One Hundred Names

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

The door to Etcetera’s offices was left open when Kitty arrived, which added to her anticipation and overall impending sense of doom. It said to her, come on in if you dare, the door’s open, you have no choice now. The office was deserted – it was Sunday morning – and Pete could do anything to her here and nobody would hear her scream. She was pinning all her hopes on Bob coming to her rescue but the article was probably enough to send him over the edge too, as Etcetera were implicated as losing advertisers and being in financial trouble. Not good press.

When she entered Constance’s office, Pete was standing, as usual, at the desk with the phone glued to his ear. He was wearing his weekend casuals, a look Kitty wasn’t used to seeing on him, and again it struck her that he looked younger, more attractive than the jacket-wearing stressed-out egomaniac who patrolled the offices. He looked up at Kitty’s approach and his face darkened.

‘Gary, can I call you back?’ He hung up abruptly. ‘That was Gary. A solicitor that I’ve been on the phone to all morning trying to figure out where we stand on all of this.’

‘What do you mean, a solicitor?’

‘You did read the paper this morning?’ he asked sarcastically. ‘But I forgot, you didn’t need to, you already knew what the story was before it was printed. You see, there’s a little bit there about Etcetera’s advertisers apparently pulling out if you are not suspended.’

‘Yes, but-’

‘And so the other advertisers who weren’t going to pull their money are now in a panic as to whether they should do the same or not, because paying for advertising in this magazine apparently makes them look bad,’ he ended in a shout.

Kitty’s eyes widened and she jumped a little at the volume of his voice. She had never seen him this angry before. Bitching, stressed and bad-tempered, yes, but never like this.

‘You think I did this deliberately?’ Her voice cracked. ‘Jesus, Pete, if I wanted to tell my side of the story, I’d have done it a whole lot better, don’t you think? I was on my way home from working on the story when I ran into an old college friend who seemed to have no idea about what happened with Thirty Minutes. So we went for drinks to catch up and in the space of an entire night – yes, an entire night, Pete, because it wasn’t enough that he used me for a story, he had to go and degrade me and make me feel like a complete whore in the process – I talked about what had happened, of course I did, because I was upset. It’s all been very stressful and I decided to talk to somebody about it, somebody who was totally unrelated to this world, a man who told me he was writing a novel, for Christ’s sake, and who seemed to care, and when I woke up this morning I find that crap splashed all over the paper and I’m really exhausted because I had to sleep on a friend’s couch so I am humiliated and mortified and extremely sorry, okay? I’m really sorry.’ She hadn’t realised she was crying until Pete held out a tissue to her and she felt her wet cheeks and her nose running.

‘Okay,’ he said gently. ‘Okay, that’s a different story entirely. I’m sorry for getting the wrong idea.’

Kitty simply nodded her thanks and continued wiping her streaming eyes.

‘Is it true about the attacks on your flat?’

‘Last night it was firecrackers. A firecracker roll, apparently. Five thousand of them. Hence the sleep on a couch.’

‘Jesus, that could have been dangerous,’ he said, face full of concern.

‘I’m fine.’

‘Did you call the guards?’

She shook her head.

‘Why not?’

She shrugged but she knew exactly why.

‘You haven’t had an easy time of it, have you?’

Her tears started up again at the sympathy. ‘I made a stupid mistake, Pete, a really bad, unprofessional mistake, and I ruined a man’s reputation, possibly his life, and for that I deserve to be punished, but,’ her tears took over again and she struggled to speak, ‘I’ve had enough now. I just want to write nice stories about good people, I want to get back to doing what it is that I love, what makes my world normal again. And I want people to believe in me again. I want you to look at me and listen to me without the doubt that I can see so obviously. I’m second-guessing myself enough as it is, Pete. I don’t need it from everyone else too.’

Pete looked at her, full of sympathy. ‘Would it be unprofessional to offer you a hug?’

‘Would it be unprofessional to accept?’ she sniffed.

Though when she thought of it after, it was rather unprofessional behaviour, but sometimes when people are involved, business has to stop being business and the human must win. However, Kitty couldn’t ignore the underlying truth that they both hung on to that hug for a little too long.

The curtains were still closed in Bob’s flat when she left the office and she contemplated calling in to give her version of events before he heard it from someone else but she decided against it. If her sleepless nights were anything to go by, she was certain he needed his rest.

‘I’ll tell him,’ she heard Pete say from the top of the stairs as he locked the door.

‘Thanks.’

He looked around the car park. ‘No bike today?’

‘It was stolen.’

He looked at her with a half-smile in disbelief. ‘Jesus, Kitty, the same people?’

‘No, no, other people. I’m a popular lady.’

He shook his head. ‘So it seems.’ He looked at her as if he had never seen her before, as if this was their very first meeting. As if it just occurred to him that she was a person in the world he had an interest in getting to know. And to her surprise, she liked it. She liked him looking at her like that. He came down the steps and they started walking together.

‘Can I give you a lift?’

‘No, thanks, I’ll walk.’

‘To Fairview?’

‘No, I’m just going as far as town.’

They reached his car and he opened the passenger door, extended his arm like an old-fashioned gentleman.

Kitty laughed. ‘I forgot that you don’t take no for an answer.’

It felt strangely intimate sitting next to him in his car.

‘Where am I driving you to?’

‘BusÁras, please.’ It was the main central station for bus routes nationwide.

‘Is this your attempt to run away?’

‘Not a bad idea. No, this is just a day trip. I’m interviewing another person on Constance’s list in Straffan. A woman named Ambrose Nolan who runs a butterfly museum and conservation site.’

‘A butterfly museum? Never heard of it.’

‘Well, then, it will make a good read.’

‘So how is this butterfly woman linked to the others you’ve met?’

‘I thought I had until Friday to tell you that,’ she said in mock indignation.

‘It’s only a week until we go to print,’ he shot back. ‘I was hoping to know what the story is before then.’

Me too, thought Kitty.

‘You know, Oisín O’Ceallaigh and Olivia Wallace have agreed to write their stories for Constance’s tribute.’

‘Really?’ Kitty’s eyes widened. ‘I can’t believe you talked them into it. Did they ask for much money?’

‘They’re doing it for free. For Constance.’

Kitty nodded. Constance had so much respect for the writers, she was glad to see them returning the support she’d given them over the years.

‘It’s a really big scoop to get stories from them, Kitty,’ Pete said. ‘No one has seen or heard from Oisín for almost ten years. Olivia hasn’t written for over five years and has turned down every publishing deal offer imaginable to return to writing.’

‘I know, I agree.’ Kitty replied emphatically, wondering why he felt he had to tell her the importance of this. These were big-name writers; it was obviously a huge deal for Etcetera to get the opportunity to publish their original stories.

‘They’re only doing this because it’s for Constance’s tribute and their stories can only be included in Constance’s tribute section if we also have Constance’s last story. Do you understand?’

Kitty swallowed. Nodded.

‘So you need to keep thinking, Lois Lane,’ he warned playfully.

‘No pressure then,’ she said, trying to hide her nerves with a smile.

‘Welcome to my world,’ he said and gave her such a vulnerable look she wanted to reach out to him. Instead she cleared her throat, severing their eye contact, and climbed out of the car.

When she reached the ticket desk they refused to let her buy a ticket. Her bus was driving off.

‘Jesus,’ she fumed, her phone starting to vibrate in her pocket. ‘What next?’ She looked at her screen: it was Steve. She had thrown the man out of his bed in the middle of the night and had probably caused his housemates to think he was terminally ill. She couldn’t ignore this call.

‘I’m sorry, I just said what you told me to say, then they read way too much into it and made it a bigger deal than it actually was. I’m sorry but I was just doing what you told me to do.’

There was a silence. ‘What are you talking about?’

‘Your housemates. They saw me this morning.’

‘Never mind them, I haven’t been home yet. Did you know he was a journalist?’ He spoke quickly, with a sense of urgency.

She sighed and sat down on a chair. ‘Steve, I know you don’t think very highly of me and my moral standards but-’

‘Did you know he was a journalist?’ He sounded like he was running and out of breath.

‘Where are you?’

‘Answer the question, Kitty.’

‘No. He told me he was writing a book. A fictional thing. A novel. He didn’t mention anything about being a journalist. I feel such an idiot.’

‘What happened?’

‘Are you running or something because you really sound like-’

‘What happened?’

‘Jesus! Okay! He showed up at the dry-cleaners like it was the biggest coincidence in the world, even though he lived on the other side of the city. I should have known. Then we went for drinks, caught up on old times, he knew nothing about Thirty Minutes, didn’t even pretend to be all that interested, which, again, I should have been suspicious of, but I’d had a few drinks, so I talked a little… then… it doesn’t matter. Then that was it. We left.’

‘No, that wasn’t it. Then what?’

‘No, it’s embarrassing, Steve. I-’

‘Tell me,’ he practically shouted at her.

‘I ended up in his place.’ She felt physically sick. ‘Oh God, I feel so… crap. What do you think I should do?’

He was quiet. Then just when she thought he’d gone, he said, ‘What do you mean, you ended up in his place?’

‘Jesus, how else can I put it? I stayed over, you know?’

‘Okay,’ he said quietly, and he hung up the phone.

Kitty stared at the phone in shock. He hung up on her, probably for the first time ever. He must have been so disgusted by her.

Kitty’s phone rang again and, assuming it was Steve to tell her their connection failed, she answered it immediately. It wasn’t.

‘Kitty, are you okay?’ Sally asked.

‘No.’

‘Where are you?’

‘BusÁras.’

‘Why?’

‘I was going to Kildare but I missed my bus.’

‘I’ll drive you.’

‘You don’t even know when I’m coming back.’

‘When are you coming back?’

‘Never.’

‘Perfect. I’ll be there in twenty minutes.’

Kitty had met Sally at a television presentation course five years previously. Sally was a meteorologist who had attained an honours degree in Mathematical Physics and, at the time, was working in Met Éireann and preparing to stretch her wings by moving into television weather presentations in the Irish language. Along with writing for Etcetera, Kitty, at that time, was preparing to make her move into television journalism after presenting a few small but successful shows on a small city channel. She had set her sights on bigger stories on a bigger network and was fine-tuning her presentation skills, which meant slowing down her speech and trying to stop looking so concerned or, in Steve’s words, constipated, when she was concentrating on remembering her words.

Sally arrived at BusÁras with the top down on her convertible, and her long blond hair tied back. Kitty quickly scuttled away from her hiding place by the vending machine with her head down and as much hair in front of her face as possible.

‘Everyone around me is reading the paper,’ Kitty explained, after embracing her friend. ‘I’m probably just being paranoid, though. I’m sure they’re not paying the slightest bit of attention to my story, they’re too busy reading about the earthquake. Aren’t they? Tell me they’re all reading about the earthquake.’

‘There was an earthquake?’ Sally asked without a hint of irony.

Kitty sighed. ‘Isn’t it your job to know about things like that?’

‘I don’t work weekends.’

‘Obviously not.’ Kitty looked up at the grey clouds they were headed towards. ‘Maybe you should put the roof up; it looks like it’s going to rain.’

Sally laughed as if she had the inside scoop, which she believed she had. ‘It’s not due to rain today.’

‘Thought it was your weekend off.’

‘I pay attention,’ she shrugged, and they laughed.

‘So, where are we going?’

‘Straffan, to a butterfly farm.’

‘Why?’

‘I’m interviewing the woman who runs it. Kind of. She doesn’t know she’s going to be interviewed yet.’

‘Be careful. Are you trying to get your own back?’

Kitty smiled but it faded quickly. ‘At least I won’t sleep with her for her story.’

Sally gasped. ‘You slept with him?’

Kitty covered her face in her hands and slid down the chair. ‘I’m a despicable human being.’

‘Not really, but you know you could have got some money for the story, or were you desperate for sex?’

Kitty laughed. ‘I’m kind of desperate for both.’

Sally gave her a sympathetic look and Kitty explained what had happened that night.

‘Have your parents called?’ she asked, after getting over her initial anger.

‘Yes. To tell me once again how embarrassed and ashamed they are of me. I just let Mum get it out of her system. It seems to help her to have a go at me but there’s nothing new there.’ She looked up at the sky as she felt a drop of rain fall on her face.

‘Did you feel that?’

‘What?’

‘Rain.’

‘It’s not going to rain today,’ Sally said confidently.

Ten minutes later they had to pull over by the side of the road while Sally manually closed the roof.

‘That’s unusual,’ Sally said, glancing up at the sky, and Kitty tried to hide her smile.

An hour and a quarter later they were fully updated on each other’s lives and they had reached the butterfly museum in Straffan. It was situated just outside the village: a charming house beside the museum with plenty of land stretching all around it. Open seven days a week during the summer months, it was composed of a tropical house with a bridge over a small pond, with butterflies fluttering all around them.

Kitty asked a young girl at the customer desk for Ambrose Nolan and was instead diverted to a bow-tie-wearing man named Eugene, who told her that Ambrose didn’t do tours. On learning Kitty was a member of the media he proceeded to take her and Sally on a personal tour of the museum, which was busy, on this reasonably good-weathered Sunday, with families and children. He was so jolly and full of such joie de vivre that Kitty couldn’t bring it upon herself to stop his excited chatter about the butterflies he seemed to love and know so well. He certainly was up with his knowledge of the various species, and she wouldn’t have been surprised if he was on a first-name basis with every butterfly in the tropical room.

‘Many of the tropical butterflies breed here so you will able to observe the entire life cycle of a butterfly,’ he explained as they stepped out to the tropical room. ‘Here you will see where they have laid eggs, caterpillars eat the food plants, then they become well-camouflaged pupae, and if you’re lucky you can watch a butterfly emerge from a pupa to start a new life with wings and set off on its first flight.’

Sally widened her eyes sarcastically at Kitty.

Kitty ignored her and looked around for Ambrose. ‘So you said Ambrose doesn’t do guided tours, but does Ambrose work here?’

‘Oh, indeed, Ambrose has been working here for the past… well, since she was a child. Her mother and father opened the museum and when Ambrose was old enough she helped run the family business. She has been instrumental in developing what was initially just a small museum into this great centre. She extended the museum, which used to be in what is now the gift shop, into this great big exhibition room, she introduced the café and picnic area, which as you can see was a marvellous idea, and five years ago she opened the tropical room. If it wasn’t for Ambrose, these facilities just simply wouldn’t be here today,’ he said proudly.

‘Is she here today?’ Kitty tried again.

‘She’s here every day,’ he laughed. ‘She lives next door but she doesn’t see visitors. Now let me bring you through to the museum and I can show you what we do in more detail. The framed butterflies are from surplus captive-bred butterflies; they are not collected in the wild,’ he explained seriously as he led them to the gallery.

Sally gave Kitty a withered look but Kitty prodded her and they followed him, while Kitty looked around for a way to get to the house next door.

The gallery consisted of dried butterflies exhibited in sealed timber frames with an internal mount and brass plate.

‘These are perfect specimens,’ Eugene explained, and a few customers drew nearer to them to listen to the talk. ‘They haven’t been altered in any way. Specimens last for fifty years but must not be hung in direct sunlight. Many of the butterflies are over one hundred years old and are still as bright as the day they were originally flying.’

He looked at them, his face flushed with the thrill of the idea.

‘Fascinating,’ Kitty said, looking at the wall and wondering how to change the conversation. ‘Is it possible for me to speak with Ambrose today?’

‘I’m afraid Ambrose isn’t working in the museum today.’

‘Is she at home? Could I call to her there?’

‘Oh, I doubt she’s in there on a day like this,’ Eugene chuckled. ‘Ambrose is working on a butterfly conservation garden on her land. She really is extremely dedicated to protecting our butterflies and making sure we don’t do damage to their natural populations or environments.’

Kitty looked out at the picnic area and saw the ‘Private. Staff Only’ gate leading from the premises.

‘She sounds like a wonderful woman,’ Sally said.

‘Oh, yes indeed, she is,’ Eugene became a little flustered and he blushed. ‘She has dedicated her life to conserving butterflies. Ms Logan,’ he lowered his voice so that the people listening to his lecture wouldn’t overhear, ‘Ambrose is… very private, you see. If there’s anything you would like me to ask her for you I promise I will do so and get in immediate contact with you. It’s just that… well, Ambrose is private,’ he repeated and then he resumed his normal tone. ‘This beautiful butterfly here is called the Dark Green Fritillary from the Nymphalidae family, also known as Mesoacidalia aglaia. It is a large, powerful, bright orange butterfly, which you often see battling with the breeze on a cliff top, limestone pavement or sand dune. Startlingly visible yet frustratingly evasive, it is a grassland species that breeds on common dog-violet. Both sexes have a greenish underside on the hindwing.’

As more people gathered around to hear Eugene speak, Kitty slowly backed away from the group while he was distracted. She headed straight to the picnic area, and when she noticed Eugene looking in her direction warily, she pointed discreetly to the ladies’ toilet and he nodded and continued his talk. As soon as he looked away Kitty hurried to the gate that said, ‘Private. Staff Only’. She pushed it open and stepped into a wonderland, a long lawn bursting with colour, butterflies fluttering to and fro, skimming her nose as they hurried to get out of her way. At the end of the garden Kitty saw a stooped figure.

‘Excuse me,’ Kitty called.

The figure stood up straight, turned round, then turned her back on Kitty. She pulled her hair down, long wild red hair, like fire, that fell to the small of her back.

‘Stop!’ she called, and her voice was so adamant that Kitty immediately halted.

‘I’m sorry,’ Kitty called. ‘My name is-’

‘You’re not allowed in here,’ the woman shouted.

‘Yes, I know, I’m very sorry, I-’

‘This is private premises. Please go back!’

Her voice was authoritative, but Kitty discerned a note of panic at the periphery of her words, and her posture showed she was afraid.

Kitty took steps back and then changed her mind. She had one chance to do this.

‘My name is Kitty Logan,’ she called. ‘I work for Etcetera magazine. I wanted to talk to you about your stunning set-up here. I’m sorry to have frightened you. I just wanted to talk to you.’

‘Eugene deals with press,’ she barked. ‘Out!’ Then she added more gently, ‘Please.’

Kitty backed away but when at the gate she tried one more time. ‘I just need to know one thing. Did Constance Dubois contact you at any stage in the past year?’

She expected to be shouted at again, to find the gardening fork being flung at her head, but instead there was silence.

‘Constance,’ she said suddenly and Kitty’s heart started racing. ‘Constance Dubois,’ she repeated.

Ambrose still wouldn’t turn around.

‘Yes. Do you know her?’ Kitty asked.

‘She called me. One time. She asked about a caterpillar.’

‘She did?’ Kitty asked, in shock, her mind racing. Had these names got to do with her initial interview? ‘An Oleander caterpillar?’

‘That means something to you?’

‘Yes,’ Kitty said breathlessly, trying to take it in and process what this could possibly mean for a story.

Ambrose finally turned round but all Kitty could see was her wild hair. ‘You can wait for me in there.’ She pointed the gardening fork at the open door that led to her house.

Kitty looked at it in surprise. ‘Thank you.’

She stepped inside and found herself in the kitchen. It was a modest home, a charming country cottage that had been updated but kept true to its roots. The Aga took over the room, its heat still emanating from breakfast time. She sat at the kitchen table and watched the woman finish up work, make her way towards the house, head down, all wild red hair covering her, still not meeting Kitty’s eye even as she stepped into the house and asked her if she’d like a cup of tea.

Kitty thought of Sally being lectured on butterflies of Ireland by Eugene and guiltily said yes to the tea. Ambrose did most of her talking with her back turned, and when she finally sat at the rectangular table, which seated eight, she chose to sit not opposite Kitty but at the end of the table, at the corner, looking away. It took a long time and an awkward warming-up conversation for Kitty finally to be able to make eye contact with Ambrose, and when she did she noticed something unusual. Ambrose had eyes of different colours, one a striking green and the other a deep dark brown. And it wasn’t just that: when her thick hair finally did move a centimetre from where it had been strategically placed, Kitty could see the discoloration that spread from the middle of her forehead and went down her nose, over her lips, half her chin, and disappeared beneath her high-collared blouse. The burn, if it was that, looked like a flame licking unevenly at the right side of her face, and as quickly as Kitty had seen it, it disappeared again as the thick veil of red hair was closed, and one bright green eye remained staring out at the kitchen table.