The Irish Bride

by Alexis Harrington

  He knew from living in the cramped quarters of an Irish cottage there was very little that remained private. She was no stranger to men or anyone else in various stages of undress. But he found her embarrassed innocence endearing. Arousing in fact.

  God, he’d better not entertain notions like that this early in the day. Last night had been difficult enough, and there was no sense in starting his morning with thoughts that would only torture his mind and body.

  The serving women had come for the tub shortly after his return last night, and now the washstand stood behind the dressing screen. After he washed and dressed, they found a little restaurant, La Maison Café, that served them tea, sausages, and something called beignets, sweet, fried pastries that tasted wonderful.

  After, Farrell returned to the hotel room to finish her letter and Aidan began his search for transport North. It had long been his experience that a good place to gather information was in a pub. He walked down the street to a barroom with a name that made him grin—Lass of Killarney.

  He stood in the doorway, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the dim interior. It smelled vaguely like the pubs back home, full of cigar and pipe smoke, the rich, warm odor of ale and the sharper tang of whiskey. Flowing through the open back door at the end of the bar came the acrid stink of piss from the outdoor jakes. Except for the large painting of the naked lassie hanging behind the bar, which no pub in his experience could have afforded, it was fairly familiar.

  The patrons were slightly less disreputable-looking than the ones at The Rose and Anchor in Queenstown, so he crossed the floor to the bar.

  “Sure, and after she had her way she wanted to have another go, and me dead from her efforts. Dead, I swear to ye, Jack. She brought me back. She could do things to a man that would make his eyes roll back in his head. My heart stopped entirely at least twice, it did!” The storyteller, a big, broad-shouldered man with carroty hair, sucked down the entire contents of his ale mug in one gulp, then dragged his forearm across his mouth. He shook his head regretfully. “I do miss that old girl. She was even more entertainin’ than her daughter.”

  “Ah, Flanagan, if I wouldn’t go broke, I’d give you free ale just to hear your stories,” Jack, the barkeep said, laughing. “Your heart stopped. Har-har!”

  “So it did! Maybe it was three times, at that!”

  In a land where even English sounded like a foreign language, Aidan’s ears immediately picked up the welcome sound of a homegrown voice.

  “And what will yours be?” Jack asked him, still smiling over the other man’s story.

  “I’ll have what he’s having,” he replied and nodded at the burly Irishman.

  Flanagan looked at Aidan. “I take it ye’re not from these parts.”

  “Nor you—I can understand your speech.”

  The other man gave a hearty bark of laughter. “Aye, I know what ye mean. I’m Colm Flanagan, most recently from Philadelphia.”

  “Aidan O’Rourke. I’ve just come from County Cork with my wife.” He put out his hand, which Flanagan wrung in his own beefy paw.

  “County Cork, is it now? Well, keep your valuables safe because there be Yankee tricksters in every port, eager to take severe advantage of the newly come.”

  Aidan nodded. Charles Morton had told him the selfsame thing. “As I’ve heard.”

  “I’m from Strokestown in County Roscommon meself, but I haven’t seen it these eight years past.”

  “Ah, ye’d have left during the famine, then.” Aidan took a big sip of the ale put in front of him.

  “Aye. Eighteen-forty-seven was a terrible year, you might remember. My family were tenants of Major Denis Mahon.”

  Fascinated, Aidan leaned forward a bit. “We heard he was a tyrant, banishing his tenants on those coffin ships. Worse than Cromwell, it was said, and that he got what he deserved when he was shot dead in his own carriage.”

  Flanagan shrugged philosophically. “He was in a position I wouldn’t wish on the devil himself. The estate was thirty thousand pounds in debt when it came to him, and the rents were three years in arrears. Then the potato miadh struck and the famine followed. He offered passage to Canada to any tenant who would give up his wee patch of land. So my brothers and I, we said all right. The major chartered two ships and both of them lost a lot of passengers to typhus by the time we reached Quebec. My brothers were among them. But I lived. Maybe I wouldn’t have if Mahon hadn’t given me the chance to leave.” He sounded glad to have gone.

  “Don’t ye miss Ireland?”

  The big man gave him a half-smile that Aidan knew well; he’d seen it, at one time or another, on nearly every Irish face he’d ever known. It reflected heart-sore regret and the reality of life. “That I do, boyo, every one of my days, just like I miss my sainted mam. But I know I’ll not see either of them again in this life.”

  Aidan was silent for a moment, realizing that Colm Flanagan spoke for him as well, and for God knew how many other Irishmen. He drained his ale.

  “So ye came to Philadelphia and then New Orleans, and you’ve been here all these years?” Aidan signaled the barkeep to bring two more pints.

  “Oh, Jaysus, no. I’ve been to New York, Boston, Providence, Newport—all up and down the east coast. I dug ditches, I worked on docks and in factories and on the railroads. But the work—harder than anything at home, mind—was never steady. And ye take your life in your hands in most cases. The bosses aren’t too choosey about putting their workers in dangerous jobs. There are always others eager to take a dead man’s place. I’ve seen men worked to death, killed in accidents and by sickness. I gave up on those cities and came down here, but I’ve got a plan for something better. Something different altogether.” He lifted the mug brought by the barkeep and nodded at Aidan. “Thank you. In the name of Erin.”

  Aidan lifted his mug as well. “Name of Erin,” he intoned and took a long swallow of ale. “Is there no solid work up North?”

  “Aye, lad, there’s work, but the pay is bad, the hours longer than ye can imagine, and now we’ve a new enemy in America.” Flanagan looked around the barroom, and his voice dropped to a near whisper. “The Know-Nothings.”

  “Eh? No what?”

  “It’s a political party. They’re called Know-Nothings because they operate in secret against immigrants, and most especially Catholics. Hate us, they surely do. They got the name since when they’re asked about their evil doings, they claim to know nothing. They’ve murdered Irishmen and destroyed churches. Nobody stops them.”

  Aidan stared at him.

  “Not what ye’d heard back home, aye?” Flanagan’s chuckle was grim. “You probably got letters from America, or knew someone who did, who said this is the land of milk and honey, or maybe tea and whiskey. Food galore, enough to make a man fat, gorgeous houses, and two-three sets of clothes.”

  It was Danny Leary’s letter almost to the word, the one he’d told Farrell about the night before they sailed. No, Flanagan’s account wasn’t what he’d heard. He could only shake his head. “Are they starving in America too?”

  “No, no, all those things are here—miles of good crops, herds of cattle, flocks of sheep and chickens—this is a place of plenty. But Irishmen might only see it all going to someone else. The poor souls get here, most of them can’t read or write, some of them can speak only Irish, they don’t know how to do anything but work the land. The priests and politicians here urge them to settle on farms, but none can afford that. So they end up sweeping floors in places like this—” He gestured around the barroom. “Or turning their lungs black in the coal mines, or digging canals. Sometimes they do work that plantation owners won’t risk their slaves to do. Our women, if they’re lucky enough, and if ye can call it luck, go to work in rich men’s homes as servants or cooks. Otherwise they toil in the textile mills, breathing in lint, and God keep them from burning to death if the places catch fire. There’s nothing wrong with hard work, but a man ought to be paid for what he does, and not have to risk his life in
the doing. It’s a disgrace, so it is.”

  By this time, Aidan had begun to regret that he’d met Colm Flanagan. He felt as if someone had plunged a knife into his heart and twisted the haft. If what the man said was true, his life and Farrell’s would be no better than it had been in Ireland. It sounded as if no one was willing to prevent the abominations he described, and because this was America, it made the situation that much worse. Aidan wondered what he was going to do, after he’d made Farrell all those grand promises. Surely, given the man’s talent for yarn-spinning, he must be exaggerating.

  Flanagan must have seen the disillusionment in Aidan’s face. “Aye, things aren’t what we expected—life isn’t so rosy and the streets aren’t gold paved. But there are opportunities.” He leaned close again, as if he were about to reveal a treasured secret. “For myself, I’m going to try my luck with a new enterprise I’ve learned of in the Oregon Territory near the Pacific Ocean. A man with enough money to make the trip and the grit to carve a life out of the wilderness could prosper.”

  He went on to tell Aidan the fantastic story that a man could settle on one hundred sixty acres and claim it as his own. All he had to do was build a house and work the place for a couple of years. And if he had a wife, she could acquire the same size parcel in her own name.

  “And no one there will tell ye that you can’t work because you’re Irish or because you’re Catholic or any of that blather. It’s wide open land, free for the taking.”

  “Free?” Aidan repeated. “Nothing is free in this life. Someone always has their hand out to be paid.”

  “That’s the grand part of this, lad. The American government is eager to expand the country and settle the West. They passed an act to give away land through the end of this year.” Flanagan drained his ale mug. “So if you’ve a mind to go, you’d best get on with it.” He glanced at the wall clock and grimaced. “Christ, I’ve got to get down to the docks and see if I can pick up a job for a day or two.” He straightened away from the bar and put out his hand to Aidan again. “It’s been a pleasure, Aidan O’Rourke. Good luck to ye, and if you decide to go to Oregon, maybe we’ll meet again.”

  Aidan watched him leave, then paid his bill. What Flanagan had told him about the Oregon Territory sounded too good to be true. He intended to find out if it was.

  * * *

  “You want to travel two thousand miles west? Past the bounds of civilization and into the domain of naked savages, God help us! You’ve been gone all day and now ye come back here, smelling like the floor of a pub to tell me this? And how will we be getting there, Mr. O’Rourke?”

  Farrell stood with her hands on her hips and faced him across the width of the rug in their hotel room. She knew she probably sounded like a scold, but Aidan’s news was so astonishing, so alarming, she couldn’t help herself. Every scheme he had dreamed up beginning with that night in Clare’s cottage was more crackbrained than the next. Their weeks at sea, the misery, the discomfort, the danger that they had endured came washing over her. Here they had just landed and he was talking about going farther still. “And what happened to the plan of going to New York or Boston or—or somewhere closer, if I may ask?”

  Patiently, Aidan went on to repeat the story of his chance meeting with Colm Flanagan. “After that I nosed around a bit—yes, in pubs—asking questions to confirm everything he’d told me. Most of it was true, including the bad things. We don’t want to go to a place where we’re treated like dirt again, and kill ourselves working just to barely survive. There’s land out west, miles and miles of it, that no one owns.” He scratched at an insect bite on his jaw. This semi-tropical climate was like Eden to the beasts. “And from what I could learn, people have been going to Oregon in droves, following a path they call the Oregon Trail. It might be hard at the beginning but we’d settle in soon enough. We’ll grow acres of crops and work the land—it’ll be heaven.”

  “But Holy Mother, it’s too far away entirely!”

  He held out his hands in an expression of exasperation. “Too far away—from what, I ask ye? From New Orleans? This town isn’t home to us. From New York, a place we’ve never even seen and have no attachment to?”

  His question forced her to admit her true fear. She lowered her chin and stared at the worn pattern on the rug. When she answered, her voice was as small as a girl’s. “It’s too far away from Ireland.”

  A moment of silence passed and she looked up at him. She saw the echo of her regret in his eyes, that they would never see their homeland again.

  At last he replied, “Ah, little red one, Ireland is always with us. Here”—he pointed to his temple—“and here,” and he put his hand over his heart. It will never matter how many miles we travel. So it’s settled, then. We’ll go to the Oregon Territory.”

  His pronouncement infuriated her. She wasn’t asked if she wanted to go or how she felt about the decision. He simply told her they were going. The very same kind of decree had sent her across the Atlantic. Her brows met over the bridge of her nose.

  “I didn’t want to come to America in the first place, but ye kept telling me we’ll have a better life, and I began to believe you. Well, we’re here now and it still isn’t good enough for you. I’m sick of traveling. I just want to light someplace, and I don’t see why we have to go all the way to the damned Pacific Ocean to do it! What will be next? China? I won’t go, I’m telling you. I won’t.”

  He took a step back, as if she’d slapped him. Her arms were rigid at her sides and her hands closed into fists. The sudden silence in the room was broken only by the raspy sound of their breathing. The vehemence of Farrell’s outburst surprised even her. She was not a retiring creature, but neither was she given to losing her temper.

  She let her hands relax, but every other muscle was locked with worry and anger. “Do you even care about what I want? Can ye not understand how it feels to be ordered about like a dog?” she asked, more quietly.

  “I do understand, and I don’t mean to give you orders.” He came close again and she could smell the scent of clean sweat, and the faintest whiff of wood smoke and porter. “But I also remember what it feels like to starve, and so do you. Think, girl, just think.” He gripped her arms in his big hands, his face alight with the passion of a man aching for freedom. “Wild game and fish without end, wide-open land, never plowed once, they say, begging to be planted and free for the taking. The O’Rourkes will finally own land again. Farrell, lass, how can we not go?”

  Her shoulders sagged under his touch but she did not respond.

  “Will ye think on it, at least?” he implored. His expression was so appealing, so full of hope, she couldn’t refuse him outright. Liam had once told her that Aidan’s chief failing was not his rebelliousness or his passion. It was hope. Hope, Liam had said, and Aidan’s certainty that he could make his dreams come true would bring him the most trouble and break his heart. A man ought to accept his lot in life and make the best of it, had been Liam’s opinion.

  “Aye, I’ll think on it,” she replied glumly, and felt as if she were agreeing to think about spending a year in gaol.

  * * *

  “Farrell, will ye get up and come to see Mrs. Kinealy, then? She’s askin’ for you.”

  It was her mother’s voice Farrell heard, so clear and bright, not weak from hunger and sickness. Although she couldn’t see her, Farrell knew she was a young woman again, and she was but twelve years old herself.

  “I’m coming, Mam,” she called and ran to the front door of their cottage to see her mother and greet the neighbor. Friendly Mrs. Kinealy, she was the poorest of the poor, and everyone loved her. Through the open front door, though, all Farrell could see was a gray dusk, as if the world had taken its last breath. The trees were tall, leafless skeletons, rattling their limbs in the cold wind like dry bones picked clean. Everything was gray and white—all color had drained away.

  “Farrell, are ye coming?”

  She hurried down the road, past the empty cottages, past
the destroyed, diseased potato gardens, toward the sound of her mother’s voice, she but she couldn’t see her. “Where are you, Mam?

  “Just here, lass, here with Mrs. Kinealy. Come along, now, we’re waiting for you.”

  She rounded a fallen tree and saw her mother. She was dressed in rags and she was as gray as the landscape. “Say good morning to Mrs. Kinealy, will ye?”

  There, beside her mother, stood a dog that looked just as skeletal as the trees. In its slavering jaws was a woman’s head, hanging from its teeth by her hair. The head’s eyes opened and looked at Farrell.

  “Mrs. Kinealy!”

  “God love ye, lass. I’ve come to a bad end, I have. We all starved, me, your mother, your father and brothers. All of us. Don’t let it happen to you. Don’t you come to a bad end, you and your man.”

  Farrell tried to run but her feet would not move. The foul-smelling, plague-infested soil seemed to be sucking her down. She tried to scream, but could make no sound. She tried to look away, but her eyes would not do anything but stare at the dead woman’s talking head, gray and collapsed and shriveled.

  Farrell sat bolt upright in bed and heard a shrill cry that came from her own mouth.

  “Farrell! Whisht, wee céadsearc! Ye’re dreaming!” Aidan scrambled onto the bed beside her, fumbling for a match and trying to comfort her at the same time. “It’s only a dream.” He struck the match and held it to the candle on the table beside the bed. Light poured over them and she recognized the hotel room. This wasn’t Skibbereen. It was New Orleans, in America.

  “Oh, God, Aidan!” She buried her face against his chest, grateful for its solid strength. His arms enclosed her and she cried, terrified and heartbroken.

  “It was real, so real!” she gasped between sobs.

  “No, lass, it wasn’t. It was only a bad dream sent by the fey people to trouble you, that’s all.”