by Charles Egan
‘You’re most welcome,’ he said. ‘Maybe you can put manners on that son of ours.’
Sarah laughed. ‘I might,’ she said, ‘but I’ve got to corner him first, and that mightn’t be so easy.’
‘Go on out of that,’ Eleanor said. ‘You’ve got him well reined in already.’
Michael sat at the table, as Eleanor poured out four cups of whiskey. He raised his cup. ‘And here’s to the pair of you.’
The conversation continued in a light-hearted way. Then Michael held up his hand.
‘So what was Partry like?’ he asked.
‘Don’t ask,’ Pat said. ‘You wouldn’t want to know.’
‘Let me be the judge of that.’
‘Look,’ Pat said, ‘you think you’ve seen famine and fever. Partry is worse than anything you’ve seen around Carrigard or Kilduff, I’ll tell you that for sure. Tough and all as ye might think ye are, ye don’t want having nightmares, and I don’t want to talk about it and be giving myself more torment.’
He stood, and walked over to the open door. He stared up at the trees, as if thinking. Images kept flashing across his mind. A mud hut beside a stream and a dead blackthorn tree on a crag. He grasped the door frame, trembling, and hoping no-one would notice.
At last he turned back.
‘But if ye want bad dreams, wouldn’t there be enough in Kilduff already?’
‘What of Kilduff?’ Michael asked.
‘There’s cholera in Kilduff. Or hadn’t ye heard?’
‘Cholera!’ Eleanor exclaimed. ‘Surely not.’
‘What are you saying?’ Michael asked, disquiet in his voice.
‘Cholera,’ Pat replied.
‘Who told you?’
‘Sabina. And sure how could it not? It’s all over Mayo.’
‘Oh God,’ Eleanor said. ‘How long is it since we last had that last? Ten years, twenty, I don’t remember,’
‘1832,’ Michael said. ‘That was a terrible time right enough, though Carrigard wasn’t so bad.’
‘It wasn’t,’ Eleanor said. ‘It was mostly in the towns. Kilduff got it bad then, though. Couldn’t I see it myself every time I went up shopping that time.’
Michael had picked up a stick, and was drawing circles in the ashes at the front of the fire.
At last he spoke.
‘Sure, maybe it’s not as bad as last time, it’ll be a different kind.’
‘I don’t know about that.’ Pat said. ‘Wherever it’s coming from, they say it’s a powerful one this time. Even worse than ’32.’
‘Enough of this,’ Eleanor said abruptly. ‘We can talk all night about terrible things, but there’s better things afoot. I’m sure Pat did not bring Sarah here just out of friendship.’
Pat smiled. ‘No, mother. There might have been other reasons, as you have well guessed. We are to be married. But sure you’ve always known that.’
‘And a better daughter, I could not ask for.’
‘And another mother for little Brigid,’ Michael said.
Pat was concerned though. Even with his wages, it was hard enough to feed the family, and now there was one extra mouth. Still, his parents welcome for Sarah delighted him. There were better things in life than cholera, and talk of marriage distracted everyone from Partry.
But Eleanor was thinking of more practical things.
‘It’ll be a few weeks to the wedding yet,’ she said. ‘First we must have the banns read out.’
‘You can leave the Kilduff side to me,’ Michael said, ‘I’ll talk to Father Reilly. A decent man too, he’ll have the banns read here.’
‘I’ll write to Knockanure and Westport,’ Pat said, ‘the moment I get to Castlebar.’
‘Yes,’ Eleanor said, ‘that would be a good plan. I just hope people will see it as it is. It’s a bad time in some ways, what with people suffering all around us, but sure life goes on, doesn’t it? Luke and Winnie got married in the middle of the fevers. There were many others marrying at the same time.’
‘Yes,’ Michael said, ‘I think you’re right.’
*
That evening, Michael took out pen and paper and started to write a letter.
‘Who to?’ Eleanor asked.
‘Luke and Winnie. It’s a long time since they’ve heard from us. We must tell them of Pat and Sarah.’
‘Of course,’ Eleanor said. ‘But what of Mayo? What can we say of that?’
‘Well, we’re not starving, and I believe Winnie’s people are fine too. They’ll want to know that.’
‘They will,’ Elanor said. ‘And tell them John Gallagher is in England.’
‘Fine. They might know already, but sure I’ll say it anyhow.’
‘And what should you say about the rest of the County?’
‘We must be honest. The starvation is getting worse and now, the cholera!’
‘Yes,’ Eleanor said, ‘they’ll need to know all that.’
That night, she lit the turf fire in the room that Luke and Winnie used before they went to America. It was there that Sarah slept that night while Pat slept in the outshot in the kitchen.
Over the next few days, Pat helped his father around the farm, rebuilding walls along the fields, smashing rock in the quarry, and rebuilding the destruction of the winter on the roads where they still held contracts to the County.
Then it was time to return to Castlebar. Eleanor had made up a bag of cooked potatoes, cooled overnight. Pat hugged his mother and Sarah. He knew that the old friendship between them had been re-established, and the strength of that friendship would carry them through for many years, good and bad. And Sarah had taken young Brigid to her heart.
Then he mounted the donkey and rode towards Castlebar.
*
Gaffney rose from the desk as he entered.
‘Pat, I’m most happy to see you.’
‘Did you think I wasn’t coming?’
‘I was thinking of all sorts of terrible things about you, fever, cholera or whatever. And it wasn’t just you I was worried about; I need you for this meeting with the Grand Jury tomorrow.’
That evening, Pat slept in the administration building.
Next morning, he was sitting outside the Committee Room.
‘Just wait till you’re called,’ a clerk said to him.
He went through his own copy of the report again and again, though he was already confident of its contents.
When he entered the Committee Room, he saw there were copies of his report mixed in with a mess of papers around the table.
Gaffney was on the right-hand side of the table, two men alongside him, three more facing them.
At the top, a man sat facing down the table. He was bald on top, but with black hair all down his face – thick mutton-chop whiskers and sideburns with a dense black beard. He wore a well-ironed shirt, a bow tie and a thick black jacket. The Chairman.
Pat took the chair at the opposite end of the table.
‘Stand,’ the Chairman shouted.
Pat glanced over to Gaffney who just nodded. He stood.
‘Who produced this drivel?’
‘This is my most reliable man,’ Gaffney replied.
‘If he is your most reliable, you should fire the others. This man too. He’s a liar.’
‘I resent that,’ Gaffney said.
‘He talks of cholera in Ballinrobe. Have any of us seen cholera? Is there cholera in Westport? Or Castlebar? Fever perhaps. Cholera no. On what evidence, have you based these lies?’
‘I saw it myself,’ Pat said.
‘Saw it himself. We have a medical expert now, do we? Would a man like this know the difference between cholera and common diarrhoea?’
‘The difference is death,’ Pat said. ‘Cholera kills. Diarrhoea rarely does.’
‘Oh yes, and who do we have to confirm it. A papist priest! We’ve know what lies they tell.’
‘They’re not lies,’ Pat said. ‘I spoke with the doctor. He knew cholera right enough.’
Gaff
ney raised a hand, before the other man could reply.
‘Tell us about the rest of it, Pat,’ he said. ‘Levally and the rest of them.’
‘Yes, Mr. Gaffney. Lucan’s evictions…’
‘Lord Lucan,’ the man shouted from the end of the table. ‘You’ll call me by my name.’
Now Pat knew who the man was. He decided to press on.
‘Yes, my Lord, I witnessed your eviction…’
‘There were no evictions.’
‘But I saw the villages. Levally, Cloonark, Cloonacastle, Baun, Cappacurry, Knocknacroagha…’
A man from the left-hand side raised his hand.
‘You visited all of these villages?’
‘I did.’
‘Were you there when these people were supposedly evicted?’ one of the other men asked.
‘No. I…’
‘Surely it is possible that the people in these villages simply emigrated, or even died.’
‘It’s easy to know the difference between an eviction and emigration,’ Pat said. ‘It’s all in the way the roof is brought down.’
‘So we’ve an expert on demolition now,’ Lucan said.
‘No expert, my Lord,’ Pat responded, ‘but I’ve seen Lord Clanowen’s evictions being carried out in Gort na Móna. Just by Kilduff. I know how it’s done. And Father Conway witnessed the Levally evictions in 1848.’
Lucan waved his hand with contempt. ‘A priest.’
One of the other men stood.
‘Before you go, this story of your travels in the mountains.’
‘All fabricated,’ Lucan said from the end of the table.
‘Were you there?’ the other asked.
‘I was. Father Ward took me…’
‘Another priest,’ Lucan repeated.
‘I believe the word of my own eyes,’ Pat said. ‘And I’m not a priest. Nor is Father Ward a liar.’
‘This report is total nonsense,’ Lucan said. ‘And you know it.’
‘And we wouldn’t think Dean Callanan would lie either,’ Gaffney said. ‘And you could hardly call him a priest of Rome.’
‘Yes,’ Pat said. ‘I met him too. And I don’t think he tells lies either.’
‘How do we know the accuracy of Dean Callanan’s letter?’ Lucan asked. ‘His letter is counter-signed by damned near every papist bishop west of the Shannon. It could well be a forgery.’
‘He told me he had sent the letter,’ Pat said. ‘It’s no forgery.’
Silence.
‘My Lord,’ he added, with disdain.
*
Pat and Gaffney were dismissed from the meeting.
‘I’m sorry, Pat,’ Gaffney said.
‘They didn’t believe a word I said, and they have the gall to tell me the report was made up.’
They walked along the corridor to Gaffney’s office.
‘They didn’t want to believe it. Maybe they’ve got enough problems already without worrying about Partry or Louisburgh.’
‘I know.’
‘I wouldn’t worry,’ Gaffney said, as they entered the office.
The Connaught Telegraph was lying on his desk, a note on top, underlined – ‘Read This’.
Gaffney picked it up. ‘I wonder who this is from. Doesn’t want us knowing, whoever it is.’
He read it. Then he handed it across to Pat.
‘A letter to the Editor?’ Pat exclaimed ‘From Father Ward?’
‘Indeed,’ Gaffney said. ‘Wouldn’t you know Cavendish would copy something like this?’
May 13 1849
To the Editor of the Freeman.
Dear and Respected Sir – it is with pain and with trouble that I thus address you, soliciting your influence with the charitable and humane people of England and Ireland for my distressed and perishing flock. The heart cannot conceive nor can the tongue describe the frightful and awful sufferings of human nature here. A famine of four long years and the agonies of hunger, unprecedented in the annals of our Irish history, together with fevers, dysenteries, sweating, cold, and nakedness, and, to crown the climax of our misfortune, a raging cholera or plague has set in for the last fortnight. The people are withering with fear and are dying in multitudes. Deaths numerous but coffins few – buried without coffins in dykes and ditches, and many – many disfigured and destroyed by rats. In this doomed and mountainous parish, upwards of nineteen hundreds of God’s creatures fell victim to this devouring famine – more than seven hundred families are wandering without a house to put their heads into. They are seeking shelter in dykes and ditches. This is the effect of the Gregory clause. Five years ago, there were fifteen hundred children attending the several schools in my parish, now there are not ten children. Where are they gone to? Famine and eternity can tell. For the last week, I witnessed many a disconsolate heart. At Bornahowna, Peter Flanagan, wife, the two daughters and two grand-daughters died within one hour of each other. A poor sight – four corpses leaving one house together.
At Gortmore, about the hour of midnight, there were seven corpses in the same house. There is wailing and crying almost in every house. At Ballybanane, Wm. Walsh and his son were found dead, entwined in each other’s arms and both nearly eaten by rats. Martin Walsh, in same village, together with his father and mother, were also found dead. Anthony Derrig, in the next field dead under scraws. At Drimcaggy I found James O’Brien and his wife dead in a sawpit, and near to the place his little child drowned in a stream in the same village. But now there are no villages.
Pat Shaughnessy’s two daughters, his mother, and his wife, were found in a hut dead together. There are many similar and equally distressing cases. They are now complaining before their God. On whom will we call – to whom will we make our sad complaint! Our gardens are turned into graves – our fields strewed with the sick and with the dying – our houses mouldering in dark ruins – our people naked, shivering, wandering, and craving for a grain of meal or a crust of bread. What can a priest do alone? There is no resident landlord, magistrate, or gentleman, in this extensive and remote parish. I am labouring from morning until night, and often from night until morning, in administering to the sick and dying, and helping to bury the dead, where they are melting into corruption by length of time.
I shudder and am sorely afraid at the awful and gloomy prospects before me. Three long months without any prospects of relief, except through charity.
Dear and respected Sir, in the name of charity I call on you – in the name of a suffering Redeemer I invoke you – and in the name of a perishing and dying people I implore you to speak – speak, and arouse the great and the charitable to the relief of the suffering and starving people of this doomed and perishing parish.
With feelings of profound respect, I remain your most humble and most obedient servant,
Peter Ward, Parish Priest, Partry, Ballinrobe.
‘So what do you think of it?’ Gaffney asked.
‘Tears hell out of us all, doesn’t it?’
‘See the acknowledgment. It’s taken from the Freeman’s Journal.’
‘And the date on the letter. That’s the day after I left Father Ward. All the villages he describes, they’re the ones the both of us visited together. He told me when I left that he’d write his own report. To be honest, I thought he was going to send it to the County here, I never thought he’d send it to the Freeman’s Journal.’
‘Confirms everything in your report. Now all Ireland knows of it.’
‘He’s leaving one out though. There was one family, name of Kennedy. Father Ward wouldn’t let me in the door. It upset him something awful. He said there were things no man should see.’
‘You never mentioned that in your report.’
‘I didn’t see inside. I’d have had to attack him to get past, and sure I couldn’t do that. God knows, he was upset enough already.’
‘A pity,’ Gaffney said. ‘There’s been some ghastly stories.’
‘Like what?’
‘Never mind. Now I want you to do a q
uick errand for me. I want you to run over to the Connaught Telegraph, and get five more copies of this paper. Ask for Cavendish if you have any problem.’
Pat forced his way out through the gate. Ghastly stories, too terrible to tell. Again, the same caginess, this time from Gaffney. But what stories?
He reached the Connaught Telegraph. He had decided to ask for Mr. Cavendish anyhow.
The clerk at the door looked up in surprise.
‘Mr. Cavendish? And who should I say is calling?’
‘Pat Ryan. Mr. Gaffney sent me from the County.’
He waited. Then he was ushered into an office.
It was large and needed to be. Along one wall, the floor was piled high with newspapers. The other walls were lined with shelves, covered with heaps of loose papers and files. In the centre was a desk, which was covered with more newspapers and printers’ proofs, all with many scribbles across them. A tall man stood behind. He extended his hand.
‘Pat Ryan?’ he said. ‘I’ve seen your reports.’
‘I know you have, Mr. Cavendish.’
‘Not that any of us should admit that we’ve seen them. But you don’t have to worry, they’re under lock and key. Now, what can I do for you?’
‘I’m looking for five more copies of last Saturday’s Telegraph.’
Cavendish went to the door and whispered an instruction. He returned.
‘How can it help you?’
‘Well, maybe I shouldn’t say, Mr. Cavendish, but the journey Father Ward describes is the one he took me on. No one will believe my word on it though. Father Ward’s letter will help.’
‘You were on this journey?’
‘All he writes about in his letter. I saw every one of the houses and cabins he entered. It’s all true.’
‘And Ballinrobe?’
‘In a terrible way, entirely. Father Ward tells the truth of it.’
Pat made his way back to the Union, and brought the newspapers to Gaffney.
‘That’s splendid,’ Gaffney said. ‘Let’s just open them all at the letter page.’
Then he took the papers, and he walked into the corridor with Pat.
‘I’m afraid I can’t ask you in,’ he said at the door of the Committee Room. ‘You may stay outside.’
Pat could hear loud voices within. Only a few minutes later, Gaffney came out again.
