“I hankered after Mam's bonny-clabber when I was in England,” added Daniel. “Now I know how it feels to be delivered from Purgatory.”
They were drawing near to Dunmanway. They decided it would be prudent to circumvent the town with all their food, lest someone try to take it. “Hunger makes for desperate folk,” lamented Daniel. So they went north and west, drawing near the Cox estate.
The Protestant Cox family had bought most of Dunmanway and its environs over one hundred and twenty-five years earlier, becoming landlords to almost everyone in the district. They had attempted to make their “investment” bear fruit by starting linen, wool, and cotton industries in the town, as well as establishing other trades. But the inhabitants of Dunmanway did not measure up to the level of compliance demanded of them. Nor did nature cooperate with its periodic famines; starving workers were not productive. The Coxes lived stylishly in their Georgian mansion to the east of the town, but the temperament of the Irish people and the Irish countryside, as well as competition from the English markets, prevented them from reaching the pinnacle of wealth.
The afternoon sun reeled from behind the clouds, brightening the greens of the landscape; Daniel’s dismal memories of Sheffield contrasted with the soul-rending splendor of the Munster hills and plains. The air was brisk, as if spring had never ended, but had only been sleeping and now awoke with enthusiasm. The fragrance of the sod, grasses, and waters was pungent and alive. It was a primeval land, a land full of pain, servitude and death, and yet so heartbreakingly young, energetic and free. Daniel hoped that he would never again have to leave his homeland.
A party of riders was cantering towards them. Among them was a young lady.
“And here comes the landlord's daughter,” sang Owen, with a mischievous wink at Daniel, as his eyes sparkled to a deeper shade of blue. “God bless us and keep us!”
Daniel's florid face, with its wide, high cheekbones, heavy brow, full mouth, strong, jutting jaw and straight nose, was drained of all color, as if in dread. Encountering Miss Helena Cox was both an unexpected joy and a horror; that he had made her acquaintance at all was something that never should have happened.
It would not have happened except for the accident at the linen mill in Dunmanway, in which dozens of workers were maimed and wounded. The local physician, Dr. Smythe, was called to the scene, along with the area's blacksmiths and barbers, including Daniel, who found himself assisting Dr. Smythe in aiding a man with multiple breaks and fractures. The doctor was impressed by Daniel's skill in setting the bones and his knowledge of anatomy.
“You are an uncanny lad,” declared Dr. Smythe. “You have a gift for healing. I would like for you to assist me. Someday, perhaps if there are changes, you might become a doctor yourself.” As the law then stood, Catholics could not be given licenses to practice medicine. Thus Daniel began a new life of accompanying the doctor on his rounds throughout the district, although he kept working at the smithy part time. It was what first brought him to the Cox estate. Miss Helena Cox had been thrown from her horse, and had broken her ankle.
Daniel had never been in an elegant home before, never seen the glitter of crystal and the gleam of silver, although his mother still had a few of the china dishes and the teapot that had come with her dowry. His parents had told him never to act overawed around the English. “Be courteous and humble as becomes a good Christian,” his father told him. “But never be obsequious. Always remember that in Ireland your people once were kings.”
“Don't slouch, you're as good as they are,” his mother had told him.
So it was that Daniel entered the Cox household with head held high, keeping custody of the eyes so as not to ogle in spite of himself. Miss Cox was lying upon a green velvet sofa in the drawing room, still garbed in her riding habit; her boots and hat were tossed in a heap on the floor beside her. Tousled, honey-blond curls were spread loose upon the silk-fringed cushion. Her pale blue eyes grew wide upon seeing Daniel, as though one of the farm animals had just entered the room.
The doctor examined the afflicted member, and then addressed the young lady's parents, who hovered nearby. “Mr. and Mrs. Cox, this young man is the best bonesetter in Dunmanway. I ask your permission to allow him to treat Miss Helena’s ankle.”
“I will not permit that peasant to touch my child,” declared Mrs. Cox, clasping a lace handkerchief in her hand. Mr. Cox murmured something to her, and then turned to Daniel.
“What is your name, lad?”
Daniel bowed. “I am Daniel O'Connor, sir. My father is Michael O'Connor of Togher.”
“I know of him. You come from steady, respectable folk. Dr. Smythe, a word, if you please...” The doctor and Mr. Cox conferred in a corner for a moment. When they returned, Dr. Smythe patted Daniel on the shoulder. "Go on, lad."
“Let me hold your hand, darling,” whimpered Mrs. Cox to Helena. Daniel's fingers, strong as steel but gentle, examined the ankle. He was surprised when his patient did not cry out as he snapped the bones into place, although he sensed a shudder run through her and heard a quick intake of breath. He glanced up to see her staring out the window, clinging to her mother’s hand.
“Good work!” exclaimed Dr. Smythe, as he began to bind the ankle. Miss Helena looked directly into Daniel’s face.
“Thank you, Daniel,” she said, sweetly, as a single tear trickled down her face, and she held out her hand. The tear flooded his heart like a deluge, and from that moment his love for Helena was the breath of life to him.
Now as Helena approached with her entourage, Daniel could see her blond mane tossing in the wind beneath a man's high-crowned hat with a long veil billowing behind. He doffed his own hat, revealing his matted, chestnut curls. In the year that had passed since he had first visited the Cox estate, he had been summoned occasionally not only to mend bones, but to repair broken farm equipment and kitchen implements, and to help with the horses. His knack in handling the beasts had also become known to Mr. Cox and so he was called to help train them and to care for them in their illnesses. On those visits, he had only glimpsed Helena and barely a word passed between them. They greeted one another with only a polite nod and a bow, except for once, when he saw her in the stables and helped her mount her horse. Then she had asked after his family, if they were all well, but Daniel was so flummoxed by the touch of her gloved hand, he could only say, “Aye, Miss.”
She was now but a few yards away. The three gentlemen riding with her, whom Daniel recognized as her brother and cousins, made as if to pass without acknowledging their existence, but Helena slowed her horse to a trot. “Good afternoon, Daniel O’Connor,” she called with a slight nod of the head, and the hint of a smile.
“And a very good day to you, Miss,” he replied with a bow.
“I presume this young man to be one of your brothers?” She reined the horse to a walk.
“He is, Miss. ‘Tis me brother Owen.” Owen swept his hat from his dark wild mop with a flourish, making an elaborate bow as if he were meeting a queen.
“Very good! Happy Saint Patrick's Day!" And she galloped away.
“Bleeding Bonaparte! So they believe in Saint Patrick, do they?” asked Owen, plopping his hat back on his head.
“Aye. But they think he was a Protestant,” sighed Daniel, watching Helena until she disappeared.
“What! That's foolish nonsense! Not only do they steal our land, they steal our saints!” exclaimed Owen.
“Now Owen, don’t you be forgetting that Mr. Cox is a good man as landlords go. He has a fair twice a year in Dunmanway, and a market every Tuesday, and has done a lot to keep folk from starving when the potatoes are blighted.”
“Oh, come now, Dan. We are all his slaves. Just a pack of slaves.”
“Remember what Pa always says. No man can be a slave if he has gained mastery of himself. And anyway, Mr. Cox has paid me well. I will use the money I save to train to be a doctor.”
“Doctor!” snorted Owen. “Do you think the English will let you become a
doctor? You're dreaming, man. And how much of your savings have you used up during the famine? How much will be left by the time things are back to normal?”
Daniel pondered Owen's words. “Then I'll just start working and saving again.”
“Until the next famine takes it all once more. Oh, Dan, there is no getting ahead in this country. We might all be better off in Australia.”
“Don’t be saying that. Things will get better . . .” They both fell into silence.
They were passing a circle of standing stones, a reminder of the pagan days long ago, before Saint Patrick had come to preach the Gospel. Daniel thought of the courage of the saint, to return to the land where he had been enslaved, facing the fierce Irish chieftains and druids, being hunted and tortured, but finally establishing the Church. It was said that when the great Patrick passed from this world into heaven, the night was never as dark as it had been before his coming.
Soon they were in the heart of Gleann-a-croim the former domain of the MacCarthy clan, last of the Gaelic realms. In the distance loomed Togher Castle, once inhabited by the O’Connors; only a solitary ruined tower remained, surrounded by pasture and a few grazing sheep, with the hills in the distance. As they traveled beside the River Bandon, they passed the blacksmith’s forge where Daniel labored under Mick O’Leary. Mick’s daughter Roisin was walking up from the river with a bucket of water. She was about fifteen years old, and the setting sun shone upon her red braids.
“Meeting a red-haired woman on a journey brings misfortune!” said Daniel to Owen with a smile, loud enough for Roisin to hear.
“And what journey might that be?” she retorted. “Traipsing about Cork on a holy day is nothing like to what I would be calling a journey. Sounds like a lot of boggin’ off!”
“Boggin’ off indeed!" said Owen. “Come see what the cart is full of...’tis a feast we'll be having tonight!”
“Then I'd best be about my chores, Owen O’Connor, so I can hear you sing!” Her face, fresh and freckled, was one big grin as she entered the cottage.
“One of us has got to marry her,” declared Owen. “Which one, I wonder?”
“Michael, of course,” replied Daniel. “He’s the eldest.”
“But I'm closer to her age. And I love her,” sighed Owen.
“Now how would you be supporting a wife, when you won't persevere in a trade...and work being scarce as it is? Besides, you're too young!”
“I just thought...” Owen trailed off. He scowled, and kicked at a stone.
“Don't think. At least, not of Roisin...Come, we're almost home.”
They traversed the road through the fields cultivated by Michael O'Connor. Last October, the acreage allotted to potatoes had smelled from a distance of the rotten, blighted crop, and some of the stench still lingered, although the fields were newly plowed. Oats, barley, rye, and beans were also grown; otherwise the family would have been on the brink of starvation, for all the wheat belonged to the landlord. Their father often told them why the Irish had come to rely on potatoes: land was limited because of generations of subdividing, and potatoes did not take up much space. Also, because they were underground, potatoes could not be burned or destroyed by enemies. In the hard times, they lived on watercress, roots, mushrooms, shamrocks, oatmeal and milk.
“‘Tis a blessing your Pa heeded me when I begged him to plant more oats last spring,” their mother had said several times over the winter. “For now, at least, we can have a bit of porridge.”
The crumbling tower of Togher castle stood but a stone’s throw from the O'Connor cottage. An ominous bastion of past glory, Daniel and his brothers and sisters never went near it, for once a child had died there and though the death had been an accident, the place was seen as being accursed. Dispossessed of the castle by Cromwell’s men, the O’Connors were still regarded as gentry by their fellow tenants, and Michael O’Connor exercised a certain moral authority in the neighborhood. The whitewashed, thatched, stone cottage was more like a small house than a typical Irish cabin, with a second story and an adjoining parlor, and outbuildings such as a buttery and a loom house, although the barn butted right up against the kitchen in the Celtic manner. The animals provided additional warmth in the winters.
As the boys neared the cottage, a few chickens were foraging in the yard and a cow peered out the half-door of the barn, just a few feet from the kitchen door, mooing in amicable welcome. In the back were their mother's field of flax and her vegetable patch, still dormant. In the front were several rose bushes slept; when in bloom they were white for the Jacobite cause, in memory of the time over a century ago when the O'Connors had gone to the aid of Catholic King James II when he landed at Kinsale twenty miles away, trying to regain his throne.
“Another lost cause,” Owen muttered, pointing towards the bare rose bushes.
“No,” said Daniel. “Not a lost cause, but a sign of hope.”
Their youngest brother Charley, age seven, ran from behind the cottage, scattering the chickens. When he saw them, he leaped into the air with a whoop, waving his thin arms. “Mammy, they're back!” he shouted, as he pushed open the door of the cottage.
In a moment, Joanna Ronan O’Connor was standing on the threshold. Such was her carriage and graceful simplicity that she might be taken for the lady of Togher Castle, presiding over feasts in its lofty halls, in spite of her lack of stature. From beneath her high-domed, white-linen cap, with pleated edge, tendrils of thick curly black hair, streaked with white, escaped. Around her short neck and sturdy shoulders was a linen scarf for modesty. The gray linsey-woolsey gown, patched and mended, was high-waisted according to the fashion of the turn-of-the-century. The sleeves were turned up almost to the elbow openly revealing hands that were calloused from toil. The skirt was scooped up and hooked at the back of the waist for working, revealing a brown petticoat.
Only thirty-seven, a life of hardship and the bearing of many children had caused the rose of Joanna’s youth to fade prematurely, yet in the eyes of her sons she emanated the dignity of a queen of Ireland. With her determined jaw, blunt nose and large mouth, hers had never been an overwhelming beauty, except for her piercing dark blue eyes, from which nothing escaped. They knew without being told that but for her the entire family would have starved in some earlier catastrophe. Sometimes it seemed Joanna could feed a dozen people with one potato, or multiply a single herring or a piece of bacon, and make butter and choak cheese last for weeks. She was able to get more out of a farthing than others could out of a pound; she bartered to the bone and because of her ruthless bargaining the O'Connors were able to feed most of the poor in the neighborhood.
“‘Tis a holy day of obligation,” she declared, giving them each a hardy hug. “I gather you both went to Mass this morning.” Her meaning, of course, was: “Did Owen go to Mass?” Everyone knew that Daniel would have gone no matter what.
“Aye, Mammy, we both went, in the chapel at Clonakilty at dawn,” replied Daniel.
“Well, that’s a mercy, to be sure,” she said, and she began to unload the cart. His sisters, Margaret and Norah, aged eleven and nine, came skipping out behind her. Margaret was a miniature of their mother; Norah was spindly, with pale hair and a slight limp, for one leg was an inch shorter than the other. Along with Charley, they begged for an account of Daniel and Owen’s adventures, which both youths began to relate at the same time. Then Timothy bound into their midst, turning a somersault with a joyful shout.
“Hush! You’re a boy not a banshee!” scolded Joanna. “And your Pa has a visitor in the parlor!”
Timothy, with his handsome cleft chin, resembled Owen, except he was of a more slender build and his mop of curls was a light brown. He slapped his hand over his mouth and turned another somersault. At thirteen, Tim was on the way to becoming an acrobat or an athlete; he could already outrun all of his older brothers and claimed that someday he would outrun the landlord's hunter.
As they carried in the buckets of seafood and baskets of herring they a
lmost collided with seventeen-year-old John, who was home for the holy day from Dunmanway where he worked at the linen mill in the winter. He had a head for numbers and often helped the manager with the accounts. John’s lean face was a blend of the best features of both his parents. With his father's straight nose and his mother's black curls and startling eyes, he was the most well-favored of the lot, and the most charming. Half the girls in Dunmanway were smitten with him.
Patrick, carrying two pails of milk, sauntered into the kitchen from the barn where he had been tending the livestock. At nineteen, he worked in Dunmanway in the winters for the tailor Dan Donavin. In the spring, the boys usually returned to Togher, when manpower was needed on the farm. Patrick, like Michael, the eldest, age twenty-three, was a masculine version of their mother, stocky and florid. Both the Michael O’Connors were nowhere to be seen; they were closeted in the parlor with the mysterious guest.
Inside the kitchen door hung a clay holy water font. Daniel blessed himself as he entered the cottage. “May God and Mary bless you,” he said to all therein. The kitchen was the largest and busiest part of the house, full of the smells of cooking, of slops, of bodies, and of the spicy sods of turf burning in the ample fireplace. A large black kettle of water hung over the fire, always ready for tea. A big iron pot usually had some stew or soup simmering, even if it was only watercress and mushrooms in a watery broth. On one side of the hearth an old man sat on the flagstone floor leaning against the wall, knees drawn up to his chest, tattered hat over his face, in a deep, snoring slumber. He was a distant MacCarthy cousin and a pilgrim to the shrine of the Holy Well at Togher. In spite of attempts by the Protestant authorities to close it down, the Holy Well was still frequented as it had been for centuries by those seeking healing in its miraculous waters. Pilgrims always found a place to sleep and eat beside Joanna's hearth, as an act of Christian charity and in the sacred tradition of Gaelic hospitality.
The Paradise Tree_A Novel Page 3
