Call Home the Heart

by Shannon Farrell

  As she watched him go, Muireann felt anything but regretful. With each passing day, she knew she loved Lochlainn more and more. But how could she bring herself to tell him? All the secrets she had kept from him weighed on her heart like lead.

  How could she be sure he really loved her? She was grateful for all his help, of course. But how did she know he hadn't begun their relationship to help himself, his family and friends? Had he in fact been using her?

  Everyone uses people, she thought cynically. Even me.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Over the next three months, the dreaded potato blight, which had started as only a wild rumor spread about by scaremongers, suddenly seized the land in its deathly grip.

  The first specific reports of the crop disease were printed in the English newspapers, when ruined potatoes were harvested in the Isle of Wight and Kent on the eleventh of August. The news reached Muireann a few days later, and she discussed it with Lochlainn one evening as they sat in her small office while the rain pattered down on the roof.

  "I have a bad feeling about this," she said, showing the newspaper to Lochlainn. "Call it my Scottish superstition, but I think we should take this seriously. If the best land in England has been infected by this blight, what will happen here?"

  "I don't know. Surely it might only be a small local incident. The Isle of Wight is tiny, and the land in Kent could be isolated to stop it spreading, you know, by preventing the carts from trading further afield. The disease might never get this far. Those places are hundreds of miles away across the sea, after all," he sought to reassure her.

  "I think we would do better to be prepared, than to do nothing now and then have to deal with yet another crisis here on the estate in another six weeks' time when our lumpers for the winter are meant to be coming out of the ground."

  "What do you suggest?"

  Really, she never seems to be content with anything these days, he reflected with a touch of impatience.

  "I think we should buy oats, wheat, and seed potatoes, and turnips, carrots, beets. We should cut down on milk consumption, or use more sheep and goat milk, and lay up lots of cheeses. We will also need to fish a lot more. We can smoke it for the winter. I'd like to do another seaweed run to Donegal as well. It can be dried and is apparently very nutritious. Not to mention all the shellfish, which can be smoked.

  "Also, let's see if we can get a good price for some more pigs, and I want the men to go onto the islands in the lough and hunt for wild goats. They can capture a few she-goats, a male if they can find one, and shoot others for food. I've heard meat is quite tasty, and they'll give milk as well. Both pigs and goats eat scraps, and will be cheap enough to keep if we're careful. Let's also build more rabbit and pheasant pens. I want the best men to go hunting as soon as the season starts again. And a few more chickens, geese, and ducks wouldn't go to waste."

  "Shouldn't we just wait until the Andromeda comes?"

  She shook her head. "No. It isn't due back here for several more weeks. If people start to panic, it will drive the prices up."

  "What will we use to buy these things? I thought money was a bit tight at the moment until the accounts come in at the end of the month."

  "I still have a little money set by from the sale of the Dublin house. We also have all the woolen bolts of cloth, which I was going to use for the women's and men's clothes this winter. Now I think I'll trade it, and get flannel and some heavy cotton, and see what money is left after the sale."

  In the end, Lochlainn gave in. "I'll buy everything you've listed for me, but I do think you're being a bit gloomy."

  "I know, Lochlainn, and I'm sorry. But ever since, well, for the past eight months anyway, every single time I think I see the light at the end of the tunnel, something comes to darken our already desperate situation."'

  Lochlainn pulled her to him then, and kissed her tenderly, stroking back a stray curl from her temple.

  "I have faith in your judgment, and will do as you say, my dear. But let's just hope you're only having morbid fancies."

  He knew she wasn't sleeping as well as she had been before she had left for Dublin. Though she never spoke of her nightmares, even when he demanded she tell him about them, they were terrifying enough to make her wake up screaming sometimes.

  "And if I'm not being morbid?" she asked quietly, staring up at him.

  Lochlainn held her close, propping his chin on the top of her head. "Then God help us all."

  On the fifteenth of October, after a particularly rainy autumn, Muireann could bear the uncertainty no longer. Assembling all the men by the side of the potato beds, which she had already noticed had begun to emit a rancid odor, she ordered them to start digging.

  As the first batches came up, she sagged against Lochlainn in relief. Though the potatoes were quite small, they still seemed to be edible.

  "Thank God!" she sighed, hugging him to her, heedless of who saw.

  Lochlainn had patted her on the shoulder in embarrassment, and proceeded to help with the digging.

  But about three days later, as the women were preparing the dinner in the kitchen for everyone, a huge commotion broke out.

  Muireann came running in from the turf cutting as soon as she heard the news.

  "They were sound only the other day, and now look!" Sharon shrieked.

  Muireann stared at the black putrescent mass oozing all over the floor through the wickerwork basket.

  A pang of sick dread coursed through her. She looked from one face to the next. They were all staring at her. Waiting for her reaction. She simply couldn't let them down. "Patrick, Mark, saddle the two horses now and ride into Enniskillen. Take whatever money I have in the strongbox. Buy as much rice and Indian meal as you can with it, and hurry!" Muireann ordered.

  Lochlainn came running in a short time later, having heard all sorts of weeping and wailing going up around the estate, and curious as to why everyone was standing there stock still.

  Muireann pointed wordlessly as Lochlainn gazed at the black ooze on the floor.

  He gaped. "What on earth is it?"

  "Our potatoes. Or what's left of them."

  He stared at her as though she had gone mad.

  "It's true."

  "Oh no, God, no!" Lochlainn ran his fingers through his hair as he stared in horror at the ruination of all his dreams.

  Muireann shook her head, and then squared her shoulders and looked around the room commandingly.

  "Right, I want everyone out at the potato storage pit now, and I mean everyone. The men will dig, the women will fill the creels. Get all the knives out, will you, Brona?

  "Sharon, fill up every cauldron in the house, the washtubs too. We need to dig all the potatoes up, and cut them in half. Any potatoes that look all right, we boil them now. Hopefully they will keep for a few days cooked. God knows what would happen if we just left them lying. Any other potatoes go into the laundry tubs. We will boil them up for starch, which we can sell to the laundry in Enniskillen."

  Everyone continued to stare at the floor, until Muireann exclaimed impatiently, "Come on, don't just stand there! We haven't a moment to waste!"

  Muireann reached for a knife and stalked out, and began the heart-breaking task. Lifting the first shovelful herself, she almost gagged at the smell, and then began to pick through them with her knife. Lochlainn came up to stand beside her a short time later, and took the shovel wordlessly.

  The tenantry all came out to lend a hand then, digging, cutting, filling the creels, and carrying them back and forth to the kitchen. Only about an eighth were salvageable, and even then Muireann was not so sure they should be eaten.

  She put plenty of salt in the boiling water, and then tasted one herself.

  "It seems fine, but we won't overdo it. We will just have to eat them warmed up in the stew for the next few days until they run out. Everyone gets one hot one now, but no more. If these still have traces of the disease, the last thing we need is to all get ill."

 
Lochlainn agreed with Muireann's assessment of the situation, and oversaw the handing out of the rations at dinner. It was a gloomy meal at best, eaten quickly and silently as they knew they would soon have to return to their soul-destroying work at the potato bed.

  After most of them had gone, she remarked to Lochlainn, "We're complaining because the few we do have to eat will be rationed, and served up in stew. We ought to be thankful that we have any at all. I just hope we've laid in enough stores, and that we can get more. Otherwise we're all going to have a very hard winter."

  Muireann went into the storerooms then to do some calculations. "I know what you're going to say, that the Andromeda will come. But they're probably facing the same disaster we are. Also, they'll have to stop sailing soon anyway because of the winter weather. We'll be lucky if they fit in another run. I say we shouldn't get our hopes up that they will make it through again this year, not with all the terrible gales we've been having recently. So we have to begin making other plans. If we ration the food we have here at the moment, how long could we survive until the next crops are ready?"

  Lochlainn took out his small pocket notebook and began to scribble down some figures hastily. "There are still onions, beets and turnips to come. If we have oatmeal and rice, and cornmeal. . ."

  "We need to think about the milk and eggs as well. I mean, I know I've paid off all the arrears on the mortgage, and a bit extra, but we still have to make the monthly payments. What a terrible choice I'm being presented with. If we eat, we might lose Barnakilla. If we keep Barnakilla, these people might all starve."

  "I don't have any answers for you, Muireann," Lochlainn whispered, trying to subdue the feeling of nausea which washed over him. "I wish to God I did, but I don't."

  This was the end, he was sure of it. Any sane woman would cut her losses and run. There was nothing keeping Muireann here now. The whole thing had been one impossible dream. He had lied to her, tricked her into coming, spurred her on in the belief that he could restore Barnakilla to the glorious days he remembered from his childhood.

  His own madness, ambition, and desire for this lovely woman had brought about everyone's ruin, he thought wildly.

  Muireann saw the stricken look on his face and hugged Lochlainn silently, drawing strength from his huge frame as he towered over her, wrapping her in his arms as though he would never let her go.

  But free her he must. He couldn't expect her to endure famine. He recalled all he had heard from his sister of the terrible events of 1841. It was unthinkable to subject a woman like Muireann to that.

  "At least you did try. You made me buy the food in advance," he commented softly, trying desperately to cling onto the illusion that they could make it.

  "Please, Lochlainn, don't, don't talk, not now. I need you to hold me, love me," she moaned, trying to block out the nightmare of the black potatoes

  "Sharon or Brona could come in at any moment," he gasped, shocked.

  "And that would be awful, wouldn't it? That someone might see us, think we cared about each other?" she snapped.

  "Your reputation!"

  "Liar! That isn't it at all!" she accused. "I saw the way you looked at me the other day when I hugged you. You're ashamed of me. I suppose I can't blame you. I'm a complete failure now, aren't I?"

  Lochlainn stared at her in utter disbelief. "How can you say that after everything you've accomplished!" he exploded. "You've done everything you can to restore Barnakilla, to help these people, but even you can't work miracles! You're not God. Neither am I! Do you think if I were I would have let all this happen! How do you think I feel, having to watch you sacrifice everything, while you suffer and slave away day in and day out, barely taking time to even sleep, unless I come to your bed to give you a few hours of mindless oblivion?"

  Muireann sucked in her breath sharply. "Is that what you think it is?" she gasped, feeling her gorge rise.

  "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that," he apologized, reaching for her.

  She stalked out of the storeroom and headed for her office.

  Lochlainn ran after her, pleading, "I didn't mean it!"

  Muireann sat down in her chair, utterly defeated, and put her head in her hands. She could have tolerated more deprivation, but Lochlainn's criticism was almost too much to bear.

  "Please, Muireann, I'm sorry. I never meant to hurt you. I'm angry at myself for not being able to do anything about this," he insisted, pacing the floor anxiously.

  At last she looked up. "Then why did you call our time together mindless oblivion? I asked you to be honest with me when I first came here in January. I can hardly blame you now for being exactly that."

  "All right, you want the truth, Muireann, I'll tell you," he said, rounding on her furiously. "I never know where I am with you, what you're going to do next. One minute you're warm and loving, the next minute you shut me out for weeks on end. You never speak to me about the things that really matter, about the death of Augustine, the trip to Dublin. Even worse than trying to figure out what's going on in those dark recesses of your mind is lurching from one crisis to the next, day after day.

  "So if you want the truth, then here it is plain and simple. I'm terrified. I'm frightened all the time. I'm convinced that one day I will wake up to an appalling reality which is of my own making, though not always within my control. Does that make any sense?"

  She stared at him, appalled at the depth of his anguish.

  "I want to do what's best for everyone, but I just don't have any answers anymore. You and I have literally lived from day to day and night to night, never knowing what's around the corner, or even where our next meal is coming from.

  "I feel I've let you down. That I should never have brought you here. Part of me tries to tell myself that we will come through this if we all pull together. The other part says we should just cut our losses now, quit while we're ahead," he confessed.

  She stared at him, stunned. "You really want us to give up, after everything we've suffered?"

  He sighed and shook his head. "If we do that we will be letting all these people down. I couldn't bear that either. I know it was your idea to take them in from the Colonel and Mr. Cole, but it's my duty to make this work as estate manager, to shoulder the burden with you.

  "No, I don't want to quit. Yet I think we have to face facts. I think we've both reached the end of our tethers now. Perhaps it's time for you to consider selling Barnakilla and going home."

  "You can honestly say that to me after all we've been through?" she said, feeling more shocked and betrayed with every passing minute.

  Though he knew he was lying, the last thing he could admit to her was that he loved her. Not if he was going to convince her to go home before she got dragged down along with the entire estate.

  He nodded grimly. "I can't trust myself, Muireann, or you. I'm sorry. You're like two different people, one hard and practical, the other soft and warm and yielding. I feel that we went down this road as lovers because I was afraid. I've hung onto you like a drowning man in a wide empty ocean clinging to a chunk of floating debris. I clutch you to me, trying to right my eddying world, in the hope of staying afloat. I'm sorry if that means I've been using you. Perhaps you've been using me as well, for the same reasons.

  "But surely you see it will all have to end some time? It's a miracle you aren't already with child. What I've done to you was wrong, but I couldn't help it. I know it isn't an excuse, any more than saying I needed the release I found inside you to keep me sane.

  "But I do have some scruples, some dignity. It's got to end. I can't go on being a selfish brute any longer. Not after everything you've tried to do for all of us."

  "What are you saying? That you want to leave Barnakilla? That you're abandoning me?" Muireann asked tearfully, unable to believe that he seemed to be telling her that he was ending their love affair.

  "I'm telling you for your own good, Muireann, it's all over. Sell this old pile of rubble, and go. Just go!"

  Muireann was
stupefied by his words. Certainly the potatoes had failed, but how could he ever think she would give up so easily?

  Anger welled up inside her, and the ruthless streak she had warned him about suddenly came to the fore.

  She rose from the chair and stood chest to chest with him. "I'm sorry, Mr. Roche, but I don't accept your view of the situation at all. Only the potatoes have gone. The rest of the estate is still standing. I won't give in, not even to the forces of nature. I refuse to give up Barnakilla without a fight. I told you I would do anything to save it. You don't know even one half of what I've done to keep a roof over all our heads!" she said, her eyes glittering with unshed tears.