Frank began to roar with laughter, then he picked Jack up as if he was a baby and began to carry him through the front door of the small hotel.
Maggie, Hannah and the nun looked at each other quizzically. Then Sister Agatha shrugged her shoulders and said she must be on her way.
“We’ll come down to help on your market stall later,” said Hannah. “If that’s all right with you, Mother, and you’ll be bound to know the way?”
“You can, Hannah, but I’d like to stay with yer Father. I’ll say goodbye now Sister Agatha, and I’d like ter thank yer for all yer care.”
“God bless yer Maggie and yer little family. We’ll be saying our prayers for yer husband at the convent. Perhaps yer could let us know of his recovery. Write to us when yer get home.”
She began to drive off down the high street and Maggie and Hannah waved until she rounded the bend.
“Do come in. I’ve made enough for you to share in our breakfast.”
Bridget Heaney, the nun’s sister, stood on the hotel doorstep. She was similar in looks to Agatha, but had a bit more weight on and her dark brown hair had a few streaks of silver in it. Not that anyone had seen Sister Agatha’s hair colour; it was presumed it was dark brown because of her black eyebrows. The woman could have been in her forties or fifties as her face was unwrinkled; just laughter lines around her eyes.
“I heard that dote of my husband mentioning the siege of Ballina. He does that to all our guests, likes to appear knowledgeable about the town’s history and covers up the fact that he’s a shy old thing at heart. It’s through here. Come and sit down and make yourselves comfortable. Frank will be back in a minute and I’ll get him to take your trunk up as well.”
“We had our breakfast at the convent, Mrs. Heaney, but I’m sure we’d both be grateful fer a cup of tea. But before yer pour it, do yer think yer could take me up to me husband? I’d like ter see him settled then I’ll come back down again.”
“Oh, what am I thinking of. You’ll be wanting to see your rooms. And call me Bridget, everyone else does. Do forgive me. I just get carried away with myself, don’t I Frank?” she said, as her husband came into the room.
Frank nodded. He looked rather sad and his eyes were full of compassion. These two had a hard field to plough before their man came back into the living world again.
Hannah walked along the street a little later, keeping a lookout for the road that would take her down to the River Moy. Her mother had said that the market was held on some open land in the middle of the two bridges. She would see “The Font” on the corner, a right, then a left would take her through the town. Hannah looked with interest at the shops she was passing. There was a haberdashery, a chemist and a small dressmaker’s with a window display of pretty little christening gowns. Her heart gave a thud as she saw them. She had forgotten all about her possible condition. In nine months time her baby might be wearing one of those! Oh God, what was she going to do if her courses didn’t start again? Jeremy was miles away in some steamy tropical jungle and probably wouldn’t be home again until the child was almost five. What a rat he was; an uncaring rat. No, not even a rat; a dirty horrible toad. Bella was right. She had filled her head with romantic, fanciful piffle, wanting to believe that what Jeremy had said that night had been the truth. But he probably wouldn’t have done it with Catherine Lydiate, her inner voice came to her in mockery. She would have kept herself chaste for marriage, which is what you failed to do.
Hannah found herself down beside the river. She looked to the right of her and could see the salmon weirs. To the left was a big stone bridge and in the distance she could see a ruined castle and another stone bridge nearly facing a cathedral or a large church. There were many people walking along the riverbank and she realised that must be where the market lay.
“Hannah! Over here, Hannah.”
It was Sister Agatha calling from her stall. It looked to be fairly busy as housewives milled around, handling the cabbages, feeling the firmness of the potatoes then handing over the coins if they were satisfied.
“Put this apron on, will yer? I could do with a breather; thank heavens yer came along. I haven’t got any scales for weighing on. Let people pick what they want, they usually bring a bag. A cabbage is a penny, about six large potatoes, two, and the turnips are two for thruppence. I’ll be over there getting a drink of tea if yer need me. Thank God yer’ve come, I’m parched.”
Hannah did as she was told and found she was really enjoying herself, especially as the customers she served were a cheerful lot, with lots of banter and repartee.
“Ee, thanks fer that,” said the nun gratefully when she came back a bit later to join Hannah. “Pity you can’t help me every week. The customers must have taken to yer, judging by all the money in the bag.”
“Oh, I enjoyed it. Now I know what I will do for a living. I will find something to sell from a market stall. We have a market in Neston, that’s on the Wirral, near Liverpool, that’s where we come from,”
“Tut, tut. I don’t think a girl like you will have to work fer a living. Me old eyes tell me that yer from a refined background.”
“I’m sure there’s a saying, Sister Agatha, about not judging a book by its cover, or something of that nature. I have a feeling that it won’t be too long before I will be taking responsibility for myself.”
Hannah left the nun feeling a little puzzled, but that was how she usually felt around young people. They were complicated souls; full of perplexities and hornswoggle. Lots of phases they had to go through before they found their inner self.
Maggie sat with Frank and Bridget eating lunch of buttered soda bread and a chunk of yellow crumbly cheese. Maggie and Hannah were the couple’s only guests and Maggie had turned down their request to eat lunch in their dining room.
“So, Maggie, what are yer plans?” asked Frank chewing his bread hungrily and taking big slurps from his mug of local black beer. “Your husband seems to be in no condition to take in the sights, but what about yerself? I’ll keep an eye to him if yer want ter look around.”
“We came from round here, Frank,” said Maggie sadly. “This was meant to be a trip down memory lane. Show Hannah her roots and make sense of the life that we have carved out fer ourselves. You know, close the chapter on our past, that sort of thing. But now that Jack seems to have lost his senses, it’s all a waste of time. Though I suppose I can take Hannah down to Killala, she can share my memories, if not her father’s. The doctor at the convent said it may do Jack good to see the old places, but it’s how to get him there. It’s a bit far to walk, though when we were younger we walked to Ballina often. In fact, Jack worked at the quarry so he walked it every day.”
“I can sort yer transport out, Maggie,” Frank replied eagerly. “If yer don’t mind handling our stubborn old donkey, yer can take Bertha. There’s enough room in the cart fer three people and as long as yer firm with her, she’ll get yer there and back again.”
“Oh, that’s wonderful,” Maggie said gratefully. “Hannah’s the one that is good with animals, she has a pony of her own back home. If yer sure, I’ll be grateful for the lend of it. Though I don’t think Bertha would be able to get us as far as Sligo. I think we’ll head back to England the day after tomorrow. Is there someone who could take us to Sligo? Of course we’re willing to pay.”
“I’ll ask around. Sometimes people journey over to Sligo to visit their relatives at the weekend. Or I could ask Billy McDermott. He has a carriage that he hires out, but it might cost a pretty penny fer him to drive yer there. It’s over thirty miles.
“Where did yer actually live in Killala, Maggie?” broke in Bridget. “I have a cousin who lived near the harbour. Yer know the road that goes down to the quay?”
“We didn’t live near the village, in fact we lived nearer to Ballina, than Killala, but fer some reason the hamlet we lived in was called that. You know the headland that juts out over near Moyne Abbey? Well, it was about a ten-minute walk from there. We overlooked
the place where the River Moy joined up with the sea at Killala Bay. Me parents never seemed to take me in that direction when I was small; we always came over this way. I worked fer a farmer with the name of Filbey fer a couple of years – that was, until the potatoes failed and you’ll know the rest if yer came from round here.”
“Neither of our families relied on the land fer a living,” said Bridget. “My dad was a shoemaker and Frank’s dad had this place, but we saw the poor people who suffered. Many came to sell their possessions on the market to raise money for their fare abroad. We were just about getting married then, weren’t we Frank? You’d done two years in the Army, but came back because yer dad wasn’t so well.”
“Aye, don’t remind me, Bridget. Whatever possessed me ter join the British Army, I’ll never know. I feel ashamed of meself when I look back ter those years. Anyway, we won’t get on to politics, when yer daughter gets back we’ll get Jack on his feet and put him in the donkey cart. Bridget’ll make yer a bottle of tea to take with yer, won’t yer Brid?”
The sun blazed down from the sky as Hannah chivvied up the donkey to get her to walk down towards the Killala road. Maggie felt Jack’s forehead. He was sweating, so she helped him out of his jacket and loosened the collar on his shirt. She was going to take him to the tailors the next morning and see if they had something off-the-peg to fit him there. She had remembered there was a tailors on the high street and hoped it was still trading after all these years.
The fields they were passing on the outskirts of the town were full of yellow gorse bushes. It was heath land; wild and rocky with small dense copses that Maggie remembered she used to skirt around. In the distance she could see the small islands that were dotted along the far coastline. Except for poor old Jack, she felt contented. Suddenly she felt glad that she was coming home.
“How far along, Mother? You said we would see a narrow cart track once we had passed St. Patrick’s Well.”
“It’s a bit further on yet, Hannah. I never used to walk along the road ter Ballina. I used to cut along the footpath by the waterfall and passed those woods over there. Filbey’s farm where I used ter work is over that way and have yer heard me mention Mrs. Dockerty? Her cottage was further up the path, near the farm.”
“Mrs. Dockerty? Isn’t she the mother of Eddie’s Uncle Johnny?”
“Yes, that’s true, but I doubt if she’ll still be living there. The poor old dear will be up at the cemetery, and that’s another thing I want ter do.”
“What, go to the cemetery?”
Maggie nodded.
“I grieved fer years ‘cos I wasn’t there to see me mother’s burial. Now, I can go ter see if they’re taking care of me parents’ graves.”
“Were they buried nearby in Killala?”
“No, in Ballina. We used to worship at a church at Inishpoint, but the ground there was never consecrated. Possibly because the church was so close to the headland, that they thought that one day the whole lot would fall into the sea.”
“Is this the lane, Mother? It’s very narrow and bendy. Hey up, Bertha, leave that pretty plant alone.”
As they travelled along the rutted cart track, Maggie felt full of nostalgia. She kept gripping Jack by his shirt sleeve, pointing out this and that to him.
“Look Jack, over there, see there’s Baunrosmore Island. Do yer remember when you and our Bernie walked out to it and you couldn’t get back because the tide came in? Look at the sand hills in the middle of the river. Remember when we used to catch those tiny eels? They only used ter come to Killala around harvest time. Oh, there’s the Filbey’s farm; we’ll stop here Hannah and I’ll help yer father down. Come on Jack, we’ll walk over and have a look at it all.”
Jack got down unsteadily and leant on Maggie, as they walked over to the farmyard. He rubbed at his eyes with his left hand as if he was clearing a mist away. He stopped and looked about him, Maggie held her breath. Was his memory returning? Had he remembered how he used to pass this building on his way to work every day? She caught his hand and looked into his face. His eyes began to focus on her and her heart leapt. Was this a beginning, a recognition? Then his gaze dropped and Jack looked down at his feet.
“Hannah, I think something happened then. Your father, I thought for a moment that he knew me. His eyes looked into mine for at least ten seconds. Oh, Hannah. Perhaps this place is going to help him. Get his mind back again!”
“Where else will he remember?” Hannah said excitedly. “What about the hamlet where you lived?”
“All gone now, me dears,” said a voice from within the farmyard. The person who the voice belonged to came up to the farmyard gate.
A tall thin man with light brown hair growing down to his shoulders, but not a lot up top, came out to meet them. He nodded pleasantly at Jack and Hannah, then looked puzzled when Jack turned away without acknowledging him.
“You’ll not remember me, but I knew your family. Maggie Mayo, isn’t it? Me parents had the pig farm up at Crosspatrick. I was just a tiddler when you upped and went. This place lay empty fer years after the Filbeys left, same with the row of cottages, except fer the Dockerty widow’s. But she’s bin gone this past two year; found her dead in her chair one winter’s morn, when I was passing bringing in the herd.”
“Oh, poor Mrs. Dockerty. Did yer get in touch with her sons? One of them was a friend of mine.”
“Didn’t have no address; couldn’t have written to him anyway. No, I had ter call on the parish to bury her, though her son wasn’t happy when he did turn up in the spring. But, I said to him, “What else could I have done?” Not seen him since. There’s the question of who owns the property now. It was hers, but it’s on my land. He sold her stuff to one of me labourers. That’s where Sean lives, in the middle house. Anyway, what brings yer to Killala? I’d heard yer hopped it to England when yer lost yer crop to the blight that summer. When we took over here, them cabins had just about caved in.”
“Hannah, take yer father for a walk whilst I speak for a moment with the farmer. We’ll have to leave the donkey cart here anyway. Bertha will never make it down the path to the hamlet. Would it be all right with you if we leave the donkey tied to your gate?”
The farmer agreed that it would be, then Maggie asked him her burning question. Had anyone else from the hamlet ever come back this way?
“Ah, that’s why you’ve come back then. Looking up yer relations, is it? Well, I can’t say that I remember anyone. All the time I’ve bin here, I’ve only seen the Dockerty son visit. Though there was a man hanging around about five years ago. Tall and sunburnt, not a black man with curly hair, but a man who’s spent his life in the sun.”
“Bernie, that will be me brother Bernie! He left fer a life at sea twenty years or more ago. Did yer speak to him? Did he say where he lived?”
“No, I shouted at him to get off me land or I’d set the dogs on him. I thought he was one of them gypsies that sometimes come around.”
“If he ever comes back again, will yer tell him that Maggie, his sister, was looking for him and that he can find me in Neston on the Wirral? That’s England, by the way. I had better dash off now and catch up with me husband and our daughter. I’ll see yer later when we come back fer the donkey. We should only be an hour or so.”
Maggie walked quickly along the footpath, feeling excited that her brother was still living and had come back to Killala, even if it had been after a very long time. She knelt at the shrine of the Blessed Mary on her way. It was still there after twenty years, still there for travellers to say their prayers. She prayed that Bernie was healthy and happy wherever he was and that one day they would meet again.
“And me sister, Molly, wherever she is. Look down on her, dear Mother Mary, bring her back to me one day.” Then with a prayer for the soul of her friend Mrs. Dockerty and one for Jack to be restored to health again, she continued down to Killala, back to the memories of yesteryear.
Hannah was helping her father down towards the “Giant’s Tub” a
s Maggie caught up with them. Subconsciously, Jack had walked towards Killala. Years of habit, Maggie supposed, as she looked down before her. Her eyes met nothing. No cabins, no plots of land, even the stone walling had gone. Just a grassy headland and the sea beyond.
“Oh Jack, it’s all gone,” Maggie moaned and sat down amongst the bluebells and celandines that were growing in profusion around her.
“Hannah, when we left there was a row of little cabins, made from the turf cut by my ancestors. Poor dwellings I grant yer, but what we considered to be our homes. Now there’s nothing. Someone’s come and cleared the land; there’s not even a stone bin left behind.”
“Oh, come Mother,” said Hannah practically. “You didn’t expect the place to have stayed the same. From what you told me everyone moved out anyway. The person who owned the land wouldn’t have wanted to be reminded of the bad times, would he?”
“Him?” Maggie snorted, getting up and brushing down her clothing. “He was away in his fancy house in England most of the time. It was us and the tenant farmers that supplied his lavish lifestyle. Anyway, let’s go down and have a look for any clues that might tell that we once lived there. We can sit on the cliff and look out to sea. We don’t want to waste such a glorious day.”
“I’ll be glad of a drink from that bottle you’ve got in your reticule, Mother and I’ll take off my jacket. Papa can sit there while we have a look around and I’ve got a notion to make a daisy chain.”
The warm floaty feeling was passing. Jack felt he had been left high and dry by the tide. He was hot, very hot; his head throbbing with pain and his eyes had filled with a mist, then they cleared again. A young girl was kneeling, picking flowers at his side.
“Maggie?” He put out his hand. “Maggie, you are goin’ ter come with me, aren’t yer?”
The girl rose quickly to her feet and cried out to someone that they were to come over quickly!
“Mother,” he heard her cry. “Mother, Papa has spoken again!”
Dreams Can Come True Page 11