Edith, page 9
‘I’ve no doubt you’d be glad to see the back of us, Miss Somerville. Nevertheless, you don’t strike me as the sort to hand everything over without a fight. Now, here’s what I propose.You and one of my men go up to your bedroom and together the two of you take another look through your knick-knacks. I dare say there’s a few bangles or a watch that may have slipped your mind. Better still if you remember some bank notes.’
‘I must protest! I cannot allow your, your’ – wretches springs to her tongue but she resists it – ‘your men to traipse through my bedroom. It’s private!’
‘My men need arms and ammunition. Your privacy ranks a poor second behind that.’
‘But there’s a truce in place,’ says Cameron.
‘Ah, that’s only all palaver. A breathing space ’til the war’s back on. Now, Miss Somerville, off you toddle and see what you can lay your hands on for us. Or else.’ He thuds his Mauser butt end against the palm of his hand, with a meaningful jerk of the head at Loulou, cowering on Philomena’s lap.
Cameron takes a step towards the captain and two rifles swing towards him in unison. ‘This is naked force. You have no authority or right to do this.’
‘We learned it from the English. People like you need to decide where your loyalties lie. Either give your allegiance to the Irish Republic. Or clear out.’
‘Great Britain will soon bring you to heel,’ says Cameron.
‘We’re not fucken dogs!’
Edith can see the captain’s grip on his temper beginning to fray. A vein has pushed up through his forehead. All of his anger appears to be centred on that pulsing stripe. His eyes belong to a man for whom killing has become commonplace. She takes a step towards the IRA leader. ‘My brother meant no offence.’
The captain says nothing. Neither does Cameron.
‘Did you, Cameron?’
His face reddens.
‘Did you?’ She pins him with a look.
Cameron exhales noisily. ‘I spoke … out of turn.’
The captain passes a hand over his eyes. Pauses. Speaks.‘The English won’t have things their own way here anymore. The people are ready to see this fight through.’ He nods at the man who kicked Dooley. ‘Go with her.’
Edith’s blood slows in her veins. Anyone but him. She looks at the captain and sees there is no use appealing to him. Very well. She lays Dooley on the floor, uncoils the scarf she wound round her neck when she rose from bed a lifetime ago, and rests his head on it. She can’t bear to think of his dear little face pressed to the ground.
As before, she carries the hall lamp, her skin crawling at the knowledge of who is a few paces behind her. He whistles a tune as they walk, but stops to study a collection of fox’s masks mounted on the wall, near the staircase.
‘Caught in mid-flight, you might say,’ says the whistler.
She doesn’t answer. He makes a gesture to move her on, and all at once she sees him as a man with experience of herding cattle. To the slaughterhouse, probably. On the staircase, her leg drags as she mounts. She grits her teeth and listens for the chiming of a clock, hoping to gauge the time, but the muteness of the house engulfs them. On the upper landing, under a window looking over the rooftops of rooms added on to Drishane, in afterthought, he removes his cap and scratches his scalp. Edith sees his hair is dark and untidy, like a windblown hedge.
‘Your fucken brother’d want to watch his manners round the captain. It’s all the same to us if we roast your aul’ barn of a house.’ He jams his cap back on his head and makes a fist of his hand. ‘Whoosh!’ The hand opens, fingers splayed, mimicking an explosion. ‘It’s some sight.’
She points to the grenade, dangling from his belt.‘Do you know the damage that thing could do?’
‘It won’t do a thing unless I pull the pin.’
‘You might end up doing yourself an injury in the process.
‘I know what I’m about. Pull, count to three, throw it to Jaysus and hit the ground with your head covered.’
Silenced, she walks ahead to her bedroom door, where she balks. She won’t have this Dooley-murdering devil tramping around in the space where she sleeps. ‘Wait here. I’ll never be able to find what I want with you breathing down my neck.’ She thrusts the lamp into his hand.
To her surprise, he remains on the saddle board. Quickly, she retrieves her best evening pumps from a shelf in the wardrobe. Inside one of the shoes, mummified in tissue paper, her mother’s ruby engagement ring nestles.
‘Show me what you have there.’
‘It’s a ring.’
‘Let me see.’
‘Are you an expert on stones?’
He takes two steps into the room, his boots causing the floorboards to creak. She unpeels the paper and holds the ring aloft by its gold band. Inside the lamplight’s loop, the ruby glows with the assurance of a genuine stone.
‘Grand.’
‘Shall we go?’ she asks.
‘Hold your horses.’ His eyes patrol her dressing table. ‘We’ll have them an’ all.’ A forefinger points towards an enamelled hairbrush and hand-mirror set, a sixteenth birthday gift from her parents.
She grits her teeth. ‘Be my guest. Allow me.’ She squeezes past him, carrying them. She must get this beast out of her bedroom.
He hesitates, nothing else catches his eye and he follows her. ‘I’ll take them.’
She scrapes her fingers through the brush to rake out any hairs lodged there.They can have her brush but not them. She hands over the matched pair and he jams them into a pocket. All at once, slyly exultant, she realizes he missed the comb that completes the set. It’s out of its usual place, left on her bedside table. Small victories are as sweet as large.
He whistles the same tune, walking back to the kitchen, its notes grating in her eardrums. By the time they are back, her hip is aching and one of her legs is dragging.
‘With my compliments,’ she tells the captain, handing over the ring.
‘That’s more like it. The Republic thanks you, Miss Somerville.’
She notices the whistler hasn’t produced the hairbrush and mirror. Could he be holding them back for a sweetheart? He meets her eye, an evil look on his face. She turns back to the captain.
‘Can you leave us in peace now, please?’
‘We’ll need a horse.’
She thanks her lucky stars Mike Hurley found temporary homes for the young hunters. ‘We’ve nothing but old work horses left. They pull the plough. Not much use to you.’
‘There’s one that looked fresh enough.’
‘That’s Tara, highly strung. She’ll throw any rider. I’m the only one who can manage her.’
‘The gentry aren’t the only ones who can manage a horse.’
‘I’m not suggesting that. But believe me, horse sense is a misnomer in her case. She’s skittish. If you have to take a horse, make it Samson. He’s well on in years but strong – he used to be a hunter.You’ll get some benefit out of him. He’s a horse that could leap a house.’
‘Very well, Samson it is. We have your men in the stable – they can point him out.’
‘The Hurleys – are they really all right?’ checks Edith.
‘Right as rain. I told you before. Now, ladies, Colonel, I wish you good night. To sleep, perchance to dream. Let’s gather up, lads.’
‘Will we take this yoke with us?’ Cameron’s old shotgun is waved in the air.
‘Ah, firepower.We haven’t found much in that department, have we? Colonel, do you swear on your honour as an officer and a gentleman’ – his mouth twists, amused by a private joke – ‘there are no other guns in the house?’
‘None. I handed them over at the barracks in Skibbereen.’
‘Make him go on his knees and swear it,’ urges the whistler.
‘Shame on you,’ protests Philomena.
‘Can’t I tell a lie as well on my feet as on my knees?’ says Cameron.
‘No need for anyone to get down on their knees,’ says the captain.
‘Do you swear there are no other guns, Colonel Somerville?’
‘I do.’
‘Very well, I’ll take your word for it. Now, do you have a sheet of paper and a pen?’
‘There are writing materials in my study.’
‘Mrs O’Shea, surely you have something for shopping lists and the like,’ says Edith. Goodness knows what else they’ll lift if they go tramping through the house again.
‘In the drawer on the side of the table,’ says Mrs O’Shea.
The captain pulls out a scrap of paper and pencil, writes on it rapidly, folds the sheet and hands it to Cameron.‘For you, Colonel.’
‘What is it?’
‘A list of the items we’ve requisitioned.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘The Irish Republic will refund you as soon as it has control of our tax revenues.We’re not thieves, you know.’
Cameron catches Edith’s eye. Neither of them speaks.
‘Everybody stay put for the next hour,’ continues the captain. ‘Someone will be watching the house. If any man or woman tries to leave before time’s up, we’ll be back another night. And you won’t escape so lightly next time.’ He bends at the waist in a mocking bow. ‘And so slán agus beannacht one and all. No need to wish me luck. I have the devil’s own.’ Hand shoulder high, he signals to the men. ‘Time we were away, boys.’ They swing around him in a semi-circle.
With the clarity of a flash of light in a darkened room, Edith hears Martin speaking to her. Remind them about the death coach. ‘Keep an eye out for the coiste bodhar,’ she says.
Two of the men bless themselves, another babbles what sounds like an invocation.
Even the captain has some of the swagger knocked out of him. ‘W-what’s that you said?’
‘The coiste bodhar, the death coach. It rattles along our roads most nights. Headless horses in the harness and a coachman with his head under his arm. They say no one who sees it lives out the week.’
A moan escapes from the Kerry boy in Aylmer’s boots. The wind whips a branch and taps it against the window. Everyone jumps.
The captain pulls himself together. ‘Piseogs. Now remember, ladies, Colonel, you’re being watched. Let’s go, boys.’
The back door opens, and one by one they flit out into the murk.
seven
The four people in the kitchen strain their ears for sounds from outside. A horse’s neigh. A man’s voice soothing it – not Mike Hurley’s. The crunch of footsteps. The clatter of hooves. Silence.
It is broken by Loulou, who scrabbles over to Dooley and begins to sniff him. An exploratory lick of his mouth. Another sniffing session, this time circling the body. Circumnavigation complete, she sits back on her haunches and begins to yowl.
‘Bloody well shut up!’ cries Cameron.
‘Go easy on her, Cam,’ says Edith. She’s only doing what I’d like to.
Mrs O’Shea takes her rosary beads out of a pocket and runs them through her fingers, lips moving.
‘How about a nice cup of tea?’ There’s a tremor in Philomena’s voice.
‘Good idea,’ says Cameron.
‘Right so.’ Philomena braces her arms on the sides of the chair and tries to stand, but her legs give way and she sinks back into the chair with an ‘ooph’.
Mrs O’Shea drops the beads into her lap and reaches across the space separating her from Philomena.The two hold hands.‘There, there, a stór,’ says Mrs O’Shea. Philomena breathes in, squeezes the cook’s hand, and stands up.
‘I’ll help you with the tea, Philomena.’
‘No, you stay where you are and rest yourself, Mrs O. My legs are younger than yours.We’ve all had a shock. A nice sugary cup is just what the doctor ordered.’
Edith wishes she could hold hands with them, too. But it would never do in front of her brother. She considers taking his hand in hers but knows he’d resent the staff seeing it. ‘Can I have a look at that piece of paper they gave you?’
He glances over it, before handing it to her. ‘Intolerable conceit of the man. Self-styled captain, too, I shouldn’t wonder.’ Cameron’s foot lashes out, connecting with a table leg.
Edith reads the list, laid out in copperplate script despite the time pressure the IRA leader was under.
Item 1: one horse plus assorted saddles & bridles
Item 2: one ruby ring
Item 3: pair of silver candlesticks
Item 4: one canteen of cutlery
Item 5: silver egg cups (7)
Item 6: assorted earrings, bracelets & ladys watch
Item 7: one chicken cooked & various foodstuffs
Requisitioned from Summervilles of Drishane House in name of the Irish Republic by Captain C.P., Cork Division, 19 October 1921
Well. That captain has panache, if nothing else. Edith keeps the thought to herself. Cameron would take it amiss.
Loulou whimpers, and Edith bends over her. ‘Loulou looks overheated. Maybe she’s thirsty.’
‘Shall I fetch you a bowl, miss?’
‘No, Philomena, you keep going with the tea.’
Edith tries to persuade Loulou to drink, but she refuses to lap. She dips the corner of her nightdress in the water and squeezes a few drops onto her lolling tongue. Next, she turns her attention to Dooley.‘Would you bring me his blanket, Cameron? It’s at the end of my bed. We can’t leave the poor boy lying here in his own blood.’ Her voice catches, she swallows and clears her throat. ‘I’ll wrap him up in it. He loves that blanket.’
‘First things first, Edith. We need to let our friends know about a gang of armed men roaming the countryside. They could go anywhere next. To the Castle. To Glen Barrahane. Anywhere. No one’s safe.’
‘First things first means taking care of Dooley,’ snaps Edith.
Mrs O’Shea heaves herself out of her chair. ‘There’s a towel in the drawer here, Miss Edith. It’ll cover the poor wee mite for now. You shouldn’t kneel there like that with him, you’ll stiffen up.’
Together, they lay Dooley on the towel and loosely cover him with it.
‘Miss Edith, let me clean you up.’ Philomena has a damp cloth in her hand. She strokes it across her mistress’s face, wiping away the blood.
‘I suppose I should tell the police,’ says Cameron. ‘Except they’ll do nothing. They’re afraid to leave their barracks without a battalion of soldiers at their backs.’ He cracks his knuckles methodically. First the left hand, then the right.
Edith has a flashback to their mother scolding him about the knuckles habit. She thought he had outgrown it. ‘Does anyone have the time? We’re supposed to stay put for an hour.’
Cameron consults his fob watch. ‘Just after three. Would either of you like to go back to bed? Mrs O’Shea? Philomena?’
‘I couldn’t sleep a wink!’ says Mrs O’Shea. ‘These are desperate times, so they are. From day to day, you’d never know when trouble might come knocking on your door.’
Philomena is mumbling over the tea preparations. ‘One spoon each and one for the pot,’ again and again, like a charm. She’s crunching over shards of china broken by the IRA captain, but no one thinks to sweep them up.
‘I wouldn’t have put it past those scoundrels to torch the house,’ says Cameron. ‘My heart was in my mouth when you gave that ruffian a box of matches, Peg.’
‘I didn’t have much choice.’
The whistler comes to mind – that upwards swoosh sketched with his hand. He was only too keen to reduce Drishane to rubble.What was it she heard about windows? Automatically, her eyes turn to the shuttered kitchen window. A blast of wind rattles its panes. That’s it. They smash the ground-floor windows of a house to create an updraught for the flames.The Vane-Brownes told her about it.They lost their home that way – hundreds of years of history up in smoke.
As soon as she heard how Easterfield was scorched to a crisp (‘Not half a dozen stones left standing,’ said Timmy the Post), she had Mike harness Tara to the dogcart and drove to Baltimore to see how she could help. Some portraits, war medals and various items of furniture were salvaged. But the centuries-old manor house lay in ruins, still smouldering fifteen hours later. The family lingered there, poking among the rubble, although neighbours begged them to leave.
The butler – a gloomy man who told Edith,‘Soon you’ll be the only gentry left, ma’am’ – led her towards her old mixed-doubles tennis partner, Bertie Vane-Browne. Bertie began talking ninety to the dozen about his doorknobs. They were crafted from eighteenth-century silver fob watches, an idiosyncrasy admired by guests, and their loss troubled him.‘Queen Victoria coveted them,’ he said.
She tried to comfort him, but he was fixated on the handles.
‘Irreplaceable.Those people don’t know what they’ve done. One day, they’ll regret it.’
‘At least no one’s been hurt,’ said Edith.
After all, landlords were being shot.TheVane-Brownes were tremendous fun, horsey to their fingertips, but she’d always heard their tenants had no great fondness for them. They were another of the old county families bailing out.
‘Stay, rebuild – there’ll be compensation money,’ she urged Bertie. But he said Angela’s nerves had collapsed. His wife wanted nothing further to do with Ireland.
Edith darts a look at Philomena and Mrs O’Shea. For all their words of loyalty to the Somervilles, would they care if Drishane was destroyed? They’d miss the employment but would they be bothered about the house? Edith enjoys crashing out the opening chords of All Things Bright and Beautiful when she plays the organ at Sunday service in St Barrahane’s, beside the Castle. But sometimes she is uneasy about its assumptions that everyone is comfortable with the status quo.
The rich man in his castle/the poor man at his gate/God made them high and lowly/And ordered their estate.
Automatically, she accepts the cup and saucer, comforted by Philomena’s work-roughened skin as she guides Edith’s hand to take it. Philomena’s hands are as capable as her brain.
‘Drink that, now, let you, Miss Edith.’
Edith does as she’s told. The tea is strong and sweet, and its energygiving properties course through her.
