The Monster's Wife(38)
She ran and ran, not caring about the mud splattering her best petticoats or the sweat staining the crisp lace at her bodice. It was sheer relief to feel the fear fall from her, to feel in her heart that she would arrive at the manse to find May at the centre of everyone gathered in her honour, laughing at her last minute jitters, kissing Stuart and drinking away her nerves.
The manse lay on a high spit of land that meandered into the firth. It was bleak and storm-washed in winter and all-the-year-round precarious. Oona couldn’t come on it without wondering what daredevil mason had laid stones on the brink of the sea. It must have been the Minister’s grandfather or great-grandfather who’d ordered the chopping of the grey roof slates and the hauling of the small, red bricks from the cliff face. But it was the Minister’s wife, people said, who’d made it bonny. Her garden with its trumpet flowers entwining the ornamental arch was the envy of every woman on the island. No-one could understand how she kept the weather from spoiling the heavy heads of the red tea-roses. Either she had green fingers or she’d made a pact with the devil.
And then she was gone and the salt air blistered her lilies. Her roses caught black spot. Slugs ate the trumpet vine and began on the wooden arch. Hamish was powerless to prevent these changes or to take care of himself. With much tutting and rolling up of sleeves, the women of the valley took the latter task upon themselves, but even Granny, who’d always been close to him, didn’t dare lay a finger to Annie Yule’s garden.
Walking up the path, Oona noticed that the wildness that had long since claimed the back of the house was gradually spreading to the front. Honeysuckle clutched the parlour window like bejeweled hands. Mint and rue from Mrs Yule’s herb garden waved tall and green on either side of the door. She knocked and stood waiting and for a moment felt that she was in a wilderness such as Adam and Eve had once lived in, roaming innocent until the snake gulled them. The door opened and Hamish appeared, as red-faced and angular as he was in the pulpit and without his usual smile. His hair was wild from running his hands back and forth through it.
“Is she here?” Looking at his face, Oona already knew the answer.
He shook his head and turned from her.
There was nothing more to say. Voices in Oona’s head jabbered and screamed. She wanted more than anything to sit still. Following Hamish limply through the picture-lined hallway, she saw the eyes of Yule forbears watching her glumly, heard the crackle of the fire, the hushed murmur from the formal parlour. The Yules had each had a parlour to themselves – hers for company, his more of a cubbyhole where he could take cover from company and read. Mrs Yule’s, crowded with china figurines and dainty French furniture, was barely used now. Effie and Margaret and Janet and Fiona had come with bunting and ribbons to deck it out for this most lovely of occasions, May’s bridecog.
But what Oona walked in on was more like a wake. Effie slumped in a chair, weeping while Janet mopped her brow and gave her sips of the Minister’s claret. Big Dod stood by the fire, dark-faced and silent, coughing angrily. Hamish Yule paced, fluffing his hair ever more wildly. Granny plied the search party with bannocks and cheese and they gnawed the food absently, avoiding each others’ eyes. Even Margaret had ceased her gossip. The case was too serious now.
There was talk of a bad presence on the island, of slaughtered pigs and chickens, strange things washed ashore. Andrew, sweating drink, proclaimed that if he had womenfolk, he would keep them indoors and guard them with his life at all times. No more roaming free at all hours. His eyes were on Oona when he said this.
She went to the window like one in a trance, her skin hot and tender, and pressed her forehead to the cool glass, staring out in the garden where rain fell on the table laid so beautifully with white linens for the wedding feast. Fat drops splashed on the Minister’s best plates, on a silver soup tureen and untouched bread rolls, on Stuart, who sat alone, plucking petals from the pale pink roses of the centrepiece.
34
There were oilskins nailed upon the windows and the woman never knew when the sun rose or set, or if the man had come into the room. Often, she did not hear him enter and cross the bare boards to the bed. She would open her eyes to find him stooped over her.
She had slept and woken, slept and woken in this room for as long as she remembered. She was alone now. Peat embers glowed in the grate. It was hard to draw breath. A hatchet, it seemed, had been thrust through her ribs and shards of it were chewing at her flesh. She wanted to rise and look at the wound on her chest, but if she attempted it, the wires would bite into her wrists.
Fury swelled in her, a storm blistering a cold sea, ripping warmth from the air. Anger clotted her thoughts, pinched her pinioned wrists, her broken body. It made her powerful. She fought the wires and tried to break them, slicing her flesh until fresh blood oozed down her arms and warmed her.
The fog came, though really it was always upon her, making her forget. She knew that the man opened the door, crossed the boards, fed her, made her drink and tended to her wrists. Sometimes she woke to find them wrapped in white strips and her hair smelled clean. But each time she slept, the fog rubbed out her memory. She knew neither her name nor where she was from, nor if she had ever been loved.
She didn’t feel love. At times she howled. The space in her chest grew empty then, until it filled with the one thing she was certain of: her need to hurt the one who had put her here. Sometimes she fought the fog back so she would have a chance, but sleep always took her too soon. And so she had nothing to do but sing to her anger and swell it each time she woke.