The Judge's Wife Read online

  First published 2016

  by Black & White Publishing Ltd

  29 Ocean Drive, Edinburgh EH6 6JL

  www.blackandwhitepublishing.com

  This electronic edition published in 2016

  ISBN: 978 1 78530 056 1 in EPub format

  ISBN: 978 1 78530 051 6 in paperback format

  Copyright © Ann O’Loughlin 2016

  The right of Ann O’Loughlin to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Ebook compilation by Iolaire, Newtonmore

  To John, Roshan and Zia

  Acknowledgements

  Many years ago, John and I went on a great adventure to the land of colour and spices. We travelled the length and breadth of India, but it was only when we stopped and settled to live in Bengaluru, which was then known as Bangalore, that we truly experienced the delight of this wonderful and diverse place.

  There we met the Noronha family, Olga and the now late Tony, and their two children, Nikesh and Nitya, and a huge extended family. They took us into their hearts and their lives, transforming our stay in India into a life-changing and truly life-enhancing experience. We will be forever in their debt for the love and friendship they offered two strangers from the other side of the world. Now is the time to say thank you to Olga Noronha and her family and all our dear friends in that beautiful city of South India for a friendship that has spanned over two decades.

  Writing a novel is a long and slow process; it is the writer’s family who lives that journey. To John, Roshan and Zia, who were always by my side offering support, my love and thanks. So too must I thank my agent, Jenny Brown of Jenny Brown Associates, who, with kinds words of encouragement, helped bring The Judge’s Wife to publication.

  The team at Black & White Publishing has, as always, been wonderfully supportive, but special thanks must go to my editor Karyn Millar for her sound advice and rights manager Janne Moller for her constant good humour.

  A final thank you to all the lovely readers who took my first novel The Ballroom Café to their hearts. My hope is that you enjoy The Judge’s Wife equally, and to the new readers who have happened on this novel I hope that you enjoy the story of Vikram and Grace as much as I loved writing it.

  Ann

  Contents

  Title Page

  Chapter 1: Our Lady's Asylum, Knockavanagh, Co. Wicklow, March 1954

  Chapter 2: Parnell Square, Dublin, March 1984

  Chapter 3: Bangalore, India, March 1984

  Chapter 4: Our Lady's Asylum, Knockavanagh, Co. Wicklow, March 1954

  Chapter 5: Parnell Square, Dublin, March 1984

  Chapter 6: Bangalore, India, March 1984

  Chapter 7: Parnell Square, Dublin, March 1984

  Chapter 8: Our Lady’s Asylum, Knockavanagh, April 1954

  Chapter 9: Bangalore, India, March 1984

  Chapter 10: Parnell Square, Dublin, March 1984

  Chapter 11: Our Lady’s Asylum, Knockavanagh, April 1954

  Chapter 12: Bangalore, India, March 1984

  Chapter 13: Parnell Square, Dublin, March 1984

  Chapter 14: Our Lady’s Asylum, Knockavanagh, April 1954

  Chapter 15: Parnell Square, Dublin, March 1984

  Chapter 16: Bangalore, India, March 1984

  Chapter 17: Parnell Square, Dublin, April 1984

  Chapter 18: Our Lady’s Asylum, Knockavanagh, March 1955

  Chapter 19: Bangalore, India, April 1984

  Chapter 20: Parnell Square, Dublin, April 1984

  Chapter 21: Our Lady’s Asylum, Knockavanagh, July 1955

  Chapter 22: Bangalore, India, April 1984

  Chapter 23: Our Lady’s Asylum, Knockavanagh, March 1960

  Chapter 24: Parnell Square, Dublin, April 1984

  Chapter 25: Bangalore, India, May 1984

  Chapter 26: Parnell Square, Dublin, May 1984

  Chapter 27: Bangalore, India, May 1984

  Chapter 28: Parnell Square, Dublin, May 1984

  Chapter 29: Parnell Square, Dublin, May 1984

  Chapter 30: Bangalore, India, May 1984

  Chapter 31: Parnell Square, Dublin, May 1984

  Chapter 32: Bangalore, India, May 1984

  Chapter 33: Dublin, Ireland, May 1984

  Chapter 34: Parnell Square, Dublin, May 1984

  Chapter 35: Dublin, Ireland, May 1984

  Chapter 36: Knockavanagh, May 1984

  Epilogue: The Fernandes Estate, Chikmagalur, India, July 1984

  1

  Our Lady's Asylum, Knockavanagh, Co. Wicklow, March 1954

  Every part of her ached. The thin wool coat, heavy on her shoulders, scratched across her skin. The powder he had told her to pat on her face made her cheeks bristle. The shoes he had laid out for her were too high; her ankle throbbed from where she had banged it on the last stone step on the way to the car.

  Grace dropped her face into the soft silk of the scarf loosely knotted around her neck. Tears swelled up inside her. She wanted to roll down the window and scream, to throw herself from the car when it slowed on O’Connell Street. She scanned the crowd. A woman waiting to cross the street with a male companion took in the wide car with the soft leather seats and gave a haughty look.

  Her husband, the judge, had told her to pack a small suitcase. “A time away will do you good.”

  He had stayed with her while she dressed, his arms folded, his head bowed, waiting to chaperone her to the car. At the wheel now: a silent hulk of a man.

  Judge Martin Moran took the coast road to Wicklow as if on a day trip from the city. She sat beside him, tears coursing down her cheeks, chiselling grey channels through her make-up. Hidden in her hand, inside her glove, was a small piece of white marble pressed to her skin, the smooth chill of the stone giving some comfort. Aunt Violet, tightly clutching her handbag, sat in the back, silent, watching her niece blubber into her scarf.

  The shutters were down in Knockavanagh, the shops closed for a half-day. At the far side of the town and past the meat factory, Judge Moran stopped at the gates of Our Lady’s Asylum.

  Panic streaked through Grace. Tentatively she put a hand out to her husband, but he jerked away. They slid past the tall grey building with the small windows and the water tower set aside on marshy land. At a small stone bungalow, the Morris Oxford pulled into a parking space marked “reserved”.

  “This is your new home. For a while, anyway.” The judge spoke in a firm and matter-of-fact tone. Aunt Violet placed a tight grip on Grace’s shoulder.

  A man in a suit flanked by two attendants emerged from the house, smiling, arms extended. Grace was gently helped out, her small leather case taken from the back seat.

  The suited man, his forehead beaded with sweat, stepped forward and bowed to the judge and Aunt Violet. “Judge Moran, Mrs McNally, we have coffee prepared for you.”

  “We can’t stay long.”

  Grace pulled hard, tried to turn to her husband. “Martin, don’t leave me here.”

  Her words fell into the pit of the space between them as Martin was shown into the small house.

  Aunt Violet waved her gloved hand in the air. “Coffee is an excellent idea,” she said.

  The attendant nearest dug an elbow into Grace’s ribs. “Don’t be creating such a commotion. Be a good girl.”

  Catching her up under the arms, they scooped her so high her shoes fell
off.

  “My shoes, I need my shoes.”

  “Where you are going there is no need for fancy footwear.”

  One of them took out a key and unlocked a thick iron door. “You might be a judge’s wife, but in here you are nothing, simply nothing. Get in there, take off those clothes.”

  Grace stepped in. Pressing her back into the wall, she held her arms tight across her chest.

  “Do what you are told, like a good girl.”

  Her gloves were wrenched off. Her silk scarf slid to the ground. Her coat was yanked from her shoulders and her dress pulled so that the flimsy satin gave way down one side, the sound of the tearing fabric shrieking through the room, echoing the screams in her head. She stood in her cream silk underwear, shivering.

  “Take them off.”

  “But . . .”

  The attendant took a step towards Grace. Quickly, she danced out of her slip, unhooking her bra, desperately trying to hide her breasts.

  “Knickers off as well.”

  Grace shivered. “I gave birth only days ago.”

  “Take them off.”

  Grace pulled down her knickers, shame flushing through her. She stood, her legs squeezed together, trying to hold in a pee. Voices, loud and jovial, wafted past: the hurried goodbyes, the crunch of gravel, the purr of the Morris Oxford as the judge turned it in the small yard and drove away.

  She was steered by the shoulders to the door.

  “But I am naked.”

  With a push to the back, Grace was guided across the corridor to a long, narrow room with five tiled showers. A bar of red carbolic soap was shoved into her hand; the cold tap was turned on.

  “Wash yourself, like a good girl.”

  Grace slapped the soap across her body, the harsh smell making her want to throw up. When the water stopped flowing, she was handed a towel and a blue flannelette nightgown.

  “If flannelette was good enough for May Minihan in Ward B, it can be good enough for you.”

  Rough to the touch, the nightdress had been boiled so many times that the flower pattern had long since faded.

  “Look lively.”

  They marched her down a long corridor. As they approached the steel door at the end, a key screeched in a lock. The door was pulled back from the inside.

  “My case, what about my case? Can I please have my case?”

  Grace was directed to where a stout nurse was waiting for her.

  “Ward E. Walk.”

  Scuffles of clouds framed by rectangular, dirt-encrusted windows danced overhead. The sound of laughter drifted up from downstairs, where the two attendants puffed on cigarettes and relayed to the staff canteen every detail of the committal of the judge’s wife to the asylum.

  2

  Parnell Square, Dublin, March 1984

  It was a small brown leather suitcase, snapped shut with a buckle to keep it tightly secured. A red-flecked cord was knotted tightly around the middle.

  Wedged into a corner between the judge’s desk and the window overlooking the back garden, it was as if it had been long forgotten, slipped out of the way in haste, abandoned in a dark space.

  Emma reached down. The judge was dead, otherwise she would not dare to investigate. The handle was soupy with dust; the leather creaked when she pulled on it. It remained stuck. She yanked stronger, a determination rising inside her to see what he had hidden away. Leaning forward, she gripped tighter, pulling fiercely, the rigid leather groaning as it gave in to the force, sticking halfway up until she managed to dislodge it, a funnel of dust swatting around her.

  It was heavy. An envelope addressed to Judge Martin Moran, No. 19 Parnell Square, Dublin, was attached with brown tape to the flat top. Half ripped open, the envelope had browned with age, the contents missing.

  Emma hesitated. He would not like her going through his things, especially because she had only returned once he was dead. Twelve years had passed since they last spoke.

  Here, in his room, she had shouted at him, told him he was more like a jailer than a father. He had sat back in his leather-buttoned armchair at his desk by the window, staring at her, making no attempt to interrupt.

  Glancing over her shoulder as she stalked to the door, she saw his shoulders stiffen, but he did not call her back. He knew her bags were packed. Deliberately, he hunched over the documents on his desk before slowly picking up the phone and asking the kitchen to send up a tray of tea. In a surge of fury, she grabbed a book from a shelf and threw it. It fluttered by him, plopping like a dead bird onto the windowsill behind him.

  She pushed the case into the centre of the judge’s wide desk and swiped off a layer of dust with her sleeve. Not bothering to look for a pair of scissors, she tugged at the cord, but it bit into her fingers, refusing to snap. Frustrated, she swiped at it with his letter opener, hacking like a butcher until it gave way.

  Unbuckling the strap and easing the clasps back, the case creaked on release, silverfish scattering on all sides. There was a faint whiff of old leather, and the hinges squeaked as she pushed the lid back. The sweet smell of a perfume locked away for too long wafted hesitantly past her. Emma flushed with surprise to see the neatly packed contents: a silk nightgown rolled so it did not crease, a soft brush and a comb, a small bottle of perfume held upright between powder-blue silk slippers and a small vanity bag for make-up. Two coloured cardigans were folded neatly, along with a tweed jacket pressed small, linen ruched skirts, one grey, one red, and a pair of black shoes.

  Slowly Emma fumbled with her fingers around the case, scrabbling along the bottom until she felt a rectangular shape. A red notebook. It was tied with a wide ribbon. Inside the cover the name Grace: curly writing in purple ink. Emma’s stomach tightened. The writing was even and neat. The first page the only used, as if the writer expected a lifetime to fill in the rest.

  March 22, 1954

  Martin says I have to go away to recuperate, but he does not say to where. He is so different, I can feel the anger cross in the door in front of him. Aunt Violet is in charge, I know that. She has only said a few words to me, none of them good. She is a wicked woman. How can she be so horrible to her own flesh and blood?

  Vikram, where are you? I worry so much. Has anybody told you what has happened? I am so very tired and weary. I should have run away with you, I know that now. This regret will haunt me. Have you gone back to India? Please forgive me, please don’t give up on me. Please make contact, please find me. I have written a letter to you and it is stamped, I just have to find a post box to throw it in. Maybe when I am better I can walk to a village or something, or maybe if the people are kind they will post it for me, though no doubt there will be gossip about an airmail letter to India.

  Emma scanned the rest of the book, hoping for more. Her head hurt. Grace was her mother: the woman who gave birth to her, the woman who died before she could hold her, the mother she never knew. Grace was the woman she could never talk about. The judge never even allowed her name to be uttered in his presence; he never would let anybody talk of Grace. When she had tried, his face darkened and he snapped, “Don’t, please,” his face contorted in such pain, she was never brave enough to push further.

  Furious at her inability to understand, she threw the notebook. It cleared the room, landing with a thud on the hall floor, a small pink envelope skitting out under the hall table. She made to follow the envelope, but the doorbell rang and she was afraid the caller would hear her in the hall. Turning away, the persistent buzz of the bell pushed through the rooms, but she ignored it. There was a lull when Emma thought the person outside might have given up, but the buzzing started up again in short, sharp bursts, displaying the caller’s impatience. The bell brrring itched at her brain, making her rush down the hall in anger. She swung the door open so fiercely it bounded back, bumping her on the shoulder. The woman waiting there jumped back, startled.

  Emma took her in. Middle-aged, blonde hair whipped up in a high bun. Her angular face was caked with heavy powder, her lipstick wa
s creamy pink, little spots clinging to her two front teeth, her eyelids were heavy with blue eyeshadow.

  “Your neighbour, Angie Hannon, from the bed and breakfast. I was sorry to hear about the judge. I helped him out, did a few bits and pieces for him these last few years. I thought I should introduce myself. I brought you a box of groceries, you don’t want to be worrying about shopping at a time like this.”

  “Thank you, Mrs Hannon, but I am all right.”

  “I don’t like to see you on your own here. If you want, you can stay in my place. The bed and breakfast is not that busy these days. I have plenty of free space.”

  Angie Hannon reached down and picked up a large cardboard box from the ground. “Shall I carry it downstairs for you?”

  Emma stepped back to let Angie into the hall. “Maybe leave it on the table here.”

  Angie slid it onto the mahogany table, letting it glide a path through the dust. A bottle of wine was tucked in tight beside food in paper bags, showing Mrs Hannon had shopped at more than a supermarket.

  “I am just close by, call me any time. I liked your father. He was always good to me.”

  “I did not get on with my father, Mrs Hannon, we never could find a space where we had anything in common.”

  Reaching over, Angie squeezed Emma’s arm. “That hardly matters now.”

  Emma did not answer and Angie stepped back out onto the front steps.

  Emma closed the door and turned to the judge’s library. Switching on the electric heater by the desk, she sat looking at the open suitcase. Slowly, she pulled at the red linen skirt, releasing it from its tight ball. It gave way easily, unfurling in a shiver of wrinkles to stand long and straight, its pleats still pressed in place. A grey cardigan next, the softness of the wool a reminder of when she was a child and the housekeeper soaked her clothes in vats of cold water to loosen the wool and keep it soft. Slowly, she undid the buttons and slipped her hands into the bolero sleeves. The fit was right. As she stepped into the skirt, the linen brushed a breeze across her ankles. In the cabinet at the end of the room was the judge’s mirror, installed on the inside of a door so he could check his appearance every morning, before his car arrived for the Four Courts. As she opened the door a puff of sweet mahogany pushed past, the familiar, intense smell of his cigars encircled her. Shaking her head, she tried to avoid it.