Dorothy Eden (40 page)

They arrived with gifts for her and Norah, and lollypops for the little girls. Best of all, they were able to reassure Katharine that they didn’t think their father intended to exercise his rights under the Court’s ruling and demand custody of Clare and Katie. At least he didn’t intend to do so at present for the simple reason that he had no permanent home. Children at that tender age needed a nursery, nursemaids, and a governess, all requirements which Willie would find much too expensive.

But he would enjoy holding over her head the threat of removing them from her, and in one of his bitter revengeful moods he could very well carry out that threat. She would never be easy until a legal arrangement was made giving her custody. As Charles had said, there was only one way to get Willie’s consent to that. A considerable bribe. She could only pray that when the litigation over Aunt Ben’s will was finished she would be left with sufficient money to do this. Her solicitors assured her that she must succeed in at least half of the estate. She had to cling to that hope, and never leave the children too long out of her sight.

But for all her preoccupation about this, and about Charles’ health, it was a happy Christmas. There was roast turkey, and brandy flaming on the plum pudding, the little girls shrieked with delight when the candles were lit on the Christmas tree and later the servants came in and they all sang carols round the fire. Katie nodded asleep on her father’s lap, and he looked rested and contented and less gaunt. Although that might have been the trick of the firelight.

Later Katharine tucked the little girls in bed, and Clare said in her grave voice, “Isn’t Katie a baby, she went to sleep on Papa’s lap.”

“I did not,” Katie protested. “I couldn’t because his watch hurt my ear. I could hear it ticking in his pocket.”

“Well, Papa almost went to sleep. Is he home to stay, Mamma?”

The two pairs of brown eyes looked at her. She had met that identical eager attentive gaze so often across the House of Commons, on railway stations, across the fireside, and from the pillow beside hers. Something in her heart said, “Whatever happens I will have some part of him.” She pushed the thought away and said briskly:

“He is here until Saturday, and after that he will always be home once or twice every week. Isn’t that enough when he’s such a busy man?” She lit the night light, and bent to kiss each round brow. “Remember he always loves you,” she said.

In Ireland the people still said that they would not submit to the dictation of the Church, but more and more became afraid to defy their parish priests. Especially when at Mass one priest remarked that he noticed several Parnellites in the congregation, and that the loyal flock would know what to do with them when they got them outside. A young boy who dared to cheer for Parnell was knocked senseless by his village priest. The tenacious hand of the Church was tightening its grip.

Matters were not helped by the variety of ribald songs sung about Kitty O’Shea. An element of hate, as uncontrolled as had been their love, was rising in the assembled crowds. Sometimes Parnell could not make his voice heard above the rude interjections. Michael Davitt, living up to his reputation for saintliness, offered to share his platform, saying that in this way Parnell would be sure of a quiet hearing.

Mr. Parnell replied with his immense dignity and arrogance, “Tell Mick Davitt that I have never asked for his permission to speak where and when I pleased in Ireland, and I will not do so now.”

But the battle was slipping away from him. His candidates in Sligo and Carlow were both defeated. And worst of all, physical violence began. Stones and mud were flung at him. In Kilkenny a bag of lime, thrown at him in the dark, burst in his face and blinded him for several days.

He came home to Katharine wearing dark glasses, and with a bandage still over one eye.

“Charles, what has happened?” she cried in alarm.

“Only a devilishly uncomfortable accident. I got lime in my eyes and they became inflamed. I was blind for two or three days. But Doctor Kenny assures me the injury isn’t permanent.”

“That horrible country!” she said with intensity. “I’m glad I’ve never set eyes on it.”

“Now, Kate. You know very well you would be seduced by it as everyone is. A few hysterical people aren’t going to make me hate it.”

“Far more than a few! I read the papers.”

“Then stop reading them,” he said equably.

“Oh, my love! Supposing you’d been permanently blinded.”

“Yes, that would have been a calamity. I wouldn’t have been able to see you on our wedding day. Do you realise we have only four more weeks to wait?”

“Charles, stay home until then. I beg you. I’m so afraid.”

He removed his glasses and looked at her with his one good eye. It was deeply sunken and the bones of his skull were disturbingly prominent. He looked old and tired and ill. How could she not be afraid?

But he was smiling as if her fears were completely groundless.

“I assure you that nothing is going to kill me before I stand at the altar with you. Not any bishops or priests or a pack of unruly peasants or the English Government or the Archangel Gabriel himself.”

And at last it was mid-June and her wedding day.

She wore a dress of dove grey silk, and a little turban with violets. Norah helped her to dress, and scolded her when she took too long.

“Don’t you keep poor Mr. Parnell waiting. He’s been walking up and down the hall for the last half hour. He’s as nervous as if he were a young man.”

“Well, believe it or not,” Katharine said, dabbing her flushed cheeks with rice powder, “I feel like a young girl, too. Does that seem ridiculous to you?”

Norah answered judicially that she expected she would feel the same if she were getting ready for her own wedding.

“And you won’t make the mistakes I did,” Katharine said vigorously.

“But I would never be able to love one man as you have,” Norah said, a little wistfully. “Sometimes I have hated Mr. Parnell. But it must be wonderful to be loved like that.”

“Yes,” Katharine breathed. “It is.”

“Oh, Mamma, you’re not crying!” Norah exclaimed. “You mustn’t. You’ll spoil your looks.”

Katharine drew Norah to her, holding her closely.

“Have I been such a bad mother to you and Carmen and Gerard?” she asked intensely. “I never meant to be.”

“Sometimes—” Norah began, then cried warmly, “But we
always
loved you. And now do hurry. Don’t keep Mr. Parnell waiting. You see, I do care about his feelings. And you look beautiful, Mamma. Like a bride.”

Charles, waiting impatiently at the foot of the stairs, said. “Come along, Kate. It’s time to be married.”

But as she descended slowly, he smiled, his eyes burning with all their old remembered brilliance. “Here is your bridal bouquet.” He showed her a white rose, touched it gallantly to his lips, then pinned it at her breast.

The servants, with Norah and the two little girls, had gathered in the doorway. They called their good wishes, and Charles, taking Katharine’s arm, led her out of the house.

The fast horse, Dictator, was harnessed to the phaeton outside. There was also a growing crowd headed by several journalists. Newspapers were interested in this belated marriage of a pair of notorious lovers.

Charles helped Katharine into the phaeton, climbed in himself, took the reins from the groom, and whipped up the horse.

He was smiling broadly. “Listen, they’re after us,” he said. “They won’t catch Dictator.”

Katharine, her father’s daughter, was deeply grieved that they could not be married in a church. But the registrar’s office at Steyning was decorated with bowls of summer flowers, and the registrar’s manner grave enough to have graced a pulpit. Katharine seemed to hear an echo of her father’s beloved voice, and had a conviction that the church’s blessing was with them, although she could never be married in a church. She held out her hand for the ring to be slipped on her finger, and in that moment her lips trembled uncontrollably. She and Charles had always belonged to each other, but now they did so by law, and, she thought stubbornly, looking round the little registry office, that had no altar, no candles, no air of reverence, in the sight of God.

They drove back to Walsingham Terrace with the sun on their faces. Charles had to hold the reins with one hand, for his other was in hers. This would be their most familiar gesture of love until they were old, she thought. Its comfort would stay with them long after their most passionate embraces were finished.

The crowd outside the house had grown. They stood a moment to acknowledge the few ragged cheers. As the newspaperman pressed forward Charles lifted his hand.

“Let my wife go. I’ll come out and see you presently.”

My wife … Katharine’s cheeks were flushed with the colour of girlhood. They went into the drawing room where Norah and the little girls waited, and where faithful Ellen had laid out a feast. The room was full of flowers, and there was a pile of letters and telegrams. So many good wishes, Katharine thought with gratitude and humility. She had done a great deal of damage to Ireland and the Irish cause, but all these people could still forgive her.

She let Norah take off her smart hat with the gay knot of violets, and then sank on her knees to gather Clare and Katie to her.

“Mamma, you have wet on your cheeks,” Katie complained, and Clare said severely, “You shouldn’t cry in your good dress, Mamma.”

Phyllis knocked at the door and came in, flustered.

“Mrs. O’Shea, could you come down for a minute. There’s one of those newspaper men in the hall insisting on seeing you.”

Charles rapped out, “What do you mean, Phyllis?
Who
is Mrs. O’Shea?” and suddenly everyone was laughing uproariously, and from then on there were no more tears.

Mrs. Parnell … It had come true at last. Long after Charles had fallen asleep that night, Katharine lay listening to his quiet breathing, acutely conscious of his form beside her as if it were for the first time and she didn’t know every bone, every muscle of his body. Its familiarity seemed suddenly strange and exciting. Was this because a few words had been said over them, and a ring slipped on her finger? Perhaps it was. She was more deeply conventional than she had realised.

But there were soon more separations. Charles was off to Paris to see Irish exiles, and then back to Ireland. Ireland, Katharine thought, was like a disease that was eating him up as surely as the famine killed so many peasants. But he was doubly thoughtful of her now. She had been so distressed by the incident of the lime in his eyes that he sent a telegram to her every day. Not that they were always cheerful messages, they merely indicated that he was still alive. “Town of Sligo hostile, the priests against us,” he reported, or “good friendly minority”. Then there was the day when he said sadly, “O’Kelly has gone, too.” O’Kelly had been one of the closest to him. The scar from his wounding stayed on one eyelid. On her questioning he had to admit that the name Kitty O’Shea was still screamed derisively at him. “They don’t know your real name, my Katie.”

It was August, the summer heat was beginning to wane, and the wheat in the fields behind the house had turned golden. September came in with rain, and leaves were beginning to turn rusty. It was an early autumn. It looked like being an early winter.

Charles was ready to catch the Irish mail again.

“I’ll send a telegram from Dublin.”

“Darling, you look so tired.”

He was so taut, so preoccupied, that he was beginning to find even her solicitude irritating.

“Now, don’t tell me again to give in, because I would rather die than do that.” He saw her look of hurt and added belatedly, “I will only if you insist.”

She turned away, biting her lip.

“You must do what you think right. I’ve packed plenty of warm underwear and socks. You will remember to change if you get wet. How can you expect your rheumatism to get better if you sit in damp clothing?”

“Yes, Kate, yes.”

“And promise to ask Doctor Kenny for a sedative if the pain is bad.”

“You don’t need to worry. Kenny watches over me like an old woman.” He was gone from her already, his eyes brooding over troubles ahead, his face set. “I’ll be back by the weekend, I hope. I’ll telegraph.”

The autumn in Ireland was beginning to be more like winter. At Creggs where Mr. Parnell was due to make a speech the lowering sky touched the treetops, and before his speech was half finished a drenching downpour had set in. He had never let bad weather stop him. Scorning shelter, he continued to speak in spite of his audience slowly drifting away. Once they would have been indifferent to the rain, too, when they had their beloved chief to listen to. Now the cold was deeper than that brought by the bad weather.

When at last Mr. Parnell consented to go into the hotel and changed into dry clothes, he was shivering with fever and his joints were so stiff and painful with rheumatism that he had difficulty in moving.

Nevertheless, in spite of Doctor Kenny’s advice to rest, he travelled back to Dublin and spent three days working on plans for starting a new paper. One of the most recent and hardest blows had been the defection of the loyal
Freeman’s
Journal. It had turned to the seceders, it was echoing Tim Healy’s sentiments, and could not be allowed to do so unopposed.

Mr. Parnell’s remaining friends were deeply worried about his health. His cheeks burned with fever, his eyes were sunken, at times he seemed half-delirious. But he drove himself on. He must be back in England for the weekend, he had promised his wife. He would be obliged if he could be got a cabin on the boat so that he could lie down during the crossing. That rest and a few days at home would set him up capitally. He would be back in Dublin the following Saturday.

He stood on deck waving goodbye to Mr. Kelly and Mr. Clancy. It was still raining and the sea was grey as the mail-steamer edged out of the dock. The watching men could see that the tall figure remained on deck for as long as the boat was visible to their eyes. It seemed as if he were taking a long farewell of the land he loved.