If You Were the Only Girl. Anne Bennett

windows, she was delighted to see all the family assembled to meet her. The rail bus had barely stopped before Lucy was out of it and, putting the bag and basket down on the platform, she hugged them all as if her life depended on it.

      ‘What you got?’ Danny said, indicating the baggage.

      ‘Oh, lots of stuff,’ Lucy replied.

      ‘Yes, but it will have to wait,’ Minnie said. ‘And so will any questions. We will just have time to put the stuff in at the cottage and then we will need to hightail it to Mass or we will be late.’ And so saying she caught up the bag, and Danny got the basket so that Sam and Liam could hold Lucy’s hands, and she swung the young boys along the road, Grainne hurrying along beside them. They arrived at the Sacred Heart church just a couple of minutes before Mass began. During the service, Lucy felt peace steal over her; she was so glad to be home again even if it was just for a few hours.

      After Mass many greeted Lucy and said how much she had been missed and asked how was she liking the fine job in Letterkenny; and although she was polite she answered as briefly as possible. She was anxious to get home but no one lingered long because most had taken Communion and were ready for their breakfasts.

      In the cottage there was the smell of the peat fire and the porridge cooking in the embers of it in the familiar double pan.

      ‘I have extra sugar in, and milk, for I thought you may be used to that now,’ Minnie said.

      ‘Yes, I am,’ Lucy admitted. ‘But that is what I’ll have tomorrow morning so today the others should have their share. And you can have the sugar without worrying too much about it because Cook has put some in the basket, and there is tea too.’

      ‘Oh, that was kind of her,’ Minnie said, ‘though I am careful with tea and often use the leaves twice, so I still have some left from when Clara was here.’

      ‘Mammy, you haven’t kept it all this time?’ Lucy cried in surprise, and remembered a trifle guiltily how many cups she consumed in an average day.

      ‘Like I said, I am careful, but now I can relax a little more, so, after we have cleared away after breakfast, I will make a big pot and we’ll all have a cup.’

      ‘Even me?’ Sam asked, and Minnie smiled.

      ‘Even you.’

      ‘With three sugars?’

      ‘Don’t push your luck, my lad,’ Minnie warned him grimly. ‘You are only having tea at all because of the kindness of the cook at the place where Lucy works.’

      ‘She is kind,’ Lucy said, ‘though she didn’t seem so that first day. She was worried because I was so small. She wasn’t sure that I was even fourteen. Good job Mrs O’Leary advised me to take my certificates with me.’

      ‘But she is all right with you now?’

      ‘She’s grand, Mammy, don’t worry. One thing she can’t abide is slacking. Not that you get much opportunity to do that, though Jerry Kilroy seems to have more time on his hands than we girls do.’

      ‘Who’s he?’

      ‘A footman, and so under the jurisdiction of the butler, Mr Carlisle,’ Lucy said. ‘Cook said in most houses she has worked in the butler has more to do with the Master of the house, but his batman, a man called Rory Green, came to care for him.’

      ‘So the butler hasn’t that much to do either?’

      ‘No, not really, I suppose,’ Lucy said. ‘He looks after the Master’s clothes, presses them and things like that, but Rory helps him bath and dress and gives him a shave.’

      ‘Goodness,’ Minnie said. ‘They seem to take an awful lot of looking after.’

      ‘They do,’ Lucy agreed. ‘Lady Heatherington has got a personal maid as well, called Norah Callaghan, and she’s been with her years, so I heard. Anyway, she doesn’t sleep in the attics like the rest of us do. She has a little room close to the Mistress in case she needs her in the night.’

      ‘Why would she need her?’

      ‘I don’t know,’ Lucy admitted. ‘They do proper daft things at times. And Mrs O’Leary’s right when she said that they want everything done, but they don’t want to see anyone doing it unless it’s waiting on or something, I suppose. Like, after I have cleaned the range, I have to light it and then boil water for the tea and take a cup to Cook and Mrs O’Leary. Then I have to get the steps to the front door scrubbed and all the brass polished before anyone would need to go in and out the door, and then make sure I have tidied everything away before I lay the table for the servants’ breakfast at eight.’

      ‘When do the family eat?’

      ‘Lady Heatherington comes down at nine and Rory carries Lord Heatherington down the stairs and they have a wheelchair for him to sit in. Anyway, talking of breakfast, has everyone had enough? There’s a large loaf and butter in that basket. In fact, Mammy, now that we’ve all eaten the porridge, you had better see what else there is.’

      Lucy stacked the bowls while Minnie collected the basket from the settle, and as she uncovered one delight after the other there were ‘ooh’s and ‘aah’s from the watching children. When it was all displayed on the table, Minnie said, her voice husky with unshed tears, ‘She is a kind and thoughtful lady, that cook. Tell her thank you a thousand times from me.’

      ‘I will, Mammy,’ Lucy promised, as Sam broke in with, ‘Is the bag filled with food as well?’

      Lucy laughed. ‘’Fraid not, Sam. That’s filled with boring old clothes.’

      ‘Oh,’ said Sam. ‘Are they from this cook as well?’

      ‘No, they’re from Mrs O’Leary.’

      ‘Clara?’

      ‘Yes,’ Lucy said. ‘And for you, Mammy. But let’s decide what to do with the food before we see what’s in the bag.’

      ‘I’ve a good idea,’ Danny said. ‘Why don’t we just eat it?’

      They didn’t eat it all, but Minnie cut all the children slices of bread from the loaf, which she spread with the creamy butter. The rest she put away: she said, so she could have something wholesome to make a good meal for Lucy before she would have to return to Letterkenny.

      ‘Don’t worry about me, Mammy,’ Lucy protested, as she poured water from the kettle above the fire into the bowl Grainne had got ready, and began to wash the bowls. ‘I didn’t come here to eat the food I brought. That was done to help all of you.’

      ‘You will have a good feed before you leave here,’ Minnie said determinedly. ‘God knows, I do little enough for you now.’

      ‘Ah, Mammy!’

      ‘No, Lucy,’ Minnie said. ‘Please, let me speak. When I saw you get off the rail bus I could hardly believe my eyes. In the short time that you’ve been away you have grown and there’s far more meat on your bones. I didn’t expect that. For all Clara said, I thought that they would have you run ragged.’

      ‘And let me tell you, Mammy, there are few minutes in the day when I can sit down,’ Lucy said. ‘I am on the go from when I rise in the morning till I go to bed, after I have everything washed up, cleaned the kitchen and scrubbed the floor. When I first went there, I found the days long and the whole of my body ached. I couldn’t lift the heaviest and biggest pots that I had to scour and Clodagh would have to help me. However, I am used to the hours now, and the work, and although the pots are just as heavy, I can lift them up with the best of them.’

      She dried her hands, went over to the settle, picked up the bag and gave it to her mother. She said, ‘At the bottom of the clothes you will find a cloth bag and inside there are thirty shillings. I only wish it was more, but that is yours, and every month I will bring the same. But look at the things Clara has sent first. She said she had no use for them.’

      Minnie lifted