Mary, Mary

by Julie Parsons

  ‘What’s that, what’s that?’ Mary had yelled, pulling Margaret’s hair to get her attention, and putting her two small hands on both of Margaret’s cheeks to turn her face around to her own. ‘Tell me.’ And later when she had worn herself out with leaping and jumping and twirling, and practising ‘madra’ and ‘bainne’ and ‘fír’ and ‘mná’, she demanded and whined and sobbed and sucked her thumb until Margaret gave in and found out where the dancing classes were held. The man who answered the phone in the Irish Centre had greeted her with a ‘Top of the morning’.

  ‘What?’ she said. He repeated the greeting, unaffected by her incredulity.

  ‘Your name’s on the mailing list, mavourneen,’ he assured her. ‘You’ll never be homesick again.’

  Margaret dropped the photograph on the kitchen table. She opened the middle drawer in the dresser and took out a small paper folder. She emptied its contents and spread them in a circle. Mary in her dancing costume, toes pointed, arms by her side, looked up at her. A toy doll, not a child. Her face regulation solemn, her curls tied with green ribbons.

  ‘Wasn’t I cute?’ she had said, when she found the pictures in the kitchen in a pile of old gas bills. ‘Should I have stuck to the Irish dancing? What do you reckon, Ma?’

  ‘Don’t call me Ma,’ Margaret had answered from behind the Irish Times. Then she looked at her over the paper and said, ‘Do you remember your teacher, Mrs Curtin?’

  ‘Kind of.’

  ‘Remember,’ Margaret persisted. ‘She had a little girl the same age as you. She used to come and play sometimes, and sometimes she’d stay with us.’ When her mother couldn’t go out until the bruises on her face faded. When her mother couldn’t stand it any longer and had run away to stay with her sister in Wellington. When her mother overdosed on Valium, and went to hospital to be pumped out.

  ‘What happened to her? My teacher. She died, didn’t she?’

  The coroner’s verdict was death by drowning. Accidental. But there had been no accident about it. She had walked out of her front door and down the quiet road to the beach. And then she just kept walking. Into the sea, out of her depth until the weight of her clothes and her waterlogged lungs pulled her under.

  Poor Ellie Curtin. Pretty, frail Ellie Curtin. The beginning of Margaret’s crusade. She wrote her first book about her. She owed her, skinny little Ellie Curtin.

  The first time she had come to Margaret’s front door, her nose smashed. Margaret had brought her in and cleaned her cuts and bruises, and said to her, ‘Leave him. You’re crazy to stay. Come here, with me. Bring the kids. I’ve plenty of room.’

  But Ellie just sat on the sofa, her arms crossed, rocking backwards and forwards, the tears burning the raw skin on her face, and said, ‘I can’t. You don’t understand. I love him.’

  And she had seen them a couple of months later, Ellie and Mick, and the four kids, on the beach. One Sunday. A picnic basket and a cooler of beer. The kids making sandcastles and playing rounders, and Ellie and Mick lying on a blanket, their arms around each other, their legs entwined. She had sat up and watched them, jealousy burning a hole in her stomach, until she couldn’t bear it any longer and she had called Mary and walked along the beach, as far away from them as she could. And had come home later that day, and got drunk herself, sitting on her own on the verandah, watching the stars. Until the doorbell rang, and it was Ellie, screaming, holding her side. And underneath her dress, a burn where he had held the iron to her skin, until it smoked.

  Ellie had taught her about love, and dependency, and cruelty and desire. Taught her everything she knew, and died for it.

  Now Margaret stood in front of the small rectangular mirror, which hung on the wall by the clock. I look like the same woman that I was three weeks ago, she thought. But this isn’t Margaret. This is a changeling. The fairies have stolen away the real Margaret and replaced her with this thing with the same colour hair and eyes, the same mouth and teeth, the same hands and feet. This thing is weak, passive, a victim. This thing is reduced to nothingness by the attentions of a madman. It is the starling that the cat has trapped in a corner. It shrieks and shrieks, its sweet voice transformed into harsh ugliness. This thing will never allow the real Margaret back into its skin. Not unless the real Margaret does something about it.

  She walked back up the steps and along the hall. She could hear her mother’s voice, faintly, the rise and fall of a conversation. She walked into the room. The blinds were down. The room was dark and cool. Catherine was lying propped up on her pillows. Her eyes were open, and she was looking up, at something, at someone above her. As Margaret watched she smiled, coquettishly, from under her eyelashes. Then she puckered her lips, and held up her arms. ‘Now John, now, do it now. I want you now. John. Please, please.’ Her head rolled from side to side, her eyes closing, then opening again. She opened her mouth and cried out, her withered body moving underneath the thin quilt.

  ‘Mother.’ Margaret stepped back.

  Catherine turned her head. Her eyes slid past her, darting around the room, expressions flickering across her face, like the images from the projector playing across the cinema screen. Madness, thought Margaret, is tapping on my shoulder. I should know what to do. I have looked into the eyes of the deranged. I have heard what their voices have said. And I have been the voice of reason, of responsibility, of common sense. But I know nothing. Of life, of death, of good or evil. I am become as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal.

  And then, the phone. Ringing. She picked it up. She waited. The hiss of the tape.

  The Lord is my shepherd

  I shall not want

  He maketh me to lie down in green pastures

  He leadeth me beside the still waters

  He restoreth my soul;

  He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.

  Her own voice, echoing, distorted by the size of the church. A cough, the disturbance of air as the congregation moved, settled itself. Her own voice. The reading at the funeral.

  Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death

  I will fear no evil

  For thou art with me;

  thy rod and staff they comfort me.

  Lies all lies, no one comforts me.

  Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies;

  Thou anointest my head with oil;

  My cup runneth over

  With pain and bile, the smell of vomit and the taste of bitter aloes on my tongue.

  Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life;

  And I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.

  There is no room in the house of the Lord for me. Goodness and mercy are anathema now.

  And the words repeated, distorted.

  I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever

  Dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.

  In the house of the Lord for ever.

  For ever.

  Then silence.

  22

  The crystal ball revolved slowly, scattering light like handfuls of silver coins over the heads of the dancers packed onto the floor. McLoughlin felt mournful. He had drunk far too much. Depression had set in. He looked around the huge ugly ballroom with a mixture of despair and contempt. Once, he would have been out there lurching from side to side, forcing his unwilling feet into a variety of dance steps. Now he sat, heavily, a half-empty pint glass by his hand, the remains of the turkey and ham dinner cold on his plate. Another retirement do, another set of dreary speeches, tearful reminiscing, drunken confidences. In fifteen years, maybe, it would be his turn. He would sit at the top table, Janey on one side, the Assistant Commissioner on the other. The presentation would be made. They’d find it difficult to know what to give him. He didn’t play golf, or make home videos or go on trips to England to follow his favourite football team. They knew sailing was his passion, but they’d hardly come up with enough cash for a boat. And they all knew he was a good cook.
He’d made them plates of chips often enough in the station kitchenette. He stifled a laugh. He couldn’t see it somehow, the retirement subcommittee in the cookware department of Clery’s picking out the latest deep-fat fryer.

  He slipped his hand into the inside pocket of his jacket and carefully extracted a cigar. It was a big fat Havana in its own metal tube. He’d wandered into Fox’s at the bottom of Grafton Street a couple of days ago to treat himself. Janey didn’t approve. He didn’t care particularly, but he didn’t like it when she harangued him in front of other people. Fortunately at the moment she was deeply engrossed in conversation with the girl Dave Finney had brought along. The noise was too loud for McLoughlin to eavesdrop successfully, but the odd word that drifted his way alerted him that Janey was delivering a lecture on alternative medicine.

  He slowly unscrewed the tube and slid the cigar out onto the table. It lay like a thick golden finger, unsullied, perfect against the stained white tablecloth. He touched it gently, rolling it from side to side, then picked it up, holding it against his nose and inhaling deeply. Strange to think of the metamorphosis of scents, from the powerful sweetness of the tobacco plant’s flowers to the aromatic spice of the dried leaf. As he was about to put the cigar to his lips he noticed that Janey was watching. She began to lean towards him, her hand tapping the table, her mouth opening to speak. He got up quickly, and pushed his way through the crowd towards the bar.

  Familiar faces surrounded him. There were many he knew nearly as well as his own he’d spent that long looking at them over cups of steaming tea and early morning fries in stations like Castleblayney, Elphin, Letterkenny. Some had aged badly, their bald heads sprinkled with brown spots and sweat, bellies falling in heavy folds over their belts. There were a few who still had the leanness and lightness of their youth, the wiry elegance never affected by bad diet, long hours and too many pints. Here and there he spotted casualties. One man in particular who had seen his best friend gunned down by a Provo active service unit. It had been whispered that he had run, crouched behind the car while his mate took the fire. Who could blame him if he hadn’t been brave and noble, a guard in the best tradition? A dead hero, like McLoughlin’s own father. He wasn’t alone. McLoughlin knew that courage, like self-confidence, was an elusive quality. Some days you had it, most days you didn’t. He was profoundly relieved that he had never really been tested. He had woken many times, cold sweat sticking to his skin, terror hanging like a muslin curtain around the bed, knowing that the fear was not of the bullet but of the failure to measure up. As he manoeuvred his way through the heaving, shifting mass, nodding to some, ignoring others, he felt the sadness and loneliness of the one who finally knows he doesn’t belong. Most of these men were intrinsically good. They did their job, they loved their families and friends, they had their networks of loyalties and responsibilities. They knew who they were and what they wanted. They were the lucky ones.

  He leaned his elbows on the bar avoiding the pools of beer and ashtrays overflowing with butts. He found himself a bit of space and lit the cigar, puffing hard to get it going. Thick smoke filled the air around his head. He looked through it to his face reflected in the smudged mirror behind the row of spirits bottles. He was tired, the bags under his light brown eyes heavy, the lines on his forehead scored deep. He raised his glass and drank.

  ‘That’s a great smell.’

  McLoughlin squinted sideways, then turned in the direction of the voice. ‘Hey, Tony. How are you? Where’ve you been hiding? I didn’t see you earlier.’

  Tony Heffernan eased his tall body into the small space beside McLoughlin, a pint already in his hand. ‘We’ve only just got here. We drove up from Cork this evening. We’re staying over night. Breege wants to see her mother tomorrow. She’s in the Mater Hospital.’

  ‘Serious?’

  ‘She’s had a stroke, but they say she’ll be out in a couple of weeks.’

  ‘Out and in your tender care, I suppose.’

  Tony grinned. ‘No, thank God. Breege isn’t able for the strain.’

  McLoughlin looked at his friend, suspiciously. ‘You’re looking well. Things going OK in Community Relations?’

  Again Tony smiled his big cheerful grin. ‘Couldn’t be better. How about you? Busy, I hear. Is it good?’

  McLoughlin sighed, looking into his pint. ‘It’s not that great, really.’

  ‘Oh? Having problems?’

  McLoughlin lifted his glass. ‘Ach. You know the way it is. Everyone wants instant answers. Quick solutions, like TV dramas. Solve the mystery before the final commercial break.’

  ‘Not happening, no?’

  ‘No, I’m afraid not. But let’s not talk about it. It’d spoil the evening.’

  ‘Can’t be that bad, then.’ Tony looked around him. ‘I’d forgotten what these things are like. Are we the only people here not talking about football?’

  ‘And hurling and golf handicaps.’

  Tony signalled to the barman for the same again. ‘How are things with you and Janey?’

  McLoughlin shrugged. ‘Why do you ask?’

  ‘Just wondering.’

  ‘Well, the answer is same as ever.’

  ‘No way to live, is it?’

  Again the shrug.

  ‘Well, Michael, I want you to know. I’ve made a decision. I’m forty-six. I’ve had enough.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’ll tell you the way it is. I get up every morning at half seven. I make breakfast for the kids, and I take them to school. Breege doesn’t stir. I get home around six. I make the dinner and clean up. We have to eat either before seven or after eight. Because Breege can’t miss Emmerdale, Fair City and Coronation Street. On Mondays we can’t eat until after eight thirty, because of EastEnders. We never talk, not really, about anything that’s to do with us. Instead we have these bizarre, virtual-reality style conversations about pregnancies and affairs and abortions and gangland killings. I’ve had it, up to here.’ He gestured with his hand six inches above his head.

  ‘So she’s still taking all the dope?’

  He nodded, the gaiety gone, misery turning the corners of his mouth down. ‘But I’ve decided. I’m leaving.’

  ‘So,’ McLoughlin chomped on his cigar, ‘who is she?’

  ‘What makes you think there’s someone else?’

  ‘Come on, Tony, you’ve been living like this with Breege for the last ten years, at least. I know all about it, remember?’

  Tony leaned his head on his hand. ‘Her name is Janet Simms. She’s a widow.’

  ‘A Protestant widow by the sound of it.’

  ‘Headmistress of St Columba’s Church of Ireland National School, just outside the city on the road to Bandon.’

  ‘How d’you meet?’

  ‘I went to give a talk to her sixth class about drug awareness, and it went so well she invited me back to talk to the fourth class about cycling road safety, and then we were running weekend workshops on drug abuse, and she came along, and somehow one thing led to another.’

  Christ, I hope you know what you’re letting yourself in for, McLoughlin thought, as he swivelled around, watching Breege making her way from table to table, shaking hands with senior officers and their wives, greeting old friends, finally sitting down beside Janey, their heads together, their arms linked.

  ‘You haven’t told Breege about this yet?’

  ‘I’m going to tell her tomorrow, when we’re driving back to Cork. After she’s seen her mother. Then I’m giving it two weeks to sort everything out. I’ve already been to a solicitor. It’s not going to be easy. Financially it’ll be a disaster for a while.’

  ‘And the kids, how will they take it?’

  ‘I’m hoping they might decide to come and live with me. They’re old enough to do without their mother. Peadar’s going into transition year and Stephen into second. They’ll like Janet, I know they will.’

  ‘Well, all I can say is good luck to you. I’ve never had the guts to go through with it.’r />
  ‘You’ve never met the right woman.’

  ‘I dunno. I wonder.’

  ‘Word has it that you’ve a bit of a crush on the girl’s mother, am I right?’

  ‘Jesus, don’t talk to me, the gossip machine is in overdrive already.’

  ‘Well, as they say, no smoke.’ Tony smiled, putting an arm around McLoughlin’s shoulders.

  ‘Actually, I’ve a bit of a problem there. Any advice would be gratefully received.’ And he told him about the phone calls, about the transcripts, about the surveillance he’d set up. ‘It’s around the clock. I haven’t told the boss yet, but he’ll know when the overtime bill comes in.’

  ‘It’s a gamble. And it could be dangerous.’

  ‘Yeah, but she’s made herself a ready bait. She’s not cooperating with us. Makes life difficult for everyone.’

  Tony grinned. ‘Tricky business, watching people. You’re never sure you’re going to like what you find out, are you?’

  McLoughlin caught the barman’s eye. He ordered brandy. He looked at his friend. He could see the hope, the energy, the excitement. He envied him.

  ‘And you’re sure Breege doesn’t know anything about it?’

  Tony shook his head. ‘Did Janey ever?’

  McLoughlin smiled. ‘Funnily enough, no.’ He picked up the glass of brandy and raised it. ‘Let’s drink,’ he said. ‘To passion.’

  To the passion that dragged him out onto the dance floor, falling from body to body, refilling his glass endlessly, until he staggered out into the warm summer night, and drove, somehow, from the hotel beside the sea at Killiney Beach, around the coast to Monkstown. To the passion that made him stand in the road, watching the house, dark now, the faintest glow coming through the fanlight above the front door. To the passion that got him to climb, hauling his reluctant belly, carefully and quietly over the wall from the laneway, and creep around the back, to where he could watch her as she stood in the kitchen, drinking a glass of water, then upstairs in the bathroom a shadowy figure against the stained-glass windows and finally through the window of her bedroom, in the soft lamplight as she stood for a moment looking out into the dark before finally pulling the curtains.