The Family Way Page 16

  “Tomorrow I’ll look into hiring a buggy for us at the livery stable,” she said, “but in this heat let someone else sit up front and crack the whip.”

  I was still having misgivings about taking Bridie with us to such an inhospitable-looking place, and she solved the problem by saying she didn’t feel well and wanted to take a nap. The innkeeper promised to check in on her, so I left her lying on her cot.

  We found a horse and cab standing in the shade of some trees near the station, and climbed aboard. It was a tight squeeze with three of us in the passenger seat and we were hot and uncomfortable by the time we turned into that narrow lane between the fir trees. I had been fighting off sleep until Sid suddenly exclaimed, “There it is. Look, Gus. It is deliciously Gothic—like something out of the Middle Ages. How long has this convent been here?”

  “It used to be the old fever hospital, so I was told,” I said. “It had been abandoned for some time when the nuns came down from Quebec and took it over during the last century.”

  “They obviously looked for the most uncomfortable building in New York State,” Sid said. “To make it easy to do penance every day. And avoid purgatory.”

  She and Gus exchanged a chuckle.

  I felt the hackles of my Catholic roots rise, but I’m afraid I had to agree with them. It was the most uncomfortable-looking building in New York State. We climbed down, stiff and sweating after the trip, and attempted to straighten out the creases in our dresses and mop our perspiring brows. I tucked flyaway strands of sweaty hair under my hat and adjusted the little veil so that I looked prim and proper. I realized that the nuns would also have to approve of me as a potential employer for Katy, and my friends, however much I was fond of them, were a trifle bohemian in the way they dressed.

  Sid strode up to that massive front door and gained great pleasure from hammering on it with the iron knocker.

  “One now expects it to open and Frankenstein’s assistant to lure one inside,” she said. “If an aged nun with a hunchback says, ‘Come inside, young mistress,’ I don’t think I’ll go.”

  We waited for a while, the sun beating down upon our backs and heat radiating from that blank stone wall. Sid knocked again. “Perhaps they are all at prayer,” she said. “Or at tea.”

  Then slowly the door opened, with a deep creaking noise. A young woman stood there, a pale creature, dressed in a simple black dress with a deep white collar. Her hair was pulled back severely from her face into a braid down her back and there was no bulge under her pinafore.

  “Pax vobiscum,” she said.

  “Oh, hello.” I stepped forward and held out my hand. “I wondered if we might have a word with Katy. I spoke with her the other day and have decided that I’d like to offer her domestic employment in my household when she is ready to leave.”

  “With Katy?” For a moment I wondered if she was simpleminded.

  “Yes, you have a young woman here called Katy, don’t you? She was minding the door last time I came.”

  I saw a spasm of pain cross her face. “Oh, ma’am. I’m sorry to tell you that Katy is dead.”

  “Dead? Oh, no. Did the baby come early then? Did she die in childbirth?”

  She shook her head as if trying to shake out a bad memory. “No, ma’am. She fell down a flight of steps and broke her neck. The poor baby died too, God rest its little soul.”

  Twenty

  We stood staring at her, frozen like a group of statues, our shadows black and rigid on the ground in that bright sun.

  “I’m so sorry,” I said. “She seemed like such a nice cheerful girl.”

  “Oh, she was, ma’am,” the girl said. “I understand that everyone here was very fond of her. They were most upset about it.” She paused. “Would you like to come in? I’m not supposed to keep you standing on the doorstep. I can fetch one of the sisters.”

  I was trying to make my brain work, but it refused to. “No, thank you,” I said. “There is little point now that Katy is no longer with you.”

  “You might want to consider one of the other girls for service in your house,” she said. “They are always looking for good situations and kind people who will take them in, knowing their past.”

  I hesitated, wondering if she was trying to convince me to hire her. “Are you about ready to leave here yourself then?”

  She smiled for the first time. “Oh, no, ma’am. I’m about to enter the order. I’m a novice here.”

  “You’re going to be a nun here?” Sid asked before I could stop her. “To shut yourself away before you know anything of life?”

  The girl smiled again, such a sweet smile. “Oh, yes. It’s what I’ve wanted for a long time. I know I have a calling.”

  “You’ve been here for a while?” I asked.

  “Almost a year now,” she answered.

  “Then you will remember a girl called Maureen O’Byrne who left abruptly a couple of months ago?”

  “Was she one of the young mothers?”

  “She was. An Irish girl. Light hair.”

  She was still smiling sweetly as she shook her head. “We novices don’t come in contact with the young women who stay here. Mother doesn’t think it’s wise for us to see that other side of life. She thinks we’ll fall in love with the babies and not want to stay.”

  “And you don’t think you would?” Sid asked.

  “Oh, no,” she said. “I saw what you’d call normal life did to my mother. One baby after another and her growing weaker and weaker until she was just a shadow of the person I remembered. That’s not for me, thank you.”

  “But isn’t what you’re doing running away not running toward?” Sid demanded. I could tell she was all ready to talk this girl out of her decision.

  “We should be going, then,” I said hastily. “I wish you well.”

  “Thank you.” She paused, taking in our faces. “You are probably the last outsiders I will be able to chat with like this. I go into retreat tomorrow before I take my first vows.” She glanced back into the darkness. “I should probably go back inside.”

  The big door closed with finality. I turned to walk away. Sid caught up with me. “Why did you say you didn’t want to go in and see one of the sisters, Molly? You know we were dying to look around inside.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I wasn’t thinking. After I heard the news about Katy I was so upset all I wanted to do was to get away. Besides, you wouldn’t have seen much. They take you into a little parlor opposite the front door and you have to talk to the nuns through a carved wooden grille in the wall. It’s so dark that all you see is a vague shape.”

  “I would still have wanted to see that,” Sid said. “Wouldn’t you, Gus?”

  “I could see no reason to talk to one of the sisters,” I said. “It would obviously have been painful for them to speak about Katy and they might have tried to foist another girl onto me when I am not really in a position to take one now.”

  We summoned the cabby who had been waiting in the deep shade of the fir trees.

  “You really must have developed an instant bond with this girl, Molly,” Gus said. “You seem deeply affected by this news.”

  “I am affected by it,” I said. “She was so young, so fresh-faced and cheerful, and it seems like such a horrible, senseless end to her life.”

  “I suppose one can understand how it happened,” Sid said. “If the place is as old and crumbling inside as it looks from the exterior then there are bound to be dark and broken staircases, aren’t there?”

  I nodded, trying to make myself agree with this, but I couldn’t. I sat staring out straight ahead of me.

  “And if she was in the late stages of pregnancy she could hardly see where she was putting her feet on the steps,” Gus added. “And I’m sure one’s balance is off-kilter. One small stumble and she fell.”

  “I suppose so,” I said. “But I can’t help thinking—” I left the rest of the sentence hanging in the humid air.

  “You can’t help thinking what?�
�� Sid demanded.

  “Katy fell to her death right after she had told me her suspicions about Maureen. Maybe she remembered some other details. Maybe she confided her suspicions to someone else.”

  “Are you trying to say you think that foul play was involved?” Gus asked. “That somebody deliberately pushed Katy down the stairs to stop her from talking?” She looked at me and a smile spread across her face. “Molly, you have spent too much time investigating crime. This is a convent. In spite of the way Sid and I were joking about it, I’m sure the inhabitants are nice, normal, and gentle women who do not make a practice of pushing people down stairs.”

  “A tragic accident, Molly,” Sid reiterated. “Accidents happen. Nothing sinister about it. Just coincidental that she spoke to you before she died.”

  I sat there silently. Then I dared to voice the thought that had crept into my mind. “I can’t help wondering now whether something bad happened to Maureen. Perhaps she didn’t run away at all. And Katy figured it out and…”

  Gus put her hand over mine. “Molly, my dearest. I’m afraid your current delicate condition is making you overemotional. You’re reading too much into this. Maureen took her chance to run away while everyone was at breakfast, but she didn’t have time to go back for her possessions. And poor Katy fell. Please accept those things and let this be. I’m sure it’s not good for you to be thinking such worrying thoughts at this time. You should be thinking calm and happy thoughts for the baby’s sake.”

  “Yes,” I said. “You are right. I should let it go. There isn’t anything I can do anyway.”

  And I tried to think those happy thoughts as we arrived back at Tarrytown Station.

  Bridie was awake and feeling better enough to go in search of an ice cream, and we spent a pleasant evening sitting on the porch of the inn, watching the commerce on the river, and the sun setting on the far shore. I resolved to stop worrying about Maureen and Katy, and to accept that I could do nothing more and that my duty was now to my unborn child. I would do what I supposedly came to do, enjoy my time on the river with my friends.

  But that night I had a dream. I dreamed that I was standing in some kind of dark place; a place of whispering wind, or was it voices. All I could make out were vague archways. I looked around, trying to work out where I was, when I noticed a figure standing before me in the darkness. I could see that it was a young woman. As I moved toward her she half turned toward me and said, in a very Irish voice, “Katy, it was good of you to come and find me.”

  And I saw there was another girl standing in the shadows and they were suddenly aware of my presence and turned to look at me.

  I woke up with a jolt and sat up in bed, my heart pounding. We Irish have great faith in dreams and the second sight. If ever there was a clear message from the beyond then that was it. Katy had been on the right track after all. That voice had to belong to Maureen. Katy had found out what really happened to her and where she had gone. And presumably she had come to me in a dream because she wanted me to know the truth too. Sleep was now impossible. I got up and went to sit in the open window, feeling the cool breeze from the river gently caressing my skin.

  “I wish you’d been more specific,” I muttered. Katy obviously hadn’t left the convent, so she must have uncovered another clue to Maureen’s whereabouts within the confines of those walls. And therefore in a place inaccessible to me. Yet they had come to me in a dream, which meant they still wanted my help.

  Bridie slept, her light hair spilling over the pillow. I looked down at her fondly, then went back to the task in hand. Maureen had come to me. Katy was dead so I wasn’t going to get any more clues from her. But Maureen thought I had enough knowledge to come to the truth. And having had this dream, I was now sure that it wasn’t as simple as just running off to New York. Something bad had happened to Marureen O’Byrne and she wanted me to uncover the truth.

  I went over everything I had heard and seen and I realized that I kept coming back to the Mainwarings. Something didn’t add up with them. Mrs. Mainwaring was described by the sisters as generous enough to want Maureen back. And yet she hadn’t come across to me as a warm-hearted woman. To her, servants would be ten a penny, to hire or discard at whim. Maureen had stated that she had to go back; she had no choice. And yet she surely had plenty of choice. She was under no obligation to return to a place where she wasn’t happy. Now she was no longer encumbered with a baby she could easily do what Sid and Gus had suggested and start afresh in New York City. Mrs. Mainwaring wouldn’t give her a reference, of course, but she could claim to be freshly arrived from Ireland and start with a household where references weren’t so important.

  And another thing: why was she so angry that Mrs. Mainwaring had come to see the sisters the day before she ran away? And what had brought about that final explosion in which she had yelled, “You can’t make me. It’s cruel.” What could have been so cruel that she chose to sneak away and be gone by the next morning? Was it possible it had something to do with murdering her own child? No, I was letting my imagination run away with me. Surely nobody would ever try to force her to do that.

  Was it then to do with joining the order? Were they forcing her to enter the novitiate against her will? Obviously not, since the young novice had never come across her or even knew her name. Besides, I had been raised to respect nuns. I didn’t believe any of the rumors that the Protestants circulated. What would be the point of gaining recruits to the convent against their will?

  You can’t make me. It’s cruel. I tossed those words around in my mind. I remembered what Emily had said about Sister Angelique being mean and spiteful and not liking Maureen because Maureen had stood up to her. Might the words have been as simple as Sister making her throw away her little statue to show she was renouncing earthly goods? But if that was all, would it have driven her to run away?

  Gray light of dawn lit the sky and still I was no nearer to any enlightenment. But I knew I had to visit the Mainwarings again. I had to find out why Maureen thought she had to return there.

  Twenty-one

  I went back to bed but I don’t think I did more than doze for the rest of the night. When I came down to breakfast in the morning Sid and Gus were already tucking into ham and eggs. Gus looked at me critically.

  “Molly, you look terrible. You’ve bags under your eyes and you’re quite pasty-faced. All this rushing around has not been good for you.”

  “No, Molly,” Sid said firmly. “Gus and I have been talking and we think this whole business with Maureen has overly upset you. We’ve decided that the best thing would be to take you back to your mother-in-law’s today and let her look after you. If you’re trapped with her in the country, you won’t have any more mad urges to solve problems.”

  I shook my head violently.

  “I know you’re not entirely thrilled with your mother-in-law,” Sid continued hastily, “but for the sake of the baby we’ve got to find a way to make you rest.”

  “I can’t,” I cut into her words. “You don’t understand, I have to see this through now. I had a dream last night. It was Maureen who came to me. I know she wants me to find out the truth.”

  Gus smiled. “You Irish and your dreams. Molly, dear, I’ve been to lectures on the subject. Professor Freud has been studying dream psychology in Vienna and he says that all dreams come from our own emotional state. You are worried about Maureen, you are upset about Katy, ergo you dream about them. They are lurking in your subconscious at night. It’s perfectly normal and it doesn’t mean that you’re getting a communication from the beyond.”

  “I believe it does,” I said. “You can say what you like but I’ve had dreams before that really were communications ‘from the beyond,’ as you put it. And everyone in Ireland can tell you stories of dreams like that.”

  “Professor Freud would disagree,” Gus said. “But I thought we came to the conclusion last night that there was nothing more we could do to look for Maureen. And you’d certainly never be able to prove
that somebody pushed Katy down those stairs.”

  “There is one thing I can do and I will do,” I said. “And that is to go back to the Mainwarings’ house and talk to the servants.”

  “And why would you want to do that?” Sid asked suspiciously. “I thought we ascertained that Maureen never returned to them, even though they expected her to.”

  “So Mrs. Mainwaring said,” I said, surprised at the words that came out of my mouth. “I only have her word for it.”

  “What reason would she have for denying it?”

  I shrugged. “Maybe she changed her mind about having a fallen woman in a house where there was her own young child, but she didn’t want to appear ungracious and lose respect in the eyes of the sisters. Besides,” I added, “there is something that doesn’t quite add up about that place.”

  Gus wagged a finger at me. “Are you sure you’re not being Irish and fey again? Just because this Mainwaring woman wasn’t open and welcoming to you, doesn’t mean she has anything to hide. She probably saw from your dress that you were not a person of consequence and therefore not worth the effort.” She reached across and touched my hand. “I’m sorry, I didn’t wish to offend.”

  “No offense taken,” I said. “I’m sure you’re quite right about that. She was a person to whom such things matter. Rather shallow and maybe vindictive, I thought. That’s why welcoming a disgraced servant back didn’t quite add up.”

  “I see what you mean,” Sid nodded.

  “So that’s why I need to go back there and talk to the servants. Servants always know what is going on. They’ll be able to tell me things about Maureen.”

  “What sort of things?” Sid asked.

  “Why she said she had no choice about going back there when she clearly didn’t want to. Why she was angry with Mrs. Mainwaring for coming to the convent. Why I have such a strange feeling that something is not right there.”

  “You are a very stubborn woman, do you know that?” Sid said. “I pity Daniel, having to deal with you. I’m sure he sent you to his mother so that you couldn’t rush all over town, and now here you are doing exactly what he wanted to avoid.”