The Secret of Eveline House

by Sheila Forsey

  ‘Please, Mary, in your holy mercy let the child live. I beseech you, Most Holy Mother,’ she prayed silently.

  They were told little of how the child was.

  The strong smell of Jeyes Fluid and carbolic soap permeated the air. Nurses chatted to each other as they went about their business, dressed in starched aprons and veils. Nuns young and old walked up and down doing their various chores in a silent reverie, in white habits with large wooden rosary beads. The Matron, who was a small stern woman, seemed to be walking as if on patrol, making sure the hospital was spick and span. Hours passed and other than a nun giving them tea and telling them that the child was still alive they waited in what felt like a purgatory.

  Eventually the first nun they had met came out of a room and told them to go home. The child was still alive, and they would do all they could. She had lost a huge amount of blood and was deeply traumatised.

  ‘I must see my daughter!’ Mrs Ward grabbed the arm of the nun.

  The nun gently took her hand away and whispered softly. ‘The child is alive, and the priest has been called. Go home and thank God for his divine mercy.’

  ‘Why have you called the priest?’ Henry said, alarmed.

  The nun slowly turned her head to look at Henry and then bowed her head as if in repose.

  ‘Just to pray for her recovery,’ she said with no sign of emotion.

  Betsy asked no questions, but a burning need to know what had happened to the child almost suffocated her. But, as the nun said, she was alive and for now that would have to suffice. Betsy knew she should go but the nuns would have to throw Mr and Mrs Ward out. Mrs Ward looked like she had been beaten – her eyes had taken on a haunted look and when she spoke it was like something in her throat stifled any words. Henry kept going in and out, barely sitting, smoking heavily and shaking his head in disbelief. Betsy put on her coat and said goodbye to them. She would go back and make some soup for them for their return.

  Violet barely noticed that she left – she was lost in some sort of tormented world.

  Betsy walked back to the town. It was still light. One of those rare beautiful January evenings with a hint of frost making the air pure like silk. She was glad of the fresh air. It allowed her some time to think. When she turned onto the main street, she met Miss Doheny who was directing an awkward young girl on how to sweep the pavement properly. The poor girl looked almost in tears as Miss Doheny instructed her to put more enthusiasm into her work.

  ‘You are not here to slouch, Peggy McCormick. I want that pavement as clean as a whistle.’

  The girl looked at Betsy. Her dark-brown hair was cut in an unflattering style to her jawbone. Betsy knew she was fighting the tears back.

  ‘This is my recruit sent up from Tipperary. Say good morning, Peggy, to Betsy.’

  ‘Good morning,’ Peggy said meekly.

  ‘Peggy, when you have finished that go out and make sure all the eggs are clean before you display them tomorrow and then wash out the back yard like I showed you to.’

  ‘I will,’ Peggy said.

  Miss Doheny shook her head and bent her head towards Betsy.

  ‘She’s a bit slow, I think. A cousin of mine asked me to take her on. She has no one – her mother was bad with nerves and had to be put into the madhouse and the father died of drink. He was found dead in a ditch. Poor girl was discovered half-starved in a henhouse. To be honest, I don’t know if it will work out here for her. She has no great manner about her. It will be a long time before I can even let her near the customers.’

  Betsy felt so sorry for the girl. Of all places to be sent to! Miss Doheny was not going to be the easiest and she knew what it was like to have nobody. She cursed herself for not going the long way around and avoiding Miss Doheny. She hoped she had not heard anything about Sylvia but the minute Peggy was out of earshot she saw that Miss Doheny knew. The excitement in the woman’s eyes was too hard to mask, as clever as she was.

  ‘Betsy, have you come from the hospital? How is she? Tell me how the young girl is.’

  Betsy knew there was no point telling her to mind her own business. At least she could find out how much she knew and how she could have heard it so quickly. There were a few lay people working in the hospital – it must have been one of them.

  ‘Is it true?’ Miss Doheny demanded.

  ‘Is what true?’

  ‘No need to act like that, Betsy, it’s all over the town – how the child was almost dead and when she was found it was an awful sight. The room was covered in blood and her body was full of cuts and she was almost dead. Yet there was no explanation for it. It was like she had done it to herself or something even worse than that. Lord bless us and save us, what has come to Draheen? Never have we seen the like of this. Is it true? I heard the bedroom was bolted from the inside. What does it mean?’

  Betsy was not expecting this. What blather-mouth had given out this information so quickly? What could she tell her?

  She was terrified, thinking about what was happening to Sylvia. She could not care about her more if she was her own. It was hard enough to deal with it without the whole parish of Draheen getting wind of it and making it the talk of the town. What good would it do for anyone outside the family to know? Sylvia would become a spectacle, a circus act. She had to stop this getting out any more than it already had.

  ‘Miss Doheny, it is true that the Wards’ child is unwell, but who is making up these other inventions is beyond me. I would advise that you don’t add fuel to their mischief by spreading such gossip. I am off now to get the house ready for the Wards when they get home and I’ll say a prayer that Mr Ward does not hear such evil gossip about his only daughter. Good day to you, Miss Doheny.’

  With that Betsy walked off without a backward glance.

  But Miss Doheny followed her.

  ‘Say what you like, Betsy, but I heard it on very good authority. The day that family arrived in Draheen a darkness followed them and now it seems to have grabbed hold of that poor child. I would advise you to step as far away as possible from them.’

  The anger was bubbling up inside Betsy. How dare they! Those gossipers had somehow got hold of it. This would spread like wildfire and make everything even worse for the Wards. She felt so ashamed of her town for treating them as they had done. She turned to Miss Doheny, her heart pounding in her chest.

  ‘Well, that is where you and I differ, Miss Doheny. Thank God I have some humanity in me, and I can remember the Christian way that my mother brought me up. I have no intention of leaving the Wards’ side in their time of need. I was sick and you visited me.’ Matthew 36. You have obviously forgotten your religion. Good day to you and I’ll pray for you today, Miss Doheny, for holding such dark thoughts in your heart.’

  ‘Well, really, Betsy. It is yourself you should be praying for, to be mixed up with that family. Your poor mother would turn in the grave.’

  ‘Leave my mother out of this, Miss Doheny. She would be ashamed of our town,’ Betsy retorted.

  It had taken her over an hour to reach Eveline House since she left the hospital. The tears of frustration and anger were flowing down her face as she put her key in the door. She wept for the child when she was safe in the house and bent on her knees praying to God and his Holy Mother for them to help the child. There was an eerie feeling in the house that she had never felt before. What had happened in this house? There was no denying that what had happened to Sylvia looked evil. Betsy had a strong faith. It was why so many years ago she had thought of entering a convent. Her mother had of course instilled a strong faith in her as a child but it was more than that. She loved her faith and it meant a great deal to her. In fact, in some ways it was everything to her. But here in this house this morning she had felt something dark at work in that dreadful scene they had witnessed. Sylvia was an innocent child with a vulnerable mind. If it was a dark force at work, it had picked its victim well. A defenceless sensitive child. Betsy grabbed her rosary beads and, with her voice shaking with vi
gour, she called out the Lord’s Prayer in the Gaeilge of her childhood. A determination so fierce came over her. If it was something dark that had somehow latched on to the child, she would do everything in her power to stop it.

  At the end of her prayer she stared up the stairs and blessed herself. She wasn’t ready to face the child’s bedroom. She went into the downstairs bathroom and washed her face with the ice-cold water. Somehow she felt a little stronger then. The evening was closing in. She went into the garden to where she had found the doll and the letter. She carefully picked up the doll and the broken pieces of her face. Had somebody arrived into the front garden, jumped over the wall to the rear garden and approached Sylvia with the letter? Could they have followed her to her room? But her bedroom was bolted from inside, so no one was in there other than Sylvia. It made no sense. But how did she get the letter? Mr Ward had put a lock on the postbox to make sure that only he or Mrs Ward could open it. It was not really possible to put the letter through the door. There was no gap and no letterbox. So, someone gave it to her. But who? She went into the kitchen and brewed a pot of tea to help calm herself.

  She washed and diced some vegetables and put on a soup, then tidied up the kitchen.

  Then she walked up to the bedroom and with a deep breath walked in. Somehow, she had hoped that it was not as bad as she had initially thought. But the blood seemed to be everywhere. It amazed her that the child was alive at all. She picked up the small scissors. The cuts had to be from the scissors. She checked the window, but it was bolted tight. The bedroom was so high up that Mr Ward had bolted it in case Sylvia sleepwalked as she had from time to time.

  Betsy had heard of strange occurrences happening to people. Perhaps it was some sort of terrible disease that had suddenly come over her. But the thought that it was maybe something else frightened her.

  She ran down to the kitchen and found a bottle of holy water that had come from the holy well in Blythe Wood. She went back up to the bedroom and threw the water around the room. Then she brought up a picture of the Holy Family and a crucifix that was in a drawer and put them on Sylvia’s dresser. There was talk of people being possessed with an evil spirit that could show itself in bruising and cuts. She tried to block the words that Sylvia had whispered. She knelt beside the bed and prayed to God that whatever had happened in this room could be somehow explained.

  She took off all the bedclothes and put them in a bag to be boiled and washed. Then she got a large bucket of hot water and some sugar soap and began to clean the bloodstained room. She washed the mirror with the scrawl of SATAN. Then she began the slow process of trying to clean the wallpaper. The small hand-marks of blood almost broke her heart. With a mixture of sugar soap and warm water and a slow process of soaking and gently rubbing, she began to make progress and erase the blood from the walls. Where the blood was heavy she scraped at the wallpaper and removed it. It was better she felt to have faded scraped wallpaper than bloodstained walls. She picked up the blood-soaked rugs and brought them outside to burn at a later date, then she went back up and scrubbed the floor. She scrubbed and scrubbed until all traces of the nightmare had been erased.

  She was almost finished when she heard the latch on the door. It was Mr Ward. Please God, she prayed, that he would have good news about Sylvia. But what if it was bad news? A terrible fear gripped her. She couldn’t bear to hear it if the child had died. Did she have the right to feel this maternal love so strongly? She didn’t think she could be more heartbroken if the child was her own. Slowly she went down to the kitchen. She would need to bathe her hands as they were bleeding from the scrubbing.

  Henry was sitting with his head in his hands, sobbing uncontrollably.

  Betsy fell to her knees, thinking the worst.

  ‘No, no!’ she sobbed.

  Henry looked up, shocked to see her there. He bent down to where she was kneeling on the floor and grabbed her hands.

  ‘Betsy, sorry for frightening you – she is alive, she is alive, Betsy – they have saved her and they believe she will make it now.’

  At that, the anguish of decades was set loose as they both cried for all they had ever lost and thanked God for the life of the child.

  When she eventually got hold of herself, she washed and dressed her hands and then made some tea.

  ‘Where is Mrs Ward?’ she asked.

  ‘I am going down to collect her shortly. She begged the Matron to let her stay. But I had to promise to collect her in an hour.’

  Betsy went into overdrive. ‘Here, have some soup and some soda bread. You have not eaten at all. Poor Mrs Ward, she will be beside herself with worry.’

  Henry put down his cup of tea and looked intently at Betsy.

  ‘You saw it, Betsy, you saw the cuts, the blood and the state of the room. What does it mean?’ Betsy looked away. ‘I don’t know, Mr Ward – I have never seen anything like it.’

  ‘Violet is saying that perhaps something has taken over our child. Something evil.’ He shook his head. ‘I will not hear of it, Betsy. Is my wife mad to be saying such things?’

  Betsy wasn’t sure if he was in denial or if he really had never heard of such things. He was raised a Catholic boy – surely he had heard of evil spirits and being possessed by a devil? But perhaps it was too much to bear – how could he begin to comprehend it?

  ‘Look, Mr Ward, it is quite frightening whatever it is. Don’t be too harsh on Mrs Ward – the shock is enough kill a horse. Just bring her home and after she gets some rest you can talk to her.’

  ‘Very well, Betsy, but I won’t have my child made out to be something that she is not. She is alive, and I will watch over her night and day until she is well.’ Then he got up and paced the kitchen floor.

  He reminded Betsy of a wild horse ready to bolt at any moment.

  ‘But why, Betsy? Why Sylvia? Could she have done this herself? Why would she do such a thing as harm herself like that? The room was bolted. Nobody was in there.’

  Betsy suddenly thought of the letter. With everything that had happened she had forgotten about it. She reached into her pocket and took out the pieces, laying it out on the table for Henry to see it.

  ‘This is the letter I found it in the garden with her doll early this morning, just after we arrived in. I was going out to feed the cat. I don’t know how she got it. I checked the postbox and it is still locked. Someone somehow gave it to her or shoved it in the door. I knew something terrible was up, when I saw her doll lying broken on the ground.’

  Henry looked at the letter and then suddenly he looked at Betsy.

  ‘Thank goodness you were here. The child could be dead, only you found her. I was drunk and asleep, my wife possibly sleeping some pills off. Christ, we would not have her only for you.’ He gripped Betsy by the shoulders with such force that it almost frightened her.

  ‘Hush now, the child is alive, that is all that matters,’ she whispered.

  He looked at the letter intently and then Betsy saw fear turn to black anger in his eyes.

  ‘I will hunt down whoever did this until every breath is gone from my body and God help them when I do find them.’

  Betsy did not like the way he said it.

  ‘This is a matter for the gardaí,’ she said. ‘Goodness! Maybe I should have left the room as it was – for clues. But I have scrubbed it clean. Don’t take this into your own hands, Mr Ward.’

  But Henry was not listening.

  ‘I tell you, Betsy, they have no idea who they are dealing with!’ he said with fury. ‘This letter was the instigator of what almost killed my daughter. I will hunt them like the dirty vermin that they are!’

  Betsy regretted showing him the letter. Maybe it was shock and lack of sleep, but Mr Ward looked like a madman.

  CHAPTER 14

  There was nothing left to say, no angry words of blame. Just large unsaid silent words filling the black hole that had seemed to develop between them as they drove back to Eveline, leaving their daughter sedated in the hospital. It
had taken all her strength to leave, but the Matron would not hear of her staying any longer. She saw the reaction of the Matron when she saw Sylvia’s injuries. The cuts on her arms and legs that were so deep that they resembled stab wounds. Her face was swollen and red. It looked like she had been walloped or had hit her head and face against something. Blood was oozing from her nose. It was as if she was beaten. The Matron had blessed herself when she saw her.

  When Sylvia came around the doctor asked her how it had happened. Sylvia shook her head, crying, then began chanting something in a language that Violet did not understand, as if she was in a trance. Then she began shouting. She cursed at the Matron and, when the hospital chaplain Father Keogh sat beside her, she spat in his face. Blood oozed from her eyes. Violet could barely breathe in shock at what was happening. Eventually she found her voice and screamed at the doctor to do something. He tried to calm Sylvia and gave her something to sedate her. Eventually she seemed to pass out. She awoke again but other than looking traumatised she had no recollection of anything happening. The Matron had summoned Father Keogh again. He was a thin stern priest who looked permanently dour. He took out a prayer book and prayed over the child, his face contorted as if in pain.

  There had been an argument between Father Keogh and Doctor Norton, the hospital doctor who was looking after Sylvia. Violet could not really make sense of what they were saying. But the doctor did not agree to having the priest there and the Matron had to tell them to calm down. Eventually they had both left Sylvia as she slept and slept.

  Violet grabbed Doctor Norton by the arm and begged him to tell her what had happened to her daughter. He was a tall man with a shock of grey hair that looked almost unruly, his clothes immaculately pressed and thin-rimmed glasses on his face.

  He looked over his glasses at her, his eyes seeming tired. He was near retirement and he looked like he could do with sitting at home with a pipe and slippers.

  ‘To be truly honest with you, Mrs Ward, I have never seen anything like it. But I am a doctor and I know there is an explanation for it. It is important to keep her calm and having Father Keogh here is not helping matters. He seems to believe there is some evil spirt at play.’