secret. It was just as well they never knew that the father was married, Katie often thought.
When they died two years later—her father first, after a stroke, followed by her mother, whose heart gave out just a few weeks later—Katie decided she needed a fresh start. The thin gold band on her left hand hadn’t fooled the neighbors, and she didn’t want Caitlin growing up in a place where everyone called her a bastard child. Katie had kept in touch with Nuala over the years. She’d moved back to Ireland, too, with the man she’d met in London, and they were now raising their young family in a picturesque village called Valleymount, in County Wicklow. Known as “the garden of Ireland,” with its lush hills, cascading waterfalls, and glassy lakes, it had seemed to Katie on the two occasions that she’d been to visit that it would be the ideal place to raise Caitlin. So she sold her parents’ property and used the proceeds to buy a tiny cottage near her friend.
It turned out to be a good move. Caitlin’s early years were spent with a pack of other village kids, running barefoot through the pretty glens and swimming in the nearby Blessington Lakes. Work was hard to come by in eighties Ireland, but Katie managed to find a job as a cleaner in one of the luxury hotels nearby. Each day, after school, the little girl would help Katie dust the bedrooms and restock the toiletries. And, even though there might not be much money, mother and daughter were happy. Twice a year, they would take the hour’s bus ride into Dublin and spend the day shopping on Grafton Street before having afternoon tea in Bewley’s. But the rest of the time, they were content with Valleymount—and each other.
“You’re so lucky, Katie,” Nuala would remark enviously. “Caitlin’s an angel.” Her own daughter, Róisín, was anything but.
When Caitlin turned twelve, it was time for her to go to the local secondary school, Holy Cross. With less than twenty pupils per class, most of whom she’d grown up with, it was like spending each day with a large extended family. She was bright, but not especially academic. Her real talent and interest was art. She spent hours drawing and could capture a likeness with a few brief pencil strokes.
Of course, her adolescence brought more changes. With her Snow White looks—jet black hair and milk white skin—she was rapidly becoming a beauty, much like her mother. And as the puppy fat melted away, leaving behind womanly curves, the boys she had once played easily with turned shy around her. Tongue-tied, they took turns asking her to the pictures, but she always refused. Boys were the one area forbidden to her.
She had no idea why she wasn’t allowed out on dates. All her friends were. Saturday nights, they would head into town to go bowling with their latest boyfriends.
“Sneak out after yer mam’s asleep and join us,” Róisín said. Like their mothers, the two girls were best friends.
But Caitlin never did. As always, she obeyed her mother. It was because it was just the two of them. They had to pull together, couldn’t live in a permanent state of war like Róisín and Nuala. Róisín never understood. But that’s because she
had
a father, Caitlin reasoned; while hers had died before she was born, leaving her mother to raise her singlehandedly. Financially, it had always been tough. Caitlin wasn’t about to add to her mother’s worries.
Sometimes Caitlin wondered why Katie hadn’t ever remarried. There were plenty of men around the village who seemed interested. But her mother would always clam up whenever she asked, and Caitlin guessed that she still hadn’t gotten over her father’s death. She never pressed the subject, and mother and daughter lived happily and effortlessly together. That was, until six months ago.
Caitlin first realized her mother was ill one night after dinner. As she emptied the leftovers into the trash, she noticed that her mam had barely touched the shepherd’s