just now there happened something of such unusual importance in the valley that mrs. brennan became excited about it. the assistant teacher of tullahanogue girls' school, miss mary jane o'donovan, had left, and a new assistant was coming in her stead. miss o'donovan had always given the making of her things to mrs. brennan, so she spoke of her, now that she was gone, as having been "a very nice girl." just yet, of course, she was not in a position to say as much about the girl who was coming. but the entry of a new person into the life of the valley was a great event! such new things could be said!
on monday morning mrs. brennan called her son into the sewing-room to describe the imminent nature of the event. the sense of depression that had come upon him during the previous day did not become averted as he listened.
what an extraordinary mixture this woman who was his mother now appeared before his eyes! and yet he could not question her in any action or in any speech; she was his mother, and so everything that fell from her must be taken in a mood of noble and respectful acceptance. but she was without charity, and as he saw her in this guise he was compelled to think of his father and the incident of yesterday, and he could not help [pg 45]wondering. he suddenly realized that what was happening presently in this room was happening in every house down the valley. even before her coming she was being condemned. it was beneath the shadow of this already created cloud she would have to live and move and earn her little living in the schoolhouse of tullahanogue. john brennan began to have some pity for the girl.
ned brennan now appeared at the door leading to the kitchen and beckoned to his wife. she went at his calling, and john noticed that at her return some part of her had fallen away. his father went from the house whistling at a pitch that was touched with delight.
"where is my father bound for?"
"he's gone to garradrimna, john, to order lead for the roof of the school. the valley behind the chimney is leaking again and he has to cobble it. 'tis the great bother he gets with that roof, whatever sort it is. isn't it a wonder now that father o'keeffe wouldn't put a new one on it, and all the money he gets so handy ...?"
"my father seems to be always at that roof. he used to be at it when i was going to school there."
the words of her son came to mrs. brennan's ears with a sound of sad complaint. it caused her to glimpse momentarily all the villainy of ned brennan towards her through all the years, and of how she had borne it for the sake of john. and here was john before her now becoming reverently magnified in that part of her mind which was a melting tenderness. it was him she must now save from the valley which had ruined her man. thus was she fearful again and the heart within her caused to become troubled and to rush to and fro in her breast like rushing water. then, as if her whole[pg 46] will was sped by some fearful ecstasy, she went on to talk in her accustomed way of every one around her, including the stranger who had not yet come to the valley.
it was on the evening of this day that rebecca kerr, the new assistant teacher, came through the village of garradrimna to the valley of tullahanogue. paddy mccann drove mcdermott's hackney car down past the old castle of the de lacys. it carried her as passenger from mullaghowen, with her battered trunk strapped over the well. the group of spitting idlers crowding around brannagan's loudly asserted so much as paddy mccann and his cargo loomed out of the shadows beneath the old castle and swung into the amazing realities of the village. it was just past ten o'clock and the mean place now lay amid the enclosing twilight. the conjunctive thirsts for drink and gossip which come at this hour had attacked the ejected topers, and their tongues began to water about the morsel now placed before them.
a new schoolmistress, well, well! didn't they change them shocking often in tullahanogue? and quare-looking things they were too, every one of them. and here was another one, not much to look at either. they said this as she came past. and what was her name? "kerr is her name!" said some one who had heard it from the very lips of father o'keeffe himself.
"rebecca kerr is her name," affirmed farrell mcguinness, who had just left a letter for her at the presbytery.
"rebecca what? kerr—kerr—kerr, is it?" sputtered padna padna; "what for wouldn't it be carr now,[pg 47] just common and simple? but of course kerr has a ring of the quality about it. kerr, be god!"
these were the oracles of garradrimna who were now speaking of her thus. but she had no thought of them at all as she glanced hurriedly at the shops and puzzled her brains to guess where the best draper's shop might be. she had a vague, wondering notion as to where she might get all those little things so necessary for a girl. she had a fleeting glimpse of herself standing outside one of those worn counters she was very certain existed somewhere in the village, talking ever so much talk with the faded girl who dispensed the vanities of other days, or else exchanging mild confidences with the vulgar and ample mistress of the shop, who was sure to be always floating about the place immensely. yes, just there was the very shop with its brave selection from the fashions of yester-year in the fly-blown windows.
and there was the post office through which her letters to link her with the outer world would come and go. she quickly figured the old bespectacled postmistress, already blinded partially, and bent from constant, anxious scrutiny, poring exultantly over the first letters that might be sent to "miss rebecca kerr," and examining the postmark. then the quality and gender of the writing, and being finally troubled exceedingly as to the person it could have come from—sister, mother, brother, father, friend, or "boy." even although the tall candles of romance had long since guttered and gone out amid the ashes of her mind the assaulting suspicion that it was from "a boy" would drive her to turn the letter in her hand and take a look at the flap. then the temptation that was a part of her life would[pg 48] prove too strong for her and a look of longing would come into the dull eyes as she went hobbling into the kitchen to place it over the boiling kettle and so embark it upon its steamy voyage to discovery. in a few minutes she would be reading it, her hands trembling as she chuckled in her obscene glee at all the noble sentiments it might contain. the subsequent return of the letter to the envelope after the addition of some gum from a penny bottle if the old sticking did not suffice. her interludiary sigh of satisfaction when she remembered that one could re-stick so many opened envelopes with a penny bottle of gum by using it economically. the inevitable result of this examination, a superior look of wisdom upon the withered face when the new schoolmistress, rebecca kerr, came for the first time into the office to ask for a letter from her love.... but so far in her life she had formed no deep attachment.
it was thus and thus that rebecca kerr ran through her mind a few immediate sketchy realizations of this village in ireland. she had lived in others, and this one could not be so very different.... there now was the butcher's stall, kept filthily, where she might buy her bit of beef or mutton occasionally. she caught a glimpse of the victualler standing with his dirty wife amid the strong-smelling meat. the name above the door was that of the publichouse immediately beside it. a little further on, upon the same side, was the newsagent's and stationer's, where they sold sweets and everything. it was here she might buy her notepaper to write to her own people in donegal, or else to some of her college friends with whom she still kept up a[pg 49] correspondence. and here also she might treat herself, on rare occasions, to a box of cheap chocolates, or to some of the injurious, colored sweets which always gave her the toothache, presenting the most of them, perhaps, to some child to whom she had taken a fancy.
by little bits like these, which formed a series of flashes, she saw some aspects of the life she might lead here. each separate flash left something of an impression before it went out of her mind.
the jingling car swung on past the various groups upon the street, each group twisting its head as one man to observe the spectacle of her passing. "that's the new schoolmistress!" "there she is, begad!" "i heard paddy mccann saying she was coming this evening!" she was now in line with the famous house of tommy williams, the gombeen-man. she knew from the look of it that it was here she must buy her few groceries, for this was the principal house in garradrimna and, even so far as she, the octopus of gombeenism was sure to extend itself. to be sure, the gombeen-man would be the father of a family, for it is the clear duty of such pillars of the community to rear up a long string of patriots. if those children happened to be of school-going age, it was certain they would not be sent to even the most convenient school unless the teachers dealt in the shop. this is how gombeenism is made to exercise control over national education. anyhow rebecca kerr was very certain that she must enter the various-smelling shop to discuss the children with the gombeen-man's wife.
it was indeed a dreary kind of life that she would be compelled to lead in this place, and, as she passed the[pg 50] pretty chapel, which seemed to stand up in the sight of heaven as excuse for the affront that was garradrimna, she had a strange notion how she must go there sometimes to find respite from the relentless crush of it all. on bitter evenings, when her mind should ring with the mean tumults of the life around her, it was there only she might go and, slipping in through the dim vestibule where there were many mortuary cards to remind her of all the dead, she would walk quickly to the last pew and, bending her throbbing head, pour out her soul in prayer with the aid of her little mother-of-pearl rosary.... they had gone a short distance past the chapel and along the white road towards the valley.
"this is the place," said paddy mccann.
she got down from the car wearily, and mccann carried her battered trunk into the house of sergeant mcgoldrick which had been assigned as her lodging by father o'keeffe. he emerged with a leer of expectation upon his countenance, and she gave him a shilling from her little possessions. at the door she was compelled to introduce herself.
"so you are the new teacher. well, begad! the missus is up in the village. come in. begad!"
he stood there, a big, ungainly man, at his own door as he gave the invitation, a squalling baby in his arms, and in went rebecca kerr, into the sitting-room where mrs. mcgoldrick made clothes for the children. the sergeant proceeded to do his best to be entertaining. she knew the tribe. he remained smoking his great black pipe and punctuated the squalls of the baby by spitting huge volumes of saliva which hit the fender with dull thuds.
[pg 51]
"it's a grand evening in the country," said sergeant mcgoldrick.
"yes, a nice evening surely," said rebecca kerr.
"oh, it was a grand, lovely day in the country, the day. i was out in the country all through the day. i was collecting the census of the crops, so i was; a difficult and a critical job, i can tell you!"
with an air of pride he took down the books of lists and showed her the columns of names and particulars.... it was stupidly simple. yet here was this hulk of a man expanding his chest because of his childish achievement. he had even stopped smoking and spitting to give space to his own amazement, and the baby had ceased mewling to marvel in infantile wonder at the spacious cleverness of her da.
after nearly half an hour of this performance mrs. mcgoldrick bustled into the room. she was a coarse-looking woman, whose manner had evidently been made even more harsh by the severe segregation to which the wives of policemen are subjected. her voice was loud and unmusical, and it appeared to rebecca from the very first that not even the appalling cleverness of her husband was a barrier to her strong government of her own house. the sergeant disappeared immediately, taking the baby with him, and left the women to their own company. mrs. mcgoldrick had seen the battered, many-corded trunk in the hall-way, and she now made a remark which was, perhaps, natural enough for a woman:
"you haven't much luggage anyway!" was what she said.
"no!" replied rebecca dully.
[pg 52]
then she allowed her head to droop for what seemed a long while, during all of which she was acutely conscious that the woman by her side was staring at her, forming impressions of her, summing her up.
"i don't think you're as tall as miss o'donovan was, and you haven't as nice hair!"
rebecca made no comment of any kind upon this candor, but now that the way had been opened mrs. mcgoldrick poured out a flood of information regarding the late assistant of the valley school. she was reduced to little pieces and, as it were, cremated in the furnace of this woman's mind until tiny specks of the ashes of her floated about and danced and scintillated before the tired eyes of rebecca kerr.
as the heavier dusk of the short, warm night began to creep into the little room her soul sank slowly lower. she was hungry now and lonely. in the mildest way she distantly suggested a cup of tea, but mrs. mcgoldrick at once resented this uncalled-for disturbance of her harangue by bringing out what was probably meant to be taken as the one admirable point in the other girl's character.
"miss o'donovan used always get her own tea."
but the desolating silence of rebecca at length drove her towards the kitchen, and she returned, after what seemed an endless period, with some greasy-looking bread, a cup without a handle, and a teapot from which the tea dribbled in agony on to the tablecloth through a wound in its side.
the sickening taste of the stuff that came out of the teapot only added to rebecca's sinking feeling. her thoughts crept ever downward.... at last there came[pg 53] a blessed desire for sleep-sleep and forgetfulness of this day and the morrow. her head was already beginning to spin as she inquired for her room.
"your room?" exclaimed mrs. mcgoldrick in harsh surprise. "why, 'tis upstairs. there's only two rooms there, myself and the sergeant's and the lodger's room—that's yours. i hadn't time this week back to make the bed since miss o'donovan left, but of course you'll do that for yourself. the sergeant is gone up to the barracks, so i'll have to help you carry up your box, as i suppose you'll be wanting to get out some of your things."
it was a cruelly hard job getting the trunk up the steep staircase, but between them they managed it. rebecca was not disappointed by the bare, ugly room. mrs. mcgoldrick closed the door behind them and stood in an attitude of expectation. even in the present dull state of her mind rebecca saw that her landlady was, with tense curiosity, awaiting the opening of the box which held her poor belongings.... then something of the combative, selfish attitude of the woman to her kind stirred within her, and she bravely resolved to fight, for a short space, this prying woman who was trying to torment her soul.
she looked at the untidied bed with the well-used sheets.... what matter? it was only the place whereon the body of another poor tortured creature like herself had lain. she would bear with this outrage against her natural delicacy.
in perfect silence she took off her skirt and blouse and corset. she let fall her long, heavy hair and, before the broken looking-glass, began to dally wearily[pg 54] with its luxuriance. this hair was very fair and priceless, and it was hers who had not great possessions. her shining neck and blossomy breasts showed as a pattern in ivory against the background that it made.... some man, she thought, would like to see her now and love her maybe. beyond this vision of herself she could see the ugly, anxious face of the woman behind her. she could feel the discord of that woman's thoughts with the wandering strands of withering hair.
no word had passed between them since they came together into the room, and mrs. mcgoldrick, retreating from the situation which had been created, left with abruptness, closing the door loudly behind her.
with as much haste as she could summon, rebecca took off her shoes and got her night-gown out of the trunk. then she threw herself into the bed. she put out the light and fumbled in her faded vanity bag for her little mother-of-pearl rosary. there was a strange excitement upon her, even in the final moments of her escape, and soon a portion of her pillow was wet with tears. between loud sobs arose the sound of her prayers ascending:
"hail, mary, full of grace, the lord is with thee; blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, jesus.... hail, mary, full of grace, the lord is with thee; blessed art thou.... hail, mary, full of grace...."
