Another Kind of Life (7 page)

The mill, too, was a powder keg waiting to explode. Mary had felt the tension rise there as well over the last couple of weeks. The usual heat and humidity seemed to have intensified; the girls
had all felt the damp atmosphere to be more suffocating than usual. Mary had been glad to welcome the return of the normal April downpour, the chilly winds which put paid to any notion of the early
arrival of summer. She hoped Cecilia hadn’t felt the stirrings of bitterness: she had encouraged her sister’s complaints about the heat, about how cranky it made everyone. Keep her
safe, and out of trouble. Keep her innocent for as long as possible. Mary could only hope that all those girls with their rough hands and even rougher tongues would have enough sense to keep their
powder dry.

T
HAT
WEEK
IN
April continued to be, in so many ways, a rite of passage in my young life. It became one
of those defining times after which nothing could ever be quite the same again. All memories subsequent to that week became coloured by my experience; I came to view all events prior to it in a
different light, with the hard-won wisdom that is known as hindsight. I still think of that week as an ever-changing and shifting pattern, a kaleidoscope of events which I have rearranged in my
imagination many times, to see if I could effect a better outcome. Lily had already shattered the comfort of my domestic view of the world, and now even greater changes awaited me. It was to be the
first time that the real world intruded rudely into mine; the first time I would ever have cause to doubt Mama’s ability to make everything better; the first time that I, or anyone else, knew
anything of Papa’s trouble and its enormous consequences for all our lives.

I know that we have spoken at length of this, you and I; you have indulged my painful reminiscences more than once. But this is the first occasion on which I find myself capable of real
reflection: reflection without anger, without the soul-corroding rancour which, for so many years, was my father’s living legacy to me. Indulge me a little more, now – I already know
that love is patient.

A couple of afternoons after Lily’s revelation about her ailing sister, I made my way home from school again in the freezing rain – showers which seemed to run one into the other so
that they became a constant downpour of needle-fine sleet, and not the April showers which we like to think of as heralding the arrival of summer.

The wind felt like a knife-edge, peeling away at the delicate skin on my face. The chilblains on my feet were getting worse: stinging, weeping, sticking to my woollen stockings and causing me a
great deal of pain. I could hardly wait to get my boots off. I wanted Mama that day, wanted her to make the pain go away.

Lily opened the front door to me before I had reached the end of the path. I saw, without really noticing, a carriage with two patient horses at the kerb outside our house. I probably thought it
was for our neighbours. In any event, its significance only became apparent later on that afternoon. Lily’s face was white, and she looked intently at me. Her brown eyes were startled, more
prominent than usual. I wondered for a moment whether she had been crying over her sister again. She took my hand, and her palm was clammy.

‘You come with me, Miss Eleanor,’ she said, almost in a whisper.

I noticed that the door to the drawing room was closed. Not an unusual occurrence in itself, but this time there was no sound of ladies’ laughter, no chinking of silver spoons on china
cups. I thought I heard Papa’s voice, but it seemed deeper, less familiar to me than usual.

‘Where’s Mama?’ I asked.

‘She’s busy at the moment, Miss Eleanor. You just come along with me, now.’

‘But I need Mama to look at my feet; they hurt.’

I began to cry, more, I suspect, because I could sense something in the house that terrified me, an air of catastrophe which cast its long shadow on to everything around me, including
Lily’s frightened face.

‘I’ll look after your feet. Come along, now, there’s a good girl. The fire’s lit in the kitchen, and I’ve just made some scones. Would you like that?’

I was won over. I wanted somebody to love me, somebody to make a fuss of me. Above all, I didn’t want to be on my own that afternoon, not when whatever was going to happen happened. I sat
with my feet in a basin of warm water, sipping milk and eating scones smothered in gooseberry jam. Lily had already peeled my sore stockings from my legs, had already begun the ritual of comfort
and healing which was familiar to me from all the winters of my life. Mama preferred to use wintergreen ointment, but Lily’s remedy for the agony of chilblains came from her mother’s
people in County Tipperary. She would put a turnip in the oven just long enough for it to soften. Then she’d cut it in half, and place thinly pared slices of its fibrous stuff over each of
the broken chilblains. Next, she would carefully place a strip of cotton on top of each slice, the pieces of cloth already smeared with clarified lard.

Mama used to smile at her country ways, but I can still vividly recall the sense of warm comfort once the greasy dressing was in place, can still savour the oily, vaguely animal smells of it
all. I have always found it strange how the memory of such small details remains the most potent, once the large events in our lives are over.

Poor Lily and Katie must have been frightened out of their wits that afternoon. The arrival of the police at any door was cause for anxiety, but their arrival immediately after my father, Mr
Edward’s, unusually early return from his business day was especially troubling. He was an important man, they knew that. Someone very high up in the Post Office, one who was not given to
returning unexpectedly from work to the bosom of his family, especially not with two detectives in tow. I know now how fearful those two good women must have been for their livelihood, how disaster
for their employer signalled even more immediate and complete disaster for themselves. Nevertheless, they minded me, Katie continued her preparations for the evening meal, and Lily continued to
tend to my feet, even warmed a clean pair of stockings for me on the top of the range.

Suddenly, one of the little brass bells above us sounded. I looked up. Drawing room. Lily glanced swiftly at Katie and left the kitchen. Neither Katie nor I spoke a word. I knew that we were
both waiting for something, but I didn’t know what. I did not know until long afterwards, of course, that the two gentlemen in the drawing room, who had arrived some two hours before my
return from school, had been sent to arrest my father. I opened the kitchen door just a little, and Katie didn’t try to stop me. Instead, she watched with me as the two sombre-looking men,
dressed in black, ushered my father outside to the waiting carriage.

‘Jesus, Mary and Joseph help us,’ Katie whispered, making the sign of the cross. Then I heard Mama wail, in a voice I knew immediately to be hers, yet not hers. I wrenched the door
open fully and ran down the hallway to the drawing room. Mama was lying on the floor, her face ashen, her arms clutching at Lily.

‘Quick, Miss Eleanor, ask Katie for the salts.’ Lily waved me out of the room. ‘Hurry now.’

I did as I was told. I felt strangely calm, a state I now know to have been shock. I remember watching, in a curiously detached way, as Lily was becoming more and more frantic. The salts had
done nothing to revive Mama. She seemed to come to from time to time, only to lapse into fresh weeping again and again, and languish somewhere between consciousness and unconsciousness. She kept
calling for Papa, or rather saying his name to herself over and over, as though trying to make it reveal something to her. His name was the only word I could distinguish; I could make no sense of
anything else she said.

I ran to the window once I heard the front door close and I watched Papa leave. I understood even then that he was being taken away from us, and I wanted to cry out, to tell those men to leave
him alone, but no sound would come. I can still see myself, all these years later, standing mute, frozen, by the drawing-room window. I was aware of what was going on around me, but powerless to
respond.

Katie had come running from the kitchen once the detectives had left with Papa, and now I could hear her exclamations as she tried to help Lily with Mama. Together they tried to get her to
stand, so they could at least carry her over to the sofa. But her body was limp and heavy; all her strength had abandoned her. I remember that the room and its occupants all came into focus once I
heard Katie’s tone, really frightened now.

‘Surely we should call Dr Collins,’ she said, and I could see her glancing in my direction. I must have looked lost and terrified, because Lily called me over to her at once, shaking
her head at Katie, trying to smile at me at the same time.

‘I’ll go get some water and lavender oil,’ she said. ‘I think she’s a little bit calmer than she was. If we bathe her forehead and her wrists, she should come
round.’

She gripped my shoulders now, making me look up into her kind face. The touch of her large, solid hands made me feel real again.

‘Don’t worry, pet. Your mama has just had a shock. Come with me and help carry the water.’

I remember that I went with her obediently, glad to have something to do other than watch Mama’s shaking body, and listen to her great, gulping sobs. When we returned from the kitchen,
Katie was kneeling on the floor, supporting Mama’s head on her knees. I was relieved that the sobbing had eased. I began to hope that everything would be all right again, that we would all
get back to normal. The room seemed to be that little bit more familiar, the strangeness of catastrophe receding somewhat. Perhaps what had happened was the result of a misunderstanding. Everyone
would soon be sensible again, the house would return to normal and Papa would come back, smiling and relieved.

‘Just a mistake, Mouse,’ he would say cheerfully. ‘Nothing to worry about. Just a mistake.’

Carefully, I carried the bowl of lavender water over to where Mama was lying. I touched her hand.

‘Mama? Are you feeling better?’

She smiled at me then, very weakly, but at least her face seemed to have lost some of its earlier formlessness.

‘Thank you, dear, yes.’

I watched Lily wring out the excess water, and apply the cool cloth to Mama’s forehead. A subtle scent of lavender drifted upwards. I liked the smell, liked the whole ritual of putting
drops of oil into the water, wringing out the cloth, placing the compress on Mama’s forehead; all these smooth, deliberate movements seemed to calm everyone, not just Mama. Katie handed her a
glass of water, and she sipped from it until it was almost empty.

Eventually, she was recovered enough to stand up.

‘Let me loosen your stays, ma’am.’ I heard Lily whisper to Mama, but I pretended not to. Mama nodded, and allowed herself to be led from the room. She turned to face me, just
before she reached the bottom of the staircase.

‘I’m going to lie down for a while, dear,’ she said. ‘Lily and Katie will look after you. I’ll see you first thing in the morning.’

I remember that I ran forward, then, and gave Mama a kiss. I felt suddenly sad for the sagging body, the ghost-like face.

The last remains of my innocent existence were shattered for ever that April afternoon. I gave up waiting for things to return to what they had so recently been. Mama lay down
on her bed and stayed there until the following morning. I knew that she did not want company. Katie and Lily whispered together all that evening; I was no longer welcome in their kitchen. And
there was no sign of Papa’s return. I felt that jagged pieces of our former lives seemed to be all around us; nothing was whole any more.

As for me, I spent what I think still remains the loneliest night of my life. I crept into Hannah’s bed, in between her freezing sheets. I left her door open so that I could see the low
light from the gas lamp on the landing. I knew not to ask Lily or Katie for the warming pan that evening, or for the flickering company of a candle for myself. But even in her absence,
Hannah’s bed was far more comforting than mine. I know that I cried, but more than that, I wondered and wondered what my Papa could have done for those men to take him away. He still looked
the same, had still said, ‘Goodnight, Mouse,’ the previous evening to me. His pet-name for me came from my babyhood, Mama had once told me. I was a very quiet baby, she said. Much more
placid and contented than either of my sisters.

If someone didn’t sound any different, or look any different, then how was one ever to know whether they had done something bad? My Papa had just been arrested for embezzlement. Although
as yet I didn’t know, all I could do that night was puzzle over his disappearance: wasn’t it true that only bad people were taken away by policemen? People who broke the law? Perhaps it
was still some dreadful mistake, perhaps they really wanted some other man.

But still, I could not ignore a strong sense that Papa had indeed done something very wrong. Mama’s tears had been tears of desperation, of grief for something lost that had once been
hers. They were certainly not the tears of a loyal, distraught wife protesting her husband’s innocence. There was no fight in her, no righteousness. Instead, she had the air of someone
enduring what was both inevitable and unthinkable at the same time.

I remember agonizing over this well into the night. I think I expected some outward sign, some mark of Cain to indicate wrongdoing, to symbolize a state of sin for all to see. I was beginning to
learn, even then, that life is not always that simple.

My head began to ache with the effort to understand. I needed to escape to somewhere different, somewhere bright and happy. I began to tell myself stories, about elves and shoemakers, princes
and princesses, all the myriad wonders of fairyland.

Finally, I slept.

S
OPHIA
GOT
UP
at half past six the following morning. The whole house was quiet and dark. Lily and Katie
had not yet risen to light the range or to prepare breakfast. She could hardly blame them. As far as they knew, they might no longer have any livelihood to speak of within this household. They
would have a genuine fear of being left, literally, at the side of the road by their employers.