What collective madness had the townspeople in its grip? “If they’re concerned that a child is being allowed to kill herself,” Lib demanded, “why don’t they storm the cabin?”
Byrne gave a great shrug. “We Irish have a gift for resignation. Or, put another way, fatalism.”
He tucked her arm through his, and they walked under the trees. The sun was up, and it looked set to be another horribly lovely day.
“Yesterday I was in Athlone,” he told her, “arguing with the police. This officer, a piece of apathetic pomposity with his hat and musket—he kept stroking his moustache and saying that the situation was one of considerable delicacy. Far be it from the constabulary, says he, to invade a domestic sanctum in the absence of any evidence of a crime having been committed.”
Lib nodded. And, really, what could the police possibly have done? Still, she appreciated Byrne’s impulse to try something, anything.
How she wished she could tell him all that she’d learned the night before, and not just for the relief of sharing it but because he cared for Anna as she did.
No. It would be treachery to expose the secret that the child carried within her puny body to a man, any man, even one who was Anna’s champion. How could Byrne ever look at this innocent girl the same way afterwards? Lib owed it to Anna to keep her mouth shut.
She couldn’t tell anyone else either. If Anna’s own mother had called her a liar, most likely so would the rest of the world. Lib couldn’t put Anna through the violation of a medical examination; that body had endured so much probing already. Besides, even if the fact could be proved, what Lib saw as incestuous rape, others would call seduction. Wasn’t it so often the girl—no matter how young—who got blamed for having incited her molester with a look?
“I’ve come to a dreadful conclusion,” she said to Byrne. “Anna can’t live in this family.”
His brows contracted. “But they’re all she’s got. All she knows. What’s a child without a family?”
The nest is enough for the wren, Rosaleen O’Donnell had boasted. But what if a baby bird of rare plumage found herself in the wrong nest, and the mother bird turned her sharp beak on the chick? “Trust me, they’re no family,” Lib told him. “They won’t lift a finger to save her.”
Byrne nodded.
But was he convinced? “I’ve watched a child die,” she said, “and I can’t do it again.”
“In your line of work—”
“No. You don’t understand. My child. My daughter.”
Byrne stared. His arm tightened around hers.
“Three weeks and three days, that’s how long she hung on.” Bleating, coughing like a goat. There must have been something sour in Lib’s milk, because the baby had turned away or spat it out, and what little she got down had made her dwindle as if it were the opposite of food, a magical shrinking potion.
Byrne didn’t say, Such things happen. He didn’t point out that Lib’s loss was only a drop in the ocean of human pain. “Was that when Wright left?”
Lib nodded. “Nothing to stay for, was how he put it.” Then she added, “Not that I much cared, at that point.”
A growl: “He didn’t deserve you.”
Oh, but none of it was a matter of deserving. She hadn’t deserved to lose her daughter; Lib knew that even on her bleakest days. She’d done nothing that she shouldn’t have, for all Wright’s dark hints; had left nothing undone that she should have done. Fate was faceless, life arbitrary, a tale told by an idiot.
Except at rare moments such as this one, when one glimpsed a way of wrestling it into a better shape.
In her head, Miss N. asked: Can you throw your whole self into the breach?
Lib held on to Byrne’s arm like a rope. She found her mind hadn’t been quite made up till this minute. She told him, “I’m going to take Anna away.”
“Away where?”
“Anywhere but here.” Her eyes scoured the flat horizon. “The farther the better.”
Byrne turned to face her. “How would that persuade the child to eat?”
“I can’t be sure, and I can’t explain it, but I know she must leave this place and these people.”
His tone was wry. “You’re buying the damn spoons.”
For a moment Lib was confused, then she remembered the hundred spoons at Scutari and almost smiled.
“Let’s be clear,” he said, urbane again. “You mean to kidnap the girl.”
“I suppose they’d call it that,” said Lib, her voice rough with fright. “But I’d never compel her.”
“Would Anna go with you willingly, then?”
“I believe she just might, if I can put it to her the right way.”
Byrne was tactful enough not to point out the unlikelihood of this. “How do you propose to travel? Hire a driver? You’ll be caught before you get to the next county.”
All at once, Lib felt her tiredness catching up with her. “Odds are I’ll end up in prison, Anna will die, and none of it will have made any difference.”
“Yet you mean to try.”
She struggled to answer. “Better to drown in the surf than stand idly on the shore.” Absurd to quote Miss N., who’d be appalled to hear that one of her nurses had been arrested for child abduction. But sometimes the teaching held more than the teacher knew.
What Byrne said next astonished her. “Then it must be tonight.”
When Lib arrived for her shift, at one o’clock on Saturday, the bedroom door was closed. Sister Michael, Kitty, and the O’Donnells were all on their knees in the kitchen; Malachy held his cap in one hand.
Lib went to turn the door handle.
“Don’t,” snapped Rosaleen. “Mr. Thaddeus is in the middle of giving Anna the sacrament of penance.”
Penance; that was another word for confession, wasn’t it?
“Part of the last rites,” murmured Sister Michael to Lib.
Was Anna dying? She swayed on her feet, and thought she might fall.
“It’s not only to help a patient make a bona mors,” the nun assured her.
“A what?”
“A good death, that is. It’s also for anyone in danger. It’s even been known to restore health, if God wills it.”
More fairy tales.
A high bell rang in the bedroom and Mr. Thaddeus opened the door. “You may all come in for the anointing.”
The group got off their knees and shuffled in after Lib.
Anna was lying with her blankets off. The dresser was spread with a white cloth on which was a thick white candle, a crucifix, golden dishes, a dried leaf of some kind, little white balls, a piece of bread, dishes of water and oil, and a white powder.
Mr. Thaddeus dipped his right thumb in the oil. “Per istam sanctam unctionem et suam piissima misericordiam,” he intoned. “Indulgeat tibi Dominus quidquid per visum, auditum, gustum, odoratum, tactum et locutionem, gressum deliquisti.” He touched Anna’s eyelids, ears, lips, nose, hands, and, finally, the soles of her misshapen feet.
“Whatever’s he doing?” Lib whispered to Sister Michael.
“Wiping away the stains. The sins she’s committed with each part of her body,” the nun said in her ear, eyes still faithfully on the priest.
Anger surged in Lib. What about sins committed against Anna?
Then the priest took the dish of white pellets and dabbed each spot of oil with one of them; cotton? He set down the dish, rubbed his thumb on the bread. “May this holy anointing bring consolation and ease,” he said to the family. “Remember, God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.”
“Bless you, Mr. Thaddeus,” cried Rosaleen O’Donnell.
“Whether it be in a little time, or not for many years to come”—his voice was lullingly musical—“we will all meet again to part no more forever, in a world where sorrow and separation are at an end.”
“Amen.”
He washed his hands in the dish of water and dried them on the cloth.
Malachy O’Donnell went over to his daughter and
bent as if to kiss her forehead. But then he stopped himself, as if Anna were too holy to touch now. “Anything you need, pet?”
“Just the blankets, please, Dadda,” she told him through chattering teeth.
He drew them up and covered her to the chin.
Mr. Thaddeus stowed all his equipment in his bag, and Rosaleen showed him to the door.
“Wait, please,” Lib called to him, crossing the room. “I need to speak to you.”
Rosaleen O’Donnell gripped Lib’s sleeve so hard that a stitch popped. “We don’t detain a priest in idle conversation when he’s carrying the Blessed Eucharist.”
Lib pulled away from her and rushed after him.
Out in the farmyard, she called, “Mr. Thaddeus!”
“What is it?” The man stopped and kicked away a pecking hen.
She had to find out whether Anna had told him just now of her scheme to ransom Pat with her own death. “Did Anna talk to you about her brother?”
His smooth face tautened. “Mrs. Wright, only your ignorance of our faith excuses your attempt to induce me to breach the seal of the confessional.”
“So you do know.”
“Such calamities should be kept in the family,” he said, “not bruited abroad. Anna should never have entered on such a subject with you.”
“But if you reason with her, if you explain that God would never—”
The priest spoke over her. “I’ve been telling the poor girl for months that her sins are forgiven, and besides, we should speak nothing but good of the dead.”
Lib stared at him. The dead. He wasn’t talking about Anna’s plan to trade her life for her brother’s redemption. Her sins; Mr. Thaddeus meant what Pat had done to her. I’ve been telling the poor girl for months. That had to mean that after the mission, back in the spring, Anna had opened her heart to her parish priest, told him of all her confusion about the secret marriage, all her mortification. And unlike Rosaleen O’Donnell, he’d been clear-sighted enough to believe the girl. But the only comfort he’d offered was to tell her that her sins were forgiven and she should never mention it again!
The priest was halfway to the lane by the time Lib recovered herself. She watched him disappear around the hedge. How many such calamities were there in how many other families over which Mr. Thaddeus had drawn a veil? Was that all he knew how to do with a child’s pain?
Inside the smoky cabin, Kitty was throwing the contents of the little dishes on the fire: the salt, the bread, even the water, which spat fiercely.
“What are you doing?” asked Lib.
“They’ve the traces of the holy oil on them still,” the slavey told her, “so they have to be buried or burnt.”
Only in this country would anyone burn water.
Rosaleen O’Donnell was putting canisters of tea and sugar in a paper-lined cupboard in the wall.
“What about Dr. McBrearty,” asked Lib, “did you think to send for him before the priest?”
“Wasn’t he in this morning?” Rosaleen answered without turning around.
Kitty busied herself scraping burnt porridge into a basin.
Lib pressed on. “And what did he say about Anna?”
“That she’s in God’s hands now.”
A tiny sound from Kitty; was that a sob?
“As are we all,” muttered Rosaleen.
Rage went through Lib like an electric shock, rage at the doctor, the mother, the maid, and the committee men.
But she had a mission, she reminded herself, and she couldn’t allow anything to distract her from it. “This special mass tonight, at half past eight,” she said to Kitty in as calm a voice as she could muster, “how long do these ceremonies last?”
“I couldn’t say.”
“Longer than on an ordinary occasion?”
“Oh, much longer,” said Kitty. “Two hours, maybe, or three.”
Lib nodded as if impressed. “I was thinking that I should stay late tonight so that Sister can accompany you all to the mass.”
“No need,” said the nun, appearing in the doorway of the bedroom.
“But Sister—” Panic in Lib’s throat. Improvising, she turned to Malachy O’Donnell, who was brooding over a newspaper by the hearth. “Shouldn’t Sister Michael go too, as the child is so fond of her?”
“Indeed she should.”
The nun hesitated, frowning.
“Yes, you must be there with us, Sister,” said Rosaleen O’Donnell, “bearing us up.”
“Gladly,” said the nun. Her eyes were still puzzled.
Lib hurried into the bedroom before they could change their minds. “Good day, Anna.” Her voice oddly bright with relief that she’d manage to arrange to stay late, at least.
The child’s face gaunt, sallow. “Good day, Mrs. Lib.” Inert, as if her thick ankles fettered her to the bed, except for a shudder every now and then. Her breaths were noisy.
“A little water?”
She shook her head.
Lib called to Kitty to bring in another blanket. The slavey’s face was rigid as she handed it over.
Hold on, Lib wanted to whisper in Anna’s ear. Wait just a little longer, just until tonight. But she couldn’t risk saying a word, not yet.
It was the slowest day Lib had ever known. Yet the house was in a sort of low fever. The O’Donnells and their maid hung about in the kitchen speaking in doleful murmurs, looking in on Anna every now and then. Lib went about her business, propping Anna up on pillows, wetting her lips with a cloth. Her own breaths were coming quick and shallow.
At four, Kitty brought in a bowl of some kind of vegetable hash. Lib forced herself to spoon it down.
“Would you like anything, pet?” the maid asked the child in an incongruously cheerful voice. “Your thingy?” She held up the thaumatrope.
“Show me, Kitty.”
So the slavey twirled the cords and made the bird appear in the cage, then fly free.
Anna heaved a breath. “You can have it.”
The young woman’s face fell. But she didn’t ask what Anna meant; she just set down the toy. “Would you like your treasure chest on your lap?”
Anna shook her head.
Lib helped the girl a little higher up on the pillows. “Water?”
Another shake of the head.
At the window, Kitty said, “’Tis that picture fellow again.”
Lib jumped to her feet and looked over the maid’s shoulder. REILLY & SONS, PHOTOGRAPHISTS, said the van. She hadn’t heard the horse pull up. She could just imagine how artfully Reilly would pose the figures for the deathbed scene: soft light from the side, the family kneeling around Anna, the uniformed nurse at the back with her head bowed. “Tell him to make himself scarce.”
Kitty looked startled but didn’t argue; she left the room.
“My holy cards and books and things,” Anna murmured, looking towards her chest.
“Would you like to see them?” asked Lib.
She shook her head. “They’re for Mammy. After.”
Lib nodded. There was a kind of poetic justice in that, paper saints standing in for a child of flesh. Hadn’t Rosaleen O’Donnell been nudging Anna towards the grave all along—perhaps ever since Pat’s death, last November?
Once the woman lost Anna, perhaps she’d be able to love her without strain. Unlike a live daughter, a dead one was impeccable. This was what Rosaleen O’Donnell had chosen, Lib told herself: to be the sorrowful, proud mother of two angels.
Five minutes later, Reilly’s van moved slowly off. Lib, watching at the window, thought: He’ll be back. She supposed a posthumous composition would be even easier to arrange.
An hour later, Malachy O’Donnell came in and knelt down heavily beside the bed where his daughter was dozing. He joined his hands—his knuckles making white spots on the red skin—and muttered an Our Father.
Watching his bent, greying head, Lib wavered. This man had none of his wife’s malignity, and he did love Anna in his own passive way. If he could only be rouse
d from his stupor, to fight for his child… Perhaps Lib owed him one last chance?
She made herself go around the bed and lean down to his ear. “When your daughter wakes,” she said, “beg her to eat, for your sake.”
Malachy didn’t protest; he only shook his head. “It’d choke her, sure.”
“A drink of milk would choke her? But it’s the same consistency as water.”
“I couldn’t do it.”
“Why not?” demanded Lib.
“You wouldn’t understand, ma’am.”
“Then make me!”
Malachy let out a long, ragged breath. “I promised her.”
Lib stared. “That you wouldn’t ask her to eat? When was this?”
“Months back.”
The clever girl; Anna had tied her fond father’s hands. “But that was when you believed her able to live without food, correct?”
A bleak nod.
“She was in good health at the time. Look at her now,” Lib said.
“I know,” muttered Malachy O’Donnell, “I know. Still and all, I promised I’d never ask that.”
Who but an idiot would have made such a commitment? But it would do no good to insult the man, Lib reminded herself. Best to focus on the present. “Your promise is killing her now. Surely that cancels it?”
He writhed. “’Twas a secret and solemn vow, on the Bible, Mrs. Wright. I’m telling you only so you won’t blame me.”
“But I do,” said Lib. “I blame all of you.”
Malachy’s head drooped as if it were too heavy for his neck. A stunned bullock.
Valiant in his own dull way; he’d risk any consequences rather than break his word to his daughter, Lib realized. Would see Anna die before he’d let her down.
A tear jerked down his unshaven cheek. “Sure I still have hope.”
What hope, that Anna would suddenly call out for food?
“There was another little colleen stone-dead in her bed, eleven years old.”
Was this a neighbour? Lib wondered. Or a story out of the newspaper?
“And you know what Our Lord said to the father?” said Malachy, almost smiling. “Fear not. Fear not, only believe, and she shall be safe.”
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