Connor turned a bit and gave her da a strange look. Sinead straightened, lifted her chin, and although she didn’t let go of Connor’s hand, she walked gingerly to the horse and her son. She came close enough to feel heat emanating from the animal’s sturdy body and halted. Connor stood in back of her, his legs braced. She leaned against him, briefly closed her eyes and stretched out a trembling hand to touch Robbie and the horse.
Robbie grinned. “See, Mama. It doesn’t hurt.”
Now wide-eyed, she touched the horse. His hide rippled under her fingers as if she tickled him. “Why, he’s soft…he’s…” She looked up at Connor. Tear flowed down her face, unheeded. “Connor, he’s soft, so soft.”
She turned and rested her head against his big frame. Connor grasped her into an embrace. He rained kisses on her temple and both cheeks. “Och, lass, ‘tis proud of you I am. You’re a brave, generous girl and deserve to have a laddie like Rob.”
He cradled her in a one arm and took Robbie off the horse with the other. “Good, boyo. That’s what you are, Rob. My very good boyo.”
Sinead stared up at the two of them. “Why, Connor, you’ve tears in your eyes.”
“They’re tears of pride in my whole family.”
Pegeen, who said little earlier, spoke up now. “What ye did, Sinead, was most glorious thing I ever did see.” Tears rolled down to her chin. “And now if you gentlemen wouldn’t mind, I’d like to be speaking with the lass by meself.”
“Good thing,” Egan said, laughing to break the tension. “I’d like to be speaking to the men folk. I have some news of interest to all of us.”
Sinead took Robbie from Connor. His little legs encircled her waist. “Pegeen, come with me. Essie’s still here and we’ll have a cup of tea between us.”
“Me, too, Mama.”
“Milk, for you, laddie, with some grand, sweet raisin cookies. Go ahead with Pegeen, love. I’ll be right with you.” She set him on the ground, where he placed a hand in Pegeen’s.
Bowes and Egan removed the horse from its traces and started down the hill with it. “We’ll be taking him to the barn, Con,” Bowes shouted, making the horse jog a bit. “Meet ye there to talk.”
“Connor,” Sinead shouted to stop him. “Don’t go yet. I need to thank you…”
“For what?”
“For your patience, perhaps. For your kindnesses, your consideration.” She looked at the ground. “For everything…since we….”
“You’ve no need to be thanking me, lass. I’m your husband.”
“And I’m thinking I’d wish you’d stay that way…” Unable to meet his gaze, she turned and ran into the house, without glancing back at him.
Chapter Twenty-Four
In the afternoon, they celebrated Sinead’s bravest contact with a horse, her first in twenty years. Robbie kept running over and hugging her skirt then running back to Bowes, Connor and Egan as if he were one of the men.
“I’m proud of my mama,” he cried out at one point and looked at Connor. “Aren’t you, Da?” When Connor agreed, he also got hugged.
By evening, they moved onto a celebratory dinner for the upcoming marriage of Bowes and Pegeen. Discussion of everyone’s plans for the wedding remained at the forefront.
Not to be undone by her new life, Pegeen told them of some necessary steps she’d already taken. “The arrangements are made for the ceremony to take place on Saturday evening, following the racing program. Of the damsels at the boarding house, only one elected to stay in her present business,” she said quietly, her gaze avoiding everyone. “The others are taking different options open to them in less dangerous life styles.”
Bowes patted her hand. “Most of them intend to leave Saratoga for bigger cities where there are more opportunities. I know Peg will miss them. They’ve been good boarders and never practiced the trade at her doorstep, regardless of what some people might think.”
“Da, you know I’m sorry about the mistake I made,” Sinead said. A flush crept up her face, and her ears burned. “I didn’t really know…or understand…”
Bowes continued on. His words filled the void. “I intend to set up a small livery stable and blacksmith shop on a piece of village property I own. The land is in the village itself and near to the house. I’m willing to do your shoeing for a paltry sum, Con,” he added with a smile.
“I’m not sure how long we’re going to stay here,” Connor said. His gaze rested on Sinead. “When I leave, you’ll be taking the place over.”
Egan assured Connor. “I’ll go back to Ireland whenever ye want to return. In the meantime, I’m planning to go back to the City of New York. There are untold opportunities there for a fast-minded lad.”
“Not a job I’d be imaging for you, but I suppose it works all right for the time being. How’s life in the police department?” Connor asked in an extremely serious tone.
“Based on my short friendship with Morrissey, I’ve made a speedy rise within the department in barely two weeks. New York City and its police department have become my home away from home, but there are other things in the offing.”
“Would you not trade it all for the green hills of O’Malley Stud?” Connor asked in a surprised manner, his longing for home obvious.
Egan grinned at his older brother. “Ye know, I think this Irishman has a taste for the political life, believing he can do good things for our fellow Irishmen.” His face grew serious, mouth turning down. “Con, ye have no idea the squalor the Irish live in. By the force of those who think them scum. Bad circumstances debilitate the men. The women and children cry out in anguish, daily.”
Egan shook his head and took a deep breath. “Well, enough of depressing facts.” He turned to Essie. “And what are you intending, lass?”
Essie beamed her answer. “Since you asked, I’ll tell you. I’m going to stay with Pegeen and Bowes, help out with the new boarding house. I can read and do my numbers.”
“And where did ye do all the learning?” Egan asked, giving her the full benefit of one of his glorious smiles and dancing eyes.
Her rather obvious attraction to Egan, and her subsequent shyness because of it, touched them all in different ways. “In the very city you were talking about. Before she died, my most dear mam taught me those things.”
Pegeen interrupted. “’Tis a fine hand she has, too. We’ll need her in the spring and summers. Bowes and I decided we’d only open for some of the race crowd, those with horses of their own. We plan on advertising in local and faraway papers—wherever.”
Bowes added, “It’ll bring me more smithy duties, too. That’s when Peg will need Essie the most.”
“And I’m going to help Sinead as well.” Essie leaned over and ruffled Robbie’s hair. “Take care of this favorite tyke of mine. And in the winters, maybe I’ll get me a job in a dress shop—if one will take me.”
Egan grinned. “They’ll be lucky to have ye, too, lass. I’m betting on it.”
“Has everyone had enough?” Sinead asked. She pushed away from the table. “There’s still some cake left on the counter.”
“I’ll have it, mama,” Robbie shrieked. When everyone laughed, he asked, “What’s so funny?”
Connor stood up and lifted Robbie from his chair. He rested him on one hip. “There’s nothing funny, son. ‘Tis just big people. Once their stomachs are full, they like to laugh.”
Robbie giggled and hugged Connor, as if his da just said the most astounding thing.
Everyone came away from the table, carried dishes into the kitchen and said their goodbyes. The celebration was over. Bowes and Pegeen went back to the village. Connor and Egan went down to the barns and Robbie settled in bed.
After telling Robbie a long story and kissing his forehead in a good-night gesture, Sinead went into the kitchen to help Essie clean up. The job completed, Essie took off for her bed. Probably to dream of Egan, Sinead thought, strolling into the main room.
For the longest time, she stood by the window and looked down at the l
and below the house. A light glowed in the tent and created shadowy, ghostly etchings of figures moving around. Somehow, knowing the brothers were there comforted her.
She sat down on the long sofa, trying to search her heart for a solution to the problems besetting her. It made her morose, so she grabbed an agricultural magazine from the side table. With a sigh of discomfort, she flipped the pages, noticing little but pictures, as the details of her life came into clearer focus.
Her eyes grew heavy. She leaned against the hard back of the sofa. Exhausted by all the emotional upheavals, the highs and lows, since first meeting Connor, today’s bout with the horse sapped her last reserve of energy. She fell into a deep sleep and awoke in the middle of the night, darkness momentarily shading her vision.
She bolted upright on the sofa and swung her feet to the floor. Someone tossed a coverlet over her, loosened the buttons of her dress and placed a feather pillow beneath her head. Alert to the absence of any noise, her heart slammed against her ribs. One ragged breath followed another. She dragged air into her lungs in great gulps. A cold sweat trickled down her neck.
The light of the moon lit the room with eerie silken shapes. They flickered, shimmered and wavered before her eyes. Sinead leaped to her feet, her heart still racing for some unknown reason, and staggered to the window. Other than the moon’s reflection, there was no light anywhere else on the property.
With no regard for her state of dress, she rushed to Robbie’s room. He slept peacefully, little warm breaths leaching from his mouth. She tiptoed out of the room and listened at door of Essie’s. Soft exhalations in spurting sounds greeted her ears.
The uneasy feeling refused to leave. Connor!
Her every instinct told her to get him, bring him to the house. The place was as much his as hers. She moved slowly toward the front door, unsure of what action to take. Even if he were not going to stay here long, she should make him her husband in fact, express the love she knew she had for him. Her deep respect and love grew with every day she spent in his company.
She chastised herself mentally for her past behavior toward him. . When did she fall so deeply in love with Connor? Was it the moment she saw him? When he greeted Adelaide, thinking her to be his bride? And she chortled over Essie’s adoration of Egan, with a snicker at herself.
Every handsome feature of Conner’s face came to mind. Those features plagued her then faded into picturing the power of deep brown eyes, the size and strength of him, his kind nature. How might he have looked as a lad? As a lad? Sinead grasped the wall of the hallway she traveled. What made her thing of him as a youngster? As a lad of ten or eleven?
The vivid, sharp image of Connor O’Malley at eleven, when last she’d seen him, flooded her mind. She closed her eyes to draw the image closer and clamped her teeth over her lower lips, in concentration.
“Och, God, help me!” To her own inner anguish, she remembered. Remembered the large, brawling family of O’Malleys, mother, father and sons, her own mama, her da and her wee sister! Remembered it all! It was far clearer in the darkness of night, her most ancient of enemies, than her mind ever allowed her to envision before.
No wonder Connor always seemed so familiar to her. His occupancy of her heart was uncontested. She loved him long ago, much as she did now, followed him, day after day, like a dogged spaniel worrying a bone. How many times did he trip over her, not knowing she was standing there at his side? How many times did he reach down and pat her head? How many times had he grasped her from a high-stepping, playful animal’s buck, fraught with danger?
She came to a dead stop in the long hall. Her body folded upon itself, and she rocked back and forth. Memories assailed her.
And the accident? In her vision, her mama sat on the fence, laughing, her tangled hair whipping around her features. She turned to Sinead. The chestnut horse leaped to meet her and toss her to the ground. Her mama was carried into the house, and a door closed, ending the horrific moment.
Sinead gasped at the force of the memory and what came next. She remembered. “Aye, I remember so much more.” Sobs wracked her. She couldn’t stop her swaying nor could she rise to her feet. “Dear God, I remember…”
She had broken away from her da’s embrace. Her small legs darted like quicksilver toward Connor, only to see him standing with a gun in his hand. She stopped running, held her breath and watched him shoot the chestnut. The horse crumpled to the ground in heap and cast a last trumpet-like breath. Connor tossed the gun away and plunged headlong onto the still warm carcass. He cried his heart out in fear and terror as only a young boy could when faced with a man’s job.
Sinead floundered in the fragments of her images and slipped to her knees. Her hands came over her mouth to smother a fit of sobbing so heartbreaking it left little breath for breathing. The very person by whom she judged all other men was Connor—sweet, strong Connor. He was hers for now, but she would lose him again.
Her eyes screwed tightly shut, she mumbled incoherent sounds of distress. “Too soon... Much too soon!”
The sound of her own voice crept through her mental cobwebs. She needed to tell Connor what she remembered, then throw herself at his feet. Go back to Ireland with him, if necessary. Even if he didn’t remember her, Connor felt something for her. She sensed his concern.
But Robbie, what of wee Robbie? A sweet, innocent child. He knew nothing about any of this. He didn’t even understand about his real mother dying to bring him into this world or how his da died in a last attempt to preserve Robbie’s heritage from the Dewitts.
Lasting sobs wracked her body, in part for the wee lad and part for herself. She slumped to the floor and let the coolness of the bare wood help shoulder her burden. She’d go to the Dewitts, beg them for a release. She’d promise them anything to balance the scales, visits every year, money. Anything…
Tears hovered behind her eyeballs. She sucked in the one running down her face. Another thought intruded. Last night, Connor offered her a part of himself. Her worries about being left with two children and no father to raise them set her off. She ran. She refused his attention in fear of a totally unknown future.
She rolled over on the floor. She slapped her head with the heel of her palm, once, in misery. How foolish to give up such an exquisite part of her life! If she took a chance, perhaps, she would bear a child by the very person she’d loved since she was four. She’d survived so far without things. She’d survive even if he left…
Sinead pushed herself up to a sitting position. She cocked her head as if she were listening to something. She vowed to pit herself against everything or anything that frightened her. Ideas churned through her.
Slowly, she wiped her face with her sleeve, rose to her feet and looked around her. She could stay here, in this house, on this farm. She’d learn to love horses again. Her da would help her. He’d never turn her away.
With light-hearted steps, she tore through the living to the front door and flung it open. She gulped the air. It felt cool, its smooth velvet darkness soothing, opening her up. Her breathing became less erratic.
She marched toward the stairs with sure steps. At the top, she halted long enough to gather her nerves together a bit more closely. With great purpose, she descended the steps lit by a deceptive glow of the moon.
She went directly to the barn and called softly, “Connor, Connor? Are you there, Con?” All she heard was the sounds of the horses, munching on hay or stirring in their stalls.
Her brows knitted. She shook her head to reaffirm her decision. Connor and Egan went to sleep in the large tent, she remembered. She tramped through the damp, spongy grass of the field. At the tent, she called softly, “Connor? Egan?”
Slightly annoyed that neither answered her, but glowing with the joy of life rushing through her, she lifted the flap. “Can’t either of you answer me?” Her voice echoed in her ear like a song, faltering in her throat.
She stepped over the threshold with plans to roust them both and froze in mid-step. The tent w
as empty of humans. In fact, it was empty of everything, all Connor’s personal goods, except the two cots. Sinead sank to her knees and pounded on the raised wooden floor, a heart-wrenching wail echoing in her mind.
He was gone!
~*~
Despite the brightly shining moonlight, the road to Albany was rutted and treacherous, the distances melting into one another. Both Connor and Egan kept their horses going forward, taking turns at the lead. Connor’s was determined to reach Albany before dawn. If he was to keep to his intended schedule, he needed to get before a circuit judge no later than ten, and he set a killing pace.
“Connor, ease up a bit. Ye’re pushing too hard. The horses are plain winded.”
Forced to swallow his temper, Connor thought to spur his brother on. “Understand, please. You’ve brought the ammunition I need to get the deed done. ‘Tis important for everything to go forward as quickly as possible.” He grumbled, “The lass served a penance long enough. Why let her suffer one second more at the hands of the Dewitts?”
Connor worked hard for all he’d gained in life. Even living through the famine was small compared to what Sinead endured with Cavanaugh and the Dewitts, yet he wished he could quench this constant need to please her.
“Connor, I don’t want to be telling ye again. The horses need a bite of rest and a swallow of some cool water. That’s what we have to be doing. Right this minute, or ye’ll not be having these horses on the road home.”
Reluctantly, Connor willed himself not to crush his horse’s spirit and slowed the big bay Harry was training, to a walk. “We’ll let them cool down a bit.” Let’s see if we can find a stream of sorts.”
“Aye.” Egan rode up alongside Connor and slowed his horse to a walk. “I’ve never known ye to be so all-fired anxious to do a good deed, Or to work a horse beyond its capacity. What’s really wrong, Con?”
1863 Saratoga Summer Page 35