Chasing River

by K. A. Tucker

  “Well . . . embellished or not, that was so great. I never would have found this place on my own.” Her gaze darts to my mouth, and she bites her own lip with hesitation. “Thank you.” She leans in and kisses me. It’s more proper than last night in the office, but something tells me that simple move took a lot of guts for Amber.

  Fergus’s booming voice is back. “I’m sure you’re all sick of me by now. Nosey Flynn’s own Shannon O’Callahan will be up next, but I’d like to beg that strappin’ young lad over there to share a story or two from his fine lineage.”

  Fergus’s meaty paw gestures toward me and Amber’s pretty mouth drops with her jaw. I can’t help but laugh, giving her hand a kiss before I release it to take the makeshift little corner stage.

  EIGHTEEN

  AMBER

  River is getting up there?

  Butterflies churn in my stomach for him, because I don’t know how anyone could ever stand in front of fifty-odd people and do improv of any kind. I’m sure these storytellers know their stories well before they get up there, practicing them out loud until they can say them in their sleep. But does River? No notes . . . no cues . . . and everyone is watching him.

  River saunters over to the corner, an easy smile giving away nothing. No nerves with this guy. With a deft flick of his wrist, he steals the tweed newsboy cap off Fergus’s head and settles it onto his own head, wisps of his golden-brown hair curling at the brim.

  He perches himself on the stool and leans into the microphone. “All I wanted to do was enjoy a pint and a meal with me friends.” A round of laughter erupts. I’ve noticed that sometimes when River speaks to others from Ireland, his accent thickens a little and his choice of words changes. I wonder if it’s intentional.

  “Well, that’s okay. I brought a lovely American bird here tonight to experience the lost art of storytelling. Amber?” He holds out a hand, gesturing at me. “Come on, stand up. Give us a bow.”

  I feel my cheeks burst as all eyes suddenly shift to me. Contrary to what many think, I don’t like being the center of attention, good or otherwise.

  I shoot a glare at River, but he only nods toward me, waiting.

  Oh, what the hell . . . With a deep breath, I slip off my chair and, tucking one ankle behind the other, I splay my skirt with my fingers and bend at the knee. A playful round of applause ensues.

  “Right, of course. A curtsy. My American princess wouldn’t bow.” He winks at me and then, to my relief, takes the attention off of me. “My brothers and I had the pleasure of listening to two great men, Seamus and Fionn Delaney, regale us with fantastical lore throughout our childhood. We have an entire arsenal of stories passed down that I could choose from. Funnily enough, though, the tale I want to tell you tonight is not one of theirs. It comes from Marion Delaney. At least two or three times a week, I’d refuse bedtime until she’d tell it to me. Now, I’ll apologize in advance because I’m not nearly as long-winded as that fat bastard over there,” he sticks his thumb out at Fergus, who only laughs, “and it’s not nearly as eloquent. But I was only seven when I learnt it, so you’ll have to pardon me.”

  Another round of chuckles.

  “I’m sure you’ve all heard of the Great Hunger, between the years of 1845 and 1852? A million men, women, and children lost their lives due to starvation and disease; another million left Ireland in hopes of a new life elsewhere. Terrible time for our country.”

  I can’t help but frown, wondering what this children’s bedtime story could be about.

  “Well, the story goes something like this . . .”

  I can feel the swing in the atmosphere instantly, that moment when River’s entire presence shifts from casual banter to purpose, his gaze capturing the eyes of the audience.

  “There was once a God-fearing man by the name of Seamus McNally,” he begins, his voice suddenly deeper, calmer, more confident. “His wife gave birth to nine children in total: five girls and four boys. Not unusual back then to have such a large family, especially for farmers. Only, the boys never lived beyond the first year of life. Seamus and his wife kept trying, because they needed the boys to help run the farm. And when his wife died during childbirth with their fourth boy, who also passed on, Seamus was left to care for five little girls on his own. You can imagine what a terrifying prospect that is for any fella.”

  Despite the solemn introduction to this story, River’s little quip has people snickering.

  “Now, Seamus was actually a descendant of Brian Boru, High King of Ireland, and had the English not stripped his ancestors of their property in the centuries that followed, imposing ridiculous laws to persecute Catholics, Seamus might have been an estate owner, able to support his family in comfort. But it was not to be. For a few years he prospered as a tenant farmer, renting a four-hectare patch of land on the very property his ancestors once owned near Waterford.

  “And then one day, almost overnight, a terrible potato blight swept through the country, turning the plant leaves black and potatoes rotten. All of Seamus’s crops were destroyed, and when it came time to pay rent, he couldn’t. The English landlord evicted him and his family and burned down his house, just like that.” River snaps his fingers.

  “Luckily, Seamus was a likeable, hardworking fella, and he secured a job as a laborer on another tenant farm quickly, helping harvest oats. In exchange for his services, he was given enough space to build a one-room mud hut for his family, their pig, and three chickens to share, and a tiny patch where he could grow potatoes for his family the following year, assuming the blight would be over.

  “The family barely survived the winter but they all did, selling off their livestock and the few meager possessions they had. Seamus relied on Marion McNally, his eldest girl, to take care of her sisters while he worked the land from daybreak until nightfall, arriving home hunched over and aching. She was fourteen, and while they had no shillings to their name, she learned to become quite resourceful, taking the girls out to collect wood to burn for warmth, and nettle and seaweed and berries, both to eat and to barter with, for more clothes and necessities. They’d even collect sheep manure from neighboring farms, as it was considered rich in nutrients and good for growing crops. All she kept telling herself was that they needed to survive until the fall harvest, and then all would be grand again.

  “But the following fall harvest saw virtually every last potato in all of Ireland again ravaged by this blight. Marion knew that her family could not survive another winter. Now, there was plenty of anger boiling in the Irish at this point, especially where the McNallys lived. Anyone who had been to the shorelines by Waterford could tell you that ships full of oats and grain were leaving the docks and heading for England. Entire families of Irish were starving—to death, in many cases—and yet the English landlords were forcing tenant farms to sell their crops in order to pay their rents. The land Seamus labored on was one such farm.

  “Spurred by the sight of her little sisters’ skeletal limbs, Marion decided she would face this English landlord of theirs, a wealthy man who visited his lands only once or twice a year and was rumored to have arrived a fortnight before. She knew Seamus would never approve, so she waited until he left for the day, and then, collecting a handful of berries to give her sustenance for the fifteen-kilometer walk west, she put the second eldest in charge and left their little hut. She had no idea what she would say as she marched through the fields, noting all the landmarks on her path toward this home—there was no road to guide her—but she figured she’d know by the time she arrived.

  “You can only imagine what was going on in little Marion’s mind as she crested a hill and caught her first glimpse of the landlord’s home. This was a girl who, like many Irish farm families, had only ever seen the tiny, drafty cottages that her kind lived in. To see this huge stone building now . . .”

  River sets his pint down on a side table, freeing his hands to animate his excitement. “Remember, I told you that Seamus’s ancestors came from royalty, and so they didn’t
merely live in an estate home. They lived in a bloody castle! If you’ve been to Kilkenny, then you’ve seen something like what Marion saw that day—a beautiful home towering high above the ground, with turrets on the ends and half a dozen chimneys to help bring its occupants warmth. And real glass windows! Of course, it wasn’t quite as grand as Kilkenny, but to Marion, it was worthy of a king. Which spurred her on even more, because that should have been her family’s house. So she marched toward that castle, the massive wooden door in her sights . . . until a man’s voice called out to her. ‘Who are you?’ She turned to see a young man atop a horse, trotting toward her. She guessed him to be maybe twenty, dressed in trousers and a woolen jacket, his waistcoat peeking out beneath. He was an ordinary-lookin’ fella, but he was English and no doubt a Protestant, and therefore she despised him on sight.

  “ ‘What’s it to ya?’ she asked boldly, hugging her ratty shift dress close to her body. His horse circled around her once . . . twice . . . before he hopped off. ‘This is my land and you’re trespassing,’ he said. This was her English landlord? She put on a brave face. ‘Me name is Marion McNally and me family’s starvin,’ she announced. ‘We’re all starvin’ and you’re here, prancin’ around with your fancy horse, wearin’ your fancy clothes, livin’ in your big castle. Don’t ya know that people on your land are dying? That ya could feed them with what you send back to England to make your selfish countrymen fat and blissful?’ ”

  I smile, listening to River mimic a much thicker, more pronounced Irish brogue to perfection.

  “The young man simply stared at her, for so long she was beginning to think he might order her executed for treason. ‘I’m sorry, miss . . . but we don’t have much choice. If we don’t collect rents and taxes from our farms, then we’ll be forced to evict them from our land, or lose our land, altogether.’

  “ ‘It’s not even your land. It’s me family’s land. You’re a bunch of thieving bastards!’ Marion exclaimed boldly, and then turned and ran as fast as her skinny legs could carry her, expecting to be run down at any moment. But she wasn’t. And almost a fortnight later, when the weather had turned cold, a knock sounded on the wooden plank they used for a door to keep out the draft. They opened it to find two sacks of milled oats sitting outside, hidden beneath a few thick woolen blankets. The sound of horse hooves could be heard in the distance, galloping away.

  “Seamus quickly hid the bags inside, because the situation for everyone had become desperate, and he was afraid they would be pillaged. There was just enough to keep his girls alive for the winter, he hoped. Now, it wasn’t bad enough that the blight had stolen virtually all food for the farmers, but that year saw the harshest winter Ireland had seen in years. Cottages were buried to their rooftops in snow as storm after storm pounded the country. By the spring, bodies lay everywhere.

  “But the McNally family survived yet again, hiding within their one-room home, keeping warm with the tiniest of fires and those woolen blankets and their body heat, rationing their oats for a daily helping of porridge, using melted snow to make it. Seamus knew he should eat more, let the kids go without so he could stay healthy and take care of them like many parents had to do in those long, dark days, but he couldn’t bear listening to their hungry cries.

  “And because of that, he fell ill. In the early spring, Seamus passed on, leaving Marion to care for her four sisters. The five of them, stronger than most laborers around because of the milled oats they lived off of through the winter, were able to keep their hut by working the fields as Seamus had, and planting more potatoes, in hopes that a third year of blight was impossible.”

  He pauses to nod a thanks to Rose as she drops off a fresh pint. The Irish really do love their Guinness. That’s his fourth now, and there isn’t even a hint—a slur, a lax face, a stray thought—that would suggest it’s affected him in any way.

  “When Marion heard rumors of the landlord arriving at the house again, she knew she had to visit him. To apologize. It was the right thing to do, especially after she had spoken to him in such a horrific way. She knew that it was that young man on a horse who dropped the milled oats and blankets at her door.

  “So on the following Sunday, she again marched through the fields, along the stone wall, over the hill, her body weaker from hunger, her dress even more tattered and filthy. The man was not out on his horse this time. She found him standing before a two-hectare-sized garden patch, the soil freshly tilled, his arms folded over his chest, his brow furrowed.

  “ ‘What are you going to plant?’ she asked by way of greeting. He looked at her for a long moment before saying, ‘I don’t know, Miss Marion. What do you think I should plant here?’ She was surprised to know that he remembered her name but she pretended not to be and said, ‘You’re in Ireland, so potatoes, of course,’ which made him burst out laughing. ‘Perhaps,’ he said, holding out his hand to show her the beans. ‘But just in case of that pesky blight, I was thinking these, too. And some corn and cabbage.’ She nodded her approval. Beans and corn were expensive to plant. He asked her how her family had fared over the winter, and she shared the news of her father. His father had died as well, over Christmas, he admitted. When Marion had met this man the fall before, he hadn’t been the landlord, after all. His father had in fact owned the land.

  “The young man’s name was Charles Beasley, and he was happy to see Marion alive and well. She had been a pretty young ginger-haired thing the year before, the day she marched onto his family’s property with fire in her eyes. She still was, though far too thin for his tastes. It had been a long winter for him, sitting in the comfort of his family’s estate home near Bath, wondering if the bags of milled oats he’d dropped at her door that day would be enough to keep her alive. It was long enough to concoct a plan. He had already inquired about the McNally family in secret on the day he arrived in Ireland and knew what had happened to her father. He figured it was only a matter of time before that fiery little Irish girl would show up again.

  “So when she did, he was ready. He told her that he planned on staying on his estate for the summer to ensure proper management of the land, and he needed servants to care for him, and workers for his crops. He asked if she and her sisters could move into the servants’ quarters of his house and fulfill those roles.

  “Even though he’d basically saved her and her sisters from certain death the winter before, Marion didn’t trust this Englishman, or his intentions. But she also had no choice. The tenant farmer whose land they lived on hadn’t paid his taxes and they’d all be evicted soon enough. The five McNally girls would be left to beg on the sides of the road. So she agreed.

  “Despite the horrendous poverty that all of Ireland faced, life for Marion and her sisters improved drastically that summer. They had fresh water to drink and bathe in from the stream nearby; dry, warm beds to sleep in; cotton and wool for new clothes. For the first time in their lives, they knew what it felt like not to be hungry. They stayed within the castle’s walls, as did Charles for the most part, not wanting to risk contracting the typhus or dysentery that was running rampant through Ireland during those years.

  “Marion assumed it was only a matter of time before Charles expected other things—manly things—from one of the five girls. She hoped it would be only her that he targeted, given she was the oldest. And she assumed it would be her, given the looks he stole her way on a daily basis.

  “But he never did. Charles Beasley stayed on in Ireland, not leaving for England in the winter, and not once in the five years that the McNally girls lived under that roof—their rightful roof, through their lineage—did Charles Beasley try anything untoward. He could have. Those girls would have given him what he asked for in exchange for their family’s lives. While the entire country around them struggled through starvation and revolts against England for abandoning them in their time of need, valuing the market before Irish lives, somehow Charles held onto his land, giving the girls a home where they could grow into strong, independent Irish
women.”

  River clears his voice, and when he begins again, it sounds huskier. “The same heart condition that ailed Charles’s father took hold of Charles the winter of 1851. It was on his deathbed that he finally confessed his love for Marion. By then almost twenty, she had grown into a beautiful bird, and could have had any suitor she desired, had she put herself before her sisters. She finally admitted that she had grown to love him as well, and wished that things could have been different. ‘But they can’t,’ Charles whispered through a weak smile.” River’s own smile mimics the emotion. “ ‘You’ll always be an Irish Catholic peasant girl and I’ll always be an English Protestant lord.’ Marion wasn’t a woman who cried often, but she wiped her tears from her cheeks then, to say, ‘If the likes of me was never going to be good enough for the likes of you, then why do all this?’ With the last bit of strength left in Charles’s body, he reached for her hand, grasped it tight. ‘Oh, my dear Marion. It was the likes of me who would never be good enough for the likes of you.’ ”

  A sharp ball forms in my throat as River suddenly grows silent. Nothing but a few sniffles and the odd clank of a dish from a kitchen behind the walls can be heard.

  “Marion and her sisters left after Charles passed on and made their way to other parts of the country, met their husbands, and married. But Marion never stopped thinking about Charles Beasley, a man she was supposed to despise because of what he was, but a man she loved because of who he was.”

  With a slow, heavy sigh, River catches my eye for a moment, offering me a secretive smile before he leans into the microphone again. “And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why I cried myself to sleep a lot when I was a little boy.”

  A round of chuckles, followed by loud applause, ricochets off the stone walls as River clasps hands with Fergus, and the old man steals back his hat to cover his bald head.