Shannon (36 page)

Thus, by the time Robert came to her door, her life had once again been running a measured and level course. She lived in the comfort to which she had always been accustomed. She came home each night to a strong— if silent— home, filled with the family possessions she had always known. She cared with efficiency and taste for rooms that were rich, ordered, and quiet. Nothing disturbed the air, and she tried, with uneven success, to put the word
lonely
from her mind. She had her work, her car, her home, and her dog.

On that first night, when she had sent Robert to bed and seen him installed in his room, she gave him time to settle down. Then she knocked on the door and went cautiously in. He had drawn the bedding to his chin. She could see that he had, as she'd suggested, availed himself of her father's pajamas. Her candle cast its shadow across the ceiling; she had the presence of mind to keep it from making monsters.

Ever the nurse, she didn't sit on the edge of the bed. She placed the candlestick on the nightstand and drew forward a chair. The last time she had done this, four years earlier and half a world away in a blood-soaked field hospital tent, he, wild in his mind, had had no clue as to her identity. Now he looked at her with grateful and sleepy eyes and waited for her to say something.

She said, “In the morning— maybe we'll talk?”

“Yes. In the morning.”

“Good night, Captain Shannon. Robert.”

By then he was asleep.

She checked everything downstairs. She locked doors, secured all windows. She wanted no sudden winds off the river rattling the house and startling her guest. A moon shone into the hallway as she climbed the stairs in the dark. In her own room, she lit her bedside lamp— not a candle; she intended to stay awake.

Since childhood she had slept in the room with the alcove and its deep window seat. It too overlooked the river, and now she could see the moon's beam down along the water.

I wish I could see the path into the future.

Her shoulders hurt; a headache began; the soles of her feet felt hot; her face stung; unease and stress cascaded down her body.

Jesus. Oh, Jesus Christ. Is that a prayer or not?

The river flowed in great calm with not a ripple; it looked like a narrow lake. She sat on the window seat but rose again, then sat again.

What is this all for? There's a reason for this unease. No, there isn't. I'm excited. No, I'm not! Don't be stupid, Ellie. Stupid. Well, why did you think about him so much for so long? This is stupid.

She walked into the depth of the room, stood beside the armchair, and began to undress. Her training as a nurse and the wild rigors of army and wartime life had removed from her the inhibitions with which she
had left Ireland. Few if any Irishwomen of that generation ever stripped totally naked. They undressed under the nightdress they were about to wear; in boarding schools they wore bathing suits in the showers and bathtubs. Since she had come home for good, she had undressed totally every night, and since she lived alone she had often walked around the house wearing nothing.

Tonight, however, she undressed like a virgin again. If she thought of asking herself why, she might have fumbled— and found no answer.

By one of those small rills of good fortune, she had the next three days off from work. Tonight she meant to stay awake because she hadn't forgotten the screaming, whimpering, seemingly insane man whom she had handed over to the stretcher detail at Lucy-le-Bocage.

Outside, the night grew perfect. The breezes of the evening departed to blow over other counties, other rivers, taking the clouds with them for company, so that the moon had the sky almost to herself. Beside the moon squatted little glinting Mercury.

A small animal yelped somewhere on the riverbank, and again Ellie rose and went to the window. If the River Shannon itself had given her advice that night, this most independent minded of women would have acted upon it. By the time she heard three chimes on the breakfast-room clock downstairs, she was fumbling toward a plan.

He can stay as long as he likes. Maybe I'll find a doctor who'll check him and be discreet. Maybe not. I must get him some new clothes. He looks like he needs nourishment, nurturing. He can come to work with me, and I can sit him down in that little room that hasn't yet been converted for patients, and he can come home with me again. No, maybe he needs to be completely private. I must check again whether that new face powder is in. God above, I haven't bought decent underwear in three years. Should I consult the parish priest or will that only cause meddling?

Who can tell us about the name Shannon? How much does he know about the process of his own cure? How are they treating shell shock these days? Where can I find somebody who would know?

Does he want me to tell his parents? Why don't I wire them tomorrow that he's safe and well and here with me, and we can wire them again when those plans change— if they change. Maybe not. Maybe give him time. If those plans change. What do you mean, if they change? Of course they'll change!
Now what does he eat? What doesn't he eat? Those army rations— ech! Oh, he told me once that he loved steak. Well, that's good. And duck— who'd have duck? Where can I get some?

What's the word? What is it? Isolation, that's it! Isolation. That's how they're treating shell shock now. God, I'm restless. Keep the place very calm; keep him busy with small tasks. And a lot of rest— no distress. We can walk by the river; yes, we can walk by the river. I wonder, does he write yet? These men can't write anymore. Has he written home?

The army, the war, had taught her how to cope with sleepless nights. Three hours later, at six in the morning, she rose, washed, dressed, and went down to the kitchen, where she began a round of chores with energy that she turned on deliberately. She let out the dog; she baked; she prepared breakfast; she found her parents’ famous cuttings ledger, which contained half a century of interesting local facts or amusing snippets that had caught their eyes. Every guest who had ever come to the house had browsed this book with amusement and delight.

She checked her face in the mirror more than seven or eight times, and she rearranged and rearranged again the simple table laid for breakfast. Then, making up her mind at last, she wrote to the hospital saying that when the three days were up, she would not be back to work for some time. She was taking all the leave due to her.

When the concerned laymen of Boston had held their lethal meeting, and the deep agreement had been reached that something must be done, the Accountant had undertaken the task: “This is a burden I'm willing to carry.”

For the deed, he said, “I have the right man. I've known him for years. He's a man who wants to do me a favor, a great favor. He feels that he owes me.”

The other members of the conspiracy asked concerned questions. How reliable is he? These fellows— they're often stupid, aren't they? Isn't that why they get caught? Does he know of our existence? How discreet is he? If he is caught, will he sing? They did not want to know the killer's name.

Yet they welcomed— were even thrilled by— some of the details. This man could easily pass in Ireland; he had an Irish name and birth certificate. As a boy had been brought to the United States by his parents. He
had spent some time in seminary but had been asked to leave after a savage and completely unexpected attack on two fellow students; he maimed one for life. By all accounts he had had some kind of crack-up.

But he still carried that seminary air of distinction. Some days he even looked like a priest; he wore dark clothes and a high white collar without a necktie and from time to time was mistakenly addressed as Father by shopkeepers and railway porters.

After seminary the Accountant told them, this fellow had tried to become a police cadet but had been forced to quit after three or four incidents in which he had failed to keep his violence under control. His family having been asked to remove him, sought medical help. Before the doctor's appointment, however, he battered a passerby and the police took him.

Pulled strings kept him out of court. He was sent to work on a farm down near Great Barrington, where the paterfamilias and the grown sons had two-fisted reputations. They tamed and controlled him— up to a point. Eventually they tired of him too. The farmer consulted a brother-in-law in Boston. “That was me,” said the Accountant.

After some weeks of trying to manage him, trying to predict him—”I mean to say, it was like living with an unexploded bomb”—all who knew him agreed that the only place for this young man, by now as fit as a machine, had to be the army. And there was a major war in Europe.

He came back from the war and, like many other soldiers, had had enough of routine. Said the Accountant, “I've always found it useful to have somebody who can do the awkward chores.”

That was how the Accountant perceived and described Vincent Patrick Ryan— for it was he. The world would not have given a different rendition. Nor would, though more sadly, his adoptive parents; his life so far had a short and ultimately bitter summary.

However, the view from Vincent Ryan looked different. Nobody in the world could understand the gratitude he felt toward his new parents, as he had called them. Nor could anybody grasp why he kept so much to himself. Why didn't he take part in sports? To whom could he explain that reason?

He couldn't shower with the others, that was why. He couldn't explain the lines of thin red stripes that materialized on his buttocks and thighs from time to time, like ancient fiery cave drawings, and faded again.

They appeared at examination times and other moments of pressure. But who would understand that? Hysteria was something that women had, not men of six-foot-three.

Or who would understand that the sound of laughter carried a violent freight? It was always directed at him, he knew that for a fact. That was why he dressed so carefully— the shirts, the ascots, the beautiful fabrics and colors— to put himelf above criticism and give himself the comfort of beautiful things

But was it a crack-up? Had he had some kind of seizure on that day, the day he called in his own mind “The Moment of the Attack?” Yes— but not like people imagined. They all thought he had collapsed because he had done such a vicious thing. No, not at all. He had collapsed because he had discovered something— he had discovered what released him from his cage of a thousand bars. The war proved it. He could do as much damage as he liked; it was expected and he was even hailed for it.

But after the war— what then?

Ellie Kennedy, crisp as a crease, had no time for maunderings. She had sick patients to nurse, she had their families to cushion, and she had temperamental doctors to manage. Her attitudes, her daily grasp— these were defined by the demands of her work and the solitude of her home.

However, since the moment that she saw Captain Shannon in her kitchen, a part of her departed those shores. She didn't think about it; she wasn't that type of woman. This was a practical human being who, for all the comfort of her existence, had lost a lot of her own life in a short few years. She understood loss very clearly, and in the hospital she saw loss constantly.

If she'd ever stopped to describe her world she'd have said that she had to deal every day with life in difficult and sometimes extreme forms, so she just got on with it. Do it; don't think about it. And yet, from that July night, this organized, efficient woman knew she was going to be pressed into a new shape.

She intended— with all her ability— that Captain Shannon should continue under her roof for as long as life said he should. He would stay there and be fed and cared for.
Get him to feel better. Look at nothing else for the moment—-just get him better. Take it a day at a time. Keep today quiet, simple, and nourishing.

After her long sojourn in the kitchen, Robert came downstairs. He seemed refreshed and easy. As he sat and ate she made no fuss— she simply watched. The silence felt a little strange, but she weathered it.

Time,
she said to herself.
Give him time.

After breakfast he began to speak. His first few sentences took several minutes to come out. He explained how he had entered her house by accident some days ago. This exhausted him, because now he had come to believe that it was no accident. “I'm certain that it was— it was instinct.”

And how did he know with no evidence, she asked quietly, whose house it was?

“But I must have known, mustn't I? Because I came rushing back to it.”

Ellie made no demands. She allowed him his halting talk— and, when he had talked, allowed him his exhaustion. She merely served. All that day she served and watched. That night he again slept the sleep of the innocent.

Within a week Robert had begun to speak with an easier flow. He said that the effort to come back and find her house, and then cope with the fact of having found her house— that had been exhausting. But he conceded that he had no idea why.

The change in him could be measured. On that first day he took many sleeping breaks. The next day he took one fewer and by the end of the first week he was down to a nap in the late morning and another in the late afternoon.

Ellie approved and endorsed this routine. “Nature's cure,” she said. “That's what we teach young nurses.”

As he slept less he began to interact more fully. They skirted the subject of the war and the marines and shell shock, but she received the undoubted impression that he wanted to discuss it, if only she could find the way in.

She observed him as closely as she could— she gave him all her attention. Effectively, that house and the established life within it took in this damaged man and surrounded him with care. Bit by bit she began to formulate an idea as to what might heal— in a major way— some of his inner scars. For the moment she was happy that the hours had become days, the days had become a week, and the week looked as though it would stretch to— who knew? But she would anticipate nothing and welcome everything.

She also had the common sense to acknowledge that from the moment of Robert's arrival everything had changed— her household and its atmosphere and her whole life. First there were the practical alterations— each day of the week, already strictly time-tabled between home and the hospital, got rescheduled.