An Irish Country Practice Read online

  O’Reilly understood. This was a boy from the backstreets of Belfast.

  “And I fell behind in maths and science in my last year at school. I found out later you needed them for medicine. And to get your fees paid by the state, you needed a sixty percent average in your school-leaving exams. With the pass mark at forty percent, that’s a brave high average to go to Queens for free. I didn’t have it, and Mammy and me didn’t have the money for the fees anyway, so I went to w-work. And anyroad, d’you ever hear this one? ‘God bless the squire and his relations, And keep us all in our proper stations.’ I was a working-class boy. People like me don’t have professions. Being a doctor wasn’t for the likes of me.” He stared down at the tabletop. “I thought I had to accept that.”

  Aye, O’Reilly thought. Bloody class system. The Americans have that right. Oh, there was a form of one based on celebrity or wealth, but O’Reilly had been over there during the war and seen how anyone with gumption could rise in the world. He’d been told how actor James Cagney’s family had come from the lowest slums of New York, but in spite of that, two of his brothers had gone on to be physicians.

  “But you didn’t accept it,” said Barry.

  The man shook his head. “I got a job as a civil servant. At least I didn’t have to go and work in the shipyards or—a match factory. Mammy was pleased. I worked in the Registry of Deeds copying documents all day.” He made a self-deprecatory laugh. “It was very boring. I couldn’t do that all my life. I started to get a notion I wanted to have a profession. I thought about medicine but, och … I didn’t have the marks and we couldn’t afford the fees so there was no use day-dreaming. I wasn’t going to win an Olympic gold medal either.”

  O’Reilly was listening carefully. There was no bitterness in the man’s speech.

  Connor took a deep draught of his lemonade. “My great-great-great grandfather had been a Methodist minister. I took a notion that kind of thing might suit me. So I wrote the exams to be a lay preacher. I didn’t need any more schooling or money to do that, and I passed…” A smile of pride crossed his face, then faded. “But then I still had a powerful s-stammer. You could hardly preach a sermon if you tripped over all of your words, could you?”

  Mmmm, O’Reilly thought. While he would judge no man for his faith, there was no room for proselytising in the practice. Doctors, in O’Reilly’s opinion, had no place in patients’ religion or politics, particularly here in Ulster where the old Orange and Green currents still ran strongly beneath an apparently tranquil surface. He sipped his Jameson.

  Connor Nelson sighed. “By then I’d started asking myself, why shouldn’t I be a doctor? If I was smart enough to pass the exams for preaching, why not try for medical school? Maybe it wasn’t expected for a boy like me…” He looked directly into O’Reilly’s eyes. “But there was no law against it neither, and I began to see I had wanted it ever since I was wee and in hospital. I still didn’t have the marks, though, or the money. It started to get me down until I heard a thing from one of the ministers. The Methodist Missionary Society would pay for your medical education if you became a medical missionary.”

  O’Reilly’s frown deepened and he could see that agnostic Barry was looking puzzled too.

  “I applied. No luck.” Connor Nelson chuckled. “I think they saw through me. I don’t think I’d have been very good at converting the heathen.”

  O’Reilly glanced at Barry, saw a look of relief akin to the one he was feeling cross Barry’s face. Clearly the man was no evangelical. “So what did you do?” he asked.

  Connor Nelson took a deep breath. “I quit my job and got thirty-two shillings and sixpence a week unemployment while M-Mammy paid for the rent, my elocution classes, and my fees for Renshaw’s Academy.”

  Certainly, O’Reilly thought, while there was still a touch of the Donegal Road accent in Con’s voice and an occasional repeat of a letter, his teachers had done a fine job. Almost as good as Professor Higgins had done with Eliza Doolittle.

  “Renshaw’s? On Botanic Avenue?” Barry said. “I know that place. It gives intensive instruction in subjects its pupils need to go to university or join one of the services.”

  “That’s right. I passed all three subjects I needed,” Con shook his head, “but I still didn’t get sixty percent. Like I said, I hadn’t been good at maths and sciences at school. Still no Queens. At least not paid for by the state.”

  O’Reilly was intrigued. He even ignored his whiskey.

  “I wasn’t going to give up. I made one last attempt. I got a job as an assistant technician with the Linen Research Council in Lambeg.” He smiled. “They paid a good wage and gave me two and a half days off every week to go to Belfast Technical College.” His grin started small but grew. “I studied physics and chemistry and biology in June 1959 and I passed them all and my average was sixty-two percent. A seventy in biology pulled up my fifty-three in physics. And I still had the Latin from the exams I’d done at school. I got into Queens.” Then he grew solemn. “Mammy could hardly stop crying when I got my results, she was so proud.” He nodded to himself. “And so she should have been. All the sacrifices she made for me.”

  “Begod,” said O’Reilly, clapping the man on the shoulder, “I never heard the like for persistence.” He laughed. “Except maybe the spider that Robert the Bruce watched build and rebuild her web.”

  Connor looked from O’Reilly to Barry, then down to the table. “I know my marks weren’t that good to begin with, but I’ve done well at Queens. Never failed a single exam.”

  O’Reilly thought fondly of his closest friend, Bob Beresford, who’d made a profession of failing medical school. Poor old Bob. Dead these twenty-three years.

  “I don’t like to boast, but I won the prize for ophthalmology in finals.”

  “Good for you,” Barry said, “and fair play. You’re not boasting, just telling us about a real achievement.”

  “Absolutely right,” said O’Reilly, who was impressed by the young man’s honesty, determination, and natural modesty. “Will we take Connor Nelson as a trainee, Barry?”

  “Like a shot,” Barry said.

  “Welcome to the practice.” O’Reilly offered a hand, which was shaken. “We’ll show you the ropes on Monday, May the second.”

  There was a shake in Connor Nelson’s voice when he said, “Thank you, Fingal. Thank you, Barry. I promise you won’t regret it.”

  “I might,” said O’Reilly, “if you ever delay my dinner again.” He picked up one of the menus. “Now you two decide what you’d like to eat, and, Con?”

  “Yes, Fingal?”

  “I was impressed when you wanted to keep your wits about you, but you’re over the hurdle. Will you take a jar to celebrate?”

  “I will, Fingal. Gladly. Mine’s a pint.”

  O’Reilly raised his whiskey. “And may you take many more with me and Barry for as long as you work at Number One Main Street, Ballybucklebo.”

  14

  All the Fun of the Fair

  “Roll up, roll up. See death-defying aerialists. Laugh at the clowns. See the world’s strongest man lift five men at once.”

  The clown, dressed in fuzzy silver wig, bulbous red nose, baggy polka-dotted pants, and enormous shoes, cried in a thick Belfast docklands accent. “Be amazed when the lion tamer puts his head in the lion’s mouth. Be more amazed when he takes it out again.”

  Sue Nolan laughed and the clown doffed the small black bowler perched on his wig. “What a great way to spend our Saturday off,” she said with a sigh. “You know when I was ten, I wanted to run away and join a circus.”

  “I’m very glad you didn’t,” Barry said, taking her hand.

  “Mum and Dad used to take my brother and me to Hunter’s Circus in the Belfast Hippodrome after Christmas, but it was indoors.” She looked around wide-eyed at a single enormous, lozenge-shaped tent supported by two poles that stuck out through holes at each end of the roof. The tips of the poles carried long, multicoloured banners. “Where sh
all we go first, Barry?”

  “Go to the fun fair,” roared the clown from behind them. “Try the coconut shy. Win a prize. Every time she bumps—she bounces. Roll up. Roll up.”

  They looked at each other and laughed. “The oracle has spoken,” said Barry. “Let’s go to the fun fair.” He’d already noticed several families with children clutching stuffed animals. “I’ll try to win you a prize.”

  “All right. Win me a teddy bear and I’ll call him Barry,” she said, then whispered, “He can sleep with me when you’re unavailable. Oh, Barry, we’re going to have lots of fun today. It’ll bring out the kiddy in us.” She skipped happily on the springy grass. “It’s been years since I’ve been to a circus.”

  “Decent of the marquis, letting the Duffy circus use his ten-acre field,” he said, having to quicken his stride to keep up with her. “The MacNeill family have hosted the Duffy family on this field since the 1880s. One of them, John Duffy, an acrobat, was known as the ‘Irish Barnum,’ you know.”

  “I said it would bring out the kiddy in us, not the history master.” She was looking at him sternly and he forced a smile. He thought he’d been looking forward to today, and the weather was perfect for it. A warm sun looked down from a cloudless sky and the air was scented with … Barry sniffed and wondered who got the job of dunging out the elephant’s cage.

  It was hard to get into the spirit of things, though, when one of his patients might be close to death. Three days it had been since Lewis Miller’s stroke and, according to a registrar in the Royal, the patient was not one bit improved. Barry felt for Gracie, and, selfish though it might be, for him and Sue as well. He hadn’t told her yet that they might not be able to buy the bungalow.

  A roundabout with its garishly painted horses spun. Kiddies on their wooden saddles bobbed up and down. A small Ferris wheel slowly rotated. Rows of attractions lined a wide, grassy thoroughfare along which a young woman was giving a youngster a donkey ride. Duffy’s had been touring Ireland for almost ninety years and was still a family business. The circus had become an annual local fixture.

  Barry caught up to Sue, took her hand, and headed across the field. As they approached the roundabout, Barry waved back at Eileen Lindsay’s three kids, Sammy, Willie, and Mary, as they whirled past.

  “They all attend MacNeill Memorial, you know,” Sue said. “Sammy’ll be going to the Bangor technical school when he’s fourteen, to be prepared to learn a trade. He’s not academically gifted like Colin Brown, but he still likes to learn.” She smiled. “I do love teaching…” There was a tone in her voice that sent a pang through Barry’s heart.

  Barry knew very well what she was thinking. She loved teaching, but she’d love being a mother even more. It wasn’t something he wanted to discuss today. “Their mum’s been sick,” he said, feeling awkward. “Sonny and Maggie are looking after them.” He remembered that Eileen Lindsay was to have been discharged this morning. He hoped she was recovering well, but he’d try not to think about that either. “Sonny told me he would bring them here. There he is waiting for the ride to finish.”

  Sonny turned, in that curious way people sometimes do when they’re being observed, and must have seen them. He beamed in their direction.

  “We should speak to him,” Sue said. “Come on.”

  “All right.” Politeness demanded they do, but he had wanted this afternoon to be for him and Sue, and not have his concern for his patients intrude.

  They walked to where Sonny was standing.

  “Afternoon, Sonny.” Barry had to raise his voice to be heard over the music of the roundabout’s steam-driven calliope, the children’s laughter and delighted squeals, the calling of hucksters from other stalls.

  Sonny lifted his hat. “Afternoon, Doctor. Miss Nolan. How nice to see you both. Lovely day. The little Lindsays are having great fun.”

  “So I see,” Sue said. “I hope Duffy’s stays in business for a long time. One day I’d like to bring our kids here.”

  “I hope you do. I was never lucky enough to have children of my own.” He shook his head. “Now, Doctor, I must tell you I picked up Eileen from the hospital this morning. She’s much better. Maggie’s keeping her company at our house. She’s going to stay with us for a few days.”

  “I’m delighted to hear it,” Barry said.

  The three breathless Lindsay children arrived. Sammy, the oldest and clearly their spokesman, said, “Hello, Miss Nolan. Doctor. That was wheeker, Mister Houston, so it was. Can we go on the Ferris wheel now? Can we? Can we?”

  Sonny tousled the boy’s hair. “Willie and Mary are too wee, and I don’t think your ma would want you taking the ride on your own, would she?”

  “Aaaaaaaw, but we wanna. We wanna.” Sammy kicked a grassy tussock and eyed his sister with a stony gaze.

  Tears trickled from Mary’s eyes as she said, “I don’t. I’m scared to go.”

  Willie’s lower lip began to quiver. “Me too.”

  “They’re such babies,” said Sammy in disgust. “I wanna go on the Ferris wheel.”

  Barry watched Sammy, who was continuing to kick the ground, his face resolute. As “Doctor Laverty” he was perfectly relaxed with children as patients, talking to them easily to discover where things hurt. In general practice, it was mostly the typical childhood illnesses of mumps, measles, and chicken pox, broken bones, coughs and flu. He’d never considered paediatrics as a specialty because he hated seeing children suffer, and his own upbringing as an only child had left him with very little understanding of child-rearing. He’d been brought up solely by his mother until he was five, and then by her and his ex-naval father, who had put great store in fair but rapid discipline and the philosophy that “children should be seen, but not heard.” Corporal punishment had been the order of the day at Barry’s boarding school. He waited to see how the puzzled-looking, childless Sonny would deal with this. Sammy, as far as Barry was concerned, should be spoken to harshly for upsetting his younger sister and brother and told off about the evils of selfishness.

  But before Sonny could speak, Sue knelt beside Mary. She looked deep into the little girl’s sapphire blue eyes and said, “Don’t be scared, Mary. If Mister Houston would like, you and Willie can come with us, can’t they, Barry?”

  Barry nodded. What else could he do?

  “And Sammy can have his ride with Mister Houston, if that’s all right?”

  “Dead on,” said Sammy.

  Mary stopped crying, wiped her nose on the sleeve of her cardigan, and said, “I think you’re very nice, Miss Nolan.”

  “Thank you, Mary,” Sue said. “And Sammy, do you think it was very nice of you to be so selfish? Make Mary cry?”

  Sammy hung his head. His voice was small. “Sorry, Mary. I am. So I am.”

  “Thank you,” Sue said. She stood.

  “I think it’s an excellent idea.” Sonny surveyed the Ferris wheel as it revolved slowly, and laughed. “I reckon my old ticker can handle the pace. I’m looking forward to this. Come along, Sammy, my boy. We’ll meet you, Doctor, and your adoptive brood at—at…” Sonny stared round the fairground. “At the candy floss stand in about fifteen minutes.”

  And Barry, not particularly relishing his role as surrogate daddy, followed on behind Sue and her two charges.

  The wide path between the two rows of tents and booths was thronged with families. Barry noticed a lot more youngsters clutching stuffed toys, and he’d not forgotten his promise to win a teddy for Sue.

  Barry and Sue were kept busy exchanging greetings with villagers. The whole population of Ballybucklebo seemed to have turned out for this beloved local tradition. They passed Madame Rosalita’s tent, advertising “Fortunes told, palms read, Tarot readings.” I’d give a lot to get a glimpse into the future right now, he thought.

  Sue hurried the children past the “Salome and her Dance of the Seven Veils” tent. “Not for little eyes,” she said.

  “Agreed.” But what would keep the children amused until they could be
returned to Sonny? Perhaps there was a petting zoo somewhere?

  The air rang with calls of shills trying to entice customers to the various attractions, the music of the calliope was unceasing, and from farther away where the field dipped into a hollow came a ferocious roaring.

  Mary screamed and clung to Sue.

  Willie stuck out his chin, Barry guessed, to show he was a big boy and not one bit scared.

  Sue turned and grinned at Barry. “What on earth was that?”

  “Donal, who has been going to the show for years, told me their top act is the animal trainer. He gets in a cage with some lions and a Bengal tiger. I think that was the tiger.”

  Sue shuddered. “Lady Macbeth’s enough cat for this girl.” She bent to Mary. “But it can’t hurt you, dear. It’s in a very stout cage.”

  Barry was impressed at how good she was with the children. Would he be when the time came?

  “Doctor Laverty,” Willie said, “please could me and Mary go for a ride on one of them wee donkeys, like?”

  Mary said, “Pretty please.”

  Barry looked at Sue. “What do you think?” Personally, he had no desire to have to explain to Eileen Lindsay why one of her precious kiddies had fallen off and broken an arm. On the other hand, he’d told Sue he would win her a teddy bear, and that would be easier to do without the kids looking on.

  “Why not?” Sue said.

  “All right.” Barry spoke to the nearby donkeys’ handlers, paid, and turned over the children to the care of the two young women. He waited to see the little ones mounted and led off at a sedate walk.

  To his left was a stall with more stuffed prizes, including a big teddy bear like the ones he’d seen earlier. Hopeful punters were throwing tennis balls at pyramids of grey wooden milk bottles at the back of the booth.

  “Try your luck, sir? Win a prize for the beautiful lady? A shilling for t’ree tries. Knock all de bottles down.” He demonstrated by sweeping the pile closest to him off with his hand. “See? Nothing to it. Go on, sir. Big strong man like you? No problem.” The man had a thick Northside Dublin accent.