The Whitest Flower

They paused by the gates of a beautiful walled garden. Along its sides, thorny creepers grew; along its pathways were neatly trimmed bushes. Everything was laid out in perfect symmetry. Just like the lazy beds, only here there were no rows of potatoes – no need for that at Tourmakeady Lodge! These were the rose gardens, Pakenham’s pride and joy.

‘They say Pakenham has a score of men working here – a dozen for the rose gardens alone.’ Ellen shook her head in disbelief.

‘Aye, and if he does itself he’ll have no luck for it,’ Michael responded. ‘One fine day these fine rose bushes will make a bed of thorns for him.’

‘’Tis said he guards it as if ’twere the Crown Jewels themselves within.’

‘Just as well he does!’ Michael laughed. ‘It wouldn’t take me and Martin Tom Bawn long to make a fine potato patch out of it.’

The image of Pakenham’s rose gardens being replaced with lazy beds full of lumpers appealed to Ellen, and she laughed with him.

Bridget Lynch, pretty as a picture, opened the tradesmen’s entrance to Ellen and Michael. Ellen was taken by the young girl’s beauty and the radiance of her smile.

Bridget leaned towards the visitors and gave the customary Gaelic greeting, but not too loudly. Pakenham would have her flogged if he heard her speaking ‘that bog language of the papists’, as he called it. It was expressly forbidden to speak Irish in the house or grounds of Tourmakeady Lodge. Ellen, sensing the risk the girl took, laid a hand on Bridget’s arm and whispered, ‘Dia’s Muire dhuit.’

Bridget took in the woman before her. So this was Ellen Rua O’Malley, the woman whose beauty was spoken of in the four corners of Connacht. It felt strange to be so close to the red-haired woman. It was as if some energy, some spirit-force enveloped her. Yet Bridget was not afraid of it. This woman was not dangerous or evil, like some of the old ones back in the mountains. No, Ellen Rua’s spirit was good – and Bridget Lynch liked it.

A whiff of a breeze brushed a strand of Ellen’s hair across Bridget’s cheek. She felt it fall against her skin – strongly textured, yet fine; the essence of the woman herself. And in the eyes of the red-haired woman, Bridget Lynch saw not only her own reflection, but also the wildness of the green mountain fields, the wide blue of the sky, and the dark brooding of the Mask. Ellen Rua had more than beauty. She was of the land, of history – she was of Ireland. She would never be a landlord’s tallywoman. That would be a betrayal not only of body but of soul and country. So Bridget did not fear for Ellen Rua O’Malley. Sir Richard Pakenham would be no match for her. Of that, Bridget Lynch was sure.

The moment between the two women was broken by the arrival of an irate Mrs Bottomley.

‘Girl, are you whispering about the place in that foreign tongue again?’ she accused Bridget – ignoring Ellen and Michael, as if they weren’t there. ‘His Lordship will have something to say to you about that.’

Ellen noticed the sadness come into the girl’s eyes at the mention of Pakenham.

‘Have the peasants cleaned their feet, girl?’ Mrs Bottomley harried Bridget, still ignoring them. ‘Bring them in, bring them in – the kitchen, mind, no further. And stay with them,’ she instructed Bridget, without any hint of subtlety.

‘Begging your pardon, ma’am.’

The housekeeper heard herself being addressed. It was with some surprise she registered that it was the tall red-haired woman. Mrs Bottomley turned, displaying obvious distaste that a peasant should have the audacity to speak to her.

‘Begging your pardon, ma’am,’ Ellen repeated in as polite but as firm a Queen’s English as Mrs Bottomley would have wished to hear in His Lordship’s lodge. ‘Peasants we may be, but thieves we are not.’

A reply to this insolence was on the tip of Mrs Bottomley’s tongue, but something in the manner of the woman affirmed the truth of what she had said. The housekeeper, lost for a response, executed an about-turn and shouted to an as yet invisible figure, ‘Mr Beecham! Mr Beecham! The peasants – those people from Maamtrasna are here.’

Bridget, meanwhile, could scarce contain her glee at the routing of Mrs Bottomley by Ellen – something she wouldn’t have deemed possible had she not witnessed it with her own eyes. What a story she would have for them back in Partry next time she was home.

She hurried to conceal her merriment as Beecham strode into the kitchen.

‘Well now, and what do we have here?’ the agent asked. ‘Ah, a delegation of the tenantry! What have you to say, O’Malley?’ Beecham ignored Ellen and directed the question at Michael.

‘His Lordship requested my attendance,’ Michael said quietly.

‘Yes, O’Malley, precisely – your attendance. Albeit a day of religion in the papist Church, it is not a day of family worship here,’ Beecham said, looking askance at Ellen. ‘Can you not conduct your own business, like a man, without bringing your wife to plead for you?’

‘I plead for nothing, Mr Beecham,’ Michael said staring down Pakenham’s middleman. ‘And we have other business in Castlebar.’

‘Pah, what business in Castlebar for the likes of you two?’ snorted Beecham. ‘Business my foot! I know the business you’re about: going to “buy the Christmas” – is that what you peasants call it? I knew it! I’ve told His Lordship time and again, the rent is set too low for you scheming beggars. His Lordship is far too generous, while you filthy idlers spend your time lazing about your lazy beds and begetting children.’

Ellen could feel Michael clench his fists as Beecham continued: ‘Well, my Christmas beauties, listen now, and listen well – the rent is to be raised one-twentieth for every child in a house above two children. This will put a halt to your lechery, and overpopulating His Lordship’s land. It’s time there was an end to the incessant subdividing when these offspring grow up, leaving the land never developed – only with potatoes, potatoes, and more damned potatoes.’

Ellen and Michael listened aghast as the agent outlined the scheme he had hatched with Pakenham.

‘Furthermore,’ Beecham went on, ‘any arrears in rent – any arrears at all, so-called Famine or not – will result in immediate eviction from both dwelling-place and land. There will be no abatements of rent, despite rumours to the contrary being put about by O’Connell and his agitators. Is that quite clear?’

‘It is clear that these new rents are unjust and an affront to God for the families he has blessed with children,’ Michael began, anger clouding his face. ‘It is clear that the potato crop has already failed many people. An increase in rents, facing into a year of shortage, can only drive more of the people to hunger and to the roadside. Is that what His Lordship wants?’

‘Yes, that is exactly what His Lordship wants!’ barked Pakenham. The landlord had entered the room unnoticed. Now he strode across the room to join Beecham, displeasure written all over his face.

‘What is all this noise? I won’t have the tenantry raising their voices in my household. Oh, it’s you, O’Malley!’ Pakenham said, feigning surprise. ‘And the pretty red-crested mountain thrush, too.’ He paused and looked quizzically at Beecham. ‘Is there to be a céilí here at the Lodge?’ he asked mockingly. Then he rounded on Michael and Ellen: ‘Does the law of the Lord not provide for each man to do what he wills with that which is his? And does the Lord not command the servant to increase the profit of his master or be banished forever from his master’s sight? Is this not writ in the Holy Books – even of your own papish Church?’

He spoke like a preacher, Ellen thought, laying out their sins before them.

‘It is! It is! It is!’ the landlord answered his own question, clapping the fist of one hand into the open palm of the other.

Then he turned on Bridget, who had obviously been as unsettled as they were by his surprise entrance. Ellen was aware of a slight flush on the girl’s cheeks, and the nervous clasping and unclasping of her hands.

‘Don’t fidget, girl! Make yourself useful for once,’ Pakenham said gruffly. ‘Go bring my port for when I’ve finished here.’

At this, Ellen noticed that the slight flush on Bridget’s face had darkened, becoming a ridge of deep scarlet along each of the girl’s cheekbones. She felt sorry for the young servant; Pakenham had obviously set out to demean her in front of them.

‘Your Lordship,’ said Michael, ‘we Máilleachs pay our just dues on time, as we have done since my father’s day.’

Ellen could see that he was measuring out the words, holding himself back.

‘We have used the land well, reclaiming even the marshy land by the lakeshore – to Your Lordship’s profit.’

Michael stopped there and Ellen breathed a sigh of relief. He had said it well.

‘Show me the book, Beecham!’ Pakenham thrust an imperious hand out towards his agent.

Beecham passed over the well-worn rent book, and Pakenham ran his finger down the quill-crafted entries.

‘Let me see … Yes, O’Malley, Michael. Wife and three children. Maamtrasna. That’s you, isn’t it?’ Pakenham never looked up, never waited for an answer. ‘Yes, well everything appears to be in order here, O’Malley.’

The landlord closed the book, ambled to the window, looked out, and then returned across the room to stand directly in front of Ellen and Michael.

‘You know, O’Malley,’ he said conversationally, ‘I’ll wager my garden of roses that the marshland which you speak of is not the only land on my property reclaimed by you. What say you to that?’

Pakenham pushed his face closer to Michael’s.

Michael, unflinching, stared the landlord straight in the eye. How could Pakenham have known about the lazy beds on top of the mountain? He had his spies about, to be sure, those that would sell out their fellow Irishmen for a shilling. But Michael was certain Pakenham couldn’t have known, was only baiting him. He said nothing.

‘You see, Beecham? He doesn’t answer – I was right! I know these peasant dogs and the way they think. Declare a portion of improved land, pay the extra rent for a quiet life and then rob me blind. Thinking, “Sure, Pakenham will never know, and him beyond in London enjoying hisself,”’ Pakenham mimicked the local accent. ‘And you – silent woman’ – he turned on Ellen – ‘You sing, but you can’t speak – is that it?’ he taunted. ‘Speak up, woman! What should I do about fraudsters and tricksters who use my land without fair payment?’

Like Michael, Ellen never flinched from the landlord’s onslaught. She waited a beat before replying, ‘It’s little I know about fraudsters, Your Lordship.’

Was this it? Was this all the songbird was going to sing? Pakenham was angry. She had a nerve, this peasant wench. Well-spoken, too, not like the rest of them. He looked at her intently. She seemed very sure of herself, not attempting to appease him, like many of them did, with their clumsy curtseying.

She was a one, this beauty, with her fine head of hair, fine face, fine … Good Lord, the woman was pregnant!

‘See here, Beecham – our singing bird will shortly be taking to the nest and we shall have another new tenant! Mark that down in your book, Beecham – mark it down, man. Aye! – this is rum indeed,’ Pakenham laughed, enjoying himself. ‘Were it not for your visit here, Mrs O’Malley, we would never have known of this happy event … and a twentieth on the rent to boot!’

Ellen felt Michael start to move on Pakenham. She reached out, caught his arm, squeezed it.

‘A child is a gift from God – as we all are,’ she measured out, with not a tinge of irony. ‘Now that we have fulfilled our duties, my husband and I must be on our way, and not take up any more of Your Lordship’s time.’

She let it rest there. Now was not the time, she thought. But she knew that, before too long a time had passed, they would once again cross paths with the landlord.

Pakenham was intrigued by the redhead’s refusal to be goaded into openly insulting him. She had chided him with dignity, adroitly extricating herself, and that husband of hers, from a fraught situation. What features she had! Why, with a decent set of clothes on her, you could parade her up and down Pall Mall all day and every head in London would turn to behold her. She would be a worthy adversary for him, much more so than that flighty, fidgety Bridget, who had just returned with his port. Although the girl had led him a merry dance for quite some time, he had had his way with her in the end. Bridget responded to his look by casting her eyes to the floor. Pakenham could imagine her, running to the priest, looking for forgiveness after sinning against the Sixth Commandment – and with the landlord too! No doubt she’d been given treble the normal penance, for she was thrice-damned, him being also Protestant and still perceived as ‘English’ by those sagarts, even after being here two hundred years!

He would let the O’Malley woman’s impudence go for now – wait and see what the lean winter months would bring. This Famine would be of assist to him with this one. Of that he had no doubt.

He turned to Beecham. He had other matters to attend to.

‘Yes, well, that’s enough for today, Beecham. Mark a further year’s holding for O’Malley here, decide on the new rent and …’ he paused, as if the idea had just come to him, ‘I want you yourself to check the extent of land reclamation carried out in the Maamtrasna Valley and report any under-declarations to me.’

‘Yes, Your Lordship,’ Beecham replied, his lips curling into a smirk.

‘O’Malley, ma’am – I bid you the compliments of the season.’ Pakenham fixed Ellen with a rather wan smile and then, without looking away from her, commanded: ‘Bridget, my port. Fetch it to my study, and wait for me within. I shall be there momentarily, as both Mr Beecham and our other guests are leaving.’

Pakenham knew that the inference would not be lost on Ellen. For the first time, he saw the redhead’s eyes flicker as she glanced towards Bridget – now flushed with the humiliation of being publicly shamed.

Bridget nodded and, almost inaudibly, replied, ‘Yes, sir,’ before hurriedly leaving the room.

Ellen felt much sympathy for the girl. Again Pakenham had used the young servant as a pawn in his game with them. He had made a point in demonstrating to them – and to Ellen in particular – his power over others. Shown how, had he chosen to, he could have used his power to make them suffer by denying them another year’s tenancy.

Pakenham, too, had invaded her intimacy. Let her know what was about to happen to the young servant. Let her know that it was she, Ellen Rua, he would be thinking of. She, and not Bridget Lynch. Ellen felt sick. She wanted to get as far away as possible from him.

As if it were not her speaking, she heard herself say, ‘Thank you, M’Lord, and may the Christ-Child and His Holy Mother, Mary, Virgin most pure, bless you and keep you free from all sin.’

At this very pointed reference to his intentions towards Bridget, Pakenham gave the merest hint of a smile, but said nothing. Ellen and Michael then left the kitchen, and the landlord’s odious presence.

No sooner had they gone than Pakenham, white with rage, picked up the nearest object to him, which happened to be the bone-china teapot, and dashed it against the floor of the kitchen. Bridget rushed back in steadying the glass of port on the silver salver she carried.

Pakenham made a lunge at the girl. Apoplexy contorting his face, he raged: ‘Damn them! Damn them to high heaven, these Irish bitches!’ That red-haired she-devil had blessed him – her landlord! The gall of her! And not only that, she’d cautioned him not to sin! Not to sin, and she nothing but a whore’s melt – born of an unholy union with a disgraced priest. The whole countryside knew of her. How dare she speak to him of sin!

‘Damn her!’ he roared at Bridget. ‘And damn you, too, you little she-witch. You’re all hewn from the same tree – sniggering, whispering bog-bitches!’

He made another lunge at Bridget, but succeeded only in grabbing the intaglio-cut Venetian glass, filled to the brim with fine port wine.

‘Damn the whole conniving lot of you! Get out of my sight, girl! Go on, get out of here! Go home to that breastthumping holy mother of yours – or I’ll not be responsible for you!’

As Bridget dropped the silver salver and ran, Pakenham hurled the glass past her. Its ruby-red contents, symbol of her downfall, hung for a moment in the air above her before emptying down on her head and shoulders, baptizing her, anointing her with its unholy chrism.

Ellen and Michael heard the crash of the silver and, then, as Pakenham’s shouting followed them down the path, the sound of glass smashing into the door. At the rose gardens they stopped, hearing Pakenham’s final outburst, followed by the door banging closed and the sound of footsteps running from the house.

Ellen looked at Michael. ‘The girl will be all right now – for the Christmas at least!’

As they left Tourmakeady Lodge behind them, Michael was angry. ‘Pakenham and his likes should be run out of the country once and for all. O’Connell is wrong: peaceful means will never do it. We have to take back what is rightfully ours – they’ll never just hand it over,’ he said. ‘I think Pakenham would wish the blight to hit us again. If the crop failed and we had no rent for him, he’d have us on the roadside quicker than you could cross yourself. It would suit him to clear the land, and have bigger holdings, with sheep and cattle on them, instead of humans. The people should rise up – it’s the only way.’

They decided not to go on to Castlebar. No matter how bad things had been in other years, they had always managed to buy the Christmas. But now, with a rent increase looming over them, they were forced for the first time to break years of tradition.

So they turned and headed back along the road that skirted the western boundary of Lough Mask. It was a December day to the core: bright and frosty and fresh. Along the way they stopped here and there to exchange news and greetings with any they chanced upon. Otherwise, they walked briskly, eager to be back with the children before nightfall, but their hearts heavy that it was disappointment only they brought home with them this year and not the Christmas.

9

They came at first light, Beecham and a trio of the constabulary. Mountain and marshland alike they combed, Beecham writing it all down in his book and drawing lines on some map he had. Roberteen followed them and saw it all.

As they rode off again through the village, Beecham shouted, ‘Tell O’Malley that Sir Richard thanks him.’

That evening, after dark, three men called to speak to Michael.

Ellen recognized Johnny Jack Johnny’s son from Glenbeg, but the Shanafaraghaun man, as he was referred to, was a stranger to her. She was surprised that Roberteen made up the three.

She put the children to bed, although Patrick wanted to sit up with the men. ‘Are they Young Irelanders?’ he whispered. She wondered that herself.

They sat with Michael at the hearth for a while, then all four went outside. She noticed that the unnamed Shanafaraghaun man did most of the talking. ‘He was in Dublin with O’Connell,’ Roberteen had said when he introduced the man to Michael, ‘but he broke from O’Connell again.’

An hour or so later, Michael came back alone.

‘O’Connell is for repealing the Union with Britain without violence – “Not a single drop of blood,” he says – but the Young Irelanders are for the sword, and the Shanafaraghaun man is for the Young Irelanders. He says the sword is a sacred weapon,’ Michael told her, his face animated in the firelight, ‘and that moral force should be backed by musket force!’

Then he handed her a piece of paper which the Shanafaraghaun man had given him.

When Grattan rose, none dared oppose;

The claim he made for freedom;

They knew our swords to back his words;

Were ready, did he need them.

‘What do you think, Michael?’

‘This is not the moment for hasty decisions. We should think – work out a plan. Without a plan, Pakenham will split us, then pick us off, one by one, with the backing of the Crown. The Shanafaraghaun man’s headed back for Dublin again. He said the priests and bishops were against any rebellion, but I think Father O’Brien’s a good man – he’ll stand behind us against Pakenham. I’ll go to Clonbur tomorrow and let him know what’s happening.’

She read the four lines of the poem again. Swords to back words – it would have to come to that, she knew.

10

The next morning Michael set off to see the priest. It was a good eight-mile walk to Clonbur, but with luck he’d meet a horse or cart travelling his way. When he reached Beal a tSnámha he would have no choice but to wait for a horse to ford the swirling waters of the Mask. There the lake formed a narrow channel, dividing the road before it opened out again towards America Beag on the Cloughbrack side.

It made him conscious of how cut off by water, how isolated Maamtrasna was from the rest of the Galway-Mayo townlands. Still he wouldn’t trade it for anywhere else. Surrounded by mountain and water – sure wasn’t that the beauty of it?

Somehow he would get across the Mask, make it to Clonbur, and put it to the priest that something must be done about Pakenham.

He would be home to Ellen and the children by dusk.

Ellen, having seen Michael on his way, sat down with the children for the Lessons. Katie managed to contain herself as they said the customary learning prayer, but leapt in at ‘Amen’ with that day’s burning topic.

‘Amenarealllandlordsbad, a Mhamaí …?’ she blurted.

Even Ellen had to draw breath after that. How like Katie it was to get straight to the crux of the matter. She couldn’t help but laugh.

Katie sat poised, ready to strike again if Ellen’s answer was not to her liking. But before Ellen had time to reply, Patrick cut in: ‘Of course they are. Every last single one of them is bad. They say “’tis harder to find a good landlord than it is to find a white blackbird.”’

Ellen was taken aback by Patrick’s fervour. She wondered who it was her son had been listening to of late. Deciding to let it pass – for now – she got the lesson under way.

‘All right, bad landlords it is to be this morning. Now, what do we know about good and bad?’

Katie’s hand shot up. ‘Well, there’s good people and there’s bad people, and we’re the good people … And that’s what I asked you: Are the landlords all bad people?’ Katie sighed with exasperation. Why couldn’t mothers give you a straight answer?

Ellen ignored Katie’s impatience. ‘And what do you have to say about this, Mary?’ she asked her third child.

‘Well, I think that nobody is good all the time and nobody is bad all the time …’

Ellen nodded at her to go on.

‘It’s like when Katie does a bold thing …’

Katie was up on her knees, ready to defend herself.

‘Sit down, Katie!’ Ellen paused until she did. ‘Continue, Mary.’

‘Well, that doesn’t mean Katie’s a bad person – she’s only a little bit bad, and the other times she’s good,’ Mary explained in her quiet, unerring way.

Katie grimaced and then relaxed. She wasn’t sure how to take this, but, on balance, she thought she came out of it all right, so she stayed quiet.

‘That’s a good answer, Mary,’ affirmed Ellen. ‘You remember Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden?’

They nodded.

‘When they committed the original sin – the first sin, against God – what did God do?’

‘He punished them.’ Katie liked this idea. ‘And will he punish the landlords too?’ she persisted.

‘We’ll get to that in a minute, Katie. Just be patient,’ Ellen admonished. ‘The way that God punished Adam and Eve was very wise. He said to them, “Adam and Eve, in spite of all I have given you, you have disappointed Me. You have done the first bad thing, but I will give you another chance. From now on, you will have to choose between good and evil, between right and wrong. When you die, I will judge you. I will add up all the good things and all the bad things you have done. If you have done a lot of good things, you can come back into heaven with Me. If you have done a lot of bad things, then I will send you away from here to hell.”’