The Eden Tree (30 page)

Karen picked up her cup and followed Linn, settling on the couch. Linn slumped into a wing chair and began her tale.

Karen never interrupted once. She refreshed her coffee twice, signaling for a pause by lifting a finger and going into the kitchen to tap the pot on the stove. Otherwise she was still, listening wide-eyed with that particular attention that had always made her a confidante of many. She knew how to concentrate and knew when to keep her mouth shut.

“And so,” Linn concluded, “we have the same father. Kevin Pierce and Mary Drennan were Con’s parents.”

Karen nodded thoughtfully. “And that’s why you broke it off with him, because you think he’s your half brother?”

“I don’t think, I know. I saw the birth certificate myself. Believe me, I checked. I wouldn’t be here with you if there were any doubt about it. I would be with Con on Ildathach.”

Karen rose, putting her cup and saucer on the coffee table. “I see.” She wore an odd expression—not the sadness Linn would have expected, but consternation, as if she were troubled.

“Don’t look like that, Karen; there’s nothing you can do about it. There’s nothing anyone can do.”

Karen smiled mechanically and picked up her sweater and purse. “I have to go, Linn. Thanks for telling me about it. I can understand better now what you’ve been going through. I’ll give you a ring tonight.” She offered Linn another wan smile and left.

Linn gathered up the cups and brought them into the kitchen, wondering what had caused Karen’s abrupt departure. Her behavior had been odd, to say the least. Then Linn shrugged mentally and dismissed it.

She had enough on her mind as it was.

* * * *

Linn was awakened by the sound of the doorbell ringing in the middle of the night. She sat up in darkness and glanced at the fluorescent dial of her bedside clock. Not night, early morning. Who on earth would be ringing her doorbell at 5:45 in the morning?

It was Karen, who obviously hadn’t slept at all. She looked exhausted and emotionally spent. She brushed past Linn and collapsed on the sofa.

“Karen, what are you doing here at this hour?” Linn asked. “You look as though you’ve been up all night.”

“I have. I’ve been sitting in the Catholic church in Fair Lawn, the one that’s open twenty-four hours a day.”

“Saint Leo’s?”

“That’s right, Saint Leo’s.”

“You drove out from the Village to sit in Saint Leo’s all night? Karen,” Linn said, laughing, “you aren’t even Catholic.”

Karen shrugged. “Same God. It was the only church I knew would be open.”

“Why did you have to go to church?”

“I had a big decision to make and I needed advice from a higher authority.”

Linn belted the sash of her robe and curled up next to her godmother on the couch. “All right, what’s going on?”

To her surprise, Karen took her hand and held it in her lap. Her face was very serious.

“Linn, I was your mother’s dearest friend. I have loved you all your life, looked after you as best I could when your mother died.”

Linn smiled. “No one could have done a better job.”

Karen squeezed Linn’s hand. “I did my best, anyway. But I hope I’ve come to the correct decision here. I am about to break a promise I made to your mother before you were born.”

“What do you mean?” Karen asked, alarmed by Karen’s demeanor.

Karen took a breath. “Regardless of the allegiance I feel to your mother’s memory I can’t stand by and see you ruin your life for nothing. I know she would want you to be happy.”

“For nothing?” Linn echoed, puzzled. What was this?

“Linn, you can have your Connor for your husband. There is no blood relationship between you. Con may be Kevin’s child, but you are not.”

Linn didn’t move, didn’t dare to breathe. He heart leaped at this possibility she had never even considered. Was Karen right?
 

“Kevin married your mother when she was already pregnant by another man. He was a German exchange student she’d met when he spent the summer at the university where she took courses there. He was on a short term residence program. He never knew about the child; he’d gone back home by the time she realized she was pregnant. She never contacted him, never saw him again after that summer and married your father quickly. You were born early, right?”

“I was told I was premature,” Linn said softly, still dumfounded. “Everyone said my parents had been a good match, so happy together. It never occurred to me that they might have married for anything but love.”

“Your mother never wanted you to know. She was afraid you would think badly of her for her mistake. Kevin knew all about it when they got married. He had lost someone he loved very much and he sympathized with your mother’s plight. They were both wounded souls clinging to each other to get over past problems. I think it started out as a gesture of kindness, his marrying her, but it seemed that they grew close in the short time they had together. I know for a fact that he never regretted doing what he did and that you were the joy of his life.”

“And when my mother died, you and he kept silent for her sake,” Linn whispered.

“That’s right. Kevin knew how much she wanted your good opinion, and he saw no purpose in telling you the truth. He also wanted you to inherit from Dermot, as you just did.”

“Dermot never knew,” Linn murmured softly. “He did leave me his property; he did think I was his grandchild.”

“I suspect that was your father’s last laugh,” Karen said, smiling slightly.

Linn’s eyes roamed the room, seeing nothing. It was too much to take in at once. A wild surge of joy was building inside her, but she was afraid to unleash it, afraid that if she did she would be thwarted again. Could this possibly, wonderfully, be true?

She sought Karen’s gaze. “No one knows?” she asked.

“No one knew except Kevin and me. That leaves me. There are no records to check, Linn. Kevin listed himself as your father on everything. You have only my word, but I swear it’s the truth, darling. Go back to Ireland and find Con. Have the happiness your mother would have wished for you.”

Linn put her hands on Karen’s shoulders and searched the other woman’s face.

“Karen,” she whispered, “you wouldn’t lie to me about this? I know you want to help me. You wouldn’t make this up out of some misguided good intention to end my current unhappiness? Because if I went back to Con and found out later that Kevin really was my father, I don’t know how we could bear it.”

Karen closed her eyes and moved her head slowly from side to side. “No, Linn. I do want to help, but I would never take it upon myself to twist fate like that. My decision concerned breaking your mother’s trust and betraying her confidence, and that’s all. I believe in my heart that she would agree I made the right choice.”

Linn threw her arms around Karen and hugged her until the older woman was squealing. “God bless you for telling me. Of course you made the right choice. You were never a better friend to my mother than you are today.”

Karen embraced her tightly and then sat back. “All right, enough of this mush. I think you have a plane to catch.”

Linn didn’t know what to do first. She stood, sat down and then stood again. “Oh, I’m so happy,” she breathed. “You’ll never know what you’ve done for me.”

“I think I have a rough idea,” Karen said, standing up herself. “I’m dying for a cup of coffee.”

“Help yourself,” Linn said, pulling off her robe and heading for the shower. “On the way to the airport, will you drop me at the college so I can explain that I need some time off?”

“Why don’t I just open a limousine service?” Karen asked from the kitchen, reaching for the canister of coffee.

“Would you call Aer Lingus and book me on the next flight to Shannon?” Linn yelled from the bathroom. “I’ll take anything they have.”

“Is the number in your directory?” Karen called.

She was talking to empty air. She heard the hiss of running water through the door to the hall. Linn was already in the shower, doubtless trying to wash and dress at the same time.

Karen sighed, replacing the metal tin on the counter. She went back into the living room and dialed New York information.

By the time Linn emerged dripping, pulling on clothes over her still wet body, she was booked on a flight to Shannon.

* * * *

Linn peered down through the gauzy curtain of clouds at the green landscape visible beneath the wing of the plane. She was back—back where she most longed to be. The pilot circled lower, coming in for a landing, and she could pick out the runways and the clapboard outbuildings of the airport. “
Cead mille failte
,” the sign in the lobby read. A hundred thousand welcomes. Linn felt every one of them. She was coming home.

As the air hostess made her final announcements to the passengers, Linn unfolded Bridie’s latest letter and read it again. It was light and chatty, skirting the most salient issue, and said that Con was doing “tolerably well, considering.”

Linn had no idea what that meant. He could be drinking himself to death or trying to get himself killed in Ulster, and she doubted Bridie would tell her about it. She wouldn’t want to deliver any more bad news to Linn, who’d had enough of it.

When she landed, she called both the gatehouse and the main hall and got no answer at either. She tried Bridie’s house and got Terry.

“Terry, this is Aislinn Pierce. May I speak to your mother?”

“She’s at my sister’s in Donegal, miss. She’ll be back later this day. You sound awful close; where are you?”

“I’m at the airport.”

“In Eire?”

“Yes, Terry. I’m back.”

“Does that mean you’ve worked it out?”

“As soon as I find Con, everything will be fine. Do you know where he is? His number doesn’t answer.”

There was a pause. “I don’t know where he’s gone, miss. He’s been away some days now. I know Ma’s been worried about him.” Terry hesitated. “He’s been in a bad way since you left him—drinking, picking fights, you know the sort of thing.”

Yes, indeed. She knew the sort of thing. She voiced her greatest fear. “Terry, do you think he’s gone north? It might be like him to make himself a target.”

“Don’t think so, miss. His car’s still at the cottage, and Mr. Fitz said something to Ma about him going off someplace to write.” Terry sighed. “Sounded like an excuse for a roaring drunk to me.”

Linn hoped it was a roaring drunk. She would much prefer that to a dangerous excursion above the border.

“Terry, do you think you could come and get me?”

“Sure thing, miss. Sit tight and I’ll be there.”

“You’re an angel.”

Terry chuckled wickedly; it was the first time Linn had ever heard him laugh. She stared in amazement at the phone.

“You didn’t think so the night of the Fleadh,” he said.

“You’re right about that. Would you bring your mother’s key to the house? I gave mine back to her when I left.”

“Right. Wait in the outside lounge and look for me. I should be there in half an hour.”

“Okay, kid. Goodbye.”

* * * *

Linn was perched on a chair in the lounge, her feet on her single bag, when Terry pushed his way through a crowd of departing passengers who were heading for the duty-free shop to spend their last pounds. When he saw her, he grinned and unzipped his black leather jacket to reveal a blue sweatshirt underneath. He had a way of doing that which promised untold delights beneath the clothes. Linn spotted a teenage girl watching him covertly and smiled to herself. Bridie was in for a few more gray hairs from that one, for sure.

“
Failte a bonnla
, miss,” Terry said. “Welcome home.”

“Thanks, Terry. You can’t know how wonderful it is to be here, and that’s a big change from the way I felt the last time I was in this place.”

He picked up her bag as if it were weightless and took her arm. “Ma came back as I was leaving. She wants to see you.”

“Do you have the key to the house?”

Terry shook his head. “She wants me to bring you to our place first.” He shot her a sidelong glance. “She was a bit bothered that you were back. I think you’d best talk to her.”

Linn could understand why Bridie was upset. She didn’t know what Linn now did, and she probably thought that Linn’s return was going to be the cause of more misery for all concerned.

“All right, Terry. Let’s go to your house.”

Linn followed Terry down the escalator and through the long corridor to the main reception room on the first floor. She waited while he retrieved his cycle, and then she climbed up behind him. There was a work stoppage in progress and Terry threaded his way through the circling protestors, one heel on the ground, and then gunned the motor once they reached the open road.

Linn closed her eyes and let the fresh, wet breeze bathe her face and whip through her hair. The highways around the airport were wide and well traveled, but it wasn’t long before they were immersed in the countryside. They skimmed along a narrow ribbon of road that skirted huts with their original thatched roofs, and others where the straw had been replaced with corrugated metal now rusting from the damp. Every once in a while Linn would peek to reassure herself that she was actually back in County Clare. As they rounded a bend, she glanced up and saw a medieval stone tower looming up from the side of the road. It was an enchanting anachronism in the middle of the modern landscape. She was in Ireland, all right. She blew it a mental kiss and closed her eyes again.