A Week in Winter(16)

He was unprepared for Chicky to change his terms of employment.

‘You’ve been here six months and you’ve been a great help, Rigger,’ she said one evening when Miss Queenie had gone to bed. He was very pleased with the compliment. There hadn’t been many of those coming his way. Rigger waited to hear what would come next.

‘When the builders move in properly in a few weeks, I’ll need help to get Miss Queenie to and from Dr Dai’s and the health clinic. Can you drive?’

‘Yes, I can drive,’ Rigger said.

‘But do you have a licence? Did you do a driving test or anything?’

‘I’m afraid not,’ Rigger admitted.

‘So that’s the first thing you must do – get some driving lessons from Dinny in the garage and do the test. Can you grow things?’

‘What kind of things?’

‘We should have our own produce here: potatoes, vegetables, fruit. We should have hens, too.’

‘Are you serious?’ Sometimes Rigger thought that Chicky was certifiable.

‘Completely serious. We must offer visitors something special; make them feel that this place is providing their food rather than just going into town and buying it all in a supermarket.’

‘I see,’ said Rigger, who didn’t see at all.

‘So I was thinking that if I called you my manager and paid you a proper wage you might feel you have more of a stake here. It won’t just be a place where you are hiding out. It would be a real job with a real future.’

‘Here? In Stoneybridge?’ Rigger was astounded that anyone could see his future in these parts.

‘Yes, here in Stoneybridge indeed. It’s not as if you’re likely to be able to go back to Dublin at any time in the near future. I hoped you might want to put down some roots here, make something of yourself.’

‘I’m grateful to you and everything but—’

‘But what, Rigger? But you see a glittering future for yourself in Dublin stealing great sides of beef and beating up decent butchers who try to protect their business?’

‘I didn’t beat up anyone,’ he said indignantly.

‘I know that. Why else do you think I took you on? You saved Nasey’s life, he says. He was determined you should have a fresh start. I’m trying to give it to you, but it’s difficult.’

‘Do you like me, Chicky?’

‘Yes, I do, actually. I didn’t think I would but I do. You’re very good to Queenie, you’re kind to the kitten, you have a lot of good points. You’re very young. I wanted to get you some skills and see that you have a bit of a life. But you just throw it back at me and say that a life here is worth nothing at all. So I’m a bit confused, really.’

‘It’s just not what I thought my life would be,’ he said.

‘It’s not what I thought my life would be either, but somewhere along the line we have to pick things up and run with them.’

‘At least your bad luck wasn’t your own fault,’ Rigger said.

‘It probably was in some ways.’ She looked away.

‘But your husband being killed and all – you weren’t to blame for that.’

‘No, that’s right.’

‘I’d be happy to be your manager if you’ll still take me,’ he said, after a pause.

‘We start to dig the vegetable garden tomorrow morning, and your first driving lesson will be with Dinny tomorrow afternoon. You’ll start to learn the rules of the road tomorrow night. Miss Queenie will be in charge of that.’

‘I’m up for it,’ Rigger said.

‘And I’ll open a post office account for you and put half your wages in each week and give you half in cash. That way you can buy some nice clothes and take a girl to a dance or whatever.’

‘Can I tell my mother and Nasey?’

‘Oh yes, of course you can. But I wouldn’t hold out any hopes about your mother.’

‘It will be the first bit of good news she ever had about me,’ he said.

‘No, she was delighted with you way back when you were born. She wrote and told Miss Queenie all about it. You were six and a half pounds, apparently. But things are different now. Nasey says she needs to see a doctor; it’s kind of a depression but she won’t hear of it.’

Chicky thought she saw tears in Rigger’s eyes but she wasn’t sure.

The driving lessons went well. Dinny said that Rigger was fearless but reckless, quick to react but impatient. The rules of the road were a trial, but Miss Queenie loved testing him each evening.

‘What does a sign like a circle crossed out mean on the outskirts of a town?’ she would ask.

‘That you can drive as fast as you like?’ Rigger suggested.

‘No, wrong, it means you can drive at the national speed limit,’ Miss Queenie cried triumphantly.

‘That’s what I meant.’

‘You meant drive as fast as you like,’ Miss Queenie said. ‘They would have failed you.’

He passed the test with no problem.

He drove Miss Queenie everywhere: to her appointments with Dr Dai, to the hospital for a check-up, to the vet to have Gloria spayed.

‘It seems a pity for her not to have kittens of her own,’ Miss Queenie had said as she stroked the little cat on her lap.