The Blue Horse (6 page)

She rubbed her eyes. She felt an overwhelming desire to be with her mother, to reassure herself that Mam was in the house. Slipping from under the sleeping bag she went down the wooden stairs trying not to make too much noise.

Mam was sitting in front of the fireplace staring at the dying flames. Near her, Davey’s head rested on a cushion and he was snugly wrapped in two rugs. Mam didn’t seem to hear her. She tiptoed up and whispered. ‘Mam! Mam, I had a bad dream.’

‘It’s all right, pet, sit down here beside me and pull this blanket over you. It’s just that everything is so strange. There have been a lot of changes in a few short days. You’re worried about it, that’s all.’

Katie nodded.

Mam put her arms around Katie.

‘I’m worried too. I hope we’ve done the right thing. I’m worried about your Da – there’s a lot that I –’

They were interrupted by the arrival of one sleepy twin after the other. They had their sleeping bags and blankets and without any fuss settled themselves in front of the fireplace.

‘Can’t sleep in that room,’ Paddy declared, his eyes closing again almost immediately. Katie waited to see if Mam would send them back upstairs, but she just seemed to accept that they needed to be with her. About fifteen minutes
later Hannah appeared, almost falling down the strange stairs with the sleeping bag wrapped cocoon-like around her. She was upset and crying.

‘I thought you’d all gone off and left me, I called your names. Why didn’t you come?’

‘Hannah, come over here to me – go easy or you’ll wake Davey up.’

Katie was moved further away. Hannah pushed her head against Mam and curled into her, her tears and upset fading away. A stab of jealousy stung Katie; the younger you were the more love you got.

There was a sense of reassurance with them all gathered in the small living-room. Tom’s snores rumbled away upstairs, but the rest of them took comfort from each other and finally relaxed. Things felt more normal now. Maybe they’d be able to sleep within four walls and under a black tiled roof after all.

With every day that passed Katie began to feel that number 167 was home – well, maybe!

Miss O’Gorman took Mam over to a big storage depot. Beds and blankets, a small fridge that made a funny sound when you opened the door, a green and grey checked couch and wobbly armchair were among the things delivered the next morning. Everything was second-hand, someone else didn’t want them, but they did the Connors family just fine. The house didn’t seem as empty as it had the first night. There was a discount shop down in the town and Mam went there to get plates and cups and bowls and a silver-coloured kettle and a teapot.

They still had no curtains. The morning sun streamed in so early every day that they were first up in the neighbourhood. It was funny watching out the window as other people came downstairs in dressing gowns and ate breakfast and got ready for their day.

Next door a woman called Mrs Dunne lived with her son and daughter. Her eldest girl was married and brought two grandchildren to see her every weekend. Mrs Dunne’s husband had died of a heart attack two years ago.

Katie noticed that at first Mrs Dunne would avoid being outside if any of them were around.
She seemed embarrassed to talk to them – even to say hello!

It was Duffy constantly pushing her nose through the back fence that got Mrs Dunne talking. She liked dogs and used to drop scraps of food over the fence to Duffy – bits of meat and left-over chicken. Maybe she thought they didn’t feed her. Anyway, because of Duffy, she and Mam began to chat. She had lots of good advice to give Mam about training dogs and bringing them up. Mam would nod and listen, and try to hide her knowing smiles.

On the other side were the Foxes. They were well named, Katie decided, as they were a sly, cunning lot, always coming and going. They barely spoke and made it clear they had objected to having travellers as neighbours. A large rain-soaked piece of white cardboard still lay flung on the grass in their cluttered back garden. ‘Keep Out The Tinkers’ it said. Day by day the message was slowly being washed away.

Mrs Fox was a real gossip, always watching out the windows to see what they were at. Paddy and Brian would pull faces when they spotted her.

‘Leave the poor soul alone,’ scolded Mam. ‘I think she’s lonely, that’s why she’s so interested in other people’s lives.’

Mam was far too soft.

Paddy and Brian had taken to Ashfield as easy as pie. The road seemed crammed with young
fellows their own age and as soon as they were up in the morning they ran out to join the army of pals that kicked ball and played chasing out in the road.

But Hannah was different. Katie was sick of telling her to go out, but still she would not venture beyond the front wall. Katie lost her temper with her one day.

‘Hannah, would you go out and play! Look at her, Mam.’

There she was sitting on the front wall, swinging her feet, her eyes wide, humming softly to herself. A crowd of girls about her own age, seven and eight, would set up a game deliberately near her only a house or two up, but never ask her to play. Hannah would watch them intently and Katie knew she was secretly keeping score and longing to join them. If a ball came near her she would jump down and try to grab it, and then stand with it in her hand, hoping they’d ask her to play.

‘Give us back our ball,’ was all they’d shout. Hannah would toss it back, but there was still no sign of them asking her to join in.

‘Don’t be bothered with them, Hannah,’ urged Katie. ‘Pretend you don’t care, and ignore them.’

But her little sister wouldn’t. She seemed content to sit on the wall and watch.

The kids in the estate were a funny lot. Some were fairly friendly, but others stared as if you were from outer space. Sometimes during the
day the doorbell would ring and when they went to answer it there was no one there.

‘Just kids messing,’ Mam said, but it did worry Katie a bit. Sometimes it happened late at night, around midnight or even later. That was too late to be ‘just kids’.

Katie and Tom both found notes pushed through the letterbox. Luckily Mam couldn’t read the messages:

The writing and the paper was always different but the basic message was the same – go away.

Tom was angry about it and had all kinds of plans to try and catch whoever did it. Katie just hoped it would stop, and they both agreed not to let Mam know about it. She had enough on her plate to deal with.

‘Will you come door-to-door with me?’ Mam asked a few days after they moved in. They took Hannah, and Davey in the buggy, and went to an estate twenty minutes away on the bus. Mam knocked on the doors.

‘Would you have a bit of help, Missus? I’ve just moved in with the family to a new house. Any spare sheets or towels or household goods would be very welcome.’

Some banged their doors shut, and others
chatted and were quite friendly. After two hours there was barely enough space for Davey to sit in the buggy, and both Hannah and Katie held an assortment of plastic bags. Mam held her head high walking back down to the main road. ‘No harm in getting what others don’t want,’ she declared. Later that night she was all excited, sorting out the odds and ends to see what they could use. She draped a huge white sheet over the living-room window and hung curtains on two of the upstairs windows. The begging had certainly been worthwhile.

‘Wait till Brigid sees the place. I’m right proud of it,’ beamed Mam.

‘When will Da see it?’ asked Hannah before Katie could stop her.

‘Soon, pet. Any day now, that’s what I’m hoping.’

A week later Katie was thrilled to see Maggie and Bridey and her aunt arrive for a visit.

‘We left the wild ones back home,’ joked Auntie Brigid.

Home – it had changed again. They were living in a different field now, practically on the side of the road.

‘Not as nice at all,’ whispered Maggie. ‘I wish we had a place like this, we’d be rightly set up then.’

Hannah was delighted to have Bridey for company and took her out to sit on the wall to show off that she had a friend too.

Mam was busy trying to get information about Da and his whereabouts.

‘You must have seen him, Brigid? Is he all right? Was he asking after us? Do you know where he is?’

‘He’s in Cork, Kathleen.’

‘You mean to tell me he’s down at the other end of the country!’

They tried to chat and laugh, and pass it off, but Katie knew that as far as Mam was concerned, all the good was gone from the visit.

‘Summer’s coming to an end,’ announced Mam next morning. ‘We must sort out about school.’ She ordered them all to have a bath, wash their hair and dress in the best clean clothes they had.

‘We’ll go down to the schools and see what’s what, so hurry up the lot of you.’

Tom lay splayed out on his bed and would not budge. ‘I’m not going, Mam. I’m finished with schooling.’ At almost fifteen, he had his mind made up.

‘There might be some kind of course or centre for you to go to.’

‘Mam, let me be. All last year I worked with Da. I can’t go back to desks and books now. I’m done with it.’

‘But what’ll you do then, son? Please, just come with us,’ she pleaded.

‘No, you go on. I’ll stay home. I’ve things to think about.’

He was adamant and would not move.

The rest of them pulled the hall door closed behind them and set off down the road.

Saint John’s National School was only about ten minutes’ walk away. It was a low grey building with green-painted iron railings all around. It served most of Ashfield and the other big estates nearby.

The caretaker opened the door and showed them all into a large waiting area with wooden benches. The boys and Hannah began to play a form of hopscotch on the tiled floor. It was so weird and spooky being in a school during holidays; it felt hollow and any noise echoed around the empty corridors and rooms.

Mr Searson, the headmaster, came out to meet them and brought Mam into his office. Katie was left to mind the others. It took about twenty minutes for Mam to reappear, then Paddy and Brian and Hannah had to go into the office and the headmaster talked to each of them and gave them a sheet of paper to fill in which took another half-hour. Katie pushed Davey up and down the corridors to pass the time. They all seemed very quiet when they came back and Paddy whispered that it was ‘real hard’. The caretaker made a cup of tea for Mam. She was very nervous. The clock ticked on and on.

Finally Mr Searson brought them all into his office.’Well, Mrs Connors, they have all done the tests I’ve given them, difficult enough if you have been in and out of schools too often.’

Mam reddened.

‘As I told you our classes are very large here, we cover a wide catchment area, and there are very few places … however, that said, I can only offer one place.’

Katie looked anxiously at Hannah, whose eyes were wide, full of hope.

‘One of the boys – Brian, isn’t it?’ he added.

Katie gasped. Brian! Only him? How could it be?

‘His learning skills are just about right for his age and his marks are very good; some problems with spellings but we do have a remedial teacher here to help with things like that.’ The man was staring at Brian with a smile on his face.

‘But what about Paddy? The twins have never been separated.’ Mam looked at Paddy who had slumped in the chair as if an unknown assailant had suddenly pounded him in the guts. ‘What class will Paddy be in, or Hannah?’

‘Well that’s it, that’s my problem, Mrs Connors, they won’t be in any class. I’m full up. Paddy, even if I had a place, would be about two classes behind Brian. They would not be together anyway. He needs to work a lot harder to catch up. I don’t know if putting him in a big class and letting him fall behind would be doing him any favours. Hannah, well!’ He turned to Hannah. ‘Do you understand about reading at all, Hannah?’

The little girl looked scared out of her wits, her blue eyes huge like an animal caught in a trap. Katie felt like hitting the middle-aged greying man in his striped suit for the pain he was causing her.

‘Come on, don’t be afraid to say what you feel.’

‘I don’t understand it, not any of it. The words all have strange sounds and when they’re all spread out on a page it’s like a big puzzle and I’m meant to make sense of it. Most of the time I can’t
make any sense of it. I’m not very good, am I?’ With a wobble in her voice she raised her head and stared straight at the man.

‘Did you go to school at all?’ Mr Searson asked gently.

‘Indeed they did, Mr Searson. Hannah and all of them have been in schools all over the place. Wherever we moved to we always tried to get them into a school or there would be someone to take a few of them and teach them their letters or what they needed to know to get them ready for their communion. We did our best for them.’

‘I know, Mrs Connors. Life on the road is hard, and moving around for no matter what reason or what the cause is not the best thing for a child’s education.’

‘We’re travellers, that’s our life,’ Mam interjected stubbornly.

‘Yes, well, taking that into account I’d like to make a suggestion. We’re very lucky that there’s a special school for travellers on the far side of town. The children are collected by bus. It’s a good school, and Hannah and Paddy would both do well there and hopefully be able to re-learn the basics.’

‘But the twins have never been split up. They go everywhere, do everything together. I’d hoped the three of them would go to the same school, the one nearby.’ Mam was staring at him.

‘Look, Mrs Connors, it’s the best I can do. I have an enormous school to run here. None of
my teachers has the time to teach Hannah on her own, the time has to be shared between thirty-five other children too. I have to be fair to everyone!’ He stopped for a moment considering an idea. ‘Maybe if you or your husband could do a bit of reading work with them?’

Mam was silent for a second.

‘Mr Searson, I’m on my own at the moment and … well … I can’t read nor write myself.’

The headmaster was embarrassed and began to trip over himself trying to apologise.

‘I’ll help her, I’ll help them both,’ Katie volunteered. ‘I’m good at reading.’

‘Now that’s the idea,’ Mr Searson smiled. ‘Where do you go to school?’

‘Nowhere.’

‘There’s a very good Community School close by. You might consider it. Otherwise there’s a convent school for girls in the centre of town.’

‘I’ll think about it,’ muttered Katie, ‘nothing’s been decided yet!’

‘Well, Mrs Connors, it’s lovely to meet you and your family. Think about Brian and let me know by the end of the week.’

‘I’ll think about it, Mr Searson.’ Mam was standing up to go. ‘Thank you for your time.’

They left the school a silent bunch. In a few weeks’ time the yard would be crowded and noisy with children and Katie couldn’t help but wonder would Brian be one of them.

‘Will we go to the Community School today,
pet?’ Mam asked her. ‘Are you in the mood for it?’

‘Not today, Mam. I’m not sure about school.’

‘Well, tomorrow’s another day. Anyway, I’ll find out from Miss O’Gorman about it and what she thinks I should do. I wish your Da was here … just to talk to …’

Katie nodded.

‘But no point in wishing, I’ve given up on that.’

‘Me too,’ whispered Katie, watching the grey drabness of the road.