The Herbalist (38 page)

She walked as fast as she could without
running, walked along the main street with no idea which direction to take. She
couldn’t go to Mai’s; it was too risky, with Finbar lurking there. She
almost had the price of the fare to London, but where would she stay? What would she do?
She needed more money. The herbalist owed her for all that time labelling; he
hadn’t paid her a penny. So she turned on her heel and headed for his house.

It was an age before he answered the door.
When he did, he was wearing a soft leather motorcycle helmet and brown jacket. He was
impatient to get going, told her that he had no money in the house.

‘Come back in an hour or two,’
was all he said.

But she had nowhere to go till then. She
began to weep.

‘Can I wait here, till you come
back?’

‘No, you can’t.’ The
herbalist was jumpy, irritated.

‘Then you must give me my money
now.’

‘I don’t have it.’

‘I’ve waited long enough; I need
it now.’

‘Look, come back in an hour, then
you’ll get it.’

He shut and locked his door, mounted his
motorcycle, started it up and buzzed off. What would she do for the hour, where could
she wait? Trust the herbalist to be the only person in the town who locked his door. She
walked around the back of the house, to find somewhere to sit while she waited. The back
window was open slightly, just two or so inches. Enough for her to get a good grip and
shove it upwards. It made a horrible grinding sound, but it opened. Sarah took a quick
look around to make sure no one could see and then climbed up on to the sill and in. The
window was harder to close than it had been to open, but she tried to leave it as
she’d found it.

She moved a chair to the front window,
buttoned up her coat and sat waiting. He’d go mad when he saw her here, but what
choice did she have? She had nowhere else to go.

She wondered what Dan would do. He would
probably go to his pal Mick Murphy’s and Mick would keep him there. They were both
hiding like children; it was laughable. Since Carmel thought the child was Dan’s,
perhaps Dan did too? As far as she could make out, he hadn’t denied it to Carmel.
Maybe he believed he had got Sarah in trouble. The whole town would think it was
Dan’s child after Carmel’s theatrics anyway. Maybe Dan and Sarah could run
off together? Could start somewhere else, where the people weren’t so
narrow-minded.

An unwelcome thought popped up – Dan was
narrow-minded. She wasn’t even sure if she could go to him.

Panic set in. What would Mai do? What would
Mai say?

One step at a time
, that’s
what she’d say. Just concentrate on getting your money, and getting the six
o’clock train to Dublin. In Dublin, worry about getting to London. In London,
worry about getting to your aunt Margaret. Then worry about her turning you away.

One step at a time.
Just like she had
managed.

The thick greying plaster on the
herbalist’s walls made her queasy. When was he coming back with her money?

Charlie was inconsolable. He had gone into
town and heard of Rose’s death even before I’d got up that morning. The news
had spread quickly. He told me she was found dead in her own bed after a brief
illness.

‘But she wasn’t even
sick,’ he cried; ‘she wasn’t even sick!’

He wouldn’t let me fix him anything;
he went around the house opening doors and slamming them. He was beside himself. He said
that he had been waiting up for Rose all night, that she was his desperate friend, that
the parlour had been prepared for her. He stopped short of getting down on his knees and
howling.

I went back up to my bedroom to dress. I
lifted my pillow and looked at the envelope I had taken from Rose’s jacket the
night before. I eased the envelope open without tearing it and took out the letter. I
knew I shouldn’t, and at the same time I really knew I should. I thought of
Rose’s knees, of her never, ever being out of her mother’s company. I
thought of her parents in that room where her body was laid out, the way they’d
said nothing to me or to each other. And the way they’d lied. The way they had
already told everyone that she’d died at home after a short illness. Why would
they do that when there could be a raving lunatic out there, ready to kill again?

The envelope was barely wet. Rose
can’t have been there long. The hair on the top of her head had been flat and
darkened. Had I come along in the middle of something? It was my duty to find out.

Ah, I was codding no one – I opened the poor
dead girl’s letter because I was a nosy cow.

Dear Mother,

The baby’s gone. I’m sorry. It’s what you wanted but not what
I wanted. I would’ve loved that baby. And all the rooms in our house that
are so empty.
It would’ve only taken up a small space.
Now it’s taking up no space at all.

I have to go. I know someone kind and he’s going to mind me. I’ve
got to go, because if I don’t leave another baby will come and we’ll
all be hurt all over again. As long as I live in that house, babies will keep
coming. Are you putting your hands over your ears now, Mother? Please listen
this time. I’m not lying.

I don’t think you know what it was like, what was really done. If
you’d known, you wouldn’t have made me do it, I know that. You
thought it was all flowers and tinctures, isn’t that right? A spoon of
something. If you knew the truth, you’d know why I have to leave now.
I’m not going because I don’t love you. That’s why I want you
to know these things, and when I’ve gone away, you can tell people and
they can stop it happening to another girl, even a bad one, because no one
deserves to have their baby hurt out of them, no one.

He always offered me syrup in a small glass first. It was dark and bitter. I got
sick afterwards, into a bucket that he kept there. He made me remove my
underclothes. He examined me, with his hands. Do you know what I mean? I cried
so much it vexed him. Then he picked up a long instrument and forced it into my
private parts. He did this every time.

You said to him, ‘My little girl is in trouble, help her,’ and you
paid him. And now there is no baby for me. Maybe there never will be again. God
forgive us, Mother.

I don’t want you to worry: I’m safe now. No more of that for me,
don’t ever worry.

Love,

Rose

He did that. The herbalist did that.
Nothing they don’t ask for.
That was what he said. And who gave Rose
a baby? I ran down and said out straight to Charlie: ‘Did you get Rose in trouble,
did you?’

He was crying so much I couldn’t make
out what he said. I felt awful for distressing him when I did finally make it out. He
had kissed her once, on the hand. He loved her; he was helping her to escape. Yes, she
was in some trouble, but it was another man who had got her in it, someone she
couldn’t stand up against, someone who’d locked her under the stairs. That
wouldn’t have made sense to most people, but it made horrible sense to me.

Sarah had almost dozed off. The chair was
well stuffed and her feet rested comfortably on her suitcase. She leant forward and
peeped through the crack in the curtains. Young girls were gathered around the pump
outside. One with fair hair to her waist worked the handle; it took all her strength to
push it down and release the water. Her feet left the ground every time the handle rose
up again. Her two friends held their dusty toes under the gushing water and squealed
with pleasure. Sarah smiled. A dark stout woman appeared and the children quietened as
she passed. The woman was marching towards the herbalist’s house. Sarah moved back
from the window and listened to the footsteps approach. Even though she knew it was
coming, the knock gave her a fright. She sank back into the soft chair and closed her
eyes. She felt the woman waiting on the other side, waiting and listening for any sign
of life. ‘He’s not there, missus,’ a girl shouted. ‘He’s
gone off on his motorbike.’ Sarah heard the woman walk away. The children began
squealing again.

Sarah realized then that she was starving.
All she’d eaten for breakfast was a biscuit. She went to the cupboard. The deep
shelves were full, but not with food. They were crammed with jars. Some contained dried
matter and were labelled – ‘Speedwell’, ‘Red Clover’,
‘Eyebright’, ‘Sage’ – but most weren’t. The unlabelled
jars were packed with tablets, some large and brown, others small and white. Sarah
uncorked a tall slim bottle that looked like it might be a tincture. It smelt of nothing
she recognized. It smelt wrong. She put it back. There were hunks of beeswax on the
bottom shelf, sitting alongside bottles of rose water, lavender water, witch hazel and a
dozen small jars. She unscrewed the lid of one of them, dabbed her finger into a white
cream and rubbed it on the back of her hand. It melted into her skin. She massaged a
dollop into her hands. It felt wonderful. Sarah turned the jar upside down, saw a tab
and read the
familiar round handwriting:
‘Comfrey’
.
It was Mai’s cream, the one the colonel loved
so much that he had her make it for him in batches. He obviously loved it so much that
he was selling it on. She remembered Mai’s ‘Sarah … do it with love.’
Sarah took the jars, opened her suitcase and packed them away.

Never mind waiting for him to come back. If
the herbalist had any money here, she would find it herself. A two-roomed house
wouldn’t take long to search.

She checked the cupboard first, in behind
the bottles and jars, and then the various tins over the mantelpiece. They contained
sugar, tea leaves, dried herbs and biscuits. She looked under the narrow stretcher bed
he had shoved against the wall – nothing. She searched beneath the seat of the armchair
by the window, in the turf basket by the fire, under the table, the school-desk. She
found no money.

She didn’t fancy going back into the
room he slept in, but there was nowhere left. She went into his room and lifted the
mattress. Nothing there. Under the pillow she found an envelope. A picture fell out, a
tattered photo of a mother and child. She didn’t care who they were. She put the
picture back in the envelope and returned it to where she’d found it. She looked
in his jug and basin. Still nothing. She got down on her knees, lifted the heavy fringed
bed-cover and looked under the bed. She tugged out a box from underneath.

The last time Sarah had seen tools like
these was in a doctor’s bag. Once, when Mai was attending a breech delivery, the
woman’s husband had panicked and sent for the doctor. He arrived with a huge black
case that he plonked on a sideboard by the window and yanked open. The instruments
inside glinted as he prepared to go into action. But before he could do anything the
baby slipped out on to the bed – Mai had turned it with her hands. The husband brought
the doctor into the kitchen for a drink while the mother nursed her child. Mai took her
time tidying up the room. As she waited, Sarah stared into the doctor’s open case,
fascinated that he needed all those tools when her aunt could birth a child with her
bare hands.

Unlike the instruments in the doctor’s
bag, those in the herbalist’s box were worn and dull. He had other bits and pieces
in there too. It all looked very shabby. She pulled the lid down on the box
and shoved it back under the bed with her foot. Was the herbalist
moonlighting delivering children? Who in their right mind would let him near them? It
didn’t make sense.

There was nowhere else to search. Sarah
would have to wait till he came back. He owed her almost twelve shillings and she needed
every penny. She also needed a drink of water and something to eat. She left the
herbalist’s bedroom and closed the door behind her.

She grabbed the biscuit tin from the
mantelpiece and went over to the back window, daring to pull the curtains slightly open.
The sun shone in as if it were the middle of summer instead of nearly autumn. She
spotted Aggie’s boat moored just up the river. Aggie moved around a lot. Afraid
someone might evict her if she ever stayed too long in the one part of the river.