Bird of Passage (13 page)

‘I wasn’t paying attention. Oh, Finn, I’m so sorry. I hate it that you have to go away. Why can’t you just stay on the farm?’

‘How can I? I have to go!’

‘Why?’

‘Because I do. Because that’s the way it is.’

‘But you’ll be back next spring, won’t you?’

‘Maybe.’ He was knocking a pebble against a granite boulder, striking sparks. A faint acrid whiff of sulphur came off it.

‘What do you mean, maybe?’

‘I can’t say for sure. I have to go where I’m sent. Where the work is.’

‘Oh.’

She didn’t want to have to think about this right now. She wanted everything to go on just as before, with Finn coming back, like the swallows, every spring.

‘Listen, I’ll write to you,’ she said. ‘I can write to you from the school.’

‘I don’t have an address. Besides, you can’t,’ he said. ‘You mustn’t write to me.’ There was panic in his voice.

‘Why on earth not? Our English teacher said that we should have a pen pal. He said it would improve our English, writing letters. Nobody’s going to mind.’

‘They wouldn’t mind here. But they would mind in Ireland.’

‘Why? Is it because you would have a girl writing to you?’

‘Well, that too.’

‘Can’t you tell them I’m your cousin?’

He started to laugh. ‘You have no idea, do you? No notion at all!’

‘Because you don’t tell me anything. I know nothing about your school, Finn!’

‘They know fine I have no cousin over here. And it wouldn’t make any difference if you
were
a cousin. ‘Twouldn’t matter if you were a girl or a boy. ‘Twould just be the fact of my getting letters from here. And they would certainly stop me coming.’

‘Would they?’

 ‘I don’t talk about you or about your grandfather or the farm or anything. Don’t you understand? I say as little as possible. And you mustn’t ever write to me. Do you hear me now?’

‘I hear you, but I can’t see the sense in it. And I’ll hate it. I have so much I want to tell you!’

‘Then write away, but don’t post the letters. Just let me see them when I come back. If I come back.’

Kirsty felt her heart contract in fear. ‘What do you mean,
if
you come back?’

‘I’ll be sixteen later on this year, Kirsty. It depends where they send me. I expect I’ll be put to work on a farm somewhere. If I am, then I may just be able to get to the tatties next summer. But it may not be here and I may not even be sent to a farm. I could be put into a factory or something’

‘But could you not come anyway? Once you’re sixteen?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said, helplessly. ‘I don’t know what I’ll be able to do until the time comes. We go where we’re sent. We have to.’

‘You mean like Francie. Or Michael.  Maybe he’ll be able to call himself Michael, now. That would be good, wouldn’t it?’

‘Maybe.’

‘Though I must admit I’ll always think of him as Francie. Won’t you?’

Finn wouldn’t meet her eyes. He looked beyond her, over the sea.

‘Do you know where he is, Finn? How is he getting on? Will you maybe go and see him when you finish school?’

‘I won’t be able to see him.’

‘I didn’t think I’d miss him, but I have. Haven’t you? You must miss him!’

He nodded, miserably.

‘I really think you ought to see if you can get in touch with him. Then you could tell my mum where he is and she could write to him. Wherever he is, they can’t mind
him
getting letters. Not now he’s older. She could send him something at Christmas.’

‘I can’t do that. I can’t find him, Kirsty.’

‘I’m sure you could, if you tried.’

‘No, I couldn’t.’

‘How can you be so sure?’

‘Because he isn’t anywhere.’

‘What do you mean, he isn’t anywhere? He has to be somewhere!’

‘I mean what I say.’

‘So where is he?’

‘Nowhere.’

‘You mean he’s still at the school?’

‘No, you feckin’ idiot. I mean he’s dead and buried. He should have left the school, but he died.’

‘
Died?
‘ She rolled the word around in her mouth, tasting it, the finality of it. The impossibility of it. ‘But he was young. Young people don’t...
die
.’

‘Sometimes they do. Your father died.’

‘But he wasn’t so young. He was all grown up, at least. Not like Francie. So what happened? Was he ill? What did he die of?’

‘He wasn’t ill. Or no more ill than usual. There was an accident, Kirsty.’

‘What kind of accident?’

He was reluctant to continue. He should never have started this, never have told her. But when she persisted, he said, ‘He had a fall.’

‘A fall?’

‘Down the stairs. He fell down these big stone stairs at the school. There’s a stairwell in the middle of the building and he fell down it in the night.’

‘I don’t understand how that could happen!’

‘He was always a bit unsteady. A bit... wobbly. You know that.’

She stared at him, shaking her head.

‘Not that wobbly. What was he doing? Where was he going? Was he trying to run away? Was that it?’

She understood nothing about it. And he wasn’t going to be the one to tell her. How could he tell her about the night times? The darkness? The things that went on under cover of night? He could hardly bear to think of it, let alone speak about it, it gave him such a terrible sense of shame. The chosen boys would be summoned out of the dormitories in the dark, shaken roughly awake, dragged out of bed, half asleep sometimes, confused, sickly and not able to defend themselves. How could they defend themselves? Finn was never chosen. His good fortune.  Plug ugly, that was why. If he was ever woken, and dragged out, it was only for a beating. And that was bad enough. Nightshirts rolled up. Naked from the waist down, with your bits dangling. Bend over! A line of them sometimes. The brother, rolling up his sleeve. Practically jumping up and down in his excitement. The cane, thrashing away, swishing through the air, and the sting of it, the heavy breathing.  

But it was worse for the others. Especially boys like Francie. That soft face. Beautiful, like a girl. The way it had been when Finn had first met him. Although not later. Not the sad, shambling creature he had become. Night times. The darkness. The things that went on under cover of night. Beatings and whippings and much worse. The cries and groans. The way Francis would crawl back into bed when it was all over, hunched in pain, coughing, his hands covering himself. Not speaking. Not saying anything about it to anyone. Because it was a sin. You mustn’t speak about it, because it was a terrible sin. Not even in confession. It was unforgiveable. ‘My fault,’ he said to Finn. ‘My fault.’

‘How can it be your fault?’ Finn had whispered in the dark.

‘Because I’m an occasion of sin.

And then, the night they had heard it. The single, high pitched cry and the terrible silence, followed by a muted thud. The stairwell in the middle of the building was deep and broad. The dormitories high up, at the top of the house. The boys had huddled in the doorway, listening, listening, while outside they heard running footsteps, the swish of robes on stone floors, whispers, a dozen urgent whispers, back and forth, question and answer. Ah God, ah God. Francis O’Brien.

In the morning, Brother Michael, his face grim, had gathered them together, told them that there had been a terrible accident. One of the boys had fallen from the upper floor, fallen into the stairwell. He had been walking about in the night, perhaps in search of a glass of water. Perhaps he hadn’t been feeling well. They all knew that he was a sickly soul. Poor Francis O’Brien, God rest his soul. He had been taken to hospital, but he was pronounced dead on arrival. It was a sad day for all of them. And they would say a prayer for the repose of his soul. They would say it now. All together.
O God, the Creator and Redeemer of all the faithful, grant to the souls of Thy servants departed, the remission of all their sins, that, by our help and pious supplications, they may obtain that pardon which they have always desired; who livest and reignest, world without end...

Finn didn’t believe any of it. He mouthed the words of the prayer, but he didn’t believe that either.
Give them O Lord, eternal rest. And let perpetual light shine upon them. May they rest in peace...

Francis was at peace, that much was true, and no prayers from the likes of Brother Michael would make a blind bit of difference. But no matter how much Finn thought about the accident, he didn’t know how it had happened. Francis never left the dormitory at night unless summoned. He would have been much too frightened to go wandering about in the dark.   

‘I don’t know what happened to him,’ he told Kirsty. ‘The Brothers said it was an accident. But he’s dead, sure enough. And buried. There’s a cemetery at the school and he’s somewhere in there. There’s a wooden cross and that’s all there is.’

‘Finn, why on earth didn’t you tell me sooner?’

‘I  didn’t want to upset you.’

‘Mum thinks he’s still alive.’

‘Tell your grandad. He can pass it on.  I’m not going to be the one to tell her.’

‘Don’t you care?’

‘You know nothing about it.  Nothing. He was going to leave. He was going to get away. He’ll never get away now.’

‘Finn, do you really
have
to go back there?’

 ‘I do. For now. But I’ll be sixteen myself in October. And I’ll do my best to come back here next year.’

‘I’ll worry about you, all the time.’

‘I can take care of myself. I’m a big boy now.’ He tried to smile but it was more of a grimace. ‘And I’m not Francis. I’m nothing like Francis. I’ll be safe enough. I’d fight them.’

‘ How do you mean you’d fight them?’

‘Nothing. It’s nothing.’

‘Promise me you’ll come, if you can. Promise me you’ll come back to the island,  just as soon as you’re able. And if you can’t come, you have to find a way of writing to me. A way to let me know you’re safe. Will you do that?’

‘I’ll try.’

CHAPTER TEN

The day before his sixteenth birthday, Finn was told to make himself ready and pack up his few belongings in a brown cardboard suitcase. He didn’t have much to show for all his years in the school. Even in the sad little suitcase they rattled about a bit.

‘Where am I to go?’ he asked. Questions were normally frowned upon. You did as you were told and that was that. But Brother Michael was more forthcoming than usual.

‘We’ve found a place for you on a farm in Donegal. A good place. An excellent opportunity for a boy like you with nothing to recommend him. If you work hard, you could do well there. Brother John will drive you to the bus station in the morning and put you on the bus. He’ll tell the driver where to let you off. You’re expected. You’ll be met.’

And that was that. All these years, finished and done with, packed into a battered suitcase that one of the brothers had probably brought in with him. And Finn himself, disposed of in much the same way.  Afterwards, he wondered why on earth he hadn’t simply got off the bus, in some one street town, somewhere between the school and his final destination, and disappeared. He had almost no money, it was true, but he was a strong boy, he might have found work here and there, and made his own way to Belfast, and the ferry. But like a long-caged animal, he saw no way out, even when the door was left ajar.

The ‘good place in Donegal’ was a remote, untidy and run-down smallholding. The farmer ran a few sheep on the high hills. It might have been like Dunshee, but instead it seemed deliberately chosen for its discomfort and isolation. He slept in a chilly outhouse, with inadequate bedding, and insufficient food and worked like a dog. Actually, the dog slept in the house, in the ashes on the hearth, and in more comfort than Finn. Probably better fed as well, he thought, considering his diet of thin porridge and boiled potatoes. The views from the house were beautiful, and the wintry landscape, with grey dawns and fierce sunsets,  was the only thing that sustained him through those first miserable months. The school had been a dark huddle of low lying buildings. At least the light and air up here reminded him of Dunshee.

He was working for a taciturn, middle-aged couple, who seemed to have some connection to one of the Brothers, an uncle and aunt perhaps, although they were never very forthcoming. He spent the early spring in the lambing shed, cold and bloody and weak with exhaustion. Up to his armpits in wool and shit, he felt nothing but hunger and a certain indomitable hope that forced him to get up each day and soldier on. The hope had all to do with getting away to the tatties, with returning to Dunshee. There was the promise of payday, but it never seemed to come. The farmer was always having ‘a few problems’ and putting Finn’s pay ‘on the long finger’ as the woman of the house put it.

For a while Finn almost despaired of escaping,  even for the summer, but at last he talked the farmer round with promises of the good money he would send back, as he had once sent it back to the school. He still had Micky Terrans’ home phone number, scrawled on a precious piece of paper, which he kept screwed up in the pocket of his jacket, but he had memorised it anyway. Over Easter he managed to walk down to the village on the pretext of wanting to go to confession. Once there, he called Micky from the phone box, with a few coins he had saved up for the purpose. With Micky on his side, things were easier. Micky was going to be in Donegal on some business of his own, and he agreed to meet up with the farmer in a bar down in Letterkenny, and talk him round. Perhaps Alasdair had a hand in the matter too, Finn couldn’t be sure, but the long and short of it was that Finn found himself on the ferry to Scotland with the first squad of the year.