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‘Lucy, he said, ‘you weren’t there for Uncle Peter’s account of Parnell’s funeral, were you? At one point Young James interrupted at the mention of a young woman called Maud Gonne who was a friend of the poet W.B. Yeats.’

‘I was reading Yeats that last day at Butler’s Court, Francis, when you raided Mulcahy’s.’

‘Maybe that’s an omen. Anyway, Young James said Gonne was Yeats’s bitch goddess, she wouldn’t marry him, she wouldn’t leave him alone.’

‘What’s that got to do with this letter, Francis?’ asked Lady Lucy.

Her husband held it up. ‘It comes from Boston, Massachusetts. This is Young James’s handwriting. There’s no precise address, and no date. The front side says Bitch and the back says Goddess. Then the front side says:

‘Fasten your hair with a golden pin,

And bind up every wandering tress;

I bade my heart build these poor rhymes:

It worked at them, day out, day in,

Building a sorrowful loveliness

Out of the battles of old times.

‘You need but lift a pearl-pale hand,

And bind up your long hair and sigh;

And all men’s hearts must burn and beat;

And candle-like foam on the dim sand,

And stars climbing the dew-dropping sky,

Live but to light your passing feet.’

‘It’s so beautiful, Francis,’ said Lady Lucy. ‘Do you think the poet is still writing to his bitch goddess?’

‘I’m sure that’s what Young James thinks. He was always very fond of Yeats. But don’t you see, Lucy, he’s letting us know that he’s alive, that he’s in America for the present. Maybe Young James will come back some day.’

‘And what does the other side of the letter say?’

Powerscourt read very quietly, pausing every now and then to look into Lady Lucy’s eyes.

‘Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths,

Enwrought with golden and silver light,

The blue and the dim and the dark cloths

Of night and light and the half light,

I would spread the cloths under your feet:

But I, being poor, have only my dreams;

I have spread my dreams under your feet;

Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.’