THOMAS (part 3 of 8)

THOMAS (part 3 of 8)

image Patrick McGill ‘The Navvy Poet’ credit internet

Thomas stood on the edge of the town square. It was good to be home. The smell of horse mature assailed his nostrils. But he wasn’t thinking about the smell or the clatter of horses hoofs on the cobbled street. His eye was caught by a girl walking with an elderly farmer. Her bright head of auburn hair shining like a bright sun as it fanned out on her shoulders. Thomas’s heart leaped. Mary Gallaher. She hadn’t changed in the years since he has last seen her.
On their first day at Cloughfin School when he was four and she was three he had shyly made room for her on the long form that was to be their desk until they went into the “Master’s room “at the other end of the long single roomed building. He had lost his heart to her that day.
At fourteen, on his last day at school they had walked home together. Their tears mingled when he told her he was emigrating to work in Scotland. She had kissed him in the shelter of the Gortin Rock. He still remembered the softness of her skin and the shame he felt at the rough calluses’ on his hands as he brushed away her tears. He had worked the length of Scotland and England since that day. He hadn’t met anybody like her since.
It’s as pointless now as it was then, he thought turning away. She’s a farmer’s daughter. She’d soon be twenty-one. No doubt she was walking out with somebody with better prospects than him. Ignoring the overwhelming urge to cross the street and talk to her he started for the Main Street.
“Too well travelled to speak to an old school pal and neighbour’s wain,” a voice said behind him.
“Hello Mary didn’t see you. There’s nearly as many people here as in Glasgow,” Thomas said letting his gaze travel from the handsome gaily coloured crochet shawl she wore over a summer dress, to the well-heeled leather boots on her feet.
“You never were much good as a liar,” Mary laughed. “I saw you looking at me from across the street.”
A group of youths their belonging hanging from their waist and shoulders hurried past them almost pushing Mary off her feet into a horses droppings. Automatically, Thomas reached out his arm to steady her. Mary scowled and looked down at her spattered boots. Thomas felt his hands clench into fists. He wanted to run after the jostling boys and bang their heads together. “Don’t worry,” Mary sighed, “I’ve suffered worse at Strabane Fair days.”
Feeling the colour rise in his face Thomas drank in every feature on the face that he pictured in his mind’s eye every night before sleep overtook him.
“What are you doin’ at the Fair,” he asked to cover the confusion her nearness was causing him. He doubted, dressed as she was, she was looking to be hired out for three or six months.
“You remember Granda James? He’s here looking for somebody with a strong back and a strong stomach to work on the farm. Da sent me to keep an eye on him. He’s old now, forgets what he’s supposed to be doin’,” she giggled with a twirl of the fringe on her shawl.
I remember him, alright, Thomas mused. Round as a hoop, as soon as September, October came he’d be out gathering spuds and at harvest time working at the corn and wheat from early morning to late night.; his hands scabbed and sore from pulling the thorn bushes from the sheaves as he spread them on the floor of the barn to dry ready for the threshers. James would get every last bit of work he could out of him before letting him retire for the night.
. Then when he got back to school in November, the Master would clip him about the ear when he couldn’t help the younger scholars to write their numbers and letters on the slates.
“Ach, what good is learnin’ for the like of you,” Mary’s grandfather would say as Thomas tried to use the sleeves of his jumper to save his hands from the sharp thorns of the thistles.” It’s a strong back and a civil tongue in yer head – not like that father of yours – when yer laying railway lines and working down the mines, in Scotland and England,” old James would mutter.
But what Mary’s grandfather objected to more than the time spent learning was the close friendship between Thomas and his granddaughter. So, when old Father Callaghan started checking around for a farmer’s daughter with ‘prospects’. James saw his chance.
“Pass no remarks,” his mother Isabella used to say, “Oul James – a step above buttermilk – knows nothin’ but work. He’s workin’ since he crawled out the cradle. That’s was the way it was in his day, son. Every man, woman and child had to pull their weight to survive.”
Thomas remembered his mother always had a faraway look in her eyes when she talked like that. He suspected she was reliving her own upbringing in a house where they often went to bed with empty bellies.
Thomas had to admit oul James had been right. Working as a navvy was back breaking work that didn’t require much learnin’. But being able to read, write and do his sums had come in handy when the boys needed letter send back home and when the gaffers tried to diddle him in the hours and rate of pay. The word got around he had been a teacher whose family had fallen on hard time. He never put them off their notion.
” C’mon, “Mary said breaking into his thoughts. Without asking she tucked her hand in the crook of Thomas’s arm. “They’re selling Cream Teas in Russell’s Cafe,” she announced steering him through the crowds that thronged the street. “Want to hear all about the places you’ve seen before Granda comes lookin’ for me.”She fell silent when she saw her grandfather hurrying across the street towards them.
“Daughter,” where do ye think yer goin’?”
“The teashop…”
“There’s no time for drinkin’ tea. There’s work to be done. Didn’t yer mother give you a list of things she wanted back, “her grandfather scolded taking her free arm.
It was only then he recognised Thomas. His eyes grew scornful. “Yer back, then,” he said ungraciously. “And not before time. Yer poor mother is hard done by now that yer da hasn’t the parish priest at his back,” he said.
He turned back to his granddaughter. “Go on with ye, Mary, look about yer mother’s bits and pieces – and meet me in half an hour at the teashop,” he amended as his she opened her mouth to object.
Mary drew her shawl about her chest. “I still want to hear all about your travels,” she said to Thomas.” Meet me at the chapel gate after first Mass on Sunday, “Ignoring her grandfather, she turned on her heel and with an angry toss of her hair and a flounce of her dress marched down Castle Street.
“You keepin’ well, James,” Thomas asked politely. James fixed him with a hard stare. “Cassie, Mary’s sister, is getting’ no younger. If ye intended to have a family it’s time you married her like ye promised.” Taking his pocket watch from the pocket of his waistcoat he checked the time and without another word walked away.
Open mouthed, Thomas watched him go. Sweet Mother of God, all the time he had stayed away had been wasted. Even with the promise of a share in the home farm Cassie hadn’t found a man that would take her on, he thought incredulously.
And who would blame them, he thought opening the door of the nearest pub. He downed one drink and then another. After a while he calmed down. There was only one thing for him. He didn’t want to do it – under the circumstances – but it had to be done. He tipped up his glass, drank the last dregs and left.
The road to Lifford was black with mountain people by the look of them – probably from as far away as Donegal Town and Glenties, Thomas thought; making their way to the hiring fair in the hope of getting work.
“You’re headin’’ the wrong way, “ a young lass not yet ten years of age by the size of her, called out as him as he crossed the old stone bridge.
His knock on the door of the Infirmary was answered by a women dressed all in black. “I’m here to see the Parish Priest, Father Callaghan,” he state firmly. The woman took in his suit, clean shirt and polished worn boots. He looked respectable enough. She sniffed at the smell of drink, hesitated and then she opening the door led him to the bottom of a stairway and pointed upwards. “You’ll find him up there – near the end,” she mumbled.
As he climbed the dark staircase Thomas wondered at her words. Did she mean the priest’s room was near the end of the landing above him or did she mean the priest was near his end? The latter made him hurry his step. He had to get the old priest to let him out of the promise his father Patrick had made on his behalf.
Inside the room chairs were lined around the wall. Father Callaghan lay, a shrivelled shape in a high iron bedstead. “Father,” it’s me – you’re namesake, “Thomas said softly.

Gemma Hill copyright 2020