The Exile Breed

by Charles Egan

  Danny looked up as they entered.

  ‘Father…Mother…’

  He ran across and embraced them both. Irene seemed surprised, but said nothing.

  Aileen was weeping. ‘My son, my son,’ she whispered in Irish.

  Danny stepped back.

  ‘So ye made it.’

  ‘We did,’ said Murty. ‘Murteen here took good care of us.’

  ‘He kept ye in the best hotels, I’m hoping.’

  ‘Of course,’ Murty answered, a touch of sarcasm in his voice. ‘Better than we’re used to at home.’

  ‘I’d hope so.’

  Danny waved them all to sit, and ordered the maid to make tea. But first he poured glasses of whiskey, while they waited for the tea. Murty sipped it.

  ‘What of your news then? You’re to be married, the pair of you?’

  ‘For sure,’ Danny answered. ‘It’s a question of timing though.’

  ‘Murtybeg said three weeks.’

  ‘Not a chance. We’ve far too much work. We want a proper wedding, and that’ll take time to organise. So we’re putting it off, a few months at least.’

  ‘Yes,’ Murty said. ‘That would be wise.’

  ‘But enough of that,’ Danny said. ‘What of Mayo?’

  ‘Worse than ever,’ Murty said. ‘The potato is back, but there’s not enough of it.’

  ‘You’re lucky to be out of it so. But what of the others? Michael? Eleanor? Pat?’

  ‘Pat is clerking in the Poor Law Union,’ Murty replied. ‘Good job, from all we hear. But there’s a lot of stories about the Workhouses. Half of them are bankrupt.’

  ‘So what if Pat loses his job?’ Danny asked.

  ‘I wouldn’t worry. They’ll still have enough money once Luke gets to America.’

  ‘Why America?’ Irene asked quietly.

  ‘He’d have no chances in Ireland,’ Murty said. ‘That’s why.’

  ‘He could have come over to us.’

  ‘Yes,’ Danny said. ‘He’s a sharp fellow, my cousin. He could have done well here.’

  ‘As a ganger?’ Murty asked. ‘I don’t know that he’d care for that.’

  ‘Didn’t he do it on the Relief Works?’ Danny said. ‘He has the experience.’

  ‘I don’t think he liked that experience, neither,’ Murty said. ‘He’d like it less here. Isn’t that it?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Danny said. ‘Luke’s more than a ganger. I’d have taken him as a partner. He knew that, but he wouldn’t have it.’

  Irene was watching Aileen closely. She had noticed her quietness. Aileen had only spoken four words since they arrived, and those in Irish.

  ‘So how did you find the journey?’ Irene asked her directly.

  ‘Fine,’ Aileen replied in English. Silence again.

  The maid had brought the tea. Murty waited as she poured it.

  ‘Luke would do well, whether in America, or over here. Murteen was telling us about the railways hereabouts. Seems to be a damned good business.’

  ‘Powerful,’ Danny said.

  ‘He says you’re employing four hundred men.’

  ‘Near enough. And more to come very soon. Four hundred more perhaps. It’ll double our size.’

  Murtybeg looked at Danny in astonishment. ‘Four hundred more? You never told me that.’

  ‘Yes,’ Danny said. ‘Things have changed a lot since you left. We’re working for Brassey now, you know. Dealing directly with head office.’

  ‘Brassey!’

  ‘No less. The biggest railway builder in England.’

  ‘Damn it, I know who Brassey is,’ Murtybeg said. ‘But what? Where?’

  ‘A new cutting, down on the North Staffordshire line. It’ll be the biggest we’ve ever done.’

  ‘How much?’

  ‘I’ll tell you later. But you know the best thing of all? He came to us. We didn’t have to ask. Brassey knows how good we are.’

  ‘Well, that’s great. But where will we get four hundred men?’

  ‘That’s the question, Murteen. And I’m hoping you’ll have the answer.’

  That evening, as the light died, Murtybeg helped the maid to bring the luggage up to the refurnished loft, where Murty and Aileen would be staying. She had already lit a coal fire.

  Aileen followed, with Murty behind, carrying a candle in a holder.

  ‘There you are,’ Murtybeg said. ‘Nice and warm. You’ll live well here.’

  ‘Indeed we will,’ Murty agreed. He stood close by the fire, looking at the distant glow of the lights of Manchester in the night sky. ‘But tell me, I thought you said they were getting married soon.’

  ‘That’s what I understood,’ Murtybeg answered. ‘It seems they’re going to wait a while though.’

  ‘I wonder why that is? Do you think he’s nervous of her?’

  ‘I doubt it. They’re two of a kind, that’s for sure. No, I think it’s the reason they gave. They’ve too much work. And if you want to worry about anything, I’d worry about that. It might be they’re trying to do too much. Taking on a contract with Brassey, that’s really something. I’d never have expected that.’

  When Murtybeg returned to the dining room, Danny and Irene were having a heated argument.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Murtybeg said, making for the door.

  ‘No,’ Danny said, pointing to a chair. ‘Let’s hear what you’ve got to say. It’s about mother.’

  Murtybeg dropped his eyes.

  ‘Come on,’ Irene said, ‘you can tell us. What’s wrong with her?’

  ‘Hard to make out,’ Murtybeg said. ‘I was surprised too when I first met her back in Carrigard. She’d never been that bad in years gone by.’

  ‘So what caused it?’ Irene asked.

  ‘A lot of things,’ Murtybeg replied. ‘She was upset when Danny left.’

  ‘Me?’ Danny protested.

  ‘Yes, you. She’d understood you were only going to England for the summer. Kept your bed warm ever since, waiting for you to return.’

  ‘But that’s years ago,’ Danny said.

  ‘I know. But it seems me leaving made it even worse. Then Nessa dying. But when father lost the school, she reckoned he was going to leave for England too, leave her all alone. She was frightened of that, I can tell you.’

  ‘But there was no question of that,’ Danny said. ‘He’d never have left her.’

  ‘I know. But then, even the thought of going to England upset her too. You’ve no idea.’

  ‘So what are we going to do about it?’ Irene asked. ‘We can’t keep her here.’

  Murtybeg looked up in alarm. ‘Where would you send her?’

  ‘God only knows,’ said Danny. He thought it better not to mention their earlier conversation about Weir Mill. He could never see his mother as a millhand.

  ‘But what…?’ Murtybeg asked.

  ‘Let’s hire a nurse. Stay with her while father is working.’

  ‘The maid will do, as long as she’s here,’ Irene said.

  Danny held up his hand. ‘Well, one thing’s certain. We’re not going to agree on this tonight. We’ve other problems.’ He glanced at Murtybeg, who nodded.

  ‘Yes. I know what you’re going to say. Workers. Isn’t that it?’

  ‘That, Murteen, is precisely it.’

  ‘And you’re seriously expecting me to find four hundred more?’

  ‘I am, and damned fast.’

  ‘So what now?’

  ‘Liverpool,’ Irene replied.

  Murtybeg did not respond.

  ‘I’m afraid so, Murteen,’ Danny said. ‘It’s our only way.’

  ‘After me only getting back from Mayo,’ Murtybeg said.

  ‘I know. I know.’

  Next morning, Murtybeg left Stockport before anyone was awake, and travelled to Liverpool.

  *

  As Danny had expected, his father had little difficulty in adjusting to work in the office. Danny had suggested a starting salary of six shillings a day. He gave him a sep
arate office with his own clerk. Murtybeg occupied the same office on the rare occasions he was in Stockport.

  For the first few days Murty worked on simple accounts, adding and multiplying long columns of figures. It was he who had trained Danny, Murtybeg, Luke and Pat together with a hundred other pupils every year, pushing them harder and harder until their arithmetic was faster, and more accurate, than almost anyone. Irene had noticed this in Danny and Murtybeg, but she had been surprised to notice it even in Danny’s gangers. Their fluency in the English language had surprised her. There were certainly no similar skills in the navvies they recruited from the west coast of Mayo.

  Danny was very cautious in the way he approached his father. He knew Murty found it difficult to be working under his son, and Irene had been doubtful when Danny told her of Murty’s skills, but within a few hours, she was convinced. She realised then that she had to be more careful in her approach to Murty, and never discussed Aileen in his presence. She understood too that she would have to watch the way she handled the accounts, since Murty might question her on what she was doing.

  One evening, Aileen left the table early, and went to bed. The maid followed her.

  ‘She’s different to what she used to be,’ Danny commented.

  ‘She is,’ Murty replied, quietly.

  ‘The hunger must have upset her.’

  ‘Yes. The hunger was one cause. Not in our family though, and all thanks to you for that. Without your money, we’d have starved.’

  ‘Of course, father. But what else would I have done? We’re all family.’

  ‘We are,’ Murty said, ‘but it wasn’t that there was hunger in our house. It was what she could see on the road. Starving people, bodies in the ditches. There were frightful sights just outside our front door. But that – even that – would not have been enough to shake her so much.’

  ‘What so?’

  ‘Many things, but Nessa’s death was the worst. She was bad before, but Nessa – that was the real shock that broke your mother’s heart.’

  ‘I know,’ Danny said, ‘it was a shock to all of us.’

  ‘Enough of a shock for ye to beat the hell out of Jimmy Corrigan.’

  ‘Who told you that?’ Danny asked. ‘Murtybeg?’

  ‘I never said a word,’ Murtybeg said.

  ‘His brother, that’s who told us,’ Murty said. ‘Owen. Said the two of you beat Jimmy so bad he’ll never work again.’

  ‘Well, he was the one who’d killed Nessa,’ Danny said, in defence.

  ‘It’s up to the law to decide that.’

  ‘They’d never do anything about it. If Corrigan hadn’t made the baby with Nessa, she’d still be alive today. Isn’t that it?’

  ‘Be that as it may, making a baby with Nessa was hardly a crime. And surely not murder.’

  ‘That’s your opinion,’ Danny said. He could see that Irene was surprised. ‘And anyhow Corrigan would never have left Mayo if he didn’t know he was guilty.’

  ‘He’d have stayed at home, if he’d known what you and Murteen were planning for him over here.’

  ‘It wasn’t just me,’ Murtybeg said, lamely.

  ‘No,’ Murty said. ‘It was the pair of ye. And, one way or another, we’ll have to make some settlement with him.’

  ‘A settlement. You’re seriously expecting us to settle with Jimmy Corrigan.’

  ‘I am.’

  ‘But we don’t even know where he is.’

  ‘You were well able to find him when ye wanted to beat the living daylights out of him.’

  ‘Yes,’ Danny said, ‘but that was different.’

  ‘It’s not different, Danny. You find him. Just go and do it.’

  Danny noted that Irene had said nothing. He wondered what she was thinking.

  As they undressed for bed, she turned to Danny.

  ‘You never told me that business about that fellow you beat up. Who was he? What on earth did you do to him?’

  ‘He was the one who got my sister Nessa with child, and the baby killed her.’

  ‘Many women die in childbirth.’

  ‘Who cares about many women? It was Nessa. My own sister. And Corrigan made the baby.’

  ‘So what did you do to him?’

  ‘Myself and Murteen, we’d heard he was in Liverpool. So we found him and beat him. Just like you heard.’

  ‘But your father says he’ll never work again.’

  ‘We broke his knees and his fingers. That was all.’

  ‘That was all,’ she echoed. ‘You know, I thought I was tough enough, but I don’t think I’d be up to that kind of thing.’

  ‘Well, I’m not sorry,’ Danny said, ‘and you know as well as I do that we have to be tough in the contracting business. Very tough.’

  He blew out the candle and slipped in beside her.

  The matter was never mentioned between them again. But Danny could not get Jimmy Corrigan out of his head. The thought of Corrigan never working again had given him an idea. He and Murtybeg had traced him once before. It might be even easier now. If Corrigan couldn’t work, he could well be in Liverpool Workhouse, not as a worker but as an invalid. The more he thought about it, the better he felt that the chances were that this would be where Corrigan had ended up.

  The real question was what to do if he found him? Should he, as Murty had suggested, make some sort of restitution to him, or to the family. The very thought of it was galling.

  What else? He found it hard to think, when the question of Corrigan’s whereabouts was only a guess. The best answer was to find out if Corrigan was in the Workhouse or not.

  Danny suggested to Murty that he might like to visit a cutting. He himself wanted to visit McManus’ cutting.

  When they arrived, Murty took in everything very quickly.

  ‘Good God, Danny, those horses are better fed than the men.’

  ‘Bigger loads to pull, that’s why. And hay is cheap.’

  ‘But the men – they’re desperately thin.’

  ‘No thinner than they’d be back beyond Belmullet or Louisburgh,’ Danny said. ‘Up from Tourmakeady too, they’re starving in the mountains up there.’

  ‘Don’t you care?’

  ‘Of course I care. That’s why we feed them so well when they get here. We build them up as quick as we can. We have to.’

  McManus came over.

  ‘The Master,’ he exclaimed. ‘I’d heard you were coming. I never thought I’d see the day.’

  ‘Neither did I,’ said Murty, ‘but the day came.’

  He looked around him, preferring not to mention the health of the navvies again.

  ‘This is a massive undertaking,’ he said.

  ‘Indeed it is, Master,’ McManus said. ‘Bigger than the Relief Works were back at home, I’d wager.’

  ‘It is,’ Murty answered.

  They went to the shed, which served as McManus’ office.

  ‘Still behind schedule?’ Danny asked.

  ‘We are,’ McManus answered. ‘We’ve a desperate need for more workers. But you know that.’

  ‘We do, and right well,’ Danny said. ‘I’ve sent Murtybeg back to Liverpool the very morning after he arrived. Scouring the docks and the Workhouses, he is. We should have men for you very soon, Jamesy.’

  The three men walked out again, going back along the lines of navvies.

  ‘There’s one other thing I must mention to you,’ Danny said. ‘We’re taking on a new contract. Johnny will be taking it over as a matter of urgency.’

  ‘Is it close by?’ McManus asked.

  ‘Fifty or sixty miles. It’s on the North Staffordshire Line.’

  ‘Must be a big one if you’re asking Johnny to take it over so.’

  ‘You could say that. A Brassey contract,’ Danny said.

  ‘Brassey!’

  ‘And we’ll be needing three or four hundred men for it.’

  McManus stopped. ‘My God, Danny, we’re short of men already. Do you think we can do all this?’

&
nbsp; ‘It’s not a matter of ‘can we’,’ Danny said. ‘We must.’

  Murty and Danny discussed it all in the train back to Manchester.

  ‘Jamesy got quite a surprise there,’ Murty commented.

  ‘Didn’t he just?’

  ‘Did you see the alarm on his face when you mentioned four hundred workers?’

  Danny laughed.

  ‘Hardly surprising. He’s short of workers already, and the thought of another contract competing for that number would put him in a right panic.’

  Murty glanced out the window as a train passed in the other direction.

  ‘Wouldn’t it be easier if you raised the wages,’ Murty asked.

  ‘And lose our profits. There’s no way I’d do that.’

  They sat in silence for some time. It was clear to Danny that the question of wages was disturbing to Murty, but he did not want to discuss it further. He decided to change the subject.

  ‘Tell me,’ he asked, ‘do you remember Tim Kearney?’

  ‘Sure didn’t I teach him?’ Murty replied.

  ‘Of course you did. Well, we’re sending Johnny Roughneen down to take over the Brassey contract, and I’m thinking of asking Tim to come and work with us, and take over from Johnny.’

  ‘But where is he?’ Murty asked.

  ‘We reckon he’s over in Leeds with the gang.’

  ‘Farrelly’s crowd?’

  ‘As it was before Farrelly left.’

  ‘Is Tim still there though?’ Murty asked. ‘Will he come if you ask him? He’s not gone to America too.’

  ‘He’ll surely come if we find him. Six shillings a day will decide that very quick. And if he isn’t there, there’s still Joe Gilligan. Good men. Hard workers, and well educated, as you know well.’

  ‘Indeed,’ Murty said.

  When Murtybeg arrived back from Liverpool, Danny was dismayed to see that he had less than twenty men with him.

  ‘It’s getting harder,’ he told Danny.

  Danny took him aside. ‘Listen, Murteen, there’s one thing I’d like you to do straight away. Put these lot back on the train, and bring them down to McManus. He has a desperate call for them.’

  Murtybeg shook his head. ‘We can’t go on like this.’

  ‘I know,’ Danny said, ‘but we’ll work it out. Don’t worry.’