by Boyce, Niamh
I’ve never seen a couple in such a state of despair.
They loved that girl so. She was the apple of her father’s eye.
What sort of illness was it at all?
No such thing. She died in childbirth. Blood soaked the earth.
Don’t believe a word. The poor innocent died from an infection.
The mother’s suicidal.
Don’t say that.
The father upped and left, went to America or Cork, or somewhere equally remote.
The mother is drinking herself into a puddle of piss.
Emily Madden made a complaint against the herbalist.
Emily?
Yes, Emily.
Are you sure?
Of course we’re sure. He tried to abscond.
Must be guilty, then!
They caught him; he had gone to his house for something.
Must’ve been something valuable.
Not at all. It was a photo. A woman with a baby.
Ah, his mother. He can’t be all bad, then.
He was no innocent.
Rose was an innocent. Yes, a living, breathing angel.
There’s no smoke without fire.
Her mother has gone to the dogs, nursing rum in a public lounge.
Can she not fall apart in the luxury of her own fine house?
Lonely, I suppose, with her husband gone.
How did she manage that one? I’d have to put a bomb under my lad to be rid of him.
Oh, that Mrs Birmingham, she was always one big disaster.
A big-boned famine cow.
Rose told someone.
Really?
Shush, yes, before it happened.
It?
Her death.
No.
Yes, I heard it straight from the horse’s mouth. ‘I’m in deep trouble,’ Rose said, ‘but I’m keeping it and I’m going away.’ It was a reliable source, not someone given to gossip.
Who?
I can’t say, I swore.
Ah, go on.
It was Charlie, Charlie told us. He was sweet on Rose; he’s fit to kill.
‘Get out, every last living rotting one of you. Get out,’ shouted Carmel.
She pushed and shoved at the women’s backs till she had herded them on to the street. Then she locked the doors of Kelly’s shop.
66
His house was neat if a little bare. They were both awkward, Matt less so since they were on his home turf. He went outside to finish his work, and she rested by the fire. Her limbs still ached from having been tied up. Her head didn’t feel that great either. There was a faded photo of a stern woman over the mantelpiece. Sarah was examining it when he returned.
‘That’s my late wife.’
He stoked the fire, took down a heavy black pan and greased it with lard. It was relaxing to watch him: he moved slowly and with deliberation. The door on to the garden was open; the only sounds were the starlings. It was another world here – even the air seemed fresher.
‘My sister was taken away for the same thing.’ He nodded towards her stomach. ‘So I don’t mind marrying you, keeping you respectable. A favour.’
‘Don’t get notions.’
‘I’ve no notions left; I’m not a young man. I was born alone and I’ll die alone and I’m happiest alone.’
‘Oh, Jesus!’ said Sarah. A dark shape had flitted by the window.
‘What?’ He nearly dropped the pan, nearly lost an egg.
‘It’s him, oh God, it’s the herbalist. He’s come to get me!’
‘It’s only your imagination.’
He handed her a mug of warmed brandy.
‘Lock the doors.’
‘There’s only one door and there’s no one near it.’
‘Do you have a gun?’
‘Just for hunting. Aw, the bloody eggs are burning with all this fussing. You’ve had a shock, you need to rest. Go into the back room. I’ll make you a fresh egg.’
She checked that the window was shut and sat up on the bed beside it. She pulled the rough blankets up around her and sipped her brandy. The river was out there, the same river. The herbalist could come down it at any time, come after her.
He said his sister was sent away for the same thing.
The same thing.
She remembered Jamsie; how he had pinned her down. Was Matt’s sister pinned down too? Jamsie had laughed, imitated her expression and made an O-shape with his mouth. Then he heaved on top of her, pressed the air from her lungs. Tore at her like a greedy piglet, the heel of his hands on her collarbone. She was afraid it would snap. She thought of the wishbone drying on the stove, imagined she was still inside the house holding warm lemonade, safe and sound instead of being on the ground. When he stopped, he was puce. He looked at her.
‘You stupid bitch,’ he whispered.
The Walls of Limerick gathered momentum as she stumbled up the stairs to her room. Mai followed, shut the door. Sarah told her.
‘May the Lord have mercy on your soul.’
Mai crossed herself, as if Sarah had died. Gracie said Sarah would have to be sent away. There was a place.
‘You led him on. These lads aren’t in full control. Everyone saw youse dancing like lunatics. Enough said.’ Gracie was furious.
The two women fought like cats when everyone was gone. Sarah had sluiced herself with cold water from the jug and dried off with a towel, rubbing her skin so hard it almost bled. Then she put on her nightdress and a cardigan. She picked up her dress – muck and blood on gingham – and wrapped it up for burning. She prayed to the Little Flower, promised her all the roses in the world if they didn’t send her to the place, the place where Annie Mangan had gone.
Divine intervention prevailed. She was to begin her new position with the Holohans. She was to pretend nothing had happened, to work hard, and to wait and see if the Lord would have mercy.
Sarah finished her brandy and looked out on the river. Maybe mercy was a lock gatekeeper.
Aggie, what did they say? Did they believe all that was said about him?
Look here, my dear.
30 August 1939
CHARGE AGAINST HERBALIST
Don Vikram Fernandes, a middle-aged coloured man with an address in Black Walk, will appear in Court on Friday, 1 September, charged with an offence against a girl.
Does that ring any bells for you? It’s a poor article, barely the length of my thumb. Middle aged. Oh, he wouldn’t like that, no siree, he would not!
You’d miss it, if you weren’t looking for it, but there were plenty looking for it, plenty with an interest. And not who you’d expect. ‘Go away, Aggie, you’re only a gossip …’ That’s what was said to me, even when it was there in black and white, hidden amongst those other ink-worthy events: Byrne’s tot thrown to Daingean for robbing a plank, young Greaney caught for no light on his bloody bicycle, and that lone sentence in memory of you, poor Rose.
You wouldn’t know it, but it’s my story. You won’t find me in the column inches. You won’t find me in the newsprint. You’ll find me in the gaps, the commas, the full stops – the small dark spaces where one thing led to another. I was afraid to speak, but now I’m not, for who’ll hurt me now? I’m past that, past touch. Isn’t that right, Aggie?
Shush, a leanbh, that’s enough. See how it rains and rains; see how the river breaks its banks? As I speak, mothers are warning their daughters to never, ever, go near strange men. And to always stay away from that lane. Bad things happened in that lane, and now it’s haunted by
the ghost of an unfortunate girl. Oh, yes, they say, there’s a crack in the centre of town where young girls slip down. And among themselves, the women talk of matters they’ll never tell their children or husbands. Late-night confessions. He performed unmentionable acts. Put a spell on my daughter, my sister, my neighbour. And on me … on me … on me.
Doctor Sin, with his herbs, lotions and potions, creeps into their dreams. And what, they wonder – tiptoeing downstairs to their cupboards to select one of his brown glass bottles and hold it up – just what, they wonder, really swims therein? What sort of herbs, what breed of medicine?
Ladies, the herbs were his fingertips, his quiet lips, his dry hands cooling you down, cooling you down. Now what will you do without him?
The day the black maria came, he let the gardaí lead him away. He looked at no one. The women of the town hung around. ‘Let us at him, let us at him!’ Crows cawed from the wires, as sharp and determined soapy arms rose. They drove him off in a puff of smoke. I went over to his house. The rooms were empty, dull. The rows of bottles that were its only ornaments, gone. The stretcher bed, gone. The space where it used to be looked different to the rest of the floor; more dust motes seemed to gather over that space. Maybe it was just the morning light through the boxy windows. God preserve us, but who’d call it a surgery – only a mad man.
There was a scent of wood burning. He was up to his old tricks: a tin barrel was smoking, and he’d set light to bits of wood from the bed, the curtains. What else, I could not see. Ancient things burning, a sad smell indeed. There wasn’t hide nor hair of him anywhere, no sign of who had lived there. He was a great man for covering his tracks. He’d led everyone on a merry dance.
‘I converse with the dead. Does that scare you?’ I said.
‘Not as much as the strength of this whiskey,’ he said.
‘You don’t believe me? Let me look at your palm … your mother loved you –’
‘Only a mother could.’ He laughed. ‘Let’s dance.’
And so the first night went like that, a world away from the last.
67
The market was quiet: a few stalls, almost no customers. It was my first day in town since the herbalist was arrested, since the newspaper article, but the hawkers barely raised their heads as we walked by. The air was cool. You could feel autumn coming and autumn felt like a good clean thing.
We were the first to arrive at the courthouse, me and Charlie. It was to be a special sitting, just for me and the herbalist. We sat on the side steps and waited for the clerk and everyone else to arrive. The river was misty; it looked soft, romantic even.
‘Maybe everyone has forgotten,’ I said; ‘maybe it’s all blown over.’
‘You should tell it was Rose, not you, who had those things done to her.’
‘Whist, what are you saying? The Birminghams would never admit such a thing. And then what would there be against the herbalist? Who would give evidence?’
‘I want to throttle him.’
We heard a bolt drawing back, the click of a lock. The door opened. Clerk Roberts let us in with a quiet smile, before setting off with a duster. Had he heard Charlie? Would he know what he meant?
We stood like fools in the hall. Then Carty, the solicitor, filled the doorway; lifted my elbow and veered me into a small room. He left the door open.
‘Well now, Miss Madden.’ He seemed half asleep. ‘Any questions?’
I was worried about swearing on the bible and then telling so many lies. But they weren’t really lies, they were the truth. They were just somebody else’s truth.
‘No, sir.’
Mr Carty stood there, looking up at the ceiling. It was a high one, cream and dressed in webs. He was famous for daydreaming, the side effect, they said, of too much education. People began to file by outside, talking and laughing.
‘Well, what are you waiting for?’ He signalled for me to go in.
I had never been in court before. It was a plain half-moon-shaped room, with high, long windows so the sky could look down on us. The pews were full of people of all ages, and many were standing at the back wall. So much for it all blowing over. The whole town must’ve taken the day off. Mr Carty showed me to a seat to the left of the judge. I felt the women eat up every detail of me, from the stitching in my hem to the pins in my hair. I kept my eyes on the floor; it gleamed like treacle. The jury were huddled to my right. Ordinary townsmen, who looked a bit alarmed to be hearing this particular case. I sat and folded my hands into my lap; I knew if I looked up that I would see the herbalist, so I didn’t.
The clerk stood. There was a sudden shuffle as everyone moved forward. He cleared his throat. How much like church it was then – the way the light hung dusty, the smell of wood polish, the held breath, the sweat.
‘The people of Éire versus Don Vikram Fernandes!’ roared the clerk.
He sounded ecstatic; as if announcing the arrival of a Bengalese tiger come to perform daring feats. The whispers began.
I put my hand on a bible, not a special book, no gilt inscription, no soft leather, just an ordinary-looking dog-eared thing. Aggie said it was a Protestant bible, so it wouldn’t matter a jot. I crossed my fingers behind my back anyway and sent a silent wish for strength to the holy virgin mother. I swore to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help me God. I glanced up then and saw the herbalist. The sun shone down from the window, on him and his cream suit. His hair was cut close to his head; his skin looked tight across the bones of his face. He stared me down, his eyes blazing. He was dressed as he was the day he arrived in our town, but he didn’t look the same.
Sergeant Deegan was first to take the stand. There wasn’t a sound, not a cough or a sniffle, in the courthouse.
‘The accused did unlawfully use an instrument on the person of Emily Mary Madden for the purpose of …’
The judge slammed his hammer. ‘Anyone with any decency will now leave the court.’
There was a mighty long pause and then the people began to move. One by one they each took one last gawk, their greedy eyes pecking at my face and body, my unlawful body. It was ten minutes before the benches were emptied. There was only one woman left. Alone in the middle of the last pew sat Aggie, solemn as a mourner.
Sergeant Deegan continued, casual as you like, as if he was reciting his tables, ‘… and did use an instrument on the said person for the purpose of procuring a miscarriage.’
How did the accused plead? The accused pleaded not guilty. The burden of proof lay with the prosecution. They’d found all the proof they needed in a squalid wooden box. It held instruments, bottles containing liquid, jars containing powders and boxes of pills.
An important doctor took the stand and gave his medical opinion. He had snow-white hair, a bulbous nose and a bow tie. He said there were eighty-six medicines on the accused’s premises, some poisonous, but most of a type that he ‘couldn’t determine’. There was also the matter of a speculum whose blades had been made from two shoehorns. The good doctor told the jury that this instrument would be effective in opening the womb. ‘To let the light in, so to speak, gentlemen.’ There was laughter in the court.
There was also a probing instrument, a rod. In the doctor’s opinion no other instrument would be necessary. In the doctor’s opinion, there would be death in one out of four cases.
‘Excellent evidence, thank you again for travelling, Doctor Morgan,’ said the judge.
Charlie was leaning against the wall at the back of the courtroom, and he had begun to weep.
The judge turned to the herbalist.
‘Do you know Miss Madden?’
He nodded.
‘Can you identify he
r for the record?’
He lifted his hand and pointed at me, holding his arm out longer than need be. I thought of the hula girl and the snake hiding under his crisp white shirt, of the way he banished his demons, of the way he’d kissed my skin. He said something, but I couldn’t hear. I felt my legs begin to shake and couldn’t stop them.
‘Let the record show that the accused identified Miss Emily Madden.
‘Miss Madden will now give testimony.’
And I had to say it all over again, the things he’d done to Rose. How many times she went to him, where he touched her, the instruments he used. Had they no shame, asking such questions? Words like that coming out of a girl’s mouth in a room full of men. Telling me to speak up when I faltered, when I thought – how could he? How could he be this thing? Where was the other man, the one who had called me Cleopatra?
‘And who was the father of the child?’
I almost told the truth but stopped just in time. If I mentioned Doctor Birmingham, my case – Rose’s case – would be thrown out. So I said different, said a name they would have no trouble with. I raised my arm and pointed at the stranger.
‘It was the herbalist; it was he that ruined me.’
I could feel the herbalist’s anger; I could almost hear him hiss from across the room. I hung my head. This to me seemed the most shameful part, but I don’t know why. I was cross-examined by the herbalist’s barrister, Mr Butler.
‘Didn’t you tell anyone about the trouble you were in?’
‘No.’
‘What about your mother?’
‘Mam is dead.’
‘Were you keeping company?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Did you go to a proper doctor?’
‘No, sir.’
‘How long has this man been carrying on with you?’
‘Since the beginning of the summer, sir.’
‘Why did you let him?’