Minding Frankie (28 page)

“Yes, I tried to call you but first it was the answering machine and
then it was Eva. I talked to her and she told me that you had set out. I’ve been waiting for your call.”

“I nearly didn’t ring.…”

“Why was that? Was it nerves?” Frank asked.

“No, I thought why bother. You don’t want to be involved with me. You’ve made that clear.”

“That’s
so
wrong,” Frank cried out, stung by the unfairness of this. “I do indeed want to be involved with you. Why else would I have called you in Australia and talked to Eva?” He could almost hear the shrug of shoulders at the other end of the phone. “Why would I do that?”

Frank felt hollow. Somehow Clara had been right. He had paused when he should have gone enthusiastically forward. But that wasn’t his nature. His nature was to examine everything minutely, and when he was sure, and not a moment before, then he would pronounce.

“You probably thought I was coming to claim my inheritance,” Des said.

“It never crossed my mind. You said you wanted to get in touch. That’s what I thought it was. I was as astonished as you. You know I only just heard of your existence, and I’m delighted!”

“Delighted?” Des sounded unconvinced.

“Yes, sure, I was delighted,” Frank was stammering now. “Des, what
is
all this? You got in touch with me, I called you back. Will you come and have lunch with me today?”

“Where do you suggest?” Des asked.

Frank breathed out in relief. Then he realized he had to think quickly. Where to take the boy? “Depends what you’d like.… Quentins is very good and this new place, Anton’s, is talked about a lot.”

“Are these jacket-and-tie jobs?”

Frank realized that it had been years since he had gone anywhere that a jacket and tie was
not
necessary. There would be a lot of adapting ahead.

“Sort of traditional but not stuffy.”

“I’ll take that as a yes. Which place?”

“Anton’s. I’ve never been there. Will we say one o’clock?”

“Why
don’t
we say one o’clock?” Des sounded faintly mocking as if he were sending Frank up.

“I’ll tell you how to get there …,” Frank began.

“I’ll find it,” Des said and hung up.

Frank buzzed through to Miss Gorman. Could she kindly find him the number for Anton’s restaurant? No, he would make the reservation himself. Yes, he was quite sure. Perhaps she would cancel all appointments for the afternoon. She called back with the number and then added that she had spoken to Dr. Casey from the heart clinic, who said that there was no way the four p.m. meeting could be canceled. Too many people were setting too much store on the outcome. To have the meeting without Frank Ennis would be
Hamlet
without the prince. He would
have
to be back by four. What kind of a lunch would last three hours?

Chastened, Frank rang the restaurant.

“Can I speak to Anton Moran, please? … Mr. Moran? I have never begged before and I never will again, Mr. Moran, but today I arranged to meet for the first time a son I never knew I had and I picked your restaurant. Now I am hoping you will be able to find me a table. I don’t know where to contact the young man … my son.… It will be such a messy start to our relationship if I have to tell him we couldn’t get a booking.”

The man at the other end was courteous. “This is far too important a matter to mess up,” he said gracefully. “Of course you can have a table. Service today isn’t full,” he added, “but your story sounds so dramatic and so obviously true that I would have found a table for you even if I had to kneel down on all fours and pretend to be one.”

Frank smiled, and suddenly he remembered Clara saying that he should be more immediate, more up-front with people. Nothing worked as well as the truth, she had advised him.

Another round to Clara. Was the woman going to be right about
everything
?

·   ·   ·

Frank was in the restaurant early. He looked around at the other diners, not a man without a collar, tie and smart jacket.
Why
had he chosen this place? But then again, if he had brought them to a burger place, it would hardly look festive. Or celebratory. It would look as if he were hiding this new member of his family. He watched the door and every time some man came in who might be about twenty-five his heart gave a lurch.

Then he saw him. He was so like Rita Raven that it almost hurt. Same little freckles on the nose, same thick, fair hair and same huge, dark eyes. Frank swallowed. The boy was talking to the maître d’ at the door and making signs around his neck. Seamlessly, Teddy produced a necktie, and Des tied it quickly. Then Teddy was leading him over to the table.

“Your guest, Mr. Ennis,” he said and slipped away.

Frank thought this man should have been an ambassador somewhere rather than working in what he realized was an outrageously expensive restaurant.

“Des!” he said and held out his hand.

The boy looked at him appraisingly.

“Well, well, well …,” he said. He ignored the hand that had been offered to him.

Frank wondered should he attempt the kind of bear hug men did nowadays.

He was bound to get it wrong, of course, and knock half the things off the table. And maybe the boy, used to more rugged Australian ways, might pull away, revolted.

“You found the place,” Frank said foolishly.

He shrugged and looked so dismissive.

“I didn’t know where you were, you see. Where you would be starting out from …” Frank’s voice trailed away. This was going to be much harder than he had thought.

·   ·   ·

Near the kitchen door Teddy spoke to Anton.

“I’ve had Lisa on the phone.”

“Not again,” he sighed.

“She wants to come in for a meal sometime when we are not too busy.”

“Try to head her off, will you, Teddy?”

“Not easy …,” Teddy said.

“Just buy me a week, then. Tell her Wednesday of next week.”

“Lunch or dinner?”

“Oh, God, lunch.”

“She has her eyes on dinner,” Teddy said.

“An early-bird dinner, then.” Anton was resigned.

“She does work her butt off for this place. I don’t think we ever pay her anything.”

“Nobody asked her to slave.” Anton strained to hear what the newly united father and son were saying to each other. The conversation seemed to be limping along.

“Wouldn’t families make you sick, Teddy?” Anton said unexpectedly.

Teddy paused before answering. Anton’s family had not troubled him very much. Teddy didn’t understand what was wrong with families from Anton’s viewpoint, but he knew enough to agree with him.

“You’re so right, Anton, but think of all the business we get out of the guilt that families create! Half the people here today are here from some kind of family guilt. Anniversaries, birthdays, engagements, graduations. We’d be bankrupt without it.” Teddy always saw the bright side.

“Good man, Teddy.” Anton was slightly distracted. That man, Mr. Ennis, was making heavy weather over his meeting with his son. Even from across the room you could cut the atmosphere with a knife.

Clara always said that when in doubt, you should speak your mind. Ask the question that is bothering you. Don’t play games.

“What’s wrong, Des? What has changed? In your letter you were eager to meet.… Why are you so different?”

“I didn’t know the whole story. I didn’t know what your family did.”

“What did they do?” Frank cried.

“As if you didn’t know.”

“I don’t know,” Frank protested.

“You don’t fool me. I’ve got documents, receipts, forms signed—I know the whole story now.”

“You know more than I do,” Frank said. “Who was writing these documents and filling in these forms?”

“My mother was a frightened girl of seventeen. Your father gave her a choice. She could leave Ireland forever and she would get a thousand pounds. One thousand pounds! That’s how much my life was worth. A miserable grand. And for this she was to sign an undertaking that she would never approach the Ennis family claiming any responsibility for her pregnancy.”

“This can’t be true!” Frank’s voice was weak with shock.

“Why did you think she had gone away?”

“Her mother told me she had gone to America to stay with cousins,” Frank said.

“Yes, that’s the story they all put out.”

“But why shouldn’t I have believed them?”

“Because you weren’t a fool. If you played according to their rules you were in a win-win situation. Troublesome girl irritatingly pregnant, out of your hair, out of the country. Everything sorted. You leapt at the chance.”

“No, I didn’t. I didn’t know there was anything
to
sort out. I never knew until I got your letter that I had a child.”

“Try another story, Frank.”

“Where did you hear all this about my parents asking Rita to sign documents?”

“From Nora. Her sister. My aunt Nora. I went to see her in London and she told me everything.”

“She told you wrong, Des. Nothing like that ever happened.”

“Give me credit for some brains. You’re not going to admit it now if you didn’t then.”

“There was nothing to admit. You don’t understand. All this came to me out of a clear blue sky.”

“You never got in touch with her. You never wrote to her once.”

“I wrote to her for three months every day. I put proper stamps for America on them, but got no reply.”

“Didn’t that ring any alarm bells?”

“No, it didn’t. I asked her mother if she was forwarding the letters and her mother said she was.”

“And eventually you gave up?”

“Well, I was getting no response. And her mother said …” He stopped as if remembering something.

“Yes?”

“She said I should leave Rita alone. That she had moved on in life. She said there had been a lot of fuss made, but the Ravens had done everything according to the letter of the law.”

“And you didn’t know what she meant?” Des was not convinced.

“I hadn’t an idea what she meant, but now I see … no, it couldn’t be …”

“What couldn’t be?”

“My parents—if you had known them, Des! Sex was never mentioned in our house. They would be incapable of any discussion about paying Rita off.”

“Did they like her?”

“Not particularly. They didn’t like anyone who was distracting me from my studies and exams.”

“And her folks, did they like you?”

“Not really, same sort of reasons. Rita was skipping her classes to be with me.”

“They thought you were a pig,” Des said.

“Surely not!” Frank was surprised at his calmness in the face of insult.

“That’s what Nora says. She says you ruined everyone’s life. You
and your so-grand family. You broke them all up. Rita never came back from Australia because she had to swear not to. A perfectly decent family, minding its own business, ruined because of you and your snobbish family.” He looked very upset and very angry.

Frank knew he had to walk carefully. This boy had been so excited and enthusiastic about meeting him; now he was hostile and barely able to sit at the same table as the father he had crossed the world to meet.

“Rita’s sister in London—Nora, is it? She must be very upset.”

“Which is more than you are,” Des said mulishly.

“I
am
sorry. I tried to tell you that, but we got bogged down in a silly argument.”

“Silly argument is what you call it? A row that destroyed my mother’s family!”

“I didn’t know
any
of it, Des. Not until I heard from you.”

“Do you believe me?”

“I believe that’s what Nora said to you, certainly.”

“So you think
she
was lying?”

“No, I think she believes what she was told. My parents are dead now. Your mother is dead. We have no one to ask.” He knew that he sounded weak and defeated.

But oddly Des Raven seemed to recognize the honesty in his tone. “You’re right,” he said, almost grudgingly. “It’s up to us now.”

Frank Ennis had seen the waiter hover near them and leave several times. Soon they must order.

“Would you like something to eat, Des? I ordered an Australian wine to make you feel at home.”

“I’m sorry—I like to know who I am eating and drinking with.” Des was taking no prisoners.

“Well, I don’t know how well you’ll get to know me.… They say that I’m difficult and that I make a mess of things,” Frank said. “That’s what I’m told, anyway.”

“Who tells you that? Your wife?”

“No. I never married.”

Des was surprised. “So no children, then?”

“Apart from you, no.”

“I must have been a shock.”

Frank paused. He must not say the wrong thing here. It was a time to be honest and speak from the heart. But how could he admit to this boy that his instincts and first reactions had been doubt and confusion and a wish to check it all out? He knew that if he were wholly truthful he could alienate Des Raven forever and lose the son he had only just met.

“It may sound cold to you, Des, but my first reaction was shock. I couldn’t believe that I had a child—my own flesh and blood—without my having an idea about it. I am a tidy, meticulous sort of person. This was like having my whole neat world turned upside down. I had to think about it. That’s what I do, Des, I think about things slowly and carefully.”

“Really?” Des sounded slightly scornful.

“Yes, really. So when it had got clear in my mind, I called you.”

“And what had you to get clear, exactly?”

“I had to get my head around the fact that I had fathered a son. And if you think that’s something that can be accepted as natural and normal in two minutes then you are an amazing person. It takes someone like me a bit of time to get used to a new concept, and as soon as I did I called you and you had already gone.”

“But you must have been afraid that people would find out.” Des was still taunting him.

“No, I wasn’t afraid of that. Not at all.” He had to think what Clara might have said, and it came to him. “I was proud to have a son. I would want people to know.”

“I don’t think so.… Big Catholic hospital manager having illegitimate child. No, I can’t see you wanting people to know.”