And then it was five in the morning, or near enough to it, and still they were singing. Someone sang “The Parting Glass”—maybe Doonan, or Julia, trying to get rid of them, trying to drop them a hint? But nobody went anywhere, and then it was “Hard Times,” at which people were damp-eyed all over again, which just seemed indulgent, somehow, which seemed just to be wallowing in things; none of them had had their legs blown off, after all, at least not as far as Catherine, from her perch on James’s legs, could see. And Catherine was, by now, very, very drunk. And although the singing now seemed to be over for the night—“The Parting Glass” once more — still Catherine, with the encouragement of James and the even more enthusiastic encouragement of Nate — stood up by the fireplace and she sang the words of a song she had learned in school, and which she had forgotten that she still knew, and which was a song in Irish, and the words of it seemed to flow beautifully back to her, but then, all of a sudden, the words were gone from her, completely and utterly gone from her, and she realized that she did not have a clue, that she did not have this song, not anything more than the tune of it, at all, and so she made them up, the words; she made up not only the words, but the sounds of them. Because they were in Irish, and she could not, anymore, speak in Irish; who could? And who would notice? All Irish words sounded the same, once you were singing them in that low, sweet, melancholy way, after all — and she knew other Irish words, and she added other Irish-sounding words, and she wove them together, and she made them into the song. If the song had been in English, she would really not have been able to do this without sounding ridiculous, she thought, so she complimented herself, congratulated herself, as she sang, on having had the foresight, really, to have chosen this one. And she got as far as the chorus — or her version, anyway, of the chorus — and the sounds slid to a stop, and she bowed her head the way she had seen all the other singers do, and she said, Thanks, thank you, I think I’ll leave it there, and they roared — they roared in appreciation, and they roared in admiration, and they roared, it struck her a moment, as she staggered back to James and James’s lap, a horrible moment later, in hilarity — someone actually howled with laughter — had that been James? Would he do that to her? No, no, it had been someone else, someone they did not know, some fucker, some old fucker; Die, she thought. Go away and get on with just fucking dying—and someone cheered — and she loved this person, though maybe not — and someone held up their hands, clapping. And everything holds up its arms weeping, that came to her; that was a poem — Hughes, the new book. She shook it away. There was clapping, there was cheering; she needed to concentrate on the cheering. She needed to concentrate on James, on his beautiful, laughing face — no, just laughing face, that was the rule, just his laughing face — as he stood up, now, to take her in his arms — no, to hug her, just to hug her; friends hug, that was what friends did — and to laugh his kisses into her ear, into her hair, and to pull away from her, shaking his head, as though thinking of the wonder of her, of the wonderful wonder. Wonderful wonder; that was not from the Hughes. And Nate, beside her now as well, and someone shouted, Who cares about the bloody words, and Julia Doonan came over to her and said, Inspired, darling, delightful, and the room was getting back to itself, and part of Catherine felt very embarrassed about what had just happened, part of her wanted to curl up and die, but that was a part of her, she knew, that she would not have to face up to until the next day, and all that mattered was that she was here and she was now, sitting so cozily with James, bundled up on his lap; the armchair they were sitting on was in a kind of alcove, so it was as though they were hidden, protected, secreted away from the rest of the room, draped with a blanket that had come from somewhere—Love, love / I have hung our cave with roses—and as though this space, in which they were talking, was made only for them, only for their closeness, and their laughter, and the stories they had to tell each other and the things they had to discuss, and they went over everything, everything, not just the party and the stuff about Ed and Nate, but the whole evening, the opening, and how it had felt, the way they were looked at, the way they were here, the youngest, the kids, people thinking them interesting, thinking them beautiful, and wasn’t it funny, weren’t they a pair?
“I’ll be back in a minute,” James said, after maybe half an hour of this, or maybe an hour, and he kissed her on the cheek and went to the bathroom, or wherever, and he did not come back in a minute, and when Catherine went to look for him, she could not find him, and she could not work it out, how this place worked, how it was laid out, Michael and Julia Doonan’s mezzanine and Michael and Julia Doonan’s split-level kitchen and Michael and Julia Doonan’s little balcony out onto the street; might James be on it, the little balcony out onto the street? So she stepped out there, and she looked at the moon, which was still out, stubborn against the sunrise, which was coming, which would be beautiful. But fuck it, all sunrises were beautiful. Who had time for sunrises? And someone took her elbow, and she was frightened because she was on a balcony, and because the fresh air — fresh air, she now remembered, was the worst thing for drunkenness; it was like taking drunkenness and jeering at it, so that it became riled up and driven to do its very worst — had made things pitch and spin, had made them unpredictable, but it was James, thank heavens, and James was telling her something about a goat.
“Coat,” he said, urgently, shaking his head. “Coats, Catherine. Where are they? Where did that girl put them when we got here?”
A girl had put things somewhere; that was right, the girl who had allowed them, for a few minutes, to pretend that this was their home; the home in which they sat and listened to music and were served wine by girls in white shirts and black waistcoats.
“They must be in the downstairs bedroom,” James said. “Fuck.”
“Why fuck?” Catherine said, almost dreamily.
“You’re going in to get them,” he said, steering her down the wooden staircase, steering her towards a door — she had not seen it until now — at the end of the corridor leading away from the big central room.
“OK, Mother Superior,” she said, sniggering at him, and then they were at the door, and he was opening it, and pushing her into the room.
Nate was there, asleep on the bed, fully dressed, asleep on top of a pile of coats, which made her snigger again: he looked so untidy, lying there, so unkempt and so undignified. One arm stretched out towards the head of the bed, and his legs spread-eagled; Catherine felt the irresistible urge to take off his shoes. Not out of kindness, not out of consideration, or wanting to help him to be more comfortable; just out of mischief. She would put them, maybe, on top of the wardrobe, or she would find, in the wardrobe, a pair of Michael Doonan’s shoes and replace Nate’s with them. But as soon as she kneeled to reach Nate’s shoes, he woke up, and sat up, and planted his feet firmly on the ground, and there she was kneeling in front of him, and he blinked at her, looking almost scared.
“What the fuck?” he said, gasping. “Were you in here all the time?”
“No,” she said, frowning at him. “All what time?”
“Where’s James?”
“He’s outside,” Catherine said. “We don’t go everywhere together.”