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Tess has not had her tea. She wonders who will make their teas now. She likes a boiled egg and currant bread with butter. She likes when her mother stands beside her father at the table and pours him a cup of steaming tea from the teapot. Sometimes, he puts out his hand and touches her mother's bottom and she and her sisters pretend not to see. Her mother is in her coffin in the chapel tonight. God will probably drop down His Golden Chute soon—any minute now—when He is ready to take her mother up into Heaven. That is how she, Tess, and her brothers and sisters arrived on earth. Her mother told her that whenever she and Tess's father wanted a new baby, she went to the chapel and there she prayed, and God, hearing her prayer, dropped down His Golden Chute and popped in a baby and down the chute the baby flew, fat and happy and gurgling, into her mother's waiting arms.
Tess takes off her shoes, looks up at the black sky, begins to hum. She is not sure if the Golden Chute actually takes people back up into Heaven. That is a guess. She wonders if her mother is on her way, now, this minute, moving through the dark sky, in and out among the cold stars. She grows a little afraid. She looks down at her hands. She picks at the old burn mark on her thumb. She bites off a bit of skin and chews it. She remembers the day she got the burn. Oliver wasn't even born and she had not started school. She went out with her mother to feed the hens. Chuck, chuck, chuck, they called out. They went into the duckhouse and the henhouse to gather the eggs. Her mother had a bucket and Tess had a small tin can. Tess wanted to be just like her mother. When her mother put the eggs in her bucket that day, Tess wanted eggs in her tin can too. She started to cry, but then her mother said, Look, look, and she picked up three lovely shiny stones from the yard and put them into Tess's can and rattled them around. Then her mother ran off inside, in case the bread got burnt. Tess ran after her, but she saw another lovely pebble shining up at her from the ground and she stopped and put it in her tin can and raced in through the small yard, calling out to her mother about her new pebble. At the back door she tripped and tumbled down the steps into the kitchen, and then, half running, she fell sideways into the open fire. Her mother cried out and let the griddle pan fall and ran and lifted Tess and swung her across the kitchen into the big white sink. Later, telling Tess's father what had happened, her mother began to cry. Her two little hands were burnt, she told him, wiping her eyes. Tess tried to show him the pebbles but her hands were all bandaged up.
* * *
Everyone dresses in black the next morning and goes to the funeral. Tess and Maeve stay behind with Mike Connolly. The dining-room table is set with the good china and cutlery. There's a leg of mutton cooked and left aside in the kitchen. Mrs. Glynn comes with warm brown bread. She takes off her coat and puts eggs on to boil. She tells Maeve to mash up cold potatoes with a fork. When the plates are ready, Tess and Maeve carry them up to the dining room. Mrs. Glynn puts on her coat and says if she hurries she'll make the burial. Tess's heart jumps. Mrs. Glynn takes Maeve with her, but Tess is too young to go to the graveyard. "Your poor mother," she says. Before they leave Tess asks about Oliver. When is Oliver coming home? Mrs. Glynn says they can come and see him tomorrow. He'll be going to live with Aunt Maud after that.
When they are gone the house is quiet. The smell of the mutton makes her feel sick. She listens to the clock ticking. Everything is changing. No one puts the wireless on anymore. She hears water dripping inside the pipes high up on the wall. Upstairs the floorboards are creaking. She starts to grow afraid. She is sure there is someone up there. She thinks her mother will come down the stairs and into the kitchen. She runs out into the small yard and as she turns the corner onto the lawn she crashes into Mike Connolly. "Ah, a leanbh, slow down, slow down."
Excerpted from Academy Street by Mary Costello. Copyright © 2015 by Mary Costello. Excerpted by permission of Farrar, Straus & Giroux. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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