The Good People (37 page)

Peter and John placed Áine on the bed in the far corner of the room, and as they settled her on the blanket she murmured, the lid of one eye rising unsteadily before falling shut. Nance ordered Peter to return to the river for more water and asked John to build up the fire. It was only when the turf had been kindled and the flames threw an uneasy glow about the room that they saw the gifts and tokens lying on the cabin’s table. Noggins of butter and a basket of turf and kindling. Someone had placed a small salted nugget of bacon next to some eggs. Yellow flowers for protection: sprays of gorse and a cross woven of reeds. And on the edge of the table, a small, clean folded cloth of dowry linen.

That night was as long as the howl of a dog. Nance sat hunched over Áine for the full, slow swing of the moon, dribbling water into her mouth as the ivy and hart’s tongue boiled on the fire. She urged Peter to give John as much
poitín
as would send him into sleep on the rushes, and kept the hearth alive, getting up only to refill the piggin of well water, feed the flames with turf and, once, to scrub the blood and ashes off the stone. The woman had left a shadow of her own scorching on the flag.

Shortly before dawn Nance drained the ivy and fern leaves and pummelled their paste into softened butter. She stepped out into the brittle chill and let the rising fingers of sunlight touch the poultice. Then she returned inside and dressed Áine’s raw skin, painting the woman’s wounds with the herbed fat under prayer and a blessing of her own tongue, soothing her with a stream of words that carried in them no other meaning than a calm urgency to stay alive. She closed her eyes and thought of her da and Maggie, and Father O’Reilly, and all those who had seen in her hands a higher healing, who believed she carried a light. And she thought on her light, her knowledge and her cure, and felt her hands grow hot with it, until all suddenly spasmed, and there were rough fingers gripping her wrists and the sound of the clay vessel breaking on the floor, and when she opened her eyes it was Father Healy and Seán Lynch taking her outside, pulling her so hard that her muscles tightened with the pain of their grip, and her toes scraped against the cobbles, and there was the fresh morning air and mud, and she lay in it and there was Father Healy, pale-faced, mouth saying something to John, who argued in desperation, and above her the birds circled and the sun was rising bloody, rising red in night’s slaughter.

CHAPTER

FIFTEEN

Oak

‘Y
ou’d think nobody ever died
, there were so many there!’

‘Hearing the Mass!’

Peg nodded, glancing down to the wicker basket where the boy was concealed beside her. She and Nóra were sitting out in the yard knitting, taking in the rare sun of a thin-clouded day while Mary washed the child’s soiled rags, steam rising from her barrel.

‘’Tis the fear,’ Peg said. ‘’Tis a nervous time, what with the animals in foal and calf, and the potatoes about to be put into ground. Folk are vexed. They want reassurance that all will be well. They’re praying for the strange happenings to stop. There are them that might not believe in such things but for what has been happening.’

‘Áine.’

Peg crossed herself. ‘God be with her. Yes, Áine, but also your Martin. Brigid. There’s queer things happening up the mountains if you believe half of what goes round. And they’re after finding patterns in it all. They’re after finding reason for it.’

The boy emitted a loud shriek from his basket and the women exchanged glances.

‘’Tis back as it was,’ murmured Nóra, nodding at the child. ‘Pounding its head against the floor, pounding its fists. The
lus mór
took all the cross ways out of it, but now it’s after screeching for milk again, and scratching the maid.’ Nóra reached down and pushed the boy’s extended arm back into the basket. ‘Will she live, do you think?’

‘Áine?’

‘Aye.’

‘I pray to God ’tis so. There’s a Killarney doctor with her. The priest brought him himself. He’s hard against Nance now, and her that had the knowledge to take Áine to the river.’

‘’Twas swift thinking.’

‘Aye, and I say ’tis what saved her. But Father Healy will have none of it. Tossing her out into the yard like that! Now, I understand he has no time for a woman like Nance, that he does be thinking she’s a wonder maker. But, sure, ’tis a sad day when a priest is pushing a woman into the mud, with a grand age on her too.’

‘’Tis shameful.’

‘Throwing after her all the herbs brought in good faith.’ Peg sniffed. ‘John O’Donoghue asked him to let Nance treat the woman, but there’s no arguing with a priest. Sure, Father Healy will have Nance out of this valley. He’s already after turning minds against her. Nóra . . .’ She stopped knitting and sat the needles on her lap. ‘There are those that used to go to Nance for the cure and now they won’t even look in her direction. A man came the other day asking for her. Said his mother told him of a woman who could take the jaundice out of his child. But would you know, the man he asked was Daniel Lynch, and your own Dan wouldn’t be telling him where she lives. Told him to go on home and that no one with the charms was hereabouts.’

‘Dan’s gone with the shock of the child, may God protect him.’

‘And Brigid too, I’m sure. ’Tis a sad thing for her to be waiting for the churching and no one to be talking with but her man, when what she surely needs is company.’

‘Faith, I can’t imagine Dan speaking out against anybody.’

‘It may be he’s after believing Father Healy. The man is preaching against Nance at the altar. At the Mass he was saying she’s nothing more than a quackered hag, turned to the rot and meddling in lives to bring food to her mouth.’

‘Sure, Kate Lynch was telling all about the bittersweet Nance gave to Brigid.’ Nóra nodded at Mary. ‘The girl heard it herself at the well. Talk of poisoning. I don’t believe a word of it.’

Peg nodded. ‘I don’t believe it either. But Nóra, that’s what folk are saying of Áine.’ She reached out and placed her hand on Nóra’s knee. ‘Someone saw her go to Nance’s. Alone, like. They found tansy and lady’s mantle in the house.’

Nóra shook her head. ‘Sure, Nance was healing Áine with herbs afore Father Healy threw her out. The night she was burnt. They were just for the healing.’

Peg dropped her voice. ‘But that’s not all they’re saying. Nóra, how do you think Áine caught fire?’

‘Her dress caught light. From the hearth.’ Nóra brushed Peg’s hand away and resumed knitting. ‘How many women do you know with a smouldered apron? Begod, Peg, pity on her, but when a woman spends her hours by a fire, she’s bound to be burnt. Áine was unlucky to have it so bad, and God love her and heal her from it.’

Peg took a deep breath. ‘Nóra, I’m with you. I have no hard word against Nance. I believe she has the knowledge. But folk are saying ’twas no ordinary fire Áine was building that burnt her. They found the piss of a cow in the crock.’

‘In the crock?’

‘On the fire. The doctor found it and told the priest, and Father Healy asked John what Áine was doing, boiling potatoes in the water of a beast. John, bless his soul, told him then. ’Twas a cure told by Nance. All-flowers water.’

From across the yard Mary lifted her head and stared, open-mouthed.

‘Áine went to Nance to fix a child in her, so says John, and Nance gave her the herbs. The tansy. The lady’s mantle. She also told her to bathe in all-flowers water. ’Twas when Áine was fixing a bath of it that she caught alight. That’s what the high fire was for. ’Twas when she was following Nance’s charm.’

Nóra looked out past the yard across the valley. There was a softness on the hill, rendering the distance into golden haze. She could hear the ringing of tools on the air. ‘’Twas an accident, sure. No one is to blame.’

‘I know that, but Father Healy is saying the sin is on Nance. Muttering
piseógs
and the like. And Nóra, those that have a reluctance to trace it back to Nance’s hand are finding reason elsewhere.’

Nóra noticed Peg’s eyes flicker to the basket, and felt her stomach drop. ‘They’re saying ’tis the changeling?’

‘They’re scared, Nóra. There’s a fear in them.’ Peg sucked her teeth in thought. ‘I don’t tell you this to put the fright on you. But I thought you should know what’s being said in case anyone comes to pay you a visit, like.’

‘I’m going to Nance today, Peg. She will return my grandchild to me. She will bring back Micheál and they will not be able to lay blame at my door.’

‘I pray ’tis so, Nóra. Sweet, sore-wounded Christ. But be careful of folk. I wouldn’t let them see you go to her. I don’t know what they’ll think, but I can tell you, it won’t be good.’ Peg shuddered. ‘Not now. Anyone who still has a desire to go to Nance will be waiting for all this to blow over.’

‘Nothing is working,’ said Nóra. She stood before Nance’s door, reluctantly holding the changeling on her hip. ‘You said you could banish it, Nance. Why won’t the Good People give me my grandson back? What have I done?’ She was near weeping. She could feel the bones of the changeling’s chest against her side, feel his bleating breath.

‘It takes time,’ Nance replied. She was standing within the dark mouth of her cabin, her white hair mussed, arms held out from her sides like a man preparing to fight. ‘There’s no forcing the sea.’

Nóra shook her head. ‘You talk to Them. They gave you the knowledge. Why don’t you ask Them where Micheál is? Ask Them to return him to me. Tell them to take back
this
.’ She thrust the boy out in front of her, her hands gripping the rounded staves of his ribcage. His toes buttoned inwards, bare to the cold.

‘I am working the cure for you,’ Nance said, eyeing Nóra warily.

‘You do nothing! All you’ve done is stuff it with herbs that make it shit and tremble. It was leaking with your herbs. The lips of it have split for all the water that passed through it.’ Nóra heaved the changeling back upon the ridge of her hip and lowered her voice to a hiss. ‘Please, Nance. What you’ve done with the herbs and the foxglove, ’tis not enough. All it’s been doing is crying the louder and dirtying itself. It was all quiet and shaking, but now ’tis just as it was before. I asked you to make Them take back their own, not have it grow weak and sick, and then strong and well again. Sure, if it was a burden before, the changeling’s a weight on me now.’

Nance closed her eyes, swaying a little on her feet. She did not reply.

There was a long silence.

‘You’re filthy with drink,’ Nóra finally spat.

Nance opened her eyes. ‘I’m not.’

‘Look at the state of you.’

Nance sighed and took an unsteady step forward, lurching for the doorframe. She gripped the wood and pulled herself out over the doorstep. ‘Nóra.’

‘What? Look at you.’

‘Sit down with me.’

‘Here? I’m not sitting in the mud.’

‘Sit with me there. On that log by there.’

Nóra reluctantly followed the stumbling woman to the rotting tree trunk that lay fleeced with moss on the border of the woods.

Nance eased herself down onto it. She took a deep breath and patted the space beside her. ‘Sit you down, Nóra Leahy. Put the fairy on the ground. By there, on the grass. Under the oak.’

Nóra hesitated, lip curled, but her arms ached from carrying the changeling. Placing the child on a clump of new grass, she grudgingly sat beside Nance.

The old woman peered up at the oak’s bare branches. ‘
When the ash comes out before the oak, you’ll have a summer of dust and smoke.
’

‘What?’

Nance sniffed. ‘An old rhyme. Sure, the trees do be knowing what will come, long before it passes.’

Nóra grunted.

‘Do you see that there?’ Nance asked, pointing out beyond her cabin.

‘The Piper’s Grave.’

‘That’s it. The oak. The rowan. The whitethorn. That’s where They be.’

‘’Tis no news to me, Nance Roche. We all know where the Good People make their home.’

‘I’ve seen Them. I’ve heard Them.’ Nance blinked slowly, letting her arm drop to her side. ‘My mother was a great favourite of Theirs. They would come for her. On the fairy wind. They gave her a steed of ragwort and she went with them to the beautiful places. My aunt too. Faith, that’s where they went. And they left me, but they left me with the knowledge.’