She turned back to face him again. “Thank you for this.”
“Our pleasure, Maura. We’ve missed having you among us.”
He nudged her on, and she climbed the steps to the house, entering to the aroma of a very traditional potato stew. Mrs. O’Connor stood at the cast-iron stove, checking a pot simmering there.
“There you are, Maura,” she said. “We thought you’d be by in a spell.”
“I would’ve been back sooner, but I stopped for a gab with Katie Archer.” Besides, she hadn’t known anyone was at the house.
“How is our dear Katie?”
“She and I may have worked out a job for me.”
Mrs. O’Connor shot her a look of excitement. “Truly?”
Maura nodded. “I’ve been worrying over that. ’Tis a relief to have such a promising possibility.”
Mrs. O’Connor stirred the pot on the stove again. Maura had only ever cooked over a fire. She hadn’t the first idea how to use a stove. A difficulty suddenly entered her thoughts, weighing heavily on her mind.
“Do you know if the Archers have a stove like this one?”
“Aye.” Mrs. O’Connor set her spoon aside. “Theirs is larger and newer, though. Joseph is quite successful, you know, and wealthy as can be. He owns nearly all this valley, excepting this house and land, mine and Thomas’s” —the senior O’Connors shared both their Christian names with the eldest of their daughters and her husband, a fact that had provided any number of entertaining moments during their time in New York— “and the mercantile and church house. He even owns the land the ranchers use.”
’Twas little wonder, then, that Katie had been confident of her family’s ability to pay a housekeeper.
“What sort of man is Mr. Archer?” Maura asked.
Mrs. O’Connor moved to the wash basin and began cleaning knives, the cutting board, and spoons. “Joseph’s very like our Ian, though a bit less jovial. He’s quiet, thoughtful. As loyal a friend as you’ll ever meet. And he’s fair.”
That sounded promising indeed. “Katie strikes me as much the same.”
“Peas in a pod, those two, though we’d once thought she’d make a good match for Tavish.”
Maura very nearly laughed to hear that. “Tavish, with someone you describe as quiet? I can’t imagine it.”
A quick smile did little to hide the pain in Mrs. O’Connor’s eyes. “He’s changed in the years since you knew him, Maura. Not in the most fundamental ways—he’s still the first to rush to the rescue or to lift a person’s sagging spirits, and he’s still good to his very core—but life has taken a toll on the lad. It has on all of us, truth be told.”
“I’ve—seen Finbarr.” Maura made the statement hesitantly, carefully.
Mrs. O’Connor grew very still, washrag hovering over a dirty spoon. “Did he speak to you?”
“No. He climbed into the loft at Tavish and Cecily’s house and didn’t come back down.”
“He was nearly killed just over a year ago,” Mrs. O’Connor said quietly, resuming her washing. “In some ways he’s doing far better now than he did during those first terrible months afterward. But he struggles mightily. Cecily says it’s to be expected. That he’ll have times when he pulls away and times when he draws near. But seeing him suffer so mightily breaks my heart. Sometimes I worry that we’ll still lose him in the end. Not to his injuries, but to his sorrows. I’m not certain he can bear much more. I’m not sure any of us can.”
Then Maura would not tell them of her diagnosis, not yet, of her own uncertain future. They would know soon enough. This family, with their big, loving, vulnerable hearts did not deserve more worries, not when they were being so kind to her and her son. She would tell them later. For the moment, she would simply treasure their loving kindness.
“I’m ever so grateful to Tavish and Cecily for giving Aidan and me the use of this house. We’d’ve been in dire straits otherwise.”
“You could have stayed with us, if you’d needed,” Mrs. O’Connor assured her as she dried the dishes. “Though you’d’ve been far less comfortable, of course.” She laid down her kitchen towel, then crossed to the table, motioning for Maura to sit with her. “Having Ryan seeing to the land makes it far easier for you to adjust to life out here. It’s so very different from New York. This way, you need not take on the burden of crops and such when you’re so newly arrived.”
She had to admit that, no matter how uncomfortable she’d been at having a man hanging about all the time, Ryan’s role had proven a helpful one. Yes, it meant she couldn’t make a living off the land, but that wouldn’t have been immediately possible anyway. She hadn’t the first idea how to go about farming, nor the ability to work the land on her own. Aidan knew even less than she did.
“Do many families in the valley hire out the working of their land?” She didn’t know if the arrangement Tavish had with Ryan was a common one.
“None. Ryan began working the land when old Granny Claire lived here, after the last of her family died. She couldn’t manage the crops herself, and he needed the money. After she died and left the land to Cecily, he continued on, seeing as Tavish had his own land and income there. It saved Tavish the burden of working two farms, which he couldn’t’ve done anyway. And it’s afforded him and Cecily a bit of extra income. Ryan’s been a godsend.”
“You make him sound like a saint.”
Mrs. O’Connor laughed. “Wouldn’t he be amused to hear that? Ryan’s a good man, mind you, but none of us is a saint. Besides, he’s not working the land out of the goodness of his heart. If I’m not mistaken, he’s always intended to save enough to buy it for himself.”
That was news to Maura. “Truly? The land and barn, too?”
“And the house, I’d imagine. The old soddie would hardly make a comfortable home.”
She wasn’t certain what a soddie was, but that was hardly the most pressing thing Mrs. O’Connor had revealed. “He wants to buy this place?”
Mrs. O’Connor nodded, her expression too light for the difficulty she’d revealed to have truly wriggled its way into her mind. “As far as I know, they’ve not spoken of it specifically, though Tavish thought Ryan was going to make an offer last year. He suspects Ryan might not’ve saved quite enough money to put toward the purchase.”
“I hadn’t heard that,” Maura said quietly.
Mrs. O’Connor hopped up and crossed to the hearth. She pulled back a tea-towel set over two loaves of dough rising in the warmth of the nearly extinguished fire.
Maura sat frozen in her chair. Shocked. Ryan Callaghan meant to buy this house. From the sound of things, his offer would likely be accepted. What, then, would happen to her and Aidan? Mrs. O’Connor had said they’d’ve made room for her and her boy if this house hadn’t been available. They’d likely do so again. But how long could such an arrangement be endured? When Aidan was grown enough, he’d likely have to leave and look elsewhere for work. Her dreams of giving him a life among his family would all come to naught. They needed the stability of a home of their own, here, near his aunts and uncles, cousins and grandparents. She’d let herself begin to believe it was possible. She’d let herself hope.
Questions and doubts began multiplying. What she’d seen as a kindness—Ryan rallying her extended family to help her build the coop—no longer felt so generous. He’d made certain Tavish knew that she was out of her element and had managed to get a much-needed improvement done on land he hoped to call his own. The point of her poverty had likely not helped her cause either, and his pointing out her struggle to get the chickens she needed would have only reinforced that. He would easily be seen as the better choice to assume full possession of this farm.
She’d been going head-to-head with someone in a position to take everything from her. She hadn’t known it.
But he had.
Chapter Fourteen
“Would you be terribly put out if my ma came and sat very quietly in the house during the day?” Ryan shook his head, sighing in fr
ustration at the admittedly weak version of the question he intended to pose to Maura.
Despite practicing this speech for nearly a quarter hour out in the fields, pretending Maura was standing in front of him rather than his crop, he’d not yet hit upon the best approach.
Perhaps if I tried a less pleading approach. He set his shoulders and, in firm tones, told a particularly tall stalk of grass, “Ma’s in need of being closer to me, as her health is not reliable. I need her here during the day, in the house, where I can check on her.”
That was less a question and more a demand. He knew enough of Irish women, and Maura O’Connor, in particular, to know that such an approach would likely go about as well as a mouse herding cats.
He addressed the absent lady once more. “Miss Maura, I’ve come begging a favor on behalf of my mother. She’s ill and a bit frail and needs me nearby to look in on her during the day. Would you be willing to let her stay in the house when I’m here working the fields? She’ll be no trouble, I promise you.”
’Twas neither demanding nor groveling. The underlying difficulty was posed without pity or polish. He was no scholar, but that seemed to him a wise approach.
She’d not turn Ma away after hearing that plea. He hoped.
One thing he was certain of: the hay was coming in beautifully. He’d have some crop loss—that couldn’t be avoided—but the fields were producing well. He’d have plenty enough to fill the ranches’ orders. He’d easily make back the money he’d invested. And heaven knew his sickle-bar mower would cover more acres this summer in far less time than he’d manage by hand.
It truly was a brilliant plan, as Joseph had said. But losing the land would mean his efforts would all be for naught.
He walked the length of the row, checking for signs of distress or trouble, but found none. A very good sign.
Emerging from one of his fields, he came face-to-face with the very person he needed to talk with. “Maura. What brings you ’round here?”
A jumble of emotions filled her expression, frustration and disappointment being chief among them. And the look was aimed at him.
“What’ve I done now?”
“Why’d you not tell me you’re looking to buy this land?” Of all the answers she might have given, he’d not expected that one.
“For one thing, I assumed your family told you,” he said. “For another, I like to keep my own peace, not go spilling my troubles to all the world.”
“But you’ve a taste for telling all the world my troubles, don’t you?” That question held more than a hint of accusation. “It seems all of the O’Connor family knows I’ve little money and no idea how to do any of the things necessary to run this land.”
“I needed a post-hole digger and hands to help build the coop. You couldn’t manage it alone, no, but neither could I. ’Twasn’t a job for one person. Asking for help when help is needed is the way things are done in this valley. Needs don’t stay secret for long.”
“Yet convincing Tavish and Cecily that I’m ill-suited to this place would help your cause tremendously,” she said. “You can’t deny that.”
“I’ve not done anything to undermine your cause,” he said. “I’m not that kind of person.”
Some of her frustration softened, but that only made the worry in her expression more obvious. “I need this house.”
“And I need both this land and the house that sits on it,” he said. “I’ve worked for it, for it specifically for five years. Five years.”
“And I’ve a son who needs stability and a roof over his head, one that won’t simply be snatched away.” Though she wasn’t precisely pleading with him, a hint of it lay in her words. “This house puts my son near family, puts us near family. We need that as well, and I don’t know that we can find it anywhere else.”
He nodded calmly. “You’re reading me my own story, lass. This land puts my ma and me near our family. It will give her back some independence and hope she’s sorely lacking. This land is my only source of income. We need this land and house too.”
She pushed out a short, deep breath. “What do we do, then?”
He shrugged a shoulder and stepped past her. “I don’t know.”
She walked at his side with a silent but swift step. Her breathing still sounded awful. Whatever bit of lung inflammation she’d arrived with hadn’t abated. And she looked every bit as tired as she had then. That exhaustion, and the age of her son, had convinced him she was significantly older than he was. Realizing what he’d been seeing was the weight of worry not the actual passage of years, he now believed her to be likely no more than five years his senior. Not much older, at all. She was simply so burdened and seemed so very alone.
He reminded himself that worrying about her would do him no good; he had plenty enough to be worrying about as it was. Which only served to remind him that he had something to ask her.
“I realize the timing of the request I’m about to make is unfortunate,” he said, not bothering to begin less abruptly, “but I’m in need of a favor.”
“You’re bold, I’ll grant you that.”
“I’d not bother, but it’s for m’ ma. I’d endure nearly anything for her.” He shot Maura a quick look. Certain that she was listening, he pressed on. “She’s not well. It’s nothing catching. Her joints are rheumatic and have been for years. It’s growing worse, though. She needs me to check on her during the day and to help her with things, see to it she’s not suffering overly much.”
“She told me the two of you live with your older brother,” Maura said. “Cannot he look after her?”
“He and his wife have all they can manage looking after their own place and growing brood. Though they do not do so on purpose, they . . . neglect her a bit.” He felt terribly disloyal speaking ill of his brother, but Maura needed to be convinced to accept an inconvenience, and the truth seemed the best way to manage it. “She’s made to feel a burden, which only makes it all worse. I need her close by during the day. So I’m asking if you’d allow her to stay in the house while I’m in the fields. She’ll not give you trouble, and I’ll come inside regularly to see to whatever she needs.”
He looked to Maura again. Her brow was drawn, and her face twisted in thought. She at least appeared to be considering his request. Ryan held his breath as they walked onward.
“My mother-in-law said something about there being a soddie?”
Ryan bristled on the instant. “I’ll not consign her to stay in that. It’s dark and poky, hot in the summer and bitterly cold in the winter. Even the soddie that once sat on our family’s land when we first settled in Hope Springs wasn’t as shabby as the one here.”
Embarrassed color heated Maura’s face. “I was going to ask what a soddie is, as I’m not entirely sure. I hadn’t meant to imply that your mother should be made to pass her days anywhere so miserable.”
He took a calming breath. He believed her explanation, but the thought of his ma confined to those cramped quarters pricked sharply at him. “A soddie is a building made of sod, of dirt. Most of the families here about began in them, living half underground while they built proper homes. Some simply built nicer, bigger soddies. But the one on this land—” How could he adequately describe it? “This one’s currently being used as a vegetable cellar, and it’s better suited to that purpose than for living in.”
She shook her head. “That’d not do for your mother.”
Her assessment showed her to be a thoughtful person and increased the chances of the arrangement he was proposing not being a complete disaster.
“She’s more than welcome in the house. In fact, I’ve a job, beginning Monday, so I’ll be gone during the day as it is.”
“You have?” He didn’t know whether to think of that as a positive development. “What is it you’ll be doing?”
“Grave robbery.” She made the pronouncement so solemnly he almost believed her. But a moment later, he spied devilry in her eyes.
He knew how to play along. “An o
ld profession, that, though not a terribly honorable one.”
“Hadn’t you heard, Ryan Callaghan? The Irish are not honorable people. Violent and ignorant and lacking in any morals, every last one of us.”
“You know, I have heard that. Nearly every American I encountered when I first arrived in this country told me as much. ’Twas eye-opening to realize I, who’d spent my life surrounded by Irish, had been so mistaken in their character.” He picked a blade of feed grass in passing, examining it as they walked on.
“’Tis a fine thing the Americans are willing to explain about us to ourselves,” Maura said. “Why, without them, we might’ve started thinking we were people.”
Ryan ran his fingers over the grass. The blade had the right thickness and texture—pliable without being wilted. “Looks like a good crop this year.”
“I’m glad to hear it.” She sounded sincere.
“I really do love this land, Maura. I can’t just give it up.”
“I know. But neither can I. A life here, with his family nearby, and a future free of factories and crippling poverty—that’s all I have to offer my son.”
He stopped at the path leading to the next field. “We’re at an impasse, then? Both of us are fighting for what only one of us can have in the end?”
Sadness pulled at her brow. “Unfortunately, it seems life means to make enemies of us.”
“I’d’ve far better liked being your friend, Maura,” he said. “I wish fate had dealt us a different hand.”
She nodded. “So do I.”
He motioned with his head toward his field. “I need to check more of the crop.”
“I’ll not keep you.” She walked away, head a little lowered, not in defeat but in thought. Life was uncertain at the moment for both of them, and Ryan hadn’t the first idea who would emerge victorious in the end.
Chapter Fifteen
Maura swept the floor for the second time in a single morning. Mrs. Callaghan was coming that day and would have a full view of how Maura ran her house, of how suited, ill- or otherwise, she was to the life she was trying to build, a life the same woman’s son stood in a position to snatch away. Maura would make certain even the most critical eye could find nothing in her housekeeping to disapprove of.
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