ANNE BENNETT

A Daughter’s Secret

COPYRIGHT

Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

This paperback edition 2008

1

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2007

Copyright © Anne Bennett 2007

Anne Bennett asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

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This novel is a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

Ebook Edition © JUNE 2008 ISBN: 9780007283576

Version: 2017-09-08

DEDICATION

To my grandson Jake, the eldest Bennett boy, with all my love

CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Also by the Author

About the Publisher

ONE

As Thomas John Sullivan drove the horse and cart past St Mary’s Catholic church on the way home from Buncrana, the nearest market town, the noon Angelus bell was tolling.

‘Dear Lord, but it’s perishing cold,’ his wife, Biddy, commented from the seat beside him. ‘The fields and hedgerows are still as heavily rimed with frost as they were this morning, for the sun hasn’t put in an appearance all day.’

‘Aye,’ Thomas John agreed, ‘it’s mighty cold, right enough. That’s Donegal for you. Sure, don’t we have the coldest of winters here at times?’

‘We do indeed. Is the child all right, Aggie?’

In the back of the cart, Aggie nursed her little brother, Finn, holding his body tight against her own, her warmest shawl wrapped around the two of them, and yet still he shivered.

‘He is all right,’ she said. ‘Just cold, like the rest of us.’

To divert him, Aggie said, ‘We’ll be home in no time now, and it’s meant to be cold, Finn, for it is nearly Christmas.’ She knew that Finn would know little of Christmas, or Santa Claus either, for he was only just turned eighteen months old. She saw a slight frown pucker his brow as she went on, ‘You’ll like Santa Claus, Finn. He brings good boys and girls presents.’

The child would, she knew, barely know the word ‘present’ either, for the Sullivan children had few of them. There was no money for such frivolities. But for Finn, the youngest, it would be different. Much had been made of him by all the family when he arrived. Aggie knew her mother had bought a few wee things in Buncrana that morning to fill his stocking on Christmas morning and she was looking forward to seeing his face.

‘Aye, nearly Christmas,’ Biddy said. ‘And then the turn of the year – 1898, I wonder what that will bring.’

Thomas John chuckled. ‘What would it bring, woman, but more of the same? Life seldom changes much, except we all get older.’

Aggie thought her father was right, and she was glad. She liked the familiarity of one day following the other predictable and safe. She had been twelve in June, so she had left school and now helped her mother in the home full time. She always looked forward to Saturday morning when she would go to Buncrana with her parents, leaving her brothers Tom and Joe to mind the farm. Her mother would sell their surplus produce in the market, like many other farmers, while Aggie went with her father to buy things needed for the farm. Since Finn’s birth, however, her primary task was to look after him while her parents were busy.

She didn’t mind this in the slightest, for it gave her a chance to meet up with her former classmates, and especially her best friend, Cissie Coghlan.

That day, though, it had been so cold that she had been glad to go home, and she was looking forward to getting into the warm house and out of the wind. When they passed the church she breathed a sigh of relief that they were not that far from home.

Tom and Joe were waiting for them in the yard, having heard the rumble of the cart. Thomas John brought it to a halt in the cobbled yard before the squat whitewashed cottage, scattering the pecking hens as he did so, and alerting the two dogs, who came from the barn barking a greeting.

Tom went forward to take the horse, saying as he did so, ‘I have the water on to boil and the potatoes are in a bucket on the stool inside.’

Biddy nodded and said to Aggie, who was climbing out of the cart with Finn in her arms, ‘Take the wee one inside. This intense cold is too much for him.’

The warmth hit Aggie as she opened the door. The room was dimly lit from the one small window at the end, though the sky looked grey and cloud-laden. But the fire burned brightly in the hearth and she saw that one of the boys, likely Tom, had banked it up with peat. There was a further stack of it the other side of the fireplace. The heavy black pot was heating the water over the fire, held up by one of the hooks of the crane that folded out from the wall.

She carried Finn across the stone-flagged floor and sat him near the warmth on a creepie, a low seat made of bog oak.

‘You sit there, my wee man, and get warm while I start dinner for us all,’ she said, and she was rewarded by a broad smile from Finn as he felt the heat from the fire.

Aggie ladled water from the pot above the fire into a basin, which she then placed on the table, the bucket of potatoes beside her ready for scrubbing. Her mother came in, followed by Joe, carrying parcels. One of these newspaper-wrapped bundles Biddy placed beside Aggie: she knew what was in it and that was fish that her father had bought from the fleet at Buncrana harbour.

Later, with the scrubbed potatoes boiling in their jackets in the big pot, and the plates taken from the dresser and put on to the side of the hearth to warm, Aggie helped her mother prepare the fish for frying, first, chopping off their heads and then slicing through each one expertly to remove the bone, as she had been taught from a child.

It was as the family was halfway through the meal and their hunger somewhat eased that Aggie said, ‘Me and Cissie were talking to Mr McAllister today.’

Biddy looked at her daughter. She knew McAllister was newly arrived in the town and there had been great curiosity about the family as there would be about anyone new. Biddy said, ‘Isn’t he the husband of Philomena, who was left the grocery store?’

Aggie nodded.

Thomas John frowned slightly. ‘And what business had a man like that with two young girls?’

‘He was nice, Daddy,’ Aggie protested. ‘I’m sure he was just being neighbourly. He asked our names, and when I said mine was Aggie Sullivan he said he could take a bet that wasn’t my given name and that Agnes had a much better sound to it.’

‘Stuff and nonsense,’ snapped her mother. ‘You are called Aggie and that’s all there is to it.’

‘Whisht,’ Thomas John cautioned his wife. ‘Let the girl get on with her tale. What else did he say?’

‘Then he asked would we like to learn to do the Irish dances properly and I said yes but there was no one now to teach us,’ Aggie continued.

‘Seems a strange thing to ask a body,’ Biddy said. ‘Why would he ask you a question like that?’

Tom, two years younger than Aggie, kept his head down so that his mother wouldn’t see his smile. He knew Aggie would have liked to dance all the day long if she had been let. He could take a bet she and Cissie had been jigging about and this McAllister had seen them. No wonder he asked them such a question.

Aggie didn’t answer her mother. Instead she went on, ‘Mr McAllister said it was shameful for us to lose our heritage this way and that he came from the West where such things were prized highly.’

‘Not just now he didn’t,’ Biddy said. ‘His wife was only after telling me this morning that they had been living in Birmingham, England this long while when news came of her aunt’s death. She was really surprised that she had been left the grocer’s shop in the town.’

‘Anyway,’ Aggie said, fearing that they had gone off the track a little, ‘he has offered to teach us to dance, and he said he can also play tin whistle and fiddle, and he can teach any who want to learn those too.’

‘I dare say he would have the time right enough,’ Biddy recounted wryly, ‘for he is more this side of the counter than the other side. He seems to prefer talking with the customers to serving them. His wife has her work cut out with four wee ones to see to as well, for he doesn’t seem to be great in that department either.’

‘Talk sense, woman,’ Thomas John said. ‘What man has a great hand in rearing weans? Sure, that’s a woman’s job.’

‘I know that,’ Biddy said. ‘I just think it a shame that that Philomena McAllister has such a hard time of it. She told me herself her husband is too fond of sitting in Grant’s Bar. In fact, he is there so often she wonders if he has shares in the place.’

‘That’s between them, surely,’ Thomas John replied, ‘and not our business at all, at all. From what I see of McAllister, he’s a personable-looking fellow and he is right, the children shouldn’t forget their heritage. But there has been no one bothered since Matty Phelan died a few years ago.’

‘There’s nothing like a spot of Irish dancing right enough,’ Biddy conceded. ‘I could fling my heels up with the best of them when I was a girl.’

‘So I can go?’ Aggie burst in, almost breathless with excitement.

‘We will make enquiries,’ her father said. ‘That is all I am offering to do at this point. And you can take that smirk from your face, Tom, for I have a mind to ask the man if he could teach you a few tunes on the tin whistle.’

Tom looked at his father in amazement. He was not averse to learning the tin whistle. In fact, if his opinion had been asked, he’d have said that he was quite pleased, but he did wonder when he might get time to practise anything he learned because he and Aggie, being the eldest, were kept hard at it.

His doubt was reinforced when his mother said to Aggie, ‘And don’t you look so pleased with yourself. If we allow you to go to this dancing it will be on top of your duties, not instead of them, and the same goes for you, Tom, and the tunes you learn.’

‘Don’t you be giving out to Aggie and Tom before they have done anything wrong, Biddy,’ Thomas John chided. ‘Neither are slackers, but there is no point in Aggie learning the dancing and Tom the tunes if they are not given time to practise. Haven’t I Joe to help me – and we mustn’t forget Finn, of course,’ he added, ruffling the hair of his youngest son.

Biddy said nothing more. Really, she expected she would have a houseful of sons by now – not that she was keen on children herself, not even her own, but she knew sons were essential on a farm. But she had gone six barren years after the birth of Joe before she produced Finn. She had really thought her childbearing days were over.

Thomas John couldn’t understand why she worried over the lack of sons. ‘What is the problem?’ he would ask, in genuine bewilderment. ‘You have a daughter to help in the house, a wee one to dandle on your knee and gladden your heart with his smile, while I have two fine, strapping sons to help me about the farm. Many would be satisfied with far less.’

Biddy never answered this, but both Tom and Aggie could have told their father that their mother was easily dissatisfied and discontented. The two of them, and to a lesser extent Joe, had borne the brunt of her ill humour time and enough, meted out by the stick that she kept hanging up to one side of the hearth.

In the New Year the dancing lessons were held each Saturday afternoon in St Mary’s church hall, the older ones going to the later class. The church had had to be put at least a mile outside the town, as decreed by the British, who had controlled Ireland at the time it was built. It was in a district called Cockhill. The Sullivans’ farm was also in Cockhill and a little over a mile away from the church so it was no problem for Aggie to get there.

McAllister owned a gramophone, a magnificent thing with a big golden horn. It was his pride and joy, and when he put records on it and lifted the needle over, tunes came out of it. Aggie and the other girls were enchanted, for they had never seen anything like it before in the whole of their lives.

‘I thought he would play the tunes on the fiddle for you,’ her father said when she told her parents about the gramophone, ‘or, indeed, the tin whistle, for he has a fine hand with them both.’

‘He said he couldn’t play and teach us properly, and using the gramophone is better,’ Aggie said.

‘And you enjoy it?’

‘Oh, yes.’ But much of Aggie’s enjoyment was down to the fact that she had been attending the classes only a little time when she fancied herself in love with McAllister.

‘I can’t understand why his wife complains about him so much,’ she said to Tom one day, after she had just come from a lesson. ‘She should be grateful to be married to such a handsome man and one that seems to be in good humour all of the time.’

‘Maybe that good humour is Guinness- or poteen-induced?’ Tom suggested with a grin, and added, ‘That’s what Daddy said, anyway.’

‘Tom,’ Aggie said angrily, ‘how can you say such a thing? Isn’t he doing a grand job with you and the tin whistle? And what’s wrong with a man taking the odd pint of Guinness or nip of poteen anyway? Our own daddy does the same thing now and again.’

‘I was only repeating what Daddy said.’

‘Well, don’t!’ Aggie retorted. ‘Isn’t the man giving up his time freely?’

It wasn’t exactly freely, though no money changed hands. However, as he taught Irish dancing to the butcher’s daughter he got his payment in kind, and he had similar treatment from the newsagent for teaching his daughter so that he had all the tobacco he needed. The various farms around provided him with other produce and so, with their own grocery store as well, his wife was well enough pleased.

The teaching of the tunes was done in the children’s own homes and the payment for this was usually in the shape of a bottle of poteen, which was distilled in the hills of Donegal. It never seemed to affect McAllister’s ability to teach, however much he drank, and he rode from farm to farm on the horse that was also used to pull the cart for the shop.

Philomena once said to Biddy that half the time she didn’t know how he made it home and it was a good thing his horse knew the way. She wouldn’t be at all surprised to find him fallen into a ditch somewhere one day, having slid from the horse’s back.

Biddy knew exactly what Philomena meant, for the man had often been well away when he left their house. If she ever complained about this, however, Thomas John would always maintain there was no harm in the man, that he just had a terrible thirst on him.

Aggie thought there was no harm in him either. In fact she thought him wonderful and strove in all ways to please him. With her love of dancing she soon progressed, and after she had been at it a year McAllister declared her a gifted little dancer. Soon after this, he asked her and Cissie to go for extra lessons on Wednesday evenings, to which Thomas John readily agreed.

He was delighted with McAllister. Tom had got on so well with the tin whistle that Joe had asked to learn too, and Tom had begun to learn the fiddle. Each week, McAllister would listen to them playing the tune he had taught them the previous week, which he expected them to master before he would teach them another. They soon had a fair collection of material and would often entertain their parents in the long winter evenings. They would play for Aggie too, and she would roll back the rugs and dance on the flagged floor of the cottage, her brown eyes flashing, her dark brown plaits bouncing to each side and her feet fair flying along. Afterwards her cheeks would be flushed and pink, and Tom realised with some surprise one day that Aggie was very pretty.

Afterwards, those pictures would often come back to haunt Tom. They were a time of innocent pleasure that would never return – before his life and Aggie’s were touched by evil.

As Aggie began to develop, her infatuation for McAllister grew stronger. In her own home, as he taught her brothers, she was able to study everything about him, like his fine head of hair, so black it sometimes shone blue in the lamplight. He had wonderful masculine hands too, with a dusting of hairs on the backs of them, and long and very flexible fingers with square nails. She watched the movement of his mouth, with his fine, full lips, listening to the lilting timbre of his voice and the way he threw his head back when he laughed, as he did often.

Tom wondered if Aggie knew that her eyes went all dopey and dreamy in this scrutiny of McAllister. It worried him slightly, though he barely knew why, and he hoped that the man himself had never noticed.

But, of course he had, and it pleased him greatly to have a young, nubile girl lusting after him. As yet she was but a child, anxious to please him and do things for him. When she was a little older, maybe he would see just how far she would go in pleasing him, for she was turning out to be a very fetching little thing.

Not long after Aggie had passed her fourteenth birthday, Biddy announced to the family that she was having another baby. She was unaccountably excited about this pregnancy, different from the way she had felt about the others. At first she said Aggie had to give up the dancing for she would need her full help in the house. It was Thomas John who said she needn’t do that.

‘Sure, it is the only place she goes, unless you count Mass. It doesn’t take her out of the house much all told, and the girl needs some distraction.’

Biddy never argued with Thomas John, the only person that she ever listened to and took heed of. Aggie knew that, and she gave a sigh of relief at her father’s words and hugged herself with delight.

Her little sister was born on a blustery day in February 1900 when the wind howled so fiercely around the cottage, it sounded like a creature in torment. It rattled the windows and caused the fire to splutter and smoke. All that ceased to matter to Aggie as she held in her arms the little sister that she had helped the midwife bring into the world. She felt a special bond with her. She was overwhelmed when Biddy asked her if she would like to be the child’s godmother, and the baby was christened Nuala Mary when she was less than two weeks old.

The whole family was charmed by that one small baby – even wee Finn, who would spend hours just gazing at her.

‘Don’t you try lifting her out of there,’ Biddy said to her small son one day, catching him by the side of the crib.

Finn looked quite astonished that his mother might think he had such a notion. ‘I wouldn’t,’ he said. ‘I might hurt her.’

‘You could well,’ Biddy said grimly. ‘And that goes for you too, Tom and Joe. Don’t you two be thinking of playing with her, for you are too big and too rough altogether.’

Tom thought his mother didn’t need to say that to him. He had left school now and was at work full time alongside his father. With his hands chapped and callused he wouldn’t touch the child at all, and as for holding her, she was so petite and delicate-looking, he would be afraid that she would break.

‘They are stronger than you think,’ Aggie told him one day when he said this.

She was lifting the child as she spoke and Tom marvelled at the easy way she did this. She laughed, but gently, at the look on his face. ‘It’s easier for a woman,’ she said. ‘And that’s how it must be, of course, for I will probably have my own weans one day.’

‘Aye, and meanwhile you are mooning after him, McAllister …’

Aggie flushed with embarrassment and guilt but she denied the accusation vehemently. ‘I am not.’

‘Yes you are,’ Tom maintained. ‘You just be glad that Mammy hasn’t noticed.’

‘There’s nothing to notice,’ Aggie said heatedly. ‘This is all in your imagination.’

‘No it isn’t,’ Tom said. ‘And for the life of me I don’t see what the attraction is. He is an old man and a well-married one too.’

‘You don’t understand,’ Aggie said, and as Tom shook his head at her, Aggie hid a smile. At home she was just good old Aggie to her father and brothers, and an extra pair of hands to her mother, especially now, and her life one of boring drudgery.

Twice a week she was Agnes Sullivan, talked and listened to as if she wasn’t a child any more, especially when she attended the special Wednesday evening dancing classes with Cissie. And that was all down to McAllister. He wasn’t exactly old either – not like her daddy was old, anyway – but he was mature. The lines on his face just added to his character, and he had the darkest brown eyes. But what was the point of saying any of that to her brother? He’d laugh himself silly if she tried.

Of course, when he was in the farmhouse, teaching her brothers or drinking with her father, he had to be far more proper towards her, seeming to know without her having to say anything that her parents wouldn’t like any sort of familiarity. If he addressed her at all, he called her ‘Aggie’ and she called him ‘Mr McAllister’, but on Saturday, after the younger children had left, and especially on Wednesday evening, she was Agnes and he was Bernie. He also kissed her and Cissie on the cheek when the class was over, making them blush at first, before they began to enjoy it, but the two girls were sensible enough to say nothing about this at home.

Aggie did daydream about Bernie McAllister sometimes, and her nights too were punctuated with fantasies about him. Sometimes, she would imagine that he would hold her in his arms and kiss her properly. She had no idea what a proper kiss was; she just knew people seemed to hold great store by it, as a sign that one person liked another. She never allowed herself to go further than that kiss, though, and yet in the morning she would be ashamed of herself. She never even whispered these thoughts and dreams to Cissie, fearing she would be shocked.

It was more than three weeks before Christmas when Aggie got to the church hall one Wednesday evening to find that Cissie hadn’t arrived. That was strange, as she was always there before Aggie. Usually, as Aggie was going out the door, her mother would find another job for her to do, for though she wouldn’t openly defy Thomas John and forbid Aggie to go dancing, she resented it bitterly. She particularly disliked the Wednesday evening sessions and so would deliberately make Aggie late, and she would arrive red and out of breath, having run every step of the way.

That night was no exception. As she stood framed in the doorway, McAllister’s breath caught in his throat. She was truly beautiful, with her flushed cheeks, heaving bosom and dancing eyes. Cissie was a bonny enough girl, but she didn’t hold a candle to Agnes, and the girl was totally unaware of it too.

‘Where’s Cissie?’ Aggie asked, scanning the room.

‘Cissie isn’t coming tonight,’ McAllister said, crossing to stand beside her. ‘She has the measles. Her mother caught me in the town and told me, but I came on here to wait for you.’

‘How awful for her,’ Aggie said. ‘Poor Cissie.’ And then disappointment trickled through her body as she said uncertainly, ‘Well, I had better go then.’

‘Why?’ McAllister said, drawing her into the room and closing the door with his foot. ‘Do you want to go?’

McAllister’s face was very close, and Aggie said, ‘No, not really but—’

‘You are very lovely, you know, Agnes,’ McAllister said, cutting across her.

No one had ever mentioned loveliness to Agnes and her eyes opened wide. ‘Am I?’

‘You are,’ McAllister said emphatically. ‘Did no one ever tell you that before?’ he asked, knowing just how unlikely that was.

‘No, never.’

‘Anyone ever tell you how your eyes sparkle brighter than the stars in the sky?’ McAllister asked. As Aggie’s face flushed further with embarrassment he added, ‘And that you look so enchanting when you blush.’

‘Oh, Bernie, really,’ Aggie said, flustered. ‘Please don’t say such things.’

‘Why?’ McAllister asked. ‘Don’t you wish to hear them?’

‘No, not really. I’m sure it is wrong to make a person think too much of themselves, especially when the things said are not true.’

‘Who said they were not true?’

‘Exaggerated then …’

‘Not a bit of it,’ McAllister cried. ‘Look into a mirror, Agnes, my darling girl, and you will see it all for yourself.’

‘You have me all of a dither.’

McAllister caught up her hand and said, ‘Don’t be ashamed or embarrassed, for as you grow up you’ll hear many such comments. And you must learn to accept them gracefully and thank the person applauding you so.’

‘Oh, I do thank you, Bernie,’ Aggie said earnestly. ‘It was just that it was so unexpected. I am not at all used to hearing people say such things about me.’

‘That’s all right,’ McAllister smiled. ‘And now to show you that I really mean the things I said, I will give you a wee kiss!’

Aggie returned the smile and, expecting the type of kiss that he gave both her and Cissie when they were leaving each Wednesday evening, she said, ‘All right.’

McAllister caught Aggie’s face up between his hands and kissed her mouth gently and then, as if Aggie’s arms had a life of their own, they encircled his neck. His kiss became more ardent and demanding, and Aggie’s whole being began to shake, and she knew she wanted that kiss to go on and on for ever.

When they broke apart at last, both were breathless. Aggie dropped her arms and pulled herself from McAllister’s embrace before allowing herself to look into his eyes. She saw the yearning there and though she didn’t understand it, she was a little alarmed by it. But what was more worrying by far were the strange longings she had coursing through her own body, feelings the like of which she had never had before and wasn’t sure they weren’t downright sinful.

‘Oh, Agnes,’ McAllister said, ‘that was truly wonderful.’

‘I know. But I don’t think we should have done it.’

‘And why not? Don’t say you didn’t enjoy it, for I shall not believe it. It wasn’t a stranger’s arms that came about my neck, or a stranger’s lips kissing me so hard.’

‘I know,’ Aggie admitted, her face flaming again, but this time with shame. ‘I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me.’

‘Don’t be sorry. Did I push you away?’

‘No, but …’

‘For two pins I would repeat the experience,’ McAllister said, reaching out for Aggie, but she twirled out of his grasp.

‘No, no!’ she cried. ‘We mustn’t.’

‘We mustn’t,’ McAllister mimicked, but gently. ‘Mustn’t touch, mustn’t kiss, and mustn’t have fun in any shape or form.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Stop being sorry. Stop saying you’re sorry,’ he snapped. He seemed to think for a moment and then suddenly said, ‘Well, if a kiss and cuddle is out, then we must dance. Take off your shawl and boots and we’ll make a start.’

Aggie looked at him and knew that while one part of her wanted to go into his arms willingly, the other part was urging her to bid the man good night and go home. She did neither, and as she removed her shawl she said, ‘I can’t dance without Cissie,’ because the two girls had been practising a duet they were to perform in the Christmas concert put on by the Church.

‘Aren’t you the girl for finding problems where there are none?’ McAllister said. ‘We will do dances that need not include Cissie.’

‘We will?’

‘Yes, we will. They are called polkas. They’re fun to do and a chance for me to hold you in my arms legitimately. What do you say?’

‘I say maybe I should go home.’

‘You disappoint me, Agnes.’ McAllister shook his head sadly. ‘Really you do.’

Aggie thought of her home and knew she wouldn’t be right in the door before her mother would be roaring at her for something and there would be a list of jobs waiting for her. And if she went, she would upset the man she admired before all others. Anyway, she wanted to stay in the church hall, lit softly by the paraffin lamps, and she knew too she would be warmed further by McAllister’s arms around her as they moved to the music.

‘I’ll stay,’ she decided, facing him, and he beamed in approval.

‘Good girl.’ And he took her in his arms.

Aggie loved the polkas, the tantalising and evocative music, and dancing in McAllister’s arms was just heavenly. They danced for ages, stopping only when the gramophone needed cranking up. Eventually they were completely out of breath.

‘Sit down and recover before you attempt the walk home,’ McAllister invited. ‘And tell me about yourself.’

Aggie couldn’t remember opening her soul as she did that night with McAllister. The man listened to the child – she was little more – who was at it from dawn till dusk just because she had the misfortune to be the elder girl in the family.

‘That’s why I love dancing, you see,’ she said. ‘It is a chance to get out. Mammy would have stopped me ages ago if Daddy hadn’t put his foot down.’

‘I’m glad he did then.’

‘Mm, so am I. Have you any family? Brothers, sisters?’

‘I have three brothers older than me who hightailed it to the States, and an older sister, Gwen, living in Birmingham,’ McAllister told her, taking a hip flask of poteen out of his pocket as he spoke and taking a long drink. ‘I was the baby.’

‘And spoiled, no doubt,’ Aggie smiled. ‘Like Nuala will probably be. She is just ten months old and she rules the roost already.’

‘But Nuala might not be the youngest always,’ McAllister said, and laughed at the blush forming on Aggie’s cheeks. ‘Now what’s embarrassed you?’ he asked.

‘It’s just … well, the thought of my parents doing that sort of thing.’

‘What sort of thing?’ McAllister teased. ‘Sex?’

Aggie gave a gasp. ‘I don’t think we should say that word.’

‘What word? Sex? Let me tell you, girl, the world would be a very peculiar place without it. You do know what it is all about, don’t you?’

Aggie nodded. ‘Of course I do.’ She lived on a farm and had seen the bull brought in to service the cows, the ram for the ewes, the boar for the sow, and the baby animals born afterwards.

McAllister, guessing a lot of the thoughts tumbling around in Aggie’s head, said, ‘You have seen the animals at it, I imagine, but for humans there is pleasure to be had too.’

Aggie’s face was a picture, for she had never heard that before. She looked at McAllister incredulously and he laughed as he pulled her to her feet.

‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Get your boots and your shawl. It’s time to go home.’

Aggie was loath to bring the evening to an end. It had been a special time with just the two of them, which would probably never happen again.

At the door McAllister took another hefty drink from the flask and offered it to Aggie. ‘Care for a drop?’

Aggie smiled as she shook her head. ‘Daddy gave me a wee sip just the other day and it burned my mouth and my throat, and afterwards it was as if my stomach was on fire. I have no liking for it at all.’

‘You don’t know what you are missing, girl,’ McAllister told her. ‘Still, your loss, sweetheart. Now, I will see you home.’

‘Oh, but really there is no need.’

‘Agnes, the wind would near cut a body in two and the night air is raw and bone-chillingly cold,’ McAllister said firmly. ‘If you will not have a wee drop of poteen to help you cope with that, then you need my arms around you to keep you from freezing altogether.’

Aggie did not protest. She could think of few things nicer than walking home wrapped in her warmest shawl and cuddled into Bernie McAllister, and she nodded her head happily.

‘I’d like that,’ she said, and they stepped into the night together.

TWO

Aggie recalled that walk home many times. She remembered how secure and protected she had felt. McAllister had his arm tight around her so that, despite the bleakness of the night, she felt glowingly warm inside.

He had been telling himself since they’d set out to go easy and have a bit of common sense, but the very nearness of Aggie was making him harden. He knew to touch her was madness. Hadn’t his wife threatened what she would do if ever she found him at it again, after that last time?

And he knew that if they hadn’t had the offer of the grocery store, and been able to flee to Ireland when they had, he’d have more than likely been laid out in a hospital bed, if not on a mortuary slab, as soon as the pregnancy of their neighbour’s daughter had become obvious. He remembered how she had pleaded with him for help and he had promised to think of something, even as they were making plans to leave. He had blamed the girl for her condition, though, claiming that she had teased him and flirted with him outrageously and that a man was only flesh and blood after all.

He had seen the telltale flush of shame steal over the girl’s face and she had even apologised for leading him on so. He had patted her hand and said she wasn’t to worry her wee head about it any longer; that he would deal with it.

How Philomena found out he never knew, but she had and she was not best pleased. Yet she made plans to leave at once and in the early morning before many were astir. McAllister had a fleeting flash of pity for the young girl left alone to cope, but it was gone in an instant and he had to admit he was relieved to be away out of it.

When Philomena saw this, however, she had snapped, ‘This isn’t being done to save your skin, so never think it. What you did to that young girl was disgusting and my heart goes out to her and the life she will likely have because of you. But I have my own weans to see to. It would not help them if you were dead or crippled, and I know you would be one or the other if we stopped here one moment longer than necessary.’

He knew she was right. He was also well aware that the girl would name him as the father, because if she wouldn’t tell willingly, her father was the sort to beat it out of her. Then he and the son would have come for him. Fear had crawled all through McAllister at that thought. His salvation, in the shape of a grocery shop in a remote part of Ireland, hadn’t come a moment too soon.

‘I appreciate it,’ McAllister had said to his wife. ‘And I’m sorry.’

‘You’re always sorry,’ Philomena had replied scathingly. ‘And in the end it makes no odds. But I am telling you now, Bernie, I know that that girl was not the first, but she will be the last, for if this ever happens again, that will be the finish of us.’

‘It won’t, I promise.’

‘You’ve promised more times than I have had hot dinners,’ Philomena snapped, ‘but this time think on, because I mean it. Keep your hands to yourself and your prick in your trousers, and we will get along well enough.’

Philomena had meant every word. He remembered that she had kicked up shocking when he had suggested the dancing and music lessons.

‘They have no one to teach them,’ he had told her. ‘Surely you are not for them forgetting their heritage.’

‘It may surprise you to learn that we have a business to run, Bernie McAllister,’ Philomena had said. ‘If you have time and energy enough for this, then I suggest those energies would be better employed the other side of the counter.’

‘It would stifle me, woman,’ McAllister had protested. ‘A man has to have some outlet.’

‘Are you sure you are not up to your old tricks?’

‘For God’s sake, woman, are you crazy or what? Don’t you think I’ve learned my lesson this time?’

‘I certainly hope so.’

‘Look, I teach the music at the children’s own homes and the dances at the church hall in a group.’

‘Well, yes, I know,’ Philomena conceded.

‘Then trust me.’

And Philomena tried. She knew that Bernie was no model husband. He said the grocery shop bored him, and certainly he was seldom seen behind the counter. He also drank far too much, but all that Philomena could put up with. As the months and then years passed she even told herself that the flight to Ireland had at last seemed to cure him of his taste for young girls, so that when he told her he was selecting two of the older and better dancers for special tuition one evening a week, she had dampened down the suspicion that arose in her. When he said to her, ‘Look, Philomena, I know how you feel, and with reason, but I promise that I will never see either of the girls alone,’ Philomena’s fears abated somewhat.

Then why hadn’t he allowed Aggie to go home that night; even sent word to the house and told her not to bother coming out? He knew why full well. The madness was coming over him again and the blood was coursing through his veins at the nearness of the girl tucked in beside him so tightly he could hear her heartbeat.

When she gave a sigh, snuggled closer and said, ‘I love being here with you like this and I am so grateful for you leaving me home,’ he knew he had lost any shred of reason that might have been attached to him. Overpowering lust had taken its place.

‘How grateful are you?’ he asked Aggie huskily, as he pulled her to a stop and turned her to face him.

She smiled as she said, ‘Lots.’

‘Grateful enough to give me a kiss?’

Aggie hesitated. ‘I’m not sure …’

‘I thought you were grateful,’ McAllister said reprovingly. ‘Fine way to show it. What harm is a kiss between two people who like each other?’

‘Nothing, I suppose,’ Aggie had to admit.

‘Well, then?’ McAllister said, opening his arms wide.

Aggie couldn’t remember the arguments for feeling it wrong to kiss McAllister, especially when she wanted to so much. She went into his arms willingly. This time, though, McAllister prised her mouth open with his tongue while his other hand fumbled underneath her shawl. Aggie was totally startled and a little afraid. She struggled, but even with one arm McAllister held her fast with ease, and the groan she gave of dismay and distaste he thought was one of pleasure.

Then the shawl fell from her shoulders and McAllister’s hand began to caress her breasts.

‘Please, please stop,’ she said when she eventually pulled her mouth away from him and struggled to free herself. ‘Let me go, Bernie. Please, for God’s sake.’

McAllister took no notice. There would be no stopping him now. His whole body was on fire to taste the delights of Aggie and he was also impatient. When he couldn’t work out how to unfasten her dress, he took hold of the neck and ripped it down the front.

Aggie felt the night air hit her bare skin. She gave a yelp of terror and tried to twist from McAllister’s arms as she cried, ‘Please, Bernie. We can’t do this, really we can’t.’ She felt the tension running all through him and she was desperately frightened. ‘What’s come over you?’

‘You, my darling girl,’ McAllister said. ‘God Almighty, you have bewitched me totally.’

‘Let me go, Bernie. Please! I am begging you,’ Aggie cried.

‘Let you go? No, my darling girl. I am going to show you a good time.’

‘I don’t want it. Really I don’t. I just want to go home.’

‘Don’t give me that,’ McAllister said almost harshly. ‘You want it as much as I do. Why else were you snuggling in so close?’

Aggie was mortified by shame. Had she brought this on herself? ‘I didn’t mean … not this … I meant it just as a friend.’

‘Don’t play the innocent with me,’ McAllister said. ‘You were ripe for it right enough. Almost begging for it, you were.’

Aggie was so frightened she had trouble drawing breath to speak, but she knew she had to make McAllister see he had made a mistake, and with a supreme effort she pulled herself away from him, panting as she faced him. ‘If I did show you that I was willing and all,’ she gasped, ‘then I am heart sorry. I didn’t mean you to think that, but I see that I probably am at fault as well, so shall we say no more about it and I will go on home by myself from here?’

‘Just who are you trying to kid?’ McAllister said. ‘You stand there half naked and say words your whole body is denying. You are so craven with desire you can barely speak.’

‘No,’ Aggie said. ‘I can’t speak because I am so feared.’

McAllister shook his head as he might at a naughty child. ‘It’s not fear you are displaying, but pure carnal lechery, which I am going to satisfy before you and I are much older.’

‘No, Bernie,’ Aggie said, backing away.

‘Ah yes, Bernie, yes,’ McAllister said. He made a grab for her, grasping her so tight she was unable to break free. ‘That is what you will be saying before the night is done.’

He pulled Aggie down to her knees, still clasped tight in his arms, and then pushed her with such force that her head hit the ground with a resounding crack. For a moment or two her senses reeled and McAllister took advantage of that. His hands shot beneath her clothes and he pulled off her knickers and stockings in one swift movement, and so roughly his fingernails scored deep scratches down her legs.

This brought Aggie to her senses and, though whimpering with fear, she began to fight like a wildcat.

‘So that is the way you want to play, is it?’ McAllister asked almost in amusement, catching hold of Aggie’s flailing arms and pinning them down across her body with one hand.

‘If you don’t let me go, I’ll scream,’ Aggie said fiercely, though even as she said it she wondered what good it would do. The wind would snatch away the sound of any scream, and who would be around to hear it anyway? There were no houses near and few would be abroad at that time of night.

McAllister threw himself on top of her. ‘Scream away then, though I might have something that will take away any desire to struggle at all.’

Aggie looked at him in terror. In all her fifteen years she had never seen a naked man, but she had seen the mating of the animals and so she knew what she was feeling between her legs. ‘Please don’t do this,’ she begged again. ‘Let me go now and I swear on my mother’s life that I will not mention this to a soul.’ Then seeing that had no effect, she said, ‘What of Philomena and the children?’

‘What the bloody hell is it to do with them?’ McAllister asked. ‘Come on, we have prevaricated more than enough,’ he went on irritably. ‘My bloody cock is ready to explode, I can tell you.’ He drew a fresh hip flask of poteen from his pocket as he spoke.

‘I’m not having any of that,’ Aggie said, ‘so don’t think it.’

‘Oh, but you are, bonny girl.’ McAllister lifted the flask to her lips. But Aggie threw her head from side to side so that the dribbles of poteen spilled from her mouth and ran down her neck.

McAllister was furious. He gave Aggie a punch in the face, causing her eyes to go out of focus and her nose to pour with blood, and she cried out in pain and terror.

‘Now look what you have made me do,’ McAllister said. ‘Just because you weren’t being a good girl and doing as you were told. Now open your mouth and swallow this nice and easy, or I will make you swallow it.’

Too frightened not to obey, Aggie opened her mouth a little and McAllister put the flask to her lips again. To make sure she would swallow this time, he held on to her bruised and smarting nose. Aggie gulped at the fiery liquid, feeling it burning her throat as it went down and then hit her stomach like a ball of fire. But far more worrying, the more of the stuff she drank, the less she wanted to fight off the man lying on top of her.

When Aggie’s useless arms fell to the sides of her body and stayed there, McAllister smiled, knowing that now she would be unable to prevent him doing what he wanted. He took the drained bottle away and let his hands trail over her body.

Part of Aggie knew she should protest at this, but she didn’t seem able to. It was as if it was happening to someone else and she was out of her body, looking down on herself. The moan took her by surprise. McAllister heard it and knew she was drunk enough to pose no resistance at all.

When he slipped his hands between her legs and began to caress her, she burned with shame for what she was allowing him to do to her, and she knew she should at least try to protest. She opened her mouth, but what came out made no sense at all and McAllister looked at her and laughed.

‘You are spouting nonsense, bonny girl,’ he said. ‘Just lie back and enjoy it.’

Aggie stared at him. She knew she was wicked because she should be pushing McAllister off and at least attempting to fight, but she seemed unable to, and she was too frightened to enjoy anything.

He entered her forcefully and she gasped as he whispered in her ear, ‘Now, my little wanton, are you not gagging for it?’

Aggie didn’t even try to answer as a sudden, stabbing pain shot through her and she cried out in alarm, but McAllister took no notice and continued to pound into her. Each thrust caused her such discomfort that she bit her lips to prevent herself crying out, afraid of inflaming McAllister’s anger and giving him cause to hurt her further.

When it was all over McAllister said, ‘Jesus Christ, Aggie, but you are wonderful. In fact you are absolutely bloody marvellous and we’ll take care to repeat that experience very soon.’

The words seeped into Aggie’s addled brain and so did the realisation of what she had done. She knew it was the very worst sin a girl could commit, and she didn’t know how in the world she had allowed it to happen.

She tried to tell McAllister how she felt, but it was as if her brain and her mouth were unconnected, and he just laughed. She beat at him with her fists, but there was no power in the blows and he laughed again. But at least he rolled from on top of her and left Aggie shivering in abject fear and helplessness.

‘Cover yourself up, for Christ’s sake,’ he said almost harshly, pulling her to her feet. ‘Put your shawl around you at least.’

But Aggie seemed incapable of anything. She staggered and would have fallen had he not caught hold of her.

‘For Christ’s sake, get a grip on yourself.’

Aggie said nothing, but stood swaying and staring at McAllister until he picked up the shawl from the ground, saying as he did so, ‘Don’t look at me that way. You wanted it as much as I did and you can’t deny that now, can you?’

Aggie shook her head but it seemed to be filled with cotton wool and she couldn’t form any words. She could remember the sexual act, though. It seemed etched in sharp relief on her brain and she imagined it always would be.

‘And whatever you think now, it was bloody marvellous,’ McAllister said, ‘in fact so good that if you don’t get dressed soon, I may begin all over again.’

Those words sent Aggie scrambling for her torn dress, though McAllister had to help her put it on. She was able to put on her own knickers but the stockings befuddled her altogether until she gave up on them and, holding them in her hand, pushed her bare feet into her boots.

McAllister tucked the shawl around Aggie’s shivering frame and said, ‘Will you be all right from here?’

Aggie looked at him wordlessly. She was having trouble standing and didn’t know if she would be able to put one foot before the other, but McAllister seemed interested only in himself.

‘Philomena will be wondering,’ he said, as if he had just remembered that he had a wife.

Aggie wanted to beg him not to leave her drunk and alone, and to give her some idea how she was going to get into the house unseen, or tell her what tale she could tell her mother to explain any of this, but she knew she could never manage to say any these things.

She could hardly believe it when McAllister just melted into the night and left her totally alone and so drunk she had trouble standing up. She wanted to call to him to come back and not abandon her in this way, and she actually tried to follow him, but her legs buckled, she fell to her knees and wept.

When McAllister reached home, Philomena, worn out by four weans to see to and a grocery store to run, had taken herself off to bed. She had left the lamp on low and, as McAllister turned the wick up to throw more light into the room, she woke from her semi-doze and watched him undress through narrowed eyes.

He had a look on his face that she had seen before, like a cat that has had the cream. As he nipped out the lamp and slipped in beside her she smelled the sex on him, even overriding the ever-present smell of poteen.

She felt her heart plummet to her boots and wondered who had had his attention that night. She knew it was his night for taking the two older girls and hoped to God it wasn’t one of those he had taken down. Dear Christ, they were little more than children, and neighbours into the bargain.

She would confront him – ask him outright. But what would that achieve? She knew he would deny it and she would get angry and so would he, and the shouts and roars of them might waken and frighten the weans and resolve nothing …

However, McAllister had noted her slight movements. ‘You awake, Phil?’

‘No.’

‘Ah, now don’t be like that,’ he said coaxingly. ‘Isn’t this your darling husband, come to give you a bit of loving before we both settle down for the night?’

Philomena gave a shiver of distaste, knowing her ‘darling husband’ had just come from a sexual encounter with another. ‘Not tonight, Bernie. I am tired, so I am,’ she said.

‘Tired be damned, woman,’ McAllister snapped angrily, grabbing for her. ‘You are my wife.’

‘Aye, poor foolish sod that I am,’ Philomena might have said. But she didn’t. She knew him well and felt his tension like a coiled spring that night. If she were to inflame him in that state she might well come off the worst for it. Instead, with a sigh, she submitted to him and, after pawing and groping at her, he had his way, as she had known he would.

Fully satisfied, he had fallen asleep almost immediately. Philomena listened to his even breathing and felt so degraded that she cried herself to sleep.

Tom was concerned. Aggie was usually home long before this and he wondered if some accident had befallen her. He couldn’t go and look for her because he was alone in the house, apart from Nuala and Finn, in their beds and fast asleep, and he couldn’t leave them unattended.

His father had left just after evening milking. He had closed a deal on a bull that afternoon and had gone off to Buncrana to seal the sale over a few pints, as was the custom. Tom knew from experience he wouldn’t be back for hours yet.

His mother, though, could be in at any time, for she had gone to help a neighbour who was having a baby. Aggie wasn’t long out of the house when the Lannigans’ eldest boy came over and said his mammy was took bad and had been like it all the day. Biddy knew she was expecting but the baby wasn’t due for a few weeks yet.

‘I must go up and see what’s what,’ she had said to Tom, ‘for all I’d like to seek my own fireside this night. Sadie’s man is away in England working and she has three weans to see to. I’ll take Joe with me in case I have to send for the doctor. You wait here with the wee ones until Aggie comes home.’

But Aggie hadn’t come home and if she didn’t return before her mother, she would probably feel the sting of the bamboo cane kept by the side of the fireplace.

Tom crossed to the window and looked out. He was almost certain he saw a shape at the head of the lane and it certainly wasn’t his mother, who would in all probability come across the fields anyway as that had been the way she had gone. It must be Aggie. Then why didn’t she just come on down to the house?

Sudden apprehension that something was very wrong caused the hairs on the back of Tom’s neck to rise. He took his jacket from behind the door and left the house.

Aggie had eventually pulled herself up by holding on to the hedges. She ached all over and the pain between her legs was almost unbearable. Shambling and unsteady, she slowly made her way forward by holding on to the bushes, though she fell to her knees more than once.

At last she stood unsteadily at the head of the lane, looking down on the cottage where the lamp shone brightly in the window. She didn’t know what to do next. Only one thing was certain and that was that her mother would beat the living daylights out of her when she saw the state of her. Her insides crawled with fear of going home and of not going home, and tears seeped from her eyes and ran down her cheeks.

When Aggie saw Tom appear before her it was as if her last vestige of strength oozed out of her and she sank to the ground with an anguished cry.

‘Oh, Tom!’

‘What is it, Aggie?’ Tom cried, going forward, and then he was nearly knocked back by the smell of poteen. He recoiled and gasped almost in disbelief, ‘Aggie, have you been drinking?’

Aggie nodded and, concentrating hard, she said, ‘Lots.’

Her words were slurred and indistinct, but Tom understood and he was shocked to the core that his elder sister was in such a state. She clutched at him and began to cry.

‘Hush, Aggie. Come on now,’ he said almost impatiently.

‘But he took me down, Tom.’

‘Ssh,’ said Tom, looking about anxiously. Words carried in the night air and those were not words to be said where any might overhear. He hoped to God it wasn’t true, that it was the ramblings of a girl in the throes of drink, but a dead weight seemed to settle in his stomach. ‘Come on, let’s get you up to the house,’ he said.

‘I can’t, Tom. Mammy will—’

‘Mammy isn’t there,’ Tom said and, in an attempt at light-heartedness added, ‘You have chosen the right evening to go on a bender. There is only me and the wee ones home because Mammy is at Sadie Lannigan’s, as she was took bad, and she took Joe along with her. So let’s away in before they are back and you can tell me all. Can you walk if I support you?’

Tom almost carried Aggie, and was very glad to reach the cottage and lower her gently into a chair. There he surveyed his sister properly and gasped with horror. He noted the slack mouth and vacant eyes of the very drunk, but he also saw that the eyes had been blacked – by someone’s fist, by the look of things – and tear trails were visible on her cheeks, mixed with dried blood smeared across her face. Her shawl was earth-stained, her dress ripped so that it was almost indecent. He saw too that her legs were bare and that her knees were grazed and had been bleeding. There were two deep scratches the length of her legs and she held her stockings screwed up in her hand.

He could barely speak he was so angry, but he was also not quite sure what to do. He knew before all else he had to try to sober her up so that she could tell him who had hurt her, but he was terrified that any minute his mother would burst through the door. If she saw Aggie in this state she would surely kill her.

He brought Aggie a drink of water from the bucket by the door and gave it to her because it was all he could think of. She drained it thankfully and he brought her another. Again Aggie took the cup and drained it.

Then Tom said, ‘Who did this to you?’

There was no point in lying. Aggie looked at her brother steadily. ‘Bernie McAllister.’

Her words were indistinct and little above a whisper, but Tom understood her and felt himself burn inside. He was just a boy and so he said to Aggie, ‘Daddy will trounce him when he hears this.’

‘Tom, Daddy is to know nothing,’ Aggie said, clutching his arm. All the way home, the one coherent thought in her head was that she had to keep silent about the whole thing. She knew McAllister would say she was willing and then she would be the one being trounced.

‘He has to know,’ Tom insisted. ‘Didn’t he bash your face up and all?’

Aggie nodded. ‘He made me drink. He held my nose.’

‘Well, then. If you tell Daddy that …’

Aggie’s heart began to jump about in panic. She knew she had to make Tom see the reason for secrecy. She concentrated and said, ‘McAllister will say I took the drink of my own free will, and that I was more than willing for sex, and they will believe him,’ she said sadly. ‘You know they will.’

Aggie didn’t understand herself why a stranger was believed over a family’s own flesh and blood, but that’s how it was. It always seemed to be the woman’s fault. She knew the cruelty of McAllister now. A man who could make her drunk so she was incapable of preventing him violating her, and then abandon her in the dark and freezing cold when she had been barely able to stand, would have no qualms in telling everyone the wanton that Aggie had become that night.

She could almost hear him say that she had become addled with the drink she had begged from him and had offered her body for sex and enjoyed it as much as he had. She knew once he told this tale, faster than the speed of light she would be locked up in one of the convents for bad girls that she was supposed to know nothing about.

Tom was still shaking his head. He couldn’t understand this. In his book, you did wrong and you were punished. That was how things worked.

‘It’s wrong that he should get away scot-free,’ he said.

‘I am not prepared to run the risk of telling our parents, are you?’ Aggie asked bitterly.

Tom looked into Aggie’s eyes and saw the fear there, and even understood some of it. He shook his head; he felt completely helpless. He said, ‘Shall I make you a cup of tea, Aggie? I have the water boiling and people say it’s good for shock.’

Aggie gave a sigh. ‘That would be good,’ she said. ‘And then I need a bowl of warm water. I need to wash all over.’

‘I will fetch your nightdress from the room,’ Tom said, ‘and then sit in there until you are done. But be quick. Mammy may be in any minute.’

With Tom out of the way, Aggie began to wash herself as fast as she could from head to foot, dabbing at the bruises on her face and legs but being more fierce altogether with the dried blood on the inside of her legs. Once ensconced in her nightdress, and with a cup of tea inside her, Aggie felt a little calmer though she could still feel her heart thumping.

She said to Tom, ‘I think it will be better if I am in bed when they all come back, don’t you?’

‘I do,’ Tom said fervently. ‘I’ll say you were feeling badly and you pretend to be asleep whether you are or not, and face the wall so Mammy won’t catch sight of your face.’

‘What about tomorrow?’

‘Jesus, haven’t we enough to worry about today?’ Tom said. ‘Let tomorrow look after itself.’ And then as Aggie still hovered, he urged, ‘Go on, get yourself away. I’ll clear up here.’

‘All right,’ Aggie agreed, getting to her feet. ‘Thank you, Tom, for all you have done. There is just one more favour I must ask of you.’ She lifted her ruined dress from the floor as she spoke. ‘Will you burn this? It wouldn’t do for Mammy to catch sight of it.’

Later, before Tom thrust the dress into the fire, he examined it and gave a low whistle. He imagined a lust-driven Bernie McAllister tearing it from his sister and was angry that he would go unpunished. He shook his head, for hadn’t they already been down that road? To protect Aggie they both had to stay silent. He pushed the dress into the fire, poking at it almost savagely until the flames had devoured every vestige of it.

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