A Long Way from Heaven

by A Long Way from Heaven (retail) (epub)

  ‘Sure an’ how come you know their miserable tongue?’ demanded Molly, ‘when ye’ve only just arrived?’ Patrick told her of his lessons from the parish priest. ‘Well, that’s all clever stuff,’ she sniffed, ‘but we’ve no need of it.’

  Patrick smiled condescendingly. ‘Had ye no need for it the other day when ye were charged twice the normal amount for your provisions?’

  ‘What! Where? I don’t believe ye.’

  ‘’Tis right, I tell ye. The old skinflint tried it on me, thought I couldn’t read the prices on his merchandise.’ An angry rumble rocked the hovel as the poor Irish realised how they were being swindled. ‘’Tis your own silly faults an’ no one else’s,’ Patrick continued. ‘But now I’m here to change all that.’

  ‘Gob, will y’ever listen to him,’ said Molly. ‘The Second Messiah. All right, Pat Feeney, you’re so clever ye can teach me the English – an’ while ye’re at it ye can turn this here tea into poteen.’ She cackled, baring long, horse-like teeth and setting the others off laughing.

  So the meeting had turned out equably. There was, however, no solution at all to the effluence from the abattoir. The stench crept into their very skin, causing people to give them a wide berth when passing them on the street. The horrible cries and foul language – the latter coming from the drovers who had a difficult task in getting the condemned beasts through the narrow passageway – demanded great stoicism. Patrick often remonstrated with the butcher, but each admonishment served only to alienate the man even further.

  Patrick felt the man’s hate now as he unlatched his door and momentarily turned to counter the butcher’s stare. Raper dropped his eyes and went back to paring his nails, allowing Patrick to step inside.

  ‘Mary, for the love o’ God will ye put that table down!’ He slung down his pack and went to assist her.

  ‘I was just rearranging the furniture,’ panted Mary, referring to the broken-legged table and two well-used stools. ‘I can’t seem to sit still.’

  ‘Where d’ye want it?’ asked her husband, then dragged the table to the specified point. ‘God, woman, I’ll have the hide off ye if I come home again an’ find ye moving heavy things like that. What’s got into ye?’

  ‘I think I’m getting near my time.’ Mary rubbed the small of her back. ‘I feel as though I’ve loads to do – they tell me ’tis that way, like the birds with their nest-building.’

  ‘I’ll give ye nest-building,’ answered Patrick. ‘An’ what might ye be giving me for me tea – worms?’

  Mary chuckled and drew the cooking-pot away from the fire. ‘Be quiet an’ sit down else ye’ll get nothing.’

  ‘Hah, it’ll be no less than I’ve been getting lately. I’ll be glad when that child comes. I’m beginning to know what a priest feels like.’

  Mary blushed. She was still not accustomed to his forward speech. ‘Stop that at once, Patrick or ye’ll get this pot over your head.’ She waved a spoon at him as they sat down to their meal.

  Later they sat side by side watching the flames lick at the fireback, thinking, as they usually did at this time of day, of their homeland. Mary tried to position herself more comfortably on the stool, keeping her hands busy by sewing a tiny garment. Molly had very kindly given her a cast-off dress belonging to the girls to cut up for baby clothes. She was proving to be a good friend, despite her sometimes thoughtless remarks and her liking for the ale, and Mary would be glad of her help when the time came. As her needle flashed in and out of the material she urged the child to make quick his arrival and hoped her prayers would be answered with a live healthy baby.

  As if by some telepathic message the child had heeded her words, he began to make his entry into the world the very next day. Patrick was roused from his sleep that fine morning by small animal utterances from the woman at his side.

  ‘It’s started,’ gasped Mary as he peered anxiously into her face. Actually it had started during the night but she hadn’t wanted to wake him.

  ‘I’ll get Molly.’ He leapt up trying, unsuccessfully, to get his legs into his breeches.

  ‘There’s no call for panic.’ Mary relaxed as the pain subsided and giggled at her husband who was shoving both limbs down one trouser leg for the second time. Despite the light laughter she felt a pang of fear at the thought of what was going to happen to her body and held out her hand to him. ‘Don’t go, Pat.’

  He turned an encouraging face at the door. ‘I’ll be but five minutes. Now don’t go away.’ He held up his hand. ‘I’ll be back before ever ye know I’m gone.’

  Molly answered his pounding at her door, bewilderment on her sleepy face. ‘Oh, ’tis you, Pat.’ She yawned and hooked a finger into each eye, ridding them of sleep. ‘An’ why would you be in such a state — as if I didn’t know. Ye’re all alike, you men. Jimmy! Jimmy, ye’ll have to get yourself off to work, I have to see to Mary.’

  A young girl squinted blearily round the bedroom door to see what the commotion was about. ‘Ah, Norah, kick your father’s backside an’ give the mob their breakfast, will ye?’ Molly instructed her eldest daughter, then followed the fast-disappearing Patrick.

  Mary groaned as the contraction gripped her, clutching with steely fingers, trying to force the new life from her.

  ‘How is it, love?’ Molly planted herself at the foot of the mattress and bent to examine the girl.

  ‘I’ve never felt anything like this,’ hissed Mary through clenched teeth, then breathed out as the spasm receded.

  ‘Don’t I know it, pet.’ Molly laughed ruefully. ‘The men get all the pleasure an’ we get all the pain. Ye’ll find it gets easier, though.’

  ‘Holy Mother o’ God never again,’ swore Mary, another pain rippling through her tortured body. She gnawed at the twisted and torn sheet that she clutched in her fists.

  ‘Ah, they all say that but sure ye’ll soon forget about the pain.’ Molly turned to the anxious husband. ‘Ye’d better be off to work; there’s nothin’ll happen here for a while yet.’

  Patrick refused. ‘I’m stayin’ right here.’ He moved to Mary’s side and took hold of her hand.

  ‘Is it that ye’d not be trustin’ me?’ asked the woman airily. ‘For if ye want to play the midwife yourself ye’re welcome.’

  ‘No!’ cried Patrick. ‘I meant nothin’ o’ the sort an’ well you know it, Molly — but this is my first child an’ I’m bound to be worried, aren’t I?’

  ‘Huh, his child says he,’ sniffed Molly. ‘Sure, an’ what’s this poor girl screamin’ an’ cryin’ for if you’re the one that’s havin’ it?’

  ‘Molly are ye going to help or aren’t yese?’ cried the desperate father.

  ‘Ah, ye won’t be needin’ me for a while yet,’ replied Molly. ‘There’s nothing I can do for a moment. I might as well go see if me own are coping.’ She made for the door.

  ‘You’re not leavin’? For God’s sake, Molly, how will I know what to do?’

  ‘Didn’t I tell ye?’ replied Molly patiently. ‘There’s nothin’ to be done for ages yet. If ye want to throw away a day’s wage ye can make yourself useful an’ hold her hand.’ With that she was gone.

  ‘Pat, you go,’ grunted Mary between pains. ‘We can’t afford for ye to be off work.’

  ‘But…’

  ‘Ye can’t help an’ I’d rather not have ye watching my pain. Go… oh, for God’s sake go!’ Her face contorted.

  He still attempted to stay but she grew so agitated at the loss of wages that in the end he did as she asked, promising to get away early if one of the lads would cover for him.

  All day the young girl rolled frantically over the palliasse, trying to escape the red-hot pincers that tore at her innards until it seemed that she could bear no more. ‘Mam!’ she cried out in her anguish, but no one could help her.

  ‘Not much longer now,’ said Molly who had kept popping in and out all through the day. ‘Come on, keep pushing.’ She held Mary’s straining legs apart, offering words of encouragement. ‘Good, keep goin�
�, I can see its head. It’s got a load o’ black hair. Come on, push, push!’

  To Mary it seemed that she might split in half at any minute. Suddenly something gave, a gush of hot moisture shot up her back and the head of the child emerged, heralding its birth with a lusty scream of rage at the indignities perpetrated upon it.

  ‘Lord above!’ Molly helped the infant to make its exit from its mother. ‘’Tis cryin’ before it’s all the way out.’ She dangled it upside down.

  Mary craned her neck to get a view of the child. ‘Is he all right?’

  ‘Not he, love – she; ’tis a fine colleen ye’d be having an’ a right lusty one at that.’ Molly wiped the blood-speckled infant and, wrapping her in a clean sheet, passed her to her mother.

  Mary cradled the child and gazed wearily into the disdainful face. The child seemed to be accusing her for the pain it had suffered.

  Patrick, now home from work, had been pacing the floor in the room below. The high-pitched wail brought him to a halt. Silence followed and he thought he must have imagined it, until Molly appeared at the top of the rickety stairs and shouted: ‘Does this child have a father or not?’

  He bounded up the stairs three at a time and stopped at the bedroom door, overcome by emotion at the sight that met his eyes. Mary, her damp hair spread over the straw-filled palliasse, beckoned and he moved closer. She looked different – what was it? Her face appeared the same with its translucent skin and piquant features, the mouth was parted in the usual kindly smile – then what had changed? Ah, now he knew – it was her eyes. She had always had wide beautiful blue eyes but now there was an added beauty; they glowed in sapphire-like brilliance, brimming with love and newly-discovered motherhood. It was an effort to tear his eyes away but somehow he directed them at the tiny bundle in her arms.

  ‘I didn’t expect a girl,’ he told her foolishly at her announcement.

  ‘Neither did I – ye don’t mind, d’ye?’

  ‘How could I mind? Just look at her and anyway there’ll be plenty of time for those sons.’ He missed Mary’s wince and laid a rough finger in the sleeping baby’s palm; the tiny hand curled around it involuntarily. ‘Will ye look at that grip? I expected her to be… well, a bit weedy-like, what with the famine an’ all, but there’s nothing wrong with this one, is there?’

  Her face shone. ‘There’s not, thank God. Ye know, I felt so sure he was going to die, Pat – ah, will ye listen to me, calling her “he”. It takes some getting used to after all these months. I don’t know what we’ll call her.’ It was usually the custom to name a first boychild after the paternal grandfather and a girl after the grandmother, but Patrick never spoke of his mother – had never really known her.

  He thought for a while then his face lit up and he spoke quietly. ‘I have just the very name that’ll serve to remind her of her heritage.’

  And as he told her, Erin Feeney opened her navy-blue eyes and, with an all-knowing gaze, erased the horrors of the past, bringing a new joy and meaning to their empty lives.

  Chapter Eleven

  Like a rosebud unfurling its petals with each new day, so the child grew and flourished, adding to their little dwelling an atmosphere of contentment. True, their environment had not altered noticeably, but when the door was shut fast against the filth and squalor outside, their humble abode was a warm haven of security.

  Now that Mary was back on her feet again she had secured a post in the chicory fields, working with the child slung on her back. Patrick was greatly displeased at his wife going out to work, but he had to admit that the money brought its benefits. Over the previous months they had added various items of cheap furniture to the house and had also purchased more clothes for themselves. They had made their place as much a little Ireland as was possible. Each night the residents of the yard would gather around the fireplace of one of its families, singing, sharing a pot of tobacco, telling tales; it was only when the dawn showed up the grassless yard and the twin towers of the gasworks instead of the granite mountain, that they had to live with the fact that this was not home.

  For Patrick work helped, the physical effort it entailed alleviating the stress of his cramped living conditions. His workmates, too, he had come to understand better, even going so far as to form a precarious friendship with the man Thompson. The insulting nicknames, he had discovered, were not intended as a personal affront. John employed this tack with everyone, it was just his way. All in all, life was a little easier than it had been.

  With Mary things were somewhat different. Although reasonably happy, it was of great concern to her that they had not sought guidance from the church since leaving Ireland. Her faith was still important to her – more so, now she had the child – and it hurt that she must enact it in private. Several times she had tried to discuss it with her husband but he would cut her dead; Patrick could be so hard. She feared what this rejection must do to his soul. There came a time, however, when she could stand it no longer, and it was as they sat by the fireside that night, watching the babe drum her heels on the rug that Mary had created from strips of rag that she spoke.

  ‘Pat, you’re not going to like this – no, I beg you, listen this time.’ He had guessed what the subject was to be and his mouth had opened to stall her. ‘I know how ye feel about the church, but…’ here she took a deep breath, ‘leaving aside my desperate need to go to Confession, that child’s got to be baptised. ’Tis terribly wrong o’ ye to risk her soul because o’ your bitterness. I want – I demand – to see Father Kelly.’ The priest had attempted time and again to breach the Feeney stronghold but had always been repulsed. Pat wouldn’t even allow the fellow to see his wife.

  ‘Sure, ye’ve had your answer, Mary.’

  There were the stirrings of anger. ‘Patrick, ’tis not often I disobey you but by God I’m going to see that child baptised if I have to beat ye senseless. Look,’ she became coaxing, ‘I could’ve taken her any time while you were out o’ the house, could I not? Had her baptised, gone to Confession an’ you’d’ve known nothing about it; but I didn’t. When I go to church I want to do it properly — with my husband.’

  ‘Then ye’ll need to find another fool.’

  ‘Patrick, damn you for a selfish hound! I’ve never known the like o’ ye, turning a priest away from our own door – ’tis unheard of.’ Whilst she had been preparing to follow her husband to work yesterday Father Kelly had been sharing a joke with Jimmy Flaherty in the yard. Patrick had gone right up to him, no less, and interrupted rudely, ‘Ye needn’t waste your time knocking on my door while I’m away.’ Father Kelly could be as rude as he: ‘Sure, haven’t I better things to be doing than bruising me knuckles on a heathen door? I’ll thank ye not to interrupt my conversation with the faithful.’ And had turned his back on Pat. Mary could have died with shame – had not dared set off for the fields till he had gone.

  Patrick took stock of his wife’s indignation. He knew from experience that on the rare occasions she employed this tone she could not be shifted. He heaved a sigh. ‘If I give my approval of your going to church will ye cease hounding me?’

  Eagerness. ‘An’ have the baby baptised?’

  ‘No. That’d mean I had to be present.’

  ‘Very well,’ she answered stiffly. ‘If that’s the limit of your generosity I’ll stop hounding ye, Patrick Feeney – in fact I’ll never utter so much as one word till you see sense.’

  ‘Mary…’

  But she bent her head over her darning and pressed her lips together and not another word did he get from her for the rest of the evening. The morning found her no more approachable. His breakfast was delivered with no whisper of regret. God, she could be a stubborn little minx when she chose. He raced down the meal, eager to be out of here. Church, church, church, that was all he ever seemed to get.

  His premature departure had singled him out for some more. As he made his exit from the yard a stentorian voice assailed him from the far end of the passage. The priest blocked his way, though Patric
k could easily have pushed him aside had he wanted. Liam Kelly was a wiry man. His originally dark brown hair was now peppered with grey, the product, Liam supposed, of listening to so many strange confessions over the years. He had often wondered if they made them up just to see his face when he left the confessional afterwards; the face that gave the first impression of cherubic mildness – which the eyes then belied; when provoked they could burn like two fiery emeralds and set the biggest brute of a sinner to instant repentance.

  ‘I was hoping to catch ye, Patrick Feeney.’

  ‘Were ye indeed?’

  ‘I was. I’ve been doing some serious thinking about you.’ Merely a raised eyebrow from Patrick. ‘Could we have a chat?’

  ‘I’m not very talkative at this time of a mornin’.’ Patrick sought a way round the priest.

  ‘Sure, you’re not very communicative at any time o’ the day,’ said Liam, then suddenly: ‘Ye think you’re getting at God through me, don’t ye?’

  ‘An’ why would I put meself out to do that?’ Patrick marvelled at why he was still standing here. Yet the voice did have some restraining quality to it.

  ‘Ah, haven’t I seen it all before? Hundereds of Patrick Feeneys, blaming Our Lord for all their problems.’

  ‘How long’ve ye been in this place?’ enquired Patrick, to which Liam replied several years. ‘Then what would ye be knowing o’ the problems I had at home, sat in your big English house with its full larder…’

  ‘Hah, full larder is it? Remind me to tell that to my housekeeper when she’s serving me faggots for the sixth time in a week.’

  Patrick tried to end this. ‘Look, all I’m askin’ is to be left alone to look after my family.’

  ‘An’ is this how ye look after them, Patrick Feeney, by keeping them from the church? ’Tis a wicked thing you’re doing here.’

  Patrick gave an exclamation to the air, then made to move away. ‘Ah, don’t be giving me that, you’re all the same.’