Danny Boy Read Online Free Page A

mother, ‘Danny can remove the nightdress in any way he chooses and if he’s too slow, I’ll help him, so I will.’
    Chrissie’s smile was tremulous, but it was at least a smile and both Rosie and Geraldine were glad to see it. Rosie gave her sister another hug and returned to her seat before her mother should come in
    Connie had offered Rosie the loan of her wedding dress, to save the young couple money and when Rosie had seen it,shimmering satin with an overdress of lace and a large train, she felt her eyes fill with tears at her generosity. A neighbour woman ran up dresses of white satin for Rosie and Danny’s sisters on her treadle sewing machine and they were decorated by Sarah and Elizabeth with beads and little pink and blue rosebuds.
    Then, Minnie announced she was going to Dublin to buy clothes for Seamus and Dermot. ‘The trousers on the suit your father wears for Mass have worn thin. They’re always shining on the knees and don’t hold the crease for five minutes and the jacket is downright shabby.’
    Rosie knew she was right, but she worried at the expense of it, what with them already paying out for the reception although it was being held at Danny’s house as it was bigger ‘Oh Mammy, Daddy will be fine in what he has,’ she protested. ‘Don’t be spending money like this.’
    ‘Och, sure aren’t you the first to be married?’ Minnie said and a rare smile touched her lips for a moment. ‘We’ll do the job properly or not at all.’
    ‘But Dermot, Mammy. He’s just a wee boy. What does he need?’
    ‘I want him in a sailor suit,’ Minnie said. ‘In the paper it said they were the talk of the place in England. Won’t he look a little dote in one. Of course you’d get nothing like that in this town, but I’m sure to find something in the fine shops in Dublin.’
    Rosie knew then why her mother was making the trip. It wasn’t for her father’s suit at all. The material could have been bought at the drapers’ in the town and run up by a seamstress the way it was always done, but, Dermot had to be dressed as a wee sailor on her wedding day. She said nothing, she had no wish to argue with her mother now and anyway there was little point. Her mother was blind and deaf to reason where the child was concerned.
    Dermot didn’t care whether he had a sailor suit or not. He didn’t even want to go and see his Rosie marry a man whowould be taking her away and he said so forcibly and shed so many and such bitter tears that Rosie felt immensely sorry for him. So little had been denied Dermot in his young life that he thought he just had to say that he didn’t want Rosie to go and she wouldn’t. It was a shock for him to realise that Rosie was going ahead with her plans, regardless of what he thought. ‘Don’t you love me any more? he asked plaintively.
    ‘Dermot, Of course I love you. I’ll always love you.’
    ‘Not as much as you love Danny Walsh.’
    ‘I love you differently,’ Rosie corrected. ‘It’s all part of growing up, getting married and leaving home. Nearly everyone does in the end and I’ll not be far away. You can come and visit as often as you are let.’
    Dermot scrubbed at his wet cheeks with the sleeve of his jersey. ‘It won’t be the same.’
    Rosie, moved by the sadness in Dermot’s face bent down and put her arms about him. ‘I know it won’t and I can’t do anything to make that better, but I want you to remember something always.’
    ‘What?’
    ‘That you are very, very special to me. My own wee brother and wherever I am you will always hold part of my heart.’
    Dermot was only slightly mollified by Rosie’s words, but he did at least begin to see that whatever he did or said, would change nothing and the days rolled by one into another.
    The day before the wedding, Rosie felt herself looking around her home, seeing her room, her sisters, her parents and little distressed Dermot in a new light, knowing soon she was leaving them behind her. She loved