22
Alex was finally starting to feel warm. The cold had gone bone-deep into him, and as soon as he had reached home he had stripped off the wet clothes in the kitchen while waiting for the kettle to boil.
Thankfully his parents and Granda hadn’t stirred; he wasn’t yet ready to speak about tonight’s events.
Grabbing two thick towels and a blanket from upstairs, he had dried himself and wrapped himself up in the thick woollen blanket, before making tea and filling a sturdy rubber hot-water bottle.
He was now in bed, wearing multiple layers of clothes – even a hat.
The hot-water bottle was gently warm on his chest, and finally, finally, he could feel that his core temperature was rising.
His mind was racing, and he knew that sleep would be slow to come.
I might have died tonight. There had been a moment in the water when, weighed down by Mrs Lennon combined with the weight of his own clothes and shoes, his head had gone under and he had been close to panic.
But in that split second, he had known that no one was coming to save him, and that if he panicked, he was a goner.
Somehow, he had pushed away the panic, kicking out towards the male voice shouting about steps some way above him, guiding him home.
Once out of the water he had gone straight into doctor mode, trying to expel the water from the lady’s lungs.
Then there had been the ambulance, and the ride with Maisie on his crossbar, the warmth from her body a gift on his chest.
Home then, and time to think, to relive the terror that had flooded through him.
God, that had been desperate! Standing alone on the edge of the reservoir, faced with the realisation that he too might die if he went in the water, he had almost given way to cowardice.
His hesitation, brief as it was, felt shameful, unmanly.
What would they think of him, if they knew?
Maisie? Father MacLaverty? The two young girls – Maisie’s sister and her friend?
Oh, he had managed the thing, jumped in, got Mrs Lennon out.
But she would die regardless, he knew – an outcome which felt like a punishment for his cowardice.
If he hadn’t panicked for those few seconds, would he have rescued her more quickly? Would she have had a better chance?
Around and around his thoughts went, yet answers eluded him. All he knew was that his efforts had been entirely pointless.
* * *
Dawn was breaking when Danny Lennon returned.
Maisie had done the ironing, cleaned the kitchen from top to bottom, and prepared a pot of porridge for the morning.
She peeled the spuds too, plopping them into a big pot of water and putting a lid on the top.
Her work done, she sat on the settee – only for a wee moment.
When she heard the front door opening she awoke abruptly, finding that she had lain down. She jumped up – confused, dishevelled, and cold. The fire was out, the light still on, and pale morning light was seeping sullenly through the open door.
‘Maisie. Thank you for staying with the childer.’ Danny’s voice was calm, but his eyes showed heartbreak.
‘It was no bother.’
There was a pause. He was trying to say something, but the words seemed stuck in his throat. He can’t say it. ‘Did – did Teresa die?’
He nodded, turning away to hang up his coat. Pausing for a second, he leaned his head against it, as if mentally bracing himself to face her again. Sadness flooded through her. ‘I’m so, so sorry, Danny.’
‘At least she’s at peace now. Her nerves were in a bad way ever since – you know.’
‘Aye. Should never have happened.’
‘And she even got to get the Last Rites and absolution. Thank God it was Father MacLaverty. Thon other get—’ He stopped himself. ‘I’ll say no more about it. What’s done is done. But do you think Father MacLaverty would do the funeral?’
‘I would hope so. They can be fairly strict about their parish boundaries, but it’s worth asking – especially since he was the one to give her the Last Rites.’
‘Aye.’ A noise from upstairs indicated at least one of the children was awake. He straightened. ‘I’ll get the childer their breakfast.’
‘Do you want me to stay and help?’
‘No. Thanks, like, but no. I’ll have to tell them about their mammy and it would be better without a stranger. No offence.’
‘Of course.’ She donned her coat, which had dried nicely hours ago on a chair in front of the fire.
Moving the chair back to the kitchen, she filled the kettle and set it on the stove to boil, then went back into the tiny living room, seeing that he was already working on clearing out the ashes.
He turned to say, ‘I called at our Johnny and Carmel’s house.
Johnny’s away to the mill already, but Carmel said she’ll be over shortly to help with the childer and to start to get things ready. ’
For the wake. ‘Aye, that’s good.’ She glanced at the tiny clock on the mantel. Half-six in the morning. ‘I’ll call back later.’
‘You’re a good girl, Maisie.’
Maisie wasn’t so sure. On the short walk from Harrogate Street to home, it all kept coming back to her.
The initial appointment with Fenton. Her last-minute appeal to Alex.
She should have told Alex that first day!
At least then he and Russell might have had the chance to intervene.
With only moments to go until her theatre slot, there had been very little that Russell could have done to protect Mrs Lennon. If only . . .
* * *
Alex woke with a start yet again. All night he’d been doing this, the strangeness of his attire and the hot-water bottle shocking him awake. The memories too. Turning his head towards the windows, he saw weak morning light peeping around the edges of the curtains.
Mrs Lennon was probably dead by now. It was highly unlikely she’d survived even another couple of hours after the ambulance had ferried her in. He’d tried, and failed, to save her.
Hopelessness flooded through him. What was the point of even trying, when he hadn’t managed to save her?
He moved cautiously in the bed, relieved to feel relatively normal in terms of the cold.
He had survived, but somewhere south of here was a grieving widower and three wee children who would never see their mother again.
* * *
The streets were fairly busy, though the millworkers would already be at their posts. Da and Maureen would already be there, and Matty was probably already away to his work too. That left only Mammy and Molly in the house.
‘Oh, so you decided to come home, did you?’ Mammy, all bristling annoyance, had come to the living room on hearing Maisie enter.
This is all I need. Taking off her coat, Maisie hung it on one of the pegs by the front door, an image flashing into her mind of Danny’s donkey jacket, and how he had leaned against it, his wee heart in smithereens.
‘Our Maureen said there was some woman in the water,’ Mammy continued. ‘But yous had got her out. Where the hell were you all night?’
‘At Mrs Lennon’s house, minding her children to let her husband away to the Royal with Father MacLaverty.’
Mammy sniffed, the mention of Father MacLaverty mollifying her a little. ‘Right. Which Mrs Lennon? There’s two sisters married to two brothers. I would know Mrs Johnny from the chapel.’
‘It’s Teresa,’ Maisie responded. ‘Mrs Danny.’
‘Is she all right?’
‘No. She died during the night.’ Maisie felt rigid, detached from it. She just wanted to get her jobs done so she could snatch a few hours’ sleep.
Mammy blessed herself. ‘Lord rest her.’ Her tone changed. ‘And who’s this Alex boy that was at the céilí?’
That’s why she’s annoyed. ‘You mean the Alex boy who pulled her out of the water and might have drowned doing it?’ Maisie gave her a steady look, uncaring that Mammy would see it as defiance. ‘You know who he is. You saw me talking to him one day on the way home from work.’
‘The Protestant? I told you to keep away from him!’
Maisie held herself rigid, rage rising within her. Because of arrogant doctors and arrogant priests, Teresa Lennon was dead, and people spent their energies worrying about the wrong things. Even Mammy. ‘It’s not very Christian of you to be so bigoted, Mammy,’ she said, her face twisting.
She got a slap for that. ‘Don’t you dare give me cheek, miss! I’ll speak to you however I want! As long as you’re under my roof, you’ll do as I say!’
‘Will I?’ Strangely, Maisie was now briefly homesick for her lonely little room in London. At least there she hadn’t had to put up with Mammy. She shrugged, knowing it would make Mammy even madder, but not caring.
Going through to the kitchen she saw that the porridge pot had been emptied and was in the sink.
Mammy hadn’t kept any for her. The house was quiet – Mammy usually let wee Molly lie a bit later on a Saturday.
Wordlessly, Maisie rolled up her sleeves, put an apron on over her good dress, and washed the pot, then began making fresh porridge for herself and Molly, while wondering if Teresa’s children were eating their breakfast yet.
In the background, Mammy was now at one of her long rants, words like disrespect and London and notions all merging into a litany of criticism that Maisie had heard a hundred times before, merged with extra words like Protestants and sin and heathen.
She would get tired of it eventually, Maisie knew, but for now she just had to let Mammy at it.
Three children, Mrs Lennon had said that first day.
Two boys and a girl. An image came to her now of the littlest child, the boy with brown eyes.
Junior. Junior would have to go through life without a mammy.
Nobody to look after him or cuddle him or care about him in the way that only a mother could.
Carmel would be good to them, Maisie knew.
There would be love, and chaos, and all the family things. But it wouldn’t be the same.