Marian Harney lives in Monkstown, in the southern suburbs of Dublin, in a house that she inherited from her father. From the outside, it appears to be as small as a cottage. Inside, it has many large, pretty rooms, where the sun pours in. Built in 1865, it's a classically Victorian town villa, with two floors of levels below the front door, and a long garden, which she keeps superbly.
I arrived on a Friday afternoon. She'd told me where the key was, so I let myself in and waited in the garden. She came home at about six o'clock, poured drinks, and said, “Where do you want to begin?”
I told her “the story so far,” and she listened with great attention; we were sitting at a wooden table. When I had finished she rose, said something like “Back in a minute,” and she reappeared, lugging a suitcase. It was a particularly beautiful piece of luggage, solid leather, with reinforced corners; I guessed (accurately) that it had been made in the 1920s.
Memory uses strange devices. I remember the most significant moments of my life in two ways—either by what I was wearing or the weather at that time. When President Kennedy was shot, I was wearing a tweed overcoat and had been back at school to give two boys extra tuition—it was seven o'clock in the evening, Irish time. For this suitcase, I recall the weather—as balmy an early summer evening as I have ever known. In the distance, I heard a seagull's cry over the nearby sea.
We lifted the suitcase onto the table. As she thumbed back the round brass clasps, Marian said, “I have to warn you: some of this might distress you. But I think you should read everything that's in here.”
She threw back the lid, this librarian, this woman whose life was spent managing repositories of knowledge. Inside stood rows and rows of packages, neatly held in rubber bands and with a card bearing the month and year in the front of each package. There were some other packages too: “Receipts” and “Doctor” and “Plantings.”
Marian took out the first package, and before she handed it to me, she said, “When Charles O'Brien and April Burke came back to Tipperary as man and wife, they entered upon an agreement. They decided to write to each other, if at all possible, every alternating day of their lives—that is, he'd write one day, and she'd reply the next. It seems to have been her idea.
“And when they started it, they liked it so much that they didn't confine themselves to one letter a day. They often wrote five, six, seven letters, most of them short notes, with the occasional longer expression of affection or the clearing up of a memory or something. Here's the first package.”
I opened at random.
Christmas Eve 1922
A long time ago, I said to you that I wanted to call you “O'Brien.” But I couldn't keep up the intimacy—you were too forbidding, too distant from me. If we do what we talked about on the boat, viz., write to each other every day, then you shall be “O'Brien” and you may use any name you like to address me.
Oh, O'Brien—I have so much I want to tell you.
By the by, the lower bolt on the first loose box on the right as you enter the stable-yard has come away from the wood of the door.
I read the letter again, and I realized that Marian was watching my face.
“Have you read these?” I said.
“Every one of them.”
I observed that April “doesn't quite stay on the point.”
“All her letters are like that. Here's his reply.”
Again, I read, and I found myself thrilling to the familiarity of the handwriting.
Christmas Day 1922
How well you have observed me in that I like being given “tasks.” I will attend to the stable-door bolt this morning. And I have given myself other tasks. To watch over you. To try and be aware of what you need before you need it. To let you weep out all that shame and unsafety. To make sure your roof is ever safe and your walls are ever sound, so to speak.
And today, yet again, I shall have the pleasure of your company. All day. And then all night.
The same loops in the letters; the same brown ink; the same excellent writing paper; I turned the note over in my hand and held it to the light.
“This,” I said, “is the man I know. She, however, is a revelation.”
“They both are,” said Marian.
I said, “What do you think of them?”
Amazingly, her eyes filled with instant tears. She shook her head and laughed. “
I'm not telling you. Ask me again when you've read everything in the suitcase.”
I said, “What else is in there?”
“You'll find out soon enough.”
“You're teasing me.”
“No, I didn't mean to. What I'm saying is—well, there's Charles's mother's journal. AmeliaO' Brien—that's very revealing. She doesn't write about him very often, but when she does it's always worthwhile. And her entries about the running of her house—I found those more interesting than perhaps you will. You'll love her—she was a terrific woman.”
“Anything else?”
She went vague. “Yes. But the best way to take in the whole experience is by reading the letters first.”
For that weekend, I did nothing but sleep, eat, and read from the suitcase. So much material—and I learned that even in the preservation of it, the differences in the two characters had been obvious. Charles had preserved all April's letters in sequence, and in numbered boxes, filed with delicacy and respect. She had kept all his letters too, but tossed into drawstringed silken bags, of the kind in which some ladies kept their nightwear. Marian had put them together.
“Typical librarian,” I said, with admiration. “Unable to bear disorder.”
“It's not so much not being able to bear disorder.” She thought for a moment. “It's—it's the fact of the disorder preventing an interesting and instructive human experience from being recorded.”
It seems possible that, one day soon, I will transcribe the letters, add a commentary, footnote them where necessary, and have them published. They may well amount to more than one volume. For now, I include here a selection, based on nothing more demanding than relevance and my own taste.
Tuesday, the 16th of January 1923
Please do not go out in the motor-car without your warmest coat. Gloves are not enough. I heard you coughing this morning; I have left a tincture of mint and eucalyptus in the kitchen. Helen knows where it is, and she will heat it for you to inhale.
Wednesday, the 17th of January 1923
Harney once told me that you, O'Brien, had “a fussy side.”
I'm learning what he meant. And I coughed because it was morning;
I am not tubercular, or ague-ridden, or creaking.
I read again this morning from the Browning you gave me,
I read “A Toccata of Galuppi's.” Did you know that Papa and I went to Venice once and we saw Galuppi's house? How can we live long enough to tell you all the things I want to tell you?
Saturday, the 3rd of March 1923
The moon is full and shining through the window, and I am about to go downstairs and dine with you. Remind me to write to Boyds and correct the seeds order for the kitchen garden. Shall you want to change the order of growths in the herbaceous areas? I recall you saying last year that you felt they wanted more reds, that you had indulged too much in your favored yellows.
Sunday, the 4th of March 1923
O'Brien! Where are you? Are you walking the herbaceous borders? Did you see how shy Mr. Tracey (is this how he spells his name?) became when he saw us stand together? Veterinary Surgeons have the gentlest hearts; you should have been a Vet.
Monday, the 5th of March 1923
Beloved girl—to repeat and explain: you cannot, in my opinion, put the beehives too close to the gardens or the herbaceous borders. Bees need room.
Nor should we bring an entire litter into the house. The sow will miss them. Can you put them all back, please—except the runt, who needs nursing. And why did you get up so early this morning? I missed you when I awoke.
Tuesday, the 6th of March 1923
O'Brien, dearest O'Brien—you are the healer among us. Every bone in my body has rested. Whoever our Creator is—we must declare and acknowledge his cleverness.
Saturday, the 19th of May 1923
Beloved girl, if we suspect that this is a swine fever, we must act immediately. I cannot think that your “pink creatures,” as you call them, must be allowed to suffer, and then infect each other. Do you wish me to get a second opinion? Mr. Tracey is very sound, and will come here as often as we wish.
Last night you began to talk a little of the day we met at Mr. Wilde's. If you can bear it, tell me more, and my heart shall be easier. That was a difficult time in my life, when I took great missteps.
And shall we again retire early?
Sunday, the 20th of May 1923
Perhaps I should earlier have raised the matter of Mr. Wilde. I think I have been too ashamed of my later behavior to find the courage. In those days I was frightened of everyone, and most afraid of all that my life would be disrupted so greatly that I could not care for Papa.
Here is what I saw, followed by what I knew. Dr. Tucker— who, even though he took a wrong view of you, had many good qualities—sensing my fear of the world, told me once that most people get by when they merely watch and do not act. As I had set myself to do. In the room, I had not seen you, but I knew from Dr. Tucker's talk that your healing matters were not going well. You were not to know that in the view of all France's doctors (or so it seemed, to judge from those who called upon Dr. Tucker) Mr. Wilde was beyond assistance.
I suffered grave consternation when he told the tale of my grandmother. For many years, we had lived under the shame of her courtesanship, and Papa knew of many men whose acquaintance she had made. When Mr. Wilde began to tell us of her, I thought that I must die—even though I had begged him to. If you recollect, I sat perfectly still. But when, after the funeral, you raised the question of the estate, I felt the chill of fear—for Papa, for me, that our secrets should be told. Foolish, I know, but there it was.
Monday, the 21st of May 1923
Thank you, my love. I am helped, and the years are eased by your kind information.
Can you make a decision soon as to how many different root crops you shall want for this year's kitchens? Shall you want yellow (as distinct from little white) turnip?
Tuesday, the 22nd of May 1923
Papa worried that, in his words, I had “never been a girl”—meaning that I was never wooed, nor did I dance where young men danced, nor enjoy the pleasures of pursuit. He must be happy now, wherever he is.
Wednesday, the 23rd of May 1923
If I have been the agent of your freeing from cares, I am the most pleased man on Earth.
I thought that we would lose every pig, and every sow and every litter. Mr. Tracey said as he departed, “Big heart, big care; small heart, puny care.” He was speaking of you.
Friday, the 29th of June 1923
Beloved April, why should you have to gather by yourself? Unless, of course, you need to—but we have maids and servant-maids who can competently take baskets and collect every petal that has blown. I am irked that the wind so blustered the roses, but I looked again this afternoon and saw that we have many tight buds yet to open themselves, so fear not for your vases.
I never told you this: when you came to Ardobreen the first time, my room lay near yours and I could not sleep, and so I wandered in and then left in fear lest you wake and be distressed.
Saturday, the 30th of June 1923
It is my turn to scold. Being short of breath cannot be good. Dr. Costigan will come tomorrow, and that's an end of it. Harney agrees with me. I wish he would stay here more often, and I fear for him. Why does he not stay here?
Saturday, the 7th of July 1923
My darling O'Brien, you are excused your last reply, and the reply to this. I trust Dr. Costigan as you trust Mr. Tracey—or would you prefer that the Vet became your physician? And why not? You have the heart of a lion and the hug of a bear—though about the care of yourself you are less sensible than my pink creatures.
I think that Dr. Costigan spoke more plainly to me than to you. He believes that your body is trying to rest. I told him something of our last two or three years, and he professed amazement that you had not come down low before.
Thursday, the 26th of July 1923
Beloved girl, where are you? I've searched the house for you; neither are you in Major or Minor. The day being so hot, I shall lie down and rest for some time. It's four o'clock.
Friday, the 27th of July 1923
If you find this in your letters box before it is time to dine, let us walk out and look at Horace. The men placed him in the nearest pastures, and I swear that they chose the prettiest cows for him.
When I had read as far as July 1923, I myself had to take a rest. I reeled back in heated contemplation. Notwithstanding the reticence of the times, even between husband and wife, the relationship was plain.
How often in his “History” had Charles expressed his longing for this girl? And how often had I sympathized with him? And silently agreed with those who told him that she was a losing bet?
It appears that she wasn't. Neither of them wrote for show or for other eyes. The letters are unaffected and unpretentious, the letters of two people who, although still in the early heat of marriage, are also getting on with their lives, with all the natural worries of any couple. Some are even explicit, but their privacy should be respected.
I liked how the age difference of twenty-two years came across. He is steady, almost sober, though, as ever, desperately passionate. And she is closer to skittish, livelier, though still with an ingrained sense of responsibility.
In my respite from them, I rooted around in the suitcase, and that is how I found Amelia O'Brien's journal. Odd, now, to read again her descriptions of April as “icy” and “conniving.”
Perhaps Amelia, impressive and likable though she was, can't have been as wonderful at judging character as she was at running the family. After all, her own husband was for several years involved in a conspiracy that could have killed their son.
I also found an envelope in the suitcase that had sealing wax on it— and, across the sealing wax, Joe Harney's signature. The seal had not been broken, and when I drew it to Marian's attention, she told me that she knew “all about it.”
“Is this to be opened?” I said.
“Not until you've read all the letters,” she said. “And as you can guess, those are my father's instructions, not some rule I made up.”
Laughing at this incentive, I continued reading. The mood of 1923 continued much as before, the mutual, sincere love and affection, with, in the more open expressions, strong hints at a powerful nocturnal life. Bit by bit, they record the arrival of other people in their lives. They discuss who came to dinner, and how many workmen to keep, whether the cook is getting too old, and how to drain and then refill the lake.
Throughout 1923 and early 1924, nothing unusual develops—apart from the fact that instead of waning, their passionate awareness of each other seems to intensify. In fact, in some periods of their lives, it begins to dominate their existence with the passage of time, rather than the typical converse.
The relationship begins to have almost a classical feeling to it. All passionate initiative seems to come from him, and is then matched by the force of her response. She evidently held the view that he was a man who needed to take the lead in all things, and that her place was to follow eagerly—that he might have been too delicate to accept a wife's advances.
In 1924, a change begins to appear. It happens slowly, and they refer to it over many weeks. A sense of fright enters the correspondence, and deep worry. In this, too, they match each other. It seems to be the case that they had reached such a plateau of mutual trust that neither would or could hide anxiety from the other.
Saturday, the 19th of April 1924
Dearest girl, tell me again tonight of your discovery. Shall we retire early?<
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Sunday, the 20th of April 1924
My love, of course we shall make all inquiries. I insist. I know little in such areas, as most of my healing did not permit of too much intimacy, owing to the fact that I am not a doctor, and the country people are reticent in the extreme, no matter what danger they feel.
Can we therefore hold back on the restocking of the styes? And let your “pink creatures” do the work for us. Yes, it will take longer, as you have already pointed out, but we perhaps need a slowing of pace.
Wednesday, the 23rd of April 1924
O'Brien—stop! Please stop now!
I too am aware that this should not be. Or certainly that things should be different. But we shall attend to it immediately. As we attended so wonderfully to the mural, the stucco, the marble, and all the other matters. Remember—we addressed what was presented to us with determination, grace, and energy.
Wednesday, the 30th of April 1924
And still, my beloved April, we go on as we are, and as we have been. And if, tomorrow, we are forced to alter matters—then we shall alter them for as long as we are directed.
That is the last of several hundred assorted letters and notes that passed between Charles O'Brien and his younger wife, April Burke Somerville O'Brien. From them, and from the surrounding materials, and from what I was finally about to read, and when added to Charles's History (it is time to drop the quotation marks and give it the full respect it deserves), I knew more about them than if I had lived under their magnificent roof.
The next day, I left Dublin—with the suitcase—and drove home to Clonmel, the capital of Charles O'Brien's cherished county, Tipperary. It took me several weeks to digest what I had learned, and to prove it true. Not that I needed proof—the integrity of all concerned had long been to my mind unimpeachable.
Tipperary: A Novel of Ireland Page 48