Kennedy's death and old Joe Kennedy's, she hardly mentioned. Her own health was failing by then, though I didn't realize it. As her beloved Walter put it, ‘Nora were never one to skryke about her aches and pains.’ I asked him if she'd believed there was a gypsy curse on the Kennedys. There had been a lot of stories about that, after Jack and Bobby's deaths.
‘Nay, lad,’ he said. ‘In fact it got on her pippin when folk brought that up. Nora always reckoned old man Kennedy didn't need any gypsy curse to bring him calamities. He brought them on himself, the way he thought he could buy the world, the way he pushed them lads into the spotlight. Pride goeth before a fall, that were her opinion.’
I said, ‘I wish Aunt Nora had written about her Kennedy years. She must have had some stories.’
He said, ‘But she did write about them. That first cottage we had at Edinsor, she sat at the kitchen table and wrote everything down in exercise books. She called it her “Memoirs,” said she were only doing it to stop herself going round the bend with nothing to look at only sheep and trees. She liked the city best, you know, Nora? She liked busyness. She only endured all this beautiful countryside for me, God bless her. Should you like to see her writings some time? If my memory serves, they're in the back of her tallboy.’ So Aunt Nora's notebooks, with multiplication tables printed on the back cover and that old-lady smell of mothballs and dried lavender, came into my possession. This is her story.
Ramon N. Mulcahy, New York, 1972
ACCIDENTALLY, THROUGH THE KEYHOLE
Herself came to the house at Smith Square. It was April 1948. She was meant to be going directly to Paris for gown fittings but then she announced she was coming to London first, to visit with Kick. Landed on us with all her bags and baggage as if it was the Ritz we were running. Now I've seen Mrs Kennedy walk away when her own child lay sick in bed, turn her back on him sooner than delay a shopping trip, so we knew she wasn't coming for the pleasure of it. There was trouble on the agenda.
Walter had to have the car at the aerodrome by eight o'clock. Too early for Kick to get herself out of bed and go with him.
I said, ‘I'd have thought you'd make the effort. Go and meet her, get off on the right foot.’
‘No fear,’ she said. ‘Talk about being trapped in a confined space. It could feel like a very long drive.’
I was worried Mrs K would start quizzing Walter about what had been going on, if she had him to herself. I said, ‘Just act dumb.’
‘Nora,’ he said, ‘I don't need to act. When you've been driving gentry for thirty-five years dumb comes natural.’
It was about eleven when they arrived. She looked as smart as a brass button, as usual. You'd never have guessed she'd been on an airplane all night. She walked right past me in the hallway, unsnapped the fox head on her stole, handed it to Delia and made straight for the drawing room still wearing her little hat, one of those round chocolate-box affairs with a bit of net veiling that came down over her brow.
‘Kaaaaathleeen,’ she started. ‘We are going to have a very serious talk.’
I don't care how many elocution lessons she's taken, she still has a voice on her that would clip a thorn bush. And it was something to see how that girl crumbled the minute she saw her mammy. She was like a naughty child who knew she'd be getting the strap.
It was all about Blood Fitzwilliam. It had finally dawned on Mrs K that Kick wasn't as worried as she might have been about her money being cut off, so she'd come in person to threaten her with the everlasting fires of hell. The lovebirds were in the country when the cablegram came, seeing his horses put through their paces on Newmarket Heath, but Kick came hurrying back to town as soon as she heard her mammy was coming. She knew she was in hot water.
She said, ‘Mother can have my room. The guest room's too small for her. Give my room an extra spit and polish. I want everything to be perfect.’
I said, ‘Then you'd better get yourself round to Farm Street and see Father D'Arcy because the first thing she'll want to know is, have you been to confession? What bedroom we put her in will be the least of it.’
She gave me one of her monkey faces. And that room of hers needed more than spit and polish. I've done my best with those children over the years but there's not a one of them ever learned to hang up a jacket.
I said, ‘What will we do about dinners? Will you have company in while she's here?’
She said, ‘If you mean Blood, no. He's going to make himself scarce. Maybe I'll invite Sissy though. Mother thinks Sissy sets the perfect example. Or maybe we should have tray suppers and I'll read aloud from Lives of the Saints. I just want to stop her ranting till Daddy's met Blood. He'll talk her round. I think Blood and Daddy'll really get on.’
I didn't. No more than a pair of turkey cocks could be left in the same pen. Mr K liked people he could order around and so did Lord Fitzwilliam. And as for anybody talking Herself round, the very idea was nonsense. There was only ever going to be one thing that would satisfy her, and that was for Kick to go home and marry a nice Catholic boy, if one could be found who'd overlook her history. I knew Kick would put up a fight but I was sure her mammy would win the day and that'd be the end of that. Blood Fitzwilliam would be given his marching orders, Smith Square would be let go and so would we.
Well, then it started. All you could hear was Mrs K's voice.
‘Look at me when I'm talking to you, Kathleen.’
‘Perfect purity and self-control, that's what you were taught at Sacred Heart.’
‘After everything that's been done for you, Kathleen Kennedy. Every advantage in life you've been given.’
The few bits I didn't manage to hear accidentally through the keyhole I could guess. Promises of hellfire and damnation. The threat of being cut off, not just from her daddy's deep pockets. From the holy sacraments as well. As long as her mammy was calling her ‘Kathleen’ I knew there had been no progress. They'd had no lunch, not even a glass of soda taken in, and it got well past the time when Mrs K usually takes her afternoon rest. Then things fell quiet. Herself came out from the drawing room and told Delia she was going upstairs to nap and wasn't to be disturbed till five o'clock. Kick was asleep in an armchair when I went in, curled up in her stocking feet with a little sodden hanky balled up on her lap. Round One had gone to Mother.
Then it was my turn.
Delia said, ‘She's rung for a glass of milk, Nora, to be taken up by you, most particular. Thank God. She frightens the bejaysus out of me.’
There she lay, waiting for me, in those old pink napping pyjamas she's had for a hundred years and frownies stuck all over her forehead, to smooth out any lines the morning's shenanigans had brought on. She was a sight. You wouldn't have known her for that bandbox little body that had walked in from the limousine.
‘Nora, dear heart,’ she said. Patted the bed for me to sit down like we were old pals. ‘What a to-do. Now, I need you to help me.’
So it was ‘Nora dear heart’, for the time being. But I've been long enough around Mrs K to know you can be a ‘dear heart’ one minute and on the bus with your valise and no references the next.
She said, ‘This is a very grave situation. Kathleen still talks of marrying this person. Did you know? Has she talked to you about her plans?’
I said, ‘As far as I know Lord Fitzwilliam didn't get his divorce yet.’
‘Well,’ she said, ‘that's something. I wonder how it's being arranged? I wonder whether the wife could be persuaded to keep him? What do we know about her? Would she be interested in money?’
I said, ‘I believe she has money.’
She said, ‘I'm sure she could use more. It isn't just the marriage, though that