a thing about vacuums.”

  Barry was still on the phone. “I’ll speak to Fingal. See you on Saturday, love.” He hung up and turned to Fingal. “Got a minute?”

  “Sure.” He headed upstairs. “Kinky has banished me from the dining room.”

  Barry followed. “That was Sue,” he said. “She’s in a bit of a pickle. Needs help.”

  “Then off you go, Barry,” said O’Reilly, “I’ll make the home visit for you.” He wondered what could be upsetting Sue Nolan, who was usually a very self-contained young woman.

  Barry shook his head. “I’d like you to go round to the school and see if you can help her,” he said.

  “Me?” said O’Reilly. “Why me?” He and Barry had stopped on the landing beside a framed photo of his old battleship.

  Barry pointed at the black-and-white picture. “Because I think she needs backup from some big guns and in Ballybucklebo, Fingal, that’s you. It’s about Colin Brown—again.”

  “Colin? Oh-oh.” O’Reilly shook his head. “What in the name of the wee man has that rapscallion been up to this time?”

  “Nothing,” Barry said. “We all know Colin’s as bright as a button. Very bright. It’s probably why he gets into so much mischief. He’ll be finished with his elementary schooling and moving on. Sue says he’s one of the smartest kids she’s ever taught. Thinks he should be sitting his Eleven Plus. She’s sure he’d pass and have a chance for a better education. I agree. Apparently the necessary application forms for the next exams arrived at school yesterday.”

  O’Reilly whistled. In Ulster the powers that be divided youngsters whose parents could not afford to send their offspring to fee-paying schools into those who should excel academically and those better suited for the trades. The two groups were educated differently. The kids, if their parents wished, could take an exam, the Eleven Plus, between ages eleven and twelve. Based on the results, the top 25 percent were offered places at grammar schools and given an academic education with the state paying. Most went on in six years to win university places or at least could get jobs like bank tellers or other white-collar occupations. The others went to secondary or technical schools for more practical training in the trades, also at the taxpayers’ expense. “She certainly could be right,” O’Reilly said. “He deserves a chance.”

  “And Colin really wants to,” Barry said, “but the trouble is, Sue naturally assumed his parents would agree. She asked him to mention it to his folks when he went home for lunch. Said she’d drop in after school this afternoon and bring the forms if Colin thought that was convenient.” Barry scowled.

  “And?”

  “And it wasn’t—convenient, I mean. According to Colin, his mother’s all for it, but Lenny, Colin’s da, was definitely not. He wants Colin to go into one of the trades. Lenny’s adamant. Won’t even consider having him sit the exam.” Barry sighed. “Colin went back to school after lunch absolutely gutted. Seems he’s got his heart set on being a veterinary.”

  “Good Lord. Hope he hasn’t told his father that.”

  “No, Colin’s too smart. He can see what’s happening. But Sue said he was very upset. He’s clutching his tummy and making hideous moaning noises. She reckons it’s all a sham but it would be a good reason for a doctor…”

  O’Reilly cocked his head and smiled at Barry before saying, “Good plan. Where are Sue and Colin now?”

  “There was some kind of concert going on and no classes so she got permission from the headmistress to take him home. Sue wanted me to go with her round to the Browns. Try to talk sense into Lenny.” He looked at O’Reilly. “You’ve taught me that being a GP here involves more than looking after the ills of the flesh. Our job’s to—” He looked down and up again. “—to look after the whole ruddy community. Sue’ll probably get told to mind her own business if she goes by herself.” His smile was rueful. “I imagine so would I, but—”

  “You think we need what the navy used to call ‘a ship of force,’ and that I fill the bill?” O’Reilly laughed. “Right. You go and see your patient and I’ll nip round to the school and take Sue and Colin to see his folks.”

  * * *

  “Doctor O’Reilly,” Connie Brown said when she answered O’Reilly’s knock from the brass lion’s head on the front door. “And Miss Nolan. What’s wrong? Is it Colin?” She moved to her son, who was wiping his nose with the sleeve of his school blazer. “Colin, use your hanky.”

  “Colin’s fine,” O’Reilly said. It had taken little for him to pretend to examine Colin at the school and then pronounce with all the authority of an expert adult, “There’s not a blooming thing wrong with you, Colin Brown,” for Colin to quit his moaning. O’Reilly said, “He’s a bit unhappy, but he’s not sick and he’s not in any trouble. I promise.”

  “That makes a change,” she said, the words clipped. “Sorry, Doctor, but it’s been a bit hectic round here. Len’s home from the shipyard. They had a work slowdown today.”

  “We wondered if Miss Nolan and I could have a word with you and Lenny, seeing as he’s still home?”

  “Yes, of course, come in. He’s in the front parlour.” Connie stepped aside. She lowered her voice. “It’s about that there exam, isn’t it?”

  O’Reilly nodded.

  “Just a wee minute,” Connie said, and turned to Colin. “Away you out into the backyard and play with Murphy, son.”

  “Yes, Mammy,” Colin said, and ran down the hall and into the kitchen. O’Reilly knew that the back door led to a walled yard where Murphy, a dog of indeterminate breed from one of Sonny and Maggie Houston’s bitches, would be overjoyed to see his master.

  Connie looked at Sue. “Miss Nolan, I’m awful sorry. I know you mean well, so you do, and want what you thinks is best for Colin. I think you’re right, but my Lenny, and he’s the man of the house, can be terrible thran when he gets his mind
made up.”

  Just as the Ulster sense of humour was ingrained, so was the tendency in some Ulstermen to congenital bloody-mindedness.

  “He’s calmed down a bit, but—well, I’m glad you’re here, Doctor. Begging your pardon, miss, but I know how Lenny respects the doctor, and all.”

  Lenny’s voice came from the front parlour. “Who the hell is it, Connie?” The words were not dripping with honey.

  She led the way. “Doctor O’Reilly and Miss Nolan have just popped in, like.”

  Lenny rose, as was proper when a lady entered a room.

  “Please sit down, everybody,” Connie said. “Would anybody like a wee cup of scald in their hand?” Her tones were those of a hostess greeting welcome guests with the offer of tea, and O’Reilly knew she was trying to pour oil on Lenny’s troubled waters.

  “There’s no time for tea,” Lenny said. “I want for til know now what all this palaver’s about, so I do. Right now.”

  O’Reilly and Sue sat. Connie remained standing. O’Reilly hesitated. He would help where he could, but Colin was Sue’s pupil and, after all, education was her speciality. “Miss Nolan?” he asked.

  “Mister Brown, I’m a young teacher, I don’t want to interfere in your family’s business, but I have never, ever met such a smart young man as your son, Colin.” Sue’s voice was low and encouraging, not pleading, the voice O’Reilly thought she probably used to encourage slower learners with difficult problems.

  O’Reilly saw Connie smile. “That’s very nice of you, Miss Nolan, isn’t it, Lenny?”

  Lenny frowned, ignored his wife. “Go on, miss.”

  “I believe he could be anything he wants; a lawyer, a doctor, a—”

  “He’s going til be a plater like his daddy, and that’s that,” Lenny said with a flat air of finality. “Right now, Harland Wolff shipyard is working on a deep-sea oil rig, the Sea Quest.” The man said the words with pride. “And the first supertanker, the Myrina, ever built in the UK. There’ll never be no shortage of work there and the wages is dead good. A man can take pride in a job like that.” He emphasised his point by stabbing his own chest with his index finger.

  Sue looked at O’Reilly.

  He said, “It’s been five years since the last liner, the Canberra, was finished here.”

  “Aye,” said Lenny, “that’s true. With all them airyplanes now there’s not the demand for liners no more, so there’s not.” He wagged the same finger at O’Reilly. “But our managing director’s got a loan from the government, and Harland’s is modernising the yard. We’ll be building ships as big as thirty-three thousand tonnes, so we will.” He folded his arms across his chest and looked O’Reilly straight in the eye. “No son of mine’s getting ideas above his station, so he’s not. There’s been a Brown at the yard since the first Mister Harland bought it from his boss, Mister Hickson, in 1861. That’s more than a hundred years, so it is, and there’ll be one there when I’m long past it and eating bread and milk.”

  O’Reilly, not missing the reference to Lenny’s toothless dotage, strained to catch the nuances in the man’s voice. Certainly there was a hard-to-shake, ingrained class consciousness, and definite pride in the shipyards, but underneath O’Reilly detected a tinge of worry. Despite Lenny’s bluster about government loans, in the wider community there was serious concern about the long-term future of shipbuilding in Ulster. The Japanese and the Koreans were able to build much less expensively in a world where now the war was over the demand for ships had diminished massively. The loss of orders was further exaggerated by a move to bigger container ships and fewer general cargo vessels. Was Lenny somehow insisting that Colin follow in his father’s foorsteps to reinforce his belief—or perhaps more accurately his fervent hope—that the shipyards would remain in business indefinitely?

  “Even so, a profession—” Sue said, then a puzzled look crossed her face.

  O’Reilly clenched his teeth, recognising, as she must have, just how thin was the ice under her. Any suggestion that a profession was a step up in life would be an immediate slap in the face to a proud tradesman. He glanced at Lenny and saw the man’s fists tightening and how he was starting to rise from his chair.

  “Take it easy, Lenny,” Connie said. “Miss Nolan thinks she’s trying to help Colin, and it is her job as his teacher, like, just like it’s Doctor O’Reilly’s.”

  O’Reilly, watching Lenny subside, smiled at Connie. “I think what Miss Nolan means,” he hastened to say, “is that maybe we should give Colin a chance for more of a choice?”

  Lenny frowned. “Like what? She already said she wanted to send him for to be a doctor or a lawyer. Being a bloody fine plater’s good enough for me. The apprenticeship’s longer than going for a doctor, but he can start earlier.”

  That was true. Most apprentices began their training at sixteen and would already have been taught basic trade skills if they’d gone to a technical school.

  “He’d still be at the yard if he was, say, a naval architect,” said O’Reilly slowly, “but he’d need different qualifications for that.” Colin, at the ripe old age of eleven, thought he wanted to be a vet, but who could predict what career the boy might choose six years from now. That was up to Colin. All O’Reilly was after was getting Lenny to agree to his son sitting the exam so his options would be open.

  Lenny frowned and stared at his callused hands, the dirt under his fingernails that no amount of scrubbing could get out, the white puckers of burn scars that were the badges of honour for platers and riveters.

  Sue looked as if she was getting ready to say something and O’Reilly caught her eye, hoping she noticed the merest shake of his head. Let Lenny make up his own mind.

  Finally the man spoke. “Suppose he passes the exam. Does he have to go to grammar school with all the kids of the toffs?”

  The class thing again, O’Reilly thought.

  “No,” said Sue. “Only if you want him to.”

  Lenny pursed his lips and looked at Connie.

  O’Reilly said, “You like the odd bet on the horses, Lenny?”

  “Aye.”

  “Letting Colin write the exam’s like backing a horse both ways—to win or place. Gives him two chances of winning.”

  Lenny nodded slowly, ponderously, before saying, “When do them forms need filling in by?”

  Sue glanced at O’Reilly before saying, “September the first.”

  Lenny stood, went to Connie, and put his arm around her shoulder. “The missus and me’ll think on it, all right? I’m making no promises, so I’m not, but we’ll talk it over.”

  Connie smiled and patted her husband’s hand.

  “I think that’s very wise,” Sue said. “After all, it is your decision.”

  Well done, Sue, O’Reilly thought. As far as he was concerned, any attempt to try to sway Lenny farther at this point would probably push him into rearing up with a flat refusal. Let the hare sit. “Come on, Miss Nolan,” he said. “I think Mister and Mrs. Brown would like to be alone.”

  “Thank you, Doctor O’Reilly, Miss Nolan,” Connie said. “I’ll show you out—and I’ll get you a cuppa and wee jam piece, Lenny, when I come back.”

  16

  The Hours of Light Return

  The sound of the bo’sun’s pipes shrilled through the Tannoy system. Fingal, perched at a table in the sick bay doing a job he hated, didn’t need to look at his watch to know it was eleven o’clock. While he was filling in requisition forms for pharmaceuticals, Warspite’s petty officer of the day would be collecting the keys to the spirits room to start the daily ritual of issuing the rum ration: one-eighth of a pint per petty officer and every man over the age of twenty and not under punishment. There was no issue for officers; they had the bar in their mess. The next pipe would be at noon when the measured quantity would be ready for general distribution. O’Reilly smiled at the thought of this arcane practice surviving into the twentieth century. There’d been talk over the years in Parliament of abolishing the men’s grog, but
nothing had happened. Trust the navy to hang on like the devil to its archaic ways.

  Rituals like these had become a fixture of Fingal’s life, but today they marked the passage of time aboard ship in an entirely new way. Unless there was some unforeseen event, Warspite should be dropping the hook at Tail of the Bank by two P.M.—four bells of the afternoon watch. The ship needed maintenance and wouldn’t be ready for sea until two weeks after she’d anchored.

  Which meant he would start his first long leave, of fourteen days—time enough to get back to Ulster and see Deirdre. Deirdre. He hugged the thought to him. As soon as the first liberty drifter was alongside he’d be off—unless, as Tom Laverty had remarked at breakfast, there was some “excitement.” Although they were nearly home, safety was by no means guaranteed. O’Reilly knew very well that only last month, the minesweeper HMS Gleaner had depth-charged and sunk a U-boat here in the seemingly protected waters of the Clyde Estuary, Warspite’s current home base. The havoc an enemy submarine might have wrought among the ships anchored here did not bear thinking about.

  Since O’Reilly had joined the battleship in November, three nearly nonstop months of bleak midwinter convoy escort duty had been his initiation back into the navy. In the final six return runs from Halifax they had lost eight merchantmen to enemy action.

  The weeks of ceaseless noise, ship’s smells, constant wetness, incessant motion, and sleeps interrupted by calls to readiness or action stations had run one into the other. At least in the medical department, O’Reilly and the rest didn’t have to contend with the savage cold on deck or the brutally high temperatures in the engine and boiler spaces. Their lot was treating the endless rounds of cuts, bruises, sprains, and broken bones occasioned by the weather.

  The grinding monotony was punctuated by periods of horror when a ship within their convoy was torpedoed or struck a mine. At those times, the sea would stink of bunker oil and men would be tossed into the sea like flotsam or grimly hang on in lifeboats or on Carley floats. Warspite was too valuable to risk stopping to rescue survivors—she could be hit by a torpedo too. O’Reilly would pray for the half-frozen men to be picked up by one of the smaller escort vessels.