Dermot looked up quickly. Nathan Brock had heard her words and he returned Dermot’s apprehensive look. The moon was between clouds and the countryside was clearly visible for half a mile about them.
They were still five miles from Kilmar when the late dawn broke and they drove into the fishing village at a gallop. By now Kathie’s cries were almost continuous, the birth of her child seemingly imminent.
One other thing was equally certain. The blast from the musket at such close range had seriously injured her eyes.
Kathie was blind.
Nathan Brock brought the pony and gig to a halt in the narrow street outside the McCabe cottage and, while the lathered animal threw its head and trembled in the traces, Nathan Brock lifted Kathie from the seat as Norah McCabe rushed out and threw her arms about her son, overjoyed to have him with her once more. Then Kathie screamed and Norah McCabe saw what was happening on the far side of the gig.
The situation needed no explanation. In the darkness of the ride the two men had only Kathie’s screams to tell them of her agony. Now, in the morning light, it could be seen that the dress she wore was soaked in her own blood.
‘Bring her inside quickly,’ said Norah McCabe. To an open-mouthed young girl onlooker she snapped, ‘Now you’ve seen enough to give you nightmares hurry away and call Bridie O’Keefe. Get her here as quickly as she can come. Do you hear me? Run as fast as your feet will take you.’
Kathie’s screams quickly brought other women on the scene from nearby houses, and before long the McCabe house was as busy as the fish-quay on an evening tide.
When a weary Nathan Brock left to return the lathered pony and the gig to Inch House, Norah McCabe turned her son out of the house.
‘It’s a long way from the homecoming I had planned for you, Dermot. But it’s best that you are away from the happenings in this house today.’
‘But where shall I go …?’ None of his companions had yet returned and, dressed in his rags, Dermot felt a stranger in his home village.
‘Go to the church. Fall on your knees and pray for your wife.’
Bridie O’Keefe had come through the door unnoticed as Kathie’s screaming reached a new crescendo.
‘While you’re about it you had better put in a word for me. If the girl who came to fetch me told the truth, then it will need more than the skill in these old hands to right the wrong that’s been done to the poor girl upstairs. Away with you, now. This is woman’s work. It’s no place for a man.’
Dermot turned to go from the house, but Bridie O’Keefe called him back.
‘Dermot McCabe! Pray for yourself most of all. There’s a darkness about you that is the Devil’s making – and he’ll tempt you sorely today.’
Norah McCabe listened in dismay, looking from the old crone to her son. She knew better than to scoff at Bridie O’Keefe’s premonitions. If she said she had seen the Devil’s darkness, then it was here, in this house, now….
‘I’ll pray for all of us, Bridie. Do your best for Kathie … and the child.’
On his way to the small village church, Dermot met Tommy Donaghue hurrying toward the cottage. Unshaven and stupid with sleep, the old fiddler had been called from his bed by one of the village women. Grasping Dermot’s hand in both of his, he muttered, ‘It’s great to see you back in Kilmar again. But Kathie? How is she …? The woman said the baby had started.’
‘She’s not at all well, Tommy. You’d best go along to see her – if Bridie will let you in the house.’
Dermot was embarrassed by the warmth of Tommy Donaghue’s greeting. He blamed himself for all that had happened to Kathie. He had caused everything. It was for him she had left Kilmar in the first place. She had suffered every kind of hardship with him in the mountains, and then when she most needed him he had let her down and forced her to leave the mountains.
Last night, during the nightmare journey from Rathconard, Nathan Brock had taken the opportunity to tell Dermot of the attack upon Kathie by the soldiers and their unknown companion. To Dermot it explained away all of Kathie’s uncharacteristic behaviour in the beginning. He wished she had been able to tell him herself. He would not have blamed her; nothing that had happened had been her fault. If only she had told him. But he realised he had not made it easy for her to talk of such a thing to him. He had been obsessed with the relationship he suspected between Kathie and his own brother.
Dermot was deeply ashamed of himself. Bridie O’Keefe was right: the Devil kept him company and fed his jealousy. Yet, in spite of the way he had behaved toward her, Kathie had insisted on coming to Rathconard to help him to escape. Risking her life and the life of the child she bore, for him. He had much to pray for.
But Dermot never got as far as the inside of the church. He was met outside the porch by Father Clery. When the old priest had been given a summary of the night’s events, he insisted that Dermot come back to his house and tell him everything. Along the way they were joined by a disgruntled Tommy Donaghue. Bridie O’Keefe had refused to allow him inside the house.
Sharing the priest’s frugal breakfast, Dermot told the two men of the hard times he had endured during the last few months and how his dreams of raising an Irish army had crumbled about him. It seemed that, this morning, Dermot McCabe was seeing things clearly for the first time.
Later, the Kilmar outlaws straggled into the village to receive an emotional welcome from their families, but in every case their first question was about Kathie.
There was little that Dermot or anyone else could tell them. Although Dermot and Nathan Brock had feared the baby might arrive during their drive to Kilmar, it had still not been born by nightfall, although Kathie was in constant labour.
Norah McCabe was worried. Bridie O’Keefe had not been able to stop the bleeding, or bring the baby into the world, and Kathie was now very weak. Her blindness was also upsetting her, and when Dermot and Tommy Donaghue were allowed to see her for a few minutes she wept for the whole time.
Liam arrived from County Kerry while the two men were with Kathie and, after a brief explanation, his mother took him straight to the room. His presence only seemed to make Kathie worse, and when she clung to him, sobbing, Liam felt embarrassed for Dermot. But when Bridie O’Keefe ushered all the men from the room and they were downstairs Dermot embraced his brother with all the affection of earlier days.
‘I’ve been a fool, Liam,’ he said. ‘But I’ll make it up to Kathie. Nathan told me.’ He said no more as Tommy Donaghue was within hearing.
‘You have both been through a bad time, Dermot, but it is nearly over now. Soon you and Kathie – and your child – will be able to go off to a happy new life together.’
‘Where?’ asked Dermot with a gesture of hopelessness. ‘I’ll be a wanted man as long as I live.’
‘Not in America.’
‘America?’ Dermot looked at his brother as though he had suggested he should go to the moon.
‘Yes, you, Kathie and all the men who were in the mountains with you. There will be no difficulty in arranging the passages, and you’ll find so many Irishmen already there that it will be just like home. Everyone who can raise the passage money is going to America. It will be a great opportunity for you, Dermot. You think about it.’
‘Whatever it is you have to think about, then, you had better do it somewhere else,’ said Norah McCabe, pushing past them to the kitchen. If it had not been for the poor girl in the bed upstairs, she would have been bursting with pleasure at having her two sons together in the house. ‘We are too busy to be moving you from room to room all the time. Go down to the ale-house. I expect you’ll find the others there tonight.’
‘All right.’ Liam looked at his tired and distraught brother. A few whiskeys would do him good. ‘But you’ll call us if anything happens upstairs?’
‘Of course. Now, away with all of you.’
Liam, Dermot and Tommy Donaghue walked through the village, stopping more than once to answer questions about Kathie.
Th
e inn was buzzing with the excitement of the returned young men, but here, too, there was much concern for Kathie. However, when it was established that there was no change in her condition, the conversations once more centred on the men from the mountains. Everyone was fully aware that their unexpected reunion could not last. They were wanted men, and it would not be long before the soldiers came to Kilmar looking for them. But, for that very reason, there was a determination to make this one evening as memorable as possible.
There was one man who took no part in the homecoming celebrations. Tomas Feehan came into the ale-house later in the evening and stopped short when he saw Dermot and the others. In the sudden hush that greeted his arrival, he turned on his heel and left again without a word to anyone.
The landlord of the inn suggested that Tommy Donaghue fetch his fiddle and give them all a tune but, as Kathie’s father stood up to leave, a messenger arrived from the McCabe cottage, asking the three men to return as quickly as possible.
The long and difficult birth was almost over, but the men were obliged to wait downstairs with no news for a further half-hour. Then, from the bedroom immediately above them they heard the sound of an infant’s first weak protest against the world. It was not repeated, but the single sound was enough for Dermot. He bounded up the stairs and into the room where half a dozen women surrounded the still figure on the bed. Another woman stood to one side, holding the baby.
But it was to Kathie that Dermot went. She lay upon the bed breathing weakly, her eyes closed.
Dermot dropped to his knees beside the bed and took one of her hands in his. It was ice cold. He looked up at his mother and fear took hold of him when she turned her head away.
‘Dermot?’ Kathie’s voice came as a faint whisper as her sightless eyes opened to search the darkness.
‘It’s all right. I’m here.’
‘It’s a boy, isn’t it?’
Dermot looked up and one of the women inclined her head wordlessly.
‘Yes, it’s a boy, Kathie.’
‘I told you…. I said it would be … a boy.’
The faint change of expression on her face could only have been a smile.
‘Who does he look like, Dermot?’
The woman holding the baby was in the shadows on the far side of the room. When Dermot beckoned to her she hesitated and looked first at Norah McCabe. Not until she received a nod did the woman bring the tiny bundle to the bedside and hold it down for Dermot to look at the baby.
‘Who does he look like?’ Kathie repeated.
‘He’s the image of me, Kathie.’
This time there was no mistaking the smile on the face of the exhausted girl.
‘I told you. I told you, Dermot…. He is your son … your child.’
Norah McCabe moved forward, signalling for Dermot to move away from the bedside, but as he tried to remove his hand from Kathie’s she stirred.
‘Let me have him, Dermot. Our son … let me hold him.’
The fisherwoman laid the baby gently down in the cradle of Kathie’s arm as Dermot stood up and backed away from the bed.
He blundered blindly from the room, passing Tommy Donaghue and Liam outside the door without a word. In the kitchen he slumped in a chair and covered his face with his hands. He heard Tommy Donaghue’s noisy grief pass by the door and was staring vacantly at the dancing yellow flames of the fire when his mother came quietly into the room and rested a hand on the shoulder of her younger son.
‘She’s gone, Dermot. It was a terribly hard childbirth and she had lost a lot of blood.’
Norah McCabe clenched her son’s shoulder savagely. ‘What you did upstairs was the kindest thing you will ever do in your life, Dermot. It made me proud to be your mother.’
Dermot said nothing, and Norah McCabe touched his unkempt black hair. She felt the need to hug her son to her and comfort him, but Dermot stood up abruptly and strode to the window to look out at the window-lit darkness that was Kilmar.
‘Kathie was a good girl. She deserved more from life.’
He was silent for a long time and then, in a carefully controlled voice, he asked, ‘What will happen to the baby now?’
‘He’s a weakling, Dermot, and is having great difficulty with his breathing. Bridie says he will be with Kathie before the morning.’
‘Then God has some mercy….’ Choking on the words, Dermot ran to the door and, flinging it open, fled from the house.
Kathie’s baby died with the day that dawned as red as the hair on its own head.
As red as the hair of a Feehan.
Chapter Forty
Bearing the name of Dermot McCabe, the baby was buried with its mother in Kilmar churchyard, surrounded by generations of McCabes.
Caroline returned from Dublin in time to attend the funeral. Disdaining a carriage, she rode to Kilmar. Afterwards, she asked Liam to return to Inch House with her. Liam now had his own riding-horse and, collecting it from the stable behind the ale-house, he rode with her along the road that curved around the side of Kilmar hill, away from the sea.
Along the way they talked of the rescue of Dermot and his friends from the lock-up at Rathconard. Caroline told Liam that the military authorities in Dublin were furious at the way the Armagh Militia had bungled their duties.
‘Soldiers will certainly be sent to search Kilmar. Your brother and those who were with him must leave as soon as something can be arranged. I will provide any money they may need.’
‘Giving money to wanted men is not the same as helping cottiers. You will keep out of this, Caroline.’
‘Nonsense! I will help because it is in everyone’s best interest to get Dermot and the others out of the way. A public trial of Irishmen, accused of rebelling against the Queen, would be the worst thing that could happen. The cottiers need help and sympathy from the English. They will lose both if Dermot and his friends are captured.’
Liam’s look at Caroline acknowledged her clear thinking. ‘You would make a fine wife for a politician, Caroline.’
‘But a poor mistress, I fear. We have been out of sight of Kilmar for minutes now, and I have not kissed you.’
Liam reined his horse alongside hers and they kissed hungrily until one of the horses tossed its head impatiently and almost unseated them both.
Caroline laughed breathlessly. ‘You have started something that will need to be satisfied before this day is out, Liam McCabe.’
They rode side by side in silence for a while; then Liam said, ‘I am hoping to persuade Dermot and the others to go to America. They should be safe enough if they set off from a south-coast port. After this business with Kathie and the baby it will be a good thing for. Dermot to get right away from Ireland.’
‘Poor Kathie. She had neither the man nor the baby she wanted – and I suspect that precious little else came her way during her lifetime. But you are right, Liam. America would be a splendid place to make a new start. It is a country with unlimited opportunities. More than a man might find here at this moment, with fresh troops arriving from England every day. Dublin has the look of a town under siege, and they say the Lord-Lieutenant has told Lord John Russell he expects a cottier uprising at any time.’
Liam snorted. ‘There is no strength in them for rebellion. Did you see Sir Richard while you were there?’
‘Yes.’ There was a hint of sadness in her voice and Liam moved closer to her so that their knees were touching. ‘He apologised for all that had happened in the past. Then he asked me to return to him.’
‘And what was your reply?’ Liam asked softly.
‘I said I would not live with him in Dublin or anywhere else. I told him we no longer have anything to give to each other.’
‘Did that make him angry?’
‘No, not at first.’ Liam could see that Caroline was upset. ‘He was just … terribly hurt. I was not prepared for that. He broke down and pleaded with me to return to him. It made me remember the many nice things he had done for me in the past. How kind he could s
ometimes be….’
Liam took her hand, and she gave him a wry smile.
‘Then he told me tongues were wagging in Dublin because I never attended any of the official functions with him. He demanded that I return. When I still refused, he said he knew what was going on between you and me. He promised to humble me and have me ostracised by society on both sides of the Irish Sea. He also threatened to see that you were thrown out of Parliament. He was angry when he said it, but he was serious, for all that.’
‘I don’t doubt it. If someone were to take you from me, I would be equally serious in my dealings with them.’
‘No one could take me from you, Liam. Not now – or ever.’
Her husky-voiced assertion roused a hunger in his body that matched her own. There was no need for words. When Liam turned his horse off the road on to a track leading to a low heather-covered hill, she turned with him. Stopping beside a small copse of low trees, he helped her down and her arms went about his neck and refused to release him. There, in deep heather, on a cold December afternoon she came to him and they made love with total abandonment.
Afterwards, as they lay together watching the slate-grey clouds race each other across the dull sky, Caroline whispered, ‘I told you once that you could take me in a field, if you needed me. I am glad you remembered.’
Liam’s arms tightened around her. ‘Many men and women are forced to make love in fields and ditches because they have no homes of their own.’
Even at such a time as this, Liam found it impossible to forget the plight of his countrymen. Caroline bit back a sharp comment, and smiled instead. ‘One day, Liam McCabe, I am going to take you to a remote island where you will have nothing to think about but you and me – and making love.’
‘I’m sorry, Caroline…. I….’
She laid a finger across his lips and then rose on one elbow to look down at him.
‘Shh! You need never apologise to me. I know you have a great deal on your mind. But I wish I knew what will become of us. If only I could look into the future….’
Now Liam sat up. ‘Future? What future is there for anyone while death and misery walk so openly through the land?’ Fiercely he said, ‘I love you, Caroline. For myself I want nothing more than to be with you, night and day. I have great happiness in my love for you – but I can never forget there are cottiers who know nothing of happiness. Even when they make love they are surrounded by hungry children whose birthright is … hopelessness. For the moment I can think of no future but helping them. It will be enough if I can keep some of them alive to see better times. To learn there is more to life than a constant fight to feed their bellies.’
The Music Makers Page 37