“Miss Beatrice Barnes, this is Mrs. Anne Gallagher. You will assist her. I trust you to be prudent.”
Beatrice nodded emphatically, and Geraldine turned away, extending a hand toward Eoin.
“W-where will you take him?” I asked, certain good parents did not just hand their children over to complete strangers. Eoin knew her, but I did not.
“The toy department upstairs, of course. And then we will go to Ferguson’s drugstore for a treat.” She smiled down at Eoin, two deep dimples appearing on her powdered cheeks. When she met my gaze again, her smile was gone. “My shift is over. I’ll bring him back at half past the hour. That should give you plenty of time to see to your purchases without the lad underfoot.”
Eoin bounced on his toes, clasping her hand in excitement before his face fell and his shoulders slumped. “Thank you, Mrs. Geraldine Cummins,” he said, “but Doc said I must stay close to my mother and help her.”
“And you will help your mother most by coming with me,” Mrs. Cummins said briskly.
Eoin looked at me, hope and doubt in his smile.
“Go ahead, Eoin. Enjoy yourself. I’ll be fine,” I lied.
I watched Eoin walk away, his hand in the older woman’s grasp, and desperately wanted to call him back. He was already showing her his pocket watch, babbling about our recent adventure at the pawnshop.
“Shall we get started, Mrs. Gallagher?” Beatrice said, her voice high, her eyes bright.
I nodded, insisting she call me Anne, and stammered through my list of needs once more, eyeing the prices as we walked, pointing out the things I liked and the colors I preferred. The average dress was around seven pounds, and the way Beatrice was prattling about dinner dresses and house frocks and winter wear and summer clothes, not to mention hats, shoes, and handbags, made me start to feel faint.
“You will need slips, corsets, knickers, and stockings as well?” she asked discreetly, though there was no one near us.
“Yes, please,” I said, deciding it was time to lie a little if I was going to accomplish anything. “I’ve been ill for a long time, you see. And I’m afraid it’s been so long since I purchased clothing that I don’t know what size I am or what’s in fashion. I’m not even sure what a lady needs,” I said, and it wasn’t hard to make my eyes well up pathetically. “I hope you’ll be able to give me some advice, bearing in mind that a whole new wardrobe could get expensive. I need the basics, nothing more.”
“Of course!” she said, patting my shoulder. “I am going to take you to a dressing room, and we will begin. I have a good eye for sizes. This is going to be great fun.”
When she returned, her arms were filled with white frills.
“We have some lovely artificial silk just in from London and knickers that fall above the knee,” she purred. “We also have some new corsets that lace up in the front and are quite comfortable.” An image of me at my writing desk wearing drawstring cotton pants and a ribbed tank flitted through my mind, and I swallowed the bubble of panic that wanted to break free.
The “artificial silk” felt like rayon, and I wondered how well it would launder, but I did my best to wiggle into the corset, appreciating the relative ease of the front laces and the long ruffle that fell halfway down my thighs. It was designed to wear over the chemise, which fit like a square-necked slip and provided little lift or support to my breasts but was soft and comfortable. I slipped on the knickers Beatrice had whispered about and decided it could be worse.
I tried on a deep-blue dress with a square neckline and sheer elbow-length sleeves. The lines were straight and simple, with a bit more volume at the hem of the skirt so it swished softly a few inches above my ankles. A sash gave the dress some shape, and Beatrice studied me, her lips pursed.
“The color is good. The style too. You have a lovely neck, and you could wear this with jewels and dress it up for dinner or wear it plain with just a hat for Mass. We’ll add the rose-colored one just like it to the stack.”
Two cotton blouses, one pink and one green, with lapels that created a wide V above three buttons could be worn with the long gray skirt Beatrice insisted was a staple. I tried on two “housedresses” next: one peach, the other white with tiny brown dots. Both had deep, thigh-high pockets and long, straight sleeves that ended in thick cuffs. They were simply styled with round necklines that skirted the collarbones and a pleated waistband that separated the bodice from the shin-length skirt. Beatrice set a wide-brimmed white straw hat decorated in peach flowers and lace on my head and declared me perfect. She added two shawls to my purchases, one a soft green and one white, and scolded me when I tried to tell her no.
“You were born in Ireland, yes? You’ve lived here all your life. You know you must have shawls!”
Beatrice brought me a long wool coat and a matching charcoal hat decorated with a spray of black roses and a black silk ribbon. She called it a cloche hat. Instead of the stiff circular brim and round dome of the straw hat, the cloche hat was snug and flared around my face coquettishly, following the line of my head. I loved it and left it on while I moved on to the next thing.
I started making a pile. In addition to the underthings and clothes, I would need four pairs of stockings, a pair of brown kid pumps, a pair of medium-heeled black T-strap shoes, and a pair of black boots for the colder months. I could also use Anne’s old boots for long walks or chores. I mentally balked at the thought of chores, wondering what kind of chores a woman in 1921 was typically tasked with. Thomas had servants, but he’d said he wanted me to assist him with his patients. I reassured myself that the boots would suffice for that as well.
I’d been keeping a tally in my head—stockings four for a pound, shoes and shawls three pounds apiece. The cotton dresses were five pounds each, the boots and the linen dresses were seven, the chemises and knickers were a pound apiece, and the skirt was four. The blouses were two and a half pounds, the corset a little more, the hats as much as the cotton dresses, and the wool coat fifteen pounds all by itself. I had to be getting close to ninety pounds, and I still needed to buy toiletries.
“You need a dress or two for parties. The doctor is often invited to the homes of the well-to-do,” Beatrice insisted, a frown curving between her brows. “And do you have jewelry? We have some beautiful costume jewelry that looks almost real.”
I showed her my ring and earrings and indicated that was the extent of it. She nodded, biting her lip.
“You also need a handbag. But that can wait, I suppose. When winter comes, you’ll wish you had another wool suit,” she added, eyeing the ugly, outdated suit I’d worn coming into the department store. “That’s not the . . . loveliest . . . suit I’ve ever seen. But it will be warm.”
“I won’t be going to any parties with the doctor,” I protested. “And this suit will have to do. I’ll have my shawls and my coat. I’ll be fine.”
She sighed as if she’d failed me but nodded her assent. “All right. I’ll have your purchases wrapped and boxed up while you finish dressing.”
26 October 1920
Black and Tans and Auxiliaries—forces pumped into Ireland from Great Britain—are everywhere, and they don’t seem to answer to anyone. Barbed wire and barricades, armoured vehicles, and soldiers with fixed bayonets patrolling the streets are all commonplace now. It’s quieter in Dromahair than in Dublin, but we still feel it here. All of Ireland is feeling it. In little Balbriggan, just last month, the Tans and the Auxies set half the town on fire. Homes, businesses, factories, and whole sections of town were burned to the ground. Crown forces said it was a reprisal for the death of two Tans, but the reprisals are always excessive and are always completely indiscriminate. They want to break us. So many of us are already broken.
This past April, the Mountjoy jail was full of Sinn Féin members whose only crime was political association. The political prisoners were mixed in among the regular criminals, and in protest of their incarceration, several of them began a hunger strike. In 1917, a political prisoner, a member of the IRB, went on strike and was force-fed. The brutal way in which he was “fed” cost him his life. As the crowds outside Mountjoy Prison grew, the national attention grew as well, until Prime Minister Lloyd George, still feeling the sting of worldwide outrage from the hunger strike of 1917, capitulated to their demands, gave the men prisoner-of-war status, and moved them to the hospital to recover. I was able to see them at the Mater Hospital in an official capacity, as a medical representative appointed by Lord French himself. I volunteered. The men were weak and thin, but it was a battle won, and they all knew it.
The Dáil, Ireland’s newly formed government made up of the elected leaders who refused to take their seats at Westminster, has been outlawed by the British administration. Mick and the other councilmembers—those who aren’t in jail—have continued to carry on in secret, establishing a working government and doing their best to create a system under which an independent Ireland can function. But local mayors, officials, and judges who work in a more public capacity can’t hide as easily as the Dáil officials can. One by one, they have been arrested or murdered. The lord mayor of Cork, Thomas MacCurtain, was shot in his house and his elected replacement, Terence MacSwiney, was arrested during a raid on Cork City Hall not too long after he took office. Mayor MacSwiney, along with the ten men he was arrested with, decided to go on a hunger strike to denounce the continued unlawful imprisonment of public officials. Their strike, just like the one in April, has attracted national attention. But not because it ended well. Terence MacSwiney died yesterday in England at a Brixton jail, seventy-four days after he began his hunger strike.
Every day it’s another terrible story, another unforgiveable event. The whole country is under immense strain, yet there is an odd hopefulness mixed with the fear. It’s as if all of Ireland is coming awake and our eyes are fixed on the same horizon.
T. S.
10
THE THREE BEGGARS
You that have wandered far and wide
Can ravel out what’s in my head.
Do men who least desire get most,
Or get the most who most desire?
—W. B. Yeats
Beatrice was waiting for me when I emerged from the dressing room, my hair a little disheveled. I was wearing one of the cotton dresses and a new hat that covered the worst of my hair. Beatrice left the brown kid pumps, as she called them, for me to wear out of the store as well, saving me from having to lace Anne’s boots by myself. Beatrice had taken Anne’s old brown suit, hat, and boots to be boxed with the rest of my purchases. I looked much better than I had when I arrived, but my side ached, and my head pounded from overexertion. I was glad the adventure was almost over.
Beatrice prattled on beside me, inquiring over my toilette. I told her I needed a shampoo for my hair and something to smooth the curl. She nodded as if shampoo was a known term. “I need products for my . . . menses?” It was the most old-fashioned word I knew to describe a woman’s period. But Beatrice nodded again, clearly understanding.