She staggered to her feet, so dizzy that she almost went back down. When she finally felt steady enough to walk, she slipped out Batterston’s door, making her way to Ruth and Henry’s cabin, trying to keep to the shadows so no one would see her.
She knocked softly and Henry opened the door.
“Good lord, girl,” he gasped, pulling her inside.
Hannah was sitting in a rocking chair, holding a sleeping Deirdre. Her hand flew to her mouth at the sight of Caitríona’s bloody, bruised face.
“Sit down,” Ruth whispered, taking Caitríona’s arm and leading her to the table. “What happened?” She poured water from a pitcher into a shallow bowl.
“He… he went crazy,” Caitríona said hoarsely. “He was all packed. He was going to run off with the gold. He didn’t care if Lord Playfair knew.” She rubbed her throat which clearly showed bruises. “He was choking me. I had to stop him. I… I hit him. I hit him with a crock.” She looked at all of them. “He’s dead.”
Ruth paused in the midst of wringing out a cloth she had soaked in water. “He’s dead?”
Caitríona nodded. Ruth began sponging the blood from her face as Hannah put Deirdre on one of the beds.
“I don’t know what to do,” Caitríona said numbly. “Should we report this to the law?”
Ruth and Henry looked at each other, and Caitríona could see the fear in their eyes. “Of course, I can’t involve you with the law,” she realized.
“I don’t know you’d be much better off yourself,” Henry said.
“What about Burley? Should I tell him?” she wondered.
Henry squatted down in front of her. “Miss Caitríona,” he said as if talking to a child, “you’re the only one heard what he was plannin’. You got no proof, and now he’s dead.”
“But look at her face!” Hannah said indignantly.
“Since when has the law cared if a white man beats a nigger or a woman?” Henry asked. He paced as Ruth finished washing the blood from Caitríona’s face and began applying one of her salves to the gashes and bruises.
Henry turned to her. “Where is he?”
“He’s where I left him, in front of the fireplace,” Caitríona said.
“That trader might come lookin’ for him when he doesn’t show up,” Henry said. “We best get him buried and fast.”
Hannah retrieved a sheet from the laundry pile and the four of them went to Batterston’s house. They rolled him up into the sheet, and Henry hoisted him over his shoulder as Hannah hastily scrubbed the blood from the floor. Caitríona grabbed the stuffed valise and, together, they made their way to a deep patch of woods on the plantation property, digging far into the night.
§§§
“Connemara!”
Conn came to as her face hit the water. Abraham lunged toward her, but Jed got there first. Grabbing her by the back of her shirt, he hauled her up coughing and sputtering, water streaming from her hair down her face.
“What in tarnation were you doin’?” Jed yelled.
“I… I lost my balance,” she lied, avoiding Abraham’s eyes.
“Are you all right?” Abraham asked.
“‘Tis nothing,” Conn said, trying to laugh it off. “Just a wee bit clumsy.”
“Hey!” Will hollered indignantly. “Doesn’t anyone care I caught a fish?”
***
“She killed him.”
Almost beside herself at this latest glimpse into Caitríona’s life, Conn forced herself to continue fishing for awhile, though Abraham quickly realized she was not focused on the fishing when he looked over to see that her rod was almost bent double as she stood, oblivious to the fish on the other end.
“Let’s call it a day,” he said gently, reeling her fish in and releasing it.
He kept glancing at her worriedly as they packed up and got back in the truck.
“I’m all wet,” she protested.
“It’s all right,” he assured her. “You won’t hurt anything in this old truck.”
She stared absently out the window as he drove, not speaking until she suddenly called, “Stop!”
Abraham braked and Conn flung the truck door open. “I’ve got to go to Miss Molly’s,” she said.
“Connemara,” Abraham started to protest, but Conn looked him dead in the eye as she shut the truck door.
“I’ve got to go to Miss Molly’s,” she repeated. “If my mother wants me, that’s where I’ll be. I’ll be home for dinner.”
With one last look, she hopped down off the running board and took off through the woods.
“Women,” Jed said, shaking his head.
Running all the way to Molly’s house, Conn breathlessly banged her fist on the door. When she heard no bark, and no one answered, she ran around the house. There, she saw that the door to the shed connected to the tunnel was standing ajar, with most of the contents of the shed sitting in the grass. Sprinting across the yard, she saw Molly and Vincent inside. Molly was sorting through the tools hanging on the walls.
Vincent gave a welcoming bark as she skidded to a stop, clutching the stitch in her side.
Molly turned to her in surprise. “Connemara? What’s wrong?”
It was a couple of minutes before Conn could answer. “Had… had another vision…” she gasped. “She killed someone.”
“Caitríona?”
Conn nodded.
“Come to the house,” Molly said, looking around to make sure no one else had overheard.
Quickly, they walked to the hemlock grove and into the little house where Molly poured Conn a glass of ice cold water.
“Drink,” she said, “and then tell me what you saw.”
Conn gulped the water, nearly choking on it in her eagerness to tell someone what she’d seen.
“Batterston – he was the overseer of the plantation Caitríona and Orla were sent to – he was going to sell some more slaves…”
“Caitríona and her sister?”
“No,” said Conn impatiently. She realized she needed to back up. “Orla was already dead in this vision, because Deirdre was about two. This was during the Civil War and Lord Playfair and his son were back in England, so Batterston knew they couldn’t do anything to him. He had already gotten in trouble for selling slaves and keeping the money.” She took another drink and continued, “Anyway, a slave trader came by, and Batterston agreed to sell him some slaves, but Caitríona heard them talking and she tried to stop him. First, she told him she’d written to Lord Playfair, but he said he’d be long gone before they could do anything. Then she said she’d sent the slaves away and he… he went crazy and started hitting her and choking her and… she grabbed this jar thing, like one of those,” she said, pointing to a heavy crock Molly had sitting on her kitchen counter, “and hit him in the head with it and killed him.”
Conn got up and began pacing agitatedly around the table. “She didn’t mean to, but she did.”
Molly was staring at her. “I didn’t realize your dreams were this detailed,” she said.
“It’s like I’m in her head, like I see everything she saw, feel what she felt,” Conn said. “She told me, she said, ‘‘tis a terrible shame I’ve brought on our family.’ This must be what she meant.”
“Maybe,” Molly agreed, somewhat doubtfully. “But it sounds like this was self-defense, and you said she didn’t mean to do it.” She thought for a moment. “Who else knew about this?”
Conn stopped pacing. “Only Henry, Ruth and Hannah. They decided not to tell anyone else.”
“Who were Henry –”
“The black people, the other slaves that she was friends with,” Conn said impatiently. “More than friends,” she added.
Molly’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean, ‘more than friends’?” she asked carefully.
“Caitríona loved Hannah,” Conn explained, pacing around the table again. “They loved each other.”
“She showed you this?”
Conn stopped again and stared at Molly. “You t
hink I’m too young to understand about two girls loving each other?” she asked, almost challengingly.
“No,” Molly said slowly, looking at Conn with new eyes. “But I’m beginning to understand why she’s been waiting for you.”
Conn wasn’t listening.
“She told Henry, Ruth and Hannah,” Conn repeated. “And they buried him in secret. That’s when I fell in the river and woke up.”
“What do you mean you fell in the river? I wondered why you were wet,” Molly said. “I thought you usually had these dreams when you were asleep.”
“I used to,” Conn said, rubbing her eyes. “But, lately, more of them have been happening when I’m not really asleep, but I can’t really remember anything, either…”
She sat down heavily, suddenly looking exhausted. Vincent laid his head on her lap and she rubbed his soft fur absently.
“Have you told anyone else about your dreams, or about Caitríona?” Molly asked.
Conn shook her head. “No. But I think Mr. Greene suspects something. He keeps asking me if I’m in any kind of trouble.”
She looked up at Molly. “What were you doing in the shed?”
It was Molly’s turn to look bewildered as she shook her head. “I’m not sure. I just woke up this morning with this feeling that I should clean out the shed so the entrance to the tunnel is clear. I couldn’t shake it, so I figured I’d better listen.”
Conn’s shoulders slumped. “How am I supposed to figure all this out? How am I supposed to make it right?” she asked imploringly.
Molly looked at her sympathetically. “I don’t know, child. But I believe you will find a way.”
CHAPTER 26
Conn lay in the dark in her bedroom, staring at the patches of moonlight streaming in through the windows. Unable to concentrate on anything she tried to read that evening, she’d finally told her mother she was tired and had come up to bed early. Hours after her last vision, her heart was still beating rapidly with the fear and dismay Caitríona had felt during Batterston’s attack and its aftermath. She felt racked by a terrible guilt at the thought that she had killed him – “that wasn’t me”, she had to keep reminding herself. Caitríona’s emotions were becoming so enmeshed with her own, that she couldn’t easily separate them any longer.
She could hear the muffled sounds of her mother saying good night to Will, and then there was a soft knock on her bedroom door as Elizabeth opened it and came in.
“Are you awake?” she whispered.
“Yes,” Conn said, rolling to face her.
“Are you feeling all right?” Elizabeth asked, sitting down on the side of the bed.
Conn didn’t answer immediately.
“What happened at the river today?”
“I lost my balance and fell in,” Conn said evasively.
“That’s not what Mr. Greene said,” Elizabeth said.
“What do you mean?”
Elizabeth shifted on the bed, leaning sideways and bracing her arm on Conn’s other side. “He said before you fell in, you had a strange look on your face. Your eyes were kind of unfocused, and when he called to you, you didn’t answer. He said you didn’t stumble or anything, you just… fell.” She reached with her free hand and smoothed Conn’s forehead. “I’ve noticed similar things lately. There are times when you seem like you’re in some kind of trance or something.”
Conn looked up at her mother’s face, half-shadowed in the dim light.
“What’s going on, Connemara?”
Her mother almost never called her by her full name. Conn suddenly sat up, hugging her mother tightly, wanting to leave all this business of the prophecy behind, wanting to just be eleven. Elizabeth held her, waiting.
“Caitríona comes to me,” Conn whispered at last. “Sometimes, she really comes, but mostly, I have dreams about her, showing me things.”
Conn waited for her mother’s reaction. Elizabeth didn’t say anything, but Conn could hear her mother’s heartbeat quicken against her ear. She pulled away and looked up into her mother’s eyes.
“You’ve seen her, too, haven’t you?” she asked.
Elizabeth nodded. “A few times, when I was your age. But not since we came back here.”
“So, you believe me,” Conn asked hesitantly. “You don’t think I’m making this up?”
“I believe you,” Elizabeth said. “But what does she want?”
Conn bit her lip, trying to decide how much to tell. “There really is a curse on our family. It was told to Caitríona by an old woman who knew things, could foresee things, before she left Ireland. Her name was Brónach.”
Elizabeth looked hard at Conn for several seconds. “What does this curse say?”
Conn closed her eyes and intoned,
“Ill-fated shall your progeny be;
From each generation after thee
Only one girl child shall survive
To carry on and keep alive
The hope to right a grievous wrong,
Until the one comes along
Who may set the past to rights.
None may help her in her quest, or
Ease the burden laid by her ancestor
On shoulders much too young to bear such sorrow.
Not since barren fields stole all hope for tomorrow
Has such a one been needed,
When father sold daughter for land he was deeded,
And plunged his soul into endless night.
Hatred is poison, like blood on the fields,
Father to daughter, a blackened soul yields
Naught but mem’ries of what once was good.
A child, ne’er soiled by hate or greed could
Bring forgiveness and healing to those long gone.
With the dead laid to rest, the living move on,
Freed at last by a soul blessed with light.”
When Conn finished, there was a long, strained silence. She opened her eyes and looked up at her mother, waiting.
“Will almost died,” Elizabeth whispered.
Conn nodded solemnly. “No boy has lived. Only one girl from each generation.”
Elizabeth pressed a hand to her cheek. “But what happened? What was the ‘grievous wrong’?”
“I don’t know yet,” Conn said. “The dreams have been taking me through her life, like a story, but I don’t know how it ends.”
They sat, each lost in her own thoughts for long minutes.
“That’s how you knew Deirdre was Orla’s daughter?” Elizabeth asked. “And the stories you were telling Will about how they almost died on the boat here?”
Conn nodded. Elizabeth lapsed into silence again.
“Miss Molly sees her, too, sometimes. It was Caitríona who told her we were in danger the night of the fire,” Conn said, hoping this would mollify her mother, helping her to see this as maybe a good thing, too.
Elizabeth opened her mouth a couple of times before saying, “Can you call her?”
Conn’s eyes opened a little wider. “Do you want me to?”
Elizabeth nodded slowly, not truly sure she wanted to see what would appear.
Conn closed her eyes again, concentrating hard and said, “Caitríona Ní Faolain.”
For several seconds, nothing happened, but then there was a sudden chill that raised goosebumps on their arms. Nothing more happened for a while and Conn began to think nothing would, but slowly a mist gathered in the center of the room and Caitríona’s form took shape.
Elizabeth gasped, as if she still hadn’t truly believed it was real. “I remember you,” she breathed.
“Yes.”
“You came to me when I was a girl.”
“Yes,” Caitríona said again. “But you weren’t the one I was waiting for.” Her eyes shifted to Conn. “Connemara is the one.”
“But why?” Elizabeth demanded. “She’s only a girl.”
“She’s a girl and a woman both,” Caitríona said, her brogue undiminished by time. “She is innocent, but wise beyond her y
ears. She can feel and understand things, things others would never understand.”
“You killed Batterston,” Conn said.
“Yes,” Caitríona answered at the same time Elizabeth exclaimed, “What?”
“He was trying to kill you,” Conn said.
Caitríona nodded.
“Was that the thing you need forgiveness for?”
Caitríona’s eyes filled with ghostly tears and ran like quicksilver down her cheeks as she shook her head. “It was my hatred…” she whispered.
“But… but you loved,” Conn said, hesitating to say more in front of her mother. “I know you did.”
“But my hatred was greater,” Caitríona said. “What I did… was unforgiveable.”
With a heartrending cry, she vanished, leaving behind her the bone-penetrating cold of her misery.
Elizabeth clasped her hands to her chest. She and Conn both jumped as the bedroom door was flung open.
“I heard noises,” Will said, rubbing his eyes as he stood there in his pajamas. “Why is it so cold in here?”
CHAPTER 27
“Where in the world do you suppose he went?” Ellie asked for probably the hundredth time.
It had been four days since Batterston had simply disappeared. The mystery and speculation over why he had gone had helped to minimize the curiosity over Caitríona’s bruises from tripping down the servants’ staircase.
Only Burley seemed dissatisfied with that explanation. “Funny how the banister managed to wrap itself round your neck,” he said quietly so that no one else would hear.
Caitríona’s face reddened, but she said nothing.
A few days later, Burley had to go to High Acre, the closest neighboring plantation, to see if they could trade some sugar for fresh corn and beans.
“I need to talk to you, private,” he whispered to Caitríona when he got back.
She met him at the pump house.
“They’re talkin’ over there,” Burley said in a low voice, “Said a slave trader came by, lookin’ to buy some slaves. Said he had a deal to buy some of ours, but Batterston never showed up. The folks at High Acre are askin’ all kinds of questions. I told ‘em I didn’t know nothin’ ‘bout sellin’ any of our slaves. ‘S far as I know, Batterston headed to the river, tryin’ to find a buyer for our tobacco this fall. That’s what I’m tellin’ Ellie and the others.”
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