Cashelmara (50 page)

“No, I only stayed at Woodhammer,” he said. “I didn’t go to London.” He produced some sketches. There were twenty-four of them, all of Woodhammer, and at least six were devoted to the intricate carved staircase in the great hall. “My staircase,” he said, and I quickly made some excuse to leave the room before he could start to weep again. It was not that I was unsympathetic, for I knew how fond he had been of Woodhammer, but being too close to tears too often myself those days, I needed someone I could lean upon, not someone who would lean upon me.

The days passed.

It was so quiet at Cashelmara.

Patrick devoted himself to his garden with a new intensity and seldom left the grounds, while I made an effort to organize my own life into some form of time-consuming routine. I paid calls scrupulously, took the carriage to Aasleagh, Leenane and Clonbur, and in return I received calls from the Plunkets, the Knoxes and the Courtneys. Conversation consisted of children, the Protestant church and what could be done for the poor. Patrick flatly refused to see anyone, so there was no question of giving dinner parties even if I had been tempted to do so. I saw little of Patrick myself. Our intimacies on Fridays had ceased, he often missed meals, and the place where I was most likely to see him was the nursery. It seemed that Ned was the only person he still wanted to see.

I wrote more often to Charles and Mama in America. I wrote to Marguerite in London. I even began to write a journal, something I’d vowed I would never do, but it’s amazing what one tries when one is desperate to be occupied. I knew matters would improve when Ned was older, but at that time he still slept in the morning and afternoon and was always in bed by half past six.

And all the while there was that silence, the endless numbing silence from which there was no escape, no release.

I must occupy myself, I said over and over again. Must keep busy. Must fill up all those empty hours or I shall go mad.

One day I walked to the chapel along the new Azalea Walk, not because I wanted to pray but because I had nothing else to do, and halfway along the walk I felt as if I were suffocating. The silence seemed to crush me in pounding waves until in a panic I tried to scream at the top of my voice, but no sound came. This terrified me. I thought I really was going mad, so I ran all the way back to the house and ordered the carriage to the door. I thought that the doctor who helped Madeleine could prescribe me some soothing medicine, but when I reached the dispensary I found he had gone to Letterturk to collect some medical supplies due to arrive that day from Dublin.

“But what a delightful surprise to see you, Sarah!” purred Madeleine before I had a chance to explain my troubles. As soon as she had seen me she had assumed my visit to be a charitable gesture. “I always hoped you would come to us one day. Would you care to have some tea in my office before you inspect the ward?”

I was in such a state that I was quite unable to tell her that illness still repulsed me as much as it ever had and that I had no intention of visiting the sick in order to pass the time. I merely followed her into her office, a tiny room no bigger than a pantry, and sank down on a wooden chair as she called to one of the village girls to make tea.

“I would have brought some flowers,” I said faintly, “but the garden …”

“You brought yourself,” said Madeleine. “That’s much more important.” She shifted some papers on the little table and removed a basket of eggs from the other wooden chair. “You chose a splendid time to come. I’ve just finished with the last patient in the dispensary and was about to write a letter to the Archbishop before I looked at the ward.”

“I hope—I mean, there’s nothing infectious, is there? I have to think of Ned.”

“Of course. No, there’s nothing of that nature. We have only nine beds, you know, so we only take the patients who are dying and have no families to tend them. At the moment we have one malignant growth, two liver disorders and the rest are starvation cases which have gone too far to be cured. We did have three consumptives, but they’re gone now, God rest their souls.” She was just crossing herself absent-mindedly when there was a knock on the door. “Come in!” she called at once.

A young woman came into the room. She was older than I was but perhaps still less than thirty. Her neat black dress and gentility of manner led me to assume that Madeleine had imported her, like Dr. Townsend, from Dublin.

“Here’s your tea, Miss de Salis,” she said to Madeleine with a smile.

“Ah yes, thank you so much. Sarah, allow me to present to you one of my most devoted and valuable volunteers, Mrs. Maxwell Drummond. Mrs. Drummond, this is my sister-in-law, Lady de Salis.”

I recognized the name Maxwell Drummond but was at a loss to imagine how this well-spoken, well-mannered young woman could have married a rogue who, according to Patrick, was not only the chief troublemaker in the valley but also the man responsible for Derry Stranahan’s murder.

“How do you do, Mrs. Drummond,” I said, trying not to look too amazed.

“Well, my lady, I thank you,” she said civilly, dropping me a small curtsy, but I noticed she did not look at me when she spoke.

“Mrs. Drummond’s youngest child is the same age as Ned,” said Madeleine, taking no notice of either my confusion or Mrs. Drummond’s embarrassment. “Stay and have some tea with us, Mrs. Drummond. There’s a stool behind the bag of meal in the corner.”

“I wouldn’t wish to intrude, Miss de Salis.”

“You wouldn’t be intruding,” said Madeleine in her sweetest, mildest voice. “You would be refusing an invitation.”

Mrs. Drummond had evidently worked long enough for Madeleine to recognize an order when she heard it.

“That’s very kind of you, Miss de Salis,” she said. “I’ll just be fetching another cup for myself.”

“Of course,” said Madeleine benignly, watching her as she left the room. As soon as we were alone she said to me, “I feel so sorry for that girl, Sarah. She is, as you can see, educated and refined—actually a Dublin schoolmaster’s daughter—but she made the ghastly mistake of running off with Drummond, and—do you know Drummond?”

“Good heavens, no! Patrick wouldn’t allow me within a mile of him!”

“Well, he’s very uncouth—that would perhaps be the kindest way of describing him. And immoral,” said Madeleine, pursing her small mouth. “However, it’s not for me to judge him—I leave that to God—but at least I’ve been able to help that poor girl by providing her with an interest and a little companionship. Fortunately her husband’s two maiden aunts live at the farm, so she has help in minding the children and can spare a few hours each week to help me here at the dispensary. She told me just the other day how much she enjoyed …” Mrs. Drummond’s footsteps sounded outside. By the time the door opened Madeleine was already inquiring after Ned’s health.

I looked at Mrs. Drummond with fresh eyes and thought how fortunate I was. When I remembered that Cashelmara was a fine house, even if it was lonely, and that Patrick had always been faithful, I felt ashamed of myself for making such heavy weather of our recent misfortunes.

“How many children do you have, Mrs. Drummond?” I asked, anxious to be friendly toward her.

“Six living, my lady, thanks be to God, four girls and two boys.”

“And your youngest—the one who’s the same age as my baby?”

“That’s Denis, my lady. He was born last December.”

We discovered that Ned and Denis had been born within three days of each other, and a fascinating conversation followed as we compared notes on our infants’ progress. Madeleine, to her great credit, appeared to find the conversation just as fascinating as we did. It was only after we had all drunk two cups of tea that she suggested it was time at last to inspect the ward, but by then I was in such a cheerful frame of mind that I would have inspected anything without complaint.

“I do hope you’ll be calling here again before long, Lady de Salis,” said Mrs. Drummond after I had smiled at each of the nine patients and wished them well.

“But of course I will!” I said at once and turned to Madeleine in time to see her satisfied expression.

Before any of us could say more, Dr. Townsend arrived from Letterturk, and Mrs. Drummond retreated to the kitchen to supervise the preparation of the midday soup.

“You’ll do us the honor of lunching with us, I hope, Lady de Salis,” said Dr. Townsend, who was lean and spry and looked nearer fifty than seventy, but I thought of Ned having lunch in the nursery and said that unfortunately I was unable to stay. I was about to take my leave of them when there was a crisis in the ward nearby. A patient shrieked for help, and when Madeleine and Dr. Townsend rushed to the rescue I was left alone in the hall.

The hall was large, since it served also as the waiting room for those who came to the dispensary, and bare save for the rows of stools placed against every whitewashed wall. I was standing at the end farthest from the front door, but as I waited for Madeleine I began to move slowly around the room, pausing only to read the religious texts which hung on the walls between pictures of the Virgin and Child. I was just wondering how many of the Irish could read and how many of the ones who could read would appreciate such sentiments as “Blessed Are the Poor” when there was an interruption. At the other end of the hall the front door burst open, and a gust of clammy air made me draw my cape more tightly around my shoulders as I waited for the door to close.

But the door stayed open. A man was in the hall, his back to the light. He wore filthy trousers, muddy boots and a smelly jacket.

Mrs. Drummond’s voice exclaimed behind me, “Max! What brings you here? Is something wrong at home?”

And as she darted forward he slammed the door, cutting off the light behind him, and I looked for the first time upon the face of my husband’s enemy, Maxwell Drummond.

HE WAS TALL, BUT
his shoulders were broad enough to make him appear shorter than he was. He had long, untidy hair, very dark, sideburns that needed trimming and a clean-shaven chin and upper lip. His eyes were even darker than his hair.

“Max …” Mrs. Drummond was blushing, deeply embarrassed by my presence. She groped for the appropriate phrases of introduction. “Lady de Salis … my husband … Max, this is …”

“Well, to be sure it is,” he said. “Haven’t you just said so? Good afternoon, my lady. Eileen, you’d best come home. Sally’s twisted her ankle and it’s defeating even Aunt Bridgie’s favorite poultice.”

“I’ll come at once.” Mrs. Drummond looked distraught as well as confused. “I must fetch my shawl and tell Miss de Salis I’m leaving. Shall I ask Dr. Townsend to come with us?”

“Jesus, no! Sally wants her mother, not a doctor!”

“I only thought—”

“Where’s your shawl?”

Mrs. Drummond withdrew without another word, but I saw her bite her lip as if it were an effort for her to keep silent. She did not look at me. When she was gone I began to draw on one of my gloves.

There was a silence. He was watching me. My other glove slipped from my fingers and fell to the floor, but although I waited for him to pick it up he did not move. I was going to pick it up myself when I glanced at him first.

His nose looked as if it had been broken more than once in the past, and his jaw was very square.

I remembered the glove. It was still on the floor. I looked at it as if it presented some insoluble puzzle and felt the color, hot and moist, creep up my neck toward my face.

And I never blush. I’ve not the complexion for it.

He went on watching me.

I turned, walked briskly to the ward. “Madeleine!” I called. “Madeleine, are you there?”

Madeleine was still stooped over the patient. “One moment, Sarah, if you please,” she said, not looking up, so I moved slowly back into the hall again.

He was still waiting there, and my glove still lay like a question mark upon the floor.

I retrieved the glove, drew it on. What was Mrs. Drummond doing? Why didn’t she come back with her shawl? Moving to the nearest religious text, I began to read it, but suddenly I was gripped by a compulsion to look over my shoulder.

He smiled at me.

“Oh, Max, I’m so sorry to be keeping you waiting …” Mrs. Drummond was rushing back into the room, but I scarcely saw her. She was talking, but her words made no sense to me.

He left. Mrs. Drummond said goodbye to me and I think I said goodbye to her. When they were gone I waited for a minute in the empty hall, and then I went outside without saying goodbye to Madeleine and told the coachman to drive me home to Cashelmara.

All the way home I told myself: I won’t think about it any more. But when I did think about it I told myself: It was nothing. I remembered all the men who had smiled at me in the past, and when I lost count I shrugged my shoulders and tried to think of something else.

On arriving home, I felt so hot and sticky that I decided to have a bath. To have a bath in the middle of the day at Cashelmara was like asking for an earthquake, but eventually at three o’clock the bath had been filled with hot water and I was washing myself scrupulously with the last bar of the expensive soap I had bought in London. It was only later when my maid was helping me into my tea gown that I remembered not only that I had had no lunch but that I had missed having lunch with Ned in the nursery.

I had tea with him instead, and presently Patrick came in from the garden to give Ned rides on his back across the nursery floor. I was just watching them contentedly when the thought slipped into my head: I wonder when I’ll see him again. And the thought with all its implications disturbed me so much that I had to scoop Ned off Patrick’s back and squeeze him very tightly to blot the memory of Drummond from my mind.

After dinner that night I said to Patrick, “I’d so like another baby. Do you suppose … perhaps …”

So we resumed our Friday nights together, but no baby came, and at last, unable to face the Marriage Act any longer without a respite, I asked if we could suspend the Friday ritual for a month. I said I hadn’t been feeling well, and he said he was sorry to hear that and he did hope I would feel better soon.