Strawberry Fields (59 page)
‘I understand, alanna,’ Brogan said quietly. ‘And you aren’t the only one to admire the Army, even though I don’t share their faith. And now that you’ve Grace under your wing, is the guilt dead? What more could you have done, indeed?’
‘I still wonder about Mollie,’ Sara confessed. ‘She was such a pretty child. I’d hate to think of her growing pale and indifferent, slouching around the street, begging . . . But what about you, Brogan? I remember the very first time we met you said you carried your burden of guilt, too.’
‘I think I stopped feeling guilty when my mammy looked at the baby I’d got tucked under me donkey jacket, and fell in love wit’ her,’ Brogan said thoughtfully. ‘Because I knew I was doin’ what young Jess wanted. And now, every time I set eyes on our young’un . . .’
‘
You
took her? Brogan O’Brady, don’t say you’ve known where Mollie was all these years and never breathed a word to me? Oh, and I’ve worried myself sick, sometimes, at what I’d done.’
You
took her? Brogan O’Brady, don’t say you’ve known where Mollie was all these years and never breathed a word to me? Oh, and I’ve worried myself sick, sometimes, at what I’d done.’
‘Once she was wit’ me mammy it wasn’t my secret, you see,’ Brogan said humbly. ‘If it had been my secret, Sara love, you’d have known first go off so you would. But you were only a child yourself then; I couldn’t risk you tellin’ someone. Polly’s whole life was at stake.’
‘Polly? Don’t you mean . . .’ Sara stopped short with a gasp. ‘Your little sister! She’s ten years old, the only girl . . . Oh, Brogan, and whenever you’ve talked about her I’ve thought what a natural, happy child she seemed. You were right; it wasn’t your secret to give away. But thank you, thank you, for telling me now!’
‘I feel better for tellin’ you, so I do,’ Brogan assured her. ‘You aren’t the only one who’s felt bad about those young wans. And you do understand, alanna, that I’d have told you if I could? Because – because I was fond of you from the first, so I was, and there was nothing I’d have liked better than to take the worry over the baby’s whereabouts from your shoulders. But it wasn’t possible, me darlin’ girl.’
Brogan leaned across the little table and took both her hands in his. Then he turned them palm upwards and kissed them, starting at the wrists and moving across her palms and down to the tips of her fingers. Sara’s heart did an enormous double-thump and then settled to a rapid, noisy rhythm. He loved her – didn’t he? She realised she had no idea how young men behaved when they were in love, nor how young women behaved, come to that. The Army had taught her a great deal, but there were still some things she simply had to learn for herself.
‘Brog? When you kissed my hands like that I felt very peculiar,’ Sara whispered bashfully. ‘It – it’s an exciting sort of feeling. Is it wrong to feel – to feel that I’d like you to – to go on kissing me?’
‘No, it’s not wrong, darlin’,’ Brogan said. ‘Sure an’ isn’t it how I’ve wanted and waited for you to feel this past decade? Look, we’ve sorted out what’s happened to Grace and Polly, now d’you t’ink we might sort ourselves out, too? Because it’s you I’m wantin’ to spend the rest of me life wit’, Sara Cordwainer. I know there’s difficulties . . .’
‘I don’t see any,’ Sara murmured. She could feel her cheeks begin to flame at the mere thought of what she was about to say. ‘Because that’s how I feel too, Brogan.’
‘Oh, my love!’ Brogan leaned forward ardently . . . and tipped the milk jug over. Sara jumped to her feet, perhaps a little relieved that the excitement and tension of the last few moments had so abruptly dissipated, and fetched a cloth. Laughing, she mopped up the milk, then went and fetched more. He had proposed to her – hadn’t he? Was it a proposal when a man told a girl that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her? She suspected that it was and her heart beat faster at the thought. To be with Brogan for always, as man and wife! It was what she wanted most out of life, she realised, though she had never even put it into thoughts, let alone words.
‘So what are these difficulties?’ Sara said presently, when order had been restored and they both had a fresh cup of tea before them. To her, the path stretched ahead, rose-strewn, sunny. ‘Are you a married man, Brogan O’Brady, with a dozen kids hidden away somewhere?’
He laughed, shaking his head. ‘No, indeed. But I’m a Catholic, darlin’ Sara, and you’re an Army lass. Liverpool may not be as bad as Dublin for mixed marriages . . .’
‘It is,’ Sara said. ‘Oh, why didn’t I
think
? But love . . . love can’t be ordered and paid for, can it, Brog? You can’t help who you fall in love with.’
think
? But love . . . love can’t be ordered and paid for, can it, Brog? You can’t help who you fall in love with.’
‘No, indeed, and our love’s already stood the test of time so it has. Well, we’ll see. I’m goin’ back to the crossing cottage at the weekend, I’ll see what’s said when I tell them I’m marryin’ the best, prettiest, most lovin’ girl in the whole of Liverpool. But they’ll expect such a one to be a good Cat’olic girl and raise a good Cat’olic family, and to be honest, alanna, it never crossed me mind, until you opened the door to me earlier, that you weren’t a good Cat’olic girl!’
‘I never was, even as a child,’ Sara admitted. ‘I was Church of England, Brog, before I joined the Army. And you really think your parents will disapprove? That they won’t like me, because I’m a Salvationist? Not even when you point out the good we do, the work . . .’
‘We won’t judge them,’ Brogan said. ‘Wait and see. But if the worst comes to the worst, alanna, there’s always America.’
‘America? But why, Brog?’
‘Because my brother Niall went there a while back and so I’ve been readin’ up about the country, the prospect there. I’m an engine driver as you know, but because I’m young still there’s no question, in England or Ireland, of me havin’ an express, or doin’ the more important lines, for another twenty years at least. I’ll be doddlin’ up and down branch lines or drivin’ goods trains for years so I will. But if I go to the States, wit’ the experience I’ve already had and me exam results, Niall says I’d be driving the transcontinental locomotives wit’in a year or two, but quite early on I’d be taking out the freights. Imagine it, Sara – to be a hogger on a freight train, travelling the high iron between Marshall and Dallas, and me not yet t’irty!’
‘Imagine,’ breathed Sara, who did not even know what he was talking about. ‘And if . . . if two people of different religions were to marry in America, Brogan, would they be ostracised, made to feel guilty?’
‘No, alanna. No one would give a tinker’s cuss, so long as they didn’t frighten the horses!’
And then Brogan leaned across the table and gathered Sara into his arms. Crockery crashed, milk jugs spilt, cakes became crumbs. But Sara, finding herself in the one place she most wanted to be, was indifferent.
‘Oh, Brogan, we’ll be so happy just to be together,’ she murmured against his mouth. ‘Can we go and see your parents
soon
?’
soon
?’
‘Very soon. But . . . you’ve no regrets, alanna? What about Grace? Strawberry Field? Your friends?’
‘Grace is happy, though I’d feel bad to leave her,’ Sara admitted, sitting back in her seat once more. ‘But we may not need to go to the States, not if your parents take to me. Then I wouldn’t have to leave the Strawb, would I?’
‘My parents will love you! But you know there’ll be disapproval . . . mixed marriages are frowned on; even the Salvationists would prefer you to marry within the Army, I daresay. Because I’d want me children brought up in the faith so I would. If you’d agree?’
‘I’d like my children to have the freedom to choose,’ Sara said after a moment. ‘Would that be unfair, Brog? After all, religion’s an important thing, it’s not like saying “I support Liverpool, or Everton,” it’s a way of life. Serving God is serving God, whether you do it as a Catholic or a Salvationist. Choice is important.’
‘I agree. But we’ll leave that problem until after we’re married,’ Brogan said. ‘Only I doubt that Salvationists would want you workin’ on at the Strawb if you were married to a Catholic.’
‘Oh? And they wouldn’t want a Catholic for a gardener, I suppose?’
Brogan laughed and threw up his hands in the immortal gesture of surrender. ‘Pax, pax! You’re right and I’m wrong, me darlin’. And when the babies come along it isn’t workin’ at the Strawb you’d be anyway. You’d be taking care of me and them!’
‘That sounds wonderful,’ Sara murmured. ‘But what about Grace? She’s tremendously happy at the Strawb, but there’s no doubt her sister is having a more – more normal sort of life with your family out at the level-crossing cottage.’
‘Me family will want to meet her, no doubt,’ Brogan said cautiously. ‘But I’m not plannin’ on tellin’ either Grace or Polly what happened all those years ago, if that’s what you were thinkin’. What I did was illegal even if ’twas for the best, I’d be t’rown in prison, very like, if it came out. And they’re only kids, the young Carbs. I wouldn’t be puttin’ the responsibility of knowin’ such t’ings on their shoulders.’
‘True,’ Sara agreed. ‘All right, suppose we offered to have Grace to live with us, Brogan? Would you like that?’
‘Look, sweetheart, stop anticipatin’. Let’s take it one step at a time, shall we? And the first step is for me to go down to the cottage and break the news that we’re engaged to be wed. Then I’ll take you to meet them and we’ll go on from there. Agreed?’
‘No! If we’re engaged to be wed the first thing to do is buy me a ring,’ Sara said. ‘Just a little, cheap one, you know, but a real engagement ring.’
Brogan got up from the table and, as Sara rose too, kissed her quickly on the side of her mouth. ‘You’re right; we’ll take a tram into the city centre tomorrow morning, first thing,’ he said buoyantly. ‘You’re a girl who gets her priorities right, Miss Cordwainer, I can tell that!’
Brogan walked up from the station to the crossing cottage, a heavy bag full of small Christmas gifts slung over his shoulder. The cottage was on the telephone, and Deirdre had rung him a couple of times, once to ask if he could do some shopping for them.
‘Wit’ only ten days to go before the holiday we’re havin’ our work cut out to get the place straight,’ she had shouted into the mouthpiece. ‘You’re in the city, me boy, so if I read you a list out, could you do me messages and bring ’em wit’ you, next time you come?’
‘I could and I will, Mammy,’ Brogan assured her. ‘But the telephone’s a wonderful invention, it carries your voice to me by the electric – you don’t have to bellow like that, you know.’
‘Who’s bellowin’?’ Deirdre said, still at full volume. “Twon’t take no heed of a whisper, that I
do
know. Did ye hear me?’
do
know. Did ye hear me?’
‘I heard,’ Brogan said patiently. ‘I’ll do your messages then, Mammy, and see you in a week, so I will.’
And now he was walking up the lane, the hedges winter-bare but bright with berries, the grass of the verge dry and white after the long summer. Over the gates he passed, Brogan could see the clean line of plough, a field of winter cabbage growing well, pasture dotted with cattle or sheep. Trees overhung the lane, trees which, in summer, would cast a delightful shade, though now they, like the hedges, were bare of leaves, and when the lane deepened, running between high banks, Brogan could see by the foliage that when spring came there would be wild strawberries here, and violets, primroses.
‘It’s just like heaven,’ Polly had written to him only last week. ‘I love it best in the world, so I do. But I wish Tad were here too.’
And the crossing cottage was nice as well. Long and low, with the bedroom ceilings slanted, the windows set in the warm red tiles so that the house looked as though it was perpetually raising its eyebrows, it crouched midway between the track and the lane, its whitewashed walls cool to the touch in summer, warm in winter. There was an airy living room which overlooked the railway line so the family could watch the trains as they thundered past, and a large kitchen overlooking the garden where the cats strolled elegantly or sneaked on their bellies after the birds, and the borders, even at this time of year, were gay with late roses, chrysanthemums, and autumn crocus.
Brogan hitched his bag a bit higher on his shoulder and strode on. His family were happy and settled already, the boys and Polly enjoying the village school, his parents almost unable to believe the rural peace by which they were surrounded. To be sure, Deirdre had complained at first that she could not sleep at nights for the trains, whilst Peader, sheepishly, had said that the long silences between trains kept him awake. But it hadn’t lasted. They had grown accustomed; indeed, Peader now said that if a train was late he was likely to wake because it hadn’t gone through, though the roar of its normal progress disturbed him not at all.
There were only two trains through between the hours of ten at night and six the next morning, and now that they were settled, Deirdre had offered to do them every other night so that Peader could sleep straight through.
‘But I like to wake and see to me gate,’ her husband had assured her. ‘’Tis a pleasure to me, alanna, and no pain. And I’m fast asleep five minutes after she’s gone through, you know that.’
The hens had settled as well as the rest of the family, and Delilah was in his element. Though not the meekest or most biddable of dogs, he was well content with the large garden in which he could wander, and the nearby meadows where cows grazed and willows overhung the small streams. There was a river, too. The boys went fishing with their homemade rods and Polly spent hours hanging over the water with a flour-bag on a split cane and came home with pinkeens galore, though the local children told her they were stickleback, and assured her that she would find more exciting things in the streams than that when spring came.
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