The Hawthorns Bloom in May

by Anne Doughty

  I feel for Sarah in her grief. It is hard for any man or woman to lose a beloved partner, but she is still young. That may make the pain sharper at the time, but perhaps it also makes healing more likely. If I were a praying man, which you know well I am not, I’d be asking for a young man to remind her there is still joy in the world even if Hugh has gone.

  Take care of yourself and write when you can to your little brother who, despite his own sorrow, is so happy to be home at last.

  Rose sat quite still, the folded sheets held lightly in her hand, her mind moving backwards and forwards across her brother’s life. She remembered how she had watched him, a toddler crawling round the housekeeper’s room in Currane Lodge, when her mother took them to Kerry after their father died. They’d gone to school with the children of the other servants and she’d helped him learn his letters. Sam was bright, picking up things so quickly that even before he became a stable boy on the estate, he’d been given permission to read the books in Sir Capel’s library. She’d encouraged him to read in whatever time he had and in the end, Sir Capel himself had sent him to train as a land agent. She had never entirely made up her mind whether to be glad or sorry that in Dublin, Sam had learnt more about land than its texture and quality, or its suitability for grazing, or cultivation.

  Smiling, red-headed Sam, lightly-built, goodlooking and friendly, had changed radically during his time in the city. She laughed to herself when she remembered the seventeen year old who’d been wildly in love with Lady Lily, the prettiest of the Molyneux daughters. After three years in Dublin, he’d turned his back on the job awaiting him on the estate and chose instead to live on a pittance from the Land League. Now, at fifty-two, he was still a fit and good-looking man, even if his red hair had receded from his temples and was distinctly thinning on top. His passion for books remained with him and it looked as if his old passion for the land of Ireland had reasserted itself.

  She shook her head slowly. It had never occurred to her that Sam might come back. But then, she said to herself, as she looked around the comfortable kitchen, most of the important things that had happened in her own life she had never expected either. Neither the good nor the bad.

  ‘Ah see ye’ve had a letter,’ said John, peering up at the mantelpiece as they moved over to the fire when they’d finished their lunch.

  ‘I have indeed, but you’d better read it this evening or you’ll be late for your meeting,’ she replied easily. ‘It’s my Sam, Uncle Sam America,’ she said laughing, ‘and it’s a big one. It took me half the morning to take it all in.’

  ‘Is he all right?’ John enquired anxiously.

  ‘Yes, of course, he’s fine,’ she said reassuringly. ‘He’s just been very busy. What made you think he mightn’t be all right?’

  ‘Ach, no reason at all,’ he said hastily, his eyes moving anxiously towards the clock.

  ‘What’s wrong, love?’ she asked quietly as she handed him his mug of tea. She looked closely at him as he took it without meeting her gaze. ‘Is there something amiss you haven’t told me?’

  ‘Shure I can’t get Hugh out of my mind,’ he said abruptly. ‘I see him beside me. I hear him. I can nearly tell you what he’s sayin’ when someone asks me somethin’. One day he’s there, happy and smilin’ and a couple of weeks later he’s dead and buried and our Sarah standing stiff as a post and the light gone from her eyes. I can’t get it outa my mind.’

  ‘Oh, John love, I’m sorry,’ she said, setting down her own mug on the edge of the stove. ‘You were with Hugh more than anyone, even Sarah, so it’s you misses him most.’

  She stood up and was about to put her arms round him when she heard a step on the garden path and the scrape of boots on the doorstone.

  ‘Anybody at home?’

  A figure stood in the doorway, the sunlight blocked by his broad shoulders and tall frame. Their younger son, Sam, smiled at her as he flicked off his cap and hung it up by the door. For one moment, she was totally taken aback. Sam’s bearing, his familiar gesture, his smile, was so like his father she couldn’t think what to say.

  ‘Hello, son, how are ye? What brings you here on a work day?’ John asked, a bleak smile crossing his face as he collected himself.

  ‘Handy delivery down in the town. It’ll take them a while to unload,’ he explained. ‘Young Mickey has a sister married up in Seapatrick. He’s away to see her. We agreed we’d take an hour and work later this evenin’.

  ‘It’s lovely to see you, Sam. There’s tea in the pot. Would you like a bite to eat?’

  ‘Just tea, Ma. I’ve had my piece.’

  ‘What about a bit of cake?’

  ‘Aye, well …’

  John laughed and looked easier as Rose crossed to the dresser. She took her time finding the tin, the carving knife and a plate, listening as John asked questions about the job. She was grateful Sam seemed happy enough, despite the changes there’d been in the management of the company he worked for, especially their work schedules.

  ‘And how is Martha?’ she asked, as she poured tea and passed him his plate.

  ‘Oh, fine. Working away as always,’ he said, dropping his eyes to the wedge of fruit cake on his plate.

  ‘And the children?’

  ‘Great. They’re all well. Wee Rose looks more like you everyday, Ma, and young Emily’s walkin’. Inta everythin’. Oh, and one on the way,’ he added, as he munched appreciatively.

  Rose nodded and smiled, but her heart sank. Another child. There were six already. Surely enough to keep on one man’s pay. She asked about each one in turn. Sam always answered her questions, told her about some childish illness safely passed or some story to make them smile, but she always felt his answers left her none the wiser about how he felt.

  ‘How do you like living on the farm, Sam?’ John went on.

  ‘Ach it’s all right,’ he said agreeably. ‘The old uncle’s a bit of a cross patch at times. Sharp with the children. But sure they have space to play themselves in the fields and the orchard. There was nowhere for them but the street in that wee house in Richhill. I’ve one of the barns Uncle Joe doesn’t use made inta a workshop and I do a bit of work for the neighbours in the evenings. It all helps.’

  ‘What about the shoes, Sam?’ Rose asked, as lightly as she could manage.

  ‘Just the same, Ma. I tried,’ he said steadily. ‘I gave her the money you sent me and she bought them all right, but she says they’re only for Sunday. None of the neighbours we’ans have shoes to go to school, she says, so why wou’d we make ours different. Her minds made up an’ I can see there’s no use goin’ on about it. That’s the way with Martha, but I did try like you said.’

  ‘I’m sure you did your best,’ Rose said, nodding vigorously to cover her disappointment.

  John got to his feet, clapped Sam on the shoulder and looked up at the clock again.

  ‘I’m sorry to leave you, but there’s a meeting at two. Maybe we’ll take a run over one of these Sundays, Sam. Just for an hour or two,’ he added hastily as he caught Rose’s glance.

  Martha had long ago made clear that she didn’t welcome visitors on a Sunday when Sam was at home to look after the children.

  ‘That wou’d be great, Da. I’d like fine to show you the workshop.’

  ‘Well, see ye make a date with your mother, I must away,’ he said quickly as he got up, kissed Rose, and headed off down the garden path.

  ‘Where has he the motor?’ asked Sam, puzzled.

  ‘Oh, he leaves it down at the farm when he knows he’s going back into Banbridge in the afternoon. It saves going up to Sarah’s to turn. I think actually he enjoys the odd word with Michael. I’m afraid he’s missing Hugh badly.’

  Sam dropped his eyes to the remaining crumbs on his plate.

  ‘How’s Sarah?’ he said abruptly.

  ‘She’s bereft,’ Rose replied honestly. ‘I’ve not seen her shed a tear yet. I don’t know whether that’s a good sign or a bad. But she’s well enough in health, thank God,
and she works hard.’

  ‘Thank God indeed,’ he said firmly. ‘Sometimes it’s a good thing to have your work to do every day. It stops you thinkin’ long,’ he added as he too got to his feet.

  ‘Sunday or Sunday week, maybe?’ she asked, as he picked up his cap and looked out into the sunshine.

  ‘Ach, yes. Just come,’ he said, turning back to face her.

  He leant down and kissed her.

  ‘Sure I’m always there, even if Martha is away up to her father or visiting her friends. The we’ans ’ill be glad to see ye. Wee Sammy is lookin’ for a ride in the motor. Ye may warn my father he’ll give him no peace till he gets sittin’ in the front seat.’

  She laughed and touched his arm as he stepped over the threshold.

  He took a few long strides along the garden path and turned down the hill. Even before she stepped back into the empty room, the echo of his footsteps had gone.

  She looked at the lunch table and the mugs parked on the corners of the stove and began to clear them up, but as she moved back and forth to the dairy and returned items to the dresser, all she could see was the small, bright face of Martha Loney the first time her son had brought her home. She’d been pleasant enough in manner and agreeable to whatever was suggested and pretty enough when she smiled. She’d been unsure then about the girl and about Sam’s haste to get married.

  Sarah had had no such doubts about Martha. From that very first visit she’d declared that Martha Loney was more in love with the idea of marriage and a family than she was with her brother.

  ‘And she was right,’ Rose whispered to herself as she wiped the table with a damp cloth. ‘Our Sam’s made his bed and there’s little anyone can do to help him.’

  She wondered which was the greater loss, the loss of a dear husband who had brought joy for some ten years, or the loss of a hope, the image of a smiling girl dissolving into a young woman so entirely taken up with her children, her own life and her own affairs, there was little place for the man who had fathered her children and now worked so hard to give his family the very best he could afford.

  CHAPTER TWO

  As Rose looked hopefully at her flowerbeds, seeking the first hint of colour in late March, she thought of all their neighbours anxiously watching the skies. Rainfall was always a problem at this time of year. A sudden dry spell would check the growth of the new grass. If that happened, animals would have to be fed hay, now both scarce and expensive. But if heavy rain came, sodden fields would delay ploughing and planting and wet conditions increase the risk of disease among the sheep and their young lambs.

  As for the Sinton mills, seasonal storms could be bad enough to disrupt regular sailings across the Irish Sea, a serious matter when contracts were penalised for late delivery. Worse still, flooding was a danger on the low-lying mill sites and wet conditions meant more illness among the workers.

  She sighed. Only one group of people seemed completely indifferent to the changes in the weather. Whether the day was bright and sunny, or teeming with rain, the early evening still light, or dipping towards dusk, the hundreds of local men who had recently joined the Ulster Volunteer Force were to be seen drilling. Outside Orange Halls, in open fields, or town squares, the sound of marching feet and shouted instructions was an everyday event.

  Every weekend, she and John saw platoons tramping back to Banbridge along the local roads, or across the nearby fields, after some cross-country route march or exercise, heavy packs on their backs, a single billet of wood in their arms, the insignia of the Red Hand proudly displayed on their sleeves. When they met them on the hill outside the cottage or tramping across their back field, they could do little but step aside, nodding to those they knew, workers from the mills and lads from neighbouring farms, accompanied by their young officers, the sons of the manufacturers whose handsome houses dotted the Bann valley.

  ‘Ah see they’ve got rifles now,’ said John flatly one evening as he put down his newspaper and took off his spectacles.

  ‘No, John, you don’t mean it,’ Rose said, horrified, as she looked up from the jersey she was knitting for young Hugh.

  He raised his eyebrows, put his spectacles on again and read her a paragraph from the Banbridge Chronicle. A local carpentry firm had landed on its feet, it said. Seeing its opportunity, it was now supplying replica rifles to the Volunteers, price one and eight pence each for pitch pine and one and sixpence for spruce.

  She breathed a sigh of relief, but was not reassured by the look on John’s face.

  ‘Do you really think they’d turn against the government if Home Rule was granted?’

  ‘I’ve no doubt about it,’ he said promptly. ‘They mean business all right. Sure there’s tens of thousands of them now all over Ulster. The English papers can laugh all they like at them drillin’ with bits of wood, but they’re serious and there’s those encouragin’ them that’ll find the money for rifles. It’s only a matter of time. Even Hugh said that, an’ you know how he felt about takin’ up arms.’

  ‘Hugh always faced facts,’ she said quietly. ‘Whether he liked it or not, if he saw something, he spoke. Sarah never had any time for making things smooth or comfortable either. I often thought that was one of the great bonds between them.’

  To her great surprise, John laughed.

  She smiled herself, delighted to hear a sound so unfamiliar. She waited hopefully to see what he might say.

  ‘D’ye mind the first time she met Hugh?’ he began. ‘Sure she was only a wee thing, the night we arrived here with all our bits and pieces, an’ he still had the bad leg from the accident, an’ the scar. She looked up at him an’ asks him did a horse kick him. An’ then she wants to know did it hurt. Oh, she’d have gone on too till she’d found out the whole details,’ he broke off, shaking his head.

  ‘Aye, an’ sure she does it still,’ he continued easily. ‘Nothin’ gets past her. I sit at these board meetings an’ I listen mostly, but it’s Sarah asks the questions. Ach, ye’d be proud of her, Rose,’ he added shyly.

  ‘Yes, I am, John,’ she replied, still smiling at the recollection of that first meeting. ‘She has a sharp mind and great courage. I just don’t know where she gets it from. It would be different if she was religious, but she’s not. I know she went with Hugh to the Quaker meeting, and helped with the charity work and the visiting, but she never became a Friend.’

  John nodded and folded up his paper. Whatever he might think himself about being religious, his mind had moved on.

  ‘Speaking of visitin’,’ he said abruptly. ‘Are we for Liskeyborough on Sunday?’

  She looked across at him and saw the sudden animation had vanished.

  ‘Yes, I think we should,’ she replied, her tone as neutral as his. ‘It’s a long time since we’ve been. Sam likes to see us there.’

  ‘Why does Martha not like us, Rose? Tell me that an’ tell me no more, as the sayin’ is,’ he asked directly, his brow furrowed with a familiar frown.

  Rose sighed. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t given thought to the behaviour of their daughter-in-law, but she found it difficult to explain.

  ‘I don’t think she actually dislikes us, John, she’s just indifferent. We don’t matter to her,’ she said steadily. ‘All that matters to Martha is the children and she’s good enough with them in her own way. After that, there’s her father and old Uncle Joe, her two sisters and her girl friends.’

  ‘An’ what about our Sam? Where does he come in?’

  ‘Well, they’ve six children and one on the way,’ she replied, her tone sharper than she’d intended.

  John just looked at her, his face grim. He shook his head.

  ‘It’s beyond me, Rose. Tell me what we ought to do an’ we’ll do it.’

  The first Sunday in April was a lovely spring-like day, the air mild, the sky a cloud-scribbled blue, and although there was no sign of the trees bursting into leaf, the hawthorns were well sprayed with soft, new leaves. As they drove along, Rose felt her spirits rise. In th
e cottage gardens they passed and along the roadsides verges themselves, daffodils bloomed everywhere. There were signs too that the birds were already nesting.

  Rose could tell from the contented look on John’s face that the engine was running sweetly and he was enjoying every moment of the drive. He enjoyed keeping his own and Sarah’s motor in peak condition, but he seldom had time to do the job as well as he’d wish these days. She glanced sideways at him, delighted he was relaxed enough to point out new buildings that caught his eye and tell her a couple of amusing things that had happened at one mill or the other.

  He was still in good spirits as he drove slowly down the steep and narrow lane leading to Richhill Station and turned off into the broad, well-swept yard of Joe Loney’s farm at Liskeyborough. Two half-barrels full of daffodils bloomed cheerfully, a vivid splash of gold against the newly whitewashed walls of the long, low dwelling, its small windows reflecting the light, the upper part of the half door wide open to the sunlight.

  ‘Place lookin’ well, isn’t it?’ he said, as he manoeuvred the motor and parked it with the bonnet facing outwards in the direction of the lane.

  Rose nodded and looked around, surprised there was no sign of life, neither chicken, nor child. Stranger still, no one appeared at the door.

  ‘Hayfoot, strawfoot, hayfoot, strawfoot.’

  They turned abruptly towards the barns behind them as Billy and Charley, the eldest of Martha and Sam’s children, marched into view, commanded by an unknown boy somewhat older than Billy’s ten summers. Both young Hamiltons carried billets of wood and both had tied a piece of old cloth round their waists as bandoliers.

  ‘Hayfoot, strawfoot, hayfoot, strawfoot,’ continued the sharp voice as he marched the two younger boys across the middle of the wide yard and into the nearby field.