Rosewater and Soda Bread (2 page)

The woman, Marjan Something-or-Other, stood for a moment observing the iron stopper, then turned to face the Mall. Yawning, she took her time shrugging back her shoulders, shaking
them loose with a smile. Her apron, a half-skirt bursting with pink and red roses, was tied loosely around her waist. She undid the bow at the back and retied it tighter, reaching in its deep front pocket for an elastic band. This she used to harness the mass of brown curls that would otherwise have fallen around her face.

Had it not been the modern year of 1987, thought Dervla, she would have sworn she had traveled back forty years in time, to when Estelle Delmonico had stood outside that very shop. Es-telle would flash her thick hair and curvy bits on the street six mornings of the week, without a thought to decency or Jim Quigley's roving eye.

That Italian witch had certainly caused a hullabaloo the year she moved into town, she and that mustachioed husband of hers. Opening up a bakery smack in the middle of Main Mall, peddling coffees and puffy pastries like it was some tinker's wedding they were catering at. Not a loaf of brown bread or a potato farl to be seen in the entire shop. Imagine such a thing, now!

Dervla shook her head slowly, her tight gray perm anchoring any sudden toss. Her beady eyes followed the Marjan woman as she made her way to the café's window shutters. Standing on the tips of her toes, she unlatched the bolts at either side of the wooden panels. Recently painted a deep plum color, the shutters folded back across the glass like a gentle accordion. As they did, a large bay window, framed by hanging baskets of wispy honeysuckle and Persian jasmine, revealed itself to the morning sun. The flowers in the baskets matched the dewy blossoms planted in two deep barrels directly below the ledge.

With a sideways tilt of her stooped back, a sloping spine that began in a pouchy, mole-infested neck, and her pointed chin angled just right, Dervla was able to look straight through, all the
way to the back of the café's dining room. There, on an elegant mahogany display counter, surrounded by teapots of various shapes and sizes, sat the showpiece of the Babylon Café, the machine she'd heard touted as “the greatest invention since the lightbulb.”

Bloody blasphemous, if you asked her, especially considering it had been Father Fergal Mahoney who had made that insidious claim, right in the middle of Saint Barnabas's noontime Mass. That blasted contraption was the reason so many once-devoted parishioners rushed through their Sunday psalms nowadays, flying down Main Mall to that crimson door of hell with communion wafers still dissolving in their parched mouths. Shameful to the point of senseless, muttered Dervla. There ought to be a law against such behavior.

Suddenly, a soft light flickered inside the restaurant. Dervla watched as the Marjan woman switched on the last of the café's five muted lamps, tapped the large belly of the gleaming machine with a silver spoon (a heathen ritual, no doubt), and positioned the diamond needle of an aging Victrola over an LP record. Cradling a short glass of tea in her palms, she walked back outside just as the sun broke through the cloudy sky.

MARJAN AMINPOUR SLOWLY sipped at her hot tea and studied the changing horizon. Mornings in Ireland were so different from those of her Persian childhood, she thought, not for the first time. Were she still in the land of her birth, Marjan mused, daybreak would be marked by the crisp sounds of a
sofreh
, the embroidered cloth upon which all meals were enjoyed, flapping over a richly carpeted floor. Once spread, the
sofreh
would be covered by jars of homemade preserves—rose petal, quincelime,
and sour cherry—as well as pots of orange blossom honey and creamy butter. The jams and honey would sit alongside freshly baked rounds of
sangak
bread, golden and redolent with crunchy sesame seeds. Piled and teetering like a tower, the
sangak
was a perfect accompaniment to the platters of garden mint, sweet basil, and feta cheese placed on the
sofreh
, bought fresh from the local bazaar.

And of course, Marjan thought with a smile, no breakfast
sofreh
was complete without the presence of a steaming samovar, the golden water boiler without which fragrant cups of bergamot tea could not be enjoyed. No meal could survive without a stop of that draft.

Marjan sighed as she took another sip of her bergamot tea. She might not be in Iran now, but she could happily boast a pantry full of jam jars. Jam jars aplenty, to be precise, as well as a domed oven whose heated bricks turned dough into piping morsels of bread—not to mention a verdant back garden, where stalks of cilantro, mint, and feathery dill bloomed season after season. And while she didn't have the time for an elaborate Persian breakfast, she did own a trusty electrical samovar, not to mention a view that had, throughout the centuries, mesmerized saints and sinners alike.

Marjan gazed up the steep and cobbled Main Mall, past the bright yellow frontage of Corcoran's Bake Shop and the fat sausage displays of the Butcher's Block, toward the obelisk monument at the opening of the town square. There, perched on his stone pedestal, with crooked staff in one hand and dead snakes splayed at his sandaled feet, was Patrick, patron saint of Eire. The old bishop looked rather triumphant in his regal robes, thought Marjan, free of the demons that had once haunted him. It had taken him a long time to get rid of them, but get rid of them he had.

From where she stood, Marjan could even see the rising summit of Croagh Patrick, County Mayo's most illustrious mountain. Conical in shape and steeped in its usual misty blanket of green, “the Reek” was a popular destination for devout climbers, contrite pilgrims who hiked its shrouded peak in hopes of spiritual release.

In quiet moments, before her sisters had woken and when the only sound on the street was that of Conor Jennings's Guinness truck, Marjan liked to take her morning tea with a view of the mountain. That old mound of penitence never ceased to amaze her, the modesty of its simple triangular shape filling her with peace and security.

Even the ancient Celts had felt the magic. Long before Saint Patrick had set foot on the mountain, druidic souls had ventured to its summit for worship. On days like today, thought Marjan, when the equinox was rounding its autumnal corner and the berries of surrounding hedgerows were turning from scarlet to deepest amethyst, their pagan exaltations must have been doubly poignant. Crops had been gathered, the old year was coming to an end, and winter was looming, dark and dangerous. Courage and faith had carried those early warriors through the bitterest of seasons. It was a great reminder of what could be done with a bit of luck, Marjan told herself.

Courage and faith—and a bit of Irish luck—had brought them to this little western town. It was still hard to believe that a year and a half had passed since she and her sisters had packed their bags and moved over from London. A year and a half! Marjan shook her head in awe. It seemed like only yesterday when she'd hung the wooden sign above the café door and begun serving platters of fried elephant ears and baklava to hungry villagers. She could still recall the anxiety with which she had prepared her first batch of
dolmeh
, the nerves that had threatened
to get the better of her as she pushed the fragrant parcels into the hot oven. How she had prayed for strength on that spring day! Having planted her hopes deep inside for so long, she had
willed
them to burst forth, feeding her vision of a café filled with warmth, laughter, and light. And somehow things had worked out. Somehow they had found a home, here in this quiet corner of the world, this Ballinacroagh.

Amazing, thought Marjan with a smile, how some things turned out. There was much to be thankful for, that was for sure.

Nodding, she lifted the tea glass to her lips, drinking in the last of its orangey goodness. Taking one final look at the ancient mountain, she turned to go back into the café.

At the door she paused, lifting her fist to the small wooden shamrock nailed above the handle. The clover's heart-shaped leaves were powerful shields against the evil eye, protecting all who paid it homage. It was a potent good luck charm that couldn't hurt from some superstitious knocking, thought Marjan.

If nothing else, she told herself with a smile, her “heathen ways” would give Dervla Quigley something to nibble on for hours to come.

“WHERE WERE YOU?” Bahar said as Marjan walked into the kitchen with her empty glass. “I had to put the dried limes in myself,” she added, halfheartedly stirring a pot of herb stew with a wooden spoon.

Marjan gasped. “Did you just put them in?” She hurried to the Aga and grabbed the spoon from her sister. Four
limoumani
were bobbing happily amongst the stewing fenugreek. She deftly fished the limes out, placing them on a small terra-cotta saucer.

Bahar held up her hands. “Take it easy. It's only a few limes,”
she said, backing away from the green stove. Through the kitchen door she could see Fiona Athey and Evie Watson settling at their usual window-side seats. “Besides, aren't you supposed to add the
limoumani
with the meat?”

“The meat has to soften with the herbs before you can introduce the sour. Otherwise, it's too overpowering,” explained Mar-jan, waving her pinched thumb and forefinger in the air as though she were conducting a symphony. “You have to let the fenugreek take hold of the broth, you see,” she added.

Bahar sighed. “I don't know how you remember all those details. Just hand me a knife and lead me to the chopping block. Anything else is too hard,” she said, tying an apron, one with maroon pheasants marching across the hem and pockets, around her neck and tiny waist. The apron was one of nearly a dozen their landlady and friend, Estelle Delmonico, had sewn for them that year.

“Looks like Fiona's ready for her jasmine tea. I think we should just give her a permit to use the samovar whenever she wants. She's in love with that thing!”

Marjan let out a laugh. “I know. I'm half-thinking of getting her one this Christmas. Mustafa's sells them now.”

“Don't you dare!” said Bahar, stuffing a frayed order pad into her apron pocket. “She'll keep it in the salon, for sure. Then we'll never see her.” She threw Marjan a creaky smile and swung past the kitchen doors.

Marjan returned to the pot and gave the thick herb stew another stir. The long, thin leaves of the fenugreek swam gracefully against the sides of her spoon, entwining themselves with the lighter cilantro, parsley, and chives.

According to the Persian seer Avicenna, whose
Canon of Medicine
Marjan often consulted, fenugreek is the first stop to curing winter chills. Combined with the hearty kidney beans
and succulent meat of the herb stew, it made for an excellent
garm
, or hot, meal. Whenever she could, Marjan liked to adhere to the ancient Zoroastrian tradition of cooking, matching the needs and bounties of the season (as well as the individual eater) to ingredients.

“Ooooh!
Gormeh sabzi!
Can I take some to school?” Layla trundled down the stairs, skipping the last three steps with gymnastic flourish. She landed soundly on the woven runner that spanned the kitchen floor, her patchy knapsack bouncing off her back like a parachute in midflight.

Marjan placed the lid back on the stockpot and turned to her youngest sister. “It won't be ready for another two hours. You'll have to take some of yesterday's saffron chicken instead.” She wiped her hands on a gingham tea towel and opened the cupboard door.

“Leftovers. God. Not again,” Layla groaned, pulling absently on her stockings. As was often the case, her school uniform was not the tidiest of numbers: a spidery rip ran down the ankle of one brown stocking, and her Doc Martens were scuffed on all sides. In accordance with school yard fashion, her striped blue shirt was not tucked in; it stuck out from the back of her dark regulation skirt, wrinkled and uneven.

Layla's long black hair, Marjan was happy to note, was immaculate as ever. It gleamed within the folds of an intricate French braid, perfectly framing her creamy, oval face.

“I don't know how I'm going to survive this year,” Layla complained. “At least when Emer was around I could trade lunches— she always had a bit of colcannon with her sandwiches.”