The Whitest Flower

‘That’s right, Patrick,’ Ellen replied. ‘That’s quite right. The old people – seanathair mo sheanathair, “my grandfather’s grandfather” – were driven back to this valley, to the rocks and the stones, by Cromwell. So always remember this …’

Three heads craned forward.

‘It’s all to do with the land – everything goes back to the land.’

‘And he hung all the priests too!’ Patrick was warming to the subject now.

‘He did,’ said Ellen. ‘He put a price on their heads and the “Shawn a Saggarts” would hunt them down for money. Then Cromwell would hang them in front of their own people. One of his generals once said of a place that there was “neither water enough to drown a man, nor a tree to hang him from, nor soil enough to bury him in.” Now, wasn’t that an awful thing to be thinking? They say Cromwell was the most hated man ever to set foot in Ireland, and the people haven’t forgotten – he still is.’

While Patrick would have listened for hours to stories of hangings and the like, Katie and Mary were beginning to tire of the foul deeds of Oliver Cromwell. Their tiredness coincided with the sound of Michael returning, so Ellen cut short the lesson with a promise that tomorrow they would draw the traithneen for Granuaile or the Children of Lir.

As she ushered the children outside, she wondered to herself whether she and Michael might now have been ‘strong farmers’ on the fine rolling plains of County Meath, had Oliver Cromwell not driven their forefathers to plough the rocks and bogland of Connacht.

She wondered how their lives might have been if the Roundhead leader had never installed Pakenham’s forefathers at Tourmakeady Lodge.

When the children were out of earshot she muttered to herself, ‘Cromwell – a curse on his name.’

Ellen had decided that she would tell Michael she was carrying his child on the homeward journey from the Sunday Mass. She always felt uplifted after partaking of the Eucharist, but this Sunday would be extra special because the God of all creation would be within her, side by side with her unborn child.

A month had gone by since that morning at the edge of the Mask when she had discovered she was pregnant. Everything had gone well with her since then, and more and more she felt the surge of new life strong in her. For some reason she had fallen into the habit of thinking about the new baby as ‘she’. It wasn’t that she particularly wanted a girl; another pair of labourer’s hands to look after them in later years would be equally welcome. Only God could decide, she told herself – but still, she just knew the baby was a girl.

There was no breakfast to be prepared – they would not break the fast before receiving Holy Communion – so Ellen was able to spend longer than usual getting the girls ready. She started with Katie and Mary, giving their hair one hundred strokes each with the silver and bone brush that the Máistir had given Cáit as a wedding gift. After her mother’s death, the brush had passed to Ellen. She never used it without recalling her father, reminiscing with that faraway look in his eyes:

‘I would sit there of an evening while the shadows moved across the lake and the meannán aerach would swoop down through the sky, his wings making the noise of a young goat, and I would watch your mother as she stroked her hair one hundred times with that brush, drawing it through the strands till they were like gold-red silk of the finest ever seen. And she all the while a-crooning in the old style, a soft suantraí. She never counted the strokes at all, but she was never one more nor less, because many’s the time I counted them myself,’ he would recall, longing for those days to be back.

Now, as she stroked Katie’s hair with her mother’s brush, Ellen was conscious of her role in carrying on and affirming the simple beauty of the lives of those who had gone before.

Patrick had dressed himself, and was now lacing up a pair of old boots which Michael had worn as a boy. Ellen smiled at this handing down between father and son. Yet another connection between then and now; crossings and linkings, always there, always reminding.

When she had finished with the children, Ellen took down her good red petticoat and dusted it off. Not a bright red – more the colour of autumn leaves. Surprisingly, it did not clash with her hair but merely added to the radiation of colour which seemed to encircle her. She had already brushed her wild dos of hair into some semblance of order and it now cascaded, loosely bound, at the back of her neck. Finally she draped her shawl – dark green, as her eyes – over her shoulders. This would cover her head on the journey to Finny and for the duration of Mass.

Michael, his Sunday cap perched jauntily over his black curls, watched approvingly as his family emerged from the cabin. Some of their older neighbours had already begun the trek, and they could see them in twos and threes negotiating the steep path that ran alongside Crucán na bPáiste – the burial place of the children.

To their right lay the dark beauty of Lough Nafooey, and above it the mountains, like steps in the September sky running all the way back to Connemara. Ahead of them, Bóithrín a tSléibhe wound its way over the crest of the mountain to Finny – the village on the banks of the river which connected the Mask and Lough Nafooey. Everything bound together, thought Ellen, fitting so well. Just like a family.

‘Katie, come back here!’

Ellen’s reverie was broken by Michael’s warning shout as the child careered dangerously close to the side of the mountain. For a moment, Katie looked hurt. Then, breaking into a big smile, she raced back to her mother.

‘I just wanted to get these for you,’ she said, gifting to Ellen some purple and yellow wildflowers she had snatched from the edge of the mountain.

‘Thank you, a stóirín!’ Ellen smiled at Katie’s burst of generosity. ‘Now, take my hand. You, too, Mary. Hurry up now, we mustn’t be late for Mass.’

* * *

As they made their descent, Father O’Brien emerged from the church. He looked up at the mountain track, seeing his people gathering in to hear the Word of God.

Among the black-clad figures of the old men and women, the sun seemed to pick out the tall figure of Ellen Rua O’Malley as, hand in hand with her twin daughters, she hastened down towards the church. Father O’Brien wondered what fate awaited them, given the news he must shortly break.

Deep in thought, the priest went back inside to make his final preparations for the Mass. Since Archbishop MacHale had stationed him at Clonbur, he had come to look forward to the one Sunday in a month when he said Mass here at the little church-of-ease in Finny. He loved this place and its people. Here in the midst of the mountains and the lakes, he heard the voice of God much more clearly than in the suffocating cloisters of Maynooth. And the French professors of theology there had taught him little compared to the peasants hereabouts with their humility, their gratitude for the precious few gifts bestowed on them, and their forbearance and dignity in the face of an unrelenting struggle for survival. On the Mass Sunday they flocked to the little Finny church. Some walked the near distance from Kilbride, but others faced more difficult journeys: skirting the edge of Lough Mask round from Glentrague, or climbing Bóithrín a tSléibhe up and over the mountain from Maamtrasna.

This would be his biggest test so far, and he did not want to fail them. But how was he to tell the peasants and mountainside cottiers who made up his flock of the news he had learned on his recent visit to the Archbishop in Tuam? What hope had he to offer them, what alternatives? None, he thought, except faith in the goodness of an all-providing God. Or, failing that, hope in ‘thy kingdom come’.

At least he could advise them to dig early rather than waiting until October to lift the potatoes.

Even so, maybe he was already too late.

When they reached the church there was still fifteen minutes to go till Mass. As was customary, Ellen, the two girls and Patrick – the latter with some resistance – went and knelt on the right-hand side of the aisle, while Michael, having doffed his cap, joined the men on the left-hand side.

Ellen thought that Father O’Brien looked a bit on edge as he took his place in the pulpit. He was nice, this new young priest. He had time for everyone, and he wasn’t all fire and brimstone as some of the clergy were. He had a holy face which shone with an inner light throughout the Mass and particularly at the Consecration. His hair was dark brown and neatly kept, in the way of clerics, but his eyebrows were the darkest she ever saw, darker even than Michael’s. She was tempted to look across the church to where Michael was, but knew she mustn’t – the old ones would be watching her, and she mustn’t give scandal by looking across the aisle.

‘Gloria in excelsis Deo,’ Father O’Brien intoned. Ellen liked the way he said the Latin. It was as if his Western brogue left him when he spoke the chosen language of the Church.

The Máistir had studied Latin in the seminary at Maynooth and had taught her enough that she could follow most of the Mass. But she thought it a cold language. Latin didn’t have the life, the earthiness of the Gaelic tongue and was only slightly ahead of ‘the narrow language of the Sasanach’ – as the valley people referred to spoken English – which had neither poetry nor music to it.

The sermon had started. She had better listen instead of wandering in her mind. Father O’Brien had a habit of picking out a member of his congregation and fixing his eye on them when he spoke.

In fact, Ellen needn’t have worried. Father O’Brien had come to the conclusion that eye-contact might work in the cities, but the people here were generally so shy and in awe of him that it just served to embarrass them. During last month’s Sunday Mass in Finny, while preaching on the Sixth Commandment – ‘Thou shalt not commit adultery’ – he had happened to catch the eye of Roberteen Bawn. The boy had looked as if he would bolt from the church. And he just a harmless enough young fellow, unlikely to be up to anything much under his mother’s hawk-like eye. Yet Father O’Brien was in no doubt that his sermon had seriously unsettled young Roberteen. Today he would be more circumspect in the use of his eyes.

He spoke to them in Irish: ‘Today, my dear people, instead of the usual sermon, I have something to read to you.’

Ellen began to feel uneasy as the priest began. Then, as the sermon continued, all the feelings of warmth, life and light which had filled her that morning seemed to ebb away.

‘The Archbishop has, in his wisdom, decreed that all priests in the Archdiocese should today lay the following information before the faithful. The Archbishop cautions against panic, but because of the dependence of so many of the people upon the potato crop he considers it prudent to advise you of the information to hand.’

At these words, there was much shuffling of nervous feet in the church. Father O’Brien pressed on in the same emotionless voice, careful not to betray the unease he felt inside:

‘While there is no conclusive proof of the arrival of the potato blight in Ireland, the advice the Archbishop gives, having consulted with some experts in this area, is that it would be wise not to delay the digging of the crop until October but to lift the potatoes immediately.’

He paused to let the message sink in.

‘I would therefore suggest to you that when you return home from this Mass, you should immediately commence digging your crops. The Archbishop hereby grants you all a special dispensation so that this work can be done today.’

This was serious, thought Ellen, as frightened whisperings filled the church. To work on a Sunday was to bring seven years’ bad luck; it went against the strict code of the Catholic Church regarding the observance of the Sabbath. She drew the children closer to her. The rest of the congregation looked as fearful as she felt: wives and children turned in their seats, seeking reassurance from husbands and fathers across the church.

Father O’Brien raised his voice to make it heard above the commotion as he read from the copied extract given to him by the Archbishop: ‘The Dublin Evening Post of ninth September reports that: “There can be no question at all of the very remarkable failure in the United States, and with regard to Holland, Flanders, and France, we have already abundant evidence of the wide spread of what we cannot help calling a calamity.”’

The priest read on, translating into Irish as he went: ‘“It is in the densely packed communities of Europe that the failure would be alarming and in no country more, or so much, than our own.”’ A deathly silence descended on the church. Father O’Brien wet his lips with his tongue before continuing: ‘“But happily there is no ground for any apprehension of the kind in Ireland.”’ Ellen, along with the rest of the congregation, exhaled a sigh of relief. ‘“We believe that there was never a more abundant potato crop in Ireland than there is at present, and none which it will be more likely to secure.”

‘So you see,’ Father O’Brien concluded, ‘the picture is not yet clear. On the one hand, if you lift the lumpers now, they will not be fully grown. On the other hand, if you do not lift them for another month, they may be diseased.

‘Considering everything, the Archbishop’s advice is as follows: when Mass has ended, you should go immediately and dig your potatoes with all haste. Now, we ask the all-knowing God for His guidance and, if it be His Divine will, that the crops might be saved. May God bless the work.’

With these words Father O’Brien returned to the liturgy of the Mass.

As the people filed silently out of the church, Ellen paused to cross herself with holy water. A figure in black stood waiting within the corner of the porch. Waiting for her. With a start she realized it was Sheela-na-Sheeoga.

‘The blessings of God and His Holy Mother and the Infant Jesus, be on you, Ellen Rua. I see you are in bloom,’ she said in a half-whisper.

Ellen made to move on. She did not want Michael and the children – or the priest for that matter – to see her talking to the old cailleach. But Sheela caught her by the arm.

‘Be not hastening away from me now, Ellen Rua. Wasn’t it yourself who was quick to hasten to me over the mountain, not a woman’s time ago?’ she said, her voice rising. ‘Remember the words I spoke to you then: “When the whitest flower blooms, so too will you bloom.” Go now with your husband, and lift the fruit of the whitest flower.’

Of course, thought Ellen, how could she not have seen it? The whitest flower was the flower that blossomed on the lazy beds. It was so obvious, she had missed it.

‘But the whitest flower will be the blackest flower,’ Sheela-na-Sheeoga continued. ‘And you, red-haired Ellen, must crush its petals in your hand.’ She paused, gauging the effect of her words. ‘Remember and heed it well, Ellen Rua.’

Ellen instinctively drew her hands about her body where her unborn child was. She could read nothing from Sheela-na-Sheeoga’s face; the old woman’s eyes stared back at her, ashen and grey, like a dead fire. Ellen was about to ask what the riddle meant, and if it had something to do with the news they had just heard, when she heard footsteps approaching. She turned her head for a moment and when she looked back again Sheela-na-Sheeoga had vanished. In her place stood Father O’Brien.

‘Was it waiting to speak with me you were, Mrs O’Malley?’

‘No, Father, thank you. Just wondering what’s to become of us all.’

‘I don’t know …’ Father O’Brien said. ‘We must pray and put our faith in the hands of the Lord, He will provide.’ Then, echoing the words of the old cailleach, he advised her: ‘Best go home now, Ellen, and take up the potatoes with your husband.’

Michael was waiting outside. He knew by the way she pulled the shawl closer about herself that something troubled her, but he waited for her to break the silence.

‘Do you think that the priest is right about the potatoes – that they’ll be bad, that the bad times are surely coming?’

‘Well if they are itself, I still don’t think it’s a right thing the priest said, to lift them today, on a Sunday.’

Ellen looked at him, understanding his reservations about ‘Sunday work’ – a taboo that went back generations.

‘Well, if it troubles you, Michael, then we’ll wait. The children and myself will gather for you in the morning,’ she said.

They were approaching the crest of the hill. It was there, with their valley opening out before them, that Ellen had planned to tell Michael about the child. But now the time seemed all wrong. The bad news from the priest, the meeting with Sheela-na-Sheeoga, had created a sense of foreboding that was somehow bound up with her being pregnant. To talk about her pregnancy under these circumstances would, she felt, be harmful to the baby in some way. By her silence, therefore, she was protecting her child.

Suddenly, as if coming face to face with a force beyond which they could not pass, they both stopped walking, stunned at the sight below them in the valley.

There in the fields were the men, women and children who had left the church before them. All furiously digging for the lumpers, pulling them up by the stalks, shaking them free of the earth, twisting and turning them – until as one they joined in a great mad shout that rose up to greet Ellen and Michael where they stood:

‘They’re safe! They’re safe! Praise be to God, the potatoes are safe!’

3

Next morning Ellen was up early, as usual, only to find that Michael was ahead of her. Quickly she tended to the children. The Lessons would have to wait. There was more important work to be done.

It was a bright September morn, with just the hint of autumn chill in it – a good day for the fields. Together they set out for the dig. Michael carried his slane – a kind of half-spade used for digging out potatoes. If you were skilful enough in its use you could lift the tubers without damaging the next cluster along the lazy bed. Ellen and the three children each carried a sciathóg – a basket made of interlaced sally rods. The lumpers would be placed in this rough sieve and shaken to remove any excess clay.

They weren’t the only ones out in the fields. Obviously, despite the Archbishop’s dispensation, some in the village had decided to respect the old ways and not work on the day of rest. But they were in the minority: in the fields adjacent to their own, Ellen and Michael could see where the lazy beds had been dug the previous day.

They were fortunate, she thought, having the two acres. Most of their neighbours had only the ‘bare acre’. An acre, even with a good crop of potatoes, could not keep a family of five for a year. May, June and July – the ‘meal months’ – would be especially hard. The previous year’s crop would have been eaten, and it was too soon for the new harvest. Families who had no savings and couldn’t find alternative work to see them through were forced to get credit to buy meal or potatoes. She would have hated that. The credit came from ‘strong farmers’ who had saved money, and who then charged a pretty penny in interest to borrowers. These scullogues would not lend money to those who were most in need of it, for the very poor would never have the means by which loans could be made good. The destitute had to rely instead on the support of their neighbours, or go begging.

Michael was already at the first lazy bed and had sunk the slane down into the earth under the potatoes. He carefully levered up a slaneful of potatoes and clay. Nervously Ellen watched him bend and tug the plant from the loosened earth. He shook it vigorously and then wiped away the remaining clods of clay from the tubers, examining them intently. Then he turned the plant in his hand, studying the three or four potatoes which dangled from it. He turned to her as she approached.

‘Buíochas le Dia – they’re sound.’ He held the plant out to her. ‘Here, look for yourself.’

Ellen examined it carefully. There was no sign of disease anywhere to be seen. She looked at him, the smile creasing her face. He caught her by the shoulders, the laughter of relief wild in him, and brought her to her knees with him. Together, there on the earth amongst the lazy beds, their food for the year to come now safe, they thanked God for His bounty.

Michael dug while Ellen, Patrick, Katie and Mary gathered and inspected. The lumpers were smaller than usual because of being lifted earlier. This was not unexpected, and therefore no cause for alarm. At one point, Katie raised a scare when she yelled out, ‘a Mhamaí, this one has black on it!’ But it turned out to be just an exceptionally large ‘eye’ on the potato.

What an ugly plant the lumper was, Ellen thought to herself. Squat and uneven in shape with what looked like smaller versions of itself stuck on here and there like little misshapen heads. The lumper wasn’t sweet like the cup and the apple variety of potatoes the Máistir had once brought back from Castlebar. But it was floury when boiled well, and, most important of all, it was hardy and grew in abundance.

While she waited for the children to return from emptying their baskets, Ellen plucked one of the tiny flowers from an upturned potato stalk. She had never before taken much notice of the ‘whitest flower’. Like the grass in the field, it was just there from year to year. Now, however, it had assumed a new significance in her life. She twirled the stem slowly between her thumb and forefinger. It was quite beautiful. Fresh and frail, its tiny petals, white as snow, formed a perfect ring around the yellow centre. Strange, she thought, the stark contrast between the beauty of the flower and its ugly fruit.

What secret did this blossom hold for her and her unborn baby? What harm could lie in this tiny flower? In keeping with the old woman’s riddle, she crushed one of the petals between her fingers and brought it to her nose. Ugh – its smell was not at all sweet; nothing like the smell of a flower. It had no perfume, but smelt dank and unclean, like an uncooked potato. She dropped it to the ground and rubbed her fingers in the earth to cleanse them of its stickiness.

‘The whitest flower will be the blackest flower,’ Ellen said to herself, wondering.

All day they toiled in the field until twilight fell over the valley, hushing the sounds of the day. Michael did most of the digging, with Patrick being given an occasional turn at ‘man’s work’. Gathering, inspecting and ferrying the baskets full of potatoes to the cabin was woman’s work, in Patrick’s eyes. But he understood the urgency of what they were at and pitched in willingly, doing whatever was required.

On one of the trips to the cabin, cradling the heavy sciathóg between her hip and the crook of her arm, Ellen caught sight of the fair head of their neighbour’s son coming towards her. A mischievousness took hold of her. She set her basket on the ground and waited for Roberteen Bawn to draw near.

‘Dia dhuit,’ she bade him, friendly-like.

‘Dia’s Muire dhuit,’ he returned, happy to see her.

He was about to continue walking past her, abashed at finding himself so close to the object of his desires, when she said, ‘Wait a minute, Roberteen.’

He turned towards her, his fair skin pinking at the cheekbones. Was the woman going to shame him here in front of the whole village?

‘Roberteen, I wouldn’t be stopping you from your work,’ she continued, an air of earnestness about her, ‘but it’s long the day has been, and the cradle of lumpers here getting heavier with each passing hour. Would you go by Michael and tell him I need his help – these lumpers are the weight of rocks?’

Roberteen looked at Ellen warily. The basket wasn’t that heavy, especially for a fine strong woman like her. Sure, weren’t the children carrying them up all the time. What was it she was up to? She must have told her husband about him watching her and now she was after sending him to Michael for a thrashing. She had that smile on her – full of divilment, she was. He looked at the creel of potatoes on the ground. It dawned on him then – a way out.