On the Edge of the Loch: A Psychological Novel set in Ireland by Joseph Éamon Cummins Page B

Everything’s grand now, you’re grand now.’
    ‘I want mama,’ the child sobbed. ‘Mama, mama.’
    ‘ A ghrá mo croi, mama’ll be home tomorrow. Uncle Leo’s going down to the big hospital in Galway and he’s bringing her home to you. You can come with me; would you like that? And Aunt Peggy. We’ll all go down together in the big bus, will we? And we’ll buy choc ices; how does that sound?’
    With no sign of the girl settling, he called to a pair of young boys in the adjoining field, sent them down to the O’Riain farmhouse with a note. Within minutes Peggy O’Riain arrived, shoulders shawled, her sandy hair rolled in pink plastic curlers. Soon she had Leonora comforted and in peaceful sleep.
    In the kitchen, Pope John XXIII and John Fitzgerald Kennedy shared the mantle with the Blessed Virgin, below which a smouldering turf fire sent earthy odours through the cottage. Leo plodded about in his boots, a heavy mood over him. Peggy entered, reflective, knelt with her palms to the pulsing turf.
    ‘What in God’s holy name is bothering the poor soul?’ she said. ‘That’s three times this week. Whatever’s the matter I pray she’s over it for Róisín getting home.’
    ‘Something’s not right, nightmares like that,’ Leo said. ‘Never before seen her that way.’
    ‘Has to be Róisín’s nieces. I’d nearly swear to it. They can be a right pair. I hope they didn’t say something in front of the poor lamb, those couple of times they minded her. More than once it was that I caught them yapping about things – you know what I’m saying – after me giving them a right telling off.’ Peggy’s face changed. ‘Leo Reffo, will you stop wearing out the lino; stop troubling yourself like that. Are you hearing me at all, man – stop!’
    He halted beside her, his half-bare arms outstretched to the mantle. ‘Something’s turned the little angel; that’s all I know. It might be what you say, them nieces. Or something else.’
    ‘Listen to me now: There’s no good getting yourself upset. We don’t know a thing for sure, whether it’s the nieces or not. She’ll surely snap out of it as quick as it came on. Childer are like that, the younger ones especially.’
    ‘I never was. At five or any other age.’
    ‘Not at all what I heard.’ Peggy rose in the glow of the fire and began uncoiling her rollers. ‘Never told a lie or chased a chicken or set fire to a haystack. We all did them things. Anyhow, it’s thirty years since you were five; you couldn’t remember right. And don’t you still go on like you’re five when you don’t get your way.’
    Barely containing her amusement, she crossed the kitchen and stood before him. ‘ A stóir, stop letting it trouble you. Things’ll be grand when Róisín’s here.’ She snuggled against him. ‘Between this and that you can’t rightly relax, I know, no more than me. Few more days, that’s all, then you’re spoken for, for good; your bachelor days are over.’ His arms clutched tighter around her; he kissed her on the lips, then kissed her again, a kiss that migrated along her neck as his hands dropped to her hips. She quickly freed herself and knelt back at the fire.
    ‘You can dampen that look, Mr Reffo. You know the rules.’ She set three sods of turf in the hearth and glanced back at his quietness. ‘The day can’t come soon enough for me either. Isn’t it an odd woman you’ll be making of me, getting me to give up the grand O’Riain name for a silly Italian one. I can hear them in the village, what they’ll be calling me, the old ones: Peggy Mary Dolores O’Riain Reffo. Maybe I should just be Peggy O. What do you think of that?’
    Leo approached her, his dourness all but gone.
    ‘Only the good Lord knows,’ she said, back in his arms. ‘Please God soon we’ll have a wee one of our own. A little Leo Reffo, Lord save us from all harm.’
    ‘I’m worried, Peg.’ Leo walked to the window, stared out. ‘What if the wee