An Irish Heart

by C M Blackwood

  I breathed deeply at the sight of the ever-moving, convoluted shadows. It was the surrounding trees which made them so disturbing, so sinister. The blackness wrapped around the trunks and branches; the shadows slid quickly around the wooden cylinders, disappearing briefly from my sight only to re-materialise seconds later, looking all the same for their experience.

  I stared up into the towering trees for what seemed a very long time. My eyes kept drifting down to the house, examining its aging eaves and dry, cracked shingles. I wondered what kind of people that roof had sheltered; I wondered why they had left the place. It seemed as though it had once been a grand house. It was enormous and fancy-looking. I thought that maybe its occupants had died. Old folks, perhaps? Yes, that would make sense. Elderly people with no children. Or maybe a middle-aged couple, murdered in their sleep. The man and woman had been stabbed in their bed; the small ones were suffocated with pillows. It seemed such a tragedy, I felt my stomach begin to roll with nausea.

  I began to contemplate going into the house, on a sort of small exploration. In fact, I had relatively few doubts as I began to ascend the steep front path. It was laid with dilapidated flagstones, wending its way, ever so slowly, up to a deep porch. I peered for only a moment into its redoubtable darkness, before I started up the steps.

  I was not the least bit surprised to find the door unlocked. I turned the handle and pushed it inward, trying to discern shapes from the thick shadows of the house – furniture, debris, anything. I hoped even for a hat stand, just to deliver some semblance of normalcy to the place. Yet, I had to admit to myself that it was the abnormality of the house that had drawn me to it in the first place.

  I closed the door behind me upon entering. I stood in the front hall for a few moments, allowing my eyes to adjust to the darkness, broken only by the dim moonlight that filtered through a dirty window to the right. When I was finally able to see clearly, I realised that there was plenty to examine. I saw the long hallway before me, all filled with dust and cobwebs. There was a doorway on the left that led into a spacious parlour. A quick glance inside showed me that the parlour windows were hung with thick, dark drapes. I thought I could see the outlines of a fair number of pieces of furniture, scattered all about the room.

  The hallway was quite lengthy. I walked all up and down it twice, taking a moment to glance into each doorway it held. I discovered a study, a sunroom, a washroom, and an enormous kitchen at the very back of the house. After I had looked at all of this, I found myself drawn to the spiral staircase at the end of the hall. The stairs were a masterpiece unto themselves, made of heavy wood, carved by a careful hand. Thick patterns swirled all along the banister, breathtakingly beautiful and just a tad bit eerie. The carved heads of what appeared to be evil angels (evil, because they sat hunched and brooding upon the rail; brooding, no doubt, over ill things) accentuated this latter conveyance – and I could not keep from staring at them. There was one at the bottom, and one at the top of the balustrade. This latter angel seemed to call down to me from his place on the landing, beckoning me forth into the shadows of his home.

  I mounted the stairs with caution, my eyes ever fixed upon the topmost angel; but his cruel, cunning countenance did not waver; and I began to suspect that he cared nothing for my presence after all.

  Though the staircase continued on up to a third storey, I stopped to investigate the second. I found three well-sized bedrooms, another washroom, another study (this one full of dusty old books), and a roomy storage closet; but nothing more.

  It was on the third floor that the tour took a turn for the strange. I noticed the difference as soon as I reached the top of the staircase. The light there was not that of any celestial body, whether it be moon or stars; but of the artificial type. It was the same light that any person would recognise from years of holding burning candles in the night; it was pure, if not dim, firelight.

  I immediately began to back up towards the stairs. I could think of no other explanation; if a candle burned there on the third floor, then I was not the only one there.

  I looked behind me, down into the nether regions of the house. There was nothing but darkness. Here on the third floor, the light halted right at the top of the staircase, just before the first step down. There was no dividing line between the dark and the light. The two just seemed to blend into one another, so that when one attempted to examine the exact point where the light stopped being, one grew dizzy and slightly cross-eyed.

  I looked for the source of the light – and saw two torches down at the end of the hall, held up by brackets attached to the walls.

  I wondered if I should be afraid. Surely, I was not alone in the house. Was the person (or persons) there with me of a malevolent temperament? Perhaps it was a burglar. Of course it was a burglar! Any inkling of fear dissipated at the very thought of stealing from dead people. The nerve one had to have! It was disgusting, really it was. After all they had been through, what with the suffocated babies and all.

  But why would a thief light candles?

  I moved a little farther into the landing, inching towards the hallway. I stepped gingerly into it, feeling that at any moment someone might very well leap out at me. I was thoroughly surprised, when I made it to the end of the hall unscathed. I looked back over my shoulder; but there was no one there.

  I occupied myself for a minute or two with the checking of all the third storey rooms. They seemed all identical to the rooms on the second floor, save for the study; which was replaced, here, only with another closet.

  Up in the ceiling was a neat square of wood, its edges all perfectly even. On one side was a metal pull ring. And what to do with a pull ring? I could not resist.

  I reached up and tugged at the ring. I had to jump back as the square of wood, accompanied now by a short set of folding stairs, came crashing out of the ceiling.

  I stared for a moment at the stairs, before deciding to climb them. They creaked ominously beneath my feet, but I trudged all the way to the top, having to haul myself up over the edge of the floor once I got there. I straightened up quickly, brushing the dust and mould off of my pajamas.

  No candlelight there in the attic. Just ordinary moonlight.

  “Hulloooooooo,” I called out. Just for good measure, I thought. But the only result of my echoing voice was a small avalanche of dust that fell from the ceiling down onto my face.

  I coughed and spluttered, till every small gob of spit-turned-mud had flown clear of my mouth. Then I began to circle round the large attic, looking for something to rummage through. Wasn’t that the point of attics? Big old storage trunks that held interesting things for a person to inspect; battered armoires full of styles gone out-of-fashion?

  But I saw no trunks, no armoires. The only thing I did see seemed entirely out of place: it was a heavy wooden desk, covered in papers.

  I sat down at the desk, and began picking up the papers, rifling through them with no real expectations of finding anything truly interesting. Probably they were just the records of the dead man who had lived here before – before he, his wife and his children were murdered in the night. (In cold blood, one might add.)

  After a few moments, however, I noticed something that was not only strange, but a little unnerving. I realised that the papers I held (along with the desk itself) were free of any trace of dust. I swept a fingertip over the desk’s surface, and it came back clean.

  There was a candle standing on a corner of the desk. I looked at it, trying to tell if it had been lit recently – when, all of a sudden, its wick burst into flame.

  I pushed back the chair in such a haste, that it went clattering onto the floor. I backed away from the desk, looking quickly round the attic and cursing the God-awful racket that the chair had made. I reached down and righted it quietly (as though that could have in some way made up for the previous noise).

  I must have stood in that attic for almost an hour, having moved into a corner of darkest shadow. I waited for someone to come up the steps I
had left undone.

  But no one ever came. I waited until the sound of the silence itself began to weigh heavily upon my ears; then I crept back to the steps, peered down them cautiously, and quickly lowered myself down into the hall.

  My escape from the house was a swift one. I returned to Niamh’s; snuck through the door that I had left unlocked (almost afraid, in a way, of being found out); and hurried back to my room.

  Chapter 29

  I woke next morning with a splitting headache. I sat up in bed, and looked all around, taking a moment to try and get my bearings. Medium-sized room, medium-sized bed, bare walls and too much sunlight – I squinted at the bedroom door, which stood partway open. Had I left it that way? I knew that I hadn’t; and I began to fear that the unidentified, possibly deceased inhabitant of last night’s derelict dwelling had come to reciprocate for my invasion of his home. I pondered the possibility of my being only moments away from death.

  I wondered what time it was. But then – what did it matter? What had I to do? Nothing, that was what. I almost began to hope for the menacing house-spirit to come for me.

  I lay still for a long while, staring absently out of the window. It was such a bright day! But I could not seem to feel the light.

  I nearly fell out of bed, when a knock came at the door. “I’ve changed my mind!” I cried; suspecting, of course, the arrival of the ghost. “Go back where you came from!”

  “What did you say?” I heard Niamh ask.

  “Oh, for God’s sake.”

  “What?”

  “Nothing. I – nothing.”

  “Well, all right. But I only came to ask you about coming with me today.”

  I lay back down again. “Coming where?”

  “To the infirmary, of course.”

  “What would I do there? I’m not a nurse.”

  “I know that. How about coming anyway?”

  “What exactly would you have me do?”

  “You’re smart enough. I’m sure that you could figure something out.” She paused. “Would you rather stay here alone for ten hours?”

  “No,” I said quickly. I got out of bed, and began pulling on my clothes.

  But the day proved as uneventful as I had expected. Since there were only two new patients (teen-aged brothers who had fallen off a shallow cliff-face in search of their father’s pocket watch, which they had stolen for fun and lost accidentally), there was hardly anything at all to do.

  Except for the paperwork.

  There were mountains of it, piled high all around the office: bills, records, and an assortment of things that seemed to have nothing at all to do with medicine. Robby sat at a small desk, scratching away in a thick ledger; and Niamh was off, having gone to help a fellow who somehow managed to string himself up by the neck in his dining room. His wife had run the four city blocks from their house to the infirmary; with which she was very familiar. (It seemed that her husband was very prone to accidents.)

  The woman pulled Niamh right out of the office, talking loudly all the while.

  “He was tryin’ to fix the chandelier,” she said. “Don’ know what he thought he’d get done, with a length o’ rope and a wooden clamp. But there he is now, danglin’ all around on the ceilin’. Can ye come and cut him down? He’s a fine mess, he is – and I’m afraid I’ll break his neck, iffen I try to do it!”

  “Do you see what comes of fancy lighting?” I asked Robby.

  ***

  Days, days, and more days – they piled onto and over one another like snow in a vast, stoney crag. (And, despite the arrival of warmer and more pleasant weather, they were just as cold.)

  I grew so tired of the small infirmary that I could hardly stand it. The mere sight of those bland white walls, and that clean, shining floor, drove me nearly to the brink. When I returned to Niamh’s in the evening, I was met by an equally insipid bedroom, one with two identical, perfectly square windows; a rectangular pinewood door whose edges could not have been more symmetrical; and a fluffy little bed with crisp white sheets and a pale quilt of nondescript pattern.

  But Niamh and I spent most every evening in the parlour, doing various amounts of nothing. I usually read; she usually sewed. We ate dinner together in the kitchen, and then moved into the parlour for tea.

  When we were each equipped with a steaming mug, we sat back in our respective seats and sipped at the hot liquid. We never spoke much; until the night when Niamh became strangely loquacious.

  “So,” said she, looking at me over the rim of her cup. “How are you taking to living here? Spending your days at the hospital and all?”

  “I like it just fine. I’m very grateful to you, Niamh.”

  It was only the memory of Earl Gunn’s subtle remonstrance, really, which made me say this.

  “Well, I’m glad you like it. Robby and I really love having you work with us.”

  I felt my eyebrows knit together. Whether or not she enjoyed having me at the hospital, I could not say – but I was fairly certain that Robby was utterly indifferent (at best) to my presence there.

  “I just want you to know,” she said, “that you can stay here as long as you like.” She looked down at her cat (whose name was Sindy), who lay curled up on the arm of her chair.

  “I’ve lived here alone for almost eleven years,” she went on after a little. “My da ran off when I was only three, so I never really knew him. Then my ma married some man I had never even met, when I was fifteen. She left me the house – or so she said in the note that I found on the kitchen table. I woke up one morning, and she was gone.” She grew thoughtful. “It’s funny. I never heard of someone having both their parents run off on them. Usually it’s just the one, unless they go at the same time.” She glanced up and smiled, looking almost ashamed.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  She shook her head. “Oh, no – nothing to be sorry about. Just an unfortunate circumstance. Lots of people have them.”

  I nodded. “I know what you mean.”

  “Aye,” she said slowly. “I suppose that you do.”

  Again, we fell silent; and we sat, indeed, without another word passed between, till we went off to bed.

  I lay awake for a long while that night. The blanket felt too hot against my skin; so I kicked it off. Without it, though, I found that I was cold; so I reached down, and pulled the sheet over me. Soon I grew warm again, but had by then passed at least halfway out of lucidity, and was making slow revolutions round a sphere of thick and murky thought.

  While I circled round and round, I remembered the date. It was the thirteenth of May.

  No cake this year.

  I thought of my cake from the year before, made months too late.

  ***

  It was some days later when Niamh tried to initiate another conversation. All that time in betwixt, we simply sat quietly, reading and sewing; and I think I might say, that I preferred the silence.

  “You know,” she said, inserting her needle into a pillowcase, “you never did tell me about your own family.”

  I looked up from my book in surprise.

  “I think I was hoping that your story would be happier than mine,” she said.

  “Let’s just say that it isn’t, and leave it at that.”

  “Oh,” she said, lowering her eyes. “I didn’t mean to pry, I was only . . .”

  “Please, don’t worry about it.” I offered her a smile. “I hope I didn’t sound rude. It’s only that there’s not much to tell. I would only bore you to tears.”

  She seemed to know not to ask any more; but not five minutes later, she said:

  “It’s just so strange – to be living in the same house with someone whom I know almost nothing about! I mean to say, I know that you were involved somehow with what happened in April; but you’ve never even said anything about that.”

  “There’s not much to say. I’m no revolutionary, I assure you. My involvement with that was somewhat accidental.”

  Niamh looked at me quizzically.
“Then how did you become involved?”

  “That’s a very long story – and has very little to do with whatever happened that day. I tell you, if I had known that it was going to happen, I never would have gone.”

  “You don’t say? Well, I’ll admit – that’s much different than what I thought you’d say.”

  “Perhaps that’s a good thing,” I said. “But I really don’t want to talk about it anymore.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t dream of asking you to talk about something that made you uncomfortable!”

  I looked back down at my book, then – but when I saw, out of the corner of my eye, that Niamh had returned her attention to her sewing, I glanced discreetly in her direction.

  I knew then, why I did not want to share anything with her. I knew then, why I was not keen on hearing too very much about her. I had known, in those last days at the hospital, why I did not want to have too very much to do with her. It was why the prospect of coming to stay with her, had filled me with nothing but dread and misgivings.

  She fascinated me.

  Yet I still don’t understand, what it was that existed between Niamh and myself. I tried to ignore it; I tried to subdue it; I tried to fight it, when it refused to submit. But there was something about her that I could not ignore.

  She was not as beautiful as Thea. She was not as wise, and she was not as clever; she was not as funny. She never made me laugh, not even once. She had a certain aura, if you will – a characteristic that allowed her to dominate anything and everything around her. Whatever she touched, she controlled; whatever she held was forced to acquiesce. I never saw her lose an argument, with Robby or anyone else.

  Under all that, though, was a kindness that seemed real as the rain. When she focused her attention upon me, it made me feel a little woozy, a little unsteady.