Nory Ryan's Song (7 page)

C
HAPTER
13

“A
package,” Celia said when I caught up to them. Her nose twitched with excitement. “In the post office.”

“From Maggie?” I took a breath. “It must be.” We had never gotten something from the post office, not once in our whole lives.

“Michael Mallon was there in Ballilee,” Celia said, “and they told him.”

We looked at each other, Celia reaching out so our hands met.

It was a long walk and the road was stony. We kept to the edge to walk on the soft weeds that grew next to the hedges. As the road twisted we caught glimpses of the sea below, and the strand still filled with people.

More people I didn’t know. People who didn’t live in Maidin Bay or even nearby.

“They will strip the earth,”
Anna had said.

And the sea, I thought, watching fishermen jog each other as they tried for a catch with ropes and bits of string. Granda said there was a world just like ours on the bottom of the sea where the
sídhe
planted potatoes in the sand and drank tea from tiny shell cups. Horses galloped past their houses on the way to a sea city. Granda had said if you bent your ear to the water on a dark night, you might hear the horses neighing.

I’d always meant to bend my ear to it. I stood there for a moment until Celia tugged at my arm. “Hurry,” she said.

At the top of a small hill Ballilee spread out before us. The church, the rectory, a row of houses; and in back of the hotel, someone emptied a pail of dirty water. A crowd of people had gathered in front of the bakery. They were begging for food. Some were mothers with tiny babies in their arms.

Babies with big eyes.

Celia hesitated. I took her arm. “Try not to look.”

We had never been inside the post office. Could we walk in by ourselves? We peered in the window at Brennan, the postman, in back of the counter. Another man was there too, gathering a pile of envelopes for the hotel.

Patch was the brave one. Before we could stop him, he pushed open the door and was inside. Sean was next, looking back over his shoulder at us.

I put my head in the air so Celia wouldn’t think I was afraid and sailed inside in back of the other two.

“There is something for us,” I said.

Mr. Brennan looked across the counter. “A package.”

“Yes,” Celia breathed.

Maggie. Maggie had sent us something all the way from Brooklyn, New York. Mr. Brennan pointed to a box on the shelf. It was scribbled over with writing; bits of colored paper were stuck to it.

What was inside? What could it be? I tried to think. Could Maggie have pried diamonds out of the Brooklyn streets? Did the diamonds belong to everyone? Could you do that? Would we be rich?

I’d give Anna a coin straightaway, and more besides, much more. I’d get back the Mallons’ currach and tell Liam I was doing it for him even though he hadn’t let me come with him. I’d buy Patch penny candy and Granda a jar of
poitín
. But first I’d buy food. We’d eat and eat.

But maybe the box held warm things to wear. Granda was cold all the time. And a shawl for me, one with fringe. Red it would be, my favorite color.

Or food.

I had to laugh at myself for thinking of that, laugh as I felt my stomach folding itself together, so hungry. What food could be sent all that way and still be good inside the package?

No, I was back to diamonds. That was what I’d hope for.

But Mr. Brennan didn’t reach for the package. He looked out the window at the people gathered in front of the bakery. They were begging, yelling for food. Someone threw a rock through the window, and the people climbed in over the broken glass. The baker, a cut on his cheek, slipped out his door. Then he was outside, running down the street, away from his rolls, and his bread, and his penny buns.

In a moment everything was gone. The shelves were bare, and outside the people tore loaves of bread into chunks, fighting over them, trampling each other.

Celia and I backed up against the wall. Patch buried his head in my skirt. And even Sean Red stood there, hands dangling, his eyes wide.

I rubbed my fingers over Patch’s back, feeling the bones, tiny as Biddy the hen’s. “Don’t be afraid,” I whispered, trying not to let him feel my hands shake.

The police came, three of them with clubs and whistles. But there was no one to arrest. They had disappeared up the street and into the alleys.

I turned back to Mr. Brennan. “Our package, please.” I didn’t dare hold out my hand, but I asked in a determined voice, as if I received a package from Brooklyn, New York, America, every day.

But Mr. Brennan shook his head.

“You said it was ours.” What would happen if I reached across the counter, and grabbed it, and ran?

At last he took the box down. I tried to see by the way he handled it … was it heavy enough to be holding diamonds? They could be small ones, tiny ones. I began to smile.

But he showed us the bits of colored paper. “Not enough stamps,” he said. “There’s money due on this.”

I shook my head. “I don’t understand.”

Celia moved forward. “It is for the Ryans,” she said. “For Granda and Nory and me. It’s from Maggie. You know that.”

He raised one shoulder just the slightest bit. “You’ll have to pay what’s owing.”

I shook my head. “We don’t have coins; we have no money.”

And as we said it, he slid the package back across the counter. I reached out and touched it, and the paper slid away under my fingers, the paper and the bits of colored pictures. I almost caught it by the string, but then, in the blink of an eye, it was up on the shelf.

“That is not right.” My voice was quivering and my chin unsteady. How cruel he was. Worse than Devlin. Worse than the English. “That’s ours,” I said. “Ours from Maggie.”

And then I saw his eyes, and I knew he was sorry for us.

“I will hold it for you,” he said, leaning toward us. “I will keep it here on the shelf. As soon as you get some money …”

“It will be forever,” I said.

“I will keep it here for you forever, then,” he said.

We stood looking up at the package, Celia, Sean Red, Patch, and I. Celia was crying. I tried to say something to make her smile. “Tear bag,” I said, but I could hardly get the words out.

“What is inside?” Patch was asking. “Is it something to eat?”

Someone else came into the post office, and Mr. Brennan made motions with his hands, telling us to go.

We walked home slowly. Slowly because I was still trying to think of a way to get the package. Slowly because it had started to rain, a cold fall rain, and the road had turned to mud. Slowly because we were so hungry.

C
HAPTER
14

T
he next day was Sunday. We walked halfway to Ballilee to the church for Mass. It took longer than usual. Now that we had the hunger, we moved slowly. On the altar, Father Harte moved slowly too. When he turned toward us, holding out his arms for the Kyrie, his hands trembled; his face was pale and thin.

We prayed for someone to help, prayed for the English to give up the rents this year, and then we came home. We made ourselves a meal of one poor hen. She was old and tough but we ate every shred of meat and sucked on the bones until they fell apart in our mouths. We made sure Patch had the softest whitest bits we could find. We didn’t dare look at Biddy and the second sister, who scratched around on the floor beside us.

“Do you think they know?” Celia asked.

“I don’t even care.” It was the first time my stomach had been full since the potatoes had failed.

But Granda said, “We can’t do this again.” He looked almost desperate. “We have lost an egg a day that would have kept us alive. We must keep the other two hens carefully, and find seed for them somehow.”

Celia and I nodded, ashamed because we hadn’t even felt sorry for the sister we had just eaten. We had been sorry only that she hadn’t had more meat on her bones.

Granda cleared his throat, looking up the way he always did. “They are building a road around Maidin Bay.”

“A road?” I sucked on the end of a bone, licking my fingers.

“For what reason?” Celia said.

Granda raised a shoulder in the air. “For no reason. The English will have us build roads that go nowhere. They will give us money but in the end they want nothing to be better.”

“We are going to build a road?”
How could I ever build a road?
I wondered.

“Not you,” Granda said. “Of course not you. How could you break up rocks and carry them?”

“Oh,” I said, relieved.

“Me,” said Granda.

Celia rolled her eyes at me.

“I will start tomorrow morning,” Granda said.

“No.” I swallowed a piece of bone, feeling the sharp edges in my throat.

Granda smoothed down his beard. “It is the only way.”

Celia bit her lips. They were chapped, so dry they were cracked and bleeding. I’d ask Anna what to do about it. She was trying to put every one of her cures into my head. A bit of boiled fish for sores. Garlic for sore throat. Egg white for … I couldn’t remember what. Even warm cow dung for burns.
Fuafar
.

Granda started again. “The rent will be due again soon.”

I closed my eyes. The rain was so much colder now and the damp seeped through our clothes. We hadn’t paid the last of the old rent, and soon the new one would be on us.

I pictured Da coming along the road, his pack on his shoulders, and felt a pain in my chest. He should have been here by now.

Suppose something had happened to him? How would we know?

“They will give us a little money.” Granda spread his hands wide. “And a meal at the end of the day.”

“The work is too hard for you,” Celia said. She scooped up the bones and put them into the pot for a broth.

Granda leaned forward. “The money will help feed the three of you. It will buy milk or a piece of salmon if there’s any to be had in Ballilee. You won’t have to worry about me.”

Not worry? Granda chopping up rocks, laying them out on a road no one needed?

Celia stood up. She licked one finger and worked at a stain on her skirt.

“Tell Granda he can’t do this,” I said, but Celia was looking at her feet. “I wish I had shoes,” she whispered.

“Celia. What about Granda?”

“I will give them a wash,” she said. “That’s the best I can do.”

I was furious. “Will you pay attention to me!”

“I’m off to see Lord Cunningham,” she said. “I’ll ask for a job in the kitchen. I’m a good cook. I wish I had thought of it sooner.”

“You are a
fuafar
cook. And that’s a terrible …” I began to say “idea.” But it wasn’t a terrible idea. It was the best idea any of us had had in a long time. I thought of Maggie on the cliff the day she left.
Celia is loyal and true
.

Celia went to the shelf for her piece of the comb. Broken in half, it hardly smoothed her hair at all. “How do I look?” she asked.

“Like a goat. A little nanny goat.” I took the comb from her and gently ran it through her hair, teasing out the knots.

Celia took a quick look at the closed door. None of us had ever been on the road after dark. We knew the
sídhe
were out there. She shook herself. “You are not to move from your place at the hearth, Granda. You will stay here,
a stór
, and I will cook up a mess of food at Cunningham’s, and bring potatoes in buttermilk for you and a sour little limpet for my sour little sister.”

I raised my hand to my mouth. “I forgot them. Here we are starving and the limpets are swimming around in their pail behind the stone wall outside. They must think they’re arrived in a strange wee ocean.”

Celia and Granda looked at each other, wondering, I guessed, if I had lost my mind.

“The ones I left there.” I waved my hand. “I’ll get them.”

I’d have to go out in the dark too.

“A delicious treat,” I whispered to give myself courage.

I said it to Celia’s back. She stood with both feet in the bowl on the floor, sloshing them up and down, looking at her toes. “I’ll never get the poor things clean,” she said, “not unless I spend a month in this spot.” She shook one foot, spraying dirty water around. “The
sídhe
will hate this water.” She tried to smile. She stood at the door for a moment, looking back at us. I knew she was afraid too.

I nodded at her to show I thought she was brave, and then she was gone.

“I will go for the limpets,” I said. I didn’t want Granda to know I was just as afraid as Celia. And I didn’t even have that far to go. Across the field and halfway to Anna’s house. I went to the doorway. There was no moon tonight and the fields were dark. I could see a tallow light at Mallons’ house, but none in Anna’s window. I shivered.

“I will go to the road tomorrow even so,” Granda said as if he were arguing with me. “My hands are still strong, and my back. You will see. I will bring money home and we will last, the four of us, until your da comes home.”

I didn’t answer him. I’d wait until Celia came home. The two of us would make sure he did no such thing.

I stepped from the doorway into the dark world. For all I knew ghostly gray men were out there waiting for me. I had heard they made themselves into wisps of fog, ugly and unfriendly to humans. Or maybe I’d see a
bean sídhe
with her hair flowing, moaning because someone was going to die.

Something moved in the field, and I began to sing Granda’s old war song for courage.

I thought of Patch and pretended I was holding his warm little hand. I imagined we were out to gather stones for his wall, that the sliver of moon was a bit of the sun, and I started to run. Where was that pail? I went the length of the wall, searching, so hungry my mouth was watering for those limpets.

Who would have stolen them?

I almost fell over the pail on its side, water spilled, the limpets hard little lumps.

A voice from so long ago.
“You never think. You never finish what you start.”

“Oh, Celia,
a stór
, you are right,” I said, scooping up the mess that no one could eat.