Woman of the House by Taylor Alice;

Author:Taylor, Alice; [Alice Taylor]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 1848790
Publisher: The O'Brien Press
Published: 2014-07-26T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eleven

KATE DID NOT sleep that night. Every time she closed her eyes, the “For Sale” notice in the Kilmeen Eagle danced into her mind. The possibility of such a thing happening had never entered her head. Mossgrove in her life had been indestructible. Generations of Phelans might come and go, but the land of Mossgrove remained in the family for ever. She ran the insoluble problem around her head for hours.

At three o’clock she finally gave up all hope of sleep. She came down to the kitchen and made a hot drink with Jack’s cure. Poor Jack, she thought, he must surely know by now because Sarah would have brought him the Eagle as usual. She knew that he had no inkling beforehand because if he had he would have got a message to her. It was a dreadful way for him to find out. Martha probably had not told anybody. Her style would be to do her own thing and keep her thoughts to herself. The chances were that the children did not know either. It would be terrible if they were told by an outsider. Thoughts and possibilities chased each other around her mind until she was so confused that she did not know what to think. She sat by the warm range in the kitchen and swirled the hot drink around in the mug. When she had it finished she felt fuzzy-headed and more confused.

She went into the sitting room and stoked up the fire; there were still some red embers so she put on more turf and soon it blazed up. She would sit by the fire here and maybe she might doze a little. She looked up at the picture of her grandfather. “Now where do we go from here?” she asked him. He looked down at her with his penetrating eyes and she wondered how he would have handled the situation.

“Your problem,” she told him, “came from outside the family, but this one is inside, which is far worse. I can see no solution to it.”

She wrapped an old knitted shawl belonging to her mother around her shoulders and sat looking into the fire, but there was no comfort to be found gazing into the glowing turf. Her mother’s face and Ned’s face swam in front of her.

She must have dozed off because from a distance she became aware that someone was tapping on the window. It did not alarm her unduly because people came to her house at all times of the night. She was startled, however, when she drew back the curtain and saw Mark’s pale face peering in at her. She went into the hallway and opened the door quickly.

“Come in,” she said. “Are you all right?”

He slipped past her soundlessly like a tall, thin shadow.

“I saw your light, Kate,” he said, looking down at her anxiously, “and I hope you don’t mind me knocking at this hour.”

“No, not at all,” she told him, taking his hand and leading him towards the fire.

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