Mary went to the Altar of Saint Hippolytus first, because she always had to take the lead. Fiona followed her with that calm precision which, throughout her life, had prevented hunger, dust, pregnancies, men and bills from having the last word. Meghan lagged a breath behind. Justine noticed this, demonstratively overtook her and caught up with Fiona, who patted her on the shoulder comfortingly.
They stepped up to the high altar of Saint Hippolytus of Rome.
The martyr looked down from above, young and stern, with a book and a chain; behind him stood the team of horses, which smelled more of Greece than of Rome. Beneath his image lay the black cloth for Dane. Drops of holy water had soaked into the fabric; the incense had become trapped in the fibres. It was no grave. It was a place where absence had finally taken the form of memory.
Mary stopped at the first step.
“I’ve never thought much of saints who let themselves be torn apart by horses. It’s a kind of piety that comes more easily to men, because afterwards they no longer have to leave anyone else to deal with the consequences of their greatness. But I’ll admit that this Hippolyt looks unnervingly fitting tonight: a young man, an ancient law, a body paying for the mistakes of others. Although a miserable end in a Sardinian silver mine is sadder than a ride out.”
Meghan closed her eyes. The name Dane wasn’t spoken, but it hung between them at once.
Fiona looked towards the horse-drawn carriage in the background.
“In stories, men often die more impressively than they lived. Women are left behind to make someone a sandwich the next morning. Perhaps that’s why I’ve always had a soft spot for martyrs; they get altars, whilst I had to do the washing.”
Justine stepped closer to the black cloth. She didn’t touch it.
“Dane would have loved this ceremony. He’d probably have smiled sheepishly and tried to explain the Latin responses to everyone. That was perhaps the cruelest thing about him: he was good in a way that made it hard not to grant him the full joy of family happiness.”
Meghan opened her eyes. Her voice didn’t come straight away. When she spoke, she was quieter than usual.
“I put this burden on him. I loved him because he was my son, and I overwhelmed him with a love that was meant for more than just a son. When we return to Drogheda, I won’t be able to pretend that this night has brought me nothing but pain; it has also cast shame upon me, and perhaps I need red dust more than I need comfort and concealment.”
Mary turned slightly towards her.
“Drogheda is no confessional. It does not forgive simply because one stands on red earth and squints into the sun. It is a harsh stretch of land with sheep, silkworms, dust, money, history and women who have known for far too long that possessions can replace what was denied them.”
Justine looked at Mary.
“And yet it calls to us. Not just me as the heiress, not you as the ruler, not Mother as the guilty one, and not Fiona as the steward. Us. That’s new and very inspiring, but perhaps that’s precisely why there’s something in it that’s Dane’s true legacy to us.”
Fiona clasped her hands. Not piously, but rather practically, as if gathering her thoughts.
“So the three of you have already sidelined me: Mary rules, Mother manages, and Justine inherits. That leaves me with nothing but the crypt, then, or what?”
Meghan kicked Fiona’s shin grumpily. Vittorio looked up from his book, confused, but a wave of Fiona’s hand reassured him.
“You’ve longed all your life not to have to share Dane with anyone as your share of Ralph: if you look after the crypt, water the flowers there and mow the grass, you’ll fulfil two wishes: yours, to be with Dane undisturbed forever; and ours, not to be paralysed by your reproachful grief. Justine will move in with Mary in the main house; I’ll stay in the steward’s house; and for you, we’ll simply build a luxurious hut next to the tomb: then you’ll always be with Dane; you can walk the three kilometres to us for tea if you like, or stay there if you don’t: that’s how we’ll untangle this tragic knot with feminine cunning rather than with swords and horses.” Fiona pointed to Saint Hippolytus.
Justine heard the words. They hurt, but not as they had before.
“I’ve often hated Drogheda because it was always bigger than me. It was in every sentence Mary spoke, in every precision of Fiona’s, in every absence of you, Mother. But perhaps I must go back there, not to surrender to it, but to see if I can stand there without immediately coming up against a dead man. And I’m accepting my inheritance now: I’m moving into the main house with Great-Aunt Mary.”
Mary’s gaze grew sharp, but not hostile.
“You’ll be standing there as soon as possible. Not as a replacement child, not as a belated gift for my childlessness, and not as an actress who finally finds her greatest role on red dust. You’ll be standing there because you’re wise enough not to believe Drogheda when it claims to be more important than the people who live there.”
Justine almost laughed and threw her arms round Mary. The old lady hesitated, but then returned Justine’s thanks. Fiona nodded contentedly; Meghan snorted jealously.
“That’s almost a bad sentence, Mary. I’m proud of you.”
“Don’t get too cocky, child. I’m very old, very rich and quite capable of ruining a good sentence with a will. You’ve received from Ralph what I coveted, and now you can tend to the fruit of that desire for ever. I’ll take the daughter I never had and you never wanted.”
Fiona let out a dry chuckle.
“Then ruin it a little less this time! Don’t just give her land, but give her room to manoeuvre. A woman can bear an inheritance if it isn’t meant to be a chain, a crown and an excuse for our old mistakes all at once.”
Mary looked at Fiona for a long time.
“You were always more dangerous when you were quiet. Today you’re dangerous because you speak. That’s a development I’d probably still disapprove of in my old age, were it not for the fact that it’s so useful. I’m going to give you half my jewellery. Why should it lie gathering dust in the safe when we can celebrate balls again in Drogheda with Justine? Dane’s blessing has made me downright generous.”
Meghan touched the bench in front of her. Her fingers rested on the dark wood, as if seeking support from something that wouldn’t give way.
“What will happen when we get there?”
Justine didn’t reply straight away. She looked at the black cloth.
“Then, at first, there’ll be silence. Probably an awkward silence. Perhaps Mary will give orders, Fiona will work, you’ll tend the crypt, and I’ll learn to become the mistress of Drogheda. But perhaps this time we’ll endure the silence until it’s no longer just empty. And then we’ll throw a ball to celebrate the return of life to Drogheda.”
Fiona nodded slowly.
“And perhaps your wedding to Rainer Harth-Kübel? You don’t start with healing. You start with marriage. For it is only from that that the next heiresses will emerge.”
Mary glanced briefly at Magdalena. Then at the Sebastian altar.
“Our witnesses will take different paths. We, on the other hand, are going home together, which is probably the most exotic journey of all, because none of us will be the woman who left when we get there.”
Fiona looked at her granddaughter.
“It’s lovely that you’re coming back to take your mother’s place as heiress, so that she can look after your brother’s tomb. She won’t mind; Mary and I will love you and teach you, because we’ve now realised what we’d previously overlooked in you.”
Justine swallowed.
Outside, the wind rattled the chapel door. Inside the villa, a breakfast table lay laid out for a new order that had only truly fallen into place last night. Valeria Sebastienne had vanished, but her work had taken effect; indeed, it had turned the situation on its head: instead of dividing the family, she had brought three women together and set the fourth free to grieve without blackmail.
Justine looked at Saint Hippolytus, at the horses, the chains and the young martyr, whose name had cast a shadow over the night ever since the fresco in the stairwell.
“I’m coming with you because I want to know whether ‘origin’ can be anything other than a place where everything began to hurt.”
Meghan closed her eyes briefly.
This time, Fiona placed her hands on Justine’s and Mary’s arms.
Mary took a step closer to the black cloth.
“Then it’s decided. We’ll return to Drogheda as soon as this Greek farce with the police lets us go. We won’t take Dane with us as a weapon, but as a deceased family member, and we’ll forget about Valeria.”
Justine looked at her.
“And Archbishop de Bricassart?”
Mary’s face turned to stone. Then, very slowly, not gently, but truthfully, she replied.
“Ralph remains where he’s always been: between us, in Rome, in Drogheda, in Dane’s decaying remains, in Meghan’s guilt, in my desire, and in God’s utterly inscrutable personnel policy.”
Meghan exhaled as if bandages had finally been applied to hold together what had been threatening to fall apart since Dane’s death.
‘That’s enough. For a start, I’m sufficiently mummified; I’ll shrink into my role and my new lodgings.’
Fiona looked at the black cloth.
‘For a start, that’s often more than someone who doesn’t work deserves.’
The four women stood before Hippolyt, but the image that formed in Justine’s mind’s eye did not belong to the chapel. It was no altar, no Greek stone. It was Drogheda in the morning light: red dust, endless expanse, sheep like pale specks, a house too big for its inhabitants, and four women approaching it from different directions.
Mary with her walking stick and her determination. Fiona with her schemes and her tardy remarks. Meghan with a guilt that was no longer quite nameless. Justine with anger, talent and a legacy that would finally conquer Australia’s largest open-air stage.
Drogheda sounded like a place where women could return to their roots without submitting to them entirely.
