Word reached the Packhorse Library a day later. Margery and Alice, by tacit agreement, shared out their routes between Beth and Izzy as best they could, then set out for the house together. There was a sharp wind that, instead of being blocked by the mountains, simply used them as a funnel, and Alice rode the whole way with her chin pressed into her collar, wondering what she could say when she reached the little house, and wishing she had an appropriate greetings card, or perhaps a posy to offer.
In England a house in mourning was a place of silence, of vaguely whispered conversation, shaded by a cloak of sadness, or awkwardness, depending on how well the deceased was known or loved. Alice, who often managed to say the wrong thing, found such hushed occasions oppressive, a trap that she would no doubt fall into.
When they reached the top of Hellmouth Ridge, though, there was little suggestion of silence: they passed cars and buggies dotted lower down the track, abandoned on the verge as the passing became impossible, and when they reached the house, strange horses’ heads poked out of the barn, whickering at each other, and muffled singing came from inside. Alice looked over to a small bank of pine trees, where three men were digging in heavy coats, their picks sending clanging sounds into the air as they hit rock, their faces puce, and their breath pale grey clouds. ‘Is she going to bury him here?’ she said to Margery.
‘Yup. His whole family’s up there.’ Alice could just make out a succession of stone slabs, some large, some heartbreakingly small, telling of a Bligh family history on the mountain stretching back generations.
Inside, the little cabin was full to bursting. Garrett Bligh’s bed had been shoved to one side and covered with a quilt for people to sit on. Barely an inch of space remained that wasn’t covered with small children, trays of food, or singing matriarchs, who nodded at Alice and Margery as they entered, without breaking off their song. The windows, which, Alice remembered, had contained no glass, were shuttered and carbide lamps and candles lit the gloom so that it was hard to tell inside if it was day or night. One of the Bligh children sat on the lap of a woman with a prominent chin and kind eyes, and the others nestled into Kathleen, as she closed her eyes and sang too, the only one of the group to be somewhere far from there. A trestle table had been set up on which lay a pine coffin, and Alice could just make out within it the body of Garrett Bligh, his face relaxed in death, so much so that, for a moment, she wondered whether it was him at all. His hollowed cheekbones had somehow softened, his brow now smooth under soft, dark hair. Only his face was visible, the rest of him covered with an intricate patchwork quilt and strewn with flowers and herbs that scented the air. She had never seen a dead body, but somehow here, surrounded by the songs and warmth of the people around him, it was hard to feel shock or discomfort at its proximity.
‘I’m so sorry for your loss,’ Alice said. It was the only phrase she had been coached to say, and here it seemed sterile and useless. Kathleen opened her eyes and, taking a moment to register, smiled vaguely at Alice. Her eyes were rimmed pink and shadowed with exhaustion.
‘He was a fine man, and a fine father,’ said Margery, sweeping in and holding her tightly. Alice wasn’t sure she’d ever seen Margery hug someone before.
‘He’d had enough,’ Kathleen murmured, and the child in her arms looked at her blankly, her thumb thrust deep into her mouth. ‘I couldn’t wish him to stay any longer. He’s with the Lord now.’
The slack of her jaw and her sad eyes failed to mirror the conviction of her words.
‘Did you know Garrett?’ An older woman with two crocheted shawls around her shoulders tapped the four inches of bed-space beside her, so that Alice felt obliged to squeeze her way in too.
‘Oh, a little. I – I’m just the librarian.’
The woman peered at her, frowning.
‘I only knew him from my visits.’ It came out apologetically, as if she knew she shouldn’t really be there.
‘You’re the lady used to read to him?’
‘Yes.’
‘Oh, child! That was such a comfort to my son.’ The woman reached out and pulled Alice to her. Alice stiffened, then gave in to her. ‘Kathleen told me many times how much Garrett looked forward to your visits. How they would take him quite out of himself.’
‘Your son? Oh, my goodness. I’m so sorry.’ She meant it. ‘He really did seem the nicest of men. And he and Kathleen were so very fond of each other.’
‘I’m much obliged to you, Miss …’
‘Mrs Van Cleve.’
‘My Garrett was a fine young man. Oh, you didn’t see him before. He had the broadest shoulders this side of the Cumberland Gap, didn’t he, Kathleen? When Kathleen married him there were a hundred crying girls between here and Berea.’
The young widow smiled at the memory.
‘I used to tell him I had no idea how he could even make his way into that mine with a build like his. Course, now I wish he hadn’t. Still –’ the older woman swallowed and lifted her chin – ‘not for us to question God’s plan. He’s with his own father and he’s with God the Father. We just have to get used to being down here without him, don’t we, sweetheart?’ She reached out and squeezed her daughter-in-law’s hand.
‘Amen,’ someone called.
Alice had assumed that they would pay their respects and leave, but as morning became afternoon and afternoon swiftly fell to dusk, the little cabin grew fuller, with miners arriving after their shift, their wives bringing pies and souse and fruit jellies, and as time slid and stalled in the dim light, more people piled in, and nobody left. Chicken appeared in front of Alice, then soft biscuits and gravy, fried potatoes and more chicken. Somebody shared some bourbon, and there were outbreaks of laughter, tears and singing, and the air in the tiny cabin grew warm, thick with the scents of roasted meats and sweet liquor. Someone produced a fiddle and played Scottish tunes that made Alice feel vaguely homesick. Margery occasionally shot her a look, as if checking she was okay, but Alice, surrounded by people who would clap her on the back and thank her for her service, as if she were a military man, not just an Englishwoman delivering books, was oddly glad just to sit and absorb it all.
So Alice Van Cleve gave herself to the strange rhythms of the evening. She sat a few feet from a dead man, ate the food, sipped a little of the drink, sang along to hymns she barely knew, clasped the hands of strangers, who no longer felt like strangers. And when night fell and Margery whispered in her ear that they really should get going now, because a hard frost would be setting in, Alice was surprised to find that she felt as if she was leaving home, not heading back to it, and this thought was so disconcerting that it pushed away all else for the whole of the slow, cold, lantern-lit ride back down the mountain.
9
Many medical men now recognize that numerous nervous and other diseases are associated with the lack of physiological relief for natural or stimulated sex feelings in women.
Dr Marie Stopes, Married Love
According to the local midwives, there was a reason most babies came in summer, and that was because there wasn’t a whole heap to do in Baileyville once the light had gone. The picture house tended to get its movies some months after they had been and gone elsewhere. Even when they came Mr Rand, who ran it, loved his liquor, to the extent that you could never be sure that you’d see the end of the show before a reel crumpled and burned on screen, victim to one of his impromptu naps, prompting jeers and disappointment across the audience. Harvest festival and hog-slaughter had slid past and it was too early for Thanksgiving, which left a long month with nothing but darkening skies, the increasing smell of wood smoke in the air, and the encroaching cold to look forward to.