An Irish Country Wedding Read Free

know,” said O’Reilly, trying not to sound smug. “By God, I do know.”
    He paid, took his little parcel, thanked the assistant, and left.
    Kitty linked her arm through his. “Thank you, darling. Thank you.”
    “Not yet,” said O’Reilly. “We’re going to Mooney’s on Corn Market. It’s not far. You can thank me after I’ve given it to you properly, you’ve put it on, and I’ve toasted you with a pint of black velvet.”
    “Black velvet?”
    “Guinness and champagne. You’ll love it.” He set off at a brisk pace. “I’m buying lunch too.”
    “Sounds wonderful.”
    They crossed Royal Avenue and headed along Castle Place. “By the way,” he said, “are you free this weekend?”
    “I am.”
    “I’d like you to come down, show your ring to Barry and Kinky,” he said, “the rest of the crew at Number One, Main Street, Ballybucklebo.”
    “I’d love to.”
    “Great.” He pushed open the door to Mooney’s Pub. “I know the barmen here,” he said.
    The place was packed, smoky, and noisy. “Black velvet. Two pints, Andy,” O’Reilly roared in his quarter-deck voice, “menus, and a dozen oysters on the half shell to start with. My belly thinks my bloody throat’s cut.”

 
    2
    And Strangled in the Guts
    What on earth was that clattering? Barry Laverty—Doctor Barry Laverty—was enjoying a cup of tea after lunch, but now he frowned and listened. Probably that demented cat Lady Macbeth knocking something over. He rose from the table wondering how O’Reilly was doing up in Belfast with Kitty. He’d been like a child going on a school outing, so impatient he hadn’t even eaten a proper breakfast, which for O’Reilly was unheard of unless there was an emer gency. And it would have to have been a life-threatening one at that for the big man to forgo his vittles.
    The clattering stopped, but now he could hear retching. A patient must have come into the house unannounced.
    Barry crossed the hall and looked into the surgery. Empty. He hurried to the waiting room, but although the plain wood chairs and God-awful rose-patterned wallpaper were there, the room was deserted.
    More sounds of retching were followed by a moan, and this time Barry knew where they were coming from—the kitchen. He ran to the back of the house and flung open the door. The room was warm and the stench of vomit smothered the cooking aromas. A saucepan lay on the floor with peeled and diced potatoes forming a small archipelago in a pool of spilled water. Mrs. Maureen “Kinky” Kincaid, Doctor O’Reilly’s housekeeper, stood clutching the edges of the sink. Her silver chignon was in disarray, tears streamed down her cheeks. “Ohhh Lord Jasus,” she gasped.
    “Kinky, are you — ” he began, then stopped. “Are you all right?” would be a bloody silly thing to ask, almost as stupid as “What’s the matter?” He was a doctor, but it didn’t take one to see that Kinky Kincaid was not well. He took a breath, resolved to behave like the doctor he was and sort out what needed to be done without wasting time mouthing platitudes. He moved to her and put an arm round her shoulders. “It’s all right,” he said. “It’s all right. Let’s get you sitting down.”
    “I’m sorry, sir,” she said, and hiccupped, “but I’ve been taken over all funny, so, and I haven’t finished getting tea ready for himself and you. And him with no breakfast.” She dragged in a deep breath and shuddered. “I’ll be grand if I could sit down for a shmall-little minute, so.”
    “Don’t worry about tea,” Barry said. Typical of Kinky to be thinking about “her doctors” and their next meal rather than herself. He knew he should get her into the surgery and onto the examining couch, or onto her own bed, but Kinky was what her fellow County Cork people would describe as “a powerful woman” and that did not imply slimness. He wasn’t strong enough to oxter-cog her to the surgery or to her quarters in the next room.