Free Falling

by Susan Kiernan-Lewis

  Sarah didn’t care who took whose car. The light was fading fast and she needed to be mounted and on her way. From here, she could see by the open flaps that Donovan had examined the contents of her saddlebags, and knew she had a king’s fortune in rifle and handgun rounds. She didn’t dare take her eyes off him but she was tempted to look to see if they’d brought shovels, which would to confirm his story.

  “Fine,” she said, not moving. “I’ll let you get on with it.”

  The young man charged up the porch stairs and Sarah, startled, jerked her gun arm up.

  “Whoa! Whoa! Gavin, you moron, she’s got a gun, for Chrissake.”

  Gavin looked at Sarah with surprise and then turned to his Dad.

  “I know, Da. But we need to…”

  “Slowly, son. Let the woman get off the porch before you mow her down. I’m sorry, Missus,” Donovan shoved a hand through his thick hair, knocking his cheese cutter cap to the ground in the process. Sarah looked for any guile in his eyes and thought she saw only weariness and anxiety. “Gavin, get down here and let her pass,” Donovan spoke slowly as if talking to a feeble-witted child.

  Sarah would have preferred they both left or at least moved away but she realized there would be no other opportunity.

  “I’m sorry,” she said again. “I’ve had cause not to trust people recently.” She shifted the gun to her other hand and wiped the perspiration from her palm on her jeans. She moved down the porch, her eyes never leaving Donovan’s and, grabbing Dan’s reins, jerked them free from the porch rail. The man touched his son’s shoulder and motioned for him to move back a few steps and give her space.

  If they were going to rush her, she thought, the moment she attempted to mount would be the time. She knew she couldn’t get up without tucking her gun away. Quickly, Sarah positioned Dan between herself and the two men, shoved the gun into her holster, grabbed the cantle, jammed her foot into the stirrup which was nearly as high as her waist and swung up in what seemed like slow motion. Once in the saddle, she could see the men were patiently waiting for her. She left the gun where it was and gathered up the reins in both hands. Pulling back, she forced Dan to back up a few steps.

  “Do you know how he died?” she asked, feeling more comfortable now that she was mounted and armed.

  Donovan shook his head.

  “Aye, no,” he said. “Maybe a heart attack? And then the hyenas came down to pick the bones.” He waved a hand at the cottage. “Sure it doesn’t look like foul play, just bad luck. I hope you’ll be telling Dierdre that. Tell her Mike Donovan will make sure he’s buried proper.”

  The light was nearly dusk but still Sarah lingered.

  “How do you know Dierdre?” she asked.

  “It’s Seamus, really,” Donovan said, turning and pulling a long handled shovel out of a ruck sack Sarah hadn’t seen before. “He was my teacher. Well, everyone’s. Did you not know he was the village schoolmaster? Everyone round these parts was schooled by Seamus at one time or another.”

  “I’m sorry, again, I’m sorry for…” Sarah indicated the porch.

  Donovan waved her off.

  “Not a-tall,” he said. “These are times to be untrusting. You’d best get on where you’re going. There’ll be no moon tonight.”

  Sarah paused. She hated how she had acted. These were good people, doing a difficult job and she’d practically held them at gunpoint and, worse, nearly shot the boy. As she turned Dan west to pick up the main road from Balinagh, she found herself vowing not to let whatever “these times” were turn her into something less than human.

  Mike watched Sarah ride off and shook his head in amazement.

  “How do you know about her?” he asked as he handed Gavin the shovel.

  The boy shrugged. “It’s all over town,” he said. “Being American and all.”

  “Is it just Herself?”

  “No, there’s a husband and a kid, too. Why?” He grinned at his father. “Took a fancy, did ya, Da? And her a pistol-packing Mama and all.”

  “Shirrup, ya ejeet,” Mike said affably, pushing him in the direction of the backyard where the grave needed to be dug.

  Gavin trotted ahead of him, displaying all the energy and resilience of youth. Mike couldn’t help but look again in the direction that Sarah had gone.

  For whatever reason, he had to admit that there was something about her, the way she spoke or carried herself, something that he couldn’t put his finger on that, he might as well admit it, had…excited him.

  He turned to the task at hand and grabbed the shovel back from Gavin, hoping the chore would banish further thoughts along those lines.

  “Go back and find something to wrap poor Devon in,” he said to his son.

  Gavin made a face and hesitated. “Aw, no, why, me?”

  “Go on, Gavin, he won’t bite you.” Donovan pierced the earth with the shovel and threw the load of dirt behind him. Gavin retreated to the house, muttering unhappily under his breath as he went.

  Mike dug for a full five minutes without thinking, then jammed the shovel into the earth and rested his arm on the handle while he waited for Gavin to reappear. It was almost like he’d seen the episode on the porch he’d just experienced in a movie or something. An American movie.

  He glanced again in the direction she had gone.

  A really interesting American movie.

  It rained nearly the whole way back to the cottage. The dark night and the rain had reduced Sarah’s visibility to just a few feet in front of her but she took solace in the fact that Dan knew the way home. It was a strange feeling, she noted, with rain and darkness all around—and wickedness, too—to just let Dan carry her home without worrying about how. As a long cold finger of rain finally found its way down her collar, she thought it just might be the first time she had ever voluntarily let someone or something else handle things. She just knew she couldn’t do it herself. It was enough to stay upright on the horse—she was so tired—without trying to figure which road to take. Her earlier plans to trot all the way back were abandoned because of the wet roads and slick trails. She let Dan pick his pace and his path.

  About a quarter mile from where she estimated the cottage should be, she felt something was different about the ride. As bumpy and uneven as it had been up to now, it felt now that Dan was limping. Groaning at her bad luck, Sarah stopped him and slid to the ground. Her legs instantly gave way beneath her and she landed in a cold puddle of dirty water in the road. Snow was piled up along the sides of the road. With shaking hands, she ran her fingers down his hock and lifted his front left hoof. A sharp rock the size of her thumbnail was pushing against his frog. Without a pick, and the rain sluicing down her face, she used her fingers to pry it out and tossed it away. Even so, she decided not to remount, whether because she doubted she would be able to haul herself back up or because Dan’s hoof needed the break, she wasn’t sure. She led him a hundred yards up the first rise where she saw something that made her gasp and stop. Tears sprang to her eyes.

  Their cottage appeared in a ghostly shadow less than an eighth of a mile away, a thin curl of smoke came from the chimney, a welcome and a promise of warmth and love that filled her with strength and joy, and a feeling of God’s presence as strong as she had ever felt before in her life.

  With the rain dripping off her jacket, the mud covering the tops of her boots, she led her limping horse toward the cottage and home.

  * * * * * *

  Dear Mom and Dad,

  I cannot even tell you how cold it is here! Somehow, when I thought of Ireland, I thought of the rain but I didn’t think of the bone-piercing cold. I asked John if we were at the same parallel as Canada but he just gave me one of those looks he gives when he thinks I should at least try to act like the parent and know more than he does!

  We’ve been getting along pretty good since I last wrote you. It’s hard work but we’re healthy, we’re (relatively) warm, and we have enough to eat. I went into town yesterday to swap some nonessential thi
ngs we had (wine, mostly) for some things we could really use (tools, mostly). Seems the Irish considered the wine in the “essential things” category and I did very well in my trading! I’ll be hard pressed to just pay the marked prices for things when I get back to civilization. I’m really getting the hang of haggling. (Smile.)

  Anyway, I met a young woman at the market who has a major problem and it turns out we were in a position to help her. Her husband was killed earlier in the month and she has two small children who depend on her. She seems to have enough provisions and she says her little farm is easily run by just herself (although I cannot imagine how…these people are a different breed from us, y’all. They are tough and resourceful.) But part of her well caved in and she can’t repair it on her own. She suggested a week’s worth of work from David (seems there are a few other things she needs doing while she’s got an able-bodied man) and she’d give us one of her dairy cows. I know it sounds absurd, probably, from your end, but having a cow would make a BIG difference in our lives here. It’s hard to describe to you but the milk would open up new worlds of food for us. John needs the milk; the young woman—Julie—needs the help. So, this is a long way of saying that David left this morning for a week away from us. I can’t say he was thrilled with the idea but he did reflect in an amused tone: “Who would’ve guessed I’d end up being more prized for my brawn than my brain?” Thought you’d get a chuckle out of that, Dad. Anyway, he just left this morning and already I’m counting the days until he’s back. As hard as it is here, it’s a lot harder when 50% of your workforce is gone! (Ha ha!)

  So I must leave you until next time. It’s late (the only time I really have time to write) and my candle is down to a nub. Take care of each other, I pray you are both well, and that, whatever happens, you won’t worry about us over here. We are surviving very well.

  Love,

  Sarah

  Sarah folded her letter and carefully tucked it away with the rest of the unmailed letters home. The rain was tattooing out a gentle beat against the kitchen windows. She wondered where David was sleeping tonight, she hoped he did better than the barn or shed at Julie’s place. She looked over at her son, asleep in the big bed and smiled.

  Before David left, they had decided to mark out the garden for the spring planting upon his return. Dierdre had promised them cuttings and seeds and David had found more seeds in the root cellar. Since Julie had said she had several rifles and all her husband’s tools, David only took a knife with him for protection on his ride to Balinagh. She smiled again thinking back at the moment that John determined (incorrectly, she told herself) that that meant one of the two guns left behind was his.

  Tomorrow, she and John would step off the garden boundaries in anticipation of preparing the ground. Sarah was not a big gardener back home and she found herself wishing she had Dierdre’s opinion on where to position the plot.

  Sarah pulled her sweater tighter around her and went to check the stove. She decided they would not use the fireplace while David was gone. Too much heat got lost with the fireplace. The little potbellied stove was more efficient for warming up the room. She opened the little stove door with an oven mitt and wedged in another couple of sticks of wood. She closed and latched it carefully. The stove would be ice-cold when they awoke in the morning, but the mountains of blankets—and each other—would keep them snug and warm until then.

  Ten days later, David still hadn’t come back.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  As she had every freezing cold morning since he left, Sarah left her warm bed, started the cook fire in the kitchen and went to the front door window to see if she might glimpse him coming down the main drive. As if her watching for him might make him come. She knew it was possible that David just hadn’t finished the work he’d agreed to do for the girl, but she couldn’t imagine he wouldn’t come home to tell her that. It wasn’t like David to just…not come.

  She turned back to the kitchen and pulled out a covered bowl of dough and began forming it into biscuits. She would make enough for all three of their meals today. The pan she had set on the stove was boiling so she poured the tea. A little-boy groan from the bed brought a smile to her lips.

  “Morning, sweetie,” she said as she mixed precious sugar and goat milk into a mug for him. “Sleep okay?”

  John made a muffled response.

  She brought his tea to him and set it down on the table next to the bed.

  “Dad here?” he asked sleepily.

  “Not yet,” she said. “I’ll bet he’ll get in later this afternoon.”

  “That’s what you said yesterday.”

  John sat up in bed and rubbed the sleep from his eyes. He reached for his tea.

  “Blow on it,” she said. He looked like such a little boy. Who would he be when they finally made it back home?

  She went back to the kitchen and felt a weight press down on her shoulders.

  Where are you, David? Your family needs you here.

  She slid the biscuits in the stove and sat down at the kitchen table with her own mug of tea.

  Today, she and John had to go collect the sheep and bring them in closer. The woman she’d traded with for the six sheep had come the first day after David left and collected her sheep and the wine. She wasn’t friendly and Sarah worried that she saw the woman looking around, taking inventory of the cottage and barn.

  Will I ever be able to trust people again? she wondered.

  Sarah decided they needed to be able to see their sheep. Besides, they had lost two to the cold in just the last week. As her son reminded her: “We don’t have an endless supply of sheep, you know.” They would move them to the patch of grass on the other side of the paddock. When David got back, they would move them back to the pasture and take turns watching over them as they grazed. (“Just like real shepherds,” John had said.)

  The rabbit traps had been empty for several days now and Sarah doubted they’d catch any more until spring. There was still some canned food in the root cellar, three chickens and one rooster and plenty of flour for bread. It might be a relatively meatless winter, but at least they’d survive.

  Sarah stood up and went to the front door again.

  “You said probably this afternoon,” John said from the bed.

  “That’s right,” she said. “I was just looking.”

  John climbed out of bed. “You were watching,” he said.

  She turned to look at him. “You’re right,” she said with a smile. “I guess I was.”

  It was when David had been gone a total of two weeks that John began to push to go after him.

  “I know the way to Balinagh,” he said. “It’s just straight down that road. Even you did it in the pouring rain and it was no big deal.”

  “He’s not in Balinagh,” she said for the hundredth time. “I told you—”

  “It doesn’t matter, Mom,” John said with exasperation. “Someone will know where she lives. Everybody knows everyone in Ireland.”

  They’d had scrambled eggs for supper with toast and what was left of the jam Dierdre had given them the month before.

  “He might need me,” John said, pushing his plate away. “He might be hurt somewhere and needing me to come.”

  Sarah could feel the tears coming.

  “This, we have to give to God.” Sarah sat down next to him and put her arms around him. “God has given us a full plate and it’s all that we can do to handle this.” She waved her hand around the room to indicate the cottage and the barn. “He may just want us to let Him handle when Dad comes back to us.”

  “You mean, like accept we can’t do anything?”

  “Well, we can pray, you know?”

  “I DO pray, Mom,” John said earnestly. “I am praying all the time that Dad comes back.”

  “I know you are, sweetie. We both are. But if you really accept that God will deal with it, you don’t keep worrying at it and agonizing over it. You accept it.”

  John stood up. “No,” he said.
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  “Now, John…” Sarah said.

  “God helps them that helps themselves,” he said stubbornly. “I think God’s wondering how long it’ll take before we get up and go look for him. I do, Mom.”

  Sarah felt a catch in her throat as she watched her boy, so resolute, so sure of himself. She covered her eyes when she began to cry.

  “Mom?” John sat back down next to her. “You okay?”

  She forced the tears back and smiled at him. “I’m fine,” she said, patting his hand. “You’re right. We’ll go first thing in the morning.”

  “Are you serious?” John jumped again and clapped his hands in his excitement. “Can we go now? Why do we have to wait ‘til morning? It’s nowhere near dark yet. It’ll take me two secs to saddle everybody up.”

  Sarah put a hand out to calm him and felt a strong rush of love and certainty, as if God were, in fact, blessing the enterprise.

  “First thing in the morning,” she said.

  The next morning Sarah and John stood in the doorway of the barn with their reins in their hands and watched the rain pour down.

  I hate Ireland, Sarah thought.

  “We’re still going, right?” John asked, looking from the rain to his mother’s face as if trying to decipher her thoughts.

  Sarah sighed but forced a smile on her face for his sake.

  “We are still going,” she said. I must be crazy. “Put the dogs in the stall with their water bowl and mount up,” she said, looping the reins over Dan’s head. “Wear your hardhat, John,” she called after him. “I don’t know when you stopped wearing it but…” She didn’t bother finishing. He was back in one of the stalls not listening anyway.

  He rejoined her, his hardhat on and buckled, and climbed onto his pony.

  “Put your shirt collar up,” she said. “Else the rain’ll go straight down your back.”

  “Mom, I’m good,” he said, moving Star out into the rain. “Let’s go.”