An Irish Heart

by C M Blackwood

  That, of course, is running on quite a bit. So we return to the night of our arrival at Lennox Lane, and watch Thea putting out the fire, before she and I make our way to bed (and Myrne ducks back into his cabinet).

  Upon entering the room, my eyes fell directly upon the baby, who was fast asleep, on a kind of small cot that I had surrounded with pillows. I had fed him earlier, and then, I realised, ceased to think of him.

  I was stricken suddenly with guilt, and with the emotions which I had been forcing back all day. Now that the fire was out, and everyone was gone to bed, and the shock of Uncle Dexter’s coming and going had quite worn away, those thoughts which I had dispelled seemed to return with sevenfold vengeance. But I got into bed silently, and stretched out against my pillows, thoroughly intending to cast myself into a sleep which would chase away cogitation.

  Yet, somehow, I found myself speaking.

  “It’s strange,” I said softly, looking all around the moonlit room. “This house isn’t small. It’s a wonder there aren’t more bedrooms.”

  “Myrne could have slept in the parlour,” said Thea. “He’s just being silly.”

  “I wasn’t worried about that,” I said. “I was only saying.”

  I felt that familiar feeling of Thea’s attention, shifting quickly and completely over to me. It was not only her eyes that I could feel, but her heart and her mind, as well.

  “What were you saying?” she asked.

  “Anything.”

  “About anything.”

  I turned to looked at her, and smiled faintly. “You do know me.”

  She opened her arms, and moved to sit up a bit against the headboard. “Come here and tell me,” she said.

  “About anything?”

  “Anything you want.”

  I went straight to her, and it was a good feeling – to go where I knew I was wanted.

  “Just being here,” I whispered, reaching for her hand. “Just being here again, with you. But nothing’s the same. When we left, I expected to be gone for weeks, at most – but all this time!”

  My eyes were beginning to dampen the blanket. I looked over at Joseph, and more tears came.

  I was so tired of tears.

  “Don’t you think I feel the same way?” Thea asked.

  “I know you do,” I said. “I know that everyone feels the same. Kerry and Mary-Anne, worse even – they lost their whole family, and now they’re here, in a strange place. I can’t imagine how that little girl feels. It makes me sick . . .”

  I really did feel ill – but not quite because of the orphaned child upstairs. I kept glancing over at Joseph, and in this new environment, where he looked so out of place, I could not help but to think of his origins. I was not even entirely sure who his father was; but, judging by the fact that he was not abominably ugly, I could rule out at least one or two suspects. Just the fact that I had to do such a thing, made me feel so very filthy and cold!

  I felt the things which had brought that baby to life; I felt the place where he had got his start. The things I had sworn I threw away; the place I had said I buried so deep . . .

  “Katie,” Thea whispered, putting a hand to my face. “Why are you breathing so hard?”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. I tried to move away.

  “No,” she said, pulling me back. “Tell me what you’re thinking.”

  I could not speak; but she saw me look at Joseph; and she did not need to ask again. “Oh, God,” she said, holding me as I started to shake.

  “I didn’t mean it,” I cried, feeling so much like a child that I just wanted to fall down and scream, kick my legs and refuse to breathe. I knew not even what I was saying, as I sobbed and choked, and choked and sobbed, and spit forth strings of words. “It wasn’t my fault,” I said. “Won’t you please believe me, Thea? Oh, it wasn’t, it just wasn’t! Don’t you see that it wasn’t?”

  Her voice was thick when she spoke again. “Oh, Katie, I know,” she said softly, trying to get me to look at her. But I wouldn’t. I would not raise my head; would not move my face away from her lap. I did not want her to see my shame.

  “It wasn’t your fault,” she said. “How could that have been your fault?”

  I clung fast to her waist.

  “Katie?”

  “It makes me so sick,” I repeated. I jumped out of bed, and raced to the bathroom, where I vomited so violently that blood came with it. Thea was right on my heels, kneeling down beside me, holding back my hair.

  “No,” I said, waving her away. “Don’t watch this. It’s disgusting.”

  “It’s not,” she said, rubbing my back. She handed me a towel to wipe my face, and added, “Well, maybe a little bit. A little gargle should fix you up just fine, though.”

  I had not even time to respond. I was overtaken by another fit of retching, and felt quite like all my insides were falling out of my mouth.

  “It’s going to be all right,” she said. “I know there’s no way to make you feel much better right now, but I’ll sit here all night if I have to.” She kissed my bare arm. “Because I love you.”

  “I love you, too,” I choked, leaning over to vomit a third time.

  Quite the touching moment, was it not?

  I lost my stomach to the toilet five times in all, but had to lie on the floor of the bathroom for almost an hour afterwards, feeling too weak to make it back to bed. I tried to get Thea to go, to just let me rest there a while, but I knew better than to think that she would actually leave.

  “Whenever you’re ready, I’ll help you to bed,” she said, leaning back against the wall so I could rest my dizzy, spinning head on her thigh. “We can stay here as long as you want. I’ve always been extremely partial to sitting on the bathroom floor.”

  “Make fun all you want,” I said, my voice hardly more than a whisper. “I didn’t make you stay.”

  “No,” she said, stroking my hair. “You didn’t. But you never have to, because I always will. That’s the point.”

  Chapter 44

  I woke in the morning, still a little woozy from my episode the night before. I stretched beneath the covers, feeling Thea’s sleeping arm around me; feeling the morning sun shining down on my face.

  I think that I fell asleep again, if only for a few minutes. At any rate, Thea still slept upon my second waking, and I could tell that she slumbered deeply; there was a faint whistling sound emitting from between her lips, when she breathed in and out.

  I don’t know how long I watched her; but it must have been quite a while, for the room was much brighter when she finally opened her eyes.

  “You’re staring at me,” she said.

  I stretched out again beside her; and took her hand in almost a snatching fashion, as if afraid that it would bound away from me.

  “Can we stay like this for a while?” I asked.

  “As long as no one bothers us.”

  “Who would?”

  “No one, I hope.”

  Just then, the baby started to cry. A few moments after that, Dolly began scratching at the door, no doubt wanting to be let out into the yard.

  We only sighed; and then we laughed.

  ***

  “I just don’t know what to do,” said Kerry Warner, later that morning. Mary-Anne, the poor little thing, was still upstairs asleep.

  “We’ve no home, and no place else to go. I suppose it will be easier to find a place, without the two wee ones . . .”

  At this, she broke down into the first fit of hysterical tears I had ever seen her shed – which was saying something, considering her present conditions.

  “Well, to start,” said Thea, looking as though she was not quite sure what to do for Kerry, but that she wished very much to do something helpful, “you’ll stay here as long as you like. You need not worry about anything yet.”

  “Thank you for your kindness,” said Kerry, looking to both Thea and myself. “If it weren’t for you, my sister and I would be living in the streets! I mean to say, even if no one
has taken our flat in Marcker Street, I simply couldn’t . . .”

  She paused, and sobbed harder.

  “How could I live again in that place?” she asked softly. “My poor family! Oh, and my babies . . .”

  Myrne, who had been standing silently off to the side, moved forward to place a hand on Kerry’s shoulder. He was full shocked, though, when she whirled about in her chair, threw her arms around him and began to cry into his shirt. He looked questioningly at me; but I only nodded. So he patted her head.

  When Mary-Anne came downstairs a while later, Kerry seemed to brighten a bit. It was as though this last duty of hers – caring for her sister – was the only thing that could bring her to life.

  Me, on the other hand – I was keeping myself quite busy. I was attempting, but failing miserably, to fashion Joseph a kind of crib. We had wood, nice and dry and thick, but we did not have many tools. Myrne insisted, though, that he needed hardly anything, and that in the end it would be him who made the suitable crib.

  And so it became a sort of competition, which lasted far into the following day – and then into the next, and the next, and the next . . .

  Dolly ran all round us in circles, yipping and howling as if in encouragement.

  “This is complex, manly work,” said Myrne, looking confusedly at the two sticks he was holding, which I think he meant to make into a pair of side-rails. “You women have no mind for such things.”

  If anyone else had said it, I would have socked them in the eye. But since it was Myrne – and I knew that, most of the time, he was more girlish than I – I simply played along.

  “Is that why your crib looks like a broken boat?” I asked.

  Everyone laughed. (Except for Myrne, of course.) We had been working for

  well-nigh six days; Thea, Kerry and Mary-Anne were sitting on the back steps, watching us, no doubt thinking that we had to finish sometime soon. They sat out there for a few minutes every day, if only to have something to laugh at. During those times, though, I noticed that Kerry so loved to hold Joseph; I expected that he reminded her of her own lost little ones, and instead of bringing tears, brought a lovely smile to her face.

  “How funny,” said Myrne, pulling a face at me. “But just you wait and see. I’ll be the one laughing, once I’ve finished.”

  “It’s freezing out here,” said Kerry. “I’m bringing this baby inside. Why can’t you two build your contraptions in the parlour?”

  “Because they would break everything in it,” said Thea, smiling more at me than at Myrne. “We’ve already had two near-broken fingers.”

  “The purple’s gone down quite nicely,” I told her.

  “I can see that. But what happens if you break your whole hand?”

  Myrne winced. “Don’t say that. It’s bad luck.”

  “You two are bad luck – whenever you’re armed with hammers.”

  By the time the sun began to dip down behind the house, only Myrne and I remained outside. I looked down at my claim to a crib, trying to be as objective as I could.

  Objectivity, in that moment, was somewhat discouraging.

  I finally threw my hammer to the ground. “This just isn’t working,” I said in frustration. “It would be more dangerous to let him sleep in either one of these things, than to put him to bed on the roof!”

  Myrne frowned. “I think that that’s a little harsh.”

  “Do you really?”

  He surveyed his own handiwork. “Well, perhaps not.”

  I marched over to the stoop, and sat down. “What an immense waste of time,” I growled.

  Myrne came to sit beside me. The backyard was beginning to darken, but we remained, staring at our disastrous creations. I think that it scared us both nearly half to death, when we heard a voice from over the fence.

  “Hey, you two!”

  I squinted in the gathering darkness, and saw a head peeking over the fence. It was Mr Crane, the old man who lived in the next house down the lane. I did not know his first name and, strangely enough, I did not recall having ever spoken to him before.

  “Yes?” I replied, feeling as though it was my duty to answer. (Judging by his complete silence, it was obvious that Myrne felt that way, too.)

  “Haven’t seen ye in a while,” said Mr Crane, peering at me.

  “We’ve been away.”

  “Oh,” said he, scratching his head. “Well, I got a surprise for ye.”

  He disappeared back into his house.

  Myrne looked at me quite seriously. “What’s he going to get?”

  “How would I know?”

  “Is he going to kill us?”

  “You’re an idiot, do you know that?”

  “That’s not very nice.”

  “Well, you do say the stupidest things.”

  “It’s not –”

  “Shhh. He’s coming back.”

  Crane’s back door swung open again. Because of the height of the fence, I could not quite see what he was doing. It looked, though, like his movements were laboured, and it took him some minutes to reach the gate in the fence.

  “Come here, would ye, and give me a hand?”

  I got up and went to the gate, Myrne following along behind me. I lifted up the lock and swung open the gate.

  What I saw rendered me speechless.

  “My goodness,” said Myrne, staring in awe. “That’s the most beautiful crib I’ve ever seen.”

  “I saw you two messin’ about back here, and thought – since I didn’t have nothin’ better to do, mind ye – that I’d show ye how it’s really done.” He looked over at our own attempts. “And, ye know, for the sake of the baby and all.”

  I reached out and touched the smooth wood. Had I actually succeeded in making something that was even shaped like a crib, Joseph still probably would have died of splinter injuries.

  “Whose baby, if ye don’t mind me askin’?”

  “Mine.”

  “This yer fella here?”

  “No.”

  “I haven’t seen any other fellas about.”

  I turned my eyes away. “There are no others.”

  He shrugged. “I’m not a-trying to pry, understand. I don’t particularly care, one way or t’other. Just seemed like a good question to ask.”

  I watched him for a moment, standing with his hands in his pockets, and sounding as though his claim to indifference was nothing but truth. There hid no unspoken judgment beneath.

  “You’re very kind,” I said to him.

  “Ah, no,” said he. “Maybe not that. Just polite, I think; comes from livin’ in the high places when I was a boy. The rough country, as they call it. Me da was a hard-workin’ man, and taught me nothin’ but the same. That must’ve been why me Lily loved me so, seein’ as my looks ain’t nothin’ to brag about.” He looked hard at Myrne. “You remember that, boy. You can’t take nothin’ with ye when ye die, but the knowin’ that ye was a hard-workin’ man, and that ye did well by yer family as best ye could. You remember that, me boy.”

  “Well, Mr Crane,” I said, once the silence had gone on just a little too long; “I still don’t know how to thank you.”

  “Oh, it was nothin’. Just a little neighbourly friendliness.”

  “But we’ve never even met.”

  “A neighbour’s a neighbour,” he said gruffly. Then he puffed up his chest. “And I never pass up a chance to show off me talent. I was a carpenter, you know. One o’ the best in Ireland.”

  “I can see that,” said Myrne.

  “And don’t you forget it.”

  “How can I repay you?” I asked.

  “Well,” he said, “ye can start by gettin’ this heavy thing the rest of the way into the house. My back’s not what it used to be.”

  “You’ve done quite enough already,” I said.

  “And second,” he went on, sniffing the air, “I smell some real good food a-cooking. It wouldn’t be comin’ from yer kitchen, would it, missy?”

  I looked back towards th
e house. “Probably,” I said. “Though I didn’t have a hand in any of it.”

  “Aye,” he said. “The yellow-haired one does the cookin’.”

  “Yes,” I said, sure that I was blushing – and glad that it was dark.

  “I remember the smells that used to come outta that kitchen, way back when she was just a wee thing,” he said. “Back when her ma was doin’ the cookin’. I had the pleasure of tastin’ some of it, on a couple occasions. I never woulda told my Lily, but yer friend’s ma – Twila was her name, I’ll never forget it – made the best cakes I’ve ever tasted.”

  I smiled. “Well, it runs in the family.”

  He squinted at us. “Then it’s a wonder ye’re both so blessedly skinny.”

  Myrne looked as if he were about to say something smart. I moved a little closer to him, so I could pinch him without Crane’s noticing. Then he merely winced, and abandoned whatever statement he had planned.

  “So,” said Crane, turning his attention on Myrne, “which one’s yers?”

  “What?”

  “Which crib?”

  “Oh.” Myrne pointed to his own.

  Crane shook his head. “It’s a pity,” he said. “A young man such as yerself, not knowin’ how to work with yer hands.” He looked Myrne up and down. “But then, you are mighty scrawny. Maybe that’s why ye’ve such a hard time – not quite enough muscle.”

  I had to choke back a laugh. Myrne glowered at me.

  “You’ll stay for supper, then?” I asked Crane. “I won’t take no for an answer.”

  “Well, if ye’d like.”

  “Of course I would. Come with me, I’ll show you in.” I looked at Myrne. “You can get this inside, can’t you?”

  “Well, I don’t –”

  “Of course he can,” said Crane. “It’ll be good for him. Build up a bit of muscle.”

  So I left him to his muscle-building, and led Crane across the yard.

  “Thea!” I called, when I had opened the back door for the old man.