There was much less sunshine as the days lengthened, though the grasses and trees still flourished along with drifts of buttercups and bright-eyed daisies and the fresh new growth on the heather. But increasingly the weather became damp and muggy with little sunlight managing to break through the low cloud.
With the downturn in the weather disappeared all hopes for the few remaining potato crops that hadn’t already showed signs of blight. Except in a very few counties in the north-east of the country, workhouses began to fill and newspapers were reporting scenes of appalling distress as people queued for food, anywhere it was known to exist, or where it had recently been made available.
Hannah, whose own anxieties about the food supply for the school and their neighbours had been mercifully quieted by the extraordinary intervention of an unknown man in Galloway and the behaviour of a small group of drunken harvesters, listened as calmly as she could to the occasional outbursts of her young colleague, John McCreedy.
John had always seemed to Hannah to be a kind and gentle young man, and he most certainly showed no change in his dealings with Rose and Sam and the other pupils in the school, but in the last few months, on the now rare occasions when they were alone together, he relayed the news from Sophie’s papers with an anger bordering on fury.
Unlike Hannah, who found the arguments of politicians and the Westminster Parliament utterly depressing, John studied the speeches and letters in all the newspapers he had access to, taking to heart the material and quoting accurately from what he had he read.
Hannah listened, as he condemned the things said by politicians. They were, he insisted, a weak and divided government and were doing as little as they could to help the situation. Some of them had even been heard to say that the famine was ‘God’s judgement on the idle Irish’.
‘How can you call a man idle,’ he said, his voice rising to a quite unaccustomed pitch, ‘when his labour is so utterly limited by the small amount of land he has? How can he be other than “idle” when there is no other work he can turn to, no matter how much he might try?’ he demanded bitterly. ‘Could Westminster not at least stop both Irish and British merchants from profiteering?’ he demanded. ‘They just use the shortages to increase their prices week by week and no one can lift a finger to stop them!’
Hannah couldn’t disagree with what he was reporting, as much of it was already being said by other friends, some who spoke in sorrow rather than in anger, but she grew increasingly anxious at the bitterness with which he spoke. It reminded her of the way he had once spoken about ‘the English’ when she had first known him. She wondered what could have happened to bring back the particular bitterness he was now expressing.
Since his return from his visit to his grandparents in Galway the previous year, he had been sharing the evening meal with her and the children as had been agreed when he became Sophie’s lodger, but for months now, he had not lingered to talk afterwards as he had previously done.
At first, she assumed that it was out of good manners, or his kindly commitment to Sophie who so enjoyed being read to, or even his own obvious commitment to his work at school. Anything they ever decided to do in school always had John’s full backing. He regularly prepared plays, and readings, quizzes and spelling competitions.
Of course, that all took time, as she herself well knew, but as the weeks passed and he still hurried away after saying a polite ‘thank you,’ and making sure, once Patrick had gone in April, that there was nothing she needed, like pails of water or creels of turf, she decided at last she must find some opportunity to ask him if there was anything wrong.
Time seemed to pass so quickly. She herself always had a list of things to do for school, another list of letters she wanted to write, a pile of napkins to sew, as well as all the household tasks. Then, to her surprise, on a lovely summer evening, the light just beginning to fade into a golden dusk, the children in bed hours ago, she looked up from her sewing to find John at the open door, poised as if he weren’t sure whether to knock or not.
‘John, I thought perhaps you had work to do this evening,’ she said easily. ‘Could you drink a mug of tea? I was just thinking of making one.’
He nodded and watched her put down the kettle and stir the fire.
‘Hannah, I’ve had some news,’ he began hesitantly. ‘It was waiting for me after supper, but Sophie put the envelope on the mantelpiece and then forgot about it until I noticed it myself, just a little while ago,’ he said awkwardly.
To her surprise, he pulled out a single, large sheet of stiff, good quality paper from his pocket and handed it to her. The heading was embellished with a design of shamrocks and Irish wolfhounds and the Dublin address laid out below was in embossed letters. She had to read it twice before she began to grasp what it was saying.
‘So, they actually want to publish what you’ve written?’ she gasped, staring at him open-mouthed.
‘Well, they say it won’t be for at least a couple of months,’ he said sheepishly. ‘There was also a note apologising for the delay in replying to me, but, as far as I could find out, this publisher is a very small concern and has to rely on grants and subsidies. If they’d had funding they could have let me know sooner about my submission. When I didn’t get any reply, I just thought they didn’t want to be bothered and hadn’t the decency to return my manuscript.’
‘And all those long weeks you were waiting, they were passing your work round folklorists and established researchers, it says here.’
‘Yes,’ he said, looking yet more awkward. ‘I got very upset about the delay. I know now I should have told you – you’d have understood how I felt, but I couldn’t face it when I was so angry. Please forgive me, Hannah. I can’t think why I was so silly.’
‘Now, John, there’s nothing to forgive,’ she said firmly, as she finally realised why he’d gone on disappearing so promptly after supper even in recent months. ‘There you were, working away every night after your day’s work in school and reading to Sophie. Going through all those stories you’d collected, looking at the patterns and themes and producing a manuscript. You didn’t just send them stories, you made “a valuable analysis of the patterns and form”. That’s what they say here,’ she said, looking back at the letter.
‘My goodness, John.’ She paused to make the tea. ‘What a labour of love, and by lamplight as well, for most of the time. No wonder you got upset when there was no response. So, what will you do now?’ she went on, surprised that he was taking an actual offer from a publisher so calmly. ‘Would you think about going to Dublin and looking for a research post? With your first book behind you, you should be able to find something that would pay you to go on with what you clearly are so good at.’
‘No,’ he said firmly, looking at her directly for the first time. ‘My job is here. I’m not giving that up, but now,’ he added, with a wisp of a smile, ‘I’m not giving up the stories either. If someone doesn’t do it, they’ll be lost,’ he went on steadily. ‘As Daniel always says: Once they’re gone, they’ve gone forever. That’s why I was so angry – I thought no one cared any more about our history and traditions. It was like my father all over again, just thinking about the present, and about money. That’s why I avoided Dermot Donnelly, to begin with, when I heard he was trying to find Johnny a place as a servant. Servants aren’t exactly given time to “paint wee pictures” are they? But just think of what a talent would have been lost if his father had managed what he wanted.’
Hannah watched him carefully. She’d never noticed that he’d avoided Dermot, who had by now become a good friend of both Patrick and herself. She tried to remember back to that day when she’d first gone to speak to Johnny’s mother and Dermot had appeared at the door later with the packet of drawings. She would never forget how distraught the poor man was when he admitted he couldn’t see any way of feeding his family. Once that anxiety was taken away, his whole personality seemed to change.
She wondered if there was any way she could remind John that Dermot was a very different person now, that anxiety can change and distort how a person thinks and behaves.
‘Are you going to tell your father about your book?’ Hannah could hardly believe she’d spoken the words that had shaped in her mind.
‘I was going to ask you that,’ John replied promptly. ‘What do you think I should do?’
Hannah pressed her lips together as if regretting her question. John had asked so, of course, she must do her best to reply. But there was no simple answer.
‘John dear, have you any idea why your father didn’t ask you what you wanted when it came to the time for further schooling? I got the feeling that he just acted.’
‘Yes, that was the trouble. I didn’t know what I wanted to be, like some people do, but I probably knew what I didn’t want to do. But when I tried to say anything, he just thought I was being awkward and he got angry.’
‘Did your father always want to be a coastguard himself?’
‘I don’t know, Hannah,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘He never talked about his family. I know from my mother that his father was a coastguard, but he was drowned long before I was born, and then my grandmother died too.’
‘And did they have other children?’
‘Yes, I think there were seven of them, but they all went away. Some to America, some to New Zealand.’
‘So, when you visit your grandparents, those are your mother’s family?’ she said sadly. ‘And you have five sisters?’
‘Oh yes. And they never stop talking,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘I miss them terribly.’ The small smile that had appeared momentarily disappeared completely.
‘It is sad, John. I wish I knew more. I think your father meant well, but we can’t know what anxiety he might have had. Probably he wanted to be sure he did his best for you, like Dermot wanted to do what he could for Johnny. Do you think that might be possible?’
‘When I stopped being angry, I sometimes thought that, but then I’d think about home and my mother and my sisters and it would all start up again,’ he admitted reluctantly. ‘When I got no reply from the publishers, I even tried to blame him. And I know that wasn’t fair.’
‘But John, when we are hurt we are often not fair. We strike out, or look for someone to blame …’
‘You’d never do that, Hannah,’ he said sharply.
‘Only because I was so fortunate with my family. Many people thought my father a hard man, but he was fond of me and never hurt me. Just think how he must have felt when I told him I wanted to marry Patrick, a Roman Catholic, when he was a strict Covenanter and only a poor labourer, when there were … well, others more suitable …’ she finished up awkwardly.
‘But not suitable to you,’ he replied with a great, beaming smile.
They both laughed and Hannah ‘squeezed the pot’ to give them each a last half mug of tea.
‘I can’t know why he acted as he did. I’m sure he did it for the best,’ John said slowly. ‘Perhaps, thinking about Dermot, I ought to give my father the benefit of the doubt. What do you think?’
‘I think there’s nothing to lose if you do. But you must promise to tell me if it seems to go wrong.’
John nodded slowly, then began to speak rather hesitantly.
‘I remember you telling me when I first came here and was going on about the English, that your father once told you never to be bitter, always to take comfort from God and your friends. Bitterness, you said, was damaging. You were right, of course. I’ve been bitter time and time again in all these months of waiting. I’ve learnt that much at least. Your father was right and I must make contact with mine. Will you read my letter for me, Hannah, when I manage to get it down? Please,’ he added softly.
He drained his tea and stood up.
‘Hannah, I don’t know what I’d have done without you. I hope I haven’t tired you out.’
‘Not a bit of it,’ she said, standing up and hugging him. ‘I shall be celebrating your good news for a very long time. I’ll think about it every time we have bad news or another problem. Congratulations, John McCreedy. Sleep well. I’ll see you in the morning.’