Mrs Borden had done this before. I’d heard Lizzie reading out Mrs Borden’s diary to Emma. How they laughed. Mrs Borden talked about how she was getting her women’s blood again even though she hadn’t bled for years, said her insides felt bruised, like it might fall out of her. ‘Listen to this!’ Lizzie had said, put on her best slow-pug voice. ‘I wake up sweating. Andrew won’t come near me.’ Emma and Lizzie laughed. I felt for her.
Mrs Borden went on and on about these horrible thoughts and feelings she had, that sometimes she wanted Mr Borden to die, that the more she had the thoughts, the more she bled, like she was being punished. So she started punching herself in the stomach, tried to stop her terrible thoughts. The girls just laughed.
But now Mrs Borden was being violent to herself again. I knew the things that followed. How she’d wake at night with red between her legs, an ache battering inside her. She’d quietly get out of bed, hold her nightie tight as a tourniquet and hobble down the back stairs to the basement and wash. She would never leave her nightie and sheets for me to deal with. Not like Lizzie has, not like Emma has. Mrs Borden wouldn’t want me to know her like that.
‘What do ya think she’s doin’ the punchin’ for?’ Mary asked.
‘I wouldn’t know anymore.’ A horse and cart went by, tripping hooves on stone, a bridle jingle-jangle. ‘Maybe it’s good I’m leavin’ when I am.’
‘Since when? Ya said that last time and had nothin’ to leave with.’
‘I’ve been savin’ all me money ta go. I’ll tell Mrs Borden soon.’
‘She won’t let ya.’
‘I don’t care. All their fightin’ and nonsense. Somethin’s gonna happen. It’ll drive me crazy.’
‘She’ll never let ya go.’
‘I’ll make her let me go.’ A pigeon cooed in the barn. ‘Well, I best be beatin’ this, earn me keep.’
Mary touched me on the shoulder and rubbed circles. ‘God love ya, Bridget.’
I beat the rug, took mouthfuls of dust.
When I went inside, Mrs Borden was in the sitting room, her eyes stony. ‘You took your time cleaning that rug.’
‘Mrs Borden?’
‘You’ve a lot of chores to get through.’
I couldn’t read her and so I went to the basement and got my cleaning things. She had me dusting photos, dusting shelves, dusting frames, piano, porcelain. The way she sat on the sofa, in Mr Borden’s space, her hands resting over her knees, like she was the master of the estate whistling commands. Mrs Borden was hardening up. Oh, but she could when it was only her and me in the house. Lizzie must’ve upset her.
‘I heard you out there with the Kelly girl.’ She spat it out all dirty.
I felt red, like I would burn and disappear. What had she heard me say? She pulled herself from the sofa, held on to the mahogany side table for support. Then she was right up close to me, her breath my breath.
‘I drive you crazy, do I? What would dear old Nanna and Mammy think of you now, hmmm? You’re making a habit of abandoning people, aren’t you?’ Mrs Borden licked her lips. I hated her then, hated that she spoke of poor Nanna as if she knew about her dear heart. Hated that I’d told her anything about me back home. Her breath my breath, a stinking piece of pork caught between teeth. I pulled away from her. Mrs Borden caught me by the wrist, held me, pinched my skin.
‘Please, Mrs Borden. Yer hurtin’ me.’
She gripped tighter, her dry paper-thin hands.
‘Why were you telling her you’re leaving the house?’ Her eyes watered. Now she knew.
‘I was goin’ ta tell ya.’
Her face came closer to me and I felt my breath bounce off her skin, warm. ‘It’s time I moved on, marm.’
‘How many others have you told?’
‘Just Mary.’
‘You’ve embarrassed me.’
‘I didn’t mean ta.’
Closer still she came, closer until our noses almost touched. Old woman freckles, blue-purple bruising under her eyes, river red lines on cheeks. ‘I paid you more, kept paying you more. Do you hate me that much? Am I that despicable?’
‘No, marm. This place is no good.’ I didn’t recognise my own voice.
Mrs Borden slapped me hard across the face, the meat cleaver sound, my head snapping to the side, my body going with it, and the room echoed like that banshee’s cave. I tasted blood in my mouth.
‘You shouldn’t be allowed to just leave!’ she bellowed, she wailed.
Outside was the sound of a horse and buggy, the ringing bell of the iceman’s cart, a man and woman walking by, her shoes tripping on bluestone trying to keep up with him. I could hear all those things from inside and I wondered if they could hear her out there. I raised my hand. I wanted to hit her back.
Mrs Borden scratched her temples, scratched hard. I tucked my hand under my arm. ‘Go upstairs and do your job,’ she said, her voice then a calm creek.
‘Marm, let me explain . . .’
‘Go upstairs.’
I got my cleaning rags, got my bucket. Mrs Borden watched me. I walked past her, made my way to the front of the house and my skin brushed against hers, a whoomp sound, like sheets drying. When I reached the stairs, Mrs Borden said, ‘When you finish up there I want you to explain this.’ She paused and I heard a rattle. I stopped. There was my money tin, all my hours and years of living Borden in her hand. Rattle, rattle.
In Lizzie’s room, I dusted and dusted. I hated Mrs Borden then. I was ready to cry in anger but held myself back, thought to play safe so I could get my money back. I dusted over Lizzie’s trinkets, those ridiculous little things she didn’t even touch. If I had half as much as she did. Over at the bookshelf, I dusted and let myself cry, let myself want Mammy and Daddy, want them to say, ‘We told ya America was no place for a girl like ya,’ want something, someone, to come into the house and make everything end, let me go walking out the front door and never return. My rags went over spines, over A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, over The Woodlanders. When was the last time she even read these? Rags over Frankenstein, over Wuthering Heights, over The Castle of Otranto, and I got to thinking of home, of the times we’d sit around the kitchen table hogging stove warmth as we told stories to one another, hours of ghosts, hours of tales about cold hands crawling out of the darkness onto your face, stories of drowned immigrants sinking to the bottom of the sea before swimming back to shore, coming back to family.
There would be Daddy and Granddaddy pouring glasses of their homemade whiskey, waiting to be told they had a fine drop.