The Birds of the Innocent Wood

by Deirdre Madden

  She can hear the night rain beat down upon the slates as she thinks of an alternative to this forgetfulness. What if it were impossible to forget, so that she remembered everything with such clarity that the memory became life itself? Memory then would be no comfort but a trap, forcing her to live again and again things that should be long past. To have such a faculty would mean that lying here in bed would be to lie as in a coffin, with the past shovelled on to her, as heavy and as dark as six foot of soil. When she remembers her mother’s death, she is grateful for her fallible memory; more grateful still when she thinks of other memories, quite recent, and so discomforting that her mind shies away from them even in their imperfection. The thought of the mark on her sister’s neck brings with it other thoughts and things remembered. If only now she could get rid of her last few memories and truly have a mind as blank as she pretends it is, perhaps she could be happy. All memory lost! She feels angry for failing to be honest even with herself, even in the privacy of her own mind, at night, in the blackness, for while her memory is poor, she has not forgotten everything; oh yes, she still remembers much.

  The pain returns, as if in punishment for her failure to see things honestly, to look as if she truly wanted to understand, no matter how much the truth will hurt her. The orchard flutters again (cards, grass, a lattice of flowers and light), fades and is gone, and the pain goes too. She breathes deeply and turns upon her side.

  She thinks now, I could kill the goat. In spring the goat is out in the field, stretching itself to the end of its tether to eat a perfect circle of grass. But Catherine thinks that perhaps the only way to solve her problem would be to kill the goat.

  She would say to her sister, ‘Look’. She would lead the creature into the farmyard, look for a moment into its crafty eyes, and then slit its throat. She would cut open its belly and pour its hot purple entrails out upon a flat stone, play to the full the part of the eccentric holy woman. Then she would poke through the entrails and speak the words of the haruspex, the craftiness of the dead goat going into herself. She would say then what she had seen elsewhere, say it without any crossing of a palm with silver, and with the accuracy of knowledge which no other fortune teller could provide. It was too much to hope that her sister would be impressed with this gift. Perhaps later she would be amazed, and when the shock of what she was told had worn off, she would think with wonder of the feat which her sister had performed. And Catherine would tell Sarah nothing but the truth. She always told her the truth: when she told her anything.

  The slyness was that when one spoke the words aloud, one did not necessarily look at the same sign where one had first read or interpreted the truth. But what of that? Did it make such a difference that Catherine could tell the future by seeing the past, by looking at a pair of hands pulling on oars, rather than by looking at a pile of entrails?

  But why should I have to be the one to tell her? Perhaps she will never forgive me for that. She will be shocked at her own stupidity. Why has she not also guessed long before now? A more sinister thought now comes to Catherine: perhaps Sarah has guessed the truth, but chooses to ignore it. Catherine quashes the idea at once. No, Sarah cannot know. Neither of them know. But because I know, I am guilty. If anything happens it will be my fault for denying the truth of the past. I will be the one who allowed time to repeat things which are wrong.

  Catherine knows her punishment. Because she denies the past, she is denied a future. She has a vision – not a memory or a dream, or a thought, but a vision – and she has been surprised to find that her sister also has such a vision which comes to her mind again and again, often at the most unexpected times. It comes without any feeling of emotion or desire. A war has torn the whole world asunder but for one country, and in that last remaining country is her last remaining friend, the last person who cares for her. In her vision Sarah crosses that continent, crosses water and risks danger, is without food or sleep or money, and she comes at last, wounded and dirty and tired, to the house of the person whom she had sought. And at that house she is welcomed and washed and fed and forgiven, and then left to sleep upon a couch.

  ‘And then what?’ Catherine had asked.

  ‘And then: nothing. That’s all there is,’ her sister replied.

  But Catherine can never reciprocate, because her vision is much more sinister. As with Sarah’s, it comes to mind unbidden and seemingly without reason: but no. Again she must be honest. This vision does come at a particular time: it comes when she tries to look into her own future. Catherine finds herself looking down what ought to be a sculpture gallery, where there should be symmetrical rows of marble busts upon wooden plinths, dark paintings in heavy gilt frames, a marble floor and a high vaulted ceiling of wood. But instead there is nothing at all: only the horror of a bright white light from which she cannot escape. She cannot close her eyes or turn away, for the light is still there. This light and this emptiness is her punishment and her future. Tomorrow will come: she will peel potatoes and milk the cows and find that she can do nothing to break through the loneliness of her father and sister, and when she goes back into her own mind she knows that she will find there no comfort for the future. She will find nothing there but this unbearable light. When she remembers this, the prayer which they say for her mother, asking that perpetual light may shine upon her, seems like no prayer at all and no blessing, but the most terrible curse.

  Catherine is not fully convinced of her mother’s immortality. She cannot imagine or conceive of a place or a state where she now might be. Catherine has come to the limits of her orthodox religion: she cannot believe in resurrection. She can only hope that somewhere her mother still exists, and that she is at peace; but if Catherine was forced to choose, she would rather see her annihilated than omniscient. She does not know how her mother could ever be at rest if she knew what Catherine knows, and if she could really see what Catherine can only see by implication and imagination. She fears the nothingness of pure light; but in her greatest fear she feels close to her mother, for she, too, must be in a state of utter timelessness, beyond place and pain, if she is anywhere at all. Every day in her life Catherine is conscious of the emptiness of light, and she struggles against it. Her diary is a proof, at least to herself, that she still has a life, but she dreads the day that will come when she will have nothing to write, not even the unhappy things with which she now fills the pages, together with casual notes of when the swallows come and go, and the date of when the lilacs begin to fade. The day will come when she will have nothing to write, not even the word ‘nothing’, and thereafter will be an unfinished book, all the pages blank. It frightens her even to imagine the whiteness of each succeeding sheet of paper, and she thinks that thumbing through the blank leaves will be like looking in a mirror, only to find that one had no reflection.

  At what precise point of time did this happen? When did she lose her future? When the nuns turned me down for the convent, she thinks. She sees herself on that day last autumn, waiting in the neat little parlour, and thinking with pleasure that soon this will be her new home. The Mistress of Novices enters. Nothing could have prepared Catherine for the shock of refusal. Not this year, but perhaps next: ‘We’ll see then.’ We’ll see. Words to use to placate a child, words that mean ‘No’. Treated in this way Catherine becomes petulant as a child, answering, ‘We’ll see’ with ‘You promised!’ The sister almost smiles, but she looks very sad and she is utterly intransigent

  ‘They don’t want me,’ Catherine says that night when she walks into the back scullery. Sarah looks up from the pan in which she is frying eels.

  ‘Why not?’ she asks.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  The smell and the heat of the eels fills the scullery, so that the very air feels greasy. Sarah wipes her hands on her apron.

  ‘Perhaps next year,’ she says.

  ‘That’s what the nuns said,’ Catherine replies, ‘but I don’t believe it.’

  Sarah pokes in the pan with a long fork. ‘I’m rea
lly sorry, Catherine.’

  Catherine does not believe this either.

  She did not cry then, but she cries now at the memory of it, and propping herself up on her elbow, she reaches under the pillow for a handkerchief. Finding it, she wipes her eyes and lies down again, but she can think only of Sarah’s opposition to her, and she can only cry to think of it.

  She remembers a day the previous July. She is standing in the farmyard and Sarah is at a slight distance from her, near to the water butt at the side of the byre. As is her custom now that she knows she is leaving, Catherine closes her eyes and tries to keep in her mind an accurate image of the scene before her. As always she fails, for on looking again, what she sees is slightly but significantly different from what she had for an instant remembered. After a few moments, she walks over to Sarah who does not acknowledge her presence, but continues trailing her fingers through the soft green scum on the water of the butt.

  ‘I won’t be here this time next year,’ she says.

  ‘Lucky you,’ replies Sarah flatly.

  But when Catherine begins to say how difficult it will be far her to leave, her sister interrupts, speaking quietly, ‘You want to leave us and you want that more than anything else, so don’t try to pretend otherwise. Mama’s dead, and now you’re going to break up the little that’s left of that family to which you like to pay such great lip-service. It’ll not really be a family after you’ve gone, but that doesn’t matter, does it? Nothing matters except that you have your own way, so as to save your own soul. Isn’t that right?’ She does not pause to allow Catherine to justify her actions, but she continues speaking and she continues stroking the slimy surface of the water. ‘Christ said that He came to divide families, didn’t He? Something about not bringing peace on earth but a sword, and setting parents against children and children against parents. I’m sure that you know the details better than I do. In which case, you’re only doing as He said. You must feel very proud, Catherine.’

  But when she lifts her head and looks at her sister, the most painful thing to Catherine is not the distance of anger and misunderstanding that there is between them, but the closeness which she feels. For when Catherine looks at Sarah, she sees herself divided. It is as if all the doubts and misgivings which she had tried so hard to suppress and ignore have been exorcised from her and cast into another, physically identical woman, and that other self is now standing before her, demanding justification. There is nothing for Catherine to say.

  The only possible comfort she can feel as Sarah walks away from her, is that if she shares so perfectly the misgivings Catherine has, then surely, deep down, she must also feel Catherine’s conviction, must understand what her sister feels and desires.

  This belief is confirmed towards the end of that year, when she sees the relationship develop between Peter and Sarah. Now it is in a sense too late, for it is some months since she has been refused admission to the convent, but still Catherine wants to take her sister aside and say to her, ‘Now do you see what I wanted? Now do you see what I needed so much?’ Religious love, sexual love, what did it matter? Just so long as it was something more than family love: something other than that. And as though to want that other love were weakness, she is comforted to see that someone else is similarly weak: she can almost feel relieved to watch her sister.

  Almost. But not quite.

  Catherine’s religion gave her and gives her no peace. She knows that Sarah will never be happy with Peter. It is all she can do to stop herself from rising now and going to her sister’s bed, wakening her and saying, ‘You must stop now. It will only become worse.’ Every Saturday, she watches Sarah closely when she has returned from the cottage. Sometimes she is miserable almost to the point of tears, sometimes her temper is short, never does she seem contented. Surely, Catherine thinks, there must be some happiness or satisfaction to be had from the affair, or else why does she do it? She remembers how she had tried at first to pretend that nothing was happening, but insidiously attempted to turn Sarah against Peter by reminding her of their mother’s dislike of the pair at the cottage. But Sarah of course ignored all this, and went her own wilful way.

  To Catherine the affair is a mystery in so many ways, and she wonders what it must feel like to open oneself to another person and be accepted, but her mind shies away when she tries to imagine the intimacy between them. She is hurt to think of their complicity. The idea that Sarah and Peter might talk about Catherine in her absence is hateful to her, until the point has come when she forces herself to ask her sister about it, no matter what the consequences might be. Sarah replies, Talk about you? You flatter yourself. We have better things to talk about.’ The tone is teasing, but Catherine knows instinctively that she is being completely honest, and when Sarah smiles at her she is kindly, without any trace of malice. She knows that Sarah understands her worry: it is like the fear of being watched unknown while one is asleep.

  Catherine turns over in bed and lies flat upon her back. She remembers hospital tests in August: naked, but for a little dress of pale blue interfacing, she lies upon a narrow couch. They are taking X-rays, and the room is full of big machines. Catherine is made to lie upon her back, and when she looks up at the ceiling, she sees a coloured poster of Piglet and Pooh; imagines sick children lying where she now lies. Look up, dear. Look at Pooh while the lady takes a photograph of what’s inside you. A very special photograph.

  She is alone with the nurse who makes her turn upon her side to lie coiled up, and as the woman guides her body into position, the feel of her hand upon Catherine’s bare skin makes Catherine feel vulnerable and uneasy.

  Five minutes later, the nurse asks her, ‘Why are you crying? I can’t possibly be hurting you.’

  She cannot tell the simple, stupid truth. She cannot say to this strange woman, ‘I’m lonely.’

  In remembering this, she understands her sister, and can almost envy her.

  If only she did not know. If only there was nothing to know.

  But the images breed in her mind: herself crying on a plastic couch; Sarah and Peter in the cottage, and Peter and herself out in a boat.

  Oars creaking in thole-pins. She looks at his hands. She raises her head and looks into the light. She will not speak to him. She does not want to speak to him ever again.

  What she saw on that day has changed her whole life. It has heightened her consciousness to a degree that she can hardly bear. She remembers going back to the farm that afternoon, and she walks into the scullery feeling as though she has been flayed alive: not figuratively, but literally, so that every touch hurts. Now everything frightens her: the cups on the shelf, the farm cat licking itself at the door, the big tree opposite the house. She feels that every little thing which she sees and touches may at any moment fall apart under this new lucidity. Having seen the hidden significance in one thing, she is afraid that she will see something horrible in every simple thing.

  And when Sarah took up with Peter, she could not believe the perversity of her sister: that she had to choose him, out of all people! But it was obvious that there really was no one else for her to choose.

  She moves now like one lost, like one who has awoken in a strange country where the language is the language she has always spoken, but the meaning has changed. When she speaks a blessing the people understand a curse, and when she speaks of love they think she speaks of hate.

  And her religion is not a comfort to her, but a torment. (Be honest, she thinks: that was the day when my future went astray, not when the nuns refused me.) It strengthened her resolve to go to the convent, but everything changed. That night when she came back from the boat, she prayed but she felt nothing. From that day on, she had no sense of the presence of God. Still she believes, but God’s silence hurts her.

  Now she lives with this silence and emptiness. It is like learning to live with the loss of a sense, while concealing that loss from those around her. Still she keeps hoping. The spring will come, the summer will come. Sarah will no
longer want Peter. My pains will go away. Dada will content himself.

  Down in the parlour cupboard, there is a delft bowl filled with soil, in which are planted five tulip bulbs and Catherine thinks of them now. She knows that they have reached the point of being five short yellow spikes, but they will continue to grow, and when they are in the light they will grow further. They will be like stiff green flames unfurling, hard and vibrantly green, and then the green flower will come and grow and the colour will blush into it; in her mind’s eye the flower grows and gains colour, and she finds this promise of spring a comfort, the same comfort she feels when, on a summer evening, she sees the late light slant thick through the window and fall upon the wall in a broad gold bar; gilding the air through which it passes. When she thinks of these things, even now, in winter, in the night, she can almost persuade herself that all will be well.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  At the moment when Jane’s baby was born, she turned her head sharply aside to face the window, and as she felt the weight of the child slide from her body the physical pain receded. She opened her eyes and saw, through her tears, the flat lough burn up the golden light of an afternoon in early summer; the sky above the water was bleach-white. The scene was now so familiar to Jane that its very strangeness lay in its familiarity, like the sight of a loved one’s half-remembered face, seen again after years of absence. She could scarcely have felt more amazed to open her eyes upon something completely unexpected; upon, say, a bright blue sea, or a forest filled with hunters and deer, than upon this stretch of predictable water.

  ‘Don’t you want to see your baby?’ said the midwife’s voice. ‘It’s a little boy.’

  ‘No,’ said Jane, and she quickly closed her eyes again upon the light of the view before her. The child had been stillborn: she had known that this would be so since the early stages of labour. Jane had resolved, even as she struggled to give birth, that she would not look at the baby.