Chapter 37
We can feel again that it is an Irish strength to celebrate the people in our past, not for power, not for victory, but for the profound dignity of human survival.
We can honor that survival best, it seems to me, by taking our folk-memory of this catastrophe into the present world with us, and allowing it to strengthen and deepen our identity with those who are still suffering.
As though in a dream, I had descended the attic stairs, changed from my bloodied clothes, fetched a cloak, and walked to the village in the dead of night.
Through the square, into the tavern, through to the hall beyond.
True to her word, Aggie had gathered all the villagers, and they lay in every spare corner of the floor, their gentle snores music to liven the twilight, the heat from their bodies enough to warm the heart.
I found Diarmuid snuggled with Beth near the far wall—close to where I had passed time in the village not long before, waiting for the storm to pass—and promptly plucked him from his makeshift bed so he might sleep cradled in my chest.
I didn’t sleep. Though I had been awake now for a day and a half, something akin to anticipation kept me from slumber. So I sat, my son sound in my arms, until the dawn’s first rays penetrated the darkness. Until the villagers stirred.
Until we’d broken our fast on yesterday’s bread.
No one spoke. But hundreds of eyes bored into my soul as I quietly nibbled and supervised Diarmuid’s meal.
It was Aggie who took charge.
“Is it done?” She appeared from seemingly nowhere and startled me into turning to my right. Her face had weathered in the night, stress and worry wreaking havoc the only way it could—pale, drawn, fingers twirling in knots.
“Aye,” I said, clearing my throat as I glanced around. They all stared—brows furrowed, lips pressed together. “And yer payment has been returned. Yer souls are safe. It was time the Cailleach went to help everyone else, in whatever way she could. I’ll take care of ye now.”
“How?” An angry call ground out from the crowd, igniting a murmured chorus that set my teeth on edge, but the door that led from the hall to the village square beyond slammed open, drawing everyone’s attention away.
“M’Lady!” A wild-eyed Beth filled the doorway, chest heaving with exertion. “M’Lady, come quick! ’Tis Mr. O’Dea! He’s brought the Lahinch constabulary! There are people here! Outsiders!”
“Ye really did do it,” Aggie whispered.
And my eyes closed briefly as the warm weight of her reassuring hand gently squeezed my shoulder.
“We’re that sorry for yer loss, Yer Ladyship.”
I nodded, lips pursed, as four strong officers removed Lady Catherine’s now shrouded corpse on a handheld gurney.
We stood in the foyer, Cormac and I, grim-faced as the constable before us removed his hat out of respect for the dead.
My heart raced in my chest, for it was only a matter of time before the officers searching the house found Teddy’s body.
They’d arrived too soon. Too early! I hadn’t thought through what needed to be done before they arrived.
Yes, I knew they would come eventually, but I’d had no sense of urgency. Stupid, stupid!
Instead, Diarmuid—getting to him—had been my sole focus. And now, the mother he’d lost, and regained, would be taken away for murder.
“Ye should go lie down,” Cormac said gently, and I turned into him. I’d immediately pulled him aside when I’d exited the hall to greet the visitors and hastily hissed that Teddy’s body was still in the house.
I’d never seen a person’s face pale with such haste.
“I can’t,” I replied.
“And had Lady Catherine suffered from any malaise? Melancholia?” asked the constable, placing his hat back atop his head.
He adjusted his belt, and I noted that even he appeared gaunt—clothes loose-fitting, the look of a few skipped meals about him.
If even the likes of the well-paid constabulary were hurting, what did that say for the rest of the people?
“She was given to fits of fancy,” Cormac replied, and I glanced at him. “It’s awful isolated here, as ye can see.”
The constable peered at Cormac’s fine attire and arched a brow. “Ye don’t sound like ye’d be a nephew of this house.”
“My aunt was a Connors. Elevated through marriage, sir. She took care of her own.” With a wide sweep of his arm, Cormac gestured toward the entrance of the library.
“All her legal documents are archived within, sir. Ye’ll find the truth of it there.
And the solicitor from Ennistymon should be arriving this afternoon with the will I provided.
I brought it directly to him after alerting you of the death. ”
“Aye. Of course. No offense meant, sir.” With a nod, the constable glanced at me, and blood rushed in my ears. “And you, Yer Ladyship. How did ye find yer mother’s mind? When exactly did ye return to the house?”
And just like that, everything I’d prepared for poured from my lips—the rehearsed story of Wilhelmina’s marriage, her life, her mourning period, down to the minute of Wilhelmina’s return to Browne House.
And I wondered then … if she knew. If she had predicted this.
If she’d grilled me—despite the lies she’d told to trap me here—because she knew this moment would come.
That I would need this information for this very occasion.
“Third floor is clear!”
I almost snapped my neck as I whipped my head toward the staircase.
“Thank you, Mahony,” the constable yelled.
The third floor was not clear! Teddy’s body was there in the guest bedroom.
I gathered breath to demand to know if they had truly checked, but Cormac pinched my arm, and I quickly turned my attention to the checkered marble floor.
“A moment please, constable,” I said. “I would like to fetch a shawl from my chamber.”
And before anyone could stop me, I crossed the foyer and hurried up the stairs. I half-expected Cormac to follow, but as I reached the second-floor landing, a quick glance found him engaging the constable in conversation, as though my contrariness was the most natural thing in the world.
Good. Gathering my skirts, I rounded the banister and flew up the next flight of stairs, heart pounding as a thin layer of sweat coated my brow. I could hear the officers above, their shouts echoing from the fourth floor to the third-floor landing.
“All clear.”
“They said ’twas this room, Lady Browne’s.”
Panting heavily, I swept to the right, toward the room where Teddy had met his demise at my hands.
The chaise where I’d sat so patiently the night before still stood beneath the window at the end of the hall, the rug before it slightly disturbed.
My brows drew together—someone had certainly come in this direction, but—
My heart ceased beating as I halted, blood turning to ice before I quickly rubbed my eyes.
“What?” I whispered.
Where once there had been a door … now there was not. Scurrying forward, my hands swept over the wall, fingers brushing over its papered surface for any sign of a door beneath, but there was … nothing.
They hadn’t found Teddy … because there was nary a room for them to check.
“There ye are. Tea’s ready in the parlor, m’Lady.” Beth appeared on the landing, and I whirled, eyes wide.
“What happened to the door?” I hissed, storming toward her as I pointed toward the offending wall. “Where did it go?”
Beth pursed her lips as she glanced over my shoulder, then gave a little shrug. “A final gift from the woman in white?”
My jaw slackened, but as a shout rang out from the floor above, I shook myself.
“All clear!”
“Let’s go,” I whispered, leading the way down the staircase. Whether ’twas a gift, or a trick, the door was hidden from the constabulary, and that’s all that mattered in this moment. For if it reappeared once they’d left, Cormac and I would deal with the mess within.
Mustering a deep breath, I schooled my face as I reached the second-floor landing and cleared my throat as my shoe tapped against the checkered marble of the foyer.
“Would you care to continue our conversation in comfort, Constable?” I asked, sweeping an arm toward the open door of the parlor.
“Don’t mind if I do,” he replied. And with all the hauteur I’d practiced the last few months, I strode ahead and led them through to the parlor, as the lady of the house I’d been taught to be.
Morning stretched to afternoon. The constable had drunk his fill and devoured the sandwiches provided, and I sent the kitchen staff to work, preparing something the others could take with them when they left—which would be soon, I hoped.
The investigation of the house continued, and every fiber of my being itched for them to be gone.
The solicitor from Ennistymon had arrived an hour since, and he and Cormac were settled in the library, discussing particulars while I stared into the fireplace, watching as the flames leapt and danced.
“More tea, m’Lady?” Beth.
Startled, I pulled the shawl draped over my shoulders closer and turned in the direction of her voice.
“Where is Diarmuid?” I asked.
Glancing over her shoulder, she scurried closer and bent to whisper in my ear. “Safe. The publican’s wife placed him in with her own children, and he’s fine.”
I nodded and sank further into the chair as she righted herself.
“What’s taking them so long?”
“Them constables are checking every nook and cranny, m’Lady,” Beth said, snatching the poker from its stand to build up the fire. Then whispered: “The door is still gone, m’Lady. I’ve gone up there twice now to check.”
“Thank God,” I murmured.
“Maybe it really was the woman in white,” Beth said, turning her attention back to the fire. The pieces of burning turf within crackled and sparked as she spread their ashy remnants around the grate, before piling new bricks atop them. “She had the kind of power to do such a thing.”
“Perhaps. I just want them all to leave—”
“Cousin?” Cormac’s voice from the door set my heart alight, and I slapped a palm to my chest as I turned.
“Y-yes?” I called.
“They’re ready for ye.”