An Irish Country Welcome Read online

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  Mister Coffin, the undertaker, stood beside O’Reilly. “Excuse me, Doctor, but it’ll take a while for an ambulance to come. I’d be very happy to run you up to the Royal, Dapper.”

  “Very kind of you,” O’Reilly said, “but Dapper may need some of the equipment in an ambulance.” And putting him in a hearse, even if in the passenger seat, would put the fear of God into an already scared man. And what it might do to any spectators didn’t bear thinking about.

  “Oh. I see. Good luck then, Dapper.”

  Donal Donnelly moved to stand protectively by his friend and pocketed the hanky he’d used to dry Dapper’s tears.

  Dapper took a deep breath. “I think I’ve had a stroke, Donal.”

  “Don’t you say that, Dapper Frew. Has Doctor O’Reilly said so?”

  “No.”

  “I haven’t. Donal’s right, Dapper, we mustn’t despair. The hospital staff will do a more detailed examination. They may order special tests to find out exactly where the bleeding is. These days, brain surgeons can do operations to stop the bleeding and allow patients to make remarkable recoveries.”

  “Honest til God, sir?”

  “Cross my heart.” O’Reilly did just that.

  Dapper managed a weak smile. “Thanks.”

  “And, oul’ hand,” said Donal. O’Reilly smiled at the affectionate term used only between the closest of friends. “You remember when I cracked my nut back in ’65 falling off that there damn motorbike of Paddy Reagan after the Downpatrick races? The doctors at the Royal drilled a hole in my loaf, let the blood out, then opened my dome and stopped the bleeding.”

  O’Reilly marvelled at the Ulsterisms for “head.”

  Donal lowered his voice to a whisper. “The patient in the next bed told me Mister Greer, the surgeon, removed my whole brain and cleaned it before he put it back. Isn’t that amazing?” Donal paused for effect.

  O’Reilly had a great deal of difficulty keeping a straight face. Charlie Greer, one of his classmates at Trinity College Dublin, was a skilled neurosurgeon, but removing and then replacing the brain was quite beyond anyone’s abilities.

  “And look at me now. Good as new. You’ll do rightly, ould hand.” He touched Dapper’s shoulder for reassurance. “I’m sure you will.”

  O’Reilly reckoned it would be unkind to explain that Donal had suffered from a very different kind of haemorrhage and that the patient talking of brain cleaning had been giving arch-schemer Donal’s leg an almighty pull.

  Jack Mills returned. “Ambulance is on its way and 21’s ready for the patient. I reckon you’ll not need me anymore so I’ll go back to the table and keep Kitty and Helen company.”

  “Thanks for everything, Jack.” O’Reilly returned to Dapper. “I don’t think you’ll need your brain cleaned, Dapper, and you’ll know one of the staff there. Mrs. O’Reilly works on ward 21 so you’ll see a friendly face on Monday. She’ll be able to keep me posted about your progress.”

  “I’d like that.”

  O’Reilly inclined his head then spoke to Connie Brown. “Thank you for looking after Dapper, Connie, and if you and Lenny and Colin need to go home that will be fine. Donal and I’ll stay with Dapper until the ambulance comes.”

  “Thank you, sir. We’ll be running along then, and get you better soon, Dapper Frew. Take care of yourself. We’ll be thinking about you.” Connie rose and collected her family.

  “Dapper,” said Donal, “I’m just going to nip over and let Julie and Bertie and Flo know what’s going on. Bertie’s giving us a lift home.”

  O’Reilly made himself comfortable on a chair beside Dapper.

  Neither spoke for some time as the level of conversation subsided and the hall gradually emptied. “See that there Donal Donnelly?” Dapper said. “See him? He’s one sound—” Dapper’s face screwed up as he searched for the word.

  “He is that,” O’Reilly said. “But don’t try to talk, Dapper. You’ll only tire yourself out. The ambulance’ll be here soon.”

  “Thanks, Doctor O’Reilly.” Dapper sighed and stared at his feet.

  O’Reilly ached for the man. Here he was a bachelor of twenty-six, a well-respected estate agent building a successful career. There was no doubt about the bleeding into his brain; the question was would Charlie Greer be able to control the bleeding and give Dapper a reasonable chance for recovery?

  “I know you’re worried sick. I would be if it was me. It’s the not knowing, wondering what’s next that’s the toughest for people to deal with.”

  Dapper nodded.

  “I’ve been a doctor for thirty-three years, and this may surprise you, but not knowing on behalf of your patients is hard to deal with too.”

  Dapper sat back against his cushion and inclined his head.

  “Some of my colleagues often say, ‘Hope for the best but prepare for the worst.’”

  Dapper frowned.

  “I don’t. How the hell do you prepare for the worst?”

  Dapper managed a small, lopsided smile.

  “So, I’ll tell you how I keep sane. I say, ‘Let’s cross that bridge when we come to it,’ and Dapper, you’ll be coming to it very soon, you’ll get some answers, and I promise you’ll be in the best hands.”

  “Thank you, Doctor O’Reilly.”

  Donal returned and sat on the other side of his friend.

  “This is a right oul’ puh—puh—” Dapper frowned.

  “Pickle,” Donal said. “But sure, we’ve been through a brave few of those since the day we met.” Donal nodded. “Pickle? It is that. Dapper and me goes back a long way, Doctor. I remember that day at MacNeill Elementary when two new boys joined my class in September. This fella was one of ’em and the other was a right dastard. At break out in the schoolyard he starts pushing me about. I was never big, and he kept calling me ‘rusty crust’ because of this.” He pointed to his carrotty thatch. “Then up you comes Dapper.”

  “Don’t like bullies.”

  “You stood between me and him. ‘Leave you my friend alone or I’ll give you your teeth til play with,’ says you. Friend? I’d never met you in my puff.”

  “I near filled my pants that day,” said Dapper.

  “You remember then? The bully says, ‘You and whose army?’ He thought he was no goat’s toe. You crouched like I’d seen boxers on the telly, leading with your left and with both fists clenched. Your man took an almighty swinging haymaker—and missed.”

  Dapper smiled. “Nothing like a straight right to the solar plexus to sicken someone’s ha—ha—”

  “Happiness. You take it easy, Dapper. I’m telling the story. You told me your daddy used til box and he was teaching you. Bloody lucky for me that day.”

  Donal looked at O’Reilly, who saw pleading in the younger man’s eyes. “Dapper and me’s been best friends ever since, haven’t we? We’ve had a brave wheen of great craic together and pulled through a clatter of scrapes. I just hope til God you’ll pull through this one. I really do.”

  O’Reilly looked up to see a uniformed man standing talking to Ronald Fitzpatrick, who had clearly been waiting at the door for the ambulance and was now pointing in O’Reilly’s direction. The man left and returned shortly with the other ambulance attendant. They pushed a trolley-stretcher to where O’Reilly sat.

  “How’s about you, Doctor O’Reilly?”

  O’Reilly recognised the man, but his usually encyclopaedic mind let him down when it came to the man’s name. “I’m grand but my friend isn’t so hot. You got here in jig time from the Royal. I thought you’d be at least forty minutes.”

  “Nah. We was called out til Cultra by a woman who said her husband was having a fit.” He unbuckled the waist strap over the stretcher and let the buckle’s halves hang down over its sides.

  “We thought she meant he was having a fit like a convulsion. Fit, my arse. It was only a fit of temper.”

  He shook his head and bent to Dapper. “Can you stand up, Mister Frew? Me and my mate’ll give you
a hand.” He took the blanket from Dapper’s shoulders and together the attendants helped him onto the trolley. “Are you comfy there?”

  “I’m rightly.”

  The attendant did up the strap’s buckle. “Anyroad, we told the thran shite til behave himself or we’d call the Peelers. Get him lifted. He calmed down then. Right waste of our time.” He smiled. “But it got us here quicker.”

  The two attendants took their places, one at each end of the trolley.

  “So, we’ll be off.”

  “Would you like me to come with you, Dapper?” Donal asked.

  “Thanks but I’ll be all—all—” Dapper expressed his exasperation by a grunt. “And how’d you get home at this hour?”

  “Fair enough, but I’ll come and see you. Good luck, Dapper,” Donal said, and waved good-bye as his friend was wheeled away. He shook his head. “Doc, I’m dead worried about him. What’re his chances of getting well mended?”

  “Sorry, Donal, we’ll get a better idea in a day or two, and I’ll keep you posted. The hospital can only give details to the next of kin.”

  “He has none. His ma and da are dead and his one brother is in Australia.”

  “But I’m his doctor and Mrs. O’Reilly nurses there. We can find out how he’s doing.”

  “Thanks, Doc.” Donal picked up the cushion and blanket. “I’d best get these back til Bertie and get Julie and me away on home. Good oul’ Cissie Sloan’s babysitting and she’ll be sending out Constable Mulligan to find us if we’re much later.”

  Together they walked through the almost deserted hall.

  “I’m tied up tomorrow, Donal, but I’m free until noon on Monday. Would you like me to pick you up at eight and we’ll take a run race up to the Royal? See Dapper. Have a word with Mister Greer?”

  “I’d need til ask Bertie for time off, but I’d like that very much, sir. I’ll ask him now and come and tell you.”

  “Right.”

  O’Reilly went to the table where Jack, Helen, and Kitty were sitting and, feeling a tad tired, plumped himself into a chair. “We’ll head for home in a minute. I’d just like an update on what’s going to happen to Dapper in the Royal, Jack. I’m a bit rusty when it comes to the treatment of subarachnoids.”

  “Well, they may have to do an immediate arteriogram to identify the damaged vessel and then operate at once, but I think he’s only had a small leak.”

  “I hope you’re right,” O’Reilly said.

  “If I am, he’ll be observed for twenty-four hours then have a lumbar puncture, because by then one hundred percent of cases of subarachnoid bleeding will have xanthochromia, yellowish discolouration of the cerebrospinal fluid caused by the breakdown of the red blood cells.”

  “Go on.”

  “There’s three possible causes of a subarachnoid: a clot in a blood vessel, usually due to atheroma often associated with high blood pressure. A rupture of an aneurysm. Or bleeding from an angioma, a congenital deformity of a blood vessel. Dapper’s probably too young for the former. Only an arteriogram, an X-ray using a contrast medium to outline the intracerebral vessels, will tell for sure, and may help Mister Greer decide on a possible surgical avenue. It used to be that if it was a small aneurysm, the patient would be put on bed rest for ten days in the hope that a clot would form in the aneurysm and stop the bleeding. These days neurosurgeons tend to move more quickly and operate, but not for several days after the initial event.”

  “So, it’s going to be wait and see time before we have any idea how well he’s going to recover?” O’Reilly said.

  “Excuse me, Doctors.” Donal stood by the table. “Bertie says that’s a grand idea, so it is. I’ll be ready at eight. Thanks, Doctor O’Reilly. I’m off for home now.” He raised his hands, the fingers all crossed, then turned for the door.

  O’Reilly shrugged. “It’s going to be hard on Donal, Kitty.” And on me, he thought. “Waiting and wondering. Uncertainty is hard to take.”

  “Amen,” Kitty said, and her voice was gentle. “But we’ll all have to try to be patient because clearly only time will tell.”

  3

  Walk in Newness of Life

  The morning light coming in from the window warmed the room and brightened the colours of the dining table’s centrepiece, a vase of scarlet snapdragons and pink and black tree mallows that Sue had picked only an hour before. Barry had deliberately seated his friends side by side facing the picture window at the far end of the lounge so they could enjoy the view of the sparkling waters of Belfast Lough, the Antrim Hills rising from the far shore to greet a clear blue sky above.

  He did not approve of their tabby, Tigger, curled up on Sue’s lap when people were eating, but if it made his wife happy? And she did look happy having Jack and Helen in the bungalow for breakfast this morning.

  As he poured himself a second cup of tea, Helen said, “This marmalade’s delicious. Is it yours, Sue?”

  “Wish I could take credit for it, but it’s Kinky’s. She knows Barry got a real taste for it when he lived at Number One Main Street and I know Kinky’s got a soft spot for our Barry.” She turned to smile at him.

  “I suppose she does. She was practically a mother to me when I lived there.”

  “Kinky always gives us half a dozen pots when she makes a batch.” Sue put down her fork and her hand strayed to Tigger’s head.

  “Lucky you.”

  “Very lucky,” Barry said, “and she made the soda farls and potato bread we had with our breakfast.”

  Jack had stayed overnight with the Lavertys, and Helen, now living at home with her father until she started her houseman’s year, had joined them for breakfast. There was still a hint of the scent of frying drifting in from the kitchen.

  Jack laughed. “I never knew you could cook anything except fried-egg sandwiches when we were students, Barry, but you turned that out like a pro.”

  “Me? Cook? Not really. Sue usually looks after that, but it doesn’t take a Fanny Cradock to do a fry-up, and for the last couple of weeks certain smells—frying’s one of them—can upset Sue.”

  “It’s weird. I can usually still eat fried stuff but sometimes just the mention can set me—Oops, excuse me.” She scooped up Tigger, deposited the cat on the floor, then, clapping a hand over her mouth, fled.

  “Poor Sue,” Barry said. “She’s been having morning sickness for the last two weeks.” He inclined his head to her plate. She’d left the rashers of bacon and two rings of black pudding, but had managed to eat the tomato, the soda farl, potato cake, and the eggs.

  Helen started to rise.

  “Please don’t worry about her, Helen. Sue prefers to be left alone.”

  “You sure?”

  “I’m sure.”

  Helen sat. “You men have it easy. Poor girl gets pregnant and before you know it she’s getting dizzy, tired, sensitive to smells like Sue is now. She’s probably in the loo throwing up.”

  “Even though I spent that six months at Waveney Hospital in Ballymena doing ob/gyn,” said Barry, “I never really understood how unpleasant some aspects of pregnancy could be. There’s all those things you mentioned, Helen, and then there’s backache and frequent peeing. They were so common, many of our teachers fobbed enquiries off with a patronising—” Jack joined in as Barry said with a complete lack of concern in his voice, “‘Don’t worry, my dear. You get that sometimes.’ I’ll certainly be more sympathetic to my pregnant patients in future.”

  “I should hope so,” Helen said.

  Sue came back.

  “You all right, pet?”

  “Fine.” She smiled. “Sorry about that. I’m quite over it now.”

  “No need to apologise,” Helen said. “It can’t be much fun.”

  “Actually,” Sue took her seat, “I really don’t mind.” She beamed at Barry. “It took us quite a while to get pregnant, so I couldn’t be more delighted.” She giggled. “I can hardly wait for it to show.”

  “By then you’ll be halfway home.” Barry took h
er hand. “And I’m sure you’ll breeze through once this morning sickness settles down.”

  “And it will do,” Helen said. “You told me you’re ten and a bit weeks now so at most you should be okay in about five more weeks.”

  “I’ll look forward to that, but I’ll not let it get me down, and once my bump comes and I can feel the baby moving, Barry and I will start buying a cot, and a pram, nappies, decorating the nursery. I’m a country girl and that’s the tradition. Superstitious nonsense if you ask me. I’m not worried.” She smiled at Barry. “We picked out the room when we first saw the bungalow in ’67 when the Millers lived here. It’s the smaller of the two guest bedrooms.”

  “It’ll be fun setting things up,” Barry said. “And none of this ‘pink for a little girl, blue for a boy’ rubbish.”

  “Very sensible,” Jack said. “With your luck, even if the odds are about fifty-fifty, Laverty, you’d probably still get it wrong and have to redecorate.”

  They all laughed.

  “I was never much of a gambling man.” Barry glanced out the back window. “It’s a lovely day out there and Max needs his exercise. Who feels like taking a constitutional on the seawalk?”

  “I’m all for working off last night’s Guinness and this morning’s brekky,” said Jack. “Helen?”

  “Just give me a few minutes to tidy myself up.”

  “I’ll give you a hand with the dishes, Barry. You go and put your feet up in the lounge, Sue. Please.”

  “I will, Jack. Thanks.”

  Barry and Jack each took plates through to the kitchen, where Barry told the idiot Max, “Behave yourself.” To Barry’s surprise, their usually unruly springer spaniel retreated to a corner and sat.

  “Hey, bye, your Max actually did what you told him. Mebbe this bodes well for fatherhood.”

  Barry laughed as he put the dishes in the sink, added detergent, and ran the taps. “That dog was trained, or should I say not trained, by my dear wife. Any of the animal’s shortcomings are entirely her doing.”

  “I heard that,” said Sue from the lounge.