In the Company of Others Page 24
I insisted C leave the surgery & rest herself in our Bedchamber.
I cannot, she said, the oul Flanagan Sisters have waited since early morning & the Bailey infant has a miserable case of Thrush. She stood rigid as a broom handle, but I persisted, for the wagon load & all the rest would soon be spilling into the little room near the Surgery, surely provoking another of her Headaches.
Send A to see me through, I said & wondered at the look she gave me for the relief I offered.
God help us, there is no strength to tell the rest of it--a farce if ever there was one. The jumble is forced into the small room as a sausage into a casing--one might fear to open the door lest the flotsam of cupboards & coat pegs & crockeries spew forth & strike one down.
Arrival of the Passiflora anxiously awaited. Though found to be salubrious in Philadelphia, Valerian & Peppermint Oil now have but weak effect.
A now complaining of blisters raised by the wearing of shoes on Wedding Day.
They're from your father's own last, I chide. Tis a discredit to fling about the talk of blisters.
I am lately persuaded that we are overly insular here--I have no Discourse with anyone save Keegan & our patients. C has but A for company & the work of two upon her shoulders, though I pray the Missus Keegan will lift the burthen. There remains the issue however, of the several unfinished guestchambers. Thus if more guests are attracted than we can immediately handle, we'll be hanging them up by a horseshoe nail.
In any case we must somehow introduce Society into the halls of Cathair Mohr.
Day following
Fog heavy o'er the Lough
Rose McFee came late yesterday with a basket of Burdock Root, & Nettles which she calls Devils Claw. She named her price for something I had not asked for nor required.
Why, Rose McFee, I say, how can ye charge a man who eased your pain & dunned ye nary a penny for the service?
That sarvice, she says, was paid by what I fixed on your neighbor.
I gave her a coin which she grabbed from my hand while instructing me in the proper use of her gleanings. I turned the raw stuff over to Aoife with a request to make a tea of the Burdock, as Rose attests it will unblock the sweat glands & urinary system which may help with the Headache.
It never arises in conversation, yet Nephew is clearly pleased to be my Heir. He swaggers about as if he owns the place in advance of my demise, suggesting where the pig sty be located & giving Keegan the business. Keegan gives it back. Th' Young Bladder, Keegan calls him, being full of th' piss, he says, tells us the goat is a most profitable animal & we should buy a flock of two hundred to begin. Keegan stalks away without a word & Young Bladder tells me Keegan must be dismissed--God have mercy. It is Nephew & his flock of hungry mouths who must be dismissed. I wonder at the numerous mistakes I have made here--chief among them, accepting land from a man who is no Christian neighbor, & now the issue of Nephew as heir to Cathair Mohr. It was the right thing to do, to pass my estate to the eldest son of my eldest brother & my Namesake into the bargain. I only wished to do as had been done unto me by Uncle. I will soon discuss the matter with my Solicitor.
Fiona on duty at an early hour--I have never heard such Rattle & Bang as she commandeers the arrangement of the kitchen to suit her taste. I'm told by a patient that the Missus Keegan can bottle a full Orchard in a day. A has fled to her family til the morrow, barefoot as any waif.
I did not return home to be a man of Show yet I require a horse for Keegan so that he needn't take Adam when he goes about my business. And then I must provide a Carriage for C's ministrations among the people, for oft times we are called out separately in any wether & she has her monthly rounds of near twenty miles, to boot. A could do with a cart & pony to visit her family & make the occasional call on a patient.
There is as well the problem of sheep & cattle--all these things I am able to see clearly now the house is liveable & the long labor essentially done. One wants a bit of mutton & beef for the table without dashing about to fetch it from others. And how then shall we have cattle when the pastures of Cathair Mohr are so long overgrown? And how then shall we manure the fields to restore their vitality if we have not cattle?
At the end, I am a town man lacking even the heart for tramping about in neglected fields wounding the Game. My father was a Sawyer whose husbandry ran to cultivating a patch of Turnips & keeping a bay mare, & no use to look for the bucolic influence from Uncle, a gentleman chiefly disposed to business, an interest in architecture, & the private life. Clearly I must furnish myself with a man to oversee further Improvements here. Keegan bright enough & industrious but not one to grasp the Long Picture.
I am reminded that Balfour employs roughly twenty or more men and women, tis a factory over there to feed and keep but three people, though I hear their entertaining of guests is near constant.
One concludes that it is not enough to have a comfortable house & a roof over one's equipage--the monstrous thing begets itself like the common hare, adding up to the full Plantation & rendering a man as impoverished as his neighbor in the windowless cot.
Day following
Mackerel skies
Nephew & his legions departing day after tomorrow, thanks to God.
The lad says to me this morning, How do you cut off a leg?
I say to him, Why do you ask?
He says, I seen Danny Moore's stump. He shown it to me, took th' wrap off it.
Aye, I say, he likes to do that.
How do you cut off a leg? he says again.
A sharp knife for the flesh & muscle, I say, & a saw for the bone.
I have never seen a more solemn look on a young face.
I'd like to do that when I'm a man, he says.
Are you sure of it? There's blood & guts to cutting into people, it's a messy business & neither Doctor nor Patient relishes a minute of it.
I should like to do it, he says, very firm. Well, then, I must go out in the carriage tomorrow. Would you like to come along?
He thinks about this. Thoughts move over his face like shifting clouds reflected on the lough.
Yis, he says. Yis, sir.
Very well. Twill be raining cats & dogs & we'll get a good soaking in & out of the carriage.
He looks at me, expectant.
We won't be cutting off any legs tomorrow. Will you still come?
He thinks again, puckering his lips. Yis, he says & gravely takes my hand & shakes it.
Day following
The lad & I got away early & the rain held off until we were nearly done with our calls. We had a bite of mutton stew with Granny Moore & a fine soda bread to sop the gravy. He ate as if famished, then watched intently my ministrations to a nasty sore on Bridie Flaherty's knee. Bridie had limped to the Moores to meet the doctor. Here, I said, offering him the nasty bandage that had been on near a week. He looked at it, aghast, then took it. Put it in the fire I said & he did. And wash up in the basin, I said & he did. In any case, the wound was nearly healed. To celebrate Bridie did a jigging hop on the other leg, which caused the lad to laugh.
We drove homeward in a misting rain.
After a long silence, he says, I don't care to go back to Mullaghmore.
And why is that?
I like it here very fine.
His mother is one of the glum sisters--I could understand his reluctance.
We were trotting along by the great stand of bracken, on one of the smoothest carriage roads hereabout--I had my own men render it so.
How did you come by the name Eunan?
Me granda got it off an oul' saint.
The boy looked over at me, serious as a monk.
Where is your father?
Me da has got no legs.
No legs!
But stumps like Danny Moore.
My God, I say. How did it happen?
't was th' stones fell on 'im when he was layin' a wall.
He's a mason, then.
Yis. His legs was trapped under th' stones a full day & th' part
of a night.
Can he work?
No. He has th' coughin'. He's with my oul' granny who makes medicine for 'im to stop th' coughin'.
Does it stop, then?
No. Yis. Sometimes.
My thoughts fly to the many aggravations of the Lungs.
If it had been me at th' cuttin' off of 'is legs, he says, twould be a better job than them butchers done.
He looks suddenly thrice his age & turns his head & stares at the lough.
How do you get by?
Mam takes in sewin'.
Aye.
For them as goes from thin to fat & back th' other way.
Twould be mostly the other way these days, I say.
I nick out the oul' stitches, she puts in th' new, too fine for th' naked eye to see, they says.
How old are ye, lad?
Siven, soon to be eight.
Are you the eldest?
Yis, an' th' onliest.
Just yourself, then?
He turns to me now & smiles but weakly. Mam says they only done it th' once.
To be polite I laugh at the little joke he has clearly been trained to put forth.
Are you schooled, then?
Yis.
I'm sorry about your Da, I say.
With all the suffering I've seen I should be able to deliver a greater consolation but I am dumb as a spoon for all that.
There's a man, I say, Arthur MacMurrough Kavanagh, whose Seat is Borris House in Carlow. He was born with stumps for legs, an' only a bit of arms. Tuck your thumbs deep into your armpits.
The boy looks at me, wondering.
Yes, do as I say I'm going to show you something.
I drop the reins & tuck my thumbs into my armpits.
Follow suit I say, & he does.
Are your thumbs deep in your armpits, so?
Yis.
Do your fingers meet over your chest?
No.
I pick up the reins.
Exactly! I say. Tis the kind of arms MacMurrough was born with. Very short & no fingers to speak of, yet he's fearless for all that.
The lad looks desolately at his hands upon a thin chest.
He's traveled to India & hunted tigers & according to the talk that goes round, he's a very fine shot.
This sets the lad to thinking long thoughts.
Fishes, too, & quite fierce on horseback, I say, aspiring to suggest some hope for those without proper limbs.
The boy's face is frozen with astonishment.
Well, now, there's more to the story of Arthur MacMurrough Kavanagh, would ye believe it? Into the bargain, he's said to be a poet & an artist.
He gawps at me. How does he hold 'is brush, so?
In his mouth, I'm told.
What about his gun, does he do it th' same?
I'm dashed if I know, I say.
How does he ride if he has no legs to grip 'is mount?
In a little chair strapped upon the horse's back, they say.
The rain pelting us now, drumming the top of the open carriage.
Giddyap, ye brute, I say to Adam, which is what Uncle's driver Mercy always said to his horse, & always in a kind manner.
At the house, Keegan is there to greet us with a gnarly apple for Adam. I hand over the reins.
Drive to Rose McFee with all speed, I say. Take a large jug & tell her to make a fresh portion of her cough Nostrum. First thing the morrow, fetch it back to me--tis going with the lad--& easy on the carriage, I say, for Keegan has little patience.
We were greeted in the rear Hall by A & a blast of cooking odours to make the mouth water--twas roasted pork shoulder & the sweet scent of baking bread. I lately learned that Fiona has taken a shine to the lad & is trying to put meat on his bones.
Come & wash, A says to Eunan, & tell us about your doctorin'.
She takes the lad's hand in hers & they walk away, chattering.
I burned th' rag, I heard him say as they went along the stair hall. Twas a desperate fester on her oul' knee.
She turns then & looks back & smiles at me.
I watch them pass out of view & find my heart thundering strangely. I do not know the cause & then--I am suddenly enfeebled by the power of a yearning long hidden.
A pesky turn for O'Donnell, he thought. And amazing, this reference to a man believed to be of his own Kavanagh line. A small-world sort of thing, which he would tell Henry in a forthcoming letter. He removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes--the faded ink demanded a price.
He thought of his own lad who, like Fintan's, hadn't wanted to go home again. Dooley had instead come to live at the rectory, and both their lives were changed forever.
He closed the journal and gazed at the innocence of Cynthia's utter absorption in the book. She moved her lips, silent as any school-girl at memory work. Her ankle had given severe pain in the night, shortening their sleep. She confessed she had slipped in the shower the day before, felt a twinge, but thought little of it. It was only a small slip, she said, and nothing to worry about.
He stood and stretched his limbs, yawned. 'I'm going down and call Dooley.'
'Dooley?' she said, not looking up.
'You remember him. Tall, skinny as a rail, red hair.'
'Um,' she said from the distant continent she occupied.
'Freckles.'
Rain drummed the panes.
'Anything I can bring you from below?'
'Did you say something?' Still reading, brow puckered.
'Anything I can bring you from below?'
She looked up, blinked, smiled. 'A pot of tea.'
'Any swelling?'
'A little. Nothing to worry about.'
'Have you come to the piece in the journal about the Kav'na with no arms or legs?'
'I'm a few entries short of your bookmark--they're just getting ready for the Feast. The one who was a member of Parliament and the father of seven?'
'The same.' He slipped his feet into the brown loafers; Pud appeared from beneath the bed.
'Feeney will be along this evening.' He went to her side of the bed and kissed her forehead. 'Back in a flash.'
'If you see Bella, tell her I send my love.'
He was mildly startled--it seemed a trivializing gesture.
'What will she think of such a thing?'
'I don't know. But she needs to hear that word today, I just feel it.'
'Well, then,' he said.
He had been given more unlikely missions, though not many.
Twenty-three
He stepped into the dining room as she came in from the kitchen.
'Bella! Good afternoon.'
He felt the perfect fool; regretted the unwitting use of his pulpit voice. 'I bear a message from my wife. She sends her love.'
She glared at him, scornful. 'You'll get nothing from me,' she said, wheeling back into the kitchen. The door swung behind her.