The Gallaghers of Ardmore Trilogy

windows. She wondered if she’d ever been happier.
    And fell asleep with the light burning and her reading glasses slipping down her nose.
     
    In the daylight, with the rain and mist whisked away by the breeze, her world was a different place. The light glowed soft and turned the fields to an aching green. She could hear birds, which reminded her that she needed to dig out the book she’d bought on identifying species. Still, at the moment it was so nice just to stand and listen to that liquid warbling. It didn’t seem to matter what bird was singing, so long as it sang.
    Walking across the thick, springy grass seemed almost like a sacrilege, but it was a sin Jude couldn’t resist.
    On the hill beside the village, she saw the ruin of the once grand cathedral dedicated to Saint Declan and the glorious round tower that ruled over it. She thought briefly of the figure she’d thought she’d seen there in the rain. And shivered.
    Foolish. It was just a place, after all. An interesting and historical site. Her grandmother, and her guidebook, had told her about the ogham inscriptions inside and the Romanesque arcading. She would go there and see for herself.
    And to the east, if memory served, beyond the cliff hotel, was the ancient Saint Declan’s Well with its three stone crosses and stone chair.
    She would visit the ruins, and the well, climb the cliff path, and perhaps walk around the headland one day soon. Her guidebook had assured her the views were spectacular.
    But today she wanted quieter, simpler things.
    The waters of the bay shimmered blue as they flowed into the deeper tones of the sea. The flat, wide beach was deserted.
    Another morning, she thought, she would drive to the village just to walk alone on the beach.
    Today was for rambling over the fields, just as she’d imagined, away from the village with her eyes on the mountains. She forgot she’d only meant to check on the flowers, to orient herself to the area just around the cottage before she attended to practical matters.
    She needed to arrange for a phone jack in the spare bedroom so she could access the Net for research. She needed to call Chicago and let her family know she was safe and well. Certainly she needed to go into the village and find out where she could shop and bank.
    But it was so glorious out, with the air gentle as a kiss, the breeze just cool enough to clear the last of the travel fatigue from her mind, that she kept walking, kept looking until her shoes were wet from the rain-soaked grass.
    Like slipping into a painting, she thought again, one animated with the flutter of leaves, the sounds of birds, the smell of wet, growing things.
    When she saw another house it was almost a shock. It was nestled just off the road behind the hedgerows and rambled front, back, and sideways as if different pieces of it had been plopped down carelessly on a whim. And somehow it worked, she decided. It was a charming combinationof stone and wood, juts and overhangs with flowers rioting in both the front yard and the back. Beyond the gardens in the rear was a shed—what her grandmother would have called a cabin—with tools and machines tumbling out the door.
    In the driveway she saw a car, covered with stone-gray paint, and looking as though it had come off the assembly line years before Jude had been born.
    A big yellow dog slept, in a patch of sunlight in the side yard, or she assumed it slept. It was on its back with its feet in the air like roadkill.
    The O’Tooles’ house? Jude wondered, then decided it must be so when a woman came out the back door with a basket of laundry.
    She had brilliant red hair and the wide-hipped, sturdy frame that Jude would imagine in a woman required to carry and birth five children. The dog, proving she was alive, rolled over to her side and thumped her tail twice as the woman marched to the clothesline.
    It occurred to Jude that she’d never actually seen anyone hang clothes before. It wasn’t something even the most dedicated of housewives tended to do in downtown Chicago. It seemed like a mindless and thereby soul-soothing process to her. The woman took pegs from the pocket of her apron, clamped them in her mouth as she bent to take a pillowcase from the basket. Snapped it briskly, then clamped it to the line. The next item was dealt with in the same way and shared the second peg.
    Fascinating.
    She worked down the line, without any obvious hurry, with the yellow dog for company, emptying her basket