by Orna Ross
It is Rory who, mid-morning, finds the one we want: Casebook 1923. He hands it over to me like a prize. I receive it with solemnity and, blowing dust off its edges, lay it down on the desk.
He moves across and stands beside me — too close — but I let him, liking the nearness of him and that we are doing this together. We each run a finger down the careful column of names, leaning into the words, and we find her easily: May 25th, 1923: Miss Norah O'Donovan, Mucknamore.
He takes out his camera, to photograph the dry, yellowing page with its sloping list of names. I am unprepared for the feelings that rush through me when I see her name: something inside me, in the pit of me, starts to tremble. Each word that describes her shines on the page, clear and cold and distinct as a star, a bright echo of something that once flamed, a long, long time ago.
When he's finished, he takes my hand and I hold his, as we read together.
Patient No: 1496.
Name: Norah O'Donovan.
Address: Mucknamore, Co. Wexford.
Age: Twenty years.
Marital Status: Single.
Religion: Roman Catholic.
Education: Reads and writes.
Previous Occupation: Home Duties.
Category of Insanity: Puerperal Mania.
Cause of Insanity: Childbirth.
May 19th, 1923
Admitted from the Holy Sisters of Mary Convent, New Ross, where she gave birth three weeks ago. She had a troublesome labour, with forceps delivery leading to a severe puerperal rupture. This rupture extends to the rectum and has turned septic.
Patient resisted coming to asylum, having to be dragged up the front steps kicking and struggling wildly. The Convent reported that she seemed all right in mind when she was first admitted there, being quiet and obedient and willing to work in the laundry. Since she gave birth, however, the nuns are unable to control her. Won't sleep or eat, weeps and wails through the night, disturbing others. Threatened to kill one nun; also, to do away with herself.
Patient placed in D Ward and given a bath. Her wound was cleaned and a poultice applied. She submitted quietly to the bath and other attentions and afterwards took some warm milk.
30g Veronal administered.
* * *
May 20th, 1923
Patient slept the night and seemed in better spirits this morning. She is a well-spoken and highly-educated young woman, and at first seemed very rational. Says she is not insane, that the convent put her here because they could not cure her birth wound or help her cope with the pain. It was pain that kept her awake at night, crying out loud, and nobody would do anything to help her.
Her family had placed her with the Holy Sisters of Mary when they learned of her condition. When asked if they would be willing to take her back should she be discharged, the patient became agitated. She began to cry and shout: she shouldn't be here at all, she did nothing wrong, we have no right to keep her, she would not stay. She exhausted herself with crying and abusing and I left her to the care of attendants.
She is not so sound in mind as she appears at first.
* * *
June 25th, 1923
Patient tried to escape today. Left by front gate somehow unobserved, but was brought back by two local labourers. Very hyped and threatening on her return. Said she had plenty of help outside if she wanted to call on it, that we were as bad as the nuns and we had no authority to keep her here. 30g Veronal administered.
* * *
June 26th, 1923
Had long interview with her this morning which started well, but degenerated. Very impudent and resistive still. She refuses to work, saying she doesn't see why she should be expected to provide labour for nothing. Also complains that she never has a minute alone the whole day long, with attendants and patients coming and going. The food is disgusting, she claims. She can't sleep at night with the noise in the dormitory and the heat and the smell. She refused to stay in bed, throwing her arms about, pacing up and down and shouting in a loud voice. 30g Veronal administered.
* * *
August 10th, 1923
Patient has built herself a sort of shelter from sticks and old sacking in the field beside the avenue hedge. She sits in this little hut most of the day, talking to herself or feverishly writing, indulging delusions of a persecutory nature. Those who accuse her of wrongdoing are lying: she is a good girl and the bad things that happened to her were not her fault, God sees all and God would forgive all.
She abuses us as she sits there, saying she should never have been brought here.
Attendant Lizzie Cloake gives her paper for her writings and, when it runs out, patient harasses Lizzie and the other attendants, or even doctors — anyone who might be able to procure pen and ink for her. As it is not harmful to herself or others, the behaviour is permitted. She is less inclined to abuse the attendants or other patients once she has her pen and paper.
* * *
August 24th, 1923
Since last note the patient has conducted herself well, being quieter and generally obedient — though still refusing to work. Spends her days outside in her hut, writing and talking to herself, coming in only to sleep and for meals. While waiting for the meals, she paces up and down the corridor, refusing to talk to anybody.
* * *
September 12th, 1923
Attendants today tried to get patient to give up her hut as the weather grows colder, but she resisted.
* * *
September 24th, 1923
The patient is now confined to divisions. It is too cold for her to spend all day outdoors. Also, she was becoming very untidy and collecting a large store of rubbish in her hut. She has taken her confinement very badly, becoming troublesome again.
* * *
September 25th, 1923
Patient caused a disturbance at breakfast when she accused another patient, Frances Sills, of putting a dead cockroach in her porridge and attendant Lizzie Cloake of laughing and turning a blind eye. Then, at dinnertime, she put an earthworm onto Mrs Sills' dinner plate and a struggle ensued, with them hitting and scratching each other. Patient would not let go of Mrs Sills' hair and had to be forcibly restrained by attendants and removed from the dining room. The incident led to some patients becoming greatly distressed. It was mid-afternoon before order was restored. Patient placed in seclusion overnight. 30g Veronal administered.
* * *
September 27th, 1923
Patient out of seclusion today. She emerged quiet and withdrawn. Interview attempted, but now she refuses to speak when spoken to.
* * *
October 1st, 1923
Patient's behaviour has improved, though still not communicating. She is withdrawn and passive, ignoring all around her. Still refusing to speak and to work, but considerably less troublesome than before.
1984
When Jack asks me to, I leave Mrs Fairbairn and join him in his two-bed maisonette. We have a "moving-in-together" party and people buy us sauce bowls and matching towels and I buy an apron and a recipe book and spend a few evenings cooking for us, a housewifely turnabout he finds highly amusing. He comes up behind me while I am cooking, puts a glass of wine into my hand, slides his arm around me under my apron. We go to the launderette together and sit watching our underwear and shirts revolving around each other's.
I give my Sundays, Mondays and most Tuesdays to him, but the other nights still belong to the pub. He comes with me less and less often. When I arrive home late, he turns to me in the dark and often we make love, his body hot against my cold skin. I act drunk and outrageous, to make him chuckle into the dark. Next morning when my head is thumping with pain and I am groaning, "Never again," he is still chuckling, still indulgent. He makes me tea and puts his hand on my forehead while I wonder whether I love him or not.
I meet his family, the father and mother and sister who all think he's wonderful. The dad is Jack, with thirty years on; the two women are kind, if puzzled by his choice. I am not what they expected, not
— frankly — what they would have hoped for him, but if I make him happy...
When I tell him this, he laughs it off. "They loved you," he says, refusing to see.
And even if they didn't, we do not need their approval. We have our friends, and we have each other.
We spend Christmas away: one year in Scotland, the next in southern Italy. Our Montgomery's group gets smaller as time passes on and individuals break away. The core of us remain: Natalie, Frank, Sally and me. We believe we are connected to each other, but our real bond is to the alcohol and it's tightening all the time.
Sometimes, I have blackouts. I don't tell Jack about this. I don't tell anybody, not even Sal or Natalie, though we love to rehash the shocking or silly things drink makes us do. Everything that happens during an alcohol-induced blackout is irretrievable, I read. It cannot be revived by any of the methods that recover lost memories, like truth drugs or hypnosis. Something about that frightens me. I do magazine quizzes that all tell me what I already know: I should give up, or at least cut down. I resolve to give up drinking doubles, drinking so often, drinking before six, but can never make the resolutions stick.
Ah, what the hell becomes my most used phrase, as I tilt back another glass.
At work, I start to miss targets and deadlines. I gargle with Listerine in the morning, suck peppermints and chew gum all day, spray Gold Spot into my mouth before going out for the evening, but still I stink. People sniff me out and I hate them for it.
I begin to lie, something I have never done. I don't know why. Jack, of all people, can handle the truth, but I never come home late now without a story prepared. He hates lies, but pretends to believe mine. I don't know when it started — maybe at the very beginning — but silence is now piling up around our apartment, masking what we're not saying.
Maeve arrives to London for a weekend to show off Donal, her fiancé. They want to take Jack and me to dinner to celebrate. "Donal's treat. He insists."
She sits enfolded within his arm, sending little glances to her ring. When the waiter arrives, they order each other's food.
"It's more interesting," says Maeve when I ask why they each don't order their own like anyone else. "It's nice to be surprised."
"We know each other's tastes," says Fiancé.
And they shower each other with smiles. I discreetly make a vomiting gesture to Jack. He and Donal talk about work, suss out each other's place on the career pecking order, while Maeve fills me in on the news from "home". All goes fine for a while, where we are almost what we seem to be: two happy couples enjoying each other's company.
During a lull, she leans across her plate of mussels to Jack. "Have you ever been to Ireland before, Jack?"
"No."
"You'll love it. You'll have to get Jo to take you to the West. It's much more scenic over there."
Jack looks at me. "I'm not sure if —"
I cut in: "We've no plans to go to Ireland, Maeve."
"But Jack, you'll surely come to the wedding. We'd love you to come."
"On his own? I don't think he'd fancy that. Would you, Jack?"
"Jo!" Maeve declares, taken aback. "Come on! You didn't really mean what you said about not coming. I didn't think you —"
"Maeve, I told you." I had too, earlier in the evening, when they came to the flat for drinks. I made sure to tell her, in advance of her asking, and had tried to explain why, but of course she hadn't taken me seriously.
"But —"
"I can't, Maeve. Please accept that."
Fiancé says: "Maeve was hoping you'd be her bridesmaid, Jo."
"I'm sorry," I reply. I lift the champagne bottle to pour us all a refill, but find I am the only one whose glass is empty. Replacing the bottle in the ice bucket, I catch a long look sloping between Maeve and Jack and — horrified — I realise my sister has been there already with him. They have discussed me.
Rage makes me tremble. I cannot believe this of Jack.
After that, the night is a disaster. I get drunk while Maeve lectures: why am I being so unwelcoming to Donal? It's so selfish to greet him into our family like this. As for Mammy and Granny Peg, I have broken their hearts. The wedding is the ideal opportunity to put everything behind us. All I can do is throw it back in their faces.
Donal and Jack look at the wreckage. Jack's face is impassive.
"What's it like to be perfect, Maeve?" I ask, at some point. "Does it never get tiring?"
Feeling something on my face, I put up my hand. I stare at my damp fingers in surprise. I am crying. But I never cry any more, not since I left Mucknamore.
"Nobody asked you to come here," I snap at my sister. "Why don't you just go home and leave us alone?"
So it is Maeve's old friend, Anita Shiels, who is her bridesmaid. I receive some photographs in the post: an older Mrs D., heavier but somehow more frail, trying to look composed; Gran and Auntie Norah just the same, Auntie Norah away somewhere in her head, Gran holding her arm.
Jack is withdrawing his love. I can feel it pulling away, like the tide going out, leaving me beached. Nothing is said. I eat breakfast on a stool opposite, The Guardian divided between us. I watch television from a separate armchair, the couch we used to share staring at us from across the room. I lie in bed beside him, not touching, my head blistered with thoughts.
Sometimes, when I am drunk, I insult him, trying to goad him towards a reaction. He looks at me like I'm a crazy intruder and he's wondering how I got in. When I sober up, I get frightened and try to blot out whatever I've done with sex. We do it furiously, long sessions that leave me physically drained but dissatisfied. I am losing the ability to tell pleasure from pain.
Or am I? Do I even care? Jack is not Rory. Rory knew me, every inch: skin and bone and sinew. I would not be able to keep my thoughts sealed off from Rory. He would not be so indulgent, so accepting, so careless. Rory wouldn't hide behind the paper. He would confront the situation. He would make me think, make me laugh, make me change.
Rory O'Donovan. I swore when I was too young to know what it meant that I would love him forever. I said he was the only man for me and that, it seems, is how it turned out.
Or was it the swearing that had made it so?
1923
Visitors, Dr Kennedy told Peg, were generally received in the day room by the friend or relative they had come to see, but in this first instance he would wish to be present when Peg and Norah met.
"Her behaviour is unpredictable," he said, index finger prodding the big brown casebook on his desk. "You can never be sure with her."
He began to read to himself again from the heavy book, silently frowning at it as if the words held a personal insult. Peg sat, hands fastened to the handbag on her lap into which she'd packed food and books and a lovely rose-perfumed hand cream for Norah.
At the window, a fly trapped between the blind and the pane was thudding itself wildly off the glass, but the doctor read on, oblivious. His pen-stand held a careful row of identical pens, shiny and sharp. Beside it was a pile of clean sheets of paper, edge to edge, awaiting his words. Peg wished he'd give her a better idea of what to expect. She wished he would tell her what was in that book that made him look so affronted. She wished he had better manners.
"Doctor, are you able to tell me what's wrong with her?"
He answered her without taking his eyes from the book. "Mania. A form of mania."
She tried again. "But can you explain to me what that means, Doctor? In Norah's particular case?"
This time he looked up. "I could only have such a discussion with a member of the inmate's immediate family."
"It's just...It was such a surprise to us, Doctor."
"She showed no signs of her weakness before?"
"No," said Peg, though the memory of a night in the grocery, when she and Norah were working on election leaflets, rose unbidden in her mind. That night, Norah had beaten herself about the head with her hands, decrying her family situation. "Nothing. Not a thing."
He picked
up his pen, made a note in the casebook, the scratch of his nib loud in the solemn room.
"So can you?" Peg asked, when it looked like he wasn't going to speak again.
He looked at her over his spectacles.
She began to get frustrated. "Can you tell me what's the matter with her, how she came to be here, whether she's going to be all right?"
"Haven't I just said, Miss Parle, that such a discussion was possible only with family?"
"Norah was my best friend, Doctor. She was engaged to marry my brother, only...only he died. We are very close, closer than many sisters."
"Nonetheless..."
"I want to help her, and so do my parents. We're all so fond of Norah."
"No doubt, Miss Parle. I do not doubt you. But you will appreciate the nature of our work here. It would be most unorthodox to discuss such matters with anybody who turned up wanting to know."
Peg nodded, putting on a reasonable face. She didn't want to get on the wrong side of him. "Do her family know that she's here, Doctor?"
"Most certainly. All the proper parties were informed, by the Holy Sisters as well as ourselves."
"Yet she's had no visitors up until now?"
He hesitated, realising the point to which she'd steered him.
"She hasn't, has she? As soon as I knew where she was, I came, Doctor, but they won't. You see? It's those who care most for Norah who must look out for her now."
"You know them, the O'Donovan family?"
"I do."
"Her father is a farmer, I have been told, of some substance. Is this correct?"
"They have about thirty acres."
