Biddy M‘Gowran felt herself to be a person of no small importance when
her grandmother had fairly set off to market and she could contemplate
her own morning’s work. She expected to be extremely busy, and well
she might, as her task was nothing less than the “redding up” of their
kitchen, which she rightly thought in bad need of such an operation.
The mistake she made was in assuming that it could be satisfactorily
performed by the hands and wits of seven years old.
Biddy had arrived at Kilanure only the day before, having hitherto
lived with her other grandmother in a gate-lodge a long way off.
Both her parents had always been dead, it seemed to her, though her
grandmothers did talk as if the trouble had happened quite a short time
ago. The gate-lodge she had just left was a highly ornamental one, with
a little terrace of coloured tiles round it, and stained glass in the
Gothic porch-windows, and all things about it were kept very spick and
span. A girl came up from the village once a week to wash and scrub,
and whatever could be polished was polished, and whatever could not be
was dusted every day.
Why this Kilanure grandmother, whom she had so seldom seen, should now
have come to fetch her away, Biddy did not know; but as she was told
that she should return “one of these fine days,” she started happily
enough, while little, old Mrs Nolan stood under the porch, shaking her
head sorrowfully in the cold March sunlight.
On their journey to Kilanure her new granny, as Biddy called her, had
spoken much about her son Larry, Biddy’s poor father, who, she said,
had been the best son in Ireland, and the finest figure of a young
man in the County Donegal. Whereas old granny had often talked of her
daughter, little Molly, who used to be the prettiest girl in five
parishes, and the best daughter that ever lived in this world--God be
good to them all.
“And a grand worker poor Larry was,” Mrs M‘Gowran now had repeated more
than once. “Ne’er a lazy bone had he in his body; I’ll say that for
him.”
This phrase stuck in Biddy’s mind, and it was chiefly a wish to prove
herself a worthy daughter of such an industrious father that made her
so eager to set about doing something without delay. But there were
other reasons too. She was really shocked at the grimy aspect of the
kitchen, as far as she could see it, for perpetual twilight dwelt
behind the two tiny windows with their panes of dusty greenish glass
and beetle brows of sloping grey thatch. The state of the floor struck
her particularly; it felt gritty and rough underfoot, as if incrusted
with dried mud. Biddy wondered how it could have got into such a
condition. The scrubbing girl, she conjectured, might not have come
this week, so that granny had no one to help her except grandfather and
Uncle Joe, who of course were not of any use--at all events indoors.
Biddy had often thought, as she watched Meg Hoey working at home, that
it must be very delightful to have command of a great bucket filled
with foaming suds, and a piece of brown soap for the making of more,
besides a cloth and a brush, and liberty to splash and slop all over
the shiny tiles or snowy boards. But Meg always refused to let her try,
on the grounds that she would be only destroying her clean frock and
delaying other people at their work. All this somehow made it now seem
quite clear to Biddy that she should set about cleaning up as soon as
ever she had the house to herself, and thus be able to surprise her
grandparents with the improvement upon their return. She had indeed
already rather surprised her grandmother by the alacrity with which
she agreed that the walk to market was too far, and her vehemence in
declaring that she would not be a bit lonely by herself until her
grandfather came in to his dinner at one o’clock. So Mrs M‘Gowran
started on her long trudge, reflecting that poor Larry’s little girl
seemed to be a good, biddable child; her husband went off with Joe to
their field-work, having told Biddy that she was the grandest little
housekeeper alive; and Biddy found herself at last blissfully alone.
She was strenuously bent upon deserving that character.
Her first requirements were some water and a bucket, and she had the
good fortune to find them both at once, in the shape of a battered old
zinc pail, nearly full, standing at the back door. She resolved to be
content with cold water, for the black, soot-shagged kettle on the
hearth was almost as big as herself, and she had sense enough not to
try lifting it. Brush and cloth must next be sought; but here Biddy had
less luck, as no semblance of the former appeared anywhere, and the
nearest approach to the latter that she lit upon was a blue checked
linen fabric lying folded on the window-seat. To the unprejudiced eye
it was quite evidently an apron; however, since there were two rather
large holes in it she gladly decided that it could be good for nothing
except a floor-cloth; and when she had torn it across to make it a more
convenient size it certainly did look like nothing better than a rag.
Then, after a long and anxious quest she found, in a broken tea-pot
on the dresser, a piece of soap, disappointingly thin, it is true.
Still she thought it would do, and she dropped it into the bucket,
intending to stir up a lather with the poker as soon as it had melted
sufficiently.
While she waited for this she had leisure to notice that two grey hens
and a white one were crawking dismally in a row on the top of the
half-door. She had closed it to exclude them, being much scandalised
at their free-and-easy entrances. Poultry were never permitted to
set scratching foot near the trim flower-beds about the castle
gate-lodge, so Biddy had no experience of fowls and their habits; but
she felt pretty sure that three hens would not keep on making such a
disconsolate noise, like the winding up of the old wheezy eight-day
clock at home, unless they wanted something very badly, and she quickly
guessed that something to be their breakfast. Granny had most likely
forgotten to feed them in the hurry of setting off to market.
What their usual food was Biddy could not tell, but during her late
researches she had espied on a shelf under the dresser a large loaf
of baker’s bread, which seemed to her suitable fare. Being stale, and
not well kneaded, the loaf fell in two as she lifted it out, making it
all the easier to break and crumble up. As she flung the white flakes
thickly into the middle of the road before the door, fowls gathered
speedily about them into a flock so numerous that Biddy thought: “New
granny must own a power of hins.” And well she might think so, for she
was entertaining unawares any of the neighbours’ “chuckens” that could
arrive fast enough, half flying, half running headlong, to share in
this public feast.
Watching and supplying their quarrelsome repast, and wishing the big
loaf yet bigger, for it was vanishing like snow in a rapid thaw, Biddy
did not see that three small children, with ragged lesson-books, and a
grey stuff bag, had come along the road and stopped to look on. They
were her cousins, Paddy M‘Gowran’s children, on their way to school,
but Biddy, the stranger, knew of no such people. After a while: “Is it
throwin’ all her good bread to the hins you are?” inquired the taller
of the little girls, who was some sizes shorter than Biddy. The sudden
question startled her, but as she considered it an impertinence she
did not answer. Presently: “Gimme the heel of the loaf,” said the fat
little boy. “It’s a nice crusty bit,” and he held out a hand.
“Indeed and I will not,” Biddy said, twisting the tough crust. “I’ve
got little enough for the poor hins as it is.” Thereupon he tried to
snatch it with a jump, but she flung it into the very centre of the
bobbing heads, and withdrew empty-handed behind the half-door.
“Come on out of that wid yourselves, Lizzie and Willie,” said the elder
little girl. “We’ll be late, and she’s a cross one.” So they trotted
away down the road.
There was now nothing to hinder Biddy from beginning her great task
immediately, and she set to work with much zeal on a patch near the
door, where she fancied that the floor looked grimiest. At first she
thought she was making good progress, because as she scrubbed away the
blue cloth quickly grew so very black and dirty that it seemed as if
she must soon come upon something underlying smooth and clean, white
boards or gay-coloured tiling. But this did not happen. The more she
scrubbed and wrung out her wet cloth the worse matters looked, and
in one place a perceptible hollow unaccountably appeared. If such an
extraordinary thing had been possible she would really have believed
that the floor itself was turning into mud. She was feeling much
perplexed and distressed, and had already splashed herself all over,
when a sudden blot of shadow made her glance up, to see the doorway
darkened. It was done by two girls, elder sisters of her last visitors,
and they stood staring curiously in at her. Neither of them spoke to
her, but they whispered to each other loudly with giggles.
“Herself’s off marketin’, I suppose. Look-a, Nan, there’s the young one
she said she was fetchin’ home!”
“Glory be to goodness, what’s she doin’ at all? After spillin’ the
bucket of drinkin’ water belike, and wipin’ it up.”
“A quare bad offer she’s makin’ at it then. And I declare now it’s one
of granny’s good blue aperns she’s got wisped up there ruinated.”
These remarks so exasperated Biddy that she plucked up courage to say,
copying Meg Hoey’s manner as closely as she could: “If _I_ was anybody
else, that came gapin’ at a person doin’ a bit of work, I’d stand
out of the light and mind me own business, and not be delayin’ other
people.”
Her rebuke seemed to amuse the girls vastly, which was disagreeable.
However, they went away directly, which was a relief. “Come along,
Sally,” Nan said, “we had a right to be there by now. Och but it’s the
comical, ould-fashioned thing.”
As the sound of their laughter receded Biddy determined to prevent the
recurrence of all such annoying intrusions by shutting the front door,
and in her haste to do so she overset the bucket, which sent wedges of
water shooting out on every side. Then, while she struggled desperately
with the stiff latch, a young man came sauntering by, and stopped to
give it the necessary shove and shake, partly from good-nature, partly
for occupation. He wore labourer’s clothes, but so far had done nothing
that day except whistle on the bank a bit down the road.
“Is Mrs M‘Gowran widin?” said this Matt Caffrey. “Ah no, to be sure,
it’s at market she is this mornin’. And so yourself’s keepin’ house,
are you--and after spillin’ the sup of water on the floor? Well now,
that’s too bad.”
“Washin’ up I was,” Biddy said, still with some pride.
“Bedad were you?” said Matt. “It’s the first ever I heard tell of
washin’ up a mud floor. Maybe if you have e’er a drop of water left in
it you might take a turn at the road out here. There’s scarce a puddle
on it to-day at all, and you’ve got a grand one in there begorrah.”
Biddy’s eyes widened with consternation as she began to perceive how
much worse than useless her efforts had been. “But sure there’s no
great harm done,” Matt added, seeing her dismayed look, “I’ll show you
the way it can be set to rights soon enough, if that’s all that ails
you.”
He stepped indoors, and picking up a large iron turf-shovel, thrust
it into the hottest corner of the fire, whence he presently drew it
out, turned a glowing red. This he held steadily, much as a careful
laundress tests her heated flat-irons, low over the wet patch on the
floor, which at once began to yield up its superfluous moisture in
pallid mists of steam. He repeated the process several times, till
Biddy, standing by, saw things underfoot grow reassuringly firm and dry.
“There--a fly wouldn’t aisy wet the tips of his ould toes on it now.
And you might be layin’ out the table ready for dinner, agin the others
come home,” said Matt, who rightly surmised that she was wishing to
wield the heavy, scorching shovel, “and then they’ll find everythin’
rael iligant.”
“True for you, I might so,” said Biddy, and darted over to the dresser.
But in a minute she emerged from among its deep bottom shelves with a
mortified air. “I made sure I seen another loaf sittin’ in there,” she
said, “and it’s only an ould white bowl.”
“Was it there you got the one you were throwin’ to the chuckens a
while ago?” said Matt, “for you may depind she had it keepin’ for the
breakfast to-morra. They do mostly be havin’ a bit of baker’s bread of
a Sunday mornin’.”
At this suggestion Biddy looked more alarmed than she knew. “Well, she
can be gettin’ another one before that, I should suppose,” she said in
an unconcerned tone.
“What sort of trees do loaves of good bread be growin’ wild on in your
part of the counthry, might I ax?” said Matt, with polite gravity.
But Biddy suddenly slid down into depths of despair. “Och, what’ll I
do at all? Sure how could I tell it was the only one she had? And the
hins was starvin’ wid the hunger, and fluttherin’ in at the door like
aigles. And it’s tormintin’ me you are, talkin’ about your ould trees.”
“Whisht-a-whisht, there’s a jewel,” Matt said soothingly, “sure
I wouldn’t be tormintin’ anybody. You made a fine offer at it,
considerin’. And as for the loaf, we must conthrive one way or
another.” He was jingling a few pennies in his pocket as he spoke, and
balancing the price of whisky against the price of bread. “Just be
washin’ the face and hands of you, that are a thrifle black or so,”
he said, “and I’ll be back again wid somethin’ in a couple or two of
minyits.”
Matt had not far to go, and he trotted briskly, especially past Doyle’s
public, so that he very soon did return with nothing less than a portly
loaf. But he found the kitchen empty, and through the open back door
sounded doleful cries. “Murther alive! What’s took her now?” he said,
setting down the loaf and running out.
Biddy had taken Matt’s advice, being indeed extremely muddy, and had
gone with a jug to the small stream, which she saw flickering by, not
many yards from the back door. There, stooping over the water, she
lost her footing on the slippery grass, and went headforemost in. It
was quite shallow, and she might easily have scrambled up the bank if
she had not got into such a panic that she could only hold on to the
edge and scream.
Matt pulled her out dripping. “Well now,” said he, “it’s the unlucky
day wid you entirely, as Tim Joyce said when his best cow choked
herself swallyin’ one of his new brogues. But the jug’s only cracked,
and that’s somethin’ anyway. We’ll make a good job of it yit. And
I’ll just bring you in to me sisther over yonder, and see can she get
you dried.” So he conducted her along the stream, past two or three
cabin-doors, till he came to one where a good-humoured young woman was
standing at a tub.
“Here’s a little girl, Bessie, from ould Mrs M‘Gowran’s,” he said to
her, “after dhrowndin’ herself fetchin’ water, and the rest of them all
away; so I thought you might maybe set her to rights.” And Mrs Bessie
said, “Mercy on us all and more too! The little crathur’s dreeped.
Why, to be sure, I can borry her a loan of Katty’s Sunday frock till I
give them muddy things a rinse in the tub here along wid me wash, and
they’ll be none the worser.”
Meanwhile Biddy’s grandmother, and her husband, who was helping her
with some parcels, were on their way home through the village. As they
passed the schoolhouse, about which the children were playing, little
Ellen, Lizzie and Willie M‘Gowran rushed up to them eagerly with news.
“Och, granny, do you know what the cross girl at your place is after
doin’ on you? She’s broke up your big loaf, and threw it every bit out
to the hins.”
“The bould little thing!” Mrs M‘Gowran said in high vexation, “and I
keepin’ it these two days a purpose agin to-morra.” She flounced on, so
much perturbed that she forgot to produce the sugarsticks she had in
her basket for the tale-bearers, who were thus justly punished.
A little further on she met their sisters Nan and Sally, and was
greeted with: “There’s fine disthruction up at your place, granny. Poor
Uncle Larry’s daughter has the floor all swimmin’ in says of water,
and she’s after tearin’ your good blue apern in two halves to wipe it
up wid. And the show she is herself wid mud and dirt is a sight to
behould. And the childer says your loaf of bread--”
“I’m to be pitied wid the likes of her, the dear knows,” said their
grandmother, hurrying on faster still, with Nan and Sally following to
see what would happen. But when they arrived, there stood the table
in the middle of a dry floor, and on it glimmered a large white loaf,
which a black hen was eyeing warily, as if about to aim a judicious
peck.
“What romancin’ at all had yous then?” Mrs M‘Gowran said, turning her
wrath upon the two girls. “There’s naught amiss wid the floor, and she
needn’t ha’ meddled wid the loaf to be lavin’ it out, but it’s right
enough. Shoo, get along, you ould baste; it’s one of Mary Gallaher’s
pullets. I wonder where the child is herself.”
Here Matt Caffrey put his head in at the back-door. “Matt, avic,” said
Mrs M‘Gowran, “might you happen to see little Biddy runnin’ about
anywhere?”
“I seen her,” Matt said rather solemnly, “times and again. And the last
time I seen her it’s as near as anythin’ she was dhrowndin’ herself
dead, the crathur, outside there, strivin’ to fetch you in a jug of
clane water you might be wantin’ when you come home. Och no, ma’am,
she isn’t hurted, glory be to goodness; I had her hefted out in a
brace of shakes. Me sisther’s just givin’ her a dry at her fire, and
she’ll bring her round to you directly. ’Twould be a pity of anythin’
happenin’ her, for there isn’t a finer-lookin’ child in the parish.
It’s yourself she favours, ma’am.”
Sure enough Matt’s sister immediately arrived, leading Biddy, very trim
and tidy in a clean pink cotton frock. But at this moment Nan, who had
been poking the loaf, triumphantly announced a discovery: “It isn’t
your one at all, granny. Scaldin’ hot it is, just out of the oven like,
instead of bein’ stale.”
“Blathers, Nan M‘Gowran, hers it is,” Matt said, and paused, divided
between a wish to screen Biddy and to let his own generosity appear.
Biddy, however, settled the question herself. “There wasn’t e’er a bit
of anythin’ else to be givin’ the hins,” she said, “and the feathers
of all of them standin’ on end wid the hunger. So I gave them the
whole of the loaf; but the strange man said he’d bring another--before
he saved me out of the river it was.”
“Well, well,” said Mrs M‘Gowran, mollified by relief from several
alarms, “she done the best she could, and she isn’t of a size to have
over-much sinse yet awhile.”
“And the hins wouldn’t find fau’t wid her housekeepin’ anyway,” said
her husband. “Deed now, she was a grand housekeeper--for the hins.”
And thus Biddy M‘Gowran came by her nickname, which she took with
her--so fast it stuck--years afterwards, when she went to keep a house
of her own at Clochranbeg.