Galway Bay (24 page)

The sun was full up when Martin O’Malley waved at us and turned his boat toward Aran. I rowed into the inlet and up onto the small strand.

“Where are we?” Michael asked, a little shaky but sound enough.

“I hope on the coast near the river that goes into Ballynahinch Lake. We’re to meet him on the island with Grace O’Malley’s tower. We’ll have to carry the curragh to the river. . . .”

“I’ll give you a hand.” Patrick stood on a rock above us.

The river ran fast enough to lift our curragh over the rapids. Patrick and Michael held tight to the sides of the curragh as I steered us into Ballynahinch Lake and rowed toward the island where the square keep Donal O’Flaherty built for his wife three hundred years ago stood covered in ivy.

“This island was a crannog,” said Patrick as he and Michael pulled the curragh up onto the island’s shore. “Thousands of years ago, people settled here because it was a handy place to defend. Still is.”

We followed Patrick through the doorway of the castle. I saw the date, 1546, the year Donal married the pirate queen who’d one day lead two hundred ships against the English and confront Queen Elizabeth in her own London palace. But she’d come here as a sixteen-year-old bride. Grainne, in Irish, Grainne Ní Maille—my granny’s name, her clan and mine.

Now Patrick Kelly hid here, fighting his own campaign against the Sassenach. I sniffed the air. Financing his war in the traditional way by distilling poitín.

“Impressive,” said Michael, walking across the dirt floor to a forty-gallon tin tub set inside Grace O’Malley’s old fireplace. A big wooden barrel of mash was nearby.

“So this is where the whiskey comes from,” I said.

“It is,” Patrick said.

He and Michael examined every bit of the still, explaining to me how the mixture of sprouted barley was dried and crushed and mixed with hot water, then stored, filtered through branches of evergreen and oak set in the bottom of the cask, then forced through a long copper wire—a worm, they said. On and on, the two of them went—throwing words like “wart” and “singling” and “doubling the run”—until I said, “That’s enough!”

“And would you like a sample?” said Patrick.

We drank Patrick’s poitín and ate slices of cold salmon on thick brown bread. “Baked in the ovens of Ballynahinch House,” he said. “The cook is friendly to us.”

Us?

“And the salmon?”

“Caught in the landlord’s river, but Thomas Martin turns a blind eye. After all, his father was Martin O’Malley’s partner in the smuggling.”

“But it’s not smuggling you’re doing now,” Michael said.

Patrick said nothing.

We sat eating salmon and brown bread, chewing and chewing and chewing—the joy of it.

“Not smuggling,” Patrick said. “It’s better you don’t know too much, but our fellows have put the fear of God in a good few landlords, agents, and bailiffs and feed a fair number of people, too. But now it’s time for me to go.”

“A shame to leave such a place,” Michael said.

“The sheriff’s put a price of twenty pounds on my head. Too tempting for informers. Happened after Ballinglass. You remember the place, Michael?”

“I do. On the Mount Bellow Road,” Michael said. “Da played for a wedding there. He took me—a tidy little place.”

“It is,” said Patrick. “The people had drained the bog and set themselves up rightly near the river Shaven—sturdy cottages with vegetable gardens. Like everyone else, they lost half their potatoes, but the other crops had come in. They’d paid their rent, eaten Indian corn, and survived.”

“As we all did,” I said, thinking they were lucky with the vegetable gardens.

“Four months ago, I passed through—Friday, the thirteenth of March it was,” Patrick went on. “The people were planting seed potatoes, and I’d stopped to help. I was asleep in a shed when I heard this racket. When I stepped out I saw the bailiffs coming with soldiers. The whole village was to be cleared, all tenants evicted. This troop of Red Coats on big horses rode into the center of the village. A force to be reckoned with, no question. The might of the British Empire. They’d fought Napoleon to a standstill and were defeating the tribesmen of India at that very moment. And who were they off to subdue this morning? Women. Women and little children and old men. And the great military objective? To force the people of Ballinglass off the land. Why? Because that’s what the landlord, Mrs. Gerard, wanted. The rent was
paid
. Remember that:
paid
. But she didn’t want rent, she wanted them gone.

“A crew of men began tumbling the houses. They had this battering ram, a massive tree trunk, tied around with chains attached to a team of horses so the men could swing it forward. These cottages were built of stone—strong. Didn’t fall easily. They battered the walls of that first cottage over and over before it finally collapsed.

“An old man went up to the officer in charge. ‘Please, Captain,’ he said, and began telling him that many families in Ballinglass had sons in the British army, that his own boy was a soldier in India. He turned to the soldiers and begged them to stop the battering-ram boys from destroying the homes where their comrades were born. ‘We paid the rent,’ he kept repeating.

“The captain turned his horse away, but the man held on to his boot. Then the captain kicked the man. He fell. Another soldier got off his horse and started kicking him, too. The Red Coats were laughing.

“I had carried Grellan’s crozier out with me, and I ran into the center of the soldiers, slashing at them with it. They left the old man and rushed at me. Luck was with me and I was able to get on that first fellow’s horse and ride away.

“Only misfortune for the people of Ballinglass. All evicted, their cottages pulled down, driven from the townland. And worst of all, many of those soldier sons of theirs were killed fighting in India at the very time the British army was evicting their families.”

“Those poor people,” I said.

“At least you tried to help, Patrick,” Michael said.

“Did them little good and gave myself away. Too close to Gallagh, Michael. Grellan’s crozier was recognized, and so was I, my name was given to the soldiers. Watch yourselves.”

“But there are so many Kellys. Unless—do they know you’re Michael’s brother?” I asked.

“It won’t matter. If they come, tell them the truth—I’ve gone to Amerikay.”

“Amerikay,” Michael repeated. “You, gone from Ireland. Hard to take it in.”

“Not going forever, Michael. There’s men and money in Amerikay will be the saving of Ireland. There’ll be Irishmen grasping Grellan’s crozier and swearing an oath to fight for the freedom of their native land.”

Patrick unwrapped a long, narrow bundle, and there it was: the bachall, the battle standard of the Kellys.

A shaft of sun came through the ivy-shrouded window slits, bright on the crozier, making the red gold staff shine—a fire in this dim place. Circles and spirals twined together along the shaft, with the head of some mythic animal on the top. We had made this—we Irish.

“We
were
a great and mighty people,” I said to Michael.

“And will be again,” Patrick said. “The Wild Geese will return.”

I remembered Granny’s stories of the Wild Geese, the Irish soldiers defeated by William of Orange, who joined the armies of Europe. Sometimes she’d point to a formation of geese flying over Galway Bay. “Na geana fiadhaine.” She’d say, as Patrick had, “They will return.”

Michael took Grellan’s crozier from Patrick. He tightened his fist around it until the muscles in his arms knotted, hearing warrior songs in his head.

Patrick needs to fight, so let Patrick go gather an army and come back. But let us have our victory in Knocnacuradh. Who’s the braver—the man who dies for Ireland or the man who lives for Ireland?

“Let me see the crozier,” I said to Michael.

But as he passed it to me, Patrick reached out and took the staff. “A geis against women touching Grellan’s crozier,” he said, and wrapped it up again.

“A geis . . . ,” I started, and then stopped. Patrick was going and taking the crozier with him. Michael was staying, choosing me, us, life.

“Where in Amerikay?” Michael was asking Patrick.

Patrick looked at me. “Walk down to the shore with me,” he said to Michael.

“Oh, for feck’s sake, Patrick. Anything you say to me, you can say to Honora. I’ll tell her anyway.”

“It’s only to protect her.”

“Don’t tell me, then,” I said.

“Chicago,” Patrick said.

“Never heard of it,” I said.

“In the middle of Amerikay. Lots of work there, and fewer Englishmen than in New York and Boston.”

“Chicago,” Michael said. “Chicago,” memorizing the strange name.

Michael put out his hand and Patrick took it, then Michael put his hand on his brother’s shoulder.

“God bless. Safe journey, Patrick,” Michael said, and hugged him.

Patrick stood with his arms at his sides, finally lifted them, embraced Michael, then stepped away.

“I’ll be back,” he said. “I know where to find you—on your neat, bright farm where the fields take the sun.”

“I’ll have the forge up when you come back,” said Michael.

“You will,” said Patrick.

I heard footsteps outside the castle doorway.

“My transport,” Patrick said. “Stay in here until we’re gone.”

I put out my hand, but Patrick didn’t take it. Instead he kissed me on my cheek, and I could see that Michael was pleased at the gesture.

“A sister for you at last,” Michael said.

“A sister,” said Patrick.

Patrick pulled a small package from his pocket and handed it to me. “Here are seeds from the Aran potatoes. The blight never came out there—healthy.”

“Seeds? Potatoes don’t have seeds,” I said.

“They do. The early fruit has seeds. Keep them through the winter and plant them.”

At the doorway, Patrick turned and tossed a small bag to Michael, who caught it in one hand.

“What’s this, Patrick?” he asked, but Patrick was gone. Michael opened the bag and poured three gold sovereigns into my hand.

“But Patrick will need this money. I’ll go after him. We can’t take . . .” he said.

“We can and be grateful,” I said. “Sit down here and let the man leave. Too late to start back now. We’ll sleep the night in Grace O’Malley’s castle.”

I woke to darkness around me and no Michael. “Michael,” I called. “Michael?” I found him standing on the edge of the island, staring across the lake to the farther shore. “Shhh,” he said to me. “Look.”

A herd of Connemara ponies drank from the lake. The stallion stood over his mares and foals, head up, sniffing the wind, white in the moonlight. Michael turned to me.

“I’ll miss Patrick. Even when I didn’t see him I knew he was out there somewhere—tending a field, cooking up a jug, talking revolution, somewhere. And then when he did appear we would talk about our father, the piper, my grandfather Murty Mor, and my mother. The only one left who knew them. Will I ever see him again?”

“He said he’d be back, Michael. You heard him.”

Michael pointed to the stallion. “Do you think that horse, given the expanse of Amerikay, would come back? He’ll be off, and who could blame him? Some crave freedom more than anything, more than . . .” Michael stopped. He stared at the herd.

I took his hand. “That stallion and his herd look sleek enough now with a month of summer’s grass inside them. But they’ll be skin and bones in the winter, not like Champion with her snug, mud-walled stable and a big foolish fellow bringing her hay and watching over her,” I said.

“But Champion might prefer that savage fellow to Gregory’s tame stallion.”

“I don’t hear Champion complaining,” I said.

I pulled his head down and kissed him. We went back to the castle. We made love where Grace O’Malley had lain, and I became a pirate queen myself, wild, not holding back. We’d survived.

Chapter 14

P
UT YOUR CANDLE
down, Paddy—there, on top of the well so Saint Enda can see it,” I said. “He’ll keep the flame burning as a sign of his protection.”

Hundreds and hundreds of people, from every townland, filled the tree-shadowed clearing around Tobar Enda this last Sunday in July, 1846—more than on any Garland Sunday in memory.

St. Garlick Sunday, Dubh Crom Sunday—strange names. Granny made sure to tell Paddy and Jamesy that it was Lughnasa we were celebrating, really—August 1, the beginning of the harvest—and the Irish people had been coming together on this day at wells and lakes, rivers and streams, on hilltops and mountainsides, since long before Christ was born.

Granny had stayed with us during the two weeks following the trip to Mac Dara’s Island and spent hours telling her tales to Paddy, Jamesy, and little Bridget. Paddy interrupted one of her stories about the good people and their ways to ask her if the fairy woman who’d taken their mam for that week after their baby brother died would ever come back. Granny had told them straight out to stop worrying. The fairies didn’t dare attack a woman who was brave in a boat, and I was that. She’d smiled at me, ready to make a saga of
my trip
, the journey to Grace O’Malley’s castle, but I’d had to tell her, “Ná habair tada.” She’d agreed.

“Leave the candle, Paddy. Now.”

The line bunched and stopped. Coughs came from behind us. Michael waited with Jamesy, holding Bridget. Mam and Da, Granny, and my brothers had finished the ritual, tipping over their lit candles, making a wax puddle, then anchoring the candles in the spilt wax. The stone lip of the well and the surrounding rocks held a votive army that would keep away all harm and let the pratties stay healthy. Please God.

But now Paddy whispered to me that he wanted to keep his candle, take it home.

Scold him, give him a good shake—I could almost hear the thoughts of the mothers behind me: Don’t let a six-year-old defy you.

But it wasn’t defiance I saw in Paddy’s face.

“Please, Mam, please,” asking me the way I was begging Our Lord. “Please, please!” He turned to Michael. “I need it, Da, I do.”

Michael looked at me. “Wouldn’t you think, Honora, that Saint Enda could see the candle burning up in Knocnacuradh?”