The Gallaghers of Ardmore Trilogy

so I could pick up some books on gardening.”
    “Books on it.” Brenna pursed her lips. Imagine, she thought, needing to read about planting. “Well, I don’t know where you’d find such a thing in Ardmore, but you could likely find what you’re looking for over inDungar-van or into Waterford City for certain. Still, if you want to know something about your flowers here, you’ve only to ask my mother. She’s a keen gardener, Ma is.”
    Brenna glanced over her shoulder at the sound of a car. “Well, here’s Mrs. Duffy and Betsy Clooney come ’round to say welcome. I’ll move my lorry out of your street so they can pull in. Mrs. Duffy will have brought cakes,” Brenna added. “She’s famed for them.” She waved cheerfully to the two women in the car. “Just give a shout down the hill if you’ve a need for something.”
    “Yes, I—” Oh, God, was all Jude could think, don’t leave me alone with strangers. But Brenna was hopping back in her truck.
    She zipped out with what Jude considered a reckless and dashing disregard for the narrow slot in the hedgerows or the possibility, however remote, of oncoming traffic, then squeezed fender to fender with the car to chat a moment with the new visitors.
    Jude stood mentally wringing her hands as the truck bumped away down the road and the car pulled in.
    “Good day to you, Miss Murray!” The woman behind the wheel had eyes bright as a robin’s and light brown hair that had been beaten into submission. She wore it in a tight helmet of waves under a brutal layer of spray. It glinted like shellack in the sun.
    She popped out of the car, ample breasts and hips plugged onto short legs and tiny feet.
    Jude pasted a smile on her face and dragged herself toward the garden gate like a woman negotiating a walk down death row. As she rattled her brain for the proper greeting, the woman yanked open the rear door of the car, chattering away to Jude and to the second woman, who stepped out of the passenger side. And, it seemed, to the world in general.
    “I’m Kathy Duffy from down to the village, and this is Betsy Clooney, my niece on my sister’s side. Patty Mary, my sister, works at the food shop today or she’d’ve come to pay her respects as well. But I said to Betsy this morning, why if she could get her neighbor to mind the baby while the two older were in school, we’d just come on up to Faerie Hill Cottage and say good day to Old Maude’s cousin from America.”
    She said most of this with her rather impressive bottom, currently covered by the eye-popping garden of red poppies rioting over her dress, facing Jude as she wiggled into the back of the car. She wiggled out again, face slightly flushed, with a covered cake dish and a beaming smile.
    “You look a bit like your grandmother,” Kathy went on, “as I remember her from when I was a girl. I hope she’s well.”
    “Yes, very. Thank you. Ah, so nice of you to come by.” She opened the gate. “Please come in.”
    “I hope we gave you time enough to settle.” Betsy walked around the car, and Jude remembered her from the pub the night before. The woman with her family at one of the low tables. Somehow even that vague connection helped.
    “I mentioned to Aunt Kathy that I saw you at the pub last night, at Gallagher’s? And we thought you might be ready for a bit of a welcome.”
    “You were with your family. Your children were so well behaved.”
    “Oh, well.” Betsy rolled eyes of clear glass green. “No need to disabuse you of such a notion so soon. You’ve none of your own, then?”
    “No, I’m not married. I’ll make some tea if you’d like,” she began as they stepped inside the front door.
    “That would be lovely.” Kathy started down the hall,obviously comfortable in the cottage. “We’ll have a nice visit in the kitchen.”
    To Jude’s surprise, they did. She spent a pleasant hour with two women who had warm ways and easy laughs. It was simple enough to judge that Kathy Duffy was a chatterbox, and not a little opinionated, but she did it all with great good humor.
    Before the hour was over, Jude’s head swam with the names and relations of the people of Ardmore, the feuds and the families, the weddings and the wakes. If there was something Katherine Anne Duffy didn’t know about any soul who lived in the area during the last century, well, it wasn’t worth mentioning.
    “It’s a pity you never met Old Maude,” Kathy commented. “For she was a fine