The House Where It Happened

by Devlin, Martina

  But nobody was thinking about food when I entered the room. Everyone was staring at Mary Dunbar. She had her chair cowped up and was standing by the table. Her body was arched like a hissing cat’s, teeth bared and eyes fixed on something that clearly nobody else could see. I took her to be in a trance. I threw her one look, and told the bairns to go to Peggy in the kitchen. Missie Sarah was willing, poor frightened pigeon, but Master Jamesey’s eyes were popping in his head and he seemed inclined to stay and gaze his fill.

  I clapped my hands. “Run along now – tell Peggy I said yiz are to have a honeycake apiece.”

  The mistress was panicky. “She doesn’t answer when I speak to her. Watch. What ails you, Mary? Mary, can you hear me?”

  Silence. It was as if the young lady was no longer in Knowehead House. She was somewhere inside her head – and it was not an agreeable place to be, judging by her expression.

  “She’s having a fit. My aunt never said she fitted. I wouldn’t have asked her to come and stay with us if I’d been told. I don’t know what to do. Do we click our fingers and snap her out of it?”

  She was asking me questions I had no answers for. I was only a maid, not a physician. But one of Ruth Graham’s brothers used to go into a trance when he was younger, and I tried to mind how her ma was with him. She never startled him out of it. She always let him be, and he’d come to on his own.

  “We must take care not to alarm her, mistress. She’ll come round in her own good time.”

  “But we can’t leave her like this.”

  I chewed my thumb, trying to think what to do for the best. “Let’s move her closer to the fire. Maybes the heat might bring her out of it.” I took hold of an arm, but it was like trying to shift a tree because Mary Dunbar was rooted to the spot. I was no weakling, but I gave up the attempt. I passed my hand in front of her eyes, and she didn’t blink. “What brought it on, mistress?”

  “I have no idea. Jamesey was teasing Sarah that we were eating rabbit rather than mutton. You know how she feels about bunnies. It got her all het up. I scolded Jamesey, he started kicking his feet against the table leg, and Sarah was pulling at my gown and gabbling away. Then I heard what she was saying. ‘Mama, something’s the matter with Cousin Mary.’ When I looked up, she was frozen solid. Buried under a sheet of ice. Just as she is now. She’s not here at all.”

  I touched Mary Dunbar again. “Come to the fire.” I kept my voice low, the way you’d handle a sick animal. “You’ll feel better when you’re all cosy.” But her attention was fixed on whatever she was staring at. And it gave her no pleasure.

  “I’m at my wits’ end.” The mistress tugged at the strings of her cap. “Run up and check her trunk – see if there may be some physick she has forgotten to take.”

  “Aye, I’ll do that.” I backed away slowly, unable to tear my eyes from that empty face. Its blankness filled me with foreboding. Less for the young lady than for what it meant for the household.

  “On second thoughts, Ellen, don’t leave me alone with her. Not while she’s having a fit.”

  “What happened?” It was Mary Dunbar.

  “Mary, my dear, you’re back with us. How are you feeling?”

  “Peculiar, Isabel. As if I nodded off in the middle of doing something. But I don’t feel rested – in fact, I’m bone weary. Where have Jamesey and Sarah gone? Are they in bed?”

  “Don’t you remember what happened?”

  She screwed up her eyes. The voice was reedy, and the words came slow, at first, but speeded up as her memory returned to her. “I was cutting my meat . . . I looked up and couldn’t see you any more . . . I just floated away . . . and found myself somewhere else. I think it must have been a cave – I could hear the sea outside, and smell the saltwater. There was a bonfire, and a group of women round it. It seemed to be a meeting place. One of the women had a skull – I think it was a human skull – there were tufts of black hair on top. She was holding it up in the air, chanting a name. ‘Hamilton Lock! Hamilton Lock! We summon you up, Hamilton Lock!’”

  The mistress held her throat, eyes searching out mine. I shook my head, warning against cutting in.

  “The women circled the fire, in a sort of procession, repeating that name. ‘We call on you again, Hamilton Lock!’ Next, the one with the skull sang out ‘She is waiting!’ and the flames leapt higher, and the others called ‘Waiting for you!’ And then, all together, they shouted ‘Mary Dunbar is waiting for you, Hamilton Lock!’ Their voices are ringing in my head still. They were gleeful cries. Triumphant cries.” She began shaking. “It was vile to hear my name coupled with his. I was in terror, Isabel. Mortal terror.”

  The mistress wrapped her arms round her cousin, stroking her. “I’ll take care of my cousin – you see about the children, Ellen.”

  “Aye, mistress, but then we need to get help. This has to be all mixed up with the aul’ mistress. I know you don’t want Knowehead talked about. But you can’t hold off any longer. You need to ask the minister and the elders for help.”

  “I’ll send for him the morning. It’s too late now to drag him out.”

  “Mistress, if it was me, I would’n waste another minute.”

  “No, first thing in the morning is time enough. I don’t want this to appear worse than it is.”

  I gaped. Mary Dunbar was saying witches used Hamilton Lock’s skull to call him back from the dead. How could it be any worse? “But Mistress Mary had a vision of what sounds like Lock’s Cave. It has to be searched.”

  “I – I suppose so. But, Ellen, don’t you see? Folk will say my cousin is possessed. She’ll be shunned – her reputation will never recover from it. Let’s leave it one more night. I’ll give her one of my sleeping draughts, and hopefully she’ll have a restful night. Perhaps in the morning she’ll tell us it was all just a vivid dream. Now, do as you’re told and see to the children.”

  I could push it no further for now, but decided to remind her about fetching the minister straight after breakfast. Even if she disliked the nudge.

  Back I went to the kitchen, to find the bairns standing by the half-door, as though they’d just as soon be outside as in.

  “I want my daddy,” said Sarah.

  I picked her up and cuddled her. “He’ll be home soon, chicken, with stories to tell about Dublin.” She pressed her face against my neck, crumbling the uneaten honeycake in her hot wee paw. I ran a hand through Jamesey’s hair. We had tried to protect them from what happened in Knowehead House before their granny died, but they still caught sounds young ears ought not to hear.

  While I have breath in my body, I’ll never forget the look in them dead eyes of hers when I went to close her eyelids for the last time. The mistress couldn’t bring herself to touch her, and it wasn’t fitting to let someone outside the family do it. So I had to nerve myself to stand over the old mistress, and press the flaps of skin down over them eyes that stared like they were seeing a vision of hell.

  And I’ll tell you this much. Mary Dunbar had the self-same look in her eyes when she was tranced.

  * * *

  We got Mary Dunbar off to bed and the mistress sat with her a while, but the young lady nodded off almost at once. The mistress told me to look in on her on my way to bed, because I was always the last to go down for the night. But the visitor slept like a newborn.

  Next morning she woke, sunny as June, and took the bairns out for a dander after breaking her fast. Missie wasn’t keen, and the cub made a lip, but their mother made them go. The childer had turned against Mary Dunbar. Still, the fresh air would do her a power of good, and it was as well to have wee legs near-hand. They could run for help if she took another turn. But I had a word in the mistress’s ear. The upshot was that Noah Spears went along with them. “You lassies are a holy terror, so you are,” he said, but he was only too willing to juke out of working on the land for an hour. Looking at him, I thought how addled in the wits I must have been, worrying about my monthlies, to think of him for a husband.

&
nbsp; When the coast was clear, I told the mistress I was ready now to step over to Ballymuldrough, to tell the minister about Mary Dunbar’s vision in a cave.

  “Don’t you have butter to churn?”

  “Aye, but butter can wait. The minister should be told about this cave with a skull in it. He’ll want to order it searched.”

  “Yes, he will. And think of the fuss – all laid at Knowehead’s door. My cousin seems much improved today. I really can’t spare you to go gadding about on errands.”

  I scowled, but I couldn’t disobey her.

  Out in the dairy I was a long time at my task, and the mistress came by to inspect the work.

  “The butter is slow to come. Do you have a horseshoe on the bottom of the churn?”

  “A-coorse I do, mistress. Sure the world and his wife know you could never churn butter without it.”

  “It’s taking its time.”

  “Sometimes it just does. There’s ne’ther rhyme nor reason to it.”

  “Aye, well, that’s true enough. I’ll leave you to it. I might take a walk and see if there’s any sign of Mary and the children.”

  “I could go and speak to the minister when I’m done here, mistress.” I knowed I was pushing it, but the thought of Lock’s Cave had filled my mind as I churned.

  “Ellen, I’ve already told you to let it rest. ’Tis possible it could all pass over. It might – mightn’t it?’

  I dropped my eyes to the churn. If I gave her the answer she wanted, she’d make a liar out of me. So I said nothing.

  She cleared her throat. “I was wondering if I should have my cousin to sleep with me in my bed. Perhaps she doesn’t like retiring on her own. That could be why she’s jittery.”

  “Does she not usually sleep on her lone, mistress? She told me she has no sisters.”

  “True enough – she’s the only one of my aunt’s children to survive infancy. You’re right, we’ll leave her be in the guest chamber. She’s settled there. One more thing: if Mercy Hunter calls for a blether, I expect you to keep quiet about this. It would be a shame to see my cousin’s name sullied in the mouths of tattle-tales.”

  * * *

  I made sure to sound as if I wasn’t a bit un’asied when I asked the wee’ans how they fared with Mary Dunbar. Jamesey talked about the Brent geese flying low over the lough. Them lingering here was a sign of the hard winter we’d just come through – usually the geese would be gone by now. As for Sarah, she jawed away about all the rabbits they’d seen. There wasn’t a word about Mary Dunbar having another attack. I hoped that was an end to it.

  When I met Noah clattering about the yard, I brought him into the house and served up a tankard of ale. Playing nursemaid to visitors wasn’t part of his job, after all.

  He downed it quickly, wanting to be on his way home to his own parcel of land. But on the doorstep he mentioned something that sent me after him, tugging at his sleeve.

  “What was that about a wooden chest, Noah?”

  “The Dunbar lassie says there’s a man hidin’ in the chest in her bedchamber. I tould her I’d go up an’ chase him, but she says none but her can see him for now. I daresay she was havin’ a wee joke at my expense.” He wiped his mouth on his sleeve. “I pity the man takes up wi’ her. She looks soft as a feather bed. But she’s thran as the day is long.”

  I let him go. Thran, he said. Stubborn, headstrong – someone not easily turned back from the path they were on. I was thoughtful as I closed the door after him.

  Chapter 5

  That evening I was worn out, and sat by the hearth with the mending basket on my lap, lacking the strength to do any work. The only light was by the glow of the fire and the moon shining through the casement. Peggy McGregor was nodding off beside me, grumbling in her sleep. Most days, you never got much use out of her company come nightfall. The fire was smoking because the chimneys needed sweeping. It was up to the mistress to send for the sweep, but it must have slipped her mind. The house was higgledy-piggledy and no mistake. A gust of wind came down the chimney and sent black smoke flapping round us, and Peggy woke with a start.

  “You were sound there.”

  “I was dreamin’ about the time I come across here first from Scotland with the minister.”

  “I daresay them were happy days, Peggy.”

  “We were young. That’s always to the good. But . . .” she studied some old burns criss-crossing her arms “. . . the first year or two were far from ’asy.’

  “I suppose everything was new to you, and you knowed nobody but your master?”

  “Ach, it was more than that. There were things not right here. It took a long while afore I felt safe in my bed.”

  “Were you afraid of attack?”

  “There’s no denying the Irish didnae want us. But we had soldiers to protect us, and muskets of our own forbye. What the Irish liked or disliked was ne’ther here nor there, providin’ they could be kep’ down. And mos’ly they were. But there was somethin’ else didnae want us. And that was harder to manage. We should’n be here, lass. That’s the long and the short of it.” Shivering, she held up her hands to the fire.

  “But Islandmagee was a wilderness till the Scotch came. The land was goin’ to waste. We only took what the Irish lacked the sense to look after, and see how we improved it.”

  “I bain’t sayin’ we’ve no right to be in Ireland. We’ve earned what we hold in Ulster.” She gripped the arms of the chair with both hands, heaved herself to her feet, and leaned in towards me. “But Knowehead House went up where it had no business bein’ put.”

  My eye was drawn to her shadow, climbing the chimney breast till it all but covered it. For the first time since I met her, Peggy McGregor was a large presence.

  “When I came here as a young woman, the aul’ folk said there was somethin’ Other about this patch of land at Kilcoan More. Nothin’ should ever a been built here. The Locks were warned agin puttin’ up their house, over where our barn stands now, but they would’n listen – and look at the luck they had. Ne’ther father nor son died in their beds. Then along came my master the minister, an’ he insisted on buildin’ here too. Folk were even more agin it by then. It would’n do, they said. Not when a great Stone sat where Minister Haltridge meant the house to go: a lump of rock put there deliberately, maybe, for what purpose we could not guess, by a race of heathens long since vanished from the face of the earth. He was tould on no account should the Stone be disturbed. But the minister was’n for budgin’. He said he refused to be ruled by superstition. It was no easy task to move thon lump of rock. But down came the Stone and up went the house.” She tottered to the door. “A pagan message, he called thon Stone. I’ve said enough – I’m for me bed.”

  “Wait, Peggy. What was the message?”

  “Dinna play the innocent with me, lassie. You ken how it is as well as I do – you’re livin’ here long enough. Knowehead House is different because of where it stands. This patch of earth is Other. It’s like nowhere else on Islandmagee. Or in Ireland, for that matter. We’re trespassers in Kilcoan More. Our walls and fences have no business here.”

  Aye, as soon as she spoke the words, I understood how it was. Trespassers – that’s exactly what we were. She knowed it, I knowed it and the mistress knowed it. So did the bairns, young as they were. My master was the only one who wouldn’t or couldn’t admit it, as stubborn as his father, the minister.

  Peggy put an end to our yarning by saying her bed was calling to her, though it wasn’t yet late by the moon. We kept early hours on Islandmagee. Most folk did. Even so, she was sleeping more and more these days – I suppose she wasn’t getting any younger.

  After she left, I was restless. For something to do, I went to the walk-in larder for an apple. They were wrinkled after a winter stored in dry sand inside a barrel, but still sweet and only a little faded. No sooner had I pulled one out than I began to hear a banging noise from somewhere in the house. Then, as I listened, wondering what it was, I heard the mistress calli
ng me, her voice spiky from fright. I dropped the apple and tore out as fast as my feet would carry me.

  Mary was in the master’s heavy leather-and-wood seat in the parlour, arms folded round her body, rocking backwards and forwards. Each time a judder went through her, the front legs of the chair were lifted up and crashed back down. You’d never believe such a slight wee thing could make as much racket.

  The mistress was beside herself. “She’s having another fit.”

  “How long has she been like this?”

  “A few minutes. The rocking is getting more violent – she’ll bite her tongue in half if she carries on.”

  The young lady’s teeth chattered in her jaw, but the flames were blazing up the chimney.

  I bent towards her. “Mistress Mary? Are you cold?”

  I half-expected her not to hear me, like before, but she answered. “Help, they’re jiggling me up and down!”

  The previous fit was nothing compared to this. Her eyes had stared at something then. Now they rolled about, the way an animal’s do in pain.