Another Man's Child

by Anne Bennett

  Norah had not been a bit abashed. ‘Maybe here I might,’ was her retort. ‘In America they wouldn’t care a jot I bet. According to what Jim says, it’s much freer there and you don’t have to marry a man you go for a walk with.’

  Peggy’s sigh was almost imperceptible for she knew another child was going to cross the Atlantic.

  Celia too wished Norah would fall madly in love with Joseph O’Leary and declare she couldn’t bear to leave him, but she had to admit that didn’t look the slightest bit likely and she knew Norah was every day more determined than ever to sail to America. She had marked her twenty-first birthday on the calendar in the room they shared with a big red circle and each day she marked another day off. Thinking about it now as she swirled the dishes in the hot water Celia felt very depressed and wondered if one by one they would all go away.

  Two years before, her sister Katie had married a Donegal man but he was a wheelwright and had a house and business in Greencastle in Inishowan, a fair distance from Donegal Town, and that’s where Katie lived now. So they hadn’t visited her since the wedding, not even when she had her first child that she named Brendan.

  Maggie might have stayed and married a local man for she was the prettiest of them all and had a string of admirers. Mammy would shake her head over her and said she would be called fast and loose, as she would accept gifts pressed on her by men, without any sort of understanding between them. She was in no hurry to settle down, she said, but Maggie had taken sick with TB a year after Jim had left for America. To protect everyone else she had been taken to the sanatorium in Donegal Town and died six weeks later when she was nineteen years old.

  That had been a sad time for them all, Celia remembered, and for herself too because she hadn’t really had to deal with death before and certainly not the death of one so young and pretty and full of the joys of life. It seemed like the whole town had turned out for her funeral, but afterwards the family had been left alone to deal with the loss of her.

  Time was the great healer, everyone said, and Celia wondered about that because for a long time there had been an agonising pang in her heart if she allowed herself to think of Maggie. She imagined it was the same for her mother for, though Peggy had never spoken about it, Celia had seen the sadness in her hazel-coloured eyes and the lines pulling down her mouth were deeper than ever and there were more grey streaks in her light-brown hair. Eventually, though, time worked its magic and they each learned to cope in their own way for life had to go on.

  ‘Have you not finished washing those pots yet?’ Peggy called and her words jerked Celia from her reverie and she attended to the job in hand.

  Monday morning they were expecting Fitzgerald to send over his bull to service the cows, for their father had told them the night before, but as the cart rumbled across the cobbles outside the cottage door, Celia, peering through the kitchen window, was surprised to see Fitzgerald’s hireling driving the cart pulling the horse box.

  ‘Why should you be so surprised?’ the man replied when Celia voiced this as she stepped into the yard to meet him. ‘I have been doing farm work all my life and driving a horse and cart is just part of it.’

  ‘I saw you at the fair on Saturday,’ Celia said.

  ‘And I saw you,’ the man said with a slight nod in her direction. ‘And I was interested enough to ask someone your name so I know you to be Celia Mulligan. And mine,’ he added before Celia had recovered from her surprise, ‘is Andy McCadden and I am very pleased to make your acquaintance.’

  He stuck out his hand as he said this and Celia would have felt it churlish to refuse to take it but, as their hands touched, she felt a very disturbing tingle run up her arm. It made her blush a little and, when she looked up into his face and saw his sparkling eyes were vivid blue, she found herself smiling too as she said, ‘I’m very pleased to meet you, Mr McCadden.’

  ‘Oh Andy please,’ the man protested and he still held her hand. ‘And may I not call you Celia? After all, we are neighbours.’

  Celia knew her father probably wouldn’t see it that way but her father was not there, so she said, ‘Yes I think that will be all right.’

  There was a sudden bellow of protest from the bull and she said, ‘Now we’d better see to the bull? My father is in the top field separating the cows. I’ll show you if you get the bull out now.’

  ‘You’ll not be nervous?’ Andy said as he began unshackling the back that would drop down to form a ramp for the bull to walk down.

  ‘Not so long as you can control him,’ Celia said.

  ‘Oh I think so,’ Andy said. ‘Mind you,’ he said as they went out down the lane leading the bull by the ring on his nose, ‘I’m surprised you haven’t your own bull on a farm of this size.’

  ‘Oh we did have our own bull one time,’ Celia said. ‘It was long before I was born and my parents were not married that long and Mammy was expecting her first child. The bull pulled away from Daddy and charged at Mammy who had just stepped out into the yard. He gored her quite badly and she was taken to the hospital and there she lost the child she’d been carrying and nearly lost her own life too. Even after she recovered, the doctor thought she might be too damaged inside to carry another child. At least that has proven not to be the case, but she would never tolerate a bull around the place afterwards.’

  ‘Sorry about your mother and all,’ Andy said. ‘But I can’t help being pleased that you haven’t your own bull.’

  ‘Why on earth would that matter to you one way or the other?’ Celia asked in genuine surprise.

  ‘Because this way I get a chance to talk to you,’ Andy declared.

  Celia blushed crimson. ‘Hush,’ she cautioned.

  ‘What?’ Andy said. ‘We are doing no harm talking.’ And then, seeing how uncomfortable Celia was, he went on, ‘Is it because I’m a hireling boy and you a farmer’s daughter?’

  Celia’s silence gave Andy his answer and he said, ‘That’s hardly fair. My elder brother Christie will inherit our farm and after my father paid out for my two sisters’ weddings last year he said I had to make my own way in the world. He has a point because I am twenty-one now and there are two young ones at home for them to provide for and I would have to leave the farm eventually anyway.’

  ‘I know,’ Celia said. ‘That’s how it is for many. Tom will have the farm after Daddy’s day.’

  ‘Have you other brothers?’

  ‘The next eldest to him went to America where we have an aunt living.’

  ‘It’s handy to have a relative in America.’

  ‘It is if you want to go there, I suppose,’ Celia said.

  ‘You haven’t any hankering to follow him then?’

  Celia shook her head vehemently. ‘Not me,’ she said. ‘My sister Norah is breaking her neck to go, but Mammy is making her wait until she’s twenty-one.’

  ‘And is that far away?’

  Celia sighed. ‘Not far enough,’ she said. ‘It’s just a few months and I will so miss her when she’s gone.’

  ‘Have you no more brothers and sisters?’

  ‘Yes,’ Celia said. ‘Dermot is over three years younger than me, so he is nearly fifteen and left school now and then there is Ellie who is nine and Sammy who is the youngest at seven.’

  ‘Not much company for you then?’

  Celia shook her head. ‘I’d say not,’ and then she added wryly, ‘Mind you, I might be too busy to get lonely for I will have to do Norah’s jobs as well as my own.’

  ‘You can’t work all the time,’ Andy said. ‘Do you never go to the dances and socials in the town?’

  Celia shook her head.

  ‘Why on earth not?’

  ‘I don’t know why not,’ Celia admitted. ‘It’s just never come up, that’s all.’

  ‘Well maybe you should ask about it?’ Andy said. ‘No wonder your sister can’t wait to go to America if she is on the farm all the days of her life. There’s a dance this Saturday evening.’

  ‘And are you going to it?�
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  ‘I am surely,’ Andy said. ‘Mr Fitzgerald told me about it himself. He advised me to go and meet some of the townsfolk and it couldn’t be more respectable, for its run by the church and I’m sure the priest will be in attendance.’

  Celia knew Father Casey would have a hand in anything the Catholic Church was involved in – particularly if it was something to do with young people, who he seemed to think were true limbs of Satan, judging by his sermons. And yet, despite the priest’s presence there, she had a sudden yen to go, for at nearly eighteen she was well old enough and she wondered why Norah had said nothing about it. Tom attended the dances but she never went out in the evening and neither did Norah, not even to a neighbour’s house for a rambling night, which was often an impromptu meeting, spread by word of mouth. There would be a lot of singing or the men would catch hold of the instruments they had brought and play the lilting music they had all grown up with and the women would roll up the rag rugs and step dance on the stone-flagged floor. She had never been to one, but before Maggie died the Mulligans had had rambling nights of their own and she remembered going to sleep with the tantalising music running round in her head. She didn’t say any of this to Andy for she had spied her father making his way towards them across the field and saw him quicken his pace when he saw his daughter in such earnest conversation with the hireling boy.

  So Dan gave Andy a curt nod of the head as a greeting and said, ‘Bring him through into the field.’ And as Andy led the bull through the gate Dan said to Celia, ‘You go straight back to the house. This is no place for you anyway.’ And Celia turned and without even looking at Andy she returned to the farmhouse, deep in thought.

  TWO

  ‘Why do we never go to the socials or the dances in the town?’ Celia said as she and Norah washed up together in the scullery.

  Norah shrugged. ‘What’s brought this on?’

  ‘Just wondered, that’s all,’ Celia said. ‘Heard a couple of girls talking about it in the town Saturday.’

  ‘Did you?’ Norah said in surprise. ‘I never heard anyone say anything and I’d have said we were together all the time.’ Her eyes narrowed suddenly and she said, ‘It wasn’t that hireling boy put you up to asking?’

  ‘He has got a name, that hireling boy,’ Celia said, irritated with Norah’s attitude. ‘He’s called Andy McCadden and he didn’t put me up to anything. He asked if I was going to the dance and I said, no, that we never go.’

  ‘What was it to him?’

  ‘God, Norah, he meant nothing I shouldn’t think,’ Celia said. ‘Just making conversation.’

  ‘Well you were doing your fair share of that,’ Norah said. ‘I watched you through the window, chatting together ten to the dozen. Very cosy it looked.’

  ‘What was I supposed to do, ignore him?’ Celia asked. ‘I was taking him to find Daddy and he was leading a bull by the nose. Not exactly some sort of romantic tryst. Anyway, why don’t we ever go to the dances and the odd social?’

  ‘Well Mammy would have thought you too young until just about now anyway.’

  ‘All right,’ Celia conceded. ‘But what about you? You’re nearly twenty-one.’

  ‘I know,’ Norah said and added with a slight sigh, ‘I went with Maggie a few times; maybe you were too young to remember it. When she took sick and then died I had no desire to go anywhere for some time and then we were in mourning for a year and so I sort of got out of the way of it and anyway I didn’t really want to go on my own.’

  ‘Tom goes.’

  ‘He’s a man and not much in the way of company,’ Norah said. ‘Anyway he’d hardly want me hanging on to his coat tails. After all he went there hunting for a wife.’

  ‘Golly!’ Celia exclaimed. ‘Did he really?’

  ‘Course he did,’ Norah said assuredly. ‘No frail-looking beauty for him, for he was on the lookout for some burly farmer’s daughter, with wide hips who can bear him a host of sons and still have the energy to roll up her sleeves and help him on the farm.’

  Celia laughed softly. ‘Well he hasn’t, has he?’ she said. ‘Though no one said a word about it, everyone knows he’s courting Sinead McClusky and she is pretty and not the least bit burly.’

  ‘Maybe not but you couldn’t describe her as delicate either and she is a farmer’s daughter.’

  ‘What about love?’

  ‘You’re such a child yet,’ Norah said disparagingly. ‘What does Mammy say? “Love flies out of the window when the bills come in the door.” Tom will do his duty, as you probably will too in time.’

  ‘Me?’ Celia’s voice came out in a shriek of surprise.

  ‘Ssh,’ Norah cautioned. ‘Look, Celia, it’s best you know for this is how it is. If I stayed here and threw Joseph over, apart from the fact my name would be mud, Daddy might feel it in my best interests to get me hooked up with someone else and of his choosing. This might well happen to you and it isn’t always in our best interests either, but it’s done to increase the land he has or something of that nature. And it will be no good claiming you don’t love the man they’re chaining you to for life, because that won’t matter at all.’

  ‘What about Mammy?’ Celia cried, her voice rising high in indignation. ‘Surely she wouldn’t agree to my marrying a man I didn’t love?’

  Norah shrugged. ‘Possibly the same thing happened to her and it’s more than likely she sees no harm in it.’

  ‘Well I see plenty of harm in it,’ Celia said. ‘You said something like this before, but this has decided me. I shall not marry unless for love and no one can make me marry someone I don’t want.’

  ‘Daddy might make your life difficult.’

  Celia shrugged. ‘I can cope with that if I have to.’

  ‘Well to find someone to take your fancy,’ Norah said, ‘you need to go out and have a look at what is on offer, for I doubt hosts of boys and young men will be beating a path to our door. And so I think we should put it to Mammy and Daddy that we start going out more and the dance this Saturday is as good a way to start as any. You just make sure you don’t lose your heart to a hireling man.’

  Celia expected some opposition to her and Norah going to the dance that Saturday evening when Norah broached it at the dinner table the following day, but there wasn’t much. Peggy in fact was all for it.

  ‘Isn’t Celia a mite young for that sort of carry-on?’ Dan muttered.

  Celia suppressed a sigh as her mother said, ‘She is young, I grant you, but Tom will be there and he can take them down and bring them back and be on hand to disperse any undesirable man who might be making a nuisance of himself.’

  ‘And I will be there to see no harm befalls Celia,’ Norah said. ‘It isn’t as if I’m new to the dances – I used to go along with Maggie.’

  Peggy sighed. ‘Ah yes, you did indeed, child,’ she said, a mite sadly. She had no desire to prevent them from going dancing, particularly Norah, for if she wasn’t going to marry Joseph maybe she should see if another Donegal man might catch her heart and then she might put the whole idea of America out of her head.

  And so with permission given, the girls excitedly got ready for the dance on Saturday. They had no dance dresses as such but they had prettier dresses they kept for Mass. They were almost matching for each had a black bodice and full sleeves. Celia’s velvet skirt was dark red, Norah’s was midnight blue. Celia had loved her dress when Mammy had given it to her newly made by the talented dress maker and now she spun around in front of the mirror in an agony of excitement at going to her first dance.

  ‘Aren’t they pretty dresses?’ Celia cried.

  ‘They are pretty enough I grant you,’ Norah said. ‘It’s just that they are so long.’

  ‘Long?’

  ‘Yes, it’s so old fashioned now to have them this long. It is 1920 after all.’

  ‘Let me guess?’ Celia said. ‘I bet they’re not this length in America.’

  ‘No they aren’t,’ Norah said. ‘Men over there don’t swoon in shock when they
get a glimpse of a woman’s ankle.’

  ‘How do you know?’ Celia demanded. ‘That’s not the sort of thing Jim would notice and he certainly wouldn’t bother to write and tell you.’

  ‘No he didn’t,’ Norah admitted. ‘But Aunt Maria did. And she said that the women wear pretty button boots, not the clod-hopping boots we have.’

  ‘Well pretty button boots would probably be little good in the farmyard,’ Celia pointed out. ‘And really we should be grateful for any boots at all when many around us are forced to go about barefoot.’

  ‘I suppose,’ Norah said with a sigh. ‘Anyway we can do nothing about either, so we’ll have to put up with it. Now don’t forget when you wash your hair to give it a final rinse with the rainwater in the water butt to give it extra shine.’

  ‘I know and then you’re putting it up for me.’

  ‘Yes and you won’t know yourself then.’

  Norah knew Celia had no idea just how pretty she was with her auburn locks, high cheekbones, flawless complexion, large deep brown eyes and a mouth like a perfect rosebud. She knew her sister would be a stunner when she was fully mature. She herself looked pretty enough, although her hair was a mediocre brown and her eyes, while large enough, were more of a hazel colour.

  She sighed for she wished her mother would let her buy some powder so she could cover the freckles that the spring sunshine was bringing out in full bloom on the bridge of her nose and under her eyes. However, she had heard her mother say just the other day that women who used cosmetics were fast and no better than they should be.

  She imagined things would be different in America, but she wasn’t there yet and Celia, catching sight of Norah’s forlorn face, cried, ‘Why on earth are you frowning so?’

  Norah shrugged and said, ‘It’s nothing. Come on, Tom will be waiting on us and you know how he hates hanging about.’

  Celia did. Her brother wasn’t known for his patience so she scurried along after her sister.

  The church hall was a familiar place to Celia and she passed the priest lurking in the porch watching all the people arriving. She greeted him as she passed and went into the hall, where her mouth dropped open with astonishment for she had never seen it set up for a dance before, with the musicians tuning up on the stage and the tables and chairs positioned around the edges of the room while still leaving enough room in there for the bar where the men were clustered around having their pints pulled, Tom amongst them. Celia knew respectable women and certainly girls didn’t go near bars though. Tom would bring them a soft drink over and Norah said that was that as far as he was concerned.