Page 60 of Road Trip
“Maybe later in the week. Tomorrow we’re going to Cobh, to the Heritage Museum.”
“Lovely,” he said. “I’ve not been to that museum since I was a boy and my cousins came over from the States. You never take time to do the tourist things in your own part of the world, do you?”
“You have family in the US?”
“Sort of. I’ve a cousin who lives in Chicago, and she came over with her kids to visit years and years ago. I remember being properly terrified by some of the exhibits there, especially the gruesome depictions of the convict ships bound for Australia. Those mannequins were terrifying to a kid, and of course, theTitanicexhibit is quite sobering.”
“TheTitanic?”
“Cobh, or Queenstown, as it was called back then, was the final port of call before theTitanicwent down after striking that iceberg. Only three days out of port. Have you not seen the film?”
“I think I’ve seen it at least three times, but it’s been years and years. I guess I forgot the part about the stop in Ireland,” Maeve said.
“Too busy ogling Leo DiCaprio in a wet undershirt, I’m guessing?”
“I was a teenaged girl. Guilty as charged,” Maeve said with a chuckle. “Anyway, I’ve also booked a consultation with a volunteer genealogist while we’re at the museum.”
“You’re that serious about finding the family roots, are you?” He shot her a quizzical look.
“Yes,” she said, annoyed at his tone. “And it’s not just idle curiosity. There’s actually something pretty big at stake.”
“I meant no offense,” he said hastily. “That is… I’m wondering why it’s so important. You found the village where your mum’s people were from. What else are you looking for?”
“Answers,” she said succinctly.
“About the Connors?”
“That and their connection to the Rossingtons.”
“Lord and Lady Rossington?” He looked incredulous. “Didn’t you tell me your mother’s people were poor farmers?”
Maeve remembered the look that had passed between Liam and his cousin Maddie when she mentioned the family name after her tour of the home farm.
“It’s a long story,” she said finally, not sure she was ready to trust a near stranger with the tale of the unexpected fork she and Therese had discovered in their family tree.
“It’s early yet. For me, anyway.”
She considered it. Liam seemed like a decent guy, sympathetic even. Why not get the perspective of a local?
“There’s this antique painting,” she said finally, unsure of where to start. “It hung over our fireplace mantel my whole life. Of a very elegant, fancy lady. Mary Helen, my mom, always swore the portrait was priceless, and by a famous artist, and that the subject of the portrait, Lady Geraldine Fitzhugh, was our Irish ancestor.”
“Hmm.”
“You’d have to know my mom. She absolutely delighted in making up wild, utterly improbable stories. What literary types call a fabulist. So I always assumed Lady Geraldine was another of Mary Helen’s tall tales, and probably the portrait was something she picked up at a yard sale, along with some old Tupperware andHummel figurines. I mean, we’re from a working-class family. With the exception of my uncle Keith, who’s a pharmacist, I’m the first on both sides of my family to get a college degree. How the hell could we be related to some wealthy Anglo-Irish aristocrats?”
“Like the Rossingtons,” he said quietly. “Although, from what I understand, the Rossington fortunes have been somewhat diminished over the years. Look at Esme, living in what might be called reduced circumstances in the gardener’s cottage. Poor old dear.”
The way he said the last phrase left no doubt that he held no sympathy for the last of the Rossingtons.
“You know Esme?” she asked.
“Everyonearound Tarrymore knows her. And her dog.”
“Sinead O’Cocker. Therese met her yesterday and chatted her up,” Maeve said.
“At the Willow, no doubt,” Liam said. “I’m shocked Esme spoke to a stranger, and an American at that.”
“Therese is a lot like our mom. She could charm the birds out of the sky.”
