Before the Fall

by Orna Ross

  My new job often keeps me busy and, often, late in the office. As soon as I can get away, I do, and join my gang down the pub. They thought my new status might affect our drinking dynamic, but I won't let it. I am the last one standing most nights, so they'll know where my allegiance lies.

  Between work and socialising, I am rarely at home, except to sleep myself back to recovery. Dirty dishes accumulate in my sink until furred. Magazines, cups, glasses, papers surround my bed, like fallout from a blast. My clothes get picked up from the floor, laundered as I need them, but never find their way back into the wardrobe. Some days I have to turn my knickers inside out because I have none clean and no time to get to a shop before work. Time and money keep calling at me to pay attention, but I am gone, off and away.

  Then, suddenly, unexpectedly, I meet Jack. Jack Ward. A teacher. Not just that, a teacher of disabled kids. An unlikely boyfriend for me in every way, so different to any of the others. Jack has none of Rory's flamboyance, but he lets me be and — for the first time in my life — I don't try to impress, don't do what I think will win approval. I carry on drinking as I have always done and in his company I am raucous, shouting and singing and swearing. None of it fazes him. He smiles through it all, goes home when he feels like going, stays and sings along if that's his mood.

  Jack takes pleasure in everything – walks in the park, Sunday mornings with the newspapers, nights out to the cinema – but the me he likes best is the one who comes out when we're home, snuggled up, three-quarters way down a bottle of red wine. He is uncomplicated in bed, easy to delight. Kind, gentle, good-looking and more clever than I allow, he sneaks into my life with his openness, his ease with the world.

  It seems audacious. Surely it will rebound on him?

  Jack rarely meets me straight after work with my friends, though he easily could, his school being just one tube station from The Rose and Crown. He likes to shower his working day away, to change his clothes, to have something to eat before he goes out, instead of making do with crisps and salted nuts until we go to the takeaway after closing time. He rarely comes clubbing with us either, though he loves to dance. He prefers it when it's just the two of us, he says without rancour, without the least pressure on me.

  Sometimes it annoys me that he is so agreeable. He has such confidence in himself, in me. He is like me in my old days with Rory, thinking love was enough. Asking for trouble

  Reflux

  1923

  North Dublin Union

  Dear Peg,

  You'll have noticed the change of address above. So much has happened since I last wrote, I hardly know where to start.

  I have to say that we felt not altogether unfortunate to be in Kilmainham Jail for Easter weekend. The seventh anniversary of the 1916 Rising felt like a good day to take our Oath of Allegiance again to the Republic and to be one of three hundred Republican girls housed there, where those brave heroes were executed.

  Now, a few weeks later, what a contrast!

  It began when we were told that we were to be moved from Kilmainham to North Dublin Union, a former workhouse. We were none too keen on this idea, as Kilmainham, with its noble association, suited us far better. Also, Mrs O'Callaghan and Miss MacSwiney were still on their hunger strike (nineteen days by then) and we were very anxious about the effect of such a move on them. So we sent our decision to the governor: no prisoner would consent to leave until the hunger strikers were released.

  Our best strategic position seemed to be the top gallery, as it is caged in with iron bars running around the horseshoe-shaped building. So we took up our posts. The place was in darkness, except for one lit window beside a gateway, behind which figures of soldiers and wardresses hurried back and forth. Our officers gave the instructions: we were to resist, but not attack; we were not to come to one another's rescue; no missiles were to be thrown; and, above all, for the sake of the patient in her cell, no one was to cry out. Then we knelt and said the Rosary and, after that, we sang some of Miss MacSwiney's favourite songs.

  Suddenly, the gate opened and the men rushed in, across the compound and up the stairs. The attack was violent, but disorganised. Brigid O'Mullane and Rita Farrelly, the first seized, were crushed and bruised between men pressing up the stairs, dragging them down. Our commander, Mrs Gordon, was next. It was hard not to go to her rescue as she clung to the iron bars, the men beating her hands with their clenched fists. When that failed to make her loosen her hold, they struck her twice in the chest, then one took her head and beat it against the iron bars. I think she was unconscious after that. I saw her dragged by the soldiers down the stairs.

  The men were determined. Some twisted the girls' arms, some bent back their thumbs. Some were kicked by a particular CID man who was fond of using his feet. One was disabled by a blow on the ankle with a revolver. Annie McKeown, one of the smallest and youngest, was pulled downstairs and kicked in the head. One girl had her finger bitten off, Lena O'Doherty was struck on the mouth, one man thrust a finger down Moira Broderick's throat. Lily Dunn and May O'Toole fainted. They do not know where they were struck.

  My own turn came too. After I had been dragged from the railings, a great hand closed on my face, blinding and stifling me, and thrust me back down to the ground, among trampling feet. After that, I remember being carried by two or three men and flung down in the surgery to be searched. Mrs Wilson and Mrs Gordon were there, their faces bleeding. One of the female searchers was screaming at them like a drunkard on a Saturday night; she struck Mrs Gordon in the face. They removed watches, fountain pens and brooches. Our orders not to hite back were well obeyed.

  The wardresses were bringing us cups of water and they were crying, and some of the soldiers too looked wretched, but the prison doctor – and a few other soldiers – looked on, smirking, smoking cigarettes. The doctor seemed to have come along for the entertainment; he did nothing to help any of the injured girls.

  After another long struggle, we were thrown into the lorries, one by one, and driven away.

  Peg, you have to let the world know of this disgrace. I don't know whether word has reached the newspapers or not; we're so much more isolated in this place than we were in Kilmainham. Please also tell the world that Republican women are housed in a place that is filthy and freezing, with no privacy or facilities for washing or bathing. The sentries can, and do, look into our wards on the ground floor. We've asked to have the lower window panes frosted or painted but no, so we have to hang clothes over them to get in or out of bed. We're experiencing every kind of discomfort: hunger, cold and dirt. And, though only a few yards from one of the most populated districts of Dublin, cut off from everything.

  We have had no news since of Miss MacSwiney. We hear rumour of peace moves outside, but never see a paper. Please fill me in on everything you know when you write. I haven't heard from Norah this long time: tell her she's not to forget me. The person who gives you this letter will tell you how to get mail through untampered.

  Please also tell your mammy and daddy I was asking for them and that I keep Barney in my prayers.

  I was thinking of you and the family at Easter time.

  You will write soon, won't you, to

  Your friend,

  Molly

  * * *

  Mucknamore,

  26th June, 1923

  Dear Molly,

  Thank you for your recent letter: what shocking news. Yet nothing should shock us anymore.

  What do you think of the ceasefire? I don't know what to make of it. I agree with Mr de Valera that further sacrifice would be in vain but I don't understand what's going to happen next. It can't be over. What was worthy of bloodshed a month ago now can't be unworthy now, surely to God.

  And surely to God they're not going to tell us that those who died did so in vain, or that women subjected to the assaults you'd experienced are to pretend it never happened.

  Be assured that the few bits of weaponry we have left here in Mucknamore went into a safe dump. I suppose w
e can add to them as time goes on. We'll be keeping quiet for a while, though. Areas never before visited now swarm with troops and they're bringing in a new Public Order Bill.

  So, ceasefire or not, it's clear they don't intend to soften. Flogging as a punishment for arson or robbery — did you ever hear the like?

  And I don't think the ceasefire makes it one bit more likely that you, or any of the prisoners, will be let out.

  They'd be afraid to have too many of us on the loose, in case we might go to the weapon dumps and start the fight again. Which is exactly what would happen, of course.

  Still, it's against any notion of democracy to incarcerate thousands of people without trial or prospect of release. And now we're to have this election. Run by a State we don't believe in, yet we're to field candidates to give the people the opportunity to show they support us. But if we win, they won't take their seats. They can't take part in a government they don't believe in.

  It's one of those jokes that makes nobody laugh.

  But I'll support the work, of course, and do what is asked of me. Mammy and I have been writing a bulletin to distribute, house to house. See what you think of this:

  Dear Voter,

  They said this Treaty would fill Irish pockets. It has filled only Irish PRISONS and GRAVES. On behalf of the King and Commons, the Irish "Free State" government has — in fourteen months — murdered, executed, tortured and imprisoned more Irishmen than were killed by the English during six years of terror (1916–1922).

  There's more about the SLAVERY and CHAOS created by the Treaty — and then it asks them to come back to us and VOTE AGAINST IT.

  Mammy helped me with it. We think it will stir the Irish people in the right direction. What do you think? It would be great to have your opinion.

  At least this time we women, and the young men under thirty, will be allowed our vote. Small mercies, but we may as well be thankful for them, because it doesn't look like we'll be having any big ones coming our way anytime soon.

  Your friend,

  Peg

  * * *

  Oulart, Co. Wexford, 29th September, 1923

  Dear Miss Parle,

  You don't know me. I am writing on behalf of a friend of yours, Miss Norah O'Donovan. She has asked me to tell you that the reason you haven't heard from her is because she is in the asylum in Enniscorthy. She has been there since May of this year, looked after by the Holy Sisters of Mary where she was held before, but she remains enclosed.

  She is in good health and manages all right most of the time, but it can be hard. She is inclined to be a loner and that is not allowed in the asylum, not unless you are sent into confinement.

  She also asked me to say that she has written to you many times. It was her firm belief that you never got those letters. We know the asylum holds on to letters if they do not want them sent.

  I believe a visit from you would cheer her greatly.

  Write to me at the address above if you want more information.

  Yours sincerely,

  Mary Clooney

  1995

  Rory comes with me to Enniscorthy, takes a day off to drive me to the hospital. He's back again, visiting every night, and I can't help but let him. And when he heard what I was intending to do today, he insisted on coming along, though I could easily have taken a cab. That big building up on the hill always fascinated him, he said, and he'd love to take a look inside.

  And after all, Norah was his aunt too.

  "It's hard to believe that she used to be good-looking," I say to him, as we set off. "Peg is always talking in her diaries about how beautiful she was."

  "I only remember her as an old woman."

  "She had deteriorated by then. She had been through so much."

  He changes gear, his hand brushing against my thigh. It feels strange to be out with him in the world beyond the two square yards of grass outside my shed. At night, we are careful to keep further apart.

  It's so physical, the attraction I feel for Rory: whatever it is that makes one body attract to another, we have it. Always had, since I was ten years old and looking at him across the gap put in place by our relatives.

  And I know he feels it too, though he's better than me at hiding all he feels under that jokey façade he's made his.

  That part of me, which I thought was numbed forever, is thawing. I know he's not the only reason I feel good these days, but this quivering delight that runs through me all the way down my limbs and into my fingers and toes: that's him.

  As we drive through Wexford, he shows me his office, with its view over the harbour: Rory A. O'Donovan, Solicitor. Conveyancing. Family Law. Company & Commercial.

  "Rory A.? A.?" I burst out laughing. "Not Aloysius? I had forgotten all about that. Rory Al-oo-ISH-us O'Donovan, Gentleman At Law." I drag out the syllables, as we did when teasing him about that name years ago. "I can't believe you use that."

  "I had no choice. They throw you out of legal-land if you don't," he says. "You have to sound important. One name doesn't cut it." He's smiling, but there's an edge under the insouciance. His sense of being in the wrong life.

  I feel sorry I brought it up. Then the part of me that wants him to acknowledge its wrongness is glad. He's brought his camera; he will photograph what we find in Enniscorthy. At least I can be glad about that.

  Each night now, he fills my sleep. Him and tiny babies, that's all I seem to dream about these days, as if my subconscious mind is funnelling in. Two nights ago, it was that the baby was born and I was running along the beach, with her snug in a sling against my chest. I looked down to smile at her and found the sling was empty. She was gone. Panicked, I retraced my sand footprints, but no matter how hard I looked I couldn't find her.

  I have dreamt of breaking her leg while changing her clothes, of dropping her on her head, of her floating out to sea. Once I dreamt she slipped down behind the skirting board in my San Francisco apartment: I was calling everybody in a frenzy, all unknowing that she was there, at my feet, her cries too tiny to be heard. As I shouted down the phone to Maeve, my baby came back, settled into my lap. But another tiny baby was still there, behind the skirting board, crying, crying, crying, while everybody else went around, all unknowing.

  It is almost twenty years to the day that I travelled to London with Dee. That's what I'm carrying in me as Rory points through the windscreen at the café where he enjoys his morning latte and Irish Times, and at the pub where he meets his friends after work on a Friday. For the first time since we were students, wrapped around each other, I'm getting a sense of his everyday life.

  This carries in it all the longing of the years apart, especially the early years and my time in London. We've never mourned what we made happen back then. I need to mourn it. I need him to mourn it.

  Now does not feel like the time to talk about all of that, but if not now, when? We can't go on like this, I say to myself, once again. Yet whatever is next, I'm not urging it on as I would have before. I do know that the time is coming when we must either tilt forward or retreat forever.

  For now, I feel safer here on the unknowing edge. And anyway, today is Norah's day.

  A mile or so from Enniscorthy town, the building comes into view: a massive, neo-Gothic, red-brick concoction, utterly incongruent with the landscape and other buildings around. In the convent, we used to joke about this place, like we joked about everything we feared. We'd circle our fingers round our temples or turn our eyeballs inwards towards our noses.

  The size is staggering and its looming presence at the top of the hill always draws comments from visitors. "What is it?" they ask, awed by its wings and towers and turrets, its two hundred windows glowering down at the road and railway below.

  Today, the stigma is supposed to have gone. We've been taught to say "mental illness", not lunacy; "patients", not inmates. Walls have been knocked down, gates opened, people released into the community, but it's still a place apart, moated by green fields and trees, the nearest house a distance
away, and the shame that soured the word "asylum" lives on.

  Rory's car purrs in through the gates and up the short avenue. The building is tamed as we approach from the side, losing the scale of its vast dimensions. Up close, it's the smaller details that catch your attention: the weeds cracking through the tarmac, the shutters blacking out so many windows, the paint flaking off pillars near the door. Two men sit at the entrance, one beside each pillar, so still they might be statues. One of them is shrivelled with age, perhaps old enough to have been in here with Norah back in the 1920s. Only their eyes move as they watch us park, get out of the car, and approach.

  Their staring makes me more conscious of how we must look to them. Like a couple, a man and his pregnant wife. I am acutely aware of my belly, thrust forward, and I want to take Rory's arm and lean against him, to be supported through what is to come. I resist and we walk between the two men with a gap of air between us.

  The younger man says, "Good morning," but in a blank way that makes me wonder whether I imagined it.

  "Hello," Rory and I say together, our voices too loud.

  Inside, we are welcomed by Miss Bell, the administrator, who allocates us one of the many empty rooms with a desk and two chairs and shows us the cupboard where the hospital records are stored. She is sorry about the confused nature of the files. Nobody really knows what is where. A work experience girl tried to get the papers in order two summers ago, but she never finished the task and that was the last time anybody touched them. Miss Bell wishes they were more ordered; she wishes she could be of more help; she wishes us the very best of luck in our search.

  The cupboard smells of dust and over-boiled cabbage, stale and unpleasant. We soon find that Miss Bell was wrong, that only the files from the 1960s onwards were poorly kept, sheaves of loose papers escaping their binders. Norah was admitted further back, when records were painstakingly transcribed into big hard-backed registers, gold-embossed with the title: 'Wexford District Lunatic Asylum for the Insane', each person's name and details carefully lined up with those above and below.