Cashelmara (62 page)

“You bloody fool!” MacGowan yelled. Although my own room lay between Patrick’s bedroom and the boudoir I could hear every word he said. “Get up!” I heard blows being struck, but that made me feel ill, so I ran away upstairs to the nurseries. By some great stroke of misfortune George chose that afternoon to pay his annual call, and when I was summoned from the nurseries to receive him I was so distraught that he noticed at once that something was wrong.

“My dear Sarah, is there some trouble … anything I can do?” His voice was so unexpectedly kind that I looked at him with new eyes. I had always dismissed him as a crusty old bachelor who had as little use for Patrick as Patrick had for him, but now I saw that once his bluff manner was discarded he had a gentle face and shy, anxious eyes. “If there’s any difficulty … hope you feel you can confide … always thought you were such a splendid girl, so much better than Patrick deserved … don’t like to see a pretty woman upset.”

I was crying. It was because he said I was pretty. I wouldn’t have cried otherwise.

“Excuse me … quite overwrought … not myself at all …”

“Patrick must take you away from here. There’s too much stress. You must go to London, take the children. I’ll give Patrick the money if he can’t pay.”

“You’re most kind, but … we have to stay.” Mustn’t mention MacGowan. “Patrick says—”

“Patrick don’t have a mind of his own nowadays, if you ask me. Madeleine says it’s disgraceful how he allows himself to be pushed around by his Scots agent, and I think it’s worse than disgraceful. It’s a scandal, by God. It’s even worse than when that insolent puppy Stranahan had a free rein.”

“I can’t … it’s not my place to criticize …”

“Of course it isn’t. You’re a loyal and devoted wife to Patrick, anyone can see that. But all the same, I think something should be said to him. I’ll say it myself, if it comes to that. God knows I’ve never shirked doing my duty, no matter how unpleasant that duty might be.”

“No … Cousin George … please …”

“Don’t you worry your pretty little head any more, my dear. I’ll talk to Patrick.”

“No!” I shrieked at him. I was on the verge of hysteria. “He’ll think I’ve been complaining—there’ll be a frightful scene. Please, Cousin George, please, please say nothing!”

He did finally agree to hold his tongue, but I could see he thought I was misguided, and his compassion was stronger than ever.

“Always feel you can call upon me for help” were his parting words as he squeezed my hand. “All you need do is send word to Letterturk Grange.”

Strangely enough I did find his words reassuring. It made a difference knowing that there was at least someone who might help me if matters became intolerable, but meanwhile, as so often happened after a stormy episode, there was a lull in which life returned to normal. Patrick, bruised and subdued, gave up drinking, Edith developed a chill, giving me a week’s respite from her company, and the children began to talk longingly of Christmas.

For the children’s sake we always took an immense amount of trouble to make Christmas at Cashelmara a festive occasion. We decorated a fir tree in the hall, just as the Germans did, and Patrick spent hours making colored paper chains to hang on the nursery walls. Cook and the kitchen maids began to prepare a staggering array of cakes and puddings, and the largest goose was duly slain in the yard. I wrapped the presents, labeled them and placed them around the tree, where on Christmas Eve we would join the servants in singing carols and on Christmas morning unveil all the surprises in those tantalizing parcels.

After that the parson, Mr. McCardle, would arrive at Cashelmara and hold a service in the chapel before he returned to conduct the Christmas service for his Protestant parishioners at Letterturk. We held services in the chapel only twice a month now, to keep up appearances, but of course it was unthinkable that there should be no service on Christmas Day.

I still managed to enjoy Christmas that year because I spent all my time in the children’s company, and they were so happy and carefree and gay.

After Christmas came New Year’s Eve. I hated New Year’s Eve with its images of vanishing time and life slipping past into oblivion, and now when the future looked so bleak the last day of the old year seemed more unbearable than ever. I thought how different things would have been if MacGowan hadn’t disrupted our lives. Eleanor was two and a half, and I could be thinking of having another baby. There would be something to look forward to and I wouldn’t feel so crushed by a sense of waste and futility.

If I could only have another baby!

I continued to think about it. I thought about it endlessly, and soon it was an obsession. Perhaps I wasn’t in my right mind; perhaps all the strain of those past months had affected me more than I realized, but in the end I thought, Why not? I’ve kept my part of the bargain, so why shouldn’t I have a reward? How can MacGowan object when a new baby would keep up appearances so admirably? Why shouldn’t I have something to look forward to?

“No,” said Patrick. “Absolutely not”

“Why?” I tried not to cry.

“Because I have to pretend to enough people in the world already and I don’t want to have to pretend to any more.”

“But for my sake—”

“It would be quite wrong for us to bring another child into the world,” he said with that stubborn expression I knew so well. “You want a child for all the wrong reasons, Sarah.”

The immensity of my disappointment made me cruel. I said scornfully to him, “You only say you don’t want a child because by this time you probably couldn’t even beget one if you tried!” and he went very white before he turned his back on me and walked away.

It was less than ten minutes before the door of the boudoir opened again. I was flicking through the pages of a magazine, but I was far too upset to notice the pictures that flashed before my eyes.

“Don’t tell me you’ve had second thoughts,” I said bitterly without looking up, and then a shadow fell across the couch, and I knew it was MacGowan who had entered the room.

“Don’t look so alarmed, Sarah,” he said, strolling to the hearth and leaning one elbow casually on the chimney piece. “I come bearing good news. Patrick’s told me that for certain reasons you’re anxious to go to bed with him again, and I thought you’d like to know that I at any rate have no objection.”

I stared at him. He stared back, and for one brief moment I sensed his overpowering jealousy and rage.

“So Patrick’s changed his mind,” he said. “He’s going to spend a night with you after all.”

When he saw me struggling to understand, he smiled. “Wasn’t that what you wanted?”

“I wanted a baby,” I said. My lips were stiff.

“Of course you do. And you were worried in case Patrick was incapable of giving you what you wanted.”

There was utter silence.

“Come, Sarah, there’s no need for you to worry about that, you know! Worry about conceiving, if you wish—haven’t you always found conception difficult?—but don’t worry about Patrick. I’ll see that he’s capable.”

I tried to speak. Nothing happened.

“Still worried? Well, of course, it
is
unlikely that one night chosen at random could result in a pregnancy, but never mind, there are other nights, aren’t there, and if you’re so obsessed by this ludicrous idea for another child …”

“No,” I said.

“You’re not obsessed? Ah no, I understand. You mean my imaginative solution to the problem doesn’t appeal to you. What a pity! I like the idea myself. When one is obliged by society to live what that society is pleased to call a ‘normal Christian life,’ the promise of unconventional amusement tends to give rise to the most disproportionate excitement. Bizarre, isn’t it? One wonders what would happen in a society in which there were no rules to break. Doubtless everyone would quickly die of boredom.”

“Stay away from me.”

“Not while you tear up Patrick’s self-respect and fling it in his face, you bitch!” All trace of blandness was wiped from his face, and I saw the violence shimmer in every line of his frame.

“I didn’t mean what I said.”

“Oh yes, you did,” he said. “I know your kind—a little sarcasm here, a cutting remark there. You destroy a man by inches.”

“I—”

“Shut your mouth. You’ve had your say, and one day soon, by God, I’ll make you pay for it.”

There was no time to scream. He was gone almost before he had finished speaking, and the door banged behind him with such a blast that all the ornaments rattled in the alcoves and the curtains shivered in the gust of air that rushed through the room.

After a long time I stood up, found the paper knife in my writing-table drawer and slipped it under my petticoats until it lay hidden in the top of my stocking. I did feel safer after that, although I don’t know why, because I was sure I would never have the courage to use it, even in self-defense. I wanted to write to Charles, but I knew I mustn’t. I might be weak enough to beg for help, and if MacGowan intercepted the letter … No, that wouldn’t do at all. I had made a mistake, and now there was a crisis, but I would simply have to endure the crisis until it went away. MacGowan had threatened me often enough before, but he had never yet made good his threats, and there was no reason he ever should so long as I appeared suitably cowed. So that evening before dinner I apologized to Patrick in front of MacGowan, and then I apologized to MacGowan too, for safety’s sake, and Patrick said, embarrassed, that he didn’t want to talk about it any more.

I locked my bedroom door every night for the next two weeks and even dragged the chest across the doorway as a barricade, but no one disturbed me. Presently my fear ebbed. I stopped carrying the paper knife in my stocking, and the next day when Patrick told me he would be spending that night at Clonagh Court I decided there was no need to lock my bedroom door.

That was a mistake. They came back. It was long after midnight, and I was enjoying my first deep sleep in two weeks. They came to my room, both of them, and once MacGowan had locked the door there was no escape.

At first I thought that MacGowan meant only to hold me down while Patrick raped me. I thought MacGowan’s mere presence would be enough to excite Patrick and humiliate me.

I was very naïve.

They lighted the lamp—or at least Patrick must have lighted it, because MacGowan was pinning me to the bed as I twisted and screamed. Patrick was drunk, not drunk enough to be unsteady on his feet but drunk enough to talk a lot in a loud voice. At first I couldn’t hear what he was saying, but then I must have stopped screaming, for I heard him say something about a demonstration. I didn’t know what he meant, but when I tried to ask him no words came.

That was when MacGowan said that I must stop thinking of Patrick as my husband and start realizing that Patrick belonged solely to him. Since I was apparently so determined not to recognize this they had no choice but to force me to face the truth.

“And the truth is that this is the only way I can go to bed with you now,” said Patrick. “The only way.” And the next moment it was he who was pinning me to the bed while MacGowan, moving behind him, tugged something from his belt.

It was a whip. It had an ornate silver handle that glittered in the lamplight.

Still I didn’t understand.

MacGowan was pulling at Patrick’s clothes, and the glitter of the whip was blinding. Squeezing my eyes shut, I tried to scream again, but Patrick’s mouth closed wetly on mine and his breath was fetid against my nostrils. I wanted to vomit because the stench of liquor was so strong, but I couldn’t even retch. All I could do was listen to the whip. I could shut out the sight of it, but I couldn’t stop my ears, and although the blows never touched me I felt every one of them in Patrick’s shivers of ecstasy.

He became unbearably excited. His weight shifted as he gasped for breath, and his rough undisciplined movements made me rigid with pain. No past marital act had been so painful before. I almost fainted with the pain of it; in fact I believe I would have fainted if only I hadn’t noticed that I could no longer hear the whip.

My fear sharpened just as Patrick glanced back over his shoulder, and the expression on his face so appalled me that I lost the last shreds of my self-control. I thrashed out, hysteria making me strong enough to wrench one arm free, and the next moment the lamp crashed to the floor. The flame died in the sudden down-draft, the glass smashed and for an instant all was confusion in the darkness.

MacGowan cursed me. Patrick in his distraction could no longer contain his excitement, and I felt him go limp with a shudder. The bed creaked as I struggled afresh, but even though Patrick had by this time withdrawn himself his body was now slumped leadenly on mine to pin me once more to the mattress.

MacGowan struck a match.

I looked across the flame into his eyes.

That’s
the part I’ll always remember. That’s the part I’ll carry with me to the grave. What came afterward is blurred now, mercifully dulled by the passage of time, but even today I can still hear that match being struck and see MacGowan watching me above the single steady flame.

For one clear second I saw myself as he saw me, the rival, the constant menace, the one person who might conceivably take Patrick away from him. I saw how my desire for a child would have seemed a ruse to him, a trick to divide them and bring Patrick back to me. And lastly I saw how in disrupting the scene before he had had the chance to gratify himself with Patrick I had driven him to an unprecedented pitch of rage.

He never spoke.

The match burned his fingers, and he shook it out and struck another. Then he lit a second lamp and brought it closer. Patrick was still lying spent on top of me, but MacGowan shoved him off so violently that he fell from the bed to the floor. Patrick barely protested. He was already half asleep, and although I screamed, begging him to protect me, my screams fell on deaf ears.

No one heard. No one came to save me. And as MacGowan moved soundlessly toward me I knew it was no longer Patrick he wanted for his partner in sodomy.