Elizabeth didn’t know what time the last train left Belfast for Banbridge, but it stopped at all the stations on the way and there was a two mile walk at the end of it, so it might well be midnight before Sam and Jamie arrived back at Ballydown. With the main road icy and the snow cover on the hill now freezing, it could be even later. She sighed and went back into the house.
After the deep darkness of the night, it took some moments to adjust to the dazzle of light from the gas lamps. Three pairs of eyes looked up expectantly as she came into the kitchen. She paused by the table, looked around and saw her basket had been placed carefully on a chair by the door. She stepped across and brought it into the light.
‘Hannah dear, I’d like you to make up a mixture of elderflower wine and honey. It needs to be warm but not hot, sweet but not sickly. A cupful would do to begin with. And a small teaspoon. Good girl,’ she added encouragingly, as Hannah rolled up her sewing, got to her feet and took the bottle and jar from her hands.
Poor girl. She saw how pale and immobile Hannah’s face had become, but Sarah looked even worse. Even paler than her sister, she had great dark circles under her eyes. She had jumped up from her chair the moment she’d appeared, ready to do whatever she might ask.
‘Sarah, I need two people to sit with me all night. Your father will be one, for I know he won’t leave your mother, but it may be a long night, so I shall ask Hannah to sit with us until Sam and Jamie get back. I’ll send Hannah to rest then. I’ll need you about two o’clock. Then we’ll start all over again,’ she explained quietly. ‘What I want you to do now is go to bed and sleep, so you’ll be fresh when everyone else is tired. If Ma gets worse I’ll call you immediately, you’re only a step away.’
To her great surprise, Sarah came and hugged her, kissed her sleepily and went upstairs without another word.
Hannah had taken the elderflower and honey out to the dairy where the mixture would be easier to make on the gas ring. Through the open door, Elizabeth could hear her small body movements as she fetched a saucepan and struck a match. There was a tiny chink from a spoon as she measured the liquid from the bottle and jar.
‘And what of me, Elizabeth?’ said Hugh softly, his eyes upon her, full of all the questions he would not put into words.
She smiled warmly and touched his cheek, grateful to share her burden if only for a single moment.
‘You’ve been doing just what I wanted,’ she said, softer still. ‘Pray for me too, that my strength will serve.’
‘Is there any hope?’
‘Just what we make for her, for the moment,’ she said quickly, moving away from him and sorting items from her basket as Hannah came back into the room.
‘Hugh, I want you to make up a rub,’ she said, in as normal a voice as she could manage, taking out a large jar full of tiny, dried sprigs. ‘Put the rosemary in the oven till its well warm, but not hot. Then crush it in a dish with the back of a spoon. Mix it with this,’ she added, producing a small jar of goose fat. ‘It’s the oil you need, not the little spikes themselves, so pick out as many as you can after you’ve mixed it. One of us will come down for it later when we’ve tried the elderflower and honey,’ she added, as he pushed himself awkwardly to his feet.
Sam had been in Belfast a number of times, both with his father and with Hugh, but he’d never travelled to the city on his own, nor visited his brother at his recently acquired lodgings. Before he left the house, he wrote down the new address carefully, even though he’d memorised it as soon as Jamie told them about his move. He’d also extracted some battered notes from the shiny, new leather wallet in the top pocket of his best jacket where he kept his savings until he felt it was worth the trouble of taking them to the bank.
The Belfast carriers had told him there was no snow in the city, and they were right, but as he came out onto the steps of the Great Northern Station, he reckoned it was colder in the city than in Banbridge. A bitter wind gusted down over the edge of the Antrim Hills and poured along the empty streets like floodwater, sweeping up the fragments of straw from horses nosebags and the torn fragments of posters once attached to walls and doors.
When he crossed Great Victoria Street from the station, to his amazement, there wasn’t a soul in sight. He’d walked almost the whole way to the White Linen Hall before he met a scurrying figure who was able to tell him where he could find the nearest cab rank.
It was a long, cold wait before he heard the clatter of hooves and exchanged words with a cloaked figure hunched up on the box.
‘Ye’d have been quicker taking the tram from Carlisle Circus,’ said the driver, looking down at Sam.
‘I might,’ said Sam agreeably, grateful to see the prospect of progress at last, ‘but I don’t know the city well. And forby, I need ye to wait to bring my brother and me back to catch the last train for Banbridge.’
‘Aye well,’ said the man, not committing himself. ‘It’s a fair step to the place ye want. It’ll cost ye a bit.’
Sam nodded. He’d been warned about cab drivers who overcharged, but he hadn’t time to argue. He urged him to make speed, got into the cab and sat down.
He’d never been in a hire cab before and he was not impressed. It bumped and creaked over the rough surface of the road. Worse still, it moved so slowly, he became more and more anxious, for the journey seemed to be taking an enormous length of time. Jamie had said his digs were convenient for the shipyard and the trams ran regularly from a terminus nearby. Sam could now make out the dark tracery of masts and rigging of ships towering over the shops as they crossed a bridge but he saw no sign of tramlines.
There were rows of worker’s houses, small and close together, the lights from their windows spilling out into empty, silent streets. Here and there, a mill building rose like a cliff, its dark face pierced with square patches of light, the noise of looms so loud he could feel their vibration on the cold, heavy air.
Adrift in the middle of a city, travelling from one unknown place to another, with no familiar landmark anywhere to be seen, Sam felt desolate. He wished now he’d let Hugh come. Maybe there was nothing he could do for his mother at home, but he wished passionately he’d never left her. He could be standing in a corner of the bedroom where she lay, her face deathly pale, her slight shoulders moving with the harshness of her breathing, her long, dark hair falling limp around her.
When he was a little boy, he used to comb her hair. He could still remember the first day Hannah asked if she could comb Ma’s hair. Ma had said yes, so he’d asked too. She’d laughed and said, ‘Why not. Am I not the lucky one to have two assistants to dress my hair, when Lady Anne herself has only one?’
Sam wiped his tears absently with his sleeve and looked at his watch. It was already after nine o’clock and the cab was going yet more slowly because of the steepness of the road.
‘There yar. Fifty-six. There’s no lights on. I hafta charge for waitin.’
‘I’ll only be a minute or two,’ Sam reassured him, as he jumped down and made for the tall, brick house sitting behind a privet hedge.
He knocked and waited. Then knocked again. Surely there must be someone at home. The fanlight above his head produced a faint gleam as a light went on somewhere within. The letterbox rattled and from within came a thin, querulous voice.
‘Who is it? Have you forgotten your key?’ a woman asked.
Through the panels of roughened glass, Sam could see she was bending her mouth to the open letterbox.
‘My name’s Sam Hamilton. I want to speak to my brother Jamie. Is he in?’ he asked, bending down to the small aperture.
‘No, he’s not.’
‘Well, where’s he gone? Tell me where I can find him,’ Sam went on, a note of desperation creeping into his voice.
‘Sure how would I know? I mind my own business,’ she said huffily. ‘Why do you want him at this hour when respectable people are in bed?’
‘Our mother’s ill. Very ill. The doctor said to get him. If I don’t get him soon, I’ll miss the last train back to Banbridge.’
‘Banbridge, dear save us,’ she said, her careful pronunciation falling foul of her surprise at the thought of such a journey. ‘Well, I’m sorry for you, young man, but I can’t help. He and some of the other lads he works with have gone out. They go off regular every few Fridays but whether it’s the pub, or gaming, or what, I don’t know. They don’t tell me. But he’ll not be back for an hour or more, I’d say.’
‘Will ye give him a message?’ Sam asked, suddenly aware of the minutes ticking away.
‘I will.’
‘Tell him Sam says “Get the first train home in the mornin’.”’
‘Is that all?’
‘Aye.’
He straightened up as the letterbox dropped shut, then tramped down the path to where the cab waited, the horse blowing in the cold air.
‘Back to the station as fast as ye can, like a good man. I must catch that train,’ he said urgently to the driver.
‘Did ye not get him?’
‘No, I didn’t. So I must get back m’self. Do your best for me an’ I’ll see ye right,’ he said, as he jumped in and buried his face in his hands.
It wasn’t reasonable at all to be annoyed that Jamie was out with his friends and had told no one where he was going, but Sam didn’t feel reasonable. He didn’t know why, but for the first time in his life he felt angry with Jamie, the big brother he had always loved and admired. If he missed that train and couldn’t get back home he’d be angrier still.
There was no response at all when Elizabeth tried Rose with a little of Hannah’s mixture on a spoon. Her lips were stiff. She was so far away in her thoughts they responded neither to the warmth nor the sweetness. The mixture simply trickled out of the edge of her mouth to be wiped gently away with a damp cloth.
Her breathing seemed to have lost a little of its harshness, but the fact that it was a little quieter was no comfort to the three who kept watch. It was also a little slower. John and Hannah could see for themselves perfectly well what Elizabeth knew already. Rose was tiring. Breathing was such an effort, it had become slower and shallower.
‘I think we’ll try the rosemary now,’ she said steadily, when two further hourly applications of balsam and lavender appeared to have made no significant improvement.
They moved all the pillows. While John supported Rose, Hannah and Elizabeth undid her nightgown and left her back and chest exposed. There was no danger of Rose feeling cold for the room was too warm for the comfort of those who sat by the bed. John regularly wiped sweat from his forehead and Hannah’s paleness was hidden by a rosy flush.
Elizabeth rolled up her sleeves, lathered her hands and began massaging shoulders and upper chest alternately. Such narrow shoulders to carry all the weight of a family’s need, not undernourished, simply lightly made, the small breasts shapely and still firm, the waist so narrow it was no more than the handspans of the skirt she’d worn at her wedding.
She thought of the child who’d held her baby brother in the straw-lined cart when her parents walked away from the wreckage of their home in Ardtur. Rose had told her how they’d survived the bitter cold of that late April day and the weeks that followed when their home was a kind neighbour’s barn. Rose had survived that hardship, she reflected, but then the infection attacking her chest was a very different enemy. It couldn’t be escaped by taking to the road and seeking shelter elsewhere.
From downstairs, the click of a door latch and the sound of voices echoed up through the stairwell. John and Hannah listened intently as Elizabeth concentrated on what she was doing, easing the tightened muscles of the shoulders, drawing her long fingers up over the rib cage and encouraging the weary chest muscles to continue their work. Neither Hannah nor John said a word till she’d wiped the remaining traces of the rub from Rose’s warm skin and fastened up her nightgown.
‘That’s Sam back,’ said Hannah, ‘but I don’t hear Jamie.’
‘John, will you hold Rose forward till I get the pillows ready?’
He took her in his arms again. Elizabeth arranged the pillows and waited. For several minutes she stood silent, watching him, thinking he might not be able to let her go, but then, very gently, he kissed her cheeks and placed her against the mound of pillows that kept her upright.
‘Go down and see Sam and stretch your legs, John,’ she said quietly. ‘She’s all right for the moment.’
Rose couldn’t think why for the life of her she’d come. Her feet were sore and bleeding and she was so out of breath there was pain in her chest with every gasp she took, but now she was here she might as well look.
‘Just where Owen said it would be,’ she whispered to herself.
The dark, square castle rose on a promontory jutting out into the lough, the only building in the whole long valley. A road ran close to the loughside, a dusty, beige line cutting through the greens and browns of the shore and the clumps of vegetation growing by the water’s edge. Around the castle itself, there were trees and a walled garden. As she watched, a carriage appeared, moving briskly along the new road until it reached the castle itself. It turned into the great open space by the main entrance and stopped. Grooms and footmen came running out to attend to horses and passengers.
‘So you’ve come back too,’ said a voice at her side.
‘Owen Friel,’ she gasped, startled and amazed. ‘I thought you were in America with Danny Lawn.’
To her surprise, he didn’t reply, he just stood looking down at the castle. Long, long ago, when they were both children, she’d climbed the mountain to see the castle, but it hadn’t even been built then. She’d been so exhausted after the climb, Owen had carried her part of the way home.
‘That’s Her Ladyship,’ he said abruptly, as a woman emerged from the coach. ‘Adair’s dead ten years or more and they say she loves this place. She’s good to the tenants and takes care of them. Not much good to us now, Rose. Or Danny either.’
Danny was standing on her other side. He’d been a big, awkward lad, no use at schoolwork, but physically strong and so good-natured he’d do anything for anybody. He seemed little changed since she’d last seen him more than thirty years ago, except for the strange clothes he wore. A two piece suit of rough, beige coloured cloth with markings on it she couldn’t make out. It was a bit like a uniform, but not as well made. He stared out over the lough, apparently unaware of her presence.
‘Well, you’ve seen it now, Rose. There’s nothing more to do. We all did what we could to set it right,’ Owen said. ‘That’s the end of it.’
She looked around at the broken rocks on the summit of the mountain where they’d stood, but they were gone. She was amazed they could have disappeared so quickly. Then, she remembered. With an awful sinking feeling as if her heart were about to stop, she saw again the rope tied round their necks where the collars of their shirts should have been.
‘We’ll try Rose Mary now.’
She wondered who Rose Mary was and why they were going to try her. Perhaps she was a new kitchen maid come to the servant’s hall to see if she would suit. Poor girl, she’d have a lot to put up with. Mr Smithers, the butler, would be watching her every move and when Cook’s back was giving her trouble, there was no pleasing her at all. Rose was glad she was a lady’s maid now. However awful Lady Anne’s tantrums might be, she never scolded like Cook or Mr Smithers. She’d been at Currane Lodge so long, there wasn’t much about the staff or the family she and her mother hadn’t talked over together while they sorted the linen, or mended the gowns. At least her mother would be kind to poor little Rose Mary.
‘Ach there ye are. I was lookin’ everywhere for ye.’
Rose turned round, smiled and held out her arms when she saw who it was. Mary Wylie hugged her and kissed both her cheeks.
‘Sure, I’m sorry we didn’t get seats together,’ she said, nodding at her. ‘But we’ll put that right. Isn’t it a shame the train’s broke down and they’ve had to send for another one. C’mon an’ we’ll take a wee walk till ourselves,’ she said, her blue eyes dancing, a broad smile on her face.
The train had stopped. All along its length people were climbing down from the carriages and making their way through the long grass on the railway banks to find a shady place under a hawthorn bush or in the shadow of great mounds of briar covered with bright pink roses. The sun beamed down from a flawless blue sky. It was a perfect day, even if at this moment she was very hot and felt terribly out of breath.
‘Where have the children gone, Mary?’ she asked, a sudden anxiety touching her.
‘Ach didn’t they find wee friends from school. Yours and mine are away wi’ them to see if the band is going to play. They’re down at the back wi’ all their instruments. They might as well play us a tune.’
Rose smiled. Dear Mary. She was looking so lovely today in the blue blouse she’d made from material she’d once given her. She slipped her arm round her soft, generous waist and felt her friend’s arm tighten around hers. They strolled slowly along the broad, smooth path beside the empty train, the sound of children’s voices in their ears.
‘You’re lookin’ tired, Rose. Shall we go and sit under that nice big tree. Maybe ye’ll have a wee sleep.’
‘Oh yes, Mary. What a good idea. I am so very tired.’
When Hannah slipped silently downstairs a little after two o’clock for a drink of water and a breath of fresh air, she found Hugh and Sam asleep in the two chairs by the fire. Hugh woke immediately, impatient with himself for having nodding off.
‘Any change?’ he asked quietly, glancing at Sam’s sleeping figure.
‘She seems weaker,’ Hannah replied with a sigh, as she drew her hands wearily down her flushed cheeks.
‘Can I take your place for a few minutes?’ he asked tentatively.
‘Yes, if you want to. I need to go outside and Elizabeth wants more warm water,’ she replied in a whisper, when Sam didn’t stir.
‘They were both boiling a few minutes ago,’ Hugh said softly, as he pulled himself to his feet and made for the stairs.
Narrow and wooden, they were awkward and difficult for his bad leg, but he managed without making too much noise. He straightened himself up at the open door of the bedroom and took in the scene before him. Rose’s immobile face now had a little colour, but her harsh breathing had faded to an irregular roughness. John’s face streamed with sweat, or tears, or both. Elizabeth, her sleeves rolled up and her blouse unbuttoned, still managed to look her unshakeable self.
‘Can I do anything?’ he asked abruptly.
‘Yes,’ she replied, rising. ‘Sit with John and Rose till I come back. I’ll only be a few minutes.’
She was grateful for the freshness of Sarah’s bedroom as she slipped inside and shut the door carefully behind her. It wasn’t worth lighting the lamp for the few minutes she would need, so she lit the bedside candle.
‘Sarah,’ she said softly, taking the cold hand that protruded from the bed clothes.
Sarah’s eyes opened slowly and filled instantly with anxiety.
‘It’s all right, Sarah, she’s still with us, but I shall need you soon. I want to explain what you have to do. Are you awake enough to listen?’
‘Yes, of course,’ she insisted, as she sat up and swung her legs out of bed. She was still wearing all her clothes, her school pinafore crumpled and creased. She pushed her feet into her shoes and tied them quickly.
Elizabeth spoke slowly and clearly, made sure she understood and then sent her downstairs to fetch Sam.
There was barely space to move in the bedroom when Sam and Hannah came back upstairs with Sarah. There was certainly nowhere for them to sit. Once Elizabeth took up her place again, Hugh offered to wait downstairs, but John stopped him. ‘No, stay where ye are, man. Sam’ll find ye a chair.’
Sam brought the chair from his own bedroom, settled Hugh beside his father and leant against the wardrobe door behind them where he could watch Elizabeth across the squares and diamonds of the winter quilt and observe Hannah and Sarah side by side at the bed’s foot.
They sat in silence, the only noise the reluctant, laboured breathing of wife, friend and mother, the unconscious woman who lay so unnaturally still, her head thrown back against the piled up pillows, the cloud of her dark hair spilling all around her.
The room grew quieter and yet warmer. Rose’s face began to flush slightly as the minutes passed. Elizabeth made no move to mix Friar’s Balsam or even to rub her chest and hands with lavender water. She sat, holding one hand, watching her face, as John also sat, his eyes never leaving her for a moment.
From downstairs they heard the chime of the American clock, a strange muted sound, as if it measured time in some different world. It gathered itself, rang the quarters and struck the hour. One, two, three.
There was a slight movement from those gathered round the bed, an intake of breath, an easing of weary muscles, but from Rose there was no movement at all.
‘Has she gone?’ John asked, his eyes dilated, as he looked away from Rose for the first time and stared at Elizabeth.
‘No,’ replied Elizabeth, leaning forward to wipe trickles of moisture from Rose’s face. ‘But she’s close.’
The park and gardens were familiar but to begin with Rose could not remember where they were. The long flight of steps up to the big house and the formal gardens on either side were far too grand for Currane Lodge, but not grand enough for Lady Anne’s new mansion in Gloucestershire which had fountains and a parterre.
She and Mary walked on, along shady paths and across little clearings dappled with sunlight and full of birdsong. From time to time through the trees, they caught sight of a lake, a bent old willow leaning over into the water, swans floating along serenely, their dazzling whiteness perfectly reflected in the unruffled water.
She felt better. And the idea of a little sleep under a shady tree was so appealing she could hardly wait to get there. There it was, out beyond a wide, sun-drenched stretch of lawn, a huge cedar, its branches spread wide, the lowest almost touching the ground. A pool of cool, dark shade softly spread with fallen fragments lay at its feet.
She paused on the edge of the woodland, looked around and wondered where the noise had come from. There were no birds to be seen in the bright sunlit space between her and the cedar. Perhaps it was one of the sheep in the park that lay beyond the house and gardens.
‘Ma-a, we’re over here.’
The voice seemed familiar. It was as if someone was calling her, but she couldn’t make out the words. She looked around. Mary had gone. The place where she still stood in the shadow of the trees was completely unknown. It was growing hotter and hotter. It was so hot she could hardly breathe.
‘Ma-a, we’re over here.’
She struggled to wipe the dripping moisture from her face, but now it seemed it was not just her face, she felt her legs, her arms, trickle with sweat. The pressure in her chest was unbearable. She took a deep breath and felt a flash of pain, as if someone had tied a cord tightly round below her breasts. She recognised the voice now. It was Sarah and she was calling her.
Suddenly she found herself in her own bed, gasping for breath and sweating so fiercely that drips of moisture rolled down her forehead and got into her eyes, blurring her vision as she struggled to make out the shapes around her.
‘Hello, Ma.’
She tried to reply but she couldn’t manage a sound. Someone was wiping her face with a damp cloth. She glanced up at her and recognised Elizabeth. Her eyes moved slowly round the room, rested a moment on each member of the gathered company and the tight immobility of her streaming face softened towards a smile.
‘She’s back,’ said Elizabeth quietly, as her eyes closed again and she drifted into sleep. ‘The fever’s broken. We’re not out of the woods yet, but we must give thanks.’