It doesn’t take very long for a body to start looking as though it belongs to the ground.
You will stay on your feet. Keep moving. Those are the rules.
THE HORSES in the field looked dazed. He tried the feed bins but they were bolted and locked. Searching the racks of harness, he found one soft rope halter. There was some loose hay, and he grabbed a handful and went out to capture the blue.
The horse was hungry and came to him easy. Slipping the halter on, Fergus led him out through the gate. “I’m going on your back. You won’t like it but that’s how it’ll be.” Climbing the fence, he threw his leg over before the animal had a chance to shy. He gripped with his knees and kept the halter loose while the horse angrily tossed his head.
“There it is . . . easy now. Not so bad, is it?” Kicking heels lightly, he started the blue walking down the road, and looked back at the gate he’d left open. Horses hated being driven; why wouldn’t they? But they would follow one another, follow their curiosity and instinct for companionship.
He smiled as he watched the tip horses ambling through the gate.
* * *
HALF A MILE along there was a stream flowing under the road in an iron culvert. The water on either side tasted fresh, and there was good thick grass along the ditches.
He stretched out on the blue’s back while the horses cropped peacefully. It was like being back on the booley — feeling the sun on his face and watching the sky, spinning himself into childish, self-conscious trances. That was before he’d understood the world existed, firm and real, careless of him or anyone.
It was as if he’d spent all that time on the booleys asleep.
Tramps stopped to drink at the stream and light their pipes and ask the news of Mr. Murdoch’s contract.
“Are they hiring on the cutting?”
“How many killed so far?”
“Any fever in the shanties?”
He felt the slow, sweet calmness of the world that afternoon. Tramps lay down in the grass, content in the sunshine, puffing their pipes, and it didn’t seem the same world where girls died choking on their own blood.
Watching over grazing horses allowed a feeling of peace.
All you are is hunger.
SNOW LIFTED from the flanks of the Welsh mountains. Some days the wind came off the sea tasting soft and wet, and he could smell grass growing.
The next Sunday, he met Mr. Murdoch coming along the road, riding a pony too small for him.
Pulling up, the contractor eyed the horses grazing. “Well, man, are those my nags?”
“They are, yes.”
“Ah. I thought as much. What are you doing, so?”
“There’s no browse left in their field. It’s all cropped down. You couldn’t keep a rabbit there.”
“And do you expect to be paid wages for grazing these poor old bucks?”
“I don’t.”
“That’s wise. Because Sunday’s Sunday, you see. The law says I can’t pay a fellow Sunday wages, even if I would. Kindness must be its own reward. But here, have a cigar.” Reaching out, Mr. Murdoch handed him a cigar. “That’s a decentlooking animal you’re sitting on. Good bones. Is he one of mine?”
Fergus nodded, sudddenly afraid that the contractor was going to claim the horse for himself.
The blue raised his head and shook his neck.
“He looks well set up.” Mr. Murdoch eyed the horse critically. “Might have hunted him — in his better days.”
“He’ll run twenty tips a day. Got his own mind. Wicked biter.”
“Is he? Well, it’s always sad to see a gentleman come down in the world.”
Mr. Murdoch rode off. Relieved, Fergus reached down to stroke the blue’s neck, and the horse twisted around and tried to bite him.
Perhaps meanness was the reason he’d come down from saddle horse to cart horse to tip horse on the railway — or perhaps his misfortune had made him mean. The world didn’t require a reason for things to fall apart. He knew that, and the horse knew it too.
Her Sorrow
IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT he was awakened by one sharp cry. He kept very still, heart knocking in his chest. Wind squealed along the walls of the shanty. It was a hard, cold night. He tried convincing himself it was only wind that he’d heard.
He’d been beaten, often. The open palm, the fist, the stick. Speechless violence, what men seemed to admire most of all. The humiliation almost unbearable, far worse than the pain.
Her next scream flickered so fast, like a startled bird, he almost believed he hadn’t heard a thing.
The musty smell of night with fear flowering in it, which is the smell of being alone.
With nothing around you but cold, you perceive the world coldly, realizing anything else is a lie you’ve told yourself.
When she cried out again, it wasn’t loud. A small shout, quick. A fox caught in a leg trap.
He got out of the crib, dressed quickly, and crept out into the cozy, causing a dispersal of startled mice.
A few coals were glowing in the grate. Dishes sat in moonlight.
He could hear the iron bed creaking.
Crossing the room, he lifted Muldoon’s pistol from the shelf. Powder and bullets were in a leather bag. Conscientiously, he loaded.
You smell a girl coming at you, like apple blossom on the wind. Excitement and demands, transformation, danger. A girl awoke you and suddenly you were walking in the startling forest of your dreams.
He crossed the room and stopped in front of the curtain.
He could hear nothing from inside, no voices, only the ticking of the ganger’s watch.
The wind had died. After a while he could hear Muck’s deep, steady breathing.
Only make a sound. Cry out. I shall walk straight in and shoot the fellow.
Muldoon began snoring.
Fergus stood just outside the curtain, shivering, his resolve slowly leaking away. Finally he unloaded the pistol, replaced it on the shelf, and returned to his crib where he fell asleep and dreamed of Luke fleeing across the bog, her boys chasing her. She was covered in scratches and they had been licking her blood.
The Cliff
IT WAS THE LAST SUNDAY before the Pay and he was grazing the tip horses along the road when he saw her walking out from camp. He’d never seen her away from the shanty before. Muck did not like her to venture.
McCarty said the road was death for girls, with all the famished tramps and gypsies.
She was a solitary figure, wearing an old bonnet and carrying a basket. As she came closer he saw she was barefoot.
“Where are you off to?”
“Gather seabirds’ eggs.”
He was astride the horse, and she passed by without saying anything more.
He continued to watch her. She had a way of walking, resolute. She owned herself.
He saw her leave the road and start across the grid of small, enclosed fields. She was heading for the clifftops above the sea. Kicking his heels, he started the horse ambling along the road. Dismounting at the gate she’d passed through, he started after her across the fields.
The grass was thick. Sheep bawled at him. Climbing the last stile, he lost sight of her. Fearing she had fallen over the cliff, he was hurrying to the edge when she reappeared, crawling out under from a clump of gorse.
“Muck says we’ll sell eggs for a penny each. I see them but I can’t reach them.”
She didn’t seem surprised that he had followed her. She stood up, brushing off her gown, and walked to the edge of the cliff. “There’s Ireland out there, man.” She pointed. “If you was a seabird, you might fly the way.”
He couldn’t see anything, just sea. The sky fast with clouds.
“No use going back,” he said.
“No. No use.”
Standing beside her, he could feel some tension in her. She was near the edge, her toes out over the grassy tufts at the very lip of the cliff. Waves smashing white on the rocks far below.
“I’m thinki
ng I’m going to jump, Fergus,” she said suddenly. “Give these old goners a splash. I’m ready as Hell.”
He took hold of her hand.
“No. Let me go.”
There a white patch of sail, far off, quite small on the silver plate of sea.
“Look, Molly, a ship.”
Stepping back from the edge, she sat down in the grass.
He sat beside her. Wetting his handkerchief, he wiped her forehead, temples, cheeks. At first she balked, then shut her eyes.
“If you want to get away,” he said, “I’ll take you to America.”
She said nothing for a while, and he kept dabbing her face.
“You haven’t the money,” she finally said. “No more than three pounds coming to you, I suppose. A fare’s three pounds each, even to Quebec. And you must have supplies for a passage. Warm clothes. Extra rations — you can’t make it on what they feed.”
“We’ll go down the line, another contract. London tunnels. Soon we’d have enough.”
Her eyes were unreadable. “He’d find me on the line.”
“He wouldn’t.”
“You don’t know Muldoon. You’re no good next to a fellow like that. You’re only a boy.”
“I’d take care of you, Molly.”
“Muck’s not so bad — he brought me out of Ireland. I was living like a finch when he found me.”
“He beats you.”
“I can stand it.”
“He rules you, though.”
She looked out to sea. Seabirds circled below the cliffs, wailing.
None of it thought out. No plan in your head. No words before you said them.
“You want to get away of him. Don’t be afraid. Come with me.”
“‘Don’t be afraid’?” She laughed, mocking him, but he saw how terrified she was, and he felt strong. Muldoon was nothing, Muldoon was bad sky; he would walk right through Muldoon.
She suddenly stood up, brushing grass and twigs from her gown and picking up the basket, which contained two paltry pale green eggs. She stepped to the edge again. He could hear birds crying and sea breaking on the rocks far below.
“If you are going to jump, Molly, then jump with me, to America.”
She looked over her shoulder. He felt exhilarated and strange, as though he were living outside himself. “Will you come?”
The huge, empty pan of sea. The motion of things.
“He mustn’t find out. You mustn’t say a word to anyone. Not to McCarty or anyone else. Keep away from me — don’t be whispering at me, never! Keep apart, or Muck will know. The Pay is when. Night of the Pay — we’ll get away then, Muck will be on a spree. How much will you have on Pay Night?”
“As you say; three pounds nearly.”
“It’s not enough.”
“It will get us to London.”
“Muck will be drinking and roaring on the Pay. Can your horse carry us both? To Chester?”
“Yes.”
“Go to the stable after you collect your pay. Wait for me there, get your horse ready. I’ll get clear of Muck somehow; once he’s on the spree you could shoot him, and he wouldn’t know it. We’ll go for Chester and catch the Southern Express. Only don’t say nothing. And don’t come at me, no whispers, no sweet talk; don’t look all moony. If Muck is giving me trouble, knocking me about, you stay out of it. I can take it. If he finds out, he’d kill us both.”
He felt like a ship, powerful, restless, moving. Standing up, he placed his hands on her shoulders. She stood still, her gaze fixed at a point on his chin.
When he bent to kiss her she accepted it, but her lips were dry and closed.
“Moll —”
She clapped a hand over his mouth, kissing his chin, then cheeks, his ear — then his mouth. Their teeth clashed. The juice in her mouth tasted sweet. She began unbuttoning his trousers. She pushed him down on the cold grass, lay down beside him and, seizing his wrists, pulled him on top of her, licking and biting his hands, thrusting his fingers into her mouth and sucking them, then dragging one hand up under her skirts and rubbing his fingers between her legs. Grasping his cock she directed him. When he was plunged in her she began bucking her hips.
Joy overwhelms the capacity to make sense of it.
For a few seconds as the juice was leaping out of him he believed he was seeing the shape of life clearly, but when the climax passed and he collapsed on her his brain went cloudy and the vision did not sustain.
She lay still for a few moments, then began wriggling out from under. She stood up, shaking down her dress. “Don’t come after me now.”
Before he could say anything she was gone. He sat up and watched her striding over the meadow, climbing the stiles.
Turning, he looked out to sea. Pale sun glinted on the waves. The sail had disappeared.
Could you see America, when the air was clear?
No. Too far.
The hard-looking, empty sea made him feel empty and alone.
It lay out there, the mystery.
Of course you couldn’t see.
HE FOUND a piece of Molly’s clothing draped on a stool by the fire, drying. A little undershirt. Flimsy white Manchester cotton.
She was outside, bucketing through more wash.
Afraid to be seen with him. Afraid Muck would somehow sniff out their plan.
He took the soft little thing, lay down in his crib, and covered his face with it, the dampness and the softness.
A girl turned you inside out.
The Pay
WEATHER CAME IN SLEET the night before the Pay. Snow covered the grade and greased the rails in the morning so that the first trucks ran almost in silence. The sky began to break at dinnertime and was dark blue by afternoon. The navvies cheered when they saw the wagon with an iron strongbox aboard pulling up at the timer’s shed, a policeman in a leather cape sitting alongside the teamster. The timer emerged to escort them to the beer shop where the Pay would be made.
After feeding their horses and turning them out, Fergus and McCarty walked back through the camp, passing the beer shop, which was closed, with curtains drawn over the windows.
It was very quiet in the camp. The navvies had came down off the cutting at the sound of the bell and headed straight up the hill to the shanties to get themselves ready.
“What will you do with your pay?” McCarty asked.
He was tempted to share the secret, but resisted. “Don’t know.”
“I’d like to get a girl,” said McCarty wistfully.
A secret makes you strong.
PAY NIGHT supper was cheese, bread, and onions, eaten quickly. Then the wash tub was dragged in front of the fire and filled. Muldoon bathed first, dropping his old clothes on the floor and stepping gingerly into the tub. After he finished it was old Peadar’s turn, then McCarty’s. After bathing, each man stood naked in front of the fire rubbing himself with the clean rags Molly had set out, then went into the sleeping room to dress in clean clothes.
Fergus was last. She was greasing boots as he undressed. She’d paid no attention to any of the men bathing except Muldoon, who had her scrub his back. Fergus was about to step into the gray, soapy water when he looked up and saw her across the room staring at him.
Naked, holding her gaze, he felt charged and reckless.
During the weeks on the line his body had been transforming, hardening. He felt fresh with power as he held her stare.
She was such a small person, small bones, hands, feet.
His prick was arousing, thickening in its pad of curious hair. Her eyes on him, wary.
Suddenly he felt capable of killing Muldoon. Knife or stick or fist or gun.
Finishing him, pitching his body out the door.
“You want hot water,” she said. Wrapping a handkerchief around her palm she lifted the kettle from the store and began pouring the steaming water into the tub.
“Get in,” she said. “You certainly need it.”
THE MEN sat in front of the fire in clean clothes,
smoking their pipes, waiting for the timer’s bell, and he tried not to look at her.
When the bell sounded, the old navvy clapped his hands. “That is the sound of joy, men! I wish you all the joy of your pay.” The old navvy and Muldoon arose and shook hands. For a few moments, they were all shaking hands with one another.
She kept back, watching them.
The ganger lit a torch from the coals, and they all pulled on coats and boots and followed him outside.
Men were streaming down the hill, groups from each shanty silently joining in the flow. The only noise was the squish of boots in the mud and the bleats of a few whistles. All were dressed in finery, hats brushed, boots freshly greased. Men wore yellow leather gloves.
He felt a little stunned by the nearness of money; perhaps they all were.
The beer shop glowed from inside. They joined the queue wrapped around the building. The curtains had been flung open. Pressing his forehead to the glass, Fergus saw the timer making the Pay at the table covered by a red blanket, the policeman standing behind him, holding a pot of beer in his fist. After taking their pay, men were crowding at the bar, drinking beer and calling for beefsteaks.
“I’m feeling strong tonight,” Muldoon called out to Greaves as the tramp walked by, his face still lumpy and purple. Ignoring Muck, he joined the queue.
“No takers,” Muck said, sounding disappointed.
“Someone will turn up,” said Molly.
On his way inside, the contractor stopped and spoke to Muldoon. “You are looking dapper, Muck.”
“Boisterous I am, mister.”
“We’ll get a challenge then. Who do you like?”
“Ach, there isn’t a man in camp now.”
“Perhaps they’ve a fighter on the Conwy job.”
Muldoon was springing on the balls of his feet, snapping punches at the air. “Only tonight I feel itchy, my lord!”
“Who’s game?” the contractor called out to the men in line. “Who’ll get up on his hind legs with Muck Muldoon? Two pounds for the last man standing.”
No one stepped forward as Muck hummed and danced, feinting punches.
The Law of Dreams Page 21
