by Charles Egan
‘And what about you and the other women?’ Pat asked. ‘How did ye get here?’
‘No thanks to Mr. Daniel, that’s for sure. Whatever our husbands sent back was never enough for more than food, though some of us starved to get the money to leave. Some of us were cleared by the landlords who paid the money to go, though that was rare enough – the half of them are bankrupt. Some got money from other relatives working in England, though few of them would stay working with Mr. Daniel. And some were evicted, and we were in Liverpool in the Workhouse already.’
‘Why wouldn’t they all leave Edwardes & Ryan?’ Pat asked. ‘Surely, when they’ve their strength, they can get better wages on other cuttings.’
‘Yes,’ she said, ‘you’d think so. But you must remember two things. First, none of the men speak anything but Irish. Mr. Daniel makes sure there are no English speakers in the gangs. But also, he helps the men with sending money back to their families in Mayo. He gives them cash advances for that, then he holds back their wages. Then they are really trapped. They moment they leave Edwardes & Ryan, their families are cut off from any cash.
When Pat left the hut, there was still a group of men and women outside. Shouting erupted.
‘Well, what did she tell you?’
‘Did she bed you?
‘Did she feed you well?’
‘I’d lay a bet that you never ate any of that at Mr. Daniel’s dinner table?’
Pat pushed his way through, without saying a word. He scrambled up the embankment. A number of the men followed him onto the track, but he ignored them and kept walking. A stone flew past his head, close enough for him to hear it. He stopped, and turned back to face them. The men stopped too. For a few moments there was a stand-off, then Pat turned again and walked towards Stockport, no one following him now.
It was getting dark. As he passed the office, he noticed a single candle burning. Curious, he entered. Murtybeg was there on his own, writing in a ledger. He looked up.
‘Not had your dinner?’
‘I thought I’d have a look around first,’ Pat said. ‘See the cut of the place.’
‘Stockport?’
‘No. I took a walk out along the track.’
‘What did you do that for?’
‘To have a look at the tigíns they live in and have a chat with them while I was at it.’
Murtybeg slammed his pen on his desk.
‘Damn it, you shouldn’t have done that. Surely you know better.’
‘Sure how would a poor amadán from Mayo know any better?’ Pat said. ‘But yes, I’ve stayed in those kind of huts myself. Working the harvest – shacks, booleys, whatever. But I’ll tell you this, Murteen, they’re nothing like these. These are disgusting. The slop Danny calls food, and the stink of shit everywhere.’
‘The food is grand,’ Murtybeg replied. ‘The meat’s more than they ever had out Erris. It might not be steak, but it’s wholesome food, and it builds them up. Far better than starving in Mayo, I’ll tell you that.’
‘And what about the wages?’ Pat asked.
‘It’s a free world. They can leave whenever they like.’
‘And your own father and mother left ye? Isn’t that it? Went away, rather than work with their own sons.’
‘I can’t deny it,’ Murtybeg said. ‘But I don’t know why you’re so surprised, Pat. I told you about father already. Why do you think he wouldn’t work with Danny?’
The following morning was Sunday. Pat was awake early. He got up.
‘What the…’ Murtybeg said.
‘I’m going to Mass.’
He left the house quietly, and walked along the tracks into Stockport Station. When he reached the station, he took the train into Manchester. He was just in time for the Leeds train, having to run hard to catch it.
‘That was a dangerous thing to do,’ the conductor told him.
‘I’m sorry,’ Pat said. He bought a ticket to Leeds.
When he arrived at Leeds station, he asked direction for the Leeds & Thirsk Railway, and walked through Kirkgate, then along the tracks until he came to the Works. A number of times he asked for directions to Gilligan’s gang, and after some time he found them. Doyle spotted him first.
‘Pat! Pat Ryan.’
Gilligan strode over.
‘Well, by God, we don’t see a Ryan for ages, and now we get flocks of them.’
‘So maybe you should count yourself lucky.’
‘Are you coming to join us?’ Doyle asked.
‘I’m afraid not. I’m working for Danny.’
‘Danny,’ Ed Higgins exclaimed. ‘You’d have your work cut out for you, working for him. And he’ll need you too, now the Master has left.
For a few minutes, Pat stayed with them, chatting about the gang. Then Gilligan stood.
‘Time to go back to work, I’m afraid,’ he said.
‘Work on a Sunday?’
‘Why not. But I suppose you’re looking for your uncle?’
‘I am.’
‘He’s back at the lodging house, working I think.’
Pat followed Gilligan’s instructions and soon found the house. The landlady admitted him.
‘Last door on the left,’ she said.
Pat knocked. Murty opened the door to him, and gaped at Pat for a moment.
‘Pat!’ he said at length. ‘What the devil…’
‘Just dropping by to see you,’ Pat answered.
‘Are you looking for work, is it?’
‘I’m with Danny.’
‘But…oh, to hell with it, come in, come in.’
Pat ducked to enter. Murty took his coat, hung it, and ushered him into the room. It had whitewashed walls, mullioned windows and a rough dresser on one wall. On the lower shelf, there were glasses, clay pipes on a small wooden rack, and tins of tobacco.
For the furniture, three stools, a low table in front.
‘Sit down, sit down,’ Murty said to him. ‘You’ll have a drink.’
‘I will,’ Pat said.
A spirit was poured, and placed in front of Pat. He sipped at it.
‘Poitín! Where the hell do you get this?’
‘Oh, there’s a lad from West Cork, works near us. Gets it from his father, I believe. You have to be able to trust your source, you know. Turn you blind otherwise.’
‘Indeed it would,’ Pat said, ‘but not this stuff you say.’
He sipped again at the rough spirit. Even for double-distilled poitín, it was rough enough.
‘We only take it out for special visitors.’
‘Of course,’ Pat said.
All this time, he had been expecting Aileen to enter, but now he realised she was not in.
‘Where’s Aileen?’ he asked.
‘At Mass.’
‘At Mass?’
‘Indeed. Gone all religious. First Mass on a Sunday, and God knows how many more. Then all sorts of devotions or whatnot for the rest of the day. Reckons the Sabbath must be kept holy. I think it’s the fright of all that’s happened. Seeing the way Danny is, and then the shock of leaving him again. Still, religion seems to calm her, and who am I to say there’s anything wrong with that?’ He raised his glass. ‘She’d kill me if she saw us drinking this of a Sunday.’
Pat sniffed at it. ‘I never thought I’d be drinking this in England either. But the strange thing is, this is the second time I’ve had it since yesterday.’
‘Don’t tell me Danny has been leading you astray with poitín.’
‘Oh, it wasn’t Danny. I went visiting his huts though. Got a sip of poitín there.’
‘Not from Cork. I’d guess.’
‘No,’ Pat said, ‘more like Mayo, I’d say.’
Murty stood up and took two clay pipes, handing one to Pat. He opened a tobacco tin. Pat pinched at it, taking a quantity and pushing it into the bowl of his pipe.
‘So you’ve seen Danny’s huts?’
‘I have. Mostly mud cabins.’
Murty lit a match, holding it across
to Pat. Pat drew at it, tamping it down and drawing it again until the tobacco glowed red.
‘So what did you think?’
‘Pretty rough conditions, I’d say,’ Pat replied. ‘Danny sure as hell has no great grá for his workers, nor for their families, however many of them manage to make their way over.’
‘Have you seen what he feeds them?’
‘I have. Dreadful slop.’
‘It is.’
‘But that’s not the worst. They’ve fever in the huts. Only a little, as far as I can see, but by Christ, if it spreads, what happens then?’
‘That’s the question, isn’t it?’
There was a rattle at the front door and a squeak of hinges. The door opened.
‘Aileen!’ Pat exclaimed. He stood, went over to her and hugged her.
‘It’s great to see you,’ he said.
‘Pat…’ she said, faintly.
Pat recalled the times before Murty and Aileen had left Mayo. In recent years, she had been held to be ‘weak in the mind’, a remarkable fact given that she was Eleanor’s sister. He wondered how they could be so different. Perhaps it was what she had seen on the Mountain in her childhood. She had had fever as a child, but so had Eleanor. She had suffered hunger in the 1820s famine, but so too had Eleanor.
When she had married, she might even have had an easier life than Eleanor, not the tough life of a farmer’s wife. But she never had Eleanor’s strength.
‘Pat…’ she repeated. Murty came across and took her by the arm. He sat her down. Pat noticed the two glasses of poitín had disappeared.
‘A cup of tea for everyone,’ Murty said.
Pat expected Aileen would get it, but Murty went out to the kitchen. He thought of following him, but felt that would be hurtful to Aileen, so he sat down beside her.
‘’Tis well you’re looking,’ he said.
‘Yes,’ she said, ‘the Good Lord helps.’
‘You were at Mass, I hear.’
‘Indeed. And it’s a cause of great heartache to me that my own husband will not do it.’
‘Why is that?’
‘There’s few enough of the fellows in the gang go to church. Murty did back in Mayo, but now he doesn’t have the courage to stand up for his own beliefs.’
Pat wondered what Murty’s beliefs were. He doubted if Murty ever had any deep religious conviction.
Murty re-entered, carrying a tray with tea, milk and sugar. He placed a cup in front of Pat, and lit his pipe again.
‘So what about Carrigard?’ he asked. ‘How’s everything there?’
‘As well as might be expected,’ Pat said. ‘Father had lost the contract on the quarry for a few months, but he’s got it back again. There’s starvation around, no doubt about that, but we’re doing well enough.’
‘It’s a curse, this damned famine. No end to it.’
‘I don’t know,’ Pat said. ‘There might be less need to worry about it soon. There’s any amount of potatoes planted, and the blight has gone. Come the early harvest, and things will be easier. By August it should be all over.’
Murty tamped down his tobacco. ‘I hope to God you’re right,’ he said, ‘because, by Christ, there’s enough hungry Irish over here, that’s for certain.’
‘Yes,’ Pat said, ‘I’d noticed. Liverpool is in a terrible state.’
‘I know,’ Murty said. ‘We’ve only seen it the once, but God, it was awful then.’
‘Sugar, Pat?’ Aileen asked quietly.
‘Just the one,’ Pat replied.
She spooned it into his cup and stirred it for him.
‘What are you doing here in England?’ she asked.
‘Working.’
‘Was it Danny tempted you?’
‘It was,’ Pat said, surprised she had not considered he might work on the Leeds & Thirsk. Had she realised that he had come to replace Murty?
‘Didn’t you have work in Mayo?’
‘I did, but that was a while back, and now the Workhouse is bankrupt. They’re letting people go, staff and inmates, both. I was earning very little. So you needn’t think it was Danny tempting me. I wrote to him, asked what was possible, and it was only after that he offered me a position.’
‘Out of the goodness of his heart, no doubt,’ Murty said.
It was very late when Pat returned to Stockport. Danny and Irene were sitting in the living room with Murtybeg, a candelabra sparkling in the corner.
‘That was a long Mass,’ Danny said.
‘Who said anything about Mass?’
‘Murteen here was getting worried about you.’
‘Arra what,’ Pat said, ‘it isn’t worrying about me you should be. Don’t you know I’m well able to take care of myself? It’s just how I got this idea I might go over and see my uncle and aunt…’
Danny jumped up.
‘Damn it, Pat, you should have told us you were going to do that.’
‘Sure what’s the harm,’ Pat said, feigning innocence. ‘They’re family after all.’
Danny sat again.
‘They’re my parents first, and I’d still have preferred if you’d told me. One of us might have gone with you.’
‘I didn’t think you’d want to,’ Pat said. ‘After all, you haven’t been across since they left.’
‘That’s none of your business,’ Irene said sharply. ‘How we conduct our lives over here is our affair. You’re only over because you couldn’t live in Mayo.’
Pat said nothing for a while. ‘Maybe you’re right, Irene,’ he said at length. ‘Maybe you’re right.’
A few days later, Pat went out to discuss the wages with Kearney, and collect the wage sheets.
As he walked along the rails, he saw a Works locomotive at the end of the line, three wagons behind it, being filled with spoil. Further on, dozens of men were digging into the side of the cutting with picks, while others shovelled away the spoil. Already along the cutting side, there was a long concave space as the pick men dug into it. Above, more men were driving metal stakes into the ground above, hammering them deeply so as to start to separate the shale and rock.
Pat had seen this type of working before, though his father would never allow it in their own quarry in Carrigard. He knew the real trick was to let the pick men dig in as far as was safe, before the men on top brought down the ‘lift’.
He saw Kearney, and both went into the office. For some time, they went through the figures. There were no errors. Kearney too, had been educated by Murty.
There was a roar from outside as the lift collapsed.
‘Good work,’ Kearney said. ‘They were fast getting that lot down.’
There was a scream.
For one terrible moment, Pat and Kearney stared at each other. Then they rushed to the door.
Already, men were hacking at the edge of the collapse. Without waiting, Pat grabbed a shovel and went to join them.
He saw a rough pair of boots sticking out. The man was not deeply buried. Within seconds they had him out, and he started to breathe convulsively. There were deep gashes on his head though, and he was still unconscious.
‘Is this Mícheál O’Brogáin?’ Kearney asked.
‘It is,’ a man answered.
Already Kearney was taking a rough roll-call, using the wage sheets he and Pat had been checking only minutes before.
‘Aedán Ó’Cadhain,’ he shouted.
‘Anseo.’ Here.
‘Ciarán MacCoinín.’
‘Anseo.’
‘Seán Ó’hUigín.’
‘Anseo.’
‘Diarmuid Ó’Céirín.’
There was no answer.
‘Diarmuid Ó’Céirín,’ Kearney shouted again, but the men were already back at the collapse, shovelling faster than before.
Pat walked along the entire line.
‘Diarmuid Ó’Céirín,’ he called, again and again.
Still no response. At length, another man came to him.
‘He was over here. Just here.�
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‘God protect him,’ Pat said.
Kearney continued through the list, one by one. Before he had finished, there were already two corpses lying where they had been dragged out.
‘And we reckon there’s three more as well as them,’ Kearney said. ‘If they haven’t had their necks broken, they’ll be well suffocated by this time.’
He left the wage sheet back into the office, then he and Pat joined the workers, shovelling hard.
After all the bodies had been dug out, they walked back the tracks together. Kearney was clearly upset.
‘Don’t say it to anyone,’ he said, ‘but I blame myself for this. This way of working, it’s terrible dangerous. We should just be digging it straight, not trying to bring hundreds of tons down at once. Those men digging in under, they never had a chance.’
‘So why do you do it then?’ Pat asked.
Kearney stopped. ‘What kind of amadán are you to ask me a question like that. You know well why it’s done this way. Your cousin insists on it – may God damn him. It’s faster, gets the job done quicker, and all for less wages. But you’re right, you know. I should stand up to him…’
‘What good would that do?’ Pat asked. ‘He’d only fire you, wouldn’t he?’
‘I’d guess you’re right,’ Kearney said.
They walked on.
‘So what about the dead fellows?’ Pat asked. ‘Are they bringing them back to Stockport tonight?’
‘Not a chance of that, I’m afraid,’ Kearney said. ‘They’ll take them out to the far end of the cutting, that’s what they’ll do, bury them deep under the embankment. It’s much easier, no questions asked that way. And yes, before you ask it, that’s the way Danny wants it.’
‘You’re a tough fellow, Tim,’ Pat said.
‘Not tough enough,’ Kearney answered, ‘and I’ll tell you this, Pat, any ganger has to be tough in this business. It’s not as easy as back in Mayo. If we weren’t tough, the railways would never get built.’
A few days later, Inspector Crawford visited.
‘I understand you had a number of deaths on one of your sites, Mr. Ryan,’ he said.