Katie was trying to listen, but Lucy's voice was beginning to echo, and she felt as if she were not really there, and were looking at Lucy through the eyeholes in a mask.
Lucy said, 'I've already found two early poems by a local fili which mention Mor-Rioghain in the context of Knocknadeenly. One of them talks about 'the frantic death-dancing of thirteen woman on the hill of the gray people,' and it also mentions 'the woman with living hair who comes from the land beyond the land.''
She hesitated, and said, 'Katie-are you all right? You're looking very white.'
'I'm grand. Cold, I think, that's all. And tired. I had some bad news about Paul this afternoon.'
Lucy took hold of her hand. 'Tell me,' she said.
'It seems as if he's never going to-' She stopped, and puckered her lips. She couldn't make her throat work.
'Take your time. It seems as if he's never going to what?'
'The doctor said that-' She waved her hand, trying to pull herself together, trying to explain herself. But then she couldn't stop the tears from running down her cheeks and she couldn't stop herself from sobbing.
The waiter came up with her coffee, but Lucy said, 'That's all right, forget it, this lady's kind of upset. Come on, Katie, you come up to my room with me and lie down for a while. You're shaking like a leaf.'
Lucy helped her up from her chair and led her across the bar and she didn't resist. Just at the moment, after everything that had happened, she had no more resistance left. Even her pride and her natural determination and her strict Templemore training couldn't protect her from grief.
They walked upstairs to Lucy's first-floor room and Lucy held her hand all the way. Room 223 was plain but it was warm and comfortable, with beige walls and a double bed with a rust-colored bedspread. Lucy drew the curtains and then she pulled down the covers.
'Here,' she said, and helped Katie out of her sodden coat. 'God, even your blouse is wet. Listen-why don't you let me run you a bath, that'll warm you up.'
'You don't have to go to any trouble.'
'What are friends for? You'd do the same for me, wouldn't you?'
'All right, a bath would be very welcome, thanks.'
Lucy brought Katie a white toweling robe from the bathroom and then started running the water. Katie sat on the side of the bed and undressed very slowly. She felt aching, exhausted, and disoriented, as if she had tumbled down six flights of stairs and knocked her head at the bottom.
'I hope you like Chanel No 5 bath foam,' Lucy called out. 'It does wonders for the skin.'
'I usually use whatever's on special offer at Dunnes Stores.'
'There,' said Lucy, coming out of the bathroom. 'You have a good long relaxing soak and I'll hang your blouse on the air conditioner.'
Katie climbed into the bath and sat there for a long time staring at nothing at all. She wanted to empty her mind of everything. Of struggling to escape from her car, as it sank backward into the river. Of Declan, shuddering in the flower bed with half of his leg missing. Of Sergeant, a Daliesque nightmare hanging in the trees. Of Paul, on his long dark journey to the end of his life. Of little Seamus, cold as ice.
'Everything okay?' said Lucy.
'Fine, thank you, yes. This bath smells gorgeous.'
'You know what my mother used to say to me? She said, sometimes you just have to admit to yourself that you've had enough, you know? Sometimes you just have to say, I can't cope, I can't fight this anymore. I have to give in.'
Katie nodded, even though Lucy couldn't see her. She picked up the facecloth from the side of the tub and it was then that she really started to cry. It hit her so unexpectedly that she couldn't believe she was doing it, and she was actually cross with herself for sobbing. But the crosser she got, the more she cried, until she was leaning forward with her nose almost touching the bubbles, her mouth dragged down, her throat aching with self-pity.
Lucy tapped gently at the door. 'Katie? Are you all right?'
Again, Katie nodded, but she couldn't speak.
'Katie? You're not crying, are you?'
Lucy hesitated for a moment and then she opened the door. 'Oh, Katie,' she said. She knelt down beside the bath, rolled up the sleeves of her sweater, and put her arms around Katie's shoulders. 'Katie, you poor darling. Everybody expects you to be so strong, don't they? They forget that you're human, like all the rest of us.'
She kissed Katie on the cheek, twice, in the way that a mother would kiss a weeping child. Then she said, 'You relax. I'm going to wash your hair for you and massage your back and you'll feel ten times better, I promise you.'
Katie sat without saying a word as Lucy unhooked the shower attachment and wet her hair. She worked shampoo into her scalp with a strong circular movement and the feeling was so soothing that Katie found herself closing her eyes.
'I always wash my hair whenever I'm feeling tired or depressed or hungover,' said Lucy. 'I wash my hair and then I sit down and eat a whole bar of chocolate. Like, if nobody else is going to pamper me, then why not pamper myself?'
She rinsed Katie's hair and then she took a handful of body shampoo and started to massage her neck muscles and her back.
'That's wonderful,' said Katie. 'Where did you learn to do that?'
'My boyfriend used to work for Gold's Gym. He taught me massage and reflexology and all kinds of tricks that
