Cashelmara (52 page)

“I’m not going unless she’s dying,” said Patrick firmly. He could barely endure to be in the same room for longer than five minutes with Katherine’s husband. “I’ll stay behind with the children if you want to go with Marguerite and the boys.”

“I’m taking the children with me,” I said at once.

“Oh no, you’re not! John’s not strong enough to travel, and Ned would be bored to tears at Duneden Castle. Damn it, Sarah, why do you always try to keep the children to yourself the whole time? They’re my children as well as yours, you know! You couldn’t have had them without me!”

“More’s the pity,” I said before I could stop myself, and the next moment we were having our worst quarrel in months. As usual it was Marguerite who suggested the appropriate compromise: John stayed behind with Nanny at Cashelmara, while Patrick and Ned came with me to Duneden Castle. “For after all, Patrick,” said Marguerite sternly, “it would really look very poor if you didn’t come, and Katherine would hardly have asked to see us if she hadn’t felt very ill indeed.”

Patrick conceded gloomily that she was right, so we made our preparations to leave as quickly as possible. But we weren’t quick enough. By the time we reached Duneden Castle a distraught Lord Duneden told us that Katherine was sinking fast, and within three hours of our arrival she was dead at the age of thirty-eight.

“Oh Lord,” said Patrick glumly after we had begun to recover from the shock, “now I’m really in the soup.”

We were in our apartments before dinner. Beyond the windows a dank mist hid the flat green Irish countryside and clung to the ivy-clad walls of the castle. I was thinking so hard of Katherine that at first I didn’t hear what he said, and even when he repeated his words they made no sense to me.

“What do you mean?” I said, startled.

“I was hoping to touch Duneden for a loan, but I can hardly ask him in these circumstances, can I? It’s all deuced awkward.”

“A loan!” The word gave me such a jolt that I forgot Katherine altogether. “But, Patrick, I thought we were doing so well financially since John was born! You were even talking of taking me to America the year after next!”

“That’s true,” he agreed heavily. “I was.”

“But what’s happened?”

“Don’t get hysterical, darling.”

“I’m not hysterical! I simply want to know what the trouble is!”

“Well, it’s the beastly harvests,” said Patrick. “It was a rotten one last year and apparently it’s a rotten one this year, and the tenants can’t pay their rents and … well, I’m beginning to feel the pinch, to put it mildly. If I had another source of income there would be no difficulty, but I’m dependent now on Cashelmara for every penny I get, and Cashelmara’s not exactly the richest of Irish estates at the best of times.”

“Why can’t the tenants be made to pay their rents? They must have some money saved!”

“What little they had went after the first bad harvest, and MacGowan says it’s pointless to expect them to produce what they don’t have. Sarah, you don’t understand how poor these people are. They grow potatoes for themselves and wheat and oats for sale to pay the rent. If the crop fails they have nothing. MacGowan says I should thank God the potato hasn’t failed as well, because if it did everyone, including me, would be damn well destitute.”

“But there must be something you can do,” I said desperately. “If it’s a question of a loan, perhaps George …”

“George is just as dependent on his tenants as I am, so I’m sure these are bad times for him too. No, Duneden was my only hope. Well, perhaps after the funeral …”

It was a very awkward situation, and I didn’t in the least want to know any more about it; but after the funeral Patrick begged me to be with him when he broached the subject with his brother-in-law, and when I tried to refuse he insisted that he would have more chance of success if I was there. I was sure he was wrong, and since I had been profoundly upset by the funeral, I was in no mood for a distressing interview, but to avert another quarrel I did as he asked. We saw Lord Duneden alone on the morning we were due to leave for Cashelmara, and the interview was every bit as humiliating as I had known it would be.

“How dare you mention such a subject at such a time!” said Lord Duneden. He was an old man now, well past seventy but with great presence and dignity. “And how dare you expect to conduct such a discussion in front of your wife, who should know nothing of such matters! Have you no pride at all? It’s quite obvious you have no sense of propriety!”

Patrick stammered apologies mingled with references to the bad harvests, but Lord Duneden cut him off with an incisive movement of his hand.

“I’ve done with you,” he said. “I’ve helped you all these years for one reason and one reason only—that you were Katherine’s brother. But now Katherine’s dead no power on earth is going to make me help you again. Leave my house this instant, and never return as long as you live.”

There was nothing else to be said. I was so covered with shame that I could hardly summon the strength to leave the room, and afterward, not trusting myself to speak to Patrick, I went straight upstairs to Marguerite.

“But the solution is obvious,” she said, surprised after I had poured out my troubles to her. “You must close Cashelmara at once to save every penny you can and come to stay with me for a few months.”

“But, Marguerite,” I said, almost in tears at her generosity, “London … I don’t think we could … you know what happens to us there.”

“Well, as it happens,” she said, “I was thinking of buying a small place in the country. I’ve made a little money with my investments lately, and I’ve been thinking for some time that I’m tired of living in London all the year round. It would be nice if I found somewhere in Surrey and used the house in St. James’s Square only for the Season.”

“Surrey’s so close to London,” I said fearfully.

“I have every intention of finding a house a long way from the railway station,” said Marguerite, and so it was settled. Thomas and David were delighted with the idea, and even Patrick himself, once he had recovered from the interview with Lord Duneden, remarked buoyantly that it was an ill wind that blew no one no good. As for me, my joy at escaping from Ireland for a few months was soured only by the knowledge that we would be living on Marguerite’s charity, but since this clearly didn’t trouble Patrick I supposed it was foolish to let it trouble me.

In fact by this time I was feeling utterly exhausted. I had identified myself strongly with Katherine in the past, and when I had looked upon her dead face it was as if for one horrifying moment I had been looking at myself. I had no choice then but to admit how terrified I was of the future, for it was so obvious that there could be no security in beauty and youth and every conceivable material advantage life could offer. Nothing saved you in the end from the passing years, from growing old and from the grave.

I was very disturbed for some days, and when Patrick pawned more silver so that MacGowan’s wages could be paid during our absence it was hard for me to make preparations for the move. But once I began I was soon so busy that I had no time to visit the dispensary, and I heard that Eileen Drummond had had a new baby only when Madeleine visited us at the end of October, three days before we were due to leave.

“At least the Drummonds don’t have to worry as much as some do about the bad harvests,” Madeleine was saying, and she embarked on some complicated explanation about a leasehold which gave them security of tenure. “And Drummond’s a shrewd farmer,” she was saying. “He’ll scrape by somehow and feed the extra mouth in the family.”

“Madeleine,” I said before I could stop myself, “I would so like to send a little gift for the baby. Perhaps if I gave you something now …”

“I’ll give it to Mrs. Drummond when I next see her,” said Madeleine approvingly. “A very good idea, Sarah.”

“You mustn’t tell Patrick. There was such trouble when I visited Mrs. Drummond once, do you remember?”

“The sins of the husband should not be visited on the wife,” said Madeleine firmly, so I went upstairs and fetched three dresses that John had worn when he was newborn. I had made them myself from the finest silk and had embroidered the smocking in blue.

Two days later I was taking John for a walk in his perambulator when Maxwell Drummond turned his donkey cart through the great iron gates of Cashelmara and came jogging steadily up the drive toward me.

I was alone. Ned was helping Patrick in his final hours of gardening before the move, and Nanny was in the nurseries packing the last of the toys.

“Good day, my lady,” said Drummond as the cart halted in front of me. He jumped down from the driver’s seat, his head bare, his hair overgrown at the back, his sideburns reaching to his jaw, and in his hands were the three baby dresses I had sent to his wife.

“We’ll not be needing your charity, so I’m returning your son’s old clothes to you,” he announced, tossing the dresses over the side of the perambulator, and turned as if to climb straight back into his donkey cart.

Anger helped me find my tongue. “Mr. Drummond,” I said, surprising myself by the firmness of my voice, “I sent the dresses to your wife as a token of good will toward her, and you needn’t talk as if I had nothing else to do with them except throw them away. John wore the dresses so seldom that they’re as good as new.”

“They’re still as good as new,” he said, swatting flies from the donkey’s back, “for we’ve had no use for them.”

“But—”

“The baby’s dead,” he said, swinging around to face me. “Eileen was thanking you for your gift but felt she must return it.”

I was horrified by my lack of understanding. How slow and stupid he must have thought me! I swallowed and tried to speak, but he was the one who spoke first.

“It’s better this way,” he said. “I’ll have enough trouble feeding six children through the winter, and the baby wouldn’t have had enough to eat.”

I thought of Eileen and the poor dead little baby and nearly choked with rage. “How can you say such a thing?” I cried. “Babies eat so little.”

“Enough to force others to go without.”

“But—”

“You know nothing,” he said. “You don’t know what hunger means, and if it’s telling me you are that it’s better to see children die by inches than die quickly without suffering, I’ll be asking you to hold your tongue and mind your own business.”

“Mr. Drummond—”

“Ah, sure I know what you’re going to say! You’re thinking: ‘And is it complaining he is and he ten times better off than anyone else in this valley!’ But I’m kin to the O’Malleys, and there’s none so poor in all the valley as they are, and is it for me to be sitting in comfort in my snug little home while all my kin starve? And don’t be telling me I could send my wife and children to her family in Dublin, for her father won’t have her in his house since she was wed, so she’s chained here the same as the rest of us. But you! Why should you be caring? You can go to England, you can escape. Faith, I swear I can hear your husband arranging the whole beautiful scheme! It’s closing the house he’ll be, putting all the servants out of work, telling MacGowan to organize the evictions, leaving the sinking ship as fast as a pack of rats—”

“Stop it!” I shouted at him. I was trembling with rage and thoroughly unnerved by his violent lack of respect. “Stop it!”

John began to wail in his perambulator.

“See what you’ve done!” I cried, upset beyond all endurance, and burst into tears.

“Holy Mother of God,” said Drummond, exasperated. “Here, Baby.” He patted John’s head, and as John looked up at him mistily I regained my self-control.

“That will do,” I said in my coldest, sharpest voice. “Good day.” I tried to push past him, but the perambulator wheel had jammed in a rut and I couldn’t push it free. I struggled uselessly as Drummond stood by and watched.

“Help me, can’t you?” I said breathlessly, ready to burst into tears again. “Help me!”

“Oh, is it help you’re wanting?” said Drummond. “And don’t ladies always say please when they ask for help from a gentleman?” And as I raised my hand to slap him he caught my wrist with a laugh, said very gently, “I’m sorry,” and smiled straight into my eyes.

In the perambulator John started to cry again, but I never even looked at him.

Drummond’s fingers tightened on my wrist.

What would have happened next if MacGowan hadn’t come clattering up the drive on horseback I hardly dared to think. But he did come up the drive, and Drummond turned abruptly to face him. John was still crying. Picking him up, I hugged him tightly and he smiled at me from the folds of his shawl.

“Move that cart,” said MacGowan tersely to Drummond, and to me he added with his customary courtesy, “Good day, my lady.”

“Good day, Mr. MacGowan.”

MacGowan turned to Drummond again. “What are you doing here?”

“That’s my business.” He was already coaxing his donkey to face the gates. “If you move that skin-and-bone bag of tinker-bred horse flesh you happen to be sitting on, I’ll be taking myself off. Good day to you, Lady de Salis.”

“Good day, Mr. Drummond,” I said and watched him wordlessly as he led his donkey down the drive toward Clonareen.

“MARGUERITE, I MUST TALK
to you,” I said unevenly.

We were in London, in the drawing room of her house in St. James’s Square on the night of our arrival. Patrick and his brothers were still lingering in the dining room, and although I knew they would be joining us I was unable to restrain myself any longer from confiding in Marguerite. Very fortunately Edith, Patrick’s niece, who lived with her, was away on a visit to her sister Clara, who had recently remarried, and so I had Marguerite to myself.

“I simply must talk to you,” I repeated, suddenly aware that I had no idea how to begin my confession, and began to roam around the sofa to the fireplace. Beyond the window the lamplighter was touching the lights in the square, but although normally I would have paused to watch this entrancing sign of civilization I was in such a state that I barely remembered I had not seen a lamplighter in years.