Heart of the Lonely Exile

by BJ Hoff

  “Aye,” Morgan said dully. “He does.” He turned now to look at Joseph, a weary, not altogether focused stare. “He should not have sent for you, Joseph. You look exhausted entirely.”

  Joseph shrugged. “At my age, there are worse things than exhaustion.”

  “You are not old, Joseph.” Morgan’s words were perfunctory, flat. “But you must be tired. How did you get here?” he asked after a moment, leaning his head against the wall behind the wheelchair.

  “Why, your grandfather sent a fine coach for me! I traveled in great style, don’t you know?”

  There was no answering smile to his attempted lightness, merely a small nod. The green eyes that once danced with roguish humor or the glint of intrigue were now dull; the wide mouth, always so quick with a smile or a good-humored taunt, had gone slack. Only a faint shadow of the rebel of Mayo hovered about the wasted man in the wheelchair.

  “Tell me of the village,” Morgan said woodenly.

  Clearly, his thoughts were on anything else but Killala. Yet Joseph seized the slightest opportunity to draw him out of himself. “Why, nothing has changed, except to grow worse. With another winter upon us, there is great despair. We will be wiped out entirely if more help does not come, and come soon.” He paused. “The generous gifts from you and your grandfather have saved more than one family, Morgan. We are grateful. You do receive my letters?”

  Morgan nodded, then pressed the fingers of one hand against his forehead, as if to still a dull ache.

  “Morgan?”

  Dropping his hand away, back to his lap, Morgan looked at him.

  “What are the doctors saying?”

  “Sure, and you know what the doctors are saying, Joseph,” Morgan replied, looking directly at him. “I don’t believe for a moment Grandfather sent a coach for your journey without a letter of explanation. You have already been told I will not walk again.”

  Grieved, Joseph sank down heavily on the edge of the bed. “I thought perhaps there might be some new word by now,” he murmured. “Some change…”

  A ghost of a smile touched Morgan’s lips, then faded. “Just like a priest. Ever expecting the miracle. Ah, Joseph, don’t we both know that old Belfast is not the city for miracles?”

  Joseph leaned forward, keenly mindful of the shattered dreams behind that marble mask. “When will you be able to travel—to go home to Dublin?”

  “Soon, I imagine. There’s little else they can do for me here, except ply me with laudanum and their bad Ulster jests.” In that moment he seemed to falter. He glanced down at the floor. “The problem isn’t so much the journey to Dublin,” he said tightly. “It’s more a question of…how I will manage once I get there. I will need…care, you see.”

  Morgan lifted his eyes. The look of agonizing humiliation that had settled over that once proud and noble face went straight to Joseph’s heart. He wanted to weep. “Why…why, your grandfather will arrange all that, lad. He will see to excellent care for you, of course.”

  Morgan looked away. “Still, I am a great ox. Too big and ungainly to be easily managed. It will no doubt take some doing to find somebody capable of…handling me.”

  Joseph thought he would choke on his suppressed pity! Wringing his hands until they ached, he groped for words. “Morgan? The pain—is the pain very bad?”

  The mask seemed to slip even more. “I will tell you the truth, Joseph,” Morgan bit out, his voice hoarse, “some days I think I will go mad with it.”

  The unexpected, blunt reply pierced Joseph’s heart. “But the laudanum—doesn’t it help at all, lad?”

  Morgan met his eyes. “Aye, it helps.” One long-fingered hand went to his head, then raked down the side of his bearded face. “I had some a short while ago. But I’m afraid to take more than a bit of the stuff, don’t you see?” He stopped, again glanced toward the window. “I’m afraid I’ll reach the point I cannot do without it.”

  Joseph looked at him. For one frozen instant, he saw what the other had doubtless allowed no one else to see—even his grandfather. He saw the raw, unrestrained fear of a man who had seldom in his life been without power, the power of robust good health and a strong, mighty body.

  A remnant from one of Morgan’s own poems suddenly slipped in among Joseph’s sorrowing thoughts: I have become a man whose soul, like Eire’s, is ever trapped between destiny and despair….

  Joseph rose slowly, staggering for a moment with weakness. He grabbed the bed railing to steady himself, then moved to Morgan.

  He could not think what to say to his stricken young friend, and so he did the only thing he knew to do. Wrapping both arms around Morgan’s wide, sagging shoulders, he pressed the great head against his chest and held him there, next to his heart, while he prayed for him.

  Outside in the hall, Annie Delaney listened to the exchange between the two men. Obviously, the frail-looking priest and Morgan Fitzgerald were old friends, for the Fitzgerald had referred to him as Joseph, rather than Father.

  When a long silence fell between the two, Annie risked a peek inside the room. Creeping closer to the door that stood ajar, she inched her face around the opening, just enough to have a look.

  A lump swelled in her throat. The priest was cradling that grand copper-crowned head against his own chest. And he was praying. Praying for Morgan Fitzgerald.

  This was a strange thing entirely! Annie could not imagine, try as she would, the hawk-faced Father Daly showing such gentle affection to even a wee child of the parish—much less a man grown!

  She found it sad and yet strangely comforting, seeing the great Fitzgerald finally surrender to his pain. Through the weeks of his confinement, Annie had shadowed the man, evading the nurses in the hallway, sneaking in and out of the small alcove near his room. Not once had she seen the Fitzgerald’s weary composure slip, even a little. Yet now he clung to the aging priest like a frightened boy.

  Shrinking back into her hidey-hole, Annie pressed her lips together, thinking. He was fretting about going home. Humiliated, no doubt, that he would be dependent on others for his care. Sure, and couldn’t she understand that? What was worse than feeling trapped by your own helplessness? And wouldn’t it be an even harder thing for a man like the Fitzgerald than it had been for her? He was a great, powerful man. Probably he had never depended on another soul for a thing before this trouble had come upon him.

  And now, just see the fix he was in! Sure, and the old man—the grandfather—would be of no help. Why, ’twas all he could do to make his way down the hall without stumbling! He looked to be a very old man. And ailing as well. Still, he was obviously rich, and so could afford the best of care for his grandson.

  His grandson. Who would have imagined such a thing? Morgan Fitzgerald himself, grandson to an Englishman! What would her da have thought of that?

  Annie sat very still, gnawing on her knuckles. It sounded as if he would be leaving soon. Leaving the hospital and going back to Dublin with his grandfather.

  She let out a long breath. There was no accounting for the way she had grown attached to the big fellow. Why, she had never laid eyes on the man until a few weeks ago! Yet ever since that awful night outside the Music Hall, when he had fallen to the street with a bullet in his back, Annie had sensed in some strange, unaccountable way that he was to be a part of her life—and she a part of his. An important part, at that.

  Perhaps because it was by his poetry that she had learned to read, had grown from a child with his words engraved upon her heart.

  Or perhaps, she thought with a faint smile, she might be a bit fey, just as her grandmother Aine had been. Some had said she was purely daft, but Annie had thought her a wonder. She still missed her sorely, even though the old dear had been dead going on four years.

  Grandmother Aine had known things. When the banshee would wail. When the cow would go dry. When disaster was lurking but a breath away.

  Whatever accounted for it, Annie knew Morgan Fitzgerald. More than knew him—she needed him. And he needed her,
though of course he could not know that as yet.

  She did not intend to let him simply walk out of her life and—Annie pressed her fingers to her mouth in dismay. Fitzgerald could not walk out of her life, any more than he could walk anywhere else! Morgan Fitzgerald would never walk again—hadn’t she heard it for herself?

  Still, he would be leaving for Dublin, and leaving without her, unless she could prevent it. She did have an idea—but would the old man hear her out? And even if he did, would he take her seriously?

  The silver-haired priest came out of the room. Watching him for only a moment, Annie got to her feet.

  Perhaps he was the very one to give her idea a boost.

  24

  An Encounter with Annie Delaney

  Oh! who can tell what things she hears—

  What secrets of the faery spheres,

  That fill her eyes with silent tears!

  Sweet wandering fancy-charmed child,

  With cheek so pale, and eyes so wild.

  Oh! what shall come of this lonely dreaming!

  THOMAS CAULFIELD IRWIN (1823–1892)

  Faith, child, would you be causing a priest to fall on his face, then?” Joseph Mahon threw out a hand to brace himself against the wall in the dim hallway. The raggedy little urchin had darted out in front of him from nowhere, blocking his path and causing him to stumble.

  “Sure, and I’m sorry, Father!” the child said breathlessly. “But I would speak with you, if you please. It’s that important.”

  Joseph stared down at the thin elfin face, speculating as to whether this creature was a girl-child or a lad.

  “And who is it wanting to speak with me?”

  “Annie Delaney, your reverence.” The pointed chin lifted, as if the name itself were a matter of pride.

  The face was perky, if not altogether clean, capped by a shaggy riot of black, straight hair that seemed to grow wild, entirely without direction. Two black-marble eyes peered out from behind the hair, studying Joseph with an unsettling, solemn gaze. The clothes were wretched: a boy’s cap, an oversized coat that looked as if it might have belonged to a drunken sailor, and a long, tattered skirt above boys’ shoes and woolen stockings.

  A street urchin. One of the numerous Belfast orphans on her own keeping, no doubt, living off what she could beg or steal.

  Now regretting his sharp tone, Joseph softened. “And what, exactly, would you be hoping to discuss with me, Annie Delaney?”

  Those disconcerting dark eyes measured Joseph for another full moment. “I would speak to you about your friend, Father. Morgan Fitzgerald. I’m hoping you might put in a word for me with the grandfather.”

  Joseph frowned. “A word for you? I’m afraid I don’t understand, lass.”

  The thin shoulders straightened. “I’m asking your help in convincing the old gentleman to take me along to Dublin City when they go.” She paused, swatting an unruly shock of hair out of her eyes. “To help take care of his grandson, don’t you see?”

  Joseph’s first instinct was to laugh, but he sensed it would be a grave error. The child was deadly serious. “Well, Annie Delaney, I’m afraid you’re a bit young to be the nursemaid for such a man as Morgan Fitzgerald. And a bit small.” Joseph paused, lifting his eyebrows in a stern look. “Besides, what would your family be thinking of such an outrageous idea?”

  The black eyes locked with his. Joseph caught a fleeting glimpse of a terrible pain in that young soul. “Sure, and there’s no family to be fretting about me, Father. As to me age and me size, more than likely I’m older—and stronger—than you think.” The child paused. “I’m nearly eleven, after all.”

  Joseph studied the strange lass with growing curiosity. She was older than he would have thought—if she were telling the truth.

  Again the sharp little chin thrust upward. “If you’re thinking that’s too young for such a position, then you should be knowing I’ve lived some longer than me years—I’ve been on me own keeping for quite a spell, don’t you see? And I’m educated as well, Father—I can read and write and do sums. I’m not ignorant.”

  Of course, she would not be ignorant. What child on the bitter streets of Belfast would be ignorant? But how to convince this curious wee lass that her schemes were out of the question?

  “Please, Father, if you’d just try to persuade the old gentleman to take me on, he wouldn’t regret it, I promise you.”

  Joseph was entirely at a loss for words. He found himself drawn to the child, did not want to be harsh with her. She was digging with the wrong foot, but he sensed she would not listen to such an incidental thing as reason. A man, even a priest, would be hard-pressed to topple Annie Delaney’s dreams, he was sure.

  Scratching his head, he drew a long sigh. Annie Delaney’s gaze never wavered as Joseph groped for an acceptable response to her outrageous proposal.

  When Joseph met with Richard Nelson later that evening in the hospital waiting room, he found it difficult to describe his remarkable meeting with Annie Delaney.

  What surprised him was that Sir Richard already knew about the peculiar wee lassie.

  The aging Englishman sat in the rickety chair with the dignity of a monarch. Yet Joseph did not miss the trembling of his hands on the head of his cane or the quaking of his voice when he spoke. “Oh, dear, yes. The poor child has been hovering about the hospital day and night.” He shook his head. “The nurses wanted to order her out any number of times, but I told them to let her alone, just so long as she doesn’t disturb Morgan. She thinks we haven’t noticed her, of course.”

  As he went on, his voice faltered, then took on new strength. Obviously, it was difficult for him to even speak of the incident that had felled his grandson. “Smith O’Brien says the child ran out into the street when Morgan was…shot. Began screaming at the bystanders to get help. Apparently she stayed right there in the street with him until the ambulance arrived. And she’s been at the hospital almost every day since, I believe.”

  Sir Richard shook his head sadly. “I can’t imagine what her family must be thinking, allowing her such freedom about the city!”

  “She has no family—or so she says,” Joseph put in.

  The old man lifted tired, sad eyes to look at Joseph. “I was afraid it might be something like that. You don’t suppose she’s a bit dull-witted, do you? Shadowing Morgan as she does? It’s most peculiar.”

  Joseph almost cracked a smile at the thought of Annie Delaney being dull-witted. The lass might be as flighty as a tinker’s child—and certainly her behavior was somewhat odd. But dull-witted? Indeed, no! Why, hadn’t she marched out an entire parade of arguments—all surprisingly well posed—to support her plea that Joseph entreat Sir Richard in her behalf? And there had been something behind those intense black eyes—some clear, bright glint of watchfulness—that signaled the presence of a sharp, even superior intelligence.

  “Whatever her reasons, she has fastened a great deal of hope on Morgan,” Joseph said with a sigh. Inexplicably, he was reluctant to take the child lightly. The fierce intensity, the solemn earnestness, of her plea had moved him more than he would have thought.

  “The child has asked me to speak with you,” he said to Richard Nelson, “in the hopes you might be persuaded to take her to Dublin, once Morgan has recovered enough to go home.”

  Sir Richard stared at him incredulously, then gave a short burst of laughter. “Why, the poor child! Was she serious, do you think?”

  Joseph nodded, still disturbed by the memory of Annie Delaney’s fierce insistence. “Oh, she was serious, all right. The lass seems to fancy herself involved with Morgan’s life somehow. She is determined to go to Dublin, to help take care of him.”

  “Good heavens! As if we haven’t enough to deal with…” Nelson’s words drifted off, and he looked away, almost as if he had forgotten Joseph’s presence entirely.

  Joseph noted again how much the elderly Englishman had failed since their first meeting in Dublin. His hands trembled continually, and hi
s every movement appeared to require great effort. He seemed to have aged years in only months.

  What was to be done about Morgan? Obviously his grandfather would be of no help at all in the more practical aspects of his care. Faith, it was more likely that Richard Nelson would soon need someone to look after him.

  Joseph rose, wincing at the stiffness in his own aging bones. Going to the window, he stood looking out. Dusk was gathering, and the candle-lit windows of Belfast’s shops and houses softened the mean gloom of the city. He felt his own spirit darken with the dreariness of his surroundings.

  “The child learned to read on Morgan’s writings in The Nation,” he told Sir Richard, attempting to shake off his heavyhearted mood. “That is likely one reason she feels so attached to him. He has become a type of folk hero to her. You’d think she knows him, and knows him well, to hear her speak of him.”

  “How peculiar,” Sir Richard replied vaguely. “But of course, what she asks is quite impossible. She’s only a little girl. She’d be more trouble than help.”

  Joseph turned to look at him. “What are you going to do, Sir Richard? Morgan will need a great deal of care, at least for an extended time, it would seem.”

  The poor man seemed beside himself with worry. “I have people looking into it now. He’s going to need someone quite strong, of course. And thoroughly reliable.” Nelson’s voice faltered. “Certainly, I’ll do all I can. But I’m afraid that will be precious little. I’m anxious to see him well settled…as soon as possible. If you could help us to find someone, I’d be most grateful.”

  Their eyes met, and Joseph shuddered at what he saw there. He had looked into the eyes of approaching death too many times not to recognize it when it stared back at him.

  At the same moment a thought struck him about a companion for Morgan. He said nothing to Richard Nelson, wanting time to consider the idea. But it occurred to Joseph that he just might be able to help Morgan’s grandfather with his dilemma.