by Anne Bennett
‘Ssh, I wouldn’t trust those at the far end. If they go blabbing to the nuns we’re in trouble, so keep your voice down.’
‘All right…but surely they can’t.’
‘There’s not a bloody thing the likes of us can do about any of this. You have to have someone respectable working for you from the outside. What about your husband?’
‘Hardly. The child isn’t his, he knows nothing about it.’
‘Tricky one, eh.’
‘It wasn’t my fault.’
‘I don’t care whether it was or wasn’t. After this place I’m judging no one.’
But Lizzie had to make it clear. ‘I was raped.’
‘So was Olga, and by her brother,’ Celia said, and added bitterly, ‘so he’s not going to come hammering on the door for her, is he? She says if he does she’d kill him, even if she has to wait a lifetime to do it. Her little boy was taken away two weeks ago. Sometimes she still cries in her sleep.’
‘Well, I won’t be doing that,’ Lizzie said. ‘I don’t know who raped me. There was a blackout, you see, in England, and the night was as dark as pitch and he was waiting for me. He stuck a knife in me and knocked me unconscious before anything else. I remember nothing of the rape, and the doctor said if I hadn’t been wearing my thick winter coat I’d have died.’
‘God,’ Celia breathed. ‘The more I hear, the more I’m sure men are bastards. My fellow and I were to be married and so I let him, you know, just the once. Next thing I’m pregnant. He’s real quiet when I tell him. He says he’ll sort something out, but I don’t hear from him for a few days and so I call round and he’s hightailed it to England. The family claim they have no address. My father brought me here. He said I am no longer his daughter and I have no family but this. Christ, this is Hell on earth, this place.’
There was a catch in Celia’s voice and Lizzie felt a lump in her own throat. ‘How old are you, Celia?’
‘Seventeen,’ Celia said, ‘and sometimes I think you know life isn’t worth living. I suppose that’s how Candy felt.’
‘You mean she killed herself?’
‘We’re not supposed to know. She crawled out of the skylight in the laundry roof and threw herself onto the cobbled yard.’
‘God, it’s a mortal sin.’
‘Yeah, well, Hell can’t be worse than this place,’ Celia hissed fiercely. ‘They’d left Candy’s baby with her four months. She fed her, changed her, cuddled her and loved her, and when they took her away she went mad. They had to lock her in one of their cells for the night. She thought they were coming from the asylum. They might have been. It’s what happens when you show normal bloody emotions in this place.’
‘And then,’ she added, ‘there was Jane, died of the flu.’
‘Flu?’
‘Aye,’ Celia said. ‘They don’t believe in calling the doctor out to us sinners, and the untreated flu led to pneumonia. Her parents came and took the body for burial in their own parish graveyard and that doesn’t always happen. But you said you’re married. Have you already got kids then?’
‘Aye. Tom’s going on for five and Niamh is just seven.’
‘Did you have any trouble?’
‘Not especially.’
‘You’ll probably do all right here then.’
‘Are you expecting?’
‘I was, I gave birth four weeks ago. It was bloody awful, I tore and bled like a stuck pig. I thought I would bleed to death, but it healed eventually.’
‘And your baby?’
‘A wee boy, a bit premature, three weeks early, and they had to take him straight away because I refused to feed him.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I didn’t want to love him like Candy did,’ Celia said. ‘He looked so wee in the cot, so delicate, and I ached to lift him up, put him to my breast, and they throbbed and leaked all over my nightdress when he cried. The nuns shouted and Sister Jude slapped me. They even tried coaxing, but I wouldn’t budge.
‘Lizzie, I wouldn’t wish a day in this hellhole on my worst enemy; how then could I wish it for my precious child. It was better he got right away than be poisoned by the fetid, malicious air of this place.’
‘Did it hurt to give him up?’
‘Oh God! You’ve no idea. I couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep; I cried for days, but alone, never in front of those old crones. I’ve seen girls ridiculed who’ve done that and I really think I’d have attacked any who ridiculed me. That would have cooked my goose right and proper.’
Lizzie was so shocked by all she’d heard she could barely take it in. She had no idea these places existed and she knew few would believe it. Would she have believed it if she hadn’t seen it herself? Probably not! And no one outside these walls got to know because it all hinged on secrecy.
‘Where does all the laundry come from anyway?’ Lizzie said. ‘I’ve been thinking about it all day.’
‘The town. We do all the washing for them,’ Celia told her. ‘Two men deliver dirty washing on Tuesdays and Fridays and take the laundered stuff back. And when they do, I’m warning you now, Lizzie, don’t look at the men, not that they’re worth a second glance anyway, if you know what I mean. They may speak to you, ridicule you, call you names or look at you as if you’ve crawled from under a stone; and whatever they say or do, keep your head down, don’t look at them and definitely don’t speak. The nuns might be about, but even if they are not in the yard with you they’ll not be far away, and it seems the men can say what they like, but should one of us reply…God, one girl was beaten black and blue because they said she was flirting with the men. As if you’d flirt with men who call you fucking whores or sodding trollops, or who ask if you are gagging for it and offer to give you a poke to put you out of your misery.’
‘I can hardly believe men would say such things, and to a woman.’
‘We’re not women, Lizzie, we are all whores and hookers and sinners, the dregs of society and not worthy of respect or even common courtesy,’ Celia replied. ‘And they pay Sister Jude for the laundry done, but we never see a penny piece of it.’
‘Where does it go?’
‘To the black babies in Africa,’ Celia said. ‘I’ve heard Father Conroy say Sister Jude is a credit. He said she collects more in months than many convents twice the size. Of course she bloody does. Those black babies are kept by our red-raw, chapped hands, our aching backs and the sweat running from us.’
‘It’s incredible,’ Lizzie breathed.
‘What is?’
‘Everything.’
‘I don’t think for one minute that this is just one on its own. I think places like this are peppered all over the country,’ Celia said. ‘I think it’s out of sight, out of mind. You better believe it, Lizzie, we are the forgotten women of Ireland.’
Lizzie lay wide awake for a long time after Celia’s even breathing told her the other girl was asleep. She’d told her much that night, much that had shocked her to the core. ‘Forgotten women of Ireland’ sounded desperate altogether.
She’d make sure she wasn’t forgotten, she thought. She’d write to her mother, to Violet. She had no paper and no stamps, but if the nuns would loan her enough for one letter, her mother or Violet would surely send her the makings for any number of letters. Surely to God she couldn’t be just wiped from their lives like that?
And the first thing she must do tomorrow would be to send a wee card to her daughter for her First Communion Day. Even the nuns would countenance that, surely to God.
With the decision made she tried to sleep, but instead she tossed and turned on the hard, lumpy mattress and eventually slept as the sun was preparing to rise.
‘A card, Pansy?’ Sister Jude asked, as if she’d never heard of such a thing before. She was smiling but it was not a warm smile. It was as if she was laughing at her.
But Lizzie had no intention of giving in. She’d asked to see Sister Jude as soon as she rose, heavy-eyed and sluggishly tired after her disturbed night, and had asked again af
ter Mass and yet again at breakfast, which was lumpy porridge and tea, and eventually she was given permission.
‘Yes, Sister, a card. Niamh is taking her First Communion on Sunday. And with me not being there and all, I just wondered…’
‘I know all about your daughter’s First Communion,’ Sister Jude snapped. ‘Pity you didn’t remember it when you opened your legs for some man. I understood it was the occasion of your daughter’s Communion that caused Father Brady to move you speedily from the home.’
‘It was, Sister, but…’
‘Lest you contaminate her day, displaying your sin for all to see, your parents bereft with shame.’
‘Just a card. Sister, that’s all,’ Lizzie cried desperately. ‘Please.’
‘And just where do people think you have vanished to all of a sudden?’
‘Back to England, to tend my sick mother-in-law.’
‘So wouldn’t it strike the postmistress as odd if your family get a letter from you with a Sligo postmark?’
Lizzie hadn’t thought of that and knew what the nun said was right. The postmistress knew everything about everybody. She knew Lizzie’s writing too, because she’d written weekly letters home to her mother since she’d first gone to England, and she’d be suspicious about letters from her coming from Sligo and would make it her business to tell everybody.
Sister Jude saw the slump of Lizzie’s shoulders and hid her smile of triumph. ‘I’m glad you see that it would be impossible, Pansy,’ she said. ‘While you are in here, it is far better that you forget all about your family. I’m sure they would prefer it that way.’
And Lizzie remembered her father’s hard eyes and stern face and her mother’s extreme nervousness and the anxiety of them both for her to be gone from the place, and how she went without the smallest gesture of affection, and knew the nun was right. ‘Return to your duties now, Pansy,’ Sister Jude said, and Lizzie turned and left the room because there was nothing else she could do.
But there were people who hadn’t forgotten Lizzie. Niamh had cried bitterly when she was told that evening after school that her Mammy had had to go back to England and wouldn’t be there for her Communion. ‘She promised,’ she said through her tears. ‘She came specially.’
‘She had to go back, I’ve told you. Her mother-in-law was ill.’
‘She don’t even like Granny,’ Niamh complained. ‘She told me. No one likes her much. She’s horrid.’
‘That will do, Niamh!’ Catherine had snapped. ‘That’s a dreadful thing to say, and what’s liking a person or not got to do with it? If a person is ill, they’re ill and need to be seen to, and that’s that.’
Tom had been unnerved by his sister’s tears, for she seldom cried, and his own voice was wobbly when he said, ‘She never even said goodbye to me.’
‘You were away at Uncle Owen’s, sure. You said goodbye when you left.’
‘Not a proper goodbye,’ Tom said. ‘Couldn’t someone have come and got me?’
‘Everyone was busy,’ Catherine replied. ‘Anyway, it’s no good going on about it, it’s done. Your mammy’s gone and that’s that.’
‘She’ll probably send us a long letter explaining it, won’t she?’ Niamh asked her grandmother.
Catherine didn’t meet the child’s eyes. ‘I don’t know, child,’ she said. ‘Have you no homework to do, for I’ll want the table to dish up the food shortly?’
‘I’ve only got reading.’
‘Well, go through your catechism.’
‘I know it.’
‘You can’t be too sure of it. Read it through again and I’ll test you when we’ve eaten.’
Niamh had sighed. When her grandmother spoke with that snap in her voice it was best to say nothing. But she knew what she’d do as soon as she could: she’d write a letter to her mammy and ask her why she’d left like that and she’d do it without her grandmother being aware of it. If she saved a little of her pocket money she could buy a stamp on her way to school and she’d use the page from her copy book to write it. She knew her grandmother kept envelopes in the drawer of the dresser.
She felt better when she’d made that decision because she loved her mammy. It had been grand to see her. She hadn’t realised how much she had missed her until she’d arrived. As for Tom, she knew he’d been fizzing with excitement for days, and that night when she’d gone to bed she heard him crying in the bed he shared with Uncle Johnnie in the far room.
Johnnie wouldn’t be in bed for hours yet, Niamh thought, and she plodded across the floor and, slipping in beside her brother, she put her arms tight around him. There was no need for words.
Later, Johnnie, who’d been upset by the children’s obvious distress, saw them fast asleep curled together in bed and hadn’t the heart to disturb them, so he slept in Niamh’s bed instead that night.
Tressa called around on Thursday morning as she hadn’t seen Lizzie since Sunday.
‘She’s away back to England,’ Catherine said in answer to her query. She didn’t know how much Tressa knew and had no intention of asking her, and anyway the story had to be stuck to for all outside the immediate family.
‘England!’ Tressa repeated.
‘Aye.’
‘Before the child’s Communion? Without saying goodbye?’
‘She hadn’t the time,’ Catherine said. ‘The call came through to the priest. Her mother-in-law was ill. She had to go home urgently and see to her.’
Tressa’s eyes narrowed. See to her mother-in-law my eyes, she thought. God, if the woman was on fire in the gutter Lizzie wouldn’t spit on her. If the woman was too sick to leave her bed to come around and berate Lizzie for each and every mortal thing, she’d be more likely to dance a jig in the yard.
Funny do altogether, to be whisked away only days before her own child’s big day. Maybe, Tressa thought, she’d send a letter of explanation later. She’d have to, because there was more to this than met the eye and yet she knew she would get no more out of her Aunt Catherine. She could be as close as a clam when she had the mind and so she left it there. When Lizzie wrote she was sure she’d hear the whole story.
Violet had no knowledge of life in a small Irish village. Lizzie had written to her when she’d been in Ireland a few days. She’d told her how good it was to be home and how excited the children were to see her and how they’d grown and blossomed. She spoke of the hills and the sea and the fine time she was having with Tressa and her family and visiting old friends. Just one line said she intended telling her mother after the weekend, when she’d been home a week, and Violet had waited for her to tell her the outcome and there had been silence.
It wasn’t like Lizzie. She must know Violet would be concerned and interested. She’d wait a couple of days and write and see what was happening. Barry said she was probably having such a good time over there she’d not taken time to write, but he didn’t know the secret she carried. ‘I know you like her an’ all, ducks,’ he said. ‘I’m pretty fond of her myself, tell the truth, but if I was her and got the offer I would stay in Ireland. I mean, she misses them nippers shocking, don’t she?’
Violet had to admit she did, and maybe she would stay now she’d gone home, and she could when she’d had that bastard’s baby and given it away. Violet would miss her, God knows, but she could see the point of it, and perhaps it was for the best.
‘You could be right, Barry,’ she told her husband. ‘But if she hasn’t written by, say, Monday or Tuesday of next week, I’ll write and ask her what’s what.’
‘Don’t blame you, old girl,’ Barry said. ‘You need to know one way or the other.’
Lizzie tossed and turned on Saturday night and when she did drop into a fitful sleep, she dreamt she saw St Bridget’s bedecked with flowers, her daughter in the white communion dress full of frills and lace, the veil held in place by a comb covered with white satin and decorated with rosebuds. She was in a row of girls, all similarly dressed. Across the aisle were the boys in their grey shorts and white
shirts with a satin sash draped across their shoulders. They were scrubbed cleaner than they’d ever been and any stray curls or unruly locks of hair were subdued by Brylcreem.
The church was crammed full of relations belonging to the children. There were mothers, fathers, uncles, aunts, grandparents…but it was the hurt look on her daughter’s uncomprehending face that jerked Lizzie awake and caused her to run to the bathroom adjoining the dormitory and vomit into the bowl.
‘What is it?’ Celia said, standing in the doorway. ‘Bit late in the day for morning sickness?’
What was the point of telling her? There was no point in complaining in this place, so she shrugged. ‘Don’t know. Could be anything.’
‘You all right now?’
Lizzie was far from all right and the bad taste stayed in her mouth all day. Being Sunday, there was no cleaning and laundry work. Instead, the girls sat in two circles, with a nun and older woman or two in each circle to ensure there would be no inane chatter between them and who read passages out of the bible while the girls hemmed sheets and darned holes in clothes and stockings.
Lizzie would have preferred work where she wouldn’t have had time to think or brood, for the constant thoughts of her children, particularly Niamh that day, could bring tears to her eyes. She was careful not to let anyone see this for she’d have hated the nuns to have something to mock, and she knew that if she wanted to survive this, she had to get a grip on herself.
Every morning at five o’clock, the girls were roused. Sleepy-eyed, they dressed beneath their nightdresses and filed down to Mass in the chapel. After Mass there was breakfast and after breakfast there were prayers. They began work at seven.
Some girls were assigned to the kitchens and some for cleaning duties, but most went to the laundry where they worked until twelve o’clock when they had their dinner. The regime was harsh and the work hard, but if the nuns had ever spoken kindly, smiled, allowed the girls to talk a little, it would have been more bearable.
Here, if you saw a nun smile it was because someone was going to catch it or be made fun of. And if they were, you had to stay silent, for to try to support the person brought worse punishment down on your own head. You learnt to keep your head lowered and look out just for yourself, knowing that one day it would be your turn to be mocked, ridiculed or beaten, and no one would come to your aid either.