It was no easy trip because, first, there was the ferry to Liverpool, then a train to London, another to Dover and the journey across the English Channel to France and yet another train. Two young women travelling alone in Franco’s Spain attracted attention and we met some amazing people along the way. We were late arriving in Barcelona that first night and missed the train to Sitges. Exhausted, and not sure where we were going to sleep, we sat drinking coffee in an almost deserted bar. Our salvation came in the form of two tall American men in naval uniform with fancy epaulettes and medals on their chests. It turned out they were officers on a huge naval vessel moored in Barcelona and offered us accommodation in the stateroom of the ship. We looked at one another, wondering if this was a wise move, but we went with them anyway. They were intrigued that two Irish women were travelling alone and seemed genuine in their concern for us. We needn’t have worried as they behaved like perfect gentlemen and the stateroom they gave us to sleep in was fit for royalty.
One of the officers appeared to be well connected and spoke in familiar terms about the Kennedys. He told us that Jackie Kennedy had been offered one million dollars to stay with John F. Kennedy until after the presidential election in 1960. He obviously didn’t think much of Jackie as he said she was an odd woman.
The next morning they gave us breakfast and brought us back to the station and we got the train to Sitges. We stayed in Sitges, in a little old house in the centre of the town, for three weeks and had a ball. We lazed about on the beach, swam in the sea and in the evening we watched the Flamenco dancers and enjoyed the nightlife.
It was beside a pool on that holiday that I followed my father’s swimming instructions in an attempt to save a little girl’s life. As I lay on my sunbed beside the pool, I heard a splash and a scream and saw a young child disappearing under the water. I dived into the pool without a thought and grabbed the child by her long blonde hair and dragged her over to the side of the pool, only to be berated by several members of her family, who shouted at me in Spanish. Apparently the child was not as young as I thought; she was a good little swimmer and had only been playing. I never practised my life-saving skills again.
The trips abroad were wonderful but I still had to concentrate on making sure the business was successful and that meant hard work and long hours. Everything was going fine until I made a big mistake. I designed and sewed the clothes for a wedding: the bride’s wedding dress, six bridesmaids’ dresses, the mother of the bride’s dress, the bride’s going away outfit, everything. We worked on those dresses for three months and borrowed to pay for the fabric, which was the very best quality. The young lady in question married a very wealthy man and, although I pursued both of them, I never got paid. I still have the wedding photographs as a constant reminder of my lack of business sense, or maybe it’s just my trusting nature.
I dreamed up other ways of making money but unfortunately, for one reason or another, they didn’t work. TLC was the name of one product I invented, which stood for Trouser Lining Company and also, of course, tender loving care. In the 1950s tailored trousers were becoming popular and the more expensive ones were lined. I thought that it would be brilliant to be able to buy lining as a separate item so that they could be worn underneath any pair of slacks. I made samples in white, black and cream, and Roches Stores was very interested. I tried to get them made in Ireland, but the cost was prohibitive so I researched having them made in China, but the company there wanted to know how many thousands of pairs I would be wanting, so that idea went out of the window.
I struggled on for a while but my heart wasn’t in it. Fortunately, a new friendship offered a welcome distraction. Delphine Bigger was one of our customers who came in for shirts and trousers to be made, which was quite unusual at the time. She ran the Coffee Inn in South Anne Street and was married to Frank Bigger, who, together with Ronnie Adams and Derek Johnston, won the Monte Carlo Rally in 1956. At enormous expense, Delphine bought Hermès scarves from Brown Thomas, and I would transform them into blouses. They were £29 each, which was an enormous amount then, and three were needed for each blouse. I thought her the most exotic and extraordinary person I had ever met, and although we were worlds apart we got on very well.
I was at a bit of a loose end when one day Delphine asked me to go on a rally with her. I agreed without knowing just what I was letting myself in for. She didn’t tell me that I was going to navigate until we arrived in Kilkenny, but I would have gone anyway. Looking back now, I must have had a sense that this was to be a significant turning point in my life, and so it was.
CHAPTER 3
Delphine was 10 years older than me; a striking woman with a head of thick wiry hair and an imposing stature, one of those larger-than-life characters you sometimes meet. She was a woman of the world and, among other things, she taught me to drink. She introduced me to gin and orange, which I didn’t take to, too sticky and sickly for my liking, so I replaced it with vodka and tonic, but I never really got into the habit until much later.
Delphine was fond of a good time and used rallying as an excuse to get away from her husband and flirt with other men. But it took me a while to work that out, naïve and innocent as I was. It was convenient for her to have a woman with her and that’s why she asked me to go along when she went rallying. ‘We’re going to Kilkenny on Sunday,’ she said, ‘and you are going to navigate.’ She knew I could drive but hadn’t thought to ask whether I could read a map, which I can’t, even to this day. We got in the car and she handed me a map and a list of reference numbers. I kept turning the map as we went around corners and telling her to turn left and right. After about three miles we found ourselves in somebody’s farmyard. My dad never cursed and Mum might say ‘damn’ now and again, so when Delphine began to swear at me that day I truly didn’t understand what she was saying. The words she shouted were all new to me, she might as well have been speaking Swahili, but I could tell she was cross!
‘I hope you drive better than you navigate. Get in the bloody car!’ she snapped, getting out and leaving the door open for me to get in the driver’s seat. In between giving me instructions, she was muttering and cursing, and so I did what I was told until eventually we got back on the road. As we neared the finish, Delphine told me to get out of the car. ‘It wouldn’t do for you to be seen driving,’ she said, so we changed places.
This business of changing places went on for weeks and nobody knew that I was doing the driving until one day we were found out. In front of us that day there was a car upside down in a ditch. I slowed down and Delphine was adamant that we shouldn’t stop, but for once I took no notice. I pulled over and asked, could we do anything, but the man sitting on the side of the road with a broken arm said that someone else had already gone for help. To tell the truth, if I had been more experienced I probably wouldn’t have stopped to enquire how the man in the ditch was; sentiment has no place in rallying. When we arrived at the finish, word had got around that I was seen in the driver’s seat and Delphine wasn’t happy, but she decided that as people knew anyway it would make sense for me to drive permanently.
When I eventually realised that Delphine had a boyfriend on the side and that I was only being brought along as a sort of decoy, I didn’t complain. I was having great fun and loved every minute of our monthly events, but that Circuit of Leinster rally when the accident happened nearly ruined everything. We started in the evening and we were driving through the night; it was three o’clock in the morning and in my experience that is the time when the body is at its lowest ebb, both mentally and physically. Delphine was navigating and as we were coming to a crossroad she told me to go straight ahead. It was foggy, the road was wet and slippery as I followed her instructions, only to find she had directed me to a T end, not a crossroad, and there was a resounding crash as we ran straight into a stone wall.
We were in a Mini and in those days the sun visor was held on with a metal clip. The impact of the crash caused Delphine to fall forward and the front of her head hit the metal