With the bodies so small, the autopsies did not take long.
When the doctor was finished, the undertaker brought in two small wooden coffins and removed the bodies to the kitchen, where they would be waked until burial Mass at the church.
“What is your opinion, doctor?” asked the coroner.
“It is impossible to tell,” he said. “The chemical testing will be able to tell us more. The cracked vertebrae could indicate strangulation. But I would prefer to see the results of the testing first. I cannot give a verdict until that comes back.”
The men of the jury nodded.
The coroner announced to the jury that a new court date would be set once the results were back and the doctor was able to give his opinion as to the cause of death. He thanked them for their service, at such short notice.
When the jury had filed out of the scullery into the kitchen, for tea and something stronger if they wanted it, the man waited with the coroner, doctor and policeman.
“Do you think we should apply to the board?” asked the doctor, looking at the coroner.
“I do,” he said. “We could exhume ahead of the twins going into the grave.”
“I will be available,” said the doctor.
“Very well,” said the coroner. “I’ll make the necessary arrangements.”
The policeman looked at the man.
The man looked back, his eyes wide, in question.
“James Martin,” said the policeman. “We will look to exhume his body.”
The man shrugged. So this whole thing would continue.
He hoped they didn’t intend to carry out the post-mortem of James Martin in the house too. His wife wouldn’t stand for it.
He went to the kitchen where the two miniature coffins were laid out on the large table.
“Lord have mercy on their souls,” said his wife, placing her rosary beads across the coffin nearest to her, the only form of comfort she could give to them. And herself.
It all made sense now. She should have trusted her instincts the day she set foot in the place. All those bad dreams. The spirits of those babies, floating around their heads.
She was sick to her stomach about what happened to them. That all this time they were going about their business and those two little babies lay cold in the garden. And they were going to grow potatoes on them!
“We can’t stay here,” she told him later, holding a cooling cup of tea.
“My love,” he said, “I know, it’s a terrible shock.”
“We can’t stay here,” she repeated. “It’s not right.”
“Maybe you could go and stay with your sister for a while?”
“No, I mean for good,” she said.
He was quiet, then he shook his head. “This is our home now. We won’t be leaving.”
She looked away, silent and angry.
The neighbours took pleasure in telling them all about the strange goings-on in the house, before they’d bought it. That James Martin had lived in the house all his life, that he had a lovely soft wife who gave birth to twins only to catch puerperal fever and die just a few days later.
And then the woman appeared on the scene, a family friend, he said, and they were married within weeks.
“Far too quick to be natural,” said one woman.
“I never liked her,” said another.
They saw to it that Aidan was all right, checking to see if he was upset or tearful. The excitement hadn’t worn off. He sat in the sitting room, crumbs on a plate in front of him, his sisters surrounding him, chattering in high-pitched tones, ecstatic at the morbid excitement introduced to their home.
But she worried about his dreams, about the minutes before he dropped off to sleep, about the visions that would surely come.
Of course, they’d all seen tragic things in their lives. People pulled under carts in front of them. Husbands kicking wives downstairs at night, other babies who caught the fever and died. There was no point nancying the boy either.
She was so tired. Tired from the shock, tired from the hordes of strangers gathered in their kitchen, tired from the talk of what had been found in their garden, of the widow woman, of where she might be now.
Eventually she had to get himself to stand up and tell everyone they’d be retiring to bed now, that it had been a long day and there was still the funeral to come.
She waited until he was ready to climb the stairs with her. Tonight, of all nights, was not a night to be going to bed alone.
She kept the candle burning by the bedside, watching the ceiling where she felt the dark swirls moved.
“I’m sorry,” he said, turning to look at her, his head on the pillow.
She continued to stare at the ceiling.
A tear ran down her face, diving onto the pillow.
“You have brought this on us,” she said.
Her voice was low and cold. It sent a chill through him.
“This is your doing. Your dream. Your country life and look what it’s brought. You can stay here if you wish. I’m not staying in a haunted house. Where a woman could do that to two innocent souls. They’re watching us at night. They’re still here. Stuck between two worlds.”
She turned over in the bed with force, shaking the mattress, the headboard rattling.
“My love,” he said, and he grabbed her by the elbow, “we’ll get the priest in, get the house blessed.”
“It’s too late for that. It’ll take more than a priest.”
“What’ll it take?”
“Find that woman,” she said. “And have her hung.”
Chapter 27
The Betrayal
He picked a nice blonde one, a good bit older, sophisticated. She had a good big rack too, the opposite of Maggie.
He’d been watching the Dublin Road, keeping an eye to see who was going up and down. He knew a lot of the women to see, just like he’d known Maggie’s mother to see. But this one was new, seemed to have come down from the North to work for a while – she had a northern twang on her, Dundalk or Newry maybe.
He didn’t tell her what he was doing, just that he wanted her to come back to his cottage for the evening, that he wanted the company and a bit of fun. He told her he’d pay her extra for the hours she wasn’t out on the street and she was agreeable to this.
Being paid to be in out of the cold was all right by her.
Her blonde hair was scraped back from her face, greasy, black roots showing. The lines on her face were ingrained into the skin, from years standing on the streets.
He’d never have chosen her for himself. She was far too old, but he had to go with older, to show Maggie that it wasn’t her he wanted any more.
He didn’t want to walk with her so he went on ahead and told her to follow him. He glanced back, noticing her funny gait, like she’d had a broken bone up near her thigh and now the leg dragged a little.
He set up the bed. It crossed his mind to ask her for a trick, seeing as she was here and all, but then thought better of it. He wanted a clear head.
“Drop your clothes on the floor.”
He needed Maggie to see the items, discarded, so she’d know, so it would be more than obvious.
He had some stout he’d taken home from the pub in a jug and he shared it with her. Then he told her to climb into the bed.
She went to sit astride him, but he pushed her away and said, “No, just wait.”
And so they waited, not talking, just sitting.
“Is there anything you’d like to talk about?” she tried.
“No,” he said and he got out his tin cigarette box and lit up.
She bent her head and took one from him, puffing on it deeply.
And then, there it was, the knock. It wasn’t the usual knock though, a rat-a-tat on the glass. This was frenzied, her knuckles pounding.
“Who’s that?” said Blondie.
“No one. Make sure your tits are out, pull the blanket down.”
She looked confused but pulled the cover
s down to reveal her body.
He opened the door slowly, only a bit, poking his head out.
Maggie burst into tears when she saw him.
“Christy!” she cried and she pushed forward, so hard it sent him backwards, the door flying open. “Christy, she’s gone. She’s gone. She got scalded. I sat up with her all night, but she’s gone!”
She wrapped her arms around his waist and buried her face in his chest.
“Who’s gone?” he said into the top of her head.
“Kitty,” she said faintly. “My beautiful beautiful Kitty.”
He took a step back, shocked with this news she had brought him. And at that moment, Maggie opened her eyes, blinking in the light, taking in the sight of the voluptuous blonde in Christy’s bed.
Her eyes trailed from the woman’s enormous white breasts, to her red satin dress, to her petticoats and knickers, where they were deposited on the floor.
“You bastard,” she whispered.
He held out his hands and went to move forward, but she turned on her heel and ran, out the open door, down the laneway in front of the cottages.
He stood, bare-chested on the doorstep, staring after her into the moonshine.
When he came back inside, he sat at the edge of the bed and planted his forehead into the comfort of the palms of his hands.
“What was that all about?” asked Blondie.
He didn’t reply.
“Is that your daughter?” she asked.
“Get out,” he said.
“Sorry ... I …”
The woman got up and started dressing.
Christy lifted his trousers, took three coins from his pocket and threw them down at her feet.
“And have a fucking wash,” he said. “You smell like a rotting corpse.”
Chapter 28
The Nanny
I was told I was seventeen. I didn’t know I was seventeen.
They had the record, they said. I was born there. My mother had delivered me in the sick room, at the back of the workhouse.
I’d never known my age for sure.
I always knew Kitty’s age because I counted the years since she was born. She was born in May, on a stinking hot summer’s day, my mother moaning in the back room till she appeared all wet and white and creamy.
I washed her gently in soapy water I’d boiled up in a big pan on the hob.
I’d washed my mother too, because the midwife didn’t attend. When she came later she said she was off looking after another woman, but I suspected she just didn’t want to spend any time attending to Mad Maggie and all that she was.
She said the baby was bonny and healthy and to make sure Ma got the milk into her.
She was aiming that at me. Make sure your mother gives her the milk.
But you couldn’t rely on my mother. So I asked the midwife if there was other milk I could give her, just in case, and she said I could get formula at the chemist’s and, if I couldn’t get any of that, to mix bread and goat’s milk and warm it up with a bit of sugar in it.
I knew I’d do anything to get the formula milk. The last baby, a boy, had died, after only six weeks. He went all blue, his lips white, and I knew he was on the way out. I cried over that little body.
My mother didn’t cry. She said it was probably for the best.
I wanted the girl to live.
And that was how I came to be very good at giving formula to babies. When all the other women and wet nurses were suckling, I was making sure Kitty got the formula, topping her up when Ma wasn’t around.
You never knew if Ma would be there or not. And then when she was there, her breath was foul with the drink and I thought if her breath was foul, well, then her milk could be foul. And you could see it in the child, the way she arched her back and spat up after the feeds, so I told Ma that her milk was bad and I’d give her the formula instead.
I got a slap a few times for making comments about my ma like that. But I didn’t care. All I cared was that this girl lived.
And she did. I watched fat gather at her wrists and at her knees and she grew stronger. Before she was even one year old, she was tottering around on her roly, sturdy legs.
It was the formula that saved her.
I often wondered would I have any babies of my own, whether I too would produce them like Ma, but I never did and never did I feel anything stir.
Kitty was a beautiful child. She didn’t look like me. I knew I looked stern and sullen.
When Kitty smiled it lit up her face. She had curly hair too, not like my straight hair that hung in clumps around my face.
We didn’t know who her daddy was. He could have been any man in this town.
She had her regulars, our ma. I knew them by their voices, by the sight of them behind the raggedy old curtain that hung between the two beds in our room.
They were the ones she drank with, in the piss-poor taverns, the ones that would go home with her and then be gone, probably when they sobered up a bit. None of them wanted anything to do with my ma. Most didn’t pay her. Just got her pitchers of beer when she was out, and she was happy with that.
There was nothing for us. That was why I had to do what I had to do.
And with the money I collected, I bought the formula and bread and oats to make stirabout.
I should have been taller. I felt it in my bones, like they wanted to stretch, but the skin wouldn’t let it. I felt sunken, living in that broken-down house, waiting to see which men came through, waiting to see if Ma would come home. Waiting to see if Kitty would live another day, because you never knew with young children. And their fevers. And their swollen sticky-out bellies.
And for three years I minded her, mostly on my own.
Until the fight happened, on Christmas Eve.
We were starving and I’d had enough of the freezing cold in the house. I thought I’d go and try and find Ma, and if I couldn’t find Ma I’d find someone else to help. A man somewhere.
I brought Kitty because I never left her, not on her own, she’d be too scared. She was such a soft child, clinging to me, tiny, her three years looking like half that on her body.
We walked up the back streets, past the taverns where Ma usually was. I looked in a few, asking people if they’d seen her.
Tiny white snowflakes whipped up around our faces, blown by an easterly wind off the river. It left our noses red, our ears not part of our heads, our fingers, gripped in our shawls, white.
She’d been seen all right. Somebody said she was drinking in the Poet’s Rest so we made our way up by the Cellars, up Rosemary Lane, a narrow, soiled street. I took note of who was out, smoking, drinking, looking to paw at me.
If Ma wouldn’t give us anything then I could come back here, but I knew if I wanted the good money, I’d have to go down the quays. I’d take them back to our house then but I’d see to them on the settle bench in the kitchen, with Kitty safely locked in the bedroom.
I never let Kitty know what was going on. She would never know what I did to provide for us.
When we got to the top of the alleyway, there was Ma, out on the street, in front of Farley’s pub. She was bawling, fighting, and I stood, watching, waiting to see if she’d stop.
There was no point going up to her in this state. She was swinging everywhere, at everyone.
She was a disgrace.
There were people trying to hold her back.
And then she lunged, at a man, tall, with hair so blond it was almost white. He was standing there with his hands up and she dived right at him and he fell down on the ground, and I could see a pool of black blood pissing out of him.
I shielded Kitty’s face and ears because Ma was screaming obscenities now, and people were gathering and coming out of the pubs. I stood and watched and when the police came I knew she was done for.
They held her while they attended to the man, roaring at her to shut up and be quiet, and then she was taken away, kicking at them, her legs flying.
Our ma. Dru
nken, bawling, deranged.
The last time I ever saw her.
I saw the owner come out of Farley’s, his wife whispering to him, and he started walking over to us. I didn’t want to be caught on the streets loitering. They knew we had no one now.
And so, we left, walking quickly, back down Rosemary Lane. I felt sick having witnessed Ma doing that to the man, knowing that it was the end for her now, for us.
I took Kitty home, not able to face going down to the quays or chatting to the men on the lanes.
There was no food that night. I heated up some water on the pan and we drank that, and I wondered if I could boil up some newspaper or something, something to line our stomachs with.
We managed three days, there, on our own.
On Christmas Day we went and stood outside the priest’s house, begging for scraps. The day after, I found a sailor down at the port who took me on board. I brought Kitty in with me, put her on a stool turned face to the wall, and gave her a string and buttons to play with. I wasn’t leaving her outside on the quay, or on the deck for another man to find. It had to be done. And that gave us enough to get a few scraps, before we were reported.
It was the priest, I’m sure. Looking at Kitty crying with the hunger on Christmas Day. He was awful sour man, couldn’t have just left us to it.
I could have looked after us though. I could have kept doing what I was doing, getting some money, kept us going.
But they were having none of it, the authorities. And so they sent us to the workhouse, because there was no one else to look after us. When we got there and there was a bed each and clothes that had been washed and starched and three meals a day, I thought maybe it was a blessing in disguise.
I didn’t have to go off with men any more.
“It’s not cold,” said Kitty, when she was tucked up in bed, facing me.
In her hand she held a long piece of yellow ribbon. Ma had put in her hair, the day before she was arrested, said it was a Christmas present. Kitty slept with it under her pillow. It was her most precious possession, the only possession she’d ever had. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that Ma probably picked it up off the street or yanked it out of another drunken woman’s hair or was given it for services rendered.
The Nanny At Number 43 Page 17