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“Ian’s risk of falling off the roof is almost nothing compared to mine.” Finbarr stood at the base of the ladder Patrick had leaned against the side of their brother’s house. “I think you had best tackle this repair on your own.”
“It’s not m’wish to see you fall to your death, lad,” Patrick said. “I’m after teaching you to help with building so you can do a bit of work on that house of yours. Does a man good to labor on the place he means to call home.”
“And that includes a blind boy on a roof?” Finbarr’s sarcasm held a noticeable note of self-pity. How well Patrick knew that weight. He couldn’t bear to see his baby brother swimming in the same poison he himself had been drowning in for a third of his life.
“I can’t say that I’m too impressed with your counting skills, Finbarr.”
His scarred face pulled in confusion. “My counting skills?”
“That you think you’re a boy makes me wonder if you’re able to count past ten with your shoes on.” He nudged Finbarr closer to the ladder. “Up with you, bean sprout. I’m behind you.”
Finbarr kept stubbornly still. “I can’t stay on a roof if I can’t see the edge of it.”
“I’m planning to tie you to the chimney. And I learned to tie blasted good knots while living in Winnipeg. The place is crawling with seafarers.” Again, he nudged his brother. “Up with you. Our sister needs her roof repaired. We’ll not fail her in this.”
Finbarr made the climb very slowly, very cautiously. Patrick held the ladder still, watching his brother closely.
“Your hand’s next spot’ll be the roof itself,” he called out. “Hoist yourself up and have a seat.”
“How steep is it?” Finbarr asked.
“Judge it with your hand,” Patrick said. “If you still can’t tell, I’ll help you sort it.”
To his credit, the lad set himself to the task. After a moment, he crawled onto the roof. Hands taking careful measure of the space around him, he sorted out a spot for himself.
Patrick climbed up the ladder, two long ropes looped over his arm. He sat beside Finbarr and began tying the end of one rope into two large loops. “I worked on the viceroy’s residence in Ottawa. That pile of stone is far taller than this house. The foreman on that job taught me how to tie off so I’d not kill m’self if I slipped.”
“Are you tying yourself to the chimney up here, as well?”
“For sure, for sure. I’ll not be up here dancing in the wind.” He pulled Finbarr’s arms through the loops. “God is good, but—”
“—don’t dance in a small boat.” Finbarr finished with him, word-for-word.
Patrick let himself chuckle. “Ma still says that, does she?”
“All the time.”
Patrick tied the loops together across Finbarr’s chest, necessary so that if the lad slipped he wouldn’t simply slide out of the harness. He created the same thing with the other rope and put it on himself.
“I’m going to anchor us. Then we can get started.”
“I have helped build and fix roofs,” Finbarr said as Patrick walked carefully toward the stone chimney. “But that was before— That was when I could see. I don’t know how much help I’ll be now.”
“Don’t fret, bean sprout. We’ll stumble our way toward some answer or another.”
“That’s what Cecily says. Well, when she says it, it sounds more like”—he paused for the length of a breath and, when he spoke again, did so with a rather impressive version of their sister-in-law’s very proper British voice—“‘Do not you fret, Finbarr. We will discover the solution if we put our minds to it.’” The lad then resumed his normal manner of speaking. “She’s convinced there’s almost nothing I can’t do.”
“You’ve quite an ally there, then. A fellow could do worse than have such support.”
“It’s frustrating, though.”
Patrick tested the knots. “How so?”
“There are things I can’t do. Sometimes it feels like they’re all lying to me.”
“If I promise not to lie to you, will you promise to try to help me up here?” Patrick set his hand on his brother’s shoulder.
“I always try. It’s just not ever enough. Cecily and Tavish and Da and . . . well, the lot of them are always pushing me to do more things or do things better.” Finbarr, it seemed, wasn’t having a much easier go of things than he, himself, was. “Sometimes I just can’t, and that’s not good enough for them.”
“It’s good enough for me.” He kept his hand on Finbarr’s shoulder.
“And you meant it when you said you wouldn’t lie to me about the things that are beyond my ability?”
“I meant it.” If Finbarr needed honesty, he’d give it to him. “Now, crawl up toward the ridgepole. I’ll talk you through where to go from there.”
With careful instruction and cautious movement, Finbarr managed to sit directly beside the leak they were meant to repair. A few wood shakes were missing, the reason rain was seeping through, no doubt.
Patrick moved his canvas bag so that it leaned against Finbarr’s leg. “I’ll be needing four wood shakes. Three maybe. Hand ’em over as I ask for them, will you?”
“I’ll keep you supplied and no mistake.”
Patrick smiled at the very Irish turn of phrase. The lad sounded so nearly American a body could be excused for forgetting he’d Irish blood in his veins and Irish family constantly around him.
They worked and chatted. Patrick told him of his ideas for building his house. Sod made more sense than wood, owing to its expense. Saving money on building materials would give him extra to spend on glass.
“A lot of windows?” Finbarr sounded more than a little hopeful.
“Cecily said”—Patrick did his most exaggerated version of an upper-class British accent—“do make certain the dear boy has a great many windows in his house. One simply cannot have too many windows. Neglect the windows, and his house will be utterly banjaxed.”
Finbarr grinned through the ridiculous “impression.” At the final word, he laughed out loud. “I can’t imagine Cecily saying ‘banjaxed.’ Tavish would. All of our siblings and our parents would. This entire half of town would say it.”
“We may’ve left Ireland,” Patrick said, “but Ireland’s not left us.”
“Finbarr!” A voice echoed up from the ground below.
“What’s Aidan doing here?” Finbarr wondered aloud.
“Recognized his voice, did you?”
Finbarr shrugged. “When a person can’t see, he learns to listen.”
“Stay put,” Patrick instructed. “I’ll see if I can’t discover what the boy wants.” He moved to the edge of the roof and sat, legs dangling over the edge. “A fine good morning to you, Aidan.”
The poor lad jumped in surprise, his gaze flying upward. He recovered quickly. “Tavish told me Finbarr was here.”
“Aye. He’s up here with me.”
“On the roof?”
“Aye.”
For a moment, Aidan didn’t say a thing. Shock remained on his face even after he recovered his voice. “I’m returning home to help my step-da in the fields. Finbarr needs to take my place at Archers’ for the rest of the day.”
“Hop over to the ladder.” He motioned to it. “I’ll walk him over to it.”
Patrick stood and returned to the chimney. He untied their ropes, then crossed back to Finbarr and snatched up the now much-lighter canvas bag. “The boss is summoning you.”
“Aidan’s been promoted, has he?” The lad had a fine sense of humor.
“Promoted to messenger, it’d seem.”
He guided Finbarr to the ladder and kept nearby as he turned and inched his way down. Patrick followed him down. Aidan fetched Finbarr’s cane and set it in his hand. The two walked off, Finbarr sweeping the ground in front of him, Aidan walking at his side.
Patrick slung his bag over his shoulder, holding the wad of ropes under his arm. The rope belonged in Ian’s barn; he’d roll it back up in there. That plan, though, was almost instantly thwarted.
Ian stood not five feet off, looking at him as if he were a cat sporting a hand’s worth of tails. “Finbarr was on the roof?”
“I anchored him good and fast. He’d not’ve fallen off.”
Ian didn’t answer, but continued simply watching him with an entirely unreadable expression.
“I can’t build the boy’s house without some help,” Patrick pressed on. “Teaching him to lend a hand is necessary.”
“You got him to go on the roof,” Ian repeated. “None of us have managed anything close to that, and we actually know the lad.”
Saints, Ian knew how to slice with a word. Dryly, he tossed back a remark of his own. “Well, one thing I didn’t do, I didn’t tell him to stay the devil away from me.”
Ian’s posture stiffened further. “That’s not fair.”
Patrick moved past him toward the barn. “Life’s not fair, Ian. That’s how you know you’re awake.”
Begor, he didn’t like being angry with Ian. But he’d learned from his lapse back into the bottle the night before that whether it was anger or indifference or flippancy, he had to pick something other than pain whenever he interacted with the brother who meant the most to him. He wasn’t strong enough to let himself feel the grief of losing Ian all over again.
Patrick stopped just inside the barn door and pulled the few remaining wood shakes from his canvas bag. He set them in the woodpile just to the side. He then made his way to an obliging stool a bit farther inside and sat, setting himself to the task of winding up the ropes so he could hang them up once more.
Ian entered. He didn’t even look at his brother. Patrick went about his work as if he were the only one in the barn. They’d once shared a tiny corner of the family’s small flat. More than once, their parents had needed to shush them, so their chatting didn’t keep everyone awake. They’d walked to and from the factory together every day and never wanted for things to talk about.
Patrick had longed for that connection the past ten years. He needed it now. But he didn’t have the first idea about how to get it back except for the one thing he was trying. Ian loved his wife; perhaps showing her kindnesses would help.
“Has Biddy thought of anything else I can do to pay off my debt to her?”
Ian stepped from a horse stall, shoving the door closed behind him. “The debt you owe this family can’t be mended like a roof, Patrick. You left us to mourn two brothers when we could’ve been bearing half that burden. That’s ten years of pain. You can’t make it just go away.”
“I know it.” He kept wrapping the rope.
“You were with Grady the last couple of years of his life. Do you have any idea the good you might’ve done if you’d been bothered to share even a bit of that with us? Saints, you’re the reason he was in that battle in the first place. Giving us back a tiny bit of him would’ve helped. But instead you ran away.”
“I did what I had to do, Ian,” he mumbled. “I don’t expect you to understand.”
For the first time since coming inside, Ian actually looked at him. “And Grady did what he set out to do: he kept you alive.”
And there it was: the reason Patrick had stayed away, and why he couldn’t explain any of his past to them. They thought of Grady in terms of noble sacrifice. They set him on a pedestal, one that required Patrick keep mum about far too many things.
He dropped the ropes onto the nail in the wall where he’d found them that morning. “I’ll ask Biddy my own self what she wants done, and I’ll do m’work out of your way.” He made for the barn door.
Ian’s voice carried after him. “You should’ve come back after the war.”
Patrick paused in the doorway. “And you should’ve listened to me before you left New York. But you didn’t. None of you did.”
He walked out, leaving behind Ian’s farm and the pain he couldn’t escape. Too much temptation awaited him in the loft of Da and Ma’s house, so he set himself in the opposite direction. Patrick refused to drink during the day. He’d started down that path while he was in Toronto. Drinking had cost him jobs, friendships, even a roof over his head. Drinking didn’t make him violent or combative. It numbed him, closed him off. It also made him too tipsy to climb up half-finished buildings, saw wood, or do any number of other dangerous things he’d undertaken on a daily basis.
He couldn’t let himself return to that. Being around his family had been even more painful than he’d anticipated, but it had done the trick: he’d kept away from the whiskey most of the time. He’d not indulged as much or as often as he had in Winnipeg. But his struggles with his family undermined all that.
He needed to go somewhere he could think. Da and Ma’s house wasn’t an option. He’d considered dropping in on Maura, but he didn’t know her new husband too well yet, and wasn’t at all willing to lay all his vulnerabilities on the table in a house filled with strangers.
He needed someone who didn’t require him to pretend that he was whole, who liked the person he was even when what he presented wasn’t very likeable.
He needed . . . Lydia. Her sweet, ready welcome.
He arrived at the Archer house almost before his mind pieced together his destination. The kitchen door around back was open, as if waiting for him. A wishful thought, but one he let himself indulge in for a moment.
A little girl’s voice—too old for Lydia—wafted out to him. Ivy, no doubt. She was talking on and on about people Patrick didn’t know. He slipped inside, quiet as he could manage, not wanting to interrupt.
Both Archer girls were at the table, plates of food in front of them. Emma, the older of the two, sat quite peacefully and calmly. Her sister was talking so ceaselessly, she’d need days and days to finish her food.
Eliza stood at the washbasin, scrubbing a pot. She smiled as she listened to the little girl’s chatter. Patrick stood there, enjoying the sight of Eliza. She’d made him feel welcome in a rickety stagecoach despite his gruff responses and vagabond appearance. She’d declared him her friend when he’d felt utterly alone. She’d convinced him to cut his hair, something he’d refused to do for years, and she’d cut it without making him feel like a child or a miscreant or a charity project. Little wonder the Archer girls were so comfortable with her. Even he was at ease in her company, and he wasn’t comfortable with anyone.
Ivy spotted him, and a squeal pierced the air around them. “You cut your hair off!”
“Miss Eliza cut it,” he said. “And m’beard. Am I looking less like a beggar man, then?”
“You look like Mr. Tavish,” Ivy said.
Emma, studying him, offered a different assessment. “You look like Aidan.”
Ivy rolled her eyes. “Aidan doesn’t have whiskers, silly. He’s just a boy.”
“He’s fifteen years old. That’s not a boy.”
Fifteen was young yet, but to a girl two or three years younger than that, Aidan likely did seem grown up.
“What brings you around, Patrick?” Eliza asked, turning enough to look at him without abandoning her washing. “Would you care for a sandwich? Ask the girls; I make delicious sandwiches.”
Ivy knelt on her chair, facing him. “She puts butter on the bread. That’s her secret.”
“’Tisn’t a secret any longer, lass. You’ve given it away.”
Far from looking guilty, Ivy grinned.
“I’ve come to see how Lydia’s faring. Last I saw her, she felt worse than a cat in a room full o’ dogs.”
Eliza dried her hands on a kitchen towel before stepping away from the basin. “She might be awake from her nap.” She motioned him to follow her to the bedroom. He didn’t hesitate.
Lydia was sitting in the bed he and Eliza had made for the sweet girl. Sleep sat heavy on her features, but she didn’t seem awake enough to venture out.
“You have a visitor, Lydia.”
She popped her fingers in her mouth, eying him with palpable uncertainty.
“It’s Mr. Patrick, sweetie,” Eliza said.
Lydia didn’t look reassured.
Eliza lowered her voice, leaning a bit toward him. “You do look quite a bit different.”
That did make sense. Patrick knelt beside Lydia’s bed while keeping enough distance not to scare her. “Don’t you remember me, mo stóirín?”
Her face lit up when he spoke. “I-und!”
His heart warmed on the instant. “There you are, love.”
Lydia reached for him, and he scooped her up. Before standing, he looked over his shoulder at Eliza, making certain she’d no objections to the girl’s nap being over. She only smiled and waved him back toward the kitchen.
He carried his sweet, tiny friend in one arm. She rubbed her little fingers over his neatly trimmed beard. He brushed his hand over her cheeks and forehead. Not a bit of fever. She did cough a little, though.
“She’ll need to eat,” Eliza said, preparing a sandwich.
Patrick pulled out a chair and sat, setting Lydia on his knee. “I’m glad you’re feeling better, sweetheart. I worried about you, you know.”
She pointed back at the doorway they’d come through. “Lydia’s woom.”
“It is that, love.”
Ivy switched chairs, sitting directly beside him and his armful. “We’re going to play hide and seek, Lydia. Do you want to play with us?”
Lydia giggled at her potential playmate. Patrick hadn’t enough experience with children to know how much a girl Lydia’s age would understand of what was said to her. Still, it was obvious she liked Ivy.
Eliza put a plate in front of her daughter with a sandwich cut into small pieces. “I truly can make you a sandwich, Patrick.”
“I thank you, but m’stomach’s not asking after anything just now.” He was thirsty, aye, but ’twasn’t at all the same thing.
“Would you play hide and seek with us, Mr. Patrick?” Ivy asked. “Mr. Tavish did sometimes, before he had his Miss Cecily and his little baby. And Finbarr did before he got all burned up and grumpy.”
“Don’t talk about him that way,” Emma said. “He’s not burned up.”
“He is grumpy, though.”
Emma picked at her sandwich. “Not as much as before.”
“He’s not as grumpy with me.” Ivy’s voice and expression held a hefty dose of cheekiness. “And Aidan said he thinks I’m going to be Queen of the World.”
This kitchen, with these lasses, was precisely what Patrick had needed. They were light and happy and didn’t seem the least upset to have him among them. He found he could even join in their chitchat.
“What do you think, Eliza? Would our Ivy, here, do well as Queen of the World?”
“Exceptionally well.” Eliza spoke as she scrubbed a plate. “And I certainly hope she’ll appoint me Royal Sandwich Maker.”
“And Lydia could be Royal Sandwich Eater!” Ivy declared, bouncing in her seat.
Patrick looked across at the quieter sister. “What about you, Miss Emma? What are you hoping to be when you’re all grown?”
She blushed a little and answered, characteristically quiet, “I would like to be a teacher.”
“Would you, now?”
She nodded, watching him with obvious uncertainty. Did she think he’d disapprove? Would it matter if he did? Poor girl needed a healthy dose of reassurance.
“I’d a teacher of sorts back in New York,” he said. “Weren’t a formal school, but he kept back at the church after services on Sunday, and any of the poor people thereabouts who wanted to learn to read and write and such could learn how. Changed all our lives. I think teaching’s a fine thing. Says a lot about your good heart that you want to undertake it.”
Emma’s color deepened, and a little smile tugged at her mouth.
Ivy stood up on her chair, bouncing with excitement. “And you could shake your ruler at children who are being bad and say, ‘Stop being bad, you bad children.’”
Patrick bit back a laugh and offered, instead, a warning. “I’ve a softness for bold lasses, sweetie, but I’ve no love for seeing them topple off chairs.”
Ivy plopped down on her bum once more. “God is good, but don’t dance in a small boat.”
“Where’d you hear that very Irish turn of phrase?” he asked.
“Finbarr used to say it all the time.”
“He doesn’t any longer?”
Ivy took up her nearly finished sandwich once more. “He doesn’t say much at all now. The fire made him quiet.”
“Aidan says Finbarr talks to him,” Emma said. “And I know he talks to Papa.”
“But he doesn’t talk to you.” Ivy’s tone was just badgering enough that Patrick half expected her to stick her tongue out at her sister.
Emma didn’t answer. She applied herself entirely to the eating of her lunch, pallor making her still-flushed cheeks more obvious. If ever a young lady needed a rescue, this one did. A turn of topic was more than called-for.
“What was it you dreamed of when you were a wee girl?” he asked Eliza as he helped Lydia pick up a bit of sandwich
She set a plate on a shelf near the stove. “My family has run an inn for generations, The Charred Oak. I grew up there, helping cook and clean. Meeting new people. Feeling close to the locals who came by every day. I loved living and working there. I always thought I’d run an inn when I was a grown woman, just like my mum.”
“We’ve been to inns,” Ivy said. “One in Ireland had music like Katie used to play, and I danced. The man who brought us the food said that I dance with venom, but Katie said that it was a different word in Irish, and that it was a fine complement.”
“It is that,” Patrick said. “Means you’ve energy and fire and fierceness to you.”
Ivy looked to Eliza. “Did you have venom when you were at your inn?”
“I was happy as the day was long. We worked hard, but it was the most joyful work in all the world.” She bent a little next to Patrick and, with her kitchen towel, wiped something from Lydia’s face. “That inn was the happiest place for a child to grow up.”
“Why did you leave?” Patrick asked.
She met his eyes with a little sadness, a little longing in her gaze. “America makes a lot of promises. Promises she doesn’t always keep.”
“Have you been unhappy on this side of the ocean?” He didn’t at all like the idea of her being anything but joyous.
“I’m not ever unhappy.” Such sincerity rang in her tone. “Not for long, at least. Happiness can be found even in the most difficult of situations.”
“That’s a bit of magic I’ve not ever managed,” he said.
She set her hand on his arm. “Keep coming back, Patrick. Lydia and I’ll teach you the trick of it.”
If she could manage that, he might start believing in miracles again.