by Hannah Kent
I am not ready to be alone, she thought.
Father Healy cleared his throat and stood up, brushing his knees of dirt and reaching for his coat and the coin offered by John.
‘May God comfort you,’ he said to Nóra, shaking the rain from his hat and setting it on his head. He took her hand again and she flinched at the feel of the bones in his fingers.
‘May God protect you. Seek His love and forgiveness and keep your faith, Mrs Leahy. I will keep you in my prayers.’
‘Thank you, Father.’
They watched the priest mount his donkey in the yard, squinting against the steady rain. He raised a hand to them in farewell, then whipped the animal’s flank with a sally rod until the weather closed around him and the valley below absorbed his black, fleeing form.
By nightfall the cabin was filled with neighbours who had heard that Martin had died by the crossroads next to the blacksmith’s, falling to the ground on the strike of hammer on anvil as though the ringing of iron had killed him. They gathered around the hearth, taking consolation from their pipes and murmuring condolences to Nóra. Outside, the rain blew against the thatch.
Confronted with a sudden crowd, Nóra concentrated on collecting preparations for the wake with Áine. There was no time to weep while they had poitín, clay pipes, tobacco and chairs to find. Nóra knew that death made people long to smoke and drink and eat, as though by tending to their lungs and stomachs they were assuring themselves of their own good health, of the certainty of their continued existence.
When she felt the weight of her grief threaten to press her to the floor, Nóra retreated to the cabin walls and pushed her palms against the cool limewash to steady herself. She took deep breaths and stared at the people in the room. Most of them were from the valley, tied to one another by blood and labour and a shared understanding of the traditions stamped into the soil by those who had come before them. They were quiet, close folk, those who lived on the shadowed side of Crohane, in the fertile crucible formed by the rising rock and hill of Foiladuane, Derreenacullig and Clonkeen. And they were familiar with death. In her small house Nóra could see that her neighbours were making room for sorrow in the way they knew to be best. They piled turf on the fire and built the flames high, filled the air with smoke, and told each other stories. There would be a time to cry, but it was not yet.
Thunder rolled outside, and the guests shivered and drew closer to the fire. As Nóra moved around the room, setting out drinking water, she heard the people whisper stories of divination. The men commented on the weather and the movements of jacksnipes and magpies, seeing in them signs of Martin’s death. Much was made of his collapse at the crossroads where they buried suicides. Some spoke of the sudden change in the sky that afternoon, of the great blackening of clouds in the west and how they had surely heralded Martin’s passing. Of the storm that was closing in upon them.
Unaware that Nóra was listening, Peter O’Connor was telling the men that, just before he had seen Martin clutch his heart, he had noticed four magpies sitting together in a field.
‘There I was, walking the lane, and did those birds move? They did not. They let me pass within arm’s reach of them and not once did they startle. “That’s mighty strange,” I thought to myself, and – I tell you, lads – a shiver went through me for it seemed they stood in conference. “Someone has died,” I thought. Then sure, I make my way down the boreen until I reached the crossroads and, soon enough, there is Martin Leahy, lying with the sky in his eyes and the clouds darkening beyond the mountains.’
There was a slap of thunder and they jumped.
‘So, ’twas you that found him then, lying there?’ asked Nóra’s nephew, Daniel, drawing on his pipe.
‘’Twas. And a sorrow ’twas to me too. I saw that great man topple like a tree. He had not yet the cold upon him, God rest his soul.’ Peter’s voice softened to a hush. ‘And that’s not all of it. When John and I were bringing the body here, dragging him up the slope from the crossroads – and you know the heft of Martin, ’twas slow going – well, we stopped a while to catch our breath, and we looked down the valley, out towards the woods, and there we saw lights.’
There was a murmur of intrigue.
‘That’s right. Lights. Coming from where the fairies do be, down by the Piper’s Grave,’ Peter continued. ‘Now, I might not have the full of my eyes, but I swear I saw a glowing by that whitethorn. You mark my words, there’ll be another death in this family before long.’ His voice dropped to a whisper. ‘First the daughter passes, and now the husband. I tell you, death likes three in company. And if the Good People have a hand in it . . . well.’
Nóra’s throat tightened and she turned away to seek out Áine. She found her taking chalk pipes and a lump of uncut tobacco from a straw ciseán.
‘Do you hear that storming?’ Áine whispered. She gestured to the basket. ‘Your nephew Daniel’s woman, the young wife, she’s brought some preparations.’
Nóra picked up a small cloth parcel and untied its string with shaking fingers. Salt, damp from the rain. ‘Where is she?’
‘Praying over Martin.’
The bedroom was crowded, the air blue with the pipe smoke that the older men and women blew over her husband. Nóra noticed that they had turned Martin’s body so that his head was at the foot of the bed, so as to avert further misfortune. His mouth had fallen open and his skin had already taken on the waxiness of the dead, his forehead greasy with the priest’s oils. The candle stub, unlit, lolled amongst the bedclothes. A young woman knelt beside him, reciting Hail Mary with her eyes closed.
Nóra tapped her on the shoulder. ‘Brigid.’
The girl looked up. ‘Oh, Nóra,’ she whispered, heaving herself to her feet. Her pregnant belly swelled, lifting the front of her skirts and apron so that her bare ankles were visible. ‘I’m sorry for your trouble. Martin was a mighty man. How are you keeping?’
Nóra opened her mouth to speak but thought better of it.
‘Himself and I brought what you might need.’ She nodded to where Daniel sat smoking with Peter. ‘I set a basket on the table.’
‘I know, Áine showed me. ’Tis kind of you both. I’ll pay you for it.’
‘A bad year for you.’
Nóra took a breath. ‘Do you know who might have the drink?’
‘Seán has brought poitín.’ Brigid pointed through to the main room where Seán Lynch, Daniel’s uncle, was setting two clay jars of spirits on the floor. His wife, Kate, was with him, a woman with crowded teeth and a hunched, hounded look. She stood in the doorway, peering around the room in agitation. They had clearly just arrived; their clothes were dark with rain and the smell of cold was on them.
‘Nóra, Brigid.’ Kate nodded as the two women made their way back into the room. ‘’Tis a sad evening. Has the priest been? Do we need to hide the drink?’
‘Been and gone.’
Seán’s face was grim, his eyes and lips set in hard, leathered lines. He pushed tobacco into the bowl of his clay pipe with a calloused thumb. ‘Sorry for your trouble,’ he told Nóra.
‘God save you kindly, Seán.’
‘You’ve a visitor lurking out there,’ he said, gesturing towards the door. Taking the offer of an ember from one of the men by the fire, he lit his pipe with the tongs and muttered, ‘May God have mercy on the souls of the dead.’ Smoke escaped from between his teeth. ‘The herb hag. She’s out by your dung heap, waiting.’
Nóra paused. ‘Nance Roche?’
‘Aye, the interfering biddy herself.’ He spat on the floor.
‘How did she know to come?’
Seán frowned. ‘I wouldn’t talk to her if she was the last woman alive.’
Kate watched him anxiously.
‘Nance Roche? I thought she was the handy woman?’ Brigid asked.
‘I wonder what she wants,’ Nóra muttered. ‘’Tis a lon
g way for an old woman on a night of tipping rain. I wouldn’t put my enemy’s dog out tonight.’
‘Looking for pipe smoke and drink, it is,’ Kate remarked sourly, nostrils flaring. ‘Don’t go out to her, Nóra. Not that hag, that swindler cailleach.’
Night had fallen and the downpour had grown heavier. Nóra pushed out the wooden door of the cabin and peered into the yard, her head hunched under the low awning of thatch. Water poured off the straw ends. At first she couldn’t see anything through the rain, only a thin rim of iron grey on the horizon where the dark had not yet suffocated the light. Then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw a small figure moving towards her from the gabled end of the house where the muck of the smallholding lay heaped against the stone wall. Nóra stepped down into the yard, shutting the door behind her to keep out the cold. The mud rose over her toes.
‘Who’s that there?’ she called, her words drowned out by thunder. ‘Is that you, Nance Roche?’
The visitor walked to the door and bent her head under the thatch, pulling the cloak from her head.
‘So ’tis, Nóra Leahy.’
Lightning flared and Nóra saw the old woman before her, drenched to the bone, her white hair slick against her skull. Nance blinked away the rain that slid down her forehead and sniffed. She was small, shrunken, with a face as wrinkled as a forgotten russet. Her eyes, fogged with age, looked up at Nóra from beneath heavy eyelids. ‘I’m sorry for your trouble.’
‘Thank you, Nance.’
‘’Tis the end of Martin’s worry in this life.’
‘So ’tis.’
‘Your man is on the way of truth now.’ Nance’s lips parted, revealing the few stray teeth that remained in her gums. ‘I’ve come to see if you will have me keen. Your Martin was a good man.’
Nóra looked at Nance dripping in front of her. Her clothes, heavy with water, hung off narrow shoulder blades, but for all her layers of sopping wool she had a certain presence. There was a sharp, bitter smell coming off her. Like bruised nettles, thought Nóra. Or rotting leaves. The smell of someone who lived close to the forest floor.
‘How did you know to come?’ asked Nóra.
‘I saw that new priest on his ass, beating the dust out of the animal. Only the Devil or a dying man would drive a priest into a wet and dirty night.’
‘Father Healy.’
‘I had the knowledge then that it was your man, Martin. God rest his soul,’ she added.
An icy thread ran the length of Nóra’s spine. Thunder sounded.
‘The knowledge?’
Nance nodded and reached for Nóra. Her fingers were cold and surprisingly smooth.
Healer’s palms, thought Nóra. ‘And so you’ve walked all the way in the wet and wind.’
‘No one becomes a worse person for rain on her head. I would do a great deal more for your man.’
Nóra opened the door and flicked the mud off her feet. ‘Well, come in so. Seeing as you’re here.’
‘I will.’
The conversation inside the crowded cabin halted as Nóra led Nance into the room. All eyes looked to the older woman, who stopped inside the doorway and gazed about her, chin raised.
‘God save all here,’ she said. Her voice was thin, husked with smoke and age.
The men nodded to her in respect. A few of the women looked Nance up and down, noting the thick clag of mud that clung to the hem of her skirt, her weathered face, her soaked shawl. Seán Lynch glared before turning his face to the fire.
John O’Donoghue rose, his blacksmith’s bulk suddenly filling the room. ‘And you, Nance Roche. God save you.’ He moved forward to lead her to the fire, and the other men immediately made room by the hearth. Peter, pipe in mouth, fetched a creepie stool and placed it firmly down by the coals, and Áine brought water for her dirty feet. Daniel offered Nance a small nip of poitín, and when she shook her head, the young man mumbled, ‘’Tis not a drop big enough to fit a wren’s bill,’ and pressed it into her hand.
Those who had fallen silent resumed their talk once they saw Nance was welcome. Only Seán and Kate Lynch retreated to the shadows where they slouched, watching.
Nance extended her bare toes to the embers, sipping her spirits. Nóra sat beside her, dread unspooling in her stomach as she watched the steam rise from the old woman’s shoulders. How had she known Martin had died?
The old woman took a deep breath and raised a hand towards the bedroom. ‘He’s in there?’
‘He is,’ Nóra answered, heart fluttering.
Nance cradled her cup. ‘When was his hour?’
‘John and Peter brought him to me when it was still light. Before evening.’ Nóra looked at the ground. The close air of the cabin after the clean night outdoors was making her feel sick. There was too much pipe smoke. Too much noise. She wished she could go outside and lie on the soft slick of mud, breathe in the smell of rain and be alone. Let the lightning strike her.
Nóra felt Nance’s hands close around her fingers. The tenderness in her touch was alarming. She fought the urge to push the woman away.
‘Nóra Leahy. You listen to me,’ Nance whispered. ‘For all the death in the world, each woman’s grief is her own. It takes a different shape with all of us. But the sad truth is that people will not want your grief a year after you bury your husband. ’Tis the way of it. They’ll go back to thinking of themselves. They’ll go back to their own lives. So let us mourn Martin now, while they will listen. While they have the patience for it.’
Nóra nodded. She felt like she would throw up.
‘And, Nóra, tell me. What’s all this muttering about him passing at the crossroads? Is that true?’
‘’Tis.’ It was Brigid who had spoken. She was cutting tobacco at the table behind them. ‘Peter O’Connor found him there. A dreadful sorrow.’
Nance turned her head, squinting. ‘And who are you?’
‘Brigid Lynch.’
‘My nephew Daniel’s wife,’ Nóra explained.
Nance frowned. ‘You are carrying. Young Brigid, you ought not to be in a corpse house.’
Brigid stopped cutting the plugs of tobacco and stared.
‘You have a right to leave. Before you breathe the death in and infect your child with it.’
‘Is that true?’ Brigid dropped the knife on the table. ‘I knew to stay out of the churchyard, but . . .’
‘Churchyard, corpse house, grave mound.’ Nance spat on the fire.
Brigid turned to Nóra. ‘I don’t want to leave Daniel,’ she whispered. ‘I don’t like to go out when ’tis dark. And ’tis storming. I don’t want to go alone.’
‘No.’ Nance shook her head. ‘Don’t you go alone. ’Tis an uneasy night.’
Brigid pressed both hands against the round of her stomach.
Nance waved at Áine, who was handing out filled pipes to the men. ‘Áine O’Donoghue, will you take this girl to a neighbour’s? Take her husband too, so he might come back with you. ’Tis no night for a soul to be alone on the road.’
‘Take her to Peg O’Shea’s,’ Nóra muttered. ‘She’s closest.’
Áine looked between the women. ‘What is it? What’s wrong?’
‘’Tis for the good of the young one’s child.’ Nance reached out and placed her wrinkled hand on Brigid’s belly. ‘Make haste, girl. Put some salt in your pocket and leave. This storm is brewing.’
By midnight Nóra’s cabin was oppressive with the smell of wet wool and the sourness of too many people in a crowded room. The eyelids of Martin Leahy were bright with two pennies, placed there by a neighbour, and there was a crusted saucer of salt balanced on his chest. A plate of tobacco and coltsfoot sat on the dead man’s stomach. The air was unbearably close, smoke-rich, as the men nudged their lips with clay pipes, borrowing Nóra’s knitting needles to tap out the ashes and wiping them on their trousers.
&
nbsp; At the approach of midnight John O’Donoghue recited a rosary for the dead, and the company knelt and mumbled their responses. Then the men retreated to the walls of the cabin and watched the women keen the body by the poor light of the rush tapers, stinking of fat and burning too quickly from their brass pinch.
Nance Roche led the wailing against the muted cracking of thunder. Her forehead was grey with ashes, her hands blackened from where she had smeared cold cinders on the foreheads of the other women. Nóra Leahy felt each powdered cheek split with the hot, wet path of her tears. She knelt on the ground and looked up at the circle of familiar faces, furrowed in solemnity.
This is a nightmare, she thought.
Nance closed her eyes, let her mouth slip open, and began a low lament that vanquished the small conversation of the men like an airless room snuffs a flame. She crouched on the clay floor and rocked back and forth, her hair loosened and thin over her shoulders. She cried without pause, without words. Her keen was hollow, fear-filled. It reminded Nóra of the bean sidhe, of the silent, scrabbling death-yawns of drowning men
As Nance keened, the other women muttered prayers for the dead, asking God to accept Martin Leahy’s departed soul. Nóra noticed Kate Lynch, brown hair dull in the gloom, next to her kneeling daughter, Sorcha, dimpled and whispering, and Éilís O’Hare, the schoolmaster’s wife, crossing herself in a latticework of prayer, one eye open to Nance as she clawed the firelight. Her neighbours and their daughters. The glut of valley women, all wringing their hands. Nóra shut her eyes. None of them knew how she felt. None of them.
It was frightening, to be unbridled from language and led into anguish by the bean feasa. Nóra opened her mouth and did not recognise her own voice. She moaned and the sound of her grief scared her.
Many in the room were moved to tears by the caoineadh of the women. They bent their damp heads and praised Martin Leahy with tongues loosened by poitín, naming the qualities that recommended him to God and man. The fine father of a daughter, gone to God only months before. A decent husband. A man who had the gift for bone-setting, and whose wide hands could always calm horses in a hackle of panic.