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Lizzie knew he could. ‘Somehow, I don’t think he’ll feel the same if his ring is on my finger,’ Tressa went on. ‘He’s made his choice publicly then and that choice is me. Please, Lizzie, don’t mess it up for me. If I don’t have Mike, I will die. I might as well, for never as long as I live will I love someone as I do him. It’s less than a fortnight I’m asking for.’
Lizzie looked at her cousin and knew if she was to do anything to jeopardise this romance Tressa would never forgive her, and she’d not forgive herself for Tressa’s heart would be broken. ‘What if you don’t hear from Ireland before then?’
‘We’re going ahead anyway. With or without their permission or blessing, we are getting engaged on the thirteenth of February, come hell or high water.’
Steve knew all about the engagement plans and he was filled with envy.
‘Amazing, the powers of a ring,’ Mike said to Steve one night as they returned from a date with the girls.
‘Have you gone all the way yet?’ Steve asked.
‘Nearly, but not quite,’ Mike said. ‘The ring will clinch it. I’ll give Tressa a good time, and bingo! Christ, I can hardly wait.’
Steve was silent, trying to cope with the frustration eating at him, and Mike said, ‘Aren’t you thinking that way yourself—engagement, I mean?’
‘Lizzie’s not ready yet,’ Steve answered shortly. Mike had no idea how little he and Lizzie did together and Steve had no intention of telling him. Tressa had said nothing either, because until she was securely engaged it was in her interest to pretend things between Steve and Lizzie were hunky-dory.
‘Maybe when she sees the ring she’ll change her mind,’ Mike commented. ‘You know how women are about rings.’
God! Steve thought, it would need more than a ring to alter Lizzie, for she was worse if anything. And she was worse, because for all her promise to Tressa to say nothing to Steve until the fateful engagement day, she felt as if she was leading him on by still going out with him. She tried not to let this affect her, but of course it did, and that evening, Steve, remembering how unsatisfactory things had been of late, said to Mike, ‘I’m not going home yet, Mike. Be seeing you.’
Mike knew where Steve was heading. In his pre-Tressa days he’d have probably been alongside him, but now he said, ‘Why d’you have to go to those places when you have a lovely girl you’ve just spent the evening with?’
‘Mind your own business, Mike,’ Steve spat out angrily. ‘I don’t have to answer to you.’
‘I was just saying.’
‘Well stop just saying,’ Steve said, ‘because I’ve stopped listening.’
Mike shrugged as Steve turned away from the streets and headed back to one of his favoured haunts in Varna Road.
The good news approving the engagement came after a week. Tressa read it out:
It is obvious you are smitten with each other and as this Mike Malone gives a good account of himself, you have our blessing so far. However, you are young and there is to be no marriage until we have met your intended. We suggest you come home in the summer and introduce us.
‘Isn’t Mammy a pet,’ Tressa said, spinning around in delight.
‘It seems all fine for you, right enough,’ Lizzie said, but she was a little saddened for she knew she would be quite lonely when she told Steve she didn’t want to see him any more, but despite this she would wait no longer than the thirteenth. She owed him that much.
That day, the girls were on duty until three o’clock and Tressa got dinner and sweet orders mixed up, laid tables the wrong way round, forgot the cruets and sauces and dropped so many things in the kitchen that the chef yelled at her. She didn’t seem to care; excitement had taken hold of her and her nerves were jumping about inside her body as she watched the clock anxiously, willing the time to be gone so she could go out to meet her man.
‘We just have three hours,’ she told Lizzie in their room. ‘Do you want the bath first?’
‘Why just three hours. Surely we’re not meeting them at six?’
‘Aye. The theatre performance is at seven thirty.’
‘Even so.’
‘They’re going to be in town anyway,’ Tressa explained. ‘They’re buying the ring today.’
‘Didn’t you want to choose it?’
‘No,’ Tressa said. ‘I wouldn’t know how much Mike would have to spend. I told him to surprise me.’
It had surprised Steve, for he’d seen Mike part with the best part of three weeks’ wages to buy the diamond cluster he’d set his heart on.
‘Some price, man,’ he said as they left the shop.
‘Tressa’s worth it,’ Mike said. ‘Think of it, Steve. This is my passport to freedom.’
‘Yeah,’ Steve remarked gloomily. ‘Let’s go and sink a few pints.’
‘You’re on,’ Mike replied.
That evening there was a spring-like feel to the air. There was even a little warmth in the setting sun and across the road, around St Phillip’s courtyard, Lizzie glimpsed the heads of snowdrops and crocuses peeping through the soil as the girls scurried along the road, for they were meeting the men at the Old Joint Stock.
Judging by the glasses on the tables, Mike and Steve were finishing their third pints when the two girls went into the pub. Lizzie’s heart sank, for when Steve was drunk he was unpredictable and could sometimes be difficult to handle. But she could hardly tell Steve what to do, and more drinks were ordered as soon as they spotted the two girls and no one listened at all when Lizzie said she’d have an orange. This was Tressa and Mike’s moment and she decided she’d not spoil it by making a fuss.
Tressa was rendered speechless by the ring and Lizzie let her breath out in a sigh. ‘Oh, Tressa, it’s gorgeous,’ and it was gorgeous, for the large diamond in the centre was surrounded by smaller diamonds that shone and sparkled in the lights of the pub.
‘Do you like it?’ Mike asked, made self-conscious by Tressa’s silence.
‘Like it? Oh, Mike, I haven’t words…Oh, thank you. I never dreamed you’d buy me something so exquisite.’
‘Nothing in the world is too good for you,’ Mike said, and he leant across the table and the two kissed.
‘Ain’t love grand,’ Steve said sarcastically and then added quietly, ‘You only have to say the word, Lizzie, and I’ll buy you a diamond twice the size of that.’
Lizzie’s heart skipped a beat at the hopeful look in Steve’s eyes, and so though she shook her head she smiled as she did, and leant across and squeezed his hand as he turned to Mike and said, ‘I’ll not congratulate, but commiserate. Another good man down. There’s few of us bachelors left, you know.’
He was putting on a good act for his friend, Lizzie thought. Making the best of it. I wish I could make his day now, by agreeing to be his girl, but I’d be fooling myself and not being fair to him.
Some of the hotel staff used the pub and insisted on buying rounds of drinks when they heard the news of Tressa’s engagement, but Lizzie insisted on drinking only orange. She felt she needed her wits about her for what she must say to Steve, and neither her nor Tressa had eaten since about eleven o’clock. They’d hoped to grab a bite after the lunchtime rush, but hadn’t had time, and she was feeling decidedly peckish.
Eventually,