Cashelmara (85 page)

“You could have sent them to America to my mother!”

“Indeed we could not! Your father would have gone to court to oppose such a move, and no judge, believe me, would have consented to children being sent abroad to a deserting wife who was living in adultery.”

“But—”

“Don’t interrupt! And don’t you interrupt either, David! I’m going to have my say. Listen, Ned. We all know that your father is at present unfit to have charge of his children. What you seem incapable of realizing is that a judge might say your mother is no more fit than your father is to have charge of them. I’m not saying he
would
say it. I’m merely saying he
might
say it. That’s why it’s very important to try and settle these family troubles privately and keep them out of the courts. Please don’t think we’re unsympathetic to your mother. We’re not. We’re on her side and we think your father has treated her abominably. But you must realize that she’s not exactly as white as driven snow herself and that there are plenty of people, not least your aunt Madeleine, who would be justified in complaining about your mother’s relationship with Drummond. Have I made myself clear?”

“We want the welfare of all you children to come first,” said Uncle David. “We only want to do what’s best for you, but sometimes it’s so difficult to know what the best is. In fact sometimes I feel equally angry with both Patrick and Sarah. It upsets me to think of children suffering just because their parents can’t behave as parents should.”

After a pause I said, “I just want to go home. That’s all I want. I want to take my mother home.”

That was when they told me they would be leaving the next day for Cashelmara to take my father away to England to cure his drunkenness. Once he was gone my mother would be able to go home with her children.

My brother and sisters had arrived the day before at the hotel in the company of my uncle David, Nanny and the new governess, who was called Miss Cameron. I had not met her before, but I had known Nanny all my life, and seeing her again was just as exciting as seeing John, Eleanor and Jane.

When they arrived I was waiting for them in the hotel hall, and the first person I saw was Nanny as she hauled herself down from the carriage. Nanny was short and dapper and always wore a widow’s bonnet and dozens of red flannel petticoats. The bonnet was worn in memory of the Dear Departed One, who had died in the Crimean War. They had been married only two weeks before the Dear Departed One had left to serve his country, and Nanny had been widowed at the age of twenty-one. The idea of remarriage appalled her—“Not at all proper, and the dear Queen would be the first to agree”—and although now I can wonder if such sentiments were really a compliment to her husband, when I was a child they seemed eminently noble and fitting.

Nanny believed very much in doing what was fitting. According to her definition this encompassed a belief in good manners, truthfulness, the Ten Commandments and the British Empire and excluded all foreigners (including the Irish), spiritualism and the Salvation Army. To explain her continuing presence at Cashelmara it should be understood that she had decided it was her mission in life to bring up four poor little English children condemned through no fault of their own to live among savages. However, she was fiercely loyal to my mother, despite the fact that my mother wasn’t English, and when it had become obvious that my mother planned to remain in America, Nanny had been the first to spring to her defense.

“She’ll be back one day,” she said. “You mark my words.” And when I still complained she demanded, “Do you think she would ever have left you if I wasn’t here to save you poor innocent lambs from the wickedness of the world?” I had no idea then what wickedness she was referring to, but I did know she would never leave us. It wouldn’t have been “fitting,” as Nanny would have said. It wouldn’t have “suited” at all.

“Nanny!” I shouted as she leaped spryly from the carriage, and rushing forward, I grabbed her in my arms and swung her off the ground.

“Mercy!” shrieked Nanny, red petticoats flying. “You’re tall as a maypole!”

I wasn’t, but I was pleased to hear her say so. “How wonderful to see you again!” I cried, giving her another twirl.

“Heavens above!” gasped Nanny. “What a nasty American accent!”

A dark head stuck itself from the carriage window. “Ned!” yelled my brother John. “Ned, I’m ten years old now—one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten!”

“Hullo, John!” I yelled back in delight. “So you became a mathematician!”

“Ladies first, Johnny,” said Nanny briskly. “Don’t be in such a hurry to get down! Come along, Eleanor.”

I had forgotten how pretty Eleanor was, and now I saw she looked prettier than ever. Her fair hair was set in ringlets, and her violet eyes were enormous in her heart-shaped face. “Eleanor!” I exclaimed, kissing her admiringly, and waited for the familiar stream of chatter, but to my astonishment not a word was said. Eleanor hid her face in her hands and burst into tears.

“There, there, precious,” said Nanny, putting her arms around her, and seeing my horrified expression, she added soothingly, “The excitement’s too much for her. She’s been high-strung lately. Johnny, help Jane down, there’s a good boy.”

“Hullo, Neddy,” said my younger sister.

“Don’t call me Neddy!” I growled.

“I want Mama,” said Jane, just as if she were ordering an item in a restaurant. She was dark like John and had an upturned nose and a wide mouth that was capable of shaping itself into any number of expressions, most of them impudent. “I want her now—at once—and then I want to go home before Ozymandias dies of grief without me.”

“Who in God’s name is Ozymandias?”

“Ozymandias King of Kings,” said Jane, “is my eldest cat. Why isn’t Mama here to meet us?”

“But she is!” cried John. “Look!”

“Mama!” sobbed Eleanor.

“Mama!” shrieked Jane, elbowing Eleanor out of the way, and there followed a very confused and emotional five minutes on the steps of the hotel. Uncle David and I stood watching with foolish smiles on our faces, Nanny wiped away a large tear and all the passers-by stopped to sigh “Ahhh!”

“Very fitting,” said Nanny when she could speak again.

The euphoria of the reunion lasted some time and was still at its peak when I had the conversation with my uncles about Drummond’s future at Cashelmara. It was not until my uncles had departed to remove my father that I had the chance for any long private conversations with either John or my sisters, for my mother refused to let them out of her sight. However, on the day after my uncles’ departure she was indisposed enough to stay in bed for the morning, and after breakfast Nanny and Miss Cameron announced their intention of taking the younger children to the beach at Salthill. It was only two miles away, and one could travel there by tram.

“Will you come with us, Ned?” asked Nanny deferentially, and I said I would. It was a sunny day and I liked the promenade at Salthill.

After we were safely installed on the beach with the picnic basket and other paraphernalia, Nanny produced her knitting, Miss Cameron took the girls off to look for shells and John wandered away to practice drawing numbers. The tide was low and some sand was exposed invitingly below us.

“Johnny’s come on such a lot,” said Nanny fondly. “He can write now, you know.”

“About time too,” I said. John’s ill-health had made him backward, but I had never thought he was stupid.

“Miss Cameron’s been good for him,” said Nanny. “She took trouble, you know, when the tutors wouldn’t. Mr. MacGowan engaged her because he said Scots teachers were the best, and I must say she’s done wonders for John and the girls.”

“Hm,” I said. I had scooped away a layer of pebbles, found some sand underneath and was busy sculpting some turrets.

“Of course,” said Nanny, “it’s ever such a shocking thing about Mr. MacGowan.”

“Hm,” I said again.

“Mark you, he might have been a wicked man in some ways, but it’s not for us to judge. Murder can never be right.”

I stopped sculpting and stared hard across Galway Bay. The blue mountains of Clare stared back. I thought of Drummond throwing his hat in the air and buying six bunches of violets for my mother.

“A criminal can be sentenced to death and hanged,” I said. “That’s murder, but everyone would say it was justified.”

“That’s quite different, dear. The judge is allowed to give a sentence of death according to the law of the land, but judges are special people appointed by the Queen. We can’t all be judges and take the law into our own hands! It wouldn’t be at all fitting. Besides, remember the Commandments. ‘Thou shalt not kill.’”

The vertigo had begun again. I dug my fingers hard into the sand and screwed my eyes tight shut.

“There, there,” said Nanny quickly. “I didn’t mean to upset you by referring to Mr. MacGowan. We’ll talk about something else. I must say, it gave me rather a turn to see Mr. Drummond here with your mama, but of course a poor defenseless woman does need an escort in this wicked world. Ned dear, I don’t want to say it, but I feel it’s only right to warn you that some very vicious rumors are circulating about Mr. Drummond and your mother. I hope he sends for his wife as soon as he gets home.”

I looked at the blue mountains again. There were three clouds above them. I stared, concentrating hard on each cloud in turn.

“Of course your mother’s such a good woman,” said Nanny, knitting needles clicking. “Such a devoted wife and mother always and never a shred of gossip to the contrary, which is more than one can say of many a beautiful titled lady, you mark my words. I’d always trust your mother to do what was fitting.”

After a moment I said, “Will you excuse me, Nanny? I want to talk to John.” I stood up, stumbling over my sculpted turrets, and walked steadily across the sand to my brother.

“Look how pretty my figures are,” said John, who had reached the number nine. “Aren’t figures a lovely shape?”

“I suppose they are. John, seven doesn’t come before six.”

“Papa’s going to design the topiary again, and he says I can help him think up new shapes. I’ve decided to choose the shape of the number five. Eight would be nice, but it’s too difficult.”

“John,” I said, “Papa’s very ill. Uncle Thomas and Uncle David are taking him away to live in England for a while.”

“Yes, that’ll be nice. But he’ll come back, won’t he? He’s promised me we can work on the topiary together.”

“I’m not sure exactly what’s going to happen, but Mama’s going to get a divorce, and—”

“What’s that?”

“John, you must know what a divorce is!”

“I don’t think so. Is it a flower?”

“Good God, no!”

“I don’t expect I would know about it, in that case. I only know about flowers. The west border’s lovely now, all purple and white, and you should see the Azalea Walk! Papa’s bought a new kind of azalea, and—”

“Didn’t he tell you he was going away?”

“Of course—when we said goodbye to him. Aunt Madeleine had come to stay, so she was there, and Uncle David was there too, of course, and Papa wore a nice velvet smoking jacket, bluish, the color of those pretty dark pansies along the east border. Papa kissed me and asked me to look after the garden for him while he was away, so I said I would. Then he wanted to kiss Eleanor, but she ran away and that made him upset. Eleanor’s peculiar nowadays. But he kissed Jane and Jane kissed him twice and hugged him, so that made up for Eleanor. Papa gave Jane a little wooden cat he had carved. He’s always giving her things, you know, and Nanny says he spoils her. Nanny’s very strict with Jane, but it’s no use because Jane just goes to Papa and Papa says she can have whatever she wants.”

Jane had always been abominably spoiled. It was one of the reasons why she was so obnoxious, and whenever the subject was raised I always felt quite unreasonably cross.

“Jane’s a little menace,” I said, unable to stop myself. “She was a menace even before I went away, and now it’s obvious she’s worse than ever. I can’t think why Mama and Papa think she’s so special.”

“Nanny says it’s because she’s the youngest. She says youngest children often get spoiled. Spoiling’s common among parents, like a cold, Nanny says, and even the best parents can catch it. Nanny says it’s a pity and we should feel sorry for Jane, but I don’t feel sorry for her particularly because she’s such a nuisance. Ned, what’s a divorce?”

“It means that Mama and Papa are going to get unmarried and that they won’t be living together in the future. It’s a pity, but it’s for the best. Papa treated Mama very badly and he let Mr. MacGowan ill-treat her too.”

“Mr. MacGowan’s dead,” said John. “I was sorry about that. He had planted some nice little trees, you know, and he showed me the seedlings. They were like baby Christmas trees. I liked them awfully.”

I said roughly, “John, you’re not listening to a word I’m saying!”

“Yes, I am. Mama and Papa are going to get unmarried. When will Papa come back to Cashelmara, do you think?”

“John, that’s exactly what I’m trying to tell you! He won’t be coming back. We’re going to live at Cashelmara with Mama, and Mr. Drummond will be the agent When Papa’s better he’ll live in England with Uncle Thomas and Uncle David.”

“Oh, but he’ll come back one day,” said John. “There’s the garden, you see. We’re going to do the topiary together. Does Mr. Drummond like gardening?”

“I shouldn’t think so.”

“Well, he won’t be any use if he can’t garden. You’d better tell Mama to send him away.”

“John …” I said, exasperated, and then gave up. I could only stare at him helplessly.

“Yes?” he said.

I made one last effort. “Mama’s very fond of Mr. Drummond. He’s going to take care of us all now instead of Papa.”

“That’s jolly obliging of him, but actually I’d rather have Papa. I don’t mind if Papa and Mama get unmarried, but Papa must come back and live with us. Mama can keep Mr. Drummond if she wants, but Papa’s got to come back.”

“John …” I was floundering for words again. “Why can’t you understand?” I said desperately. “You’re ten years old and yet you’re talking like a baby of five. What’s the matter with you?”