The Godforsaken Daughter

by Christina McKenna

  Henry nodded.

  They all stood up.

  It was time to go.

  The plane climbed into the evening sky above Belfast, a setting sun making of the landscape a golden quilt of patchwork. Henry looked out one last time, allowing himself a pang of regret for all that was now lost: his identity, his career, his colleagues, his patients. But most of all: his father, his poor, dear father.

  Oh, the irony! Terminating one life to gain another.

  But his darling Connie was worth it.

  Soon he’d be seeing her again.

  And his father would be all right. He would have Matilda, the love of a good woman—a love perhaps more precious to a man than that of a father for a son.

  Henry consoled himself with that.

  He tore open the envelope.

  It contained the items his handlers had listed, together with a smaller envelope. On the front: FOR MY LOVE, written in Connie’s distinctive hand.

  Inside: a photograph. Connie and he on the balcony of the Hyperion Hotel in Crete. She must have taken the snapshot with her when she left their home in Belfast. He recalled the kindly waiter who’d taken it and—just moments afterward—their little contretemps.

  “Only trees stay in one place all their lives, Henry. And we’re not trees.”

  Well, now their uprooting was complete. Not in the way Connie had envisaged, perhaps, but they’d make the most of it. Change is growth. Isn’t that what he told his patients sometimes?

  But where was he headed? There was no clue in the envelope and he’d been given strict instructions to talk to no one. He’d only his intuition to guide him. Through the porthole he could make out the Irish Sea. But that gave no clue; most flights out of Belfast followed the contours of that stretch of water. Who knew but he might be bound for some distant continent, to change planes in London.

  The snapshot. Was that the hint? Greece?

  “Is this seat free?” He looked up to see a stewardess. Beside her a woman, dark hair in bubble curls, thick glasses, baggy clothes.

  He nodded. Quickly stuffed the papers back in the envelope, as the stranger sat down.

  Henry really would have preferred if the woman had chosen another seat. He could no longer peruse the contents of the envelope with her in such close proximity.

  She sat with her hands in her lap, not moving, her head bowed. Perhaps she’d connected from a long-haul flight and simply wanted to sleep. Well, that was all right with him.

  He pulled his table down and found John Lennon’s In His Own Write. The writings of the former Beatle might prove a worthwhile distraction.

  But when he flipped idly through the slim volume, he saw it was full of unorthodox drawings, crazy cartoons, with not much reading to speak of.

  The inflight magazine it would have to be. It fell open at a feature: “Things to do in Istanbul.” Attracted by the beautiful photos, he began to read.

  Istanbul, an ancient and magnificent city, bridging the continents of Asia and Europe, is a destination as no other. Its rich history, stretching back thousands of years, is a heady mix of many civilizations and cultures.

  Henry was aware of the woman beside him bending down to her handbag. She freed the table in front of her.

  You may begin your Istanbul tour in the Grand Bazaar, which will enchant you with its glittering treasures and curious delights, while a sense of peace and quietude will envelop you as you enter glorious Hagia Sophia, close by.

  The woman passenger had taken out a pen and was writing something.

  A tour of the pearls of the Bosphorus, Ortakoy, Bestiktas, and Kabatas will let you enjoy the splendid views along the deep blue coast. With the Black Sea in the north, the Marmara Sea in the south and the Istanbul Strait running in all its glory through the middle of the city, you will experience the distinctive combination of Mediterranean and Black Sea—

  Henry gave a start as the seat in front of him was jerked back. God knows how long he was going to be on the aircraft. He would much prefer to have the little space that had been allotted to him for himself.

  “The rudeness of some people,” he muttered under his breath, shut the magazine, and got up.

  He leaned forward to speak with the offender.

  “Excuse me. D’you mind?”

  A gangly teenager looked into his face.

  “Do I mind wha . . . ?” he said with apparent innocence.

  “You have just pushed your seat back into my space. It is cramped enough here. Now I would ask you kindly to return it to the upright position.”

  “Och, you! Keep yer hair on, mister.” He spoke with a thick Scottish accent, but refused to budge.

  “Please . . . I’d much appreciate it.”

  Finally, with a show of reluctance, the teenager relented. The seat was jerked upright again.

  Henry sat down.

  He returned to his magazine.

  Strange!

  He saw now what looked like a folded sheet of paper wedged between its pages.

  He glanced at the woman, but she didn’t look his way. He saw the notebook and pen in front of her. Perhaps she was dumb: a mute who needed him to ask the stewardess for something.

  He opened it.

  Henry, it’s me, Connie. I’m sorry for everything. We cannot speak until we land. I love you so much.

  “What on earth . . . ?”

  He turned. Stared at the woman. Stared in disbelief.

  “Conn—”

  She put a finger to her lips, but kept looking straight ahead.

  Could it be her? The hair was different, the face more gaunt. But that profile . . . that beautiful profile . . .

  “What—”

  He felt a hand go into his.

  A tear escaped from under her glasses and rolled down her cheek. Under cover of the table, the grip on his hand grew tighter.

  There was only one way to know for certain.

  He eased back the right cuff of her sweater.

  And there it was.

  The butterfly. Holly Blue.

  His butterfly.

  It was Connie—his beloved Connie—at last.

  He turned to her again, tears in his eyes.

  The urge to hold her, strong.

  “Tea? Coffee?” a stewardess asked.

  They looked up, shook their heads as one.

  The stewardess passed on, the drinks trolley trundling farther up the aisle.

  But still he could not believe his eyes. He leaned closer and whispered. “Connie . . . Connie, darling, is it really you?”

  She lowered the pebble-thick glasses. Those blue eyes misted up with tears, unmistakable. “I love you,” she mouthed.

  And clasped his hand more tightly.

  That touch: the fleeting language for the words they could not speak.

  That was how they traveled, all the way to Greece.

  Chapter forty-seven

  Paddy and Rose had to be enlisted to help Ruby with the delivery of her gift. She had no idea where Jamie lived.

  “But I don’t want Jamie to know it came from me,” she said to Rose on the phone.

  “That’s no bother atall, Ruby. God, Jamie’ll be delighted with that. I’d love to be there to see his face, ’cos he’s been very lonely without Shep, so he has. I’ll get my Paddy to do that surely.”

  “But it has to be a surprise, Rose. Could Paddy slip in and just leave it on the doorstep?”

  “Aye, he’ll go in round the back. That way, Jamie won’t see him. His sitting room’s at the front anyway.”

  Paddy McFadden played his part to the letter. He saw Jamie on his tractor in one of his fields, and let the little puppy in his front door. It would be warmer for the wee critter to be near the hearth fire than sitting out on the cold doorstep in a box.
r />   An hour later, Jamie was on the phone to Rose.

  “God, Rose, it’s the loveliest wee thing, and divil do I know where it came outta.”

  “That’s the best I ever heard, Jamie. And where did you say you found it again?” She held out the phone so Paddy could also join in the excitement.

  “. . . curled up in me bed no less, and me sittin’ down to take me boots off. Could’a set on the wee thing.”

  “Heaven’s above, that’s the best I ever heard! And you only after losin’ Shep. It’s a merickle, so it is.”

  “A miracle is right, Rose.”

  “You know who I was talking to today, and who was asking about you, Jamie?”

  “Naw, Rose, who was that?”

  “Ruby, no less.”

  “Oh, Ruby . . . and how is she?”

  “Well, you know, Jamie, you’ll be able to find that out for yourself, for she ast me to ask you would you go over to Oaktree for a cuppa tea this evening.”

  It was a little white lie. But a little white lie in the service of romance was no bad thing in Rose’s world.

  “She didn’t!”

  “She did indeed, Jamie. Now, me and my Paddy will drop you off, ’cos we’re going in to do the flowers for the church, so we are.”

  Jamie hesitated. He’d have to change out of his farm clothes.

  Rose read his mind. “And don’t bother changin’, Jamie. Sure Ruby’s a farmer, too, so she won’t notice.”

  Ruby walked the green field, past the memorial patch of flowers under a sky of windblown clouds, down again to Beldam.

  She was happy. Oh, so very happy!

  The evening sun was putting an edge to things. Birdcalls bright in the air. The world alive with possibilities.

  She stopped near the jetty and gazed about. Saw the spot where she’d placed the stool. Smiled at the thought of her naked self, dancing under the moonlight in the name of the Goddess Dana.

  The Goddess and The Book of Light had given her one valuable insight: a renewed appreciation of the natural world and the energy—the life force—that drives and runs it all. She thought of the many little winged creatures busy in the wood, the soil, the grass. Felt bad now that she might be crushing some, and looked down at her feet.

  It was then that she spotted it. A piece of pink paper wedged in a slat of the jetty. She bent down and picked it up.

  Her three wishes, charred a bit at one end. She read.

  “‘I want to see . . .’” The word Daddy was gone. “Daddy,” she said aloud. “Yes, Daddy . . . and no, I didn’t see you, but I will in the next life.”

  The second wish: “‘I want to have lots of money.’ With Oaktree now in my name I do have lots of money.”

  Third wish . . .

  The sound of a car, slowing for the gate, distracted her.

  It couldn’t be May and June. She wasn’t expecting to see them anytime soon. The twins could hold a grudge in “perpetuity”: an important new word Ruby had learned from the solicitor, Mr. Cosgrove, and now knew the meaning of. They’d come eventually, though. Their mother’s jewelry bequest had to be collected.

  She started back up the field. Looked down at the piece of paper again. Third wish: “‘I want to meet someone nice and be happy.’”

  Footsteps in the lane.

  She turned. Incredible. For there was her third wish: Jamie McCloone, a bunch of flowers in one hand, a small bundle in the hook of his arm, making his way toward her.

  “Hello, there . . . Ruby,” he said.

  “Jamie . . . my goodness . . . I’m so glad to see you . . . didn’t expect you at all.”

  “You didn’t?” Jamie frowned. “Rose . . . Rose said you wanted me over for a drop of tea.”

  Ruby smiled. She just knew Rose had to be involved.

  “That’s right . . . now I remember. I forgot . . . yesterday with the readin’ of the will and all . . .”

  “Aye . . . a lot on your mind, Ruby, this past while . . . I know.”

  Out on the road, Rose McFadden, hunkered down behind the hedge, was giving her husband a running commentary on proceedings.

  “God, he’s giving her the wee bunch of flowers now, Paddy . . .”

  “Aye, so,” said the ever-patient Paddy through the rolled down window of the driver’s seat.

  “Now I hope he minds the right name for them flowers this time,” Rose said.

  “There’s some . . . some . . . of them flowers for you, Ruby. They’re called . . .” Jamie inspected his toecaps, trying to remember the name. “Begod now, what are they called? Aye, I mind now: swan’s babies breath and—”

  “They’re lovely, Jamie. Swan-river daisies with false—”

  “False goat’s beards and baby’s breath,” they chorused together, and laughed.

  “Is that a wee dog you’ve got there?”

  Jamie, his mind so taken up with the presentation of the bouquet and getting the names correct, had forgotten about the sleeping furry miracle he was carrying.

  “God, Ruby, that’s my wee miracle. I found her curled up in me bed only a couple of hours ago.”

  He off-loaded it into Ruby’s arms while he held the bouquet.

  “Ah . . . what a lovely wee thing! What do you call it?”

  The puppy opened its little eyes and yawned widely in Ruby’s face.

  “Paddy, Paddy! Jamie is putting the wee pup in Ruby’s arms now.”

  “Hope . . . hope it doesn’t wet on her, Rose. Them wee pups have to be toilet trained, you know.”

  “Och, away with you, Paddy . . .”

  “Haven’t thought of a name,” Jamie was saying. He looked at the sky. “God must’a sent her down from heaven.”

  Or the Goddess, thought Ruby briefly, but didn’t say.

  Jamie shifted from foot to foot. “Sorry . . . sorry I’m not better dressed. Didn’t have much time tae change.”

  “You . . . you look grand, Jamie . . . just grand, so you do. And it’s . . . really good to see you, so it is.”

  “Aye . . . Rose and Paddy dropped me off there. They’re goin’ to St. Timothy’s to do the flowers for the morrow’s Mass.” He studied the patch of flowers. “That’s where your father . . .”

  “Aye . . . but he’s in a better place now,” Ruby said. “Mammy, too.”

  “Aye, so . . . that’s the way it goes.” The farmer gazed about him. “Big place you’ve got here, Ruby. How many acres would she be?”

  “Sixty-three and three-quarters . . . about.”

  “Very big right enough. Suppose . . . suppose you’ll want to be startin’ things up again, now that you’re . . .”

  “I’d love to. Maybe you could help me . . . couldn’t manage it on me own.”

  “I’d love to help you, Ruby, surely.”

  “Come on to the house . . . sure we’ll talk about it over a cuppa tea.”

  Jamie pulled on his ear, righted his cap. The puppy in Ruby’s arms yawned again. She gazed across at Beldam.

  “I know what we’ll call this wee thing, Jamie,” she said.

  “You do?”

  “Aye . . . Dana. We’ll call her Dana.”

  “Dana . . . oh, you mean like that actor? What’s he called . . . Dana, Dana Andrews.”

  “Aye, but this Dana was a goddess. She . . . she was the Mother of the Little People.”

  “The fairies? God, I never knowed that. Niver seen a fairy meself, but me Uncle Mick now, he said he did.”

  They turned to go. Unseen by Jamie, Ruby looked over her shoulder and gave Rose a covert wave.

  Rose popped her head above the hedge, and waved back excitedly, before getting back in the car.

  Paddy reengaged the engine.

  “God, Paddy, it’s all gonna work out. And you’ll have to get yourself a new suit with Mr. Harvey, so you will
.”

  “A new suit? Why’s that?”

  “Och, Paddy, for Jamie and Ruby’s wedding! What else would it be for?”

  “Not a wee bit soon to be talkin’ about a waddin’, Rose?”

  “They’ll be married within the year. Now, I’m no fortune-teller, like that Madame Calinda . . . but I can see that for sure.”

  Rose sighed blissfully. “And to think, Paddy, if Ruby’s father hadn’t of died, Jamie and Ruby might never have met. Funny how things work out, isn’t it?”

  “Aye, funny enough all right, Rose.”

  They strolled across the field.

  Ruby with the puppy. Jamie with the flowers.

  So much for them to talk about.

  So much for them to share.

  Dana gave a little bark.

  A wondrous silence fell.

  As they walked toward the farmhouse.

  And a future that was theirs.

  Author’s notes

  As many as 3,000 people are in witness protection programs in the United Kingdom and Ireland at the present time.

  For decades, witnesses threatened during the “Troubles” in Northern Ireland were given sanctuary overseas. They can literally never go home again.

  The Atlantis Foundation was begun in London in 1974. Its practices included primal therapy, introduced by psychotherapist Arthur Janov. When Atlantis moved to Burtonport, a village on the coast of Donegal, the local people dubbed the group “the Screamers.” Finding themselves no longer welcome, the commune soon relocated to the nearby island of Innisfree, and thence to Colombia, where a small group of devotees still exists.

  Acknowledgments

  I wrote The Godforsaken Daughter in the course of a year, in three locations: starting in a lovely town in central Mexico, touching down briefly in Lucca, Italy, before finally coming to rest in my beloved Newry, Northern Ireland.

  I am truly grateful for the encouragement and support I received from Terry Goodman, senior editor at Amazon Publishing. He gave me such a wonderful reception of the first few chapters that I felt compelled to continue the journey I’d started with my hesitant heroine, Ruby Clare.