Read Online Another Kind of Life by Catherine Dunne - Free Book Online

face was white, and she looked intently at me. Her brown eyes were startled, more
prominent than usual. I wondered for a moment whether she had been crying over her sister again. She took my hand, and her palm was clammy.
    ‘You come with me, Miss Eleanor,’ she said, almost in a whisper.
    I noticed that the door to the drawing room was closed. Not an unusual occurrence in itself, but this time there was no sound of ladies’ laughter, no chinking of silver spoons on china
cups. I thought I heard Papa’s voice, but it seemed deeper, less familiar to me than usual.
    ‘Where’s Mama?’ I asked.
    ‘She’s busy at the moment, Miss Eleanor. You just come along with me, now.’
    ‘But I need Mama to look at my feet; they hurt.’
    I began to cry, more, I suspect, because I could sense something in the house that terrified me, an air of catastrophe which cast its long shadow on to everything around me, including
Lily’s frightened face.
    ‘I’ll look after your feet. Come along, now, there’s a good girl. The fire’s lit in the kitchen, and I’ve just made some scones. Would you like that?’
    I was won over. I wanted somebody to love me, somebody to make a fuss of me. Above all, I didn’t want to be on my own that afternoon, not when whatever was going to happen happened. I sat
with my feet in a basin of warm water, sipping milk and eating scones smothered in gooseberry jam. Lily had already peeled my sore stockings from my legs, had already begun the ritual of comfort
and healing which was familiar to me from all the winters of my life. Mama preferred to use wintergreen ointment, but Lily’s remedy for the agony of chilblains came from her mother’s
people in County Tipperary. She would put a turnip in the oven just long enough for it to soften. Then she’d cut it in half, and place thinly pared slices of its fibrous stuff over each of
the broken chilblains. Next, she would carefully place a strip of cotton on top of each slice, the pieces of cloth already smeared with clarified lard.
    Mama used to smile at her country ways, but I can still vividly recall the sense of warm comfort once the greasy dressing was in place, can still savour the oily, vaguely animal smells of it
all. I have always found it strange how the memory of such small details remains the most potent, once the large events in our lives are over.
    Poor Lily and Katie must have been frightened out of their wits that afternoon. The arrival of the police at any door was cause for anxiety, but their arrival immediately after my father, Mr
Edward’s, unusually early return from his business day was especially troubling. He was an important man, they knew that. Someone very high up in the Post Office, one who was not given to
returning unexpectedly from work to the bosom of his family, especially not with two detectives in tow. I know now how fearful those two good women must have been for their livelihood, how disaster
for their employer signalled even more immediate and complete disaster for themselves. Nevertheless, they minded me, Katie continued her preparations for the evening meal, and Lily continued to
tend to my feet, even warmed a clean pair of stockings for me on the top of the range.
    Suddenly, one of the little brass bells above us sounded. I looked up. Drawing room. Lily glanced swiftly at Katie and left the kitchen. Neither Katie nor I spoke a word. I knew that we were
both waiting for something, but I didn’t know what. I did not know until long afterwards, of course, that the two gentlemen in the drawing room, who had arrived some two hours before my
return from school, had been sent to arrest my father. I opened the kitchen door just a little, and Katie didn’t try to stop me. Instead, she watched with me as the two sombre-looking men,
dressed in black, ushered my father outside to the waiting carriage.
    ‘Jesus, Mary and Joseph help us,’ Katie whispered, making the sign of the cross. Then I heard Mama wail, in a