The Lost Garden (3 page)

‘There’s the Progressive Farmer,’ Paddy said.

‘How do you mean?’ Mick said, smiling already for the punch-line.

‘A man out standing in his own field.’

‘Well, that’s a good one, Paddy,’ Mick said. ‘That’s as good a one as ever I heard.’

Aileen wasn’t entirely sure what it meant, but she laughed anyway – from happiness perhaps. As the train rocked her body from side to side, she closed her eyes and leaned her cheek against the rough wool of her father’s coat. The musty smell of stale sweat and woodsmoke made her feel safe, as if she was at once away having this strange adventure but also still at home. Carmel and her catty looks didn’t matter. She was with her father and brothers, and that was all that mattered. In moments she was asleep.

Chapter Six

At Dublin Port, the crowd for the Glasgow boat was arranging itself into some sort of order before making its way down to the steerage part of the ship. Aileen was nervous of this stretch of the journey. Her brothers had warned her that this was the hardest part and, unlike at the train station, were in no hurry to get themselves on board. The third-class compartments were crowded, with no seating, and were next to the stalls transporting cattle to Scotland.

‘I slept next to a bullock last year,’ Martin told her. ‘I swear to God I thought he was going to eat me.’

‘Or worse,’ said Paddy Junior, laughing, although Aileen wasn’t sure what could be worse than being eaten by a bull.

Martin landed him a wallop on the arm. ‘Still, it was better than bunking down with your brother and him getting sick all over his shoes.’

‘I did not!’

‘Did so, you big alp!’

As her two idiot brothers locked themselves in an angry clinch, Aileen wandered away from them. There was a wind coming up, and although the steamer seemed like a large, solid vessel, she was not relishing spending the next twelve hours aboard it. She walked towards the edge of the dock and stood
peering down into the narrow gap between the vast flat edge of the boat and the low sea wall. That was the sea down there. That deep, dirty expanse like a massive bog hole. In Illaunmor, the sea looked so different at its edge. On a still day, small simpering waves bubbled white and nibbled the sand. When God’s anger was up, the waves tore at the rocks and peeled back across them with an angry hiss.

The engines on the steamer were firing up, making a huge racket. A gust of steamy wind blew up through the dark, water-floored tunnel and Aileen leaned into it, pushing her hair back from her face to catch the breeze on her neck.

‘You are the most beautiful girl I have ever seen!’

She had not noticed the boy creeping up behind her and his loud words gave her such a fright that she almost fell into the water. She would have, in fact, if the wiry young man had not caught her arm and pulled her away from the edge just in time.

She turned and, even though he had been the cause of her almost falling in, even though she had got a fright, in the moment that she saw this stranger’s face she felt something peculiar happen inside her. It was as if her heart, which had kicked with the shock of almost falling in the water, had taken a second to turn itself to one side, as if about to ask a question.

Aileen noticed how close her feet were to the edge and her heart started thumping again. What had she been doing leaning towards the dark water like that?

The nearness of her fall hit her and she shouted, ‘What the hell are you doing?’ at the idiot who had shouted and nearly caused her to fall. Who was this boy who had sneaked up on her? She looked at him but found his searing blue eyes unsettling and had to look away again.

‘Saving your life,’ he said in a northern Irish accent.

‘By nearly killing me!’ she replied, incredulous at his stupidity.
She held on to the feeling of being annoyed. She was afraid if she let it go, she might drown. Not in the water but some other way.

‘You shouldn’t have been standing so close to the edge.’

‘I wasn’t expecting somebody to
shout in my ear
!’ she screamed at him. The steamer was very loud.

‘I had to shout so you would hear me tell you that you are the most beautiful girl I have ever seen!’ he shouted in return.

She began to walk quickly back towards where her father and brothers were, but the boy stuck to her side.

‘You can’t have seen many girls, so . . .’

‘Maybe not,’ he said.

Aileen was cross to find herself feeling strangely disappointed at his concession, until he added, ‘Although I’ve seen enough to know you are one in a million.’

‘You’re stone mad,’ she said, although inwardly she felt weakened by the compliment. Nobody had ever spoken to her in that way before.

‘Were you going to jump in?’ he asked.

‘No, don’t be stupid. Why would I do that?’ she said.

‘If you had, I would have jumped in and saved you – I can swim.’

This boy was a worse fool than Michael Kelly! What kind of a soft idiot was she, having these silly warm feelings towards him? He would not shut up either, asking questions without giving her the chance to answer him: ‘What’s your name? Where are you from? No, wait – I bet you’re from Mayo?’

As she moved into the queue with her family, the boy was still there, badgering her. ‘You can go now,’ Aileen said, annoyed, with herself for the nagging notion in her stupid, stupid heart, but mostly that he had put her in the position of having to dismiss him in front of her father and brothers. ‘Please go away.’

‘Jimmy Walsh,’ the boy said, ignoring her request and holding his hand out to Paddy. ‘I assume you are father to the most beautiful girl in Ireland?’

Paddy looked at the wiry young man as if he had two heads, and Martin was already moving in. His fists curling, he snarled, ‘You heard my sister. She said, “Go away.”’

Jimmy ignored him and kept his blazing eyes firmly fixed on Paddy’s face, his hand outstretched and shaking somewhat with nervous energy. Aileen’s father could see from this Jimmy’s demeanour that he was smitten with his daughter. He also knew himself how immediately these things could happen, and as much as his big son Martin thought he could trash any man, lean lads could be as deadly to deal with – especially where affairs of the heart were concerned – and the last thing they needed before their long, arduous boat journey was a fight.

‘Paddy Doherty,’ he said, holding out his hand to the young man, who grabbed it gratefully and shook it a bit too vigorously, ‘and this is my younger son, Martin.’ Jimmy had a flash in his eyes that Paddy could not help but like, although it made him nervous. There was a kind of magic in the boy.

‘And this is my daughter, Aileen.’

‘Ignore him, Da – he’s not right in the head,’ said Aileen.

‘You got that right enough,’ said a round-faced, rather jolly-looking man who put his hands squarely on Jimmy’s shoulders. He in turn held his hand out to Paddy.‘Sean Walsh from Aghabeg. This troublesome scallywag is my son, Jimmy.’

‘Paddy Doherty from—’

‘Illaunmor. Sure I would know you anywhere from your father’s face. He was a legend. My own da was out fishing with him many the time, and I along with them as a child.’

Paddy smiled weakly. He looked vulnerable and Aileen could
see he was not quite sure what to make of this ebullient stranger having known his own father.

‘Ah yes – Donegal. He went there sometimes surely.’

‘He was a fine fisherman and he could handle himself in any weather, but then the sea only takes the very best for herself.’

There was an awkward pause before Paddy asked, ‘Are there many of you in it?’

‘Just the two of us,’ he said. ‘Aghabeg is small and few of us leave. Only me and the lad here are looking for a few extra shillings this year. We’re hoping to tag on to a crew at the other end – find one that’s short maybe. Otherwise, sure we’ll just head for Glasgow and take it from there. To be honest, Paddy, it’s been a long time since I did this. I’m not sure how it works anymore. I’d be grateful for any ideas.’

Paddy’s shoulders straightened with the challenge of being in charge. ‘I’ll introduce you to the foreman of our crew,’ he said. ‘Maybe we’ll squeeze two more in – your son looks like a fine worker, anyhow.’

‘You’re a gentleman, and you can tell him there’s a bit of graft left in this aul’ dog too,’ he jibed. ‘I’m not as old as I look.’

As Paddy walked away with Sean, Aileen turned to Jimmy and said, ‘Are you not going with them?’

‘No,’ he said. His arms folded as he stood in front of her.

‘Go on. Off you go,’ she insisted, waving her hand at him.

‘I am staying right here,’ he said.‘By your side, Aileen. Forever.’

Then he closed his eyes and threw his head back and sang, starting quietly and getting louder, ‘Aileen, Aileen, my angel Aileen,’ to no tune in particular.

Martin, more embarrassed than disgusted, walked off. ‘He’s madder than a bag of cats.’

Aileen told Jimmy to be quiet, but he wouldn’t shut up. On and on he went singing out her name until a few of the people
gathered about formed a circle round him and started clapping and whooping, encouraging him until the foolish boy fell down onto his knees in front of her and carried on. ‘Aileeeen! Aileen. I’m in love with an angel called Aileeeeen!’

She said, ‘Get up, you eejit – you’re making a show of me,’ but he would not stop and continued pleading and singing to her until, for all his silliness, Aileen found that she was laughing so hard she was breathless, and everything inside her filled suddenly with light.

Chapter Seven

The boat journey was as long and as terrible as promised.

Jimmy didn’t care. He had found the love of his life.

When he had seen Aileen standing by the side of the ship, her hair caught back from her face in a gust of wind, he thought he must be seeing things. It could not be the same girl from the island, but, impulsive as he was, he barely stopped to consider that fact before he had put himself by her side. When he discovered that she was not a vision but a real girl, he lost himself altogether. Jimmy knew he was making an eejit out of himself. Even as he was sneaking up and shouting, ‘You are the most beautiful girl I have ever seen!’ like a foghorn and nearly sending her sideways into the water, he knew it was a stupid thing to do. Sticking to her side like a limpet, introducing himself to her father in the abrupt way he did, singing to her in front of the whole crowd on the boarding ramp – in his rational mind Jimmy knew that none of these things was the way to a girl’s heart, but in truth the young fisherman was already beyond all of that. From the moment he had set eyes on her again, Jimmy knew for certain that this red-haired angel belonged to him. She had been sent to him by the gods – the powerful force of the sea, the same thing that took the lives of so many good men, yet had allowed him to swim, had turned this creature from a mirage
of fire on a distant beach into a real woman for him alone. No matter how she rebuffed him, no matter how idiotic she thought he was, no matter how her brothers threatened and fussed and his own father might laugh at him and call him ‘mad in the head’, Jimmy knew that they were meant to be together. Aileen Doherty belonged to him and he belonged to her – and that was all there was to it. All he had to do now was not move one inch from her side until she loved him back. Which she would. Soon.

‘Will you get away from me?’ she said. ‘You are getting on my nerves. Da, will you tell him . . . ?’

It turned out that the Illaunmor crew were almost last to get on the boat and the third-class cabins were packed. Even if Jimmy had wanted to leave, there were precious few places he could have moved away to.

Paddy Doherty laughed before looking out on the large cabin in front of them. ‘Holy God, the place is jammed. I swear it gets worse every year,’ he said, shaking his head and tutting as he looked out on the heaving mass of standing bodies.

The crowd comprised all adults, men and women of similar build in dull-coloured heavy outdoor clothes – wearing them to save on luggage. There were none too old and none too young – tall and lean, small and stocky. All had strong working bodies, all seeking out a space to settle themselves into for the next twelve hours.

‘Like matches in a box.’ Sean, Jimmy’s father, seemed quite shocked at the number of people.

Jimmy had slipped out of the currach last summer and swum underwater through a huge shoal of mackerel. This reminded him of that.

‘Wouldn’t you think the shipping company would cop themselves on and give us a bit of comfort?’ Sean said.

‘No need,’ Paddy assured him. ‘No matter how bad the sailing, it gets more packed every year – and only set to get worse. With the war on, sure there’s not an Englishman left in the country to pick up a spade, so they’ll be paying “the poor Irish” to do their dirty work till they’ve had their fill of Hitler.’

‘You’ve got to love the aul’ Germans,’ Sean agreed. ‘There’s nothing as good for an Irish farmer as the English at war.’

‘Provided it’s not against us,’ said Paddy.

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Sean said. ‘We ran them the last time.’

‘After a fashion,’ Paddy agreed, ‘although it took us long enough.’

Mick was paying them no heed; the gaffer’s face was all business as he scanned the cabin for their next move. ‘Come on, you men, and follow me.’

Quickly, before she thought to object, Jimmy grabbed on to Aileen’s hand and held it tight. Leading her, he followed their broad-chested gaffer through the crowd as Mick assertively shouldered his charges through the bustling bodies. Jimmy held his true love, turning often to check she was still there. He would have liked to have carried her in his arms to protect her and had an ambitious vision that one day she might let him.

At the opposite end of the room, the path began to clear and they reached ‘their spot’ near the back wall. Carmel and the other women from the group were already there. They had boarded first and were now settled comfortably on makeshift seats made from their cases and a few crates that were scattered around the edges of the vast packed room. Jimmy noted there were one or two windows, but they were too high up to look out of. Over in the corner was another doorway with steep steps that he presumed led up to a deck.

‘Surely to God it’s like a coffin ship,’ said Sean, surveying people like themselves who had arrived hoping to find a crate
to sit on but had instead to drop down on their haunches to the grimy floor.

‘Except, Sean, my friend, you might feel dead by the time we get there,’ said Mick, ‘but you’d better not be, as there’s a savage body of work waiting for us at the other end. It’s a good idea to find yourself a corner to bed down in.’

Aileen had not let go of Jimmy’s hand. Jimmy brushed aside the glad feeling he had about that when he noticed she was the only woman still standing. The other girls had gone on without her and he was feeling guilty that she had nowhere to sit.

It was his fault the women had left her behind. He had held her back from them, and however much he didn’t want to, he would have to hand her back to them now. The island women stuck together – that’s the way it was on Aghabeg with his mother and her cronies. Always in each other’s kitchens, weaving and sewing and cooking each other boxty pancakes and talking, talking, talking while using up all the tea and sugar so there wasn’t a bit left for the men and them coming in from a hard day at sea. That was how his father saw it, anyway, and as Jimmy got older, he came to see that his father wasn’t far wrong.

‘Women are different from us, Jimmy,’ Sean had told him. ‘They are a law unto themselves – never forget that, son. Just keep your head down and out of their way most of the time. Never contradict a woman, and never approach one when they are in a group. That’s my advice, and if you ever cross one, you’ll learn why.’

His father loved his mother, but he was afraid of her, which Jimmy could never understand. However, standing in front of this group of women, Jimmy himself felt a little afraid – a feeling he was so unfamiliar with he could barely name it.

The women were sitting comfortably enough, their shoulders supported by the arched walls, many of them with their
knitting and sewing already on their laps. They were settled, not looking up, as if they had lived there all their lives in that way that women had of making a home in the most unlikely of places, while a man could stand at his own hearth and look like a stranger warming his behind on another man’s fire.

One of them, a plain-looking creature, looked up and said, ‘Here she comes with her shadow.’

Jimmy didn’t really know what that meant, so he took a deep breath and said, ‘Sorry for keeping Aileen from you, ladies.’

One or two of them looked up as he spoke, but then looked aside again as if whatever he had to say was of no interest to them. He did not understand women, but at the same time he felt there was something amiss. None of them had moved aside to make room for Aileen. The plain one sucked her teeth and said something like, ‘You can keep her.’ Jimmy smiled nervously, and having barely heard what she had said but being glad that she had said something, he considered asking her to repeat herself. However, just as he was about to, he noticed her nudge the girl sitting next to her in a conspiratorial way that made him feel sick in his stomach. Jimmy shifted on his feet. He was unsure what to do next. He felt uneasy leaving Aileen there, and he knew that whatever nasty game they were playing, his love was feeling it, because she had not yet let go of his hand.

‘Would you like to go up deck and have a look around, Aileen?’

Jimmy looked at her and nodded his head to one side as if inviting her out to take the floor at a dance. He realized in that moment that this was the first time he had looked at Aileen directly. He had been too afraid to before now. God, but she was so beautiful he had to force out the words for fear of his heart stopping. It was as if a statue of the Blessed Virgin herself had come to life and was staring him in the face – her beauty was that mysterious, that powerful to him. Her skin was as pale
as the whitest beach pebble, and sad and afeard though she was, her eyes were still dancing with life. Were they green or blue? He could not look at them long enough to discern their precise colour.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘That would be lovely.’

Jimmy raised his eyes to heaven and thanked God Himself for the mean, cold hearts he had put in the Illaunmor women that had gifted him exclusive rights to his own true love this day.

Truly, he was the luckiest man alive.