Short Stories from Ireland

Short stories. Instant gratification. I like them because it reminds writers when to stop. A story ends at some point. Trying to stretch it is forcing a book.

Patrick dies in England. He and his wife Stella never had a phone so she goes to Father O’Brien the Catholic priest. He sends a telegram to Patrick’s family in the west of Ireland.

His brothers arrive to take the body back home to be buried in the presence of their 83 year-old mother, his wife Maureen and seven children. Stella and Patrick have four.

Father O’Brien is in a quandary. ‘We don’t know anything about Stella,’ said the brothers. Page 323, Maeve’s Times.

This is fiction, Death in Kilburn, a short story by Maeve Binchy but, fiction is the twin sister of real life isn’t it? My take on this is that this story is fiction for the following reasons.

l Patrick works in England like many Irish men at that time. Stella, his English wife would have insisted on visiting Ireland at some point, to introduce the four kids to their grandmother, at least.

l Which woman would agree that they should not have a home phone when her husband’s family lives far away in Ireland? How did Patrick convince Stella they don’t need a phone?

l In real life, Maureen, his Irish wife would have insisted on knowing where her husband sleeps while working in England. Their seven kids would have enjoyed a trip to see papa and do some sightseeing.

l Maureen and Patrick communicated regularly, either by letters or maybe she called him at work. If she wrote to him, where did he keep the letters?

Father O’Brien, the Catholic priest is the cucumber in the sandwich. He is still shocked that a good Catholic like Patrick is a bigamist, but the immediate problem is which wife should bury him, Stella in England or support his brothers in their mission to take him back to Ireland, to Maureen, his other wife?

Stella is the victim because she knows about Maureen. Maureen on the other hand has no clue that she had a helper in England, and Patrick’s brothers want it to remain that way, a secret. The scandal will be too much in religious Ireland.

Maybe I’m way off base for thinking that it is fiction because two people in a marriage might not know each other at all, or have unwritten agreements about not talking about certain things. Verboten! Pardon by German.

By: Nonqaba waka Msimang.