Skibbereen
A FREEZING GALE BLEW UP THE RIVER ILEN AND THE LASHING RAIN pounded on the roofs and windows of the homes of Skibbereen. On such a night, Dan was glad of the comfort and warmth of his own hearth.
He had decided to hand over to Tom Marmion the task of selecting passengers who were suitable to travel on James Swanton’s ship. He had so many competing demands on his time that he could no longer dedicate himself to the endeavour, though he still ensured that those chosen were medically fit to sail.
His rest was disturbed by a knock on the door.
He opened it hesitantly to an awful apparition: a poor woman who could barely stand, emaciated beyond belief and soaked to the skin. She was so pale and skeletal that it was as if she had appeared from the grave itself.
‘Dr Donovan, you have to help me,’ she wept. ‘My boy is dead and I have not even a coffin to bury him.’
Shocked by her appearance, Dan racked his brain trying to recognize her, for no doubt she was a patient of the dispensary.
‘Mrs …’
‘It’s Mrs Keating. Mary Keating,’ she said, taking a shuddering breath. ‘My husband died two weeks ago. I had only buried him in Chapel Lane when my little boy was taken from me. I was sick with the fever myself and there was nothing I could do, but now I have to get a coffin for my boy and bury him decently.’
‘Where is your son now?’ Dan asked.
‘I laid him out in the ditch, near my cabin. A coffin is all I want for him,’ she begged, trying to control her emotions. ‘You are a good man, and I trust that you will help me, because no one else will. Please, Dr Donovan, help me to find a coffin to bury my boy.’
Dan had the pity of his heart for the woman, but he could not invite her inside. His own wife and children were only yards away from her and she clearly had fever.
‘Mrs Keating, you should not be on the streets, for you are unwell,’ he advised.
‘A coffin is all I am asking for,’ she repeated, her hollow, near fleshless eyes mad with grief. ‘I am fixed in my purpose. I’ll not let the dogs in the fields eat him.’
‘I’m sorry but I cannot help with your son’s coffin,’ Dan said regretfully. He desperately wanted the sick woman away from his family and his doorstep. ‘My duty is to care for the living. Do you have other children?’
‘I have a boy and a girl waiting on me back home,’ she admitted.
‘Then you must return to them, Mrs Keating, for they are the ones who need you,’ he cajoled, hoping that she would take her leave. He simply could not put his family at risk.
He felt in his pocket and found a shilling, which he gave to her.
‘Please take this money. Go and purchase meal and some victuals to nourish you and the children.’
‘Thank you, doctor,’ she said, her claw-like fingers grabbing at the shiny coin.
He sighed with relief that at last she might go.
‘What about my boy, Dr Donovan?’ she continued. ‘What am I to do? I cannot leave him in the ditch. He was the blood of my heart and I am lost without him.’
Immediately Dan felt guilty. Here was a mother, who was ill herself, standing in the bitter cold before him, showing how desperately she cared for her lost child. What kind of man was he if he ignored her plea for help?
‘I will come and visit you later, to see if we can resolve the situation,’ he promised as he watched her shuffle away in the darkness.
The rain had eased but it still was near freezing outside by the time Dan and his assistant, apothecary Jerrie Crowley, drove out to Letterlishe and found Mrs Keating. Her cabin was an absolute hovel. The water poured through the rotten thatched roof and on to the muddy floor.
Jerrie had brought his lantern with him and in the darkness they could see the two surviving Keating children lying on the floor like small skeletons, their ribs and other bones protruding under their skin. Outside, in the ditch near the front door, was a small coffin containing the putrid body of a boy of about seven years old, who must have died ten or twelve days ago.
‘Where did you manage to get the coffin?’ Dan asked Mrs Keating.
‘I bought it with the shilling you gave me,’ she admitted. ‘And I carried it home.’
‘Mrs Keating, I gave you that money to buy food for you and your children,’ he admonished her gently.
‘The children and I do not care about food now,’ she replied flatly. ‘It is so long since we’ve had any to eat, we have forgotten the taste of it.’
Jerrie could not hide his upset at such suffering as he looked over at her starving children.
‘I want my boy buried decently,’ Mary Keating demanded. ‘That is the only help I ask of you.’
‘Well, that is what we will do then,’ Dan promised, as he and Jerrie took up the shovels they had also brought with them.
They carried their lantern to an abandoned patch of ground at the side of her cabin.
‘Will some of your neighbours give us a hand with the digging?’ he asked.
‘The neighbours did not a lift a finger to help us in our time of need,’ she pronounced bitterly. ‘Not even a sup of water would they bring to us.’
The ground was wet and heavy as they began their sombre task. Dan found it hard to believe that not one of the neighbours made any offer to help while they continued to dig out the sodden earth, making a large hole rather than a deep grave in which to bury the boy.
They worked in the bitter cold and near darkness until both he and Jerrie were exhausted, sweating and unable to dig any more. Prayers were said as they solemnly lowered the coffin into the ground. The boy’s mother seemed satisfied as they began to shovel the soil back into the makeshift grave to fill it in.
Back inside, Dan examined the boy and girl.
‘Mrs Keating, both you and the children are sick,’ he told her. ‘I can make a special arrangement to admit you all to the Union’s fever ward tomorrow morning. I promise you will be cared for there.’
‘I am grateful to you, doctor, and to you, Mr Crowley, for what you have done here tonight, but I’ll not go to the Union and have my children taken from me,’ she said, shaking her head stubbornly. ‘We are better staying here, in our place.’
As he and Jerrie drove the icy road home to town, they both were filled with concern for Mrs Keating and her children.
‘I suppose you cannot blame her reluctance, Dan. We all know how bad things are in the workhouse,’ Jerrie sighed.
It was nearly eleven o’clock when Dan reached home. The house was asleep except for Henrietta.
‘Dan, you are freezing cold,’ admonished his wife. ‘You will get a chill after being out so late on such a night.’
She pulled up the blankets and piled them around him, before settling her own warm and drowsy body against his. She rubbed her legs and feet up and down his to warm him up.
‘I am a fortunate man,’ he said as she touched her warm hand to his icy face, ‘to have you, my dearest, to come home to.’