bed in Dublin Castle.
‘You were liming today anyhow,’ I say, friendly enough, pleased with the heat in my blue and white apron, the scent of rough starch from it rising up to me.
‘I was so late with it. The Dunnes were looking darkly at me. So I set to. Tomorrow or the next day when it dries, if there is no rain, their house will be beaming out like a beacon. They want you to come down for tea-time tomorrow, to bring the city children with you, but not Sarah.’
‘Sarah never goes down there.’
‘No, but, it’s not a feud, is it?’
‘No, not a feud. A custom. How they live side by side, these companies of single women.’
‘And they are cousins, aren’t they?’
‘I am cousin to the Dunnes and Sarah is cousin to me.’
‘I know, I know. What’ll I say? Will I say you’ll come down?’
‘I will be happy to come down. The children will love the adventure.’
‘Where are they this moment? I have a Peggy’s-leg for them.‘
‘I don’t know. Somewhere about. I’ll bring it to them for you.’
He hands me the stick in its crinkling wrapper and I slip it into my apron pocket like a knife.
‘Well, you tend that old apple tree well,’ he says.
‘I do.’
‘It is as well to mind an apple tree.’
‘It would perish otherwise.’
‘Very likely. And you keep the whole place so well, you and Sarah.’
‘We have the measure of it.’
‘No need for a fella like me about here,’ he says, laughing hugely suddenly.
‘Men are not as essential as they think they are,’ I say, falling suddenly to humour myself, and smiling at him. Not for the first time I try to think what it might be like to be accounted normal—to be easy and fluent with my fellow human beings. In a dream of community and harmony! Nevertheless I feel unaccountably spied on, as if I were emptying out the chamber pots under the bushes, and he was close by, looking and commenting. It is an eerie feeling, certainly.
‘And is Sarah about the yard there?’ he says.
‘Sarah is about the yard,’ I say. ‘She is trying to decide which of the old hens she will kill and boil. I am afraid it brings a touch of the Solomons to her. She cannot bring herself easily to impose sentence of death on her old acquaintance.’
‘I’ll go up to her and help her wring a neck! I have no such qualms.’
‘No, I expect not,’ I say, as he passes by in his limy boots.
I go in to find the children, now that I have true treasure for them. I pass from the wild glass of the sunlight into the familiar blindness of the kitchen. No sign of Sarah at any household tasks, only the clock continues its measured work, taking away the days, or adding new days, I cannot say. My shoes clack on the blue flags. Over at the fire I place a brace of turves and then hear little giggles from the children’s bedroom. Armed with the Peggy‘s-leg, I go in fearlessly, expecting only to find childish things afoot.
The little girl lies on her bed. She is entirely naked to the world. The usual speckles of sunlight that run like shoals of small fish from the window, after being sorted and darned by the leaves outside, illuminate the strange scene. I am nonplussed, bewildered, lost, dismayed. She lies with her face towards the window and does not see me. The boy is huddled between her legs, his face down near where her body joins at the centre, near that special place that should be foreign to all eyes.
‘Do lick it,’ she says, in her sweet calm voice, innocent as a rose, truly as innocent.
‘It smells of oranges,’ he says. ‘Like when Mummy peels oranges. And rain it smells of.’
‘Give it little licks then,’ she says.
Six years old talking to four years old, nearly five! Her brother! His sister! Is this a childhood game? I search in my own murky memories for such as this? Did Dolly, Maud and me disport ourselves so? I do not think so. Now my habitual fear engulfs me, it is like a group of men charging me, knocking me down, stamping on me in the mud.
‘You were liming today anyhow,’ I say, friendly enough, pleased with the heat in my blue and white apron, the scent of rough starch from it rising up to me.
‘I was so late with it. The Dunnes were looking darkly at me. So I set to. Tomorrow or the next day when it dries, if there is no rain, their house will be beaming out like a beacon. They want you to come down for tea-time tomorrow, to bring the city children with you, but not Sarah.’
‘Sarah never goes down there.’
‘No, but, it’s not a feud, is it?’
‘No, not a feud. A custom. How they live side by side, these companies of single women.’
‘And they are cousins, aren’t they?’
‘I am cousin to the Dunnes and Sarah is cousin to me.’
‘I know, I know. What’ll I say? Will I say you’ll come down?’
‘I will be happy to come down. The children will love the adventure.’
‘Where are they this moment? I have a Peggy’s-leg for them.‘
‘I don’t know. Somewhere about. I’ll bring it to them for you.’
He hands me the stick in its crinkling wrapper and I slip it into my apron pocket like a knife.
‘Well, you tend that old apple tree well,’ he says.
‘I do.’
‘It is as well to mind an apple tree.’
‘It would perish otherwise.’
‘Very likely. And you keep the whole place so well, you and Sarah.’
‘We have the measure of it.’
‘No need for a fella like me about here,’ he says, laughing hugely suddenly.
‘Men are not as essential as they think they are,’ I say, falling suddenly to humour myself, and smiling at him. Not for the first time I try to think what it might be like to be accounted normal—to be easy and fluent with my fellow human beings. In a dream of community and harmony! Nevertheless I feel unaccountably spied on, as if I were emptying out the chamber pots under the bushes, and he was close by, looking and commenting. It is an eerie feeling, certainly.
‘And is Sarah about the yard there?’ he says.
‘Sarah is about the yard,’ I say. ‘She is trying to decide which of the old hens she will kill and boil. I am afraid it brings a touch of the Solomons to her. She cannot bring herself easily to impose sentence of death on her old acquaintance.’
‘I’ll go up to her and help her wring a neck! I have no such qualms.’
‘No, I expect not,’ I say, as he passes by in his limy boots.
I go in to find the children, now that I have true treasure for them. I pass from the wild glass of the sunlight into the familiar blindness of the kitchen. No sign of Sarah at any household tasks, only the clock continues its measured work, taking away the days, or adding new days, I cannot say. My shoes clack on the blue flags. Over at the fire I place a brace of turves and then hear little giggles from the children’s bedroom. Armed with the Peggy‘s-leg, I go in fearlessly, expecting only to find childish things afoot.
The little girl lies on her bed. She is entirely naked to the world. The usual speckles of sunlight that run like shoals of small fish from the window, after being sorted and darned by the leaves outside, illuminate the strange scene. I am nonplussed, bewildered, lost, dismayed. She lies with her face towards the window and does not see me. The boy is huddled between her legs, his face down near where her body joins at the centre, near that special place that should be foreign to all eyes.
‘Do lick it,’ she says, in her sweet calm voice, innocent as a rose, truly as innocent.
‘It smells of oranges,’ he says. ‘Like when Mummy peels oranges. And rain it smells of.’
‘Give it little licks then,’ she says.
Six years old talking to four years old, nearly five! Her brother! His sister! Is this a childhood game? I search in my own murky memories for such as this? Did Dolly, Maud and me disport ourselves so? I do not think so. Now my habitual fear engulfs me, it is like a group of men charging me, knocking me down, stamping on me in the mud.
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