Chapter Five

The Changeling

Clontarf, explained Tom, as the green and white painted open topped tramcar of the Dublin United Tram Company rattled and clanged its way along Route 30 through the bustling cobbled streets of Dublin, lay on the coast, on the north side of the city, now a suburb, was originally a small village.

They had boarded the Clontarf bound tram at Nelson's Pillar and taken seats on the upper deck of the tramcar, so that Sybil could see much more of the city than would have been immediately visible had they stayed down below. This was despite, or perhaps because of, Tom pointing out to Sybil that many people still considered it highly improper for a lady to be seen riding on the open upper deck of a tramcar. Sybil rising to the occasion had said that since she was but a "ruddy foreigner", an ignorant English girl, and no lady, such a ridiculous notion could do what little reputation she still possessed no harm whatsoever. Besides which, she had Tom there to protect her. Tom pithily observed that he felt certain that she would be more than a match for anyone, man or woman, who dared to question the propriety of her riding on the top of a tramcar and would have no need whatsoever of any paltry protection he could afford to her.

After a short while, they reached Clontarf, and got off the tram near the sea front. By now the sun had fully broken through the grey murk which had persisted since it had stopped raining and the afternoon promised to be bright and sunny. For now, at least, white clouds scudded across an azure sky, driven on by a strong south-easterly wind blowing in from off the sea, whipping up the breakers on the shore.

The tide was out, and down below them, children played on the beach, scrambling among the rock pools. One of them, a fair haired young boy running along the strand with a brightly coloured kite streaming out behind him, caught Sybil's eye. As she watched, the kite soared away up into the vast expanse of sky above. From his expression, the young boy was obviously enjoying himself immensely.

"I used to do that" said Tom, his arm around Sybil's shoulders, gazing down on the carefree scene below them.

Sybil smiled, picturing Tom as a small boy.

"Did you? Down there, on the beach?"" she asked.

"Tom paused."Yes" he said. ""I did; that and other things".

Tom, thought Sybil, had sounded wistful. He certainly looked somewhat lost. Or was it that he was …

"Come" said the girl gently. The young boy paused; looked hesitantly up at her. She smiled. "There's nothing to be frightened of". He looked quizzically back at her. Sensing his trepidation, his innate wariness, she helped him to his feet from off the short greensward at the top of the cliff.

"But if he should ..."

"He won't. Trust me".

She smiled again.

"And there really isn't anything to fear, truly".

The timbre of her voice was still gentle, but now had a keener, insistent edge to it. "We have an hour or so; no more". As if to reinforce the fact, she was already slipping his jacket from off his shoulders, beginning to unbutton his waistcoat, as she put her arm about his hunched shoulders, and led him down the narrow, steep path towards the distant cottage on the shore.

Tom was now staring out to sea, beyond the children on the beach, beyond the small steamer in the middle distance, to somewhere seemingly far beyond the distant horizon, much as he had done earlier in the day, by the ship's rail on the deck of the Munster. It was with that scene foremost in her mind that Sybil reached up and kissed him gently, almost chastely.

"Tom, my darling, wherever it is you are when you look like that, let me bring you back". Tom turned and looked at her. She gasped as a strange expression flitted across his face, at one and the same time both contemplative and bitter. And there were tears in his eyes too.

"If only you could, my darling", he said. "If only you could. But now my love, are you ready?"
"Ready as I'll ever be" said Sybil. "So long as you're with me".

"Have no fear of that, my darling. I'm here with you now ... and for always" said Tom, his eyes bright and shining.

It was odd, but it was only now that Sybil had begun to feel somewhat anxious. Despite Tom's repeated assurances both at Downton and on the sea-crossing that Ma, Ciaran, Donal and Emer - his mother, brothers and sister - were all looking forward to meeting her, that had all been in the future. Now that she was faced with what, for a long time, had been but a remote prospect, becoming a reality, and in a very short space of time too, Sybil began to feel extremely nervous about her imminent first encounter with the Bransons.

Tom had done his very best to set her mind at her ease by telling her all about his family. And now, he did so again, as they walked along the sea front towards the house for which they were bound.

"That's it over there" said Tom. Unable to point - he was carrying both their cases - he simply nodded towards a neat, white washed, two-storey, slate roofed villa, about a quarter of a mile distant, one of a pair, and which faced the open sea. A piebald horse in the shafts of a brightly painted waggonette stood tethered to the railings in front of the house, and placidly cropped the nearby grass.

Of course, Tom had spoken of his family to her many times before, but if Sybil was honest, until now, despite Tom's ability to conjure up people and places with his vivid descriptions of both, whether spoken or written, his family had just been a series of names to her - and Irish names at that. There was Ciaran, the eldest, a tenant farmer on the nearby Clontarf Castle estate. He was married to Aislin and they had a whole brood of children, three boys and two girls. Then there was Donal, a clerk with the Guiness Brewery. He was married to Niamh and living across Dublin in Rathmines. They had two children, a boy and a girl. And lastly there was Emer. She had been in service, apparently in a position similar to that held by Anna back at Downton. She too was married, but as yet, her and her husband, Peadar, a young draughtsman with the Great Southern and Western Railway in Dublin, had no children. They lived in Glasthule.

Tom had rattled off their names and the places where they all lived once again on the tram on their way out to Clontarf. He laughed as Sybil made another concerted attempt not only to try and remember them all but also to repeat them out loud, twisting her tongue round the unfamiliar Irish names. When Sybil became frustrated, stumbling over her pronouncement of "Ciaran" for the umpteenth time, and asked crossly why they couldn't have been given normal names like everybody else, Tom had just laughed.

"What do you expect, love? By normal, I take it you mean English? We can't all be called Robert or Matthew or for that matter, Mary, Edith or Sybil. As for their names being Irish, well, they are Irish!"

"But you're Irish and your Christian name isn't Irish!" countered Sybil with what to her seemed eminently good sense and was something with which even Tom could not disagree. But as so often, he surprised her.

"I don't count. I'm ... different. I'm a changeling" said Tom and laughed. "Anyway, don't try to remember all their names now, my love. Time enough for that later. It's you they all want to meet".

And so indeed it was.

A few moments later brought them to the house. Having opened the low wrought iron gate for her, Tom let Sybil pass through. Then, having shut it, he swiftly followed, close behind. With slightly faltering footsteps, Sybil walked up the short narrow path. She gave a nervous backward glance over her shoulder, just to make sure Tom was still there. He was, smiling encouragement, his overwhelming love for her plain for all to see. Sybil passed a pocket handkerchief patch of salt bleached grass and made her way towards the green painted front door with its two panes of frosted glass.

They had reached the door.

Tom set down their cases in the small tiled front porch. He lifted the heavy cast iron knocker, and rapped hard on the door. Beyond it, Sybil heard the sound of excited voices, of rapidly approaching footsteps. Never had she felt this nervous. Not even when she had appeared, dressed in the height of fashion, be-jewelled enough to dazzle even the most jaded eye, at the head of the main staircase of her Aunt Rosamund's house in London, at the reception given there by her parents to mark her eighteenth birthday. A lifetime ago, or so it seemed, and given for someone else entirely. Not for her. But for a girl from a different world.

The front door swung open to reveal, not a line of silent, inscrutable, outwardly respectful servants, but a sea of smiling faces, and Sybil found herself and Tom rapidly pulled inside on a genuinely heartfelt tide of welcome. If she had been nervous about meeting Tom's family, she need not have been. Nothing could have prepared Sybil for the warmth of the reception which the two of them received in the hallway of that small house in Clontarf.

Thereafter, the next few minutes certainly, the next hour, perhaps longer, Sybil lost all sense of time, passed in a blur. A blur of faces, of introductions being made, of endless cups of tea and plates of bread and butter, of questions posed and answers given - in Dublin ("Dubbelin" as Tom had taught her to say) - accented English. Of hugs and kisses, and demonstratively affectionate greetings for them both. Looking back, Sybil was to remember all that, when the world she knew was dissolving about her, amidst the staccato sound of gunfire, harsh shouts, and the roar of flames.

One detail of that afternoon, Sybil would always recall. And, indeed, remembered, to the very end of her life.

Someone, possibly Ciaran, perhaps it was Donal called out:
"Ma, they're here, come see!"

The welcoming throng of adults and children parted, to reveal, standing at the foot of a narrow staircase, in an equally narrow hallway, a small woman, dressed entirely in black, with grey hair and piercing blue eyes, which reminded Sybil immediately of Tom. His mother. After all, it could be no one else.

"So", the woman said, simply, "you're Tommy's Sybil". And smiled a smile of singular sweetness. "Come in, and welcome, sure. You must both be very tired".

From behind her, over her shoulder, Sybil heard Tom's voice.

"Hello, Ma. Missed me?"
"What d' you t'ink? Here, Tommy, come and greet me as you used to!"

And she opened her arms wide.

To him.

To them both.