by Therese Down
“Shut up!” he shouted at his wife. “Shut your stupid carry on and do something useful for once in your pathetic life, would ya? Help me out here! And you…” He turned back to Caitlin who contemplated him with an expression of passionate hatred. “You will do as you are told!” He finally lost his temper. “All this talk of gallivantin’ off to Dublin and your fine airs and graces… It’s all bull! Four daughters I have raised – four! No sons to help me, no money coming in – ye can’t even roll a bloody milk churn or… or mend a fence, or…”
He was so enraged he could not go on. He paused, tried breathing through his nose in an effort to sound more in control, but couldn’t manage it, for the breaths came too rapidly. “It’s high time I had something for my years of back-breaking stinking grind, so it is, and there’s no money for the likes of you, my lady, skidaddling off to un-i-ver-si-ty…” He sneered the last word, spinning it out, emphasizing each syllable.
“I will get a scholarship!” she screamed in his face. “I don’t want your stinking money!” She was not dissatisfied by the effect of her outburst; he seemed to shrink a little at the invective. “You’ve always hated me!” she continued. “Couldn’t wait to spoil everything for me, could you? You want to tie me down to this godforsaken place, and watch me drown in cow dung – just like her!” She pointed at her mother, who was now sitting on the end of her bed, hands over her ears and rocking quickly back and forth. “You make me sick! The pair of ye! Plotting and scheming behind my back, while I was saying how much I wanted to go to Dublin – be something…”
The enormity of the treachery was more than she could process. She had always suspected her parents could make her life very difficult and try to dissuade her from applying for a scholarship but she never dreamt they were capable of this. “I hate you both! I’ll never forgive you as long as I live!”
The slap when it came was resounding and shocked all three women to the core. Caitlin reeled beneath its force and put out a hand to make contact with the wall and prevent herself from falling.
“That’s enough!” Mick’s voice was a bellow, an exasperated, primordial roar. “I will not be spoken to like that in my own house!” He advanced on his daughter, hand raised to hit her again.
“No, Daddy!” cried Maureen. Mrs Spillane was on her feet, reaching for the raised hand.
“Ah no, Mick, not that,” she gasped. “Please, Mick, please.” And he dropped his hand but pushed away his wife, who fell into the steadying arms of Maureen. All three women sobbed and cried loudly.
“I am the man of this house, and by God, I will be obeyed!” He spat as he spoke; his eyes seemed to bulge as they fixed on Caitlin. She cowered, turned her face to the wall. “You will be married and that is final. Do you hear me? Do you?” He advanced on her with the attitude a boxer adopts as he faces an opponent, one foot before the other, hands raised in a parrying attitude. Caitlin slid down the wall, covering her face with both arms. When she did not look up or challenge him further, he took a step back, chest heaving, hands trembling. He had never hit a woman before. “This is not the church, or… or some rich family with nothing else to do but send people off to dream their lives away at university!” He found a handkerchief in a trouser pocket, wiped his mouth, ran a hand through his hair. His voice approached its usual timbre. “This is a working farmer’s family, with precious little to spare. Five bloody women I’ve fed all my life.” He looked around to fix Maureen and Mrs Spillane with his words. They looked back at him, sniffing and sobbing in each other’s arms. “And I have no money to fund a life of leisure for you, my lady. Do you hear what I’m saying?” At last, Caitlin tried to speak through her sobs, to defend herself, though still she did not look up.
“I’ll get work – I’ll keep myself.”
Mick laughed mockingly. “And what’ll you do? It’s all we can do to persuade you to shift your backside into the milking parlour a couple of hours a day; how the hell are you going to work long and hard enough to earn your keep in Dublin? Have you any idea what you’re talking about, have you? You’re a girl, Caitlin! And you have no idea of the dangers awaiting young girls – especially in the city. It’s all codology. Grow up, for pity’s sake.”
Later, Caitlin would wonder bitterly if this was what growing up really was: being forced to swallow someone else’s reality; to feel it deaden the heat and quick of young blood, like an antidote to hope. He left the room and his boots on the stairs were like drums, or nails, or something else ultimately male, ultimately pitiless.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The night before his mother disappeared, Jack lay in bed listening to the hoarse wailing of his baby sister. She had been crying for hours.
“There’s something wrong with her, Sean.” His mother had pleaded several times with his father to hitch up the horse and get the doctor, but it was now after midnight and Flynn was already furious that he was getting no sleep. It was calving time and he was exhausted. To make matters worse, he had lost a cow that day during a difficult birth and the calf was not thriving either. It wouldn’t suckle from its surrogate and she seemed uninterested in it. The loss of a good milking cow and a calf was a financial blow. The following day too there was a market in Thurles and he needed to get a trailer load of piglets there by no later than ten o’clock.
“For the love of God can’t you just shut her up?” he bellowed. “I have to get some stinkin’ sleep – unless you’re getting up at half past four to milk the cows and take the bainbhs to market!”
The baby cried and cried. For a few seconds every now and then, it seemed she had stopped, but then she began to wail again. The intermittent nature of her crying was almost worse than if it had been constant, for each lull afforded Sean Flynn just enough hope that he might, finally, be able to sleep, only to be awoken again by a shrill scream as he dropped off.
In his bed across from his parents’ room, Jack put his pillow over his head and whispered fervent prayers that God would make the baby stop. Please God, make the baby stop.
“Sean!” His mother was shouting. Jack sat up sharply, heart pounding more than ever. If she was shouting at his daddy there was really something wrong and everything was going to get worse. She must never shout at his father! “Will you for pity’s sake get out of the bed and fetch the doctor or take me to the doctor with this child, because I know there is something wrong with her!” There was an agonizing pause during which only the baby’s screaming could be heard, but then there was a series of thumps and thuds as Jack’s father sprang out of his bed and thundered his way across the room opposite to Jack’s. What followed next had Jack whimpering in terror, “Mammy, Mammy!”
“Sean! What are you doing? Sean, give her back… Sean, what are you doing?” His mother was hysterical. From the sounds he heard, Jack knew his father had thumped downstairs.
The baby’s crying reached a pitch it had not attained that night and was now coming from downstairs. Jack got out of bed, and though he was shaking with terror and a warm rivulet of urine was running down the inside of his leg, he opened his door and stepped cautiously onto the landing. He was all the time mouthing “Mammy, Mammy, Mammy”, as though it were a charm against evil. His mother had almost flown down the wooden stairs to the kitchen. She was still screaming.
“Give her back to me, Sean. Sean!”
“Shut up – will you shut the hell up!” His father’s voice was monstrous and it filled the house but Jack could not tell if his shouting was directed at the baby or his mother. The baby’s screams were now no more than background noise.
Peeping over the banister at the top of the stairs, Jack could see some of the kitchen. His eyes widened with horror as his mother flew at his father and his father pushed her away from him with all his might so she reeled across the kitchen out of sight, her nightdress a flash of white. And in his other hand, Sean Flynn held aloft his tiny daughter by her clothing as though it were the scruff of her neck. Before Mairead Flynn could recover from her assault and make another bid
for her baby, the child stopped crying. There was utter silence.
“Sean?” His mother’s voice was quiet and there was such a tone to it, more frightening than her screams. Jack began to cry aloud. No one paid him any heed. “Sean?” When his mother spoke again it was louder and more urgent, but his father wasn’t answering her.
“Ah no, ah no… ah, come on now… no, no, no!” His father’s voice now, and it was impossible to tell why he was saying “no” over and over again and then his mother was screaming, just screaming, a howl of desperate, furious grief. Jack’s own howls of terror added to the cacophony but a voice was missing. The baby girl did not cry again. Though he yelled and screamed at the top of his voice for her, Jack’s mother did not come to him. Then he heard the outside door opening and slamming shut and he thought his father must have gone, at last, for the doctor, but when he quieted himself in a bid to find out what was happening, sobs still shuddering through him and tears still pouring down his face, it was his father crying below in the kitchen that he heard and there was not a sign or sound of his mother. Jack’s sobs abated as his father’s gathered force and he wept like a child.
Jack never saw his mother again. His father refused to talk of that night or its consequences. Jack only knew as he got older that his mother was wearing her nightdress when she left the house in the middle of the night, and she was carrying baby Irene in her arms. Now, just over forty years later, Jack lay in bed on his back and stared into the semi-darkness of early morning. He had awoken from a terrible dream and though its shapes and images were already indistinct, the feelings it had evoked were all too keen, and his heart was still pounding in spite of the breaths he was taking to steady it. Tears escaped the corners of his eyes and he closed his eyes, swallowed hard. And as he once more recalled that terrible night, he tried, as he had tried so many times before, to imagine what had happened to his mother and why she had never come back for him.
* * *
A few days after she had disappeared, the doctor had come. Jack was eating bread and butter at the big wooden table in the kitchen and his father was sitting by the range, picking dirt from under his nails with a knife. A knock came to the door and his father had thrown down the knife, leapt to his feet, and crossed the kitchen to the door in a second or two and swung it open. He had turned from the open door, walked slowly back to his chair, and sat down again, leaving the doctor to follow him in.
Jack had stopped chewing in spite of a hunk of bread in his mouth and sat watching the men. He could not understand what the doctor was saying and they kept their voices low. Jack’s father nodded a lot, put his head in his hands. The doctor at one point reached out and put his hand on Jack’s father’s shoulder. Then he opened his brown bag and pulled out a piece of paper and a pen. Jack’s father signed it and gave it back to him. After a few more minutes they stood up. Jack thought he heard the doctor say, “A terrible shame,” and his father at one point had said quite clearly and loudly, “Her gut?” but as he lay in his bed recalling this shady encounter, Jack could only surmise that they had been talking about the baby and that the piece of paper must have been the death certificate. Not a word could he recall about his mother. The doctor had turned to Jack just before he left and asked him if he was “right”, had tousled his hair and winked. Then he left and Jack’s father sat in his chair for ages, head in his hands, before getting up and leaving the house, slamming the door behind him.
Almost as old now as his father was then, Jack felt his heart return to a normal rhythm but he felt the need to cough. He sat up quickly so he could manage the fit easier but the pain was terrible. He hacked and rasped for minutes and was exhausted by the time he could breathe again. And then, in the growing dawn light, he thought he detected something dark on the down- turned sheet that wasn’t there before – an irregular shape in the half-light which he could not account for. Fumbling for the box of matches he kept on his bedside table, he lit one and used it to light the wick of a gas lamp, which was the only source of light for this room, other than the sun. As the lamp light gathered strength and spread outwards across the bed, Jack’s heart lurched in shock, for his sheet was spotted in fresh, bright blood.
Caitlin’s fate took up residence in the Spillanes’ house like a black angel absorbing light and warmth. Mrs Spillane made a few tentative attempts to reach her daughter, but Caitlin hated her mother more than her father and shrugged off pity and remonstration with equal venom. They could do nothing that would hurt her more; there was a sort of grim freedom in that at least. She refused to eat, taking satisfaction in how worried this made her mother. Mick watched with concern the pallor which robbed Caitlin’s cheeks of their colour. Sleeplessness dulled her beauty with shadows. He told himself she would rally in time, but at night he too lay sleepless and filled with guilt. Mrs Spillane cried and tossed and turned beside him, her movements sharp, as though she were irritated, and several times she turned suddenly towards him in the bed as though she would speak but never did. Maureen listened to her sister’s sobbing each night, and pitied her. The idea of Caitlin – beautiful, talented, passionate Caitlin – married to the lugubrious and fearsome Jack Flynn was monstrous. Maureen even reached out to her sister, to console her as they lay side by side in the darkness, but her hand was met with stiff rejection. “Don’t touch me” was all Caitlin said, and the accusation implicit in her words froze Maureen’s compassion.
“I knew nothing about it, Caitlin – honestly.”
“And you’re destroyed by it, right?”
“What do you want me to say, Caitlin? Sure what can I do?”
There was no answer, and upset that Caitlin had rejected her sympathy, Maureen hardened against her sister once more. At least Caitlin might have children. Increasingly, the prospect of being childless was a cause of grief for Maureen. And what sympathy or concern had Caitlin ever expressed about that? What interest had she ever shown in Maureen’s entrance to the convent?
On the fifth morning following the announcement of her fate, Caitlin descended the stairs to find Maureen and her mother putting up Christmas decorations in the parlour. They were chattering quietly together, and Caitlin heard them laugh at some remark Maureen made. Mrs Spillane turned, suddenly aware of Caitlin’s presence.
“Hello, love,” said Mrs Spillane. Maureen eyed her sister gravely, then turned back to the decorating. Caitlin did not answer. “Will you have some tea? Something to eat?” Caitlin regarded her mother with contempt, shook her head, and turned to leave the parlour.
“Caitlin!” Her mother’s voice was sharp. Caitlin turned slowly to face her again. “That’s enough, now! We’ve all suffered enough because of this. You are not going to spoil Christmas – your sister’s last Christmas at home.” Then more gently, “Things are not so bad. Just think, you’ll have a house of your own soon, and you’ll be…”
“What?” Caitlin interrupted her. “What will I be? Free, is that it? Can I refuse ever to milk another cow or scour another churn, because that’s what I choose? Can I refuse to cook and clean and skivvy for a man I hate and can I stay out of his bed? Is that what you were going to say, Mammy?”
“Caitlin!” Mrs Spillane walked towards her daughter.
“You’ve condemned me to your life! Dancing to the tune of another filthy farmer. A skivvy – that’s what you’ve made of me. I hope you’re proud of yourself.”
Mrs Spillane raised a warning finger and pursed her lips in anger. She took a step closer towards Caitlin and raised the forefinger to her daughter’s face.
“Now, my girl. It is finished – do you hear me? We’ve all had enough of you! Just pull yourself together and stop pitying yourself. Life is what you make of it, Caitlin, and you can be a miserable little tinker or you can be gracious and accept what is your lot. We have precious few choices in this life, Caitlin, but how we live what’s given to us is one of them. It’s Christmas – think how our Lord bore his cross and remember that you have precious little to gripe about in comparison.”
“I think you’re mixing up Christmas with Easter,” Caitlin retorted sarcastically, “but you have a point if you’re trying to make analogies between my life and Christ’s – you are crucifying me!” Caitlin’s chest was heaving and in spite of her determination that it would not happen, hot tears spilled lavishly down her face so that it was hard for her to continue talking. “The difference is that there is no point to it!”
“Caitlin!” Maureen was shocked. “There’s no need for blasphemy.”
“Well done, there, Maureen,” came Caitlin’s response between sobs. “You’re already sounding like a nun. All religion and no feeling. You’ll fit in just perfect,” she said, then turned from them and went towards the kitchen.
“Where are you going, Caitlin?” demanded her mother but Caitlin neither responded nor slowed her pace. She grabbed her coat from a hook behind the kitchen door and, flinging the door open, ran outside, though she had no idea where she would go.
Exactly two years earlier, Christmas Eve 1941, Donal Kelly was home in Golden. His sisters had made a real effort to put on a spread which would cheer up their father and celebrate Donal’s homecoming. There was ham and bacon, for their father had slaughtered a young pig a month before. They had sold half of the animal to a local butcher but the rest they had smoke dried. There was a chicken too and cabbage and swede and roast potatoes. Tea, sugar, and butter were rationed, for they were in short supply during the war years, but they had their own eggs, thanks to the few chickens they kept. The girls had saved their sugar rations throughout October and November, had often gone without butter so that they would be able to make a fine sponge cake for Christmas Day with plenty of jam and fresh cream in it.