Secrets of Our Hearts. Sheelagh Kelly

      Though Sean translated the comment only too well as he closed the door upon it, his little niece asked innocently: ‘What do you mean?’

      ‘Never mind!’ Ellen shoved her daughter back inside, she and her mother following. ‘You do as you’re told and don’t say a word nor make a gesture to either of them. He’s not your uncle any more.’

      The child’s father was to endorse this, both in word and deed. In a change of tactic, from then on whenever encountering his brother, Niall would simply walk past as if the other were invisible. Hence, his children were to act by example. It was all very sad for one who had doted upon them.

      Yet however some might like to pretend that Sean did not exist, others continued to watch and to criticise his every move. Which was how they were to discover that the hussy had finally stayed the night.

      This was the ultimate outrage. At the sight of Sean and Emma emerging together at eleven thirty that Sunday morning, Nora abandoned her sentry duty and charged like a rhinoceros from the house, running directly across the street and arriving at such a velocity that she almost bowled her son-in-law over in her attempt to slap his face. She would have struck Emma too had Sean not quickly recovered from his shock to grab her arm.

      ‘You’re disgusting, the pair of you!’ Nora was snarling at them by the time Niall rushed over to referee, and to try to hold her back as she strained to be at those who had demeaned her kin. Ellen, Dolly and Harriet had rushed to join in the hounding, forming a barrier around Sean and the woman so that they could not escape. ‘Besmirching my daughter’s memory with that guttersnipe – where did she sleep, that’s what I want to know!’

      Though deeply embarrassed by the attention this was drawing – everyone dressed for the performance in Sunday clothes – Niall wanted to know too.

      The mark of retribution glowing on his cheek, an angry Sean tried to disentangle himself, whilst at the same time trying to protect Emma from Harriet, the most dominant of his sisters-in-law, who kept aiming vicious prods. ‘We don’t have to put up with this!’

      But Niall caught his arm, ‘Yes you do! You owe Nora an explanation as to how you’ve got the gall to have another woman in your wife’s bed!’

      Cornered, Sean managed to wrench his arm free, then drew a frightened Emma closer to him, barking at his accusers, ‘If you’d have been talking to me you might have found out before this – might have been invited to our wedding!’

      Totally shocked, they stopped to gawp at him, lending him the chance to carve an exit from their oppressive circle, though once free he did not run but stood his ground and faced them.

      Nora was first to recover, her accusation shrill with disbelief. ‘You can’t be married. We’d have heard from Father Finnegan!’

      Ruffled of temper and clothing, Sean was still putting them to order as he explained, ‘We got married at Emma’s church.’

      ‘Where’s that then?’ grilled Niall.

      ‘St Oswald’s.’

      There was a consensus of derision over the Protestant venue. ‘Well, you’re not really married then!’ countered Nora.

      Sean remained firm. ‘The certificate says we are.’

      ‘If you think I’m letting you bring your floozie to live in my daughter’s house—’

      ‘Nora!’ A lock of black hair tumbling over his brow, Sean leaned towards her with an expression of determination. ‘I’m very sorry but Evelyn’s dead. She isn’t coming back. I loved her but I can’t keep the house as a shrine. I’ve got to get on with my life. So it isn’t Evelyn’s house any more, it’s Emma’s.’ Taking advantage of their stunned faces, he dashed his hair back into place, straightened his spine, then said, with more equanimity than he felt, ‘If you’d like me to introduce you …?’

      ‘No, we bloody wouldn’t!’ yelled Harriet who, at twenty-five, might be the youngest, but had inherited the lion’s share of her mother’s obnoxious character. Whilst there might be name-calling from Ellen and Dolly there was the definite threat of violence here, and Sean had no wish to hang around and sample it.

      In an act of finality, he turned his back on them all, muttering, ‘I knew it’d be a waste of time,’ as he and his wife escaped up the street, shoulders braced against a tirade of insults.

      ‘You needn’t think you’re getting away with this!’

      ‘I don’t see as there’s much you can do about it,’ sighed Niall to his mother-in-law, who was to repeat this threat as he shepherded her and everyone else indoors. ‘I’m as angry as the next person. I think he’s despicable, but—’

      ‘There’s one thing I can do about it right now!’ declared Nora, in warlike form, gathering her daughters. ‘Come on – you an’ all!’ And her hand made a graphic summons at Niall as she led the procession back to Sean’s house.

      No one locked their doors around here for there was nothing to steal; Nora found something though, as she barged straight in and made for a cottage piano. ‘We’ll have this, for a start! Ellen, grab that end.’ She herself took hold of the piano and started to heave it, groaning and squeaking, across the brown lino, her daughter shoving from the other end. ‘Dolly, grab them Staffordshire dogs! Hat, you do the kitchen!’

      ‘You’re taking all his stuff?’ questioned a slightly amazed Niall, for the moment hanging back.

      ‘It’s not his property, it’s ours!’ Nora grunted and grimaced over the shifting of the piano, banging her shins as she fought to manoeuvre it over the bunched-up carpet that acted as a wedge against its wheel, her anger anaesthetising the pain. ‘I gave our Eve most of the things in this house when she got married, and I’m damned if that little bitch is having the benefit – now are you going to help us or just stand there gawping?’

      It took Niall only a few seconds to realise that what Nora said was quite true: she had donated most of the furniture here and many of the utensils, for she had done the same for all her daughters. With only the briefest qualm that Sean would come home and have no chair to sit on – but had he not brought it on himself? – he began to assist with the removal. Nudging Nora aside and telling his wife to leave this to him, he freed the piano from the bunched-up carpet, then hauled it along the passage, its castors emitting an ear-splitting squeal of protest before he hefted it over the doorstep, bumped it onto the pavement, down the kerb and across the street, eventually to install it in his own front parlour alongside Nora’s bed – for this was where she slept.

      ‘I’d rather have to climb over the blasted thing to get to me bed than let him keep it!’ rasped his mother-in-law.

      Then, under the curious eyes of the neighbours and anxious children, he and his angry female bandits proceeded to travel back and forth, transporting piece after piece of furniture, box after box of utensils and pictures, until there was no further room to cram in anything more. All that remained in Sean’s living room was a table, an old sofa, and the echo of contemptuous voices.

      For once, having washed their hands of the affair, Niall and his womenfolk were not outside to meet Sean’s return. Had they been so, they might have glimpsed through that window, denuded of its lace curtains, the heartbreaking scene of a man come home to such wanton pillage that he broke down in tears.

      ‘What have we done to them that’s so bad, Em?’ he sobbed quietly to the wife who tried to comfort him. ‘My own brother treating me like this – I know he was in on it – leaving you with not even a kettle.’

      Emma crooned and patted him tenderly, donating her handkerchief. ‘Don’t worry about me, dear. Look!’ Temporarily she rushed away, trying to sound cheerful and to salvage a ray of hope. ‘There’s a little pan here we can use to boil some water, then we’ll have a cup of tea and make a list of the things we need to buy.’

      ‘It’s hard to believe, isn’t it?’ Sean’s