‘Never better.’
‘It’s only, I’m worried about you.’
It really had come to something when a stranger had fears for your sanity. I had to get a grip. Fast. I assured her I’d be right as rain and, after tucking into the food, I returned to my laptop and began researching everything I could about the Carlisle family. The father was a civil servant who had married a wealthy heiress. Both children attended fine schools and there was ample information on Lyndon’s career in the army. As before, all records of Opaline seemed to just stop, except for a small newspaper announcement of the wedding of Jane Burridge to Lord Findley. Opaline Carlisle was named as the maid of honour. As much as it pained me to think of Martha at all, I remembered what she said about getting to know Opaline by the women in her life. Surely they must have been friends.
I took a large mouthful of cold tea and turned up the volume of the music before deep-diving into the life and times of Lady Jane. This was my happy place: researching people who were long-dead and forgotten by the world at large, as though the very act of my shining a light on them would somehow bring them back to life for a fleeting moment. That’s what had really inspired me to enter the world of rare books in the first place – uncovering the amazing lives and stories of the people who had gone before us; people who cared every bit as much about the day-to-day trivialities of life as we do; people living through some of the most amazing times whilst being wholly unaware of the significance. Something about piecing all of these things together calmed my mind. Maybe it was a comfort to know that my life was just a page in the great history book of human endeavour. It relieved some of the pressure to be someone or something of importance. That feeling would last until I saw one of my peers being awarded some bursary or other, or another who wrote a bestselling tome on the discoveries of some obscure collectors from the past. I was cursed with that most enduring of human desires – to make my mark.
After hours of trawling through births, deaths, charity events and social engagements, I found a letter to the editor of an Irish newspaper dated 1930.
Dear Sir,
I am writing out of a sense of desperation, as my entreaties to all and sundry on this issue have gone ignored. I wish to draw your attention to the deplorable state of the country’s asylums. Women who are as sound of mind as you or I are being involuntarily committed to these institutions without proper examination and being kept in the most horrendous conditions that are far below the standards of common human decency. My dear friend is being held against her will in such a place in the province of Connacht and despite letters to the government, I have been prevented from having her examined by my own independent physician. We need a root and branch investigation into these establishments as a matter of urgency.
Yours,
Lady Jane Findley
It was so out of the ordinary for an English lady to write such a letter, and to an Irish newspaper to boot. Why would she have done it? It didn’t mention who the friend was, but my senses were tingling. Opaline’s letter to Sylvia Beach spoke of being incarcerated. Was it possible that she had been placed into an asylum? I would have to find records of how many asylums there were in Ireland at the time and where.
I needed coffee. I needed Martha. The coffee would have to do.
Chapter Forty
OPALINE
For those precious few seconds before I opened my eyes, I had forgotten where I was. My mind told me that I was at home in bed, but my body knew different. I was freezing, and the rough blanket around me was not my own. I opened my eyes and the horrible truth was confirmed. It hadn’t been a bad dream. I was incarcerated at the hand of my brother.
I heard boot heels resounding heavily down the uncarpeted hallway, like a small army on the march, and my door clattered open.
‘Six o’clock, time to get up,’ a nurse announced, without looking me in the eye. She opened the window and let the freezing cold air in.
Rationally, I knew it was useless to plead my case with her, but emotionally I couldn’t help but beg for my freedom.
‘Please, I have to speak with Dr Lynch. This has all been a big mistake. You have to let me go!’
The nurse, who had jet-black, greasy hair, parted severely in the middle, and dark eyes that seemed both vacant and piercing, completely ignored me. It was as though I hadn’t spoken at all.
‘Down to the hall with you, breakfast is on the table.’
‘Yes but—’
‘You’ll speak to his assistant, Dr Hughes, later, you can take it up with him.’
She handed me a horrible grey flannel dress and told me to put it on. After dressing, she bundled up my own clothes and took them away to a place I knew not where. I was shown to a washstand, where all the other patients were rubbing their faces with icy cold water. They didn’t look particularly crazy to me. They looked tired and afraid.
The nurse, whose name I found out was Patricia, hurried us along like cattle and into what I assumed to be the dining room. There was a long wooden table with a bench either side and on it were enamel cups of some sort of broth and in the middle was a basket of hard bread. At a glance, I estimated that there were about sixty women in all. At the far end of the hall there was a separate table seating about ten women who seemed to be suffering from some kind of intellectual disability and two nurses keeping watch on them. I sat down and tried to spoon some of the broth into my mouth, but I couldn’t stomach it. My throat locked and it refused to swallow. I tried dipping the bread into it when the old woman beside me grabbed my hand.
‘Don’t eat it, it’s poisoned!’
I dropped the bread instantly and at this she began to laugh mercilessly. I couldn’t tell if she was crazy or just plain cruel.
‘Leave her alone, Agatha.’
I looked around to find the speaker of these words and was surprised to see a young woman, scarcely twenty by my reckoning, who spoke with an authority beyond her years. I nodded my thanks. It was hard to tell how old any of my cohabitants were, given their state of dress and the mental toll it took being in a place like this.
‘My name is Mary,’ she said, with a gentleness I hadn’t expected. ‘Why are you here?’
‘My brother—’ I found I could not finish the sentence for fear I would burst into tears.