Story 2 of 8 Patrick:

Story 2 of 8 Patrick:

credit to the internet
Patrick puckered his lips and whistled softly to the horse as he drew it to a stop at the stables opposite the Chapel. He looked around to check if Maggie, the priest housekeeper was within earshot. Maggie maintained that whistling offended Mary, the Mother of God. He wanted to say for the love of god woman isn’t music a form of praying and the old horse has no objections. She liked it. She flicks her ears and steps out smartly when I whistled Danny Boy. But the priest housekeeper had sway when it came to him. He knew she had somebody else lined up for his job. That’s the story of my life, he thought. So he kept his opinions to himself. He needed this job now that his chest wasn’t fit for farm work and the tattie picking in Scotland was no longer for him thanks to his old gaffer.
In the silence of the yard he could hear the crows squawking in the trees in the fields behind the priest’s house that led to the high back road and the round Windmill Tower.
The stillness was broken by the high pitched excited voices of children from the schoolyard at the foot of the chapel grounds. The horse whinnied and moved her hoofs nervously. “Steady now Molly, “he said leaning close to her and gently stroking the side of her face. “It’s just the wains out for awhile to stretch their legs.” Patrick’s thoughts went to his own son. His heart saddened. At fourteen he was still at Argery School. He’ll have to take the boat soon, he thought. It wasn’t what his mother Bell wanted for her only son. But times were hard. They needed the money.
The horse fidgeted and Patrick knew she had heard the slow heavy tread of old Father Callaghan coming around the corner of the Parochial House. “Morning Father,” he shouted. Deaf as a post, he was the one who always had a long line at the Confessional Box, especially for them that raided the landlord’s henhouse or snared the odd pheasant to keep the hunger from the door. He suspected the old priest saw the hunger etched on the parishioners faces and granted them Absolution from their sins, anyway –as long as they left the Church’s orchards and duck pond alone.
He smiled at the old man grateful to him for this job. The old priest had written to him and told him the job was his if he wanted it.
Patrick’s jaw tightened when he remembered the arrival of the letter. It had come on a day when things were bad between him and the gaffer. “You didn’t go home for the cub’s christening,” the gaffer sneered. “You sure he’s yours?
Patrick’s grip tightened on the potato creel thick with muck. The gaffer had been looking to pick a fight all day. He knew the gaffer’s game. Two of his townsfolk from Co Derry had arrived on site the night before looking for a start. If he could goad two of the Donegal boys into a fight he could sack them and give the job to the new boys.
“I hear that new wife of yours sleeps in the same bed as her Da. “She’ll have another wee papish bastard soon enough. You can go home for that,” he smirked spitting on the ground.
Patrick felt the restraining hand of Jim Freel his neighbour from home,” Don’t go for him Pat. Bell needs you to be sendin’ money home now that Thomas is here. Fightin’ is a sackin’ on the spot,” he warned. It was too late. Anger like red hot pokers coursed through Patrick. With a roar he swung the half full creel in a wide arch and let go. It hit the gaffer full on sending him sprawling backwards across the yellow-headed potato stalks; the wooden creel splintering around him.
Patrick knew before the gaffer got to his feet he’d be going home on the next boat. “You’re sack,” the gaffer panted winded from the impact of the heavy box. “But you’ll pay for that creel out of your money before you go.”
An angry murmur like a tidal wave swept up the long line of tattie gatherers spaced out along the long field.
“He has a contract ‘til March,” a Donegal voice call from further up the drill.
“He goes we all go.” A man shouted stepping out and drawing the horse plough to a standstill halfway down the drill. “The spuds can rot in the ground. Try explainin’ that to the agents when the spud quota is not there for shippin”. he shouted out. Up and down the field men and women straightened their backs, upend the potatoes from the creels turned over the empty boxes and sat down on them.
. “Take yer beatin’ like a man. If ye hand it out ye have to take it,” a young girl voice called.
Begrudgingly the gaffer extended his hand to Patrick. “You Donegal fuckers stick together,” he grunted. Patrick took his hand but he knew his days working for the gaffer were numbered.
That evening when they got back to the outhouse that was their digs the letter was there from Father Callaghan.
“Here, young Cannon,” the gaffer shouted out “A letter for you. It has a foreign mark on it.”
Patrick stopped whittling at the piece of wood he had saved from the broken creel. “It’s a stamp with a Harp on it, “he said reaching out his hand for the letter.
The gaffer snapped it out of his reach. “Don’t you make your x on the pay sheet? You can’t fuckin’ read,” he said scathingly tearing open the envelope.
Patrick felt the heat rise up his neck and ears. His school days had been spent scratching a day’s work with the farmers where he could get it and scrabbling through the fields and hedges for rotten tree branches to keep a fire in the grate. Humiliation crawled up his skin. The gaffer’s opportunity had come to get his own back and make a laughin’ stock of him.
“An offer of work, young Cannon, and from the Parish Priest of Clonleigh,” he guffawed affecting a posh accent.
Patrick was jolted back to the present by the sharp voice of Father Hughes, the new curate. “Get a move on, man. The matron at the County Hospital in Lifford is waiting for Father Callaghan to hear the patients’ confessions and give the last rites to the dying,” he bellowed startling the horse. “Help him into the carriage and be on your way.”
As the horse and carriage turned right out of the chapel grounds and took the road for Lifford Town, over the clip clop of Molly’s hoofs on the rough rutted road Patrick could hear the wheezy voice of the old priest. “When shit gets up it flies high,” he was muttering. Patrick knew he was talking about the new curate. It was common knowledge there was no love lost between them.
“What’s that you’re sayin’, Father,” Patrick asked as they ascended Drumbouy Hill and across the fields to their left caught a glimpse of the River Foyle in flood.
“What? Oh nothing – it’s nothing of any consequences,” he said resting his hands on the head of his ebony walking stick. “How is young Thomas?” he asked addressing the back of Patrick’s head. “I am told he is an able scholar who assists the teacher with the younger children.”
“He can read and write both Irish and English,” Patrick shouted a note of pride in his voice.
“It was Latin in my schooldays,” the old priest reminisced. “The Hedge Schools, you know. The teachers were mostly clerics and wandering poets and storytellers, “he said sighing nostalgically.
“Aye,” Patrick said absent-mindedly as he manoeuvred the horse and carriage through the town and down the Main Street. Turning right he set Molly into a slow cant as he neared the hospital entrance.
He could hear father Callaghan still talking about education. “Sinclair, the landlord turned a blind eye to the Hedge Schools. They were like rabbit holes – in every clump of bushes. But others thought it dangerous to education their tenants”.
“Aye,” Patrick said again as he passed through the hospital gates and drew Molly to a standstill outside the front door.
“The government brought in National School Education and now my namesake, Thomas, is benefiting from it, “Father Callaghan continued with a satisfied smile as two nurses rushed forward to hold the carriage door open and help him down.
“See to the horse and wait for me. I shouldn’t be long,” he said to Patrick. He hesitated. On the other hand with so many laid low with Consumption and the hospital caring for the sick and destitute from Stranorlor Workhouse, he might be longer than he thought. “Just so long as I get out of here again,” he said drawing in his breath as the smell of disinfection hit the back of his throat making him cough.
The Matron, Miss Gently, stern faced and briskly efficient bustled towards him. Barely able to hide her annoyance, she ushered him down the corridor toward the fever ward. “I was expecting your curate, Father Hughes,” she said. She very nearly added why he sent a useless old man like you I don’t know.
The old priest smiled. He could almost read her mind. She reminded him a lot of his mother; always finding fault. “The curate is a very busy man,” he said peering distastefully at her thick ankles cased in equally thick woollen stockings as she hurried in front of him. He knew why the curate hadn’t come himself. He was afraid of catching the fever and afraid of the Matron in almost equal amounts. Moreover, he thought, he is confident that should I catch Tuberculosis I am surplus to requirement.
He straightened his rounded shoulders. There will be new faces in Heaven before I am ready to depart this world. I am not going to my grave in the Clonleigh Graveyard until I see Thomas, my child, my namesake, married to a good woman,” he mused. “I must see to it,” he murmured. Yes, a farmer’s daughter would make Thomas an able wife. As he opened his prayer book to the prayers of the dying and began to pray he resolved in the very near future to pay all the Catholic farmers in Argery a home visit and check out their daughters.

Gemma Hill copyright 2020