The Blacksmith's Wife

by Anne Doughty

  As she came back into Sir George’s study, she noticed that the chair where Annie had sat had disappeared, Friday’s letters had arrived and there was a note tucked into the blotter.

  It was brief and to the point. Bridget Carey would be expecting her for lunch in her own room.

  By the time Sarah arrived home before it was fully dark, she was longing for the quiet of her own fireside. It would be an hour or more before Scottie appeared for supper and she needed the time badly to absorb all the happenings of the day.

  Among the pile of Friday’s delivery, there was one from Sir George in London. He told her he was hoping to come to Castle Dillon sometime in the next few days, probably accompanied by his eldest son. Lady Emma was reluctant to travel in such bad weather and did not think it would be good for the children. Sir George wanted her to begin at once the arrangements for an earlier than usual staff Christmas party as she had done last year with the help of Mrs Carey.

  Clearly he intended to be in Dublin on Christmas Day itself but did not want to disappoint his staff at Castle Dillon. At least Bridget Carey was now a friend, as well as a colleague, a practical woman with no time for making a fuss, but it was going to make a lot of extra work just when she was hoping to have a little extra time off during Jonathan’s visit.

  Except that the timing of Jonathan’s visit was now in some doubt. He was certainly coming to Ireland and the itinerary planned with some fellow Quakers was going ahead, but he was writing to warn her that bad weather in Donegal might affect their plans to spend some time together over the Christmas period.

  Among Friday’s letters, she found a short note from him, sent to Castle Dillon at the same time as a letter to Drumilly in case her postman had not been able to get up the hill. From what he said, it looked as if the weather in Yorkshire had been even worse than in Ulster. He’d ended by warning her that sailings might be cancelled if there were more gales like those in November.

  She sat looking into the flames of the restored fire, grateful for the cheering warmth but feeling incredibly sad. She had been so looking forward to seeing him, sharing with him all the plans and projects they both had, the successes as well as the failures in their efforts to help people in dire straits.

  Now, if there were gales, he might not get to Ireland in the first place and even if he did, the plans they had made would have to take second place to the commitment he had to his colleagues from the Quaker Central Relief Committee who were charged to provide updates on projects already in place in some of the most deprived areas.

  How long she sat, she had no idea, but when she heard footsteps outside the kitchen door she assumed it was Scottie arriving for his evening meal. She realised she’d closed her eyes and must have dozed off. She had not even got as far as beginning to lay the table.

  But it was not Scottie who came in: it was Jamsey, a dusting of fresh snow on his hair and shoulders. It needed only one glance to see that he brought news, and good news at that.

  ‘Great news, Sarah,’ he said, taking off his jacket. ‘That wee Annie has had her baby, a wee boy, and Ma says he may be small but he’s lively. She said to tell you she thinks they’ll both do.’

  To her great embarrassment, and to Jamsey’s surprise, he saw Sarah’s eyes stream with tears.

  ‘Oh Jamsey, what a lovely Christmas present,’ she said, as she searched for her handkerchief to mop them up.

  ‘I’m going over now to Castle Dillon to tell James,’ he said happily. ‘He’ll maybe get let out to come an’ see Annie the morra.’

  Sarah nodded and said she hoped the snow was only a shower, but she knew Jamsey was a determined young man and a good driver. Clearly he had already made up his mind. He was going to Castle Dillon, snow or no snow.

  ‘When you get there, Jamsey, ask if you can speak to Mrs Carey. Tell her, Mrs Halligan says, “she was right about the stain on the chair”, and that all is well. She’ll know what that means. And tell her I’m so grateful for all she’s done to help. She’ll probably arrange for James to come up tomorrow to see his son,’ she ended quickly, as she felt tears well up again.

  ‘Ach, isn’t it great to have good news for a change?’ said Jamsey, unexpectedly. ‘I’ll away on and leave ye to tell m’ friend Scottie when he comes in for his tea.’

  ‘I will indeed,’ said Sarah happily. ‘And you can tell your mother when you get back home that she has another satisfied customer to add to her score. You may not know, Jamsey, for she doesn’t talk about such things, but she looked after me when I was in a bad way after John died. Without her, I might not be celebrating with Annie and James tonight.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  There was no improvement in the weather as Christmas approached. On one or two days it was so bad that Scottie refused to harness Daisy, saying it was too dangerous for both her and Sarah to try to travel on such icy roads.

  While Sarah suppressed a smile, knowing what Mary-Anne might say about Scottie’s protectiveness, she did recognise the danger and accepted that it was just not worth the risk. If Daisy were to fall, she might be badly injured and the thought of her having to be despatched by a vet was far too painful to contemplate, especially after all the journeys she’d made possible since Sarah’s first visit to Castle Dillon.

  There was, of course, someone else who would have vigorously supported Scottie’s firm approach, but of her dear Jonathan she hardly dare think. In the last week before Christmas she’d had no letter for several days, so she still didn’t know if he’d been able to reach Belfast or whether perhaps he had managed that, but had then been so behind schedule he’d had to go straight on to north Donegal, the first stop on the schedule drawn up by the London Relief Committee of the Society of Friends.

  He had taken great care to warn her thoroughly, knowing how she might worry, that even if all went well, she might still not receive his letters very promptly or even in the correct order. All they could do was hope that their dearest wish would be granted and he could stay a night or two in the Charlemont Arms on his return from north Donegal to make up for the visit he’d hoped to make between his arrival in Belfast and the date he was committed to travelling to the north-west with his colleagues from the Relief Committee.

  Meantime, at both Castle Dillon and Drumilly Hill, everyday life seemed to get harder day by day. Even when Sarah was forced to stay at home, there were so many neglected tasks to catch up on that she worked hard all day and wondered by the evening why she had not been able to achieve more.

  While she and Bridget Carey had been busy preparing for Sir George’s very successful staff Christmas party, she’d barely managed to prepare food and fresh bread for Sam, Scottie and herself. Now, she found she was always searching for clean collars to freshen up her work dress and a second, even warmer dress, she’d begun in late November was still laid out in pieces in her bedroom.

  But she did admit, most willingly and gratefully, that what took up a lot of her time at home was counting money. Not only did she fill more and more small brown envelopes for women who sewed for the stall, but she now had to write regular thank you letters to both Ben and John’s brother, George, for their regular gifts of dollars.

  George had not only returned to her the money she’d given him so he could emigrate with his family, but he had set up a Relief Committee in Quebec, where he’d found work. He sent her dollars that had been collected by both Irish emigrants now settled and in work and kindly Canadians who had known hardship in their own past lives.

  Ben had drafted in his workmates in a factory turning out agricultural tools and equipment and continued to send dollars whenever he’d accumulated a significant sum.

  Most generous of all was Helen, her dear friend from childhood, who had mobilised her local friends in Charleston to take it in turns to meet at each other’s homes and use their skills in making patchwork quilts. From what Helen said, and knowing both her love of colour and her skill with a needle, Sarah could imagine what lovely creations the handmade quilts
were. She was not at all surprised they sold for such high prices to the owners of the big houses, both in South Carolina and in Georgia where friends of Helen’s husband had set up a support group. But organising it all did take time. She often laughed with Mary-Anne at how amazing it was that putting money in envelopes should be such a time consuming job, but the truth was that now the cold weather appeared to have settled in for the winter, the trade on the market stall was growing all the time. Sarah herself now had little time to sew, but she more than used that time with the amount of calculating the job required.

  It was on Friday 19th December, another snow ridden day that, to her amazement, the postman had managed the hill aided by his rubber boots and now sat down willingly for the tea she offered at her kitchen table. Together they looked at the letter he took from his bag. It was postmarked Donegal and looked as if it had taken over a week to come, the address smudged as if the envelope had been caught in a shower of rain or snow.

  She could hardly wait for her postman to thank her and say he must be going so that she could read it quickly to see if it held out any prospect of her and Jonathan being able to meet.

  She then drew over to the fire and settled down to read it slowly, so grateful to be able to share Jonathan’s immediate concerns and to have something of his which would tell her how he was faring, a small comfort when she would willingly travel with him if only circumstances were different.

  Dunfanaghy,

  10th December 1846

  My dearest Sarah,

  I am writing this by the flickering light of an ill-functioning oil lamp in a very cold bedroom in the only hotel in this small town. I cannot tell you what a joy it is after all that has happened in the past days to be sitting here writing to you, knowing that we still have hope for a meeting and for the letters we share.

  I have to confess to you that I thought I would never see you again. We set out from Liverpool in rough weather, but the rocking and pitching of the ship when we left the shelter of the Mersey was as nothing compared to the sudden gale that hit us when we were in the middle of the Irish Sea. I could not bear being thrown around in my tiny cabin facing the prospect of going down with the ship, so I went out onto the deck and clung to a coil of rope attached to the structure. I was there when part of the rigging fell down and landed only yards away from me.

  I could see that even the seamen were frightened and for a time we turned back, presumably seeking quieter waters, but there were none to be had and in the end the captain must have decided our only hope was to run before the storm and end up wherever it might leave us.

  Our chances of survival seemed to me to grow smaller with each passing minute, but I thought about you and prayed for strength. As you see, my prayers were answered. We found haven somewhere in Scotland and were kindly treated there, staying a day and a night, till the gale abated. The second attempt to cross to Ireland was still turbulent, but it was a shorter distance and, compared with what had gone before, I was positively confident that we would meet again.

  Sarah, my dearest, can you still love a man who has to confess to being so afraid? Knowing you as I do, I think you could, but I wish I could have been stronger.

  Because we arrived two days late, the coach awaited us in Belfast and so we set out directly for Donegal. That journey was made difficult by the frequent snowstorms. We arrived here in the middle of the night and I confess I was so exhausted that I could no longer put pen to paper. Foolishly, I had not brought paper with me and I could hardly ask the innkeeper to provide me when he appeared in his nightshirt with a flickering candle.

  How long it may take for this letter to reach you I dare not think, but I know you will not give up hope until all hope is indeed lost.

  We began our work this morning, much helped by a respectable merchant in the corn and flour trade. He confirmed in every detail the dreadful reports we had had from various sources in the area. The small farmers and cottiers have sold all their pigs and fowl and even their bedclothes and fishing nets for the one purpose of gaining the wherewithal to buy food. He said it was common enough for families of five to eight people to subsist on about two and a half pounds of oatmeal a day made into a thin gruel, about six ounces of meal for each!

  This, my dearest, is heartbreaking to us, for Dunfanaghy Bay is teeming with fish, as I think I told you earlier in the year. The problem is that their fragile curraghs are only suitable for fair weather fishing. They need robust boats and people to show them how to make best use of them. But the plans we set in hand to get this going in the early summer have not materialised. Meantime, people starve for want of help.

  To address that situation is, of course, our purpose here and we have come prepared and will do what we can as quickly as possible. I know from past visits to my cousins that this is a beautiful place: I have been here in springtime when every hedgerow is full of primroses and in summer when the mountains are ablaze with heather, the sky a blue dome with great white clouds piled up like castles. How I would love to be with you here when this great affliction has passed away. But then I would be happy to be with you anywhere. That is my most fervent prayer, that we can be truly together and share whatever time we are given.

  I shall write again as soon as I can, but know that I am, for the moment at least, safe from the perils of the sea and travelling with good companions who share our hopes.

  Take care of yourself, my dear one. I long to see you again.

  Your sincere friend,

  Jonathan

  Buoyed up by relief and delight, Sarah returned to Castle Dillon on Monday after her enforced absence with a lighter heart and was greeted with more good news. Sir George had now departed for Dublin, but he had left instructions with Bridget that Annie and James were to be found lodgings somewhere in the house or stables, and that she was to make provision for a young person to look after the child so that Annie could carry on with her work.

  Sir George had obviously spoken to the incumbent of St Aidan’s, the parish church of Salter’s Grange, for in the letters awaiting Sarah’s attention she found a courteous note from him. It offered a date and a time at which the young couple could be married and then have their child baptised.

  Meanwhile, Bridget had been busy. Finding that one of her ground-floor storerooms actually had a fireplace, she’d had the room emptied, thoroughly aired and then furnished from discreet subtractions from some of the smaller guest bedrooms. The happy couple now not only had a bed and a table and chairs, but the means of making a pot of tea or a bowl of porridge, a luxury they could only have dreamt of when they climbed the ladder in the barn, cautiously and separately, so that they could be together.

  On her next visit to Armagh to deposit cheques for Sir George, Sarah bought them a cake tin and some china mugs, then baked them a cake to put in it. When she gave it to Annie the next day, she asked her if there was anything she still needed.

  Annie shook her head. ‘Sure haven’t I a thousand times more than iver I had in all my life,’ she replied, close to tears. ‘James and little Patrick, and a home of our own, an’ a girl comin’ from the workhouse to look after him. Sure how could I need anythin’ more an’ now your lovely tin to put cake in and mugs to give out to our visitors. Sure I couldn’t want more if I were the Queen herself.’

  Their joy was palpable, touching all the staff. Each one of them had made some small contribution to their single-room home and the wash room they would share with some of their colleagues.

  But the most generous, and most surprising, gift of all was from Smithers. He presented the young couple with a proper cradle so they could return the drawer that Bridget had lent them to the dresser in the main kitchen.

  His change of attitude towards James was now visible. Most of the staff assumed it was because James himself had ‘had promotion’, having now been given tasks of stocktaking and accountancy which Bridget was more than happy to shed, but Sarah suspected that Bridget had once again had a word with Smithers.

  Sar
ah did raise the question when they had lunch together in Bridget’s room, but Bridget only smiled. Whatever secret she held, she intended to keep it, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t prepared to use it to the advantage of Annie and James.

  Drumilly Hill,

  24th December 1846

  My dearest Jonathan,

  What joy that you have received two of my letters when I had hardly dared hope that mine might travel any faster than yours to me. How I wish I could personally thank that merchant you mentioned who, finding them at the hotel, sent them to you in Bunbeg with a carter he knew who was going there. Our Christmas angel. May he be blessed.

  After your harrowing journey from Liverpool and the discomforts of winter travelling, I was so pleased to have some glad tidings to share with you. The arrival of little Patrick, now baptised, and his parents’ joy, seems to have cast a glow over Castle Dillon. Despite the miserable weather, which has at least brought a welcome thaw, everyone seems to be in good spirits and determined to celebrate Christmas Day, even though the Christmas party was some two weeks ago.

  I was invited to join the rest of the staff for dinner tomorrow but I had already said I would go to Mary-Anne, who kindly invited Scottie as well. It is her first Christmas without Billy and, although they could hardly be described as a loving couple, they did care for each other.

  Apparently Mary-Anne received a gift of a goose last Thursday at the stall when I was busy with customers. Only later did I find that all the women who sew for us had been saving a penny a week in December, knowing that if Mary-Anne had a goose then I would be sure to share it.

  I don’t think Scottie has ever had goose and he does so enjoy his food.

  My dear, what a homely letter, and yet I should not apologise for it being so. We speak as we see and say what is in our hearts. That is not simply a measure of honesty such as we both value, it is a measure of love. What is of importance to one, however homely, or indeed however elevated, for we do sometimes wax metaphysical, is always of importance to the other. The sharing is part of our loving.