Page 74 of Road Trip
“Savannah used to be like that. We’re not really a small town anymore. We’ve got a couple of universities, including the one where I taught, and SCAD, that’s the art and design college. The port is one of the busiest on the East Coast, and tourism is huge. But certain people think being a ‘native Savannahian’ means you’re something special. Savannah can be really snobby and insular and incredibly inbred.”
“Sounds familiar,” Liam said. “But, as I was saying, just like that legendary IRA robbery, the name Kathleen Connor, well, there’s a certain notoriety attached to it.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah. The Rossingtons, for better or worse, were sort of our version of the Kennedys—rich, attractive, powerful, although not always beloved—but Lady Delia, she was revered. She founded the local infirmary. The nursery school is named for her. She even donated the money for the building that houses the library where my mum worked. When Delia Rossington was murdered, andsupposedly by a young girl she’d taken in as an act of charity? Well, it was big news.”
“How did the Rossingtons frame that narrative?”
“The story was that Lady Fiona and her two sons had been out of town, but they came back early unexpectedly and found Lady Delia in the house, stabbed to death. Money and jewelry were missing, as was Delia’s ward—a young girl from the village whom she’d taken under her wing.”
“I can’t believe it. That happened, what, over a hundred years ago, and people still remember?”
“Americans remember the name John Wilkes Booth. And Al Capone, and Bonnie and Clyde, right? You’ve got to understand, this is a village where stealing another man’s sheep is considered newsworthy. Murders, especially of beloved aristocrats, just don’t happen here in Tarrymore.”
“But she didn’t steal the painting,” Maeve protested. “We have her letters to her brother. Delia gave it to her. Along with some money and jewelry. Kathleen didn’t run off to America. Delia had paid for her passage and made arrangements for her to go.”
“So your interest isn’t just the matter of a potentially valuable painting, then?”
“I won’t deny we could use the money if we authenticate our portrait. Therese is dead broke, which is nothing new, but now I’m newly unemployed too, and our mom just passed away. The house we grew up in was her only tangible asset, and now we find out that during the last year of her life she’d been swindled out of her life’s savings by a greedy televangelist.”
“Terrible,” Liam said.
“Instead of an estate, she left us a big fat mortgage—and a rusty coffee can full of twenty-dollar bills she thought would pay for a trip to the old country and patch things up between Therese and me.”
She couldn’t quite bring herself to tell him that her own plight was nearly as desperate as her sister’s.
“It’s my fault,” she whispered, not daring to look into Liam’s kindeyes. “I should have noticed how bad she’d gotten. I was supposed to be checking in on her, making sure she didn’t burn the house down, or drive her car into a drainage ditch. When she got really ill, I moved into the house, to take care of her.”
Maeve took a deep breath. Now she’d started talking, it was as though a dam had burst, and the pent-up emotions she’d spent months trying to repress were impossible to contain.
“The whole time, I was so damn angry at Therese, I could have throttled her. Where was she? Why didn’t she come home? I’d told her how sick our mom was, but she always had some excuse. It all fell on me, the doctors’ appointments, making sure she ate, took her meds. I put my life on hold, took leave from my teaching job at the college. As far as I knew, Therese was out there, playing at being an actress.”
“Did you ever call her, and tell her you needed help with your mum?”
“Of course not. I told myself even if I did call, she wouldn’t come. The sad truth is, I was playing the martyr. Look at me! I’m sacrificing everything! Aren’t I noble?”
“Ah yes, your Catholic school training did you proud,” he said. He leaned over until his forehead touched hers. “Can I tell you something?”
“Is this where you tell me not to be so hard on myself?”
“Certainly not. I have a policy against offering unsolicited advice. No, I was just going to remark that I’m glad your mum saved that money, because it brought you here, to this small corner of Ireland, and to me.”
She’d been so intent on telling Liam her sad life story she hadn’t realized he was pulling the Jeep up to the entrance of the inn. She didn’t want to go in, didn’t want the night to end.
He seemed to sense what she was thinking.
“Right, then,” Liam said. “How would you like to visit an authentic cottage inhabited by an authentic Irishman for one last nightcap? I promise I’ll bring you back to the inn, but first, I’ve got to go home and let Lucy out. Poor thing will be desperate to take a piss.”
Maeve rolled her eyes. “That’s a handy excuse to lure an innocent girl back to your place late at night. Does it work?”
“Not always,” he said, looking unabashed. “But Lucy appreciates when it does.”
Liam’s cottage waslocated just down the hill from Tarrymore Distillery. It was tiny, made of whitewashed limestone, with dark green shutters on the pair of windows that looked out on the postage-stamp-sized front garden. Pots of blooming red geraniums stood on either side of the arched front door. In all, it reminded Maeve of something out of a Disney movie.
As they approached the front door they heard frantic barking coming from inside.
“See there?” Liam opened the unlocked door and a furry gray-and-white bundle rocketed past them, making her way straight to a patch of grass.
