A Mother's Spirit Read Online Free

urgently.’
    ‘I’ll attend to it all directly, sir,’ Planchard said.

    Brian began to mount the ornate staircase, still with Gloria in his arms, while the butler said to Joe, ‘If you would follow me, sir …’
    Joe smiled ruefully because it was a novelty being called ‘sir’ and it had happened twice. Wondering what sort of room a drawing room was, he left down his bag and followed the butler, who crossed the black-and-white-tiled hall and opened cream double doors to a low and elegant room with a carpet so thick Joe’s feet sank into it. ‘If you will just wait here, sir,’ the butler said, ‘I am sure that Mr Brannigan will be with you shortly.’
    Left alone, Joe glanced around the room with interest and a little fear, for he felt totally out of his depth. The room was lit with electric lights set around the walls and in a huge glass chandelier, which hung from the patterned ceiling. A gold suite was drawn up in front of the white marble fireplace where a welcoming fire blazed in the grate. Joe delicately ran his hands over the brocade pattern of the upholstery and wondered if he would ever dare to sit on one of those chairs.
    He glanced at the small ornate clock on the mantelpiece. It was made of gold, which sparkled in the firelight, and had a glass front so the swinging pendulum was visible. ‘Almost six o’clock,’ Joe said to himself and, looking out where the silken curtains to either side of the large window had not been drawn, he saw the evening was as black as pitch.
    He crossed the room and stood for a long time peering out at the grounds surrounding the house, marvelling at it all. He thought back to his many, uneventful years in Ireland. He knew that when he thought about his new life in America he could never have imagined the chain of events that had landed him in a house such as this, as the invited guest of such an obviously prominent and wealthy man. He tingled with excitement for he just knew that his life would take off from this point.

    He wished no harm at all on the beautiful young lady he had rescued from danger and yet he couldn’t but thank his lucky stars that her father was a factory owner. He just knew that Brian Brannigan could shape his future in America.
    ‘Ah, there you are, my boy.’
    Joe swung around from the window. Brian was standing in the doorway arm in arm with a lady whom he introduced as his wife, Norah. The resemblance to Gloria was marked. Joe guessed that once the older woman’s hair had been just as strikingly blonde as her daughter’s, but now it was much duller and tied from her face in a sort of fancy bun at the nape of her neck. She had the same high cheekbones, and the same-shaped eyes, though Norah’s were plain blue. Behind them Joe saw the resentment and he knew that Mrs Brannigan didn’t want the likes of him sitting down at her table.
    When Brian had told Norah of the accident and of Joe’s part in it and went on to say that he had invited the man to dinner, she had looked at him as if she couldn’t believe her ears. She had been up to see Gloria, and she was distressed and worried, and now this other bombshell.
    ‘You have invited that man to dinner, here?’ she’d repeated.
    ‘Aye,’ said Brian. ‘I did.’
    ‘And why, pray, did you do that?’
    ‘Do what, my dear?’ Brian had asked mildly.
    ‘Oh, don’t be so obtuse, Brian,’ Norah asked. ‘Why ask a common workman to dinner?’
    ‘Didn’t I explain what he did, and that if he hadn’t been there—’
    ‘Of course you have explained,’ Norah snapped. ‘Though if you had acted as a proper father and refused to take Gloria to such an unsuitable place then she would have been in no danger whatsoever. But whatever he did I’m sure the man would hardly have expected to be asked to dine with us. Why didn’t you thank him sincerely, as I am preparedto do, offer him a sum of money and send him on his way? Find him a job if you must, but to ask him to dinner is madness. Surely