Wild Geese

by Caroline Pignat

  “Would you not let me clout that eejit with another box, Kit?” he whispers as he scrounges among the barrels and boxes for today’s meal.

  “I’d like nothing better, Billy. But another crate to the head might remind him of how he got that first clatter. We’re lucky he hasn’t remembered you’re here.”

  Moments later, Billy hands me a cup of water that I down in one gulp. It does nothing to quench the fire in my throat. I wipe the sweat off my forehead.

  “Dinner is served, m’lady,” he says, passing me a bit of mushy apple and some dried out cheese from the Cunninghams’ stores. “Alone, they’re so rotten they’re barely edible” he says, alternating bites between the cheese and apple. “But together, they’re not bad.” He spits out a pit. “We should be eating their good food, for the Cunninghams will probably have a great turkey dinner waiting for them when they arrive at Quebec.”

  “All I have waiting for me is a long trip home to Ireland.” I think of Henry’s glittering eyes. “Or a short trip to the afterlife.” Though for weeks I’ve yearned to make port, now the thought of it terrifies me.

  “Don’t fret, Kit,” he says, patting my leg, careful not to touch my raw and oozing ankles. “There’s a bit of hope in every calamity. Like that silver seam around the door, you just need a bit of it to find your way.”

  Famine, fever, families rent apart. There’s no hope in any of that. Though I’m glad of his company, Billy doesn’t know what he’s talking about. He tries to keep my hopes up, but I may as well be chained to a sinking ship. Nothing could possibly save me now.

  In the distance, the bell tolls. Another soul has died.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  One day rolls into the next, marked only by a thin seam of light around the door or the distant clang of the ship’s bell, as though in a dream. With nothing to do but worry, I fear for those I love. For Mam and Jack. For little Annie. For Mick. I haven’t seen him since my arrest. I drift from one nightmare into another.

  “Here, Kit. Drink,” Billy says, putting a cup in my hand.

  Though my throat is on fire, I can barely lift my head, let alone my arm.

  “Kit … are you all right?”

  His voice floats from beyond as though I’ve fallen down the long, dark tunnel. I can barely hear him over the low drumming noise. Beating. Beating. Beating like a great bodhran as the darkness presses in.

  Is this the fairy tomb? I’m buried alive!

  Cold hands touch my face. “Jaysus, you’re on fire!”

  Though I can’t open my eyes, my burning face tells me the flames are surely higher than our bonfires back home. Heat radiates from every part of me. Forging my joints together so that I cannot move. Melting my mouth so that I cannot speak. Leaving me helpless to do anything but lie against my post and burn.

  Like a martyr.

  No. Like a witch.

  Something grips my shoulders and lowers me to the ground. Pours cold water on my face. I can almost hear the hiss and sputter.

  The drumming hurts my head. I just want it to stop.

  I just want it all to be over.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  The light blinds me. Sears through my eyelids and burns into the back of my head. I try to moan, but my throat is ash. I try to move, but my bones are welded tight.

  Voices echo around me. Whispers fade in and out.

  “... covered in rash ...”

  “... fever ...”

  “... is she alive?”

  I must be dead. My lips won’t part.

  Sewn shut?

  My lids, too heavy to open.

  Held closed with two big brown pennies?

  I am here, yet not. So, I’m not bound for heaven after all.

  What did you expect? You tried to kill a man.

  My body burns, my blood scalds my very veins, and yet I cannot cry out.

  So this is hell.

  Hands lift me and lay me on a sheet. Wrap me tight.

  My shroud.

  They carry me up the stairs into the light. It shines blood red through my heavy lids. The sea air I wanted for so long slaps my face as I am laid out on the deck. Nausea washes over me, but I haven’t the energy left to get sick.

  So this is it. This is how it ends.

  I wait for the bell. The drop. The splash. I wait for the eternal sinking. For the frigid sea to snuff my burning body. But instead, the water spills over my mouth.

  A shadow cuts the burning sun. Someone leans over me, cradling my head. “Drink, Kit. Please, love.”

  Da?

  I try to drink for him but then everything goes black.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  “Can you not take her now, Father?”

  Who … Da?

  God Almighty?

  Someone’s cool hands touch my side, feel my forehead.

  “I’m sorry, son,” the deep voice near me answers. The accent is foreign to me. Not Irish. Not Da. “Grosse Isle, she is already overflowing with patients.”

  “But she’ll die here.”

  So I’m not dead. Not yet, anyway.

  A thumb draws a cross on my forehead. “Through this holy anointing may the Lord in his love and mercy help you with the grace of the Holy Spirit ...”

  The whisper of Latin prayers mingles with the scent of holy oil. The Last Rites. The sacrament for the dying.

  A priest, then.

  ’Twould be so easy to let go. A part of me wants to. No pain. No sorrow. Nothing. I want to sleep forever. But something in me screams out.

  I don’t want to die!

  He anoints my eyes, ears, nostrils, lips, hands, and feet. “Through this holy unction and His own most tender mercy may the Lord pardon thee whatever sins or faults thou hast committed.”

  Forgiveness?

  No! Pray that I survive. Pray that I find my family.

  The thought of them rushes through me like a bolt of lightning, grounding me in my body. I gasp. With all I have left in me, I will my eyes open. My head throbs and I moan.

  “Kit!” Mick is at my side, stroking my hair. “You’re awake. Praise the Lord, ’tis a miracle.” He looks to the priest, but he has already turned to the people lying next to me on the deck.

  “Lynch,” I croak, lying there as vulnerable as a chick from its shell. Surely he’d be swooping in for me any second. I try to sit up but everything spins.

  “Lie still. Tom has the fever and the captain has quarantined them to their room. You’re safe for now.”

  I swallow, though it makes my throat burn. Mick puts a cup of water to my lips. “We made it, Kit,” Mick says, tilting the cup. “Canada. We’re here.”

  “Let me see,” I mumble.

  “Rest, now. You’ll see—”

  “Let me see!”

  He wraps my rash-covered arm around his shoulder. The sight of it shocks me. I can only imagine how the rest of me looks. Mick carries me the few steps to the railing where he settles me on my feet. I have no strength. My legs shudder and buckle beneath me, but Mick holds me up. Every joint in my body aches. My head pounds. But I have to see. I can’t believe him until I see it with my own eyes.

  After weeks of nothing but unbroken horizons and the ship’s darkness, my eyes feast on this rugged shore. I gorge myself on it from one end to the other. Up the rocky bluff on the far left, along weathered tree tops, and past the tall pole laden with colored flags. Passengers load on the steamer at the dock straight ahead. Behind the dock, a path winds through the small village of tents. Houses. A church. Green grass. On the right, a few more buildings, three cannons, and more rocky inlets. A flock of seagulls lands on the wet stones and they settle their wings. The island’s only a mile or so across, if that. But ’tis beautiful. I can’t take my eyes off it.

  Land.

  A few people mill around the water’s edge, washing perhaps. Knowing Mam, that would be the first thing she’d want to do. My heart rushes at the thought of seeing them again. I’m so close now. As soon as we get ashore, I know I’ll find th
em. Mam, Jack, Annie. They have to be there. They just have to.

  But the Erin sits motionless a half mile from the shore. We aren’t disembarking. We aren’t even moving. I glance at the water around the island and catch my breath. So many ships. Thirty, maybe forty more, as well as ours, anchored at bay.

  “Why are we waiting ...” The words snag on my dry throat like coarse wool on a briar.

  “We’re in quarantine, Kit,” Mick says. He points at the bright yellow flag atop our mainmast and nods at the other ships. “We all are.”

  I see them then. The yellow flags, fluttering above the silent ships. Even if every ship had only a hundred passengers, that would mean … thousands. Thousands of Irish who traveled that Godforsaken journey, forty days or more, only to be left waiting, dying at the shore’s edge.

  My family. Where is my family?

  I search the forest of masts for the Dunbrody. But there’s no sign.

  Are they on the island?

  Did they make it?

  I look back towards the ocean, not wanting to consider the thought that they were lost at sea. Worry blazes through my mind, burning away what little energy I have, and I close my eyes for a moment, trying to gather my strength. Gently, Mick lowers me to the deck.

  “Father Robson,” cries Mrs. Ryan; she’s lying beside me. “Please, don’t leave me!”

  “The other passengers in the hold, they wait for me, too,” he says, prying Mrs. Ryan’s bony fist from his black sleeve before he stands. “Do not worry, Madame. Rest now. I am no doctor, but I say you have not the ship fever.”

  “And I’m no doctor, neither, Father. But I’d say with sick and sound together, ’twon’t be long before we all have it.”

  Father Robson kneels again beside her; he seems so large beside her frail frame as he takes her hand and pats it.

  “Wait for death, Father?” Mrs. Ryan asks. “Is that all I can do?”

  He reaches in his cassock and, pulling out his black rosary beads, places them in Mrs. Ryan’s twisted fingers. “You can pray. Pray for me and I will pray for you. Dr. Douglas is coming soon. He’s on the Royalist right now. After he inspects your ship, you will come to the island. And when you come to Grosse Isle, you can give me back my rosary beads.”

  He smiles at her and then at me as I lie back on the deck. I notice the dark circles under his eyes. He turns and walks to the hold steps. He’s a big man, Father Robson. Solid. Strong. A farmer’s son, perhaps.

  I wonder how many tired souls he carries on those broad shoulders.

  GROSSE ISLE

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  “Water! Water! Please, somebody!”

  The crying wakes me.

  “Help me. I need help!” The pleas come from beside me, beyond me, all around me. I realize then that I’m crying it, too. Joining in the sorrowful chorus.

  “Water … please ...” My throat burns like a hearth of embers.

  A young priest raises my head and puts a cup to my lips. “Here.”

  My eyes try to focus on the white canvas roof above him.

  Where am I? Where’s Mick and Murph and Joe?

  But none of it really matters as he tilts the tin cup. All I care about are those precious drops of water washing down my burning throat.

  “Yes, Father McGauran?” a woman’s voice says.

  He gently lowers my head to the ground and turns to the woman. “Nurse, these patients have been in here for eighteen hours without any assistance!”

  “More nurses have quit,” she says. “We haven’t enough staff.”

  “These poor people haven’t even had a drink of water!” Father McGauran’s voice rises with anger. Then he lowers it to a whisper. “Will we let them die for want of a cup of water?”

  “They’ve assigned me to three tents and the hospital. The sick keep coming. I can’t do it all. I just can’t.” She breaks into tears and covers her face with her hands. “I am only one person! What difference can one person make?”

  I roll onto my side in the smothering heat, finding some relief in the damp ground beneath me. The scant bits of straw laid down for bedding fail to cover the mud. My elbow sinks slightly as I lean on it to hand the tin cup to the woman calling for a drink beside me. She takes it in her hands and, trembling, brings it to her dry lips.

  Father McGauran points at me. “Look there. I helped her and she helps others. One person can make a difference. You do make a difference.”

  “But, Father,” she answers, her voice empty of all hope as they walk away. “What good are two, or even four, when there are thousands?”

  My arm shakes as I push myself up further to sit. I’m in a tent of sorts, about fifty feet long, every inch of its floor covered with sick people, a hundred of them or more squeezed in side by side. A living, breathing mass of men, women, and children, all crying out for water. Bony arms reach up here and there for help as Father McGauran and the nurse pick their path through the bodies, stooping to give a drink now and then.

  I have to find my family. If they are here in this tent recovering, they need me more than ever. I push myself up and try to stand, but my legs buckle like a newborn lamb’s. My head feels fuzzy, thick with wool. But I can’t just sit here. Not when my family is so close. With all my strength, I stand. After some moments of swaying, I take a few faltering paces. Despite my best attempts to avoid it, I step on a few people. Some cry out. Others don’t even notice. The ground seems to tilt from side to side like a ship in a squall, and I stagger, before tumbling into the arms of a man entering the tent.

  “Easy there.” He catches me and lowers me to the ground by the door, sitting me in a tiny space between two other patients. Kneeling before me, he touches my forehead and the sides of my throat. “How are you feeling?”

  “Shaky,” I say. “It feels like I’m still on the boat.”

  He smiles. “’Twill take you a few hours to get your land legs. After a while, the ground will feel solid again. Even I catch myself still listing to one side.”

  “Were you on a ship?” I ask, for he has an Irish accent. From Kilkenny, I’d say. “I thought you were a doctor.”

  “The Wandsworth,” he nods and checks inside my mouth. “We just arrived. But I am a doctor. Name’s Benson. As much as I’d like to continue my journey inland, I can’t very well leave you all like this, now, can I?”

  “I’m looking for my family,” I say. “The Byrnes on the Dunbrody. Do you know where they are?”

  He shakes his head.

  “Well, what about Mick O’Toole or the Murphys then, from the Erin, my ship?” I don’t bother naming Billy. If he survived, he’ll not be registered anywhere.

  “They might be in here. This tent is mainly those from the ships debarked in the last two days, and they do try to keep families and shipmates together.” His eyes soften as he lays me back down. “Rest now. Your fever has broken but the rash will take a few days to clear. I’ll send in some broth for you. Do you think you can eat?”

  He smiles at my nod. “That’s a good sign. Give yourself a chance to recover, a day or two, and then you can ask at the records office about your family. They log every ship.”

  He opens the flap and calls for an orderly to bring me in a bowl of broth. I thank Dr. Benson for his help and watch him wade deeper into the sea of bodies. The orderly enters and hands me a steaming bowl. It warms me, revives me at the core. I drain every last drop before heading for the door.

  Rested or not, I have to find my family.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  “Kit!” A voice calls as I near the tent door.

  “Murph!” I weave through the maze of patients to the man lying in the far corner. He grabs my hand and pulls me down for a hug. We are surrounded by strangers, though I recognize Mrs. Ryan next to him, eyes closed, rosary beads gripped in her knotted hands.

  “I thought we’d lost you,” he says, his voice hoarse. “People were saying you’d be at the Lynches’ mercy once we laid anchor.”

  I notice the nu
rse and Father McGauran are away at the other end of the tent. “Do you want a drink of water?”

  Murph nods and I fetch him one. Just going to the water barrel by the pole at the center of the tent exhausts me. But it gives me a chance to check the patients. There is no sign of my family in those rows of sorry souls. I give him the cup and then rest my trembling hand against his burning forehead. Opening his shirt, I press on his rashy chest but the white handprint I so want to see doesn’t appear. He’s worse than I thought.

  “Where’s everyone else?” I say. “Mick, Joe, and Brigid?” I’m almost afraid to ask.

  “The sailors and soldiers took the healthy off the ship. I think they’re keeping them on another end of the island. Billy, he’s with them, too.” He coughs and finishes his water. “You’re full of secrets, aren’t you, Kit?” he says with a weak smile.