Paula Reed - [Caribbean]

by Nobodys Saint

  Ireland was every bit as green as she remembered, and the damp smell of earth, rain, and seawater brought her clear and vivid pictures of those she loved. After so many weeks on board an Irish vessel, Gaeilge tripped easily off of her tongue, and that, too, added to her sense of homecoming.

  She wished there had been some way of telling her father and sister she was coming. It would have been nice to have someone there to meet her. She had only been to the actual city of Londonderry twice in her life, once with her father and sister and once to sail to England. She had been a lass of seventeen, taken by the hand and guided through. Now, she was a woman of twenty-one, and she had to find her own way. The ship made port, and Captain Cunningham took her ashore.

  “Sure as you said,” he commented, “the crew let you go easy enough, and I’m thinking they won’t be too worried about the money.”

  Mary Kate shook her head. “‘Tis a gift I have.”

  “Will there be anything else you need?”

  “I can take care of myself, thank you.”

  He gave her a bow and a merry grin and was off.

  She waited in the wet for her trunks to be unloaded. Sailors and dock workers bustled around her, perhaps slowing long enough to give her an appreciative glance, but no longer. Once her things had been set beside her, she was overwhelmed by the sense that she didn’t belong there. The trunks were entirely too heavy for her to lift and take anywhere on her own, and everyone around her seemed terribly busy doing other things. They walked around her with clear destinations in mind, while she could only stand and wonder what to do next.

  Taking a deep breath, she reminded herself that she had killed one pirate and nearly outrun another whole group of the miscreants. She had had a brush with the Spanish Inquisition and breezed in and out of a brothel in Port Royal. This was her home. How hard could it be?

  Geoff had left her with enough coin to hire someone to drive her to her village, northeast of Londonderry. She grabbed a sailor she recognized from the ship and paid him and his mates a few coppers to take her things to the main thoroughfare. Once there, she found a public carriage and squeezed in next to a mother and daughter from the country. Across from her sat the father and son. The son was a handsome fellow, not much older than Mary Kate, and she whiled away the time flirting with him and telling the whole family of her adventures in the Caribbean.

  The last time she had seen it, Mary Kate’s village had boasted a pub, three or four stores, a few houses, and a tiny church made of stone, and it had changed very little. There was a new building on the little dirt road, and a new house, but that was all. The carriage stopped outside the local pub, and the driver stepped down to retrieve her trunks. An arrival like hers in such a public place was sure to cause a stir, and before long there were seven or eight people in the street, waiting to see who would step out of the carriage. The first to meet Mary Kate’s eye was the pub owner.

  “Jack Roche! Wouldn’t you just be the first man I’d see? Do you have my old da in there, now?” Too drunk to rise and see what the clamor was, she thought.

  “Haven’t seen your da much here in a long while. Not since Bridget married Conor Fitzpatrick.”

  She felt as if he had slapped her. “Bridget? Married?”

  “She is lass, must have been six or seven month ago.”

  Mary Kate looked at the smiling faces that surrounded her, and smiled back, chatting merrily although something felt completely off-kilter inside of her. She hadn’t heard from Bridget in many weeks before she’d left England. She must have missed the news. Séamus Tylling was there, looking handsome as ever. She had shared what she had thought were passionate kisses with him long, long ago. That was before she had known what passion was. Now, she felt nothing at the sight of him but relief that he had a strong back and probably a wagon thereabouts.

  “Might you help me make my way to my da’s house?” she asked him “I’ll track down Bridget once I settle my things. Come to think of it, news travels fast. She’ll be at our door in time for dinner I’ll wager.”

  Séamus hefted the first trunk onto his shoulder and set out across the street. “She and Conor live with your da, so you’ll not have to wait an extra moment to see her.” He loaded the thing and went to fetch the other.

  Bridget, her new husband, and their da all under one roof? ‘Twas a good thing she had come back. She searched her brain to think of what she could remember about Conor Fitzpatrick. A second cousin, he was, to Maggie Fitzpatrick, who was of an age with Mary Kate. He was quite a bit older though. Why, he had to be at least thirty-five!

  How old was Diego? She forced the thought aside.

  He was a steady, even-tempered man, as she recalled. Bridget and Da had to be driving him straight out of his mind! He’d be so glad to turn Dylan O’Reilly back over to his eldest daughter, Connor might weep with gratitude. And he was a farmer, a tenant on their land. Well, Calder Larcombe’s land, but she had never thought of it that way except when she’d had to send him his rents. So much for Bridget marrying a fisherman who might take Mary Kate out in his boat. It was better that way, she told herself. The water held too many memories.

  Before long they were bouncing over the dirt road, past low stone walls and neat cottages. Sheep grazed in some fields, crops of grain and vegetables grew in others. Everything was green and damp and cool. She had longed for this once, and she tried her best to embrace it now.

  “Tell me of England,” Séamus said.

  “What would you want to be hearing about it? ‘Tis a cold, dreary place filled with stuffy Englishmen who look down their noses at you. I’ve been all the way to Tierra Firme!”

  “Where?”

  “The Spanish Main!”

  “As in the New World?” he asked incredulously.

  “Exactly! I have so much to tell! I’ve been kidnapped by pirates and rescued by a Spaniard, and I’ve seen Havana and Cartagena and Port Royal. I’ve seen slaves with skin blacker than peat.”

  “All that? I’d stay to dinner and hear it all, but Peggy Brannagan and her family are expecting me tonight.”

  “Peggy Brannagan? And here I thought Maggie Fitzpatrick was the other lass in your heart.” Second to me, a long time ago.

  Séamus shook his head. “Her da died, and her mother moved the family to Belfast. She had people there.”

  “That’s sad. Then how is Peggy?”

  “Oh, she’s as fine as can be. We’re to be wed in two weeks. You’ll be there, won’t you?”

  A knife twisted inside of Mary Kate. She didn’t want him. He couldn’t hold a candle to Diego, but everything had changed. She forced another smile. “Of course. Congratulations. She’s a lovely girl.”

  “You’re a lovely girl, too. We had some times between us, we did. All that time away, and no Englishman snapped you up to be his bride?”

  “Me? Marry an Englishman? I’d sooner cut off my right arm.”

  “Well, there’s a lad or two here that will be tripping to your door any day. You’re prettier now than when you left. Of course Liam’s married, and so’s Roche’s youngest, Cian.”

  She vaguely recalled the news of Liam in one of her sister’s letters. “Cian, too?” Wasn’t he younger than she?

  “Well, Cian and Sarah Kenedy have been married less than a year and have a five- month-old daughter, if you catch my meaning.”

  “Sarah Kenedy? Why, she’s only a child.”

  “Sixteen. Old enough.”

  Sarah wasn’t the first young girl in the village to have borne an early baby. It was just that Mary Kate had once known everything that went on here. Now, she felt like an outsider.

  The feeling only intensified when they reached the manor house. The square, stone house hadn’t changed, but the roof looked new, and the wall around the front yard had been repaired, keeping the sheep away. The grass was neatly mowed, and the flower and vegetable gardens that had once been choked with weeds thrived in tidy little rows.

  In the distance she could see two m
en swinging scythes in a field of rye, the many bundles behind them testifying to their efficiency. It was hard to tell from so far away, but she rather imagined that Conor was out there, working so hard. She didn’t know who was with him.

  Séamus lifted her down from the wagon, his hands not touching her a second longer than was proper. Once, she would have had to slap his hands away—after she had let them wander just a bit. Strange as it seemed, it felt awkward to have him behave himself.

  “Thank you, Séamus,” she said, turning away.

  “I’ll take your things inside,” he said and once again lifted a heavy trunk onto his back.

  He still had fine, broad shoulders, she thought, but she had since learned that she liked her men lean and lanky.

  He led the way and pounded on the door with the toe of his boot, and Mary Kate waited outside the door of her own house. It didn’t feel right to barge in unexpected.

  The door opened, and Bridget stared at her a moment before she screamed and cried, “Mary Kate, by the saints it is you!”

  They still looked a great deal alike, with their dark hair and blue eyes, but there was something about Bridget now that glowed. The two women embraced, and Mary Kate breathed in the woodsy scent of forget-me-nots that Bridget favored over Mary Kate’s rosewater. She hadn’t grown any, still three inches shorter than Mary Kate. The embrace felt almost perfect.

  Almost.

  They pulled apart, and Mary Kate’s gaze fell to Bridget’s stomach. Bridget laughed and clasped her hands over the small swell. “Four more months to go. Oh, I’m so glad he or she will get to meet you.

  “Do you mind, ladies?” Séamus complained. “I’ve a good-sized load here.”

  “Come in, come in!” Bridget said, pulling Mary Kate inside the house and then off to the side so that Séamus could pass.

  The house was as neat as a pin, and the savory smell of mutton stew hung in the air.

  “That’s a smell I’ve missed, I’ll tell you,” Mary Kate said.

  Bridget beamed. “Da says mine’s nearly as good as yours. Oh! Speaking of Da, did he see you when you came in?”

  “Where is he?”

  “Out in the field with Conor. Oh!” Bridget giggled again. “I’m married, you know, to Conor Fitzpatrick, and a full two months before this, in case you’re wondering.” She clasped her stomach again.

  Séamus set his burden down inside and tramped back out for the other trunk.

  “I heard. Jack Roche told me the second I stepped out of the carriage.”

  “What about you? Sir Calder said he’d found you a husband. He said he was sending you to the New World. We thought we’d never see you again! Sir Calder told Da the name of your betrothed, and I sent a letter. I can’t imagine where it will end up.”

  “If John Hartford gets it, he’ll likely burn it just because it bears my name.”

  Bridget laughed merrily. “Couldn’t send you back fast enough, could he? But you must tell me everything!”

  The second trunk arrived on Conor Fitzpatrick’s broad shoulders. “Mary Mother of God, it is you,” he said, setting the trunk down near the door.

  “Mary Katherine!” She recognized her father’s voice and spun to greet him. He folded his arms around her, and she noticed he was heavier than he had been when she’d left. Not fat, just not rail thin. She inhaled again, longing for familiar smells where touch had let her down. He didn’t smell right. Something was wrong.

  She pulled away and looked deeply into his eyes, clear and blue as her own. Bright and full of life, they were.

  “Mother of God, you’re stone-cold sober, aren’t you?”

  He grinned. Lord, had he always been so handsome? “As a judge.”

  “Mother of God,” she whispered again. Why? Why did it feel like such a betrayal? She should be so happy, but all she wanted to do was bring him a bottle of whiskey and get her old life back.

  She stepped back and her eyes traveled back and forth across the trio, and then those eyes began to burn, and her mouth started to quiver, and her throat started to close.

  “Mary Kate, are you going to cry?” Bridget asked, wonder in her voice.

  “Of course not. I’m just so happy to be home—to see you all.” Oh God, she was going to cry.

  “We’re glad to have you back, too, lass,” her father said, reaching for her.

  She jerked backward, terrified that if he touched her again, everything inside her would come spilling out. Not just the tears, but the curses and rage that threatened to explode.

  Damn them! Damn them! Damn them all for getting on just fine without her! Damn them for luring her away from the man she had given herself to, for making her leave a part of herself behind, when she’d never had to leave at all!

  She turned on her heel and fled up the stone stairs to the room she and her sister had shared, then stopped short when she got there. There were strange things in here, men’s things. A shirt tossed over the bed, like it belonged there, a man’s jacket hanging on the peg by the door, a brush she had never seen before, a pair of men’s shoes at the foot of the bed.

  And next to the dressing table was the cradle that had held her and Bridget as babes.

  She walked over and sank down next to it, fighting to hold back the tears until she couldn’t breathe.

  “I know it seems silly,” came Bridget’s soft voice behind her. Bridget’s soft voice? “We won’t need the cradle for so long, and Conor says ‘tis inviting bad luck, but I just wanted something to make it feel real.”

  “Everything’s changed,” Mary Kate said.

  “For the better. You’ll see. There’s a bed in the spare room now. ‘Tis yours, if you’ll have it.”

  “So I’m gone, and everything’s better. I never knew I was holding everyone back.”

  “What are you talking about? What are you saying?”

  Mary Kate hated the sound of bitterness she couldn’t keep from her voice. “Apparently I was the one who drove Da to drink and who could never keep the yard neat nor the crops all harvested.”

  “So you know, Mary Kate,” Bridget said, “Da near drank himself to death when he sent you away. And then, when he heard that you’d been sent to Jamaica, he…well, I’ll let him tell it to you. But it was about that time that I married Conor. He’s a pigheaded man that one. Oh, he don’t yell and throw a fit like we do, but he don’t back down either. He poured all Da’s whiskey down the privy. Stank to high heaven, and not the usual smell, I’ll tell you.”

  “You learned to cook!” It was an accusation, not praise.

  “After you left. What choice did I have? If it seems like things are running better without you, ‘tis only because there’s more of us sharing the load. You always had to bear it alone, Mary Kate. That was the lion’s share of your pride.”

  Mary Kate’s tone softened. “I thought I had done it all so well.”

  “You did.” Bridget sat on the floor next to her. “You did. Too well. D’you know how lost I was at first? Da and I nearly killed each other at least once a week. I needed you to follow, to tell me how to deal with him. I couldn’t cook, and I burned everything. I never cared for numbers, so Da, blind drunk, tried to keep the accounts. When the collectors started showing up, I had to learn fast. D’you know how many times I cursed your name for leaving me?”

  Mary Kate smiled. “How many?”

  “Mary Kate!”

  She put her hand in her sister’s. “I didn’t want to leave.”

  “I thought you didn’t fight hard enough.” Bridget squeezed that hand.

  “I only went because Sir Calder said that he’d throw us out if I didn’t.”

  “He would have, too. But I was fifteen and selfish. You were supposed to take care of me.”

  Mary Kate sniffed and dashed away the drop that spilled over her eye before it could find its way to her cheek. “I’m sorry I couldn’t.”

  “It was for the best, though. It made me grow up. D’you think a little hoyden like I was could have caug
ht the eye of a man like Conor Fitzpatrick? He said I was a brat before, but I have spirit now.”

  Mary Kate swallowed past the lump in her throat and lied through her teeth. “I’m glad you’re happy. I’m glad you had a chance to grow up.”

  “What of you? You’ve been through so much. How have you grown, Mary Kate?”

  I’ve grown so I don’t fit in here anymore, she thought. I’ve seen things, been places. I’ve learned I love the open sea and crowds of people in every color speaking every language. I’ve learned about honor and true sacrifice, rather than merely manipulating people so I get what I want.

  “A lot.” She laid her hand on the cradle and set it to rocking. “I want to marry a fisherman or a sea captain and live by the water all my life, I know that much.”

  “A fisherman? Now I’d never have thought of that.”

  “Bridget?”

  “Aye?”

  “I need you.” The tears were coming too fast to stop.

  “I always hoped that someday you might.” Bridget gathered Mary Kate into her arms and let her sister sob.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Mary Kate and Father Brendan sat in a pew in the otherwise empty chapel. The tiny sanctuary of stone with its lovely Celtic carvings couldn’t compare to the cathedral in Cartagena, there was no altar of gold or pulpit of marble, but it was intimate and familiar.

  “You must try harder to repent, Mary Kate.” Father Brendan was young, perhaps a few years shy of his forties, and Mary Kate had always felt that she could be entirely frank with him.

  “I can’t! I’ve tried and I can’t. I’d do every bit of it again if I had a chance. Oh, Father, if I hadn’t been so pig-headed, I’d do it all but be married next time.”

  “That would be a start. You can at least agree that you repent what you did without the sanctity of marriage.”

  “Well, I suppose I could regret that, aye.”