Galway Bay (59 page)

“Because he would’ve lost the battle,” Barney said.

“He lost anyway!” I said.

“But the colonel thought he could win—reinforcements were coming,” he said.

“Oh, bother the reinforcements!” Máire said. “What is this? Change partners and dance?”

We waited. The newspaper reported only that the paroled soldiers had to make their own way back to Chicago. No list of casualties. “Light” casualties meant one hundred had died or been wounded in the fighting before the surrender, a high number for us. Some had to be from Bridgeport, but no names were reported. Colonel Mulligan wasn’t paroled. He would remain a prisoner with General Price until he could be exchanged for a Confederate officer. His young wife, Marion, had watched the battle from a nearby hotel. She’d been allowed to join him in captivity, which seemed strange to me.

No word from Paddy and Johnny Og, or Patrick Kelly. Dear God, could they have been wounded or worse? We didn’t know.

Again the Holy Hour stretched into the evening. I lit candles for the boys, and Patrick Kelly, too. I’d put him out of my heart, but I could hope the fellow survived.

September became October. Boys straggled back—Lizzie McKenna’s youngest son and Molly’s son. Neither had seen Johnny Og or Paddy. The boys were closemouthed about the great battle of Lexington. All they would say was, “It was hard going—lucky to be out of it.”

You’d think Lexington—a defeat, after all—would have put the other boys off the idea of war, but not at all. Jamesy, Daniel, and every male in Bridgeport were determined to avenge the Brigade. Remember Lexington! Battles lost stir them more than battles won, I thought. The truce between Máire and me held.

Mid-October, a month after the surrender, I was outside hanging the wash on a Saturday. Jamesy had taken all the young ones to McVicker’s. I preferred to be at home in case any news came.

Two men on horseback were riding across the last stretch of prairie toward Bubbly Creek. Cowboys, probably. When they crossed the canal bridge, I could see them: a man in buckskins—Patrick Kelly—and with him a skinny boy, bent over his horse’s neck, his face hidden. But I knew him.

“Paddy! Paddy!” I ran and reached them as they came off the bridge. “Oh, Paddy!”

He slid off the horse into my arms.

“Paddy, Paddy . . .” As I hugged him close to me, I could feel every rib. My sturdy lad, so bony. An old man’s face, hollow-cheeked, covered with bristly whiskers—dirty. Standing still in my arms.

“You’re home. You’re whole. Thank God. Are you hurt?”

“Only very tired,” Patrick Kelly said from atop his horse. “He did well, Honora. Michael would’ve been proud. He was very brave.”

“Johnny Og? Where’s Johnny Og?” I looked out over the canal, but I could see no other rider.

Patrick got off his horse, lifted a rolled buffalo robe from behind his saddle, and laid it carefully on the ground.

“Johnny Og,” Paddy said.

“Dear God.”

For the first time since he was a tiny boy in the before times, Paddy wept.

I waited outside our building for Máire to come home from work. She started running when she saw me walking toward her. She knew as soon as she saw my face. Patrick and Paddy had carried Johnny Og’s body up to her parlor and set the buffalo robe in front of Máire’s fireplace. I led Máire into the room.

“He’s there, Máire,” I said.

She went down on her knees and started to pull the covering away.

“Wait, Máire,” Patrick said. I knelt next to her, put my arms around her. “Johnny Og was wounded on the last day of the siege,” Patrick went on. “He was put on a steamboat the Sisters of Mercy had turned into a hospital and was taken to Saint Louis.”

“I was in Saint Louis, too, Aunt Máire,” Paddy said, “but I didn’t know where Johnny Og was. All of us from the Brigade got separated. We had to get home on our own, but I couldn’t leave without Johnny Og. It was Uncle Patrick found me and took me to him.”

“He was alive when we got there, Máire,” Patrick said, “but his wounds were infected. He had fever.”

“And he knew us, Aunt Máire, but he thought the hospital boat was the
River Queen
and we were coming up the river from New Orleans, that we were only just arriving in Chicago.”

“A priest from Saint Louis heard his confession,” Patrick said.

“Not much to confess,” Máire said. “He never put a foot wrong.”

“He didn’t, Aunt Máire,” Paddy said. “The best of all of us, and we never . . .” He stopped. “He sent you his love. The last word he said was ‘Mathair’—Mother.”

“Mother,” Máire repeated. “I wish I’d been a better mother to him.”

“You were the best mother ever, Máire. The best,” I said.

“His body will not . . . ,” Patrick started.

“Unwrap him, Patrick,” Máire said.

Patrick got down and untied the buffalo robe. Johnny Og’s whole body, even his face, was wrapped in bands of white linen.

“Johnny Og,” Máire said over and over. “Johnny Og.”

She kissed the wrapped head of her eldest child, the baby she’d held that Christmas Eve in Bearna. Johnny Og.

“Wrap him up, Patrick,” Máire said. “Better the other children don’t see him when they come home.”

We helped her up.

“A proper wake, Honora. He needs a proper wake,” Máire said.

“He will have that,” Patrick Kelly said. “His brothers-in-arms will wish to honor him.”

I expected Máire to spit the words back at him—brothers-in-arms—honor? But she only nodded.

“And a military funeral,” Patrick said.

Máire nodded again. “Johnny Og was always a good little soldier. I couldn’t have survived the Big House without him. He knew the old Major hated him, and he learned to keep his head down. Never a whine or a whinge.”

“A brave man,” Patrick said.

“He’d be twenty-two at Christmas. Not much more than a boy,” Máire said.

The wake began on Saturday afternoon. Máire and I were together in her Bridgeport parlor, as we’d been in the cottage at Bearna. A body this time. But such a poor, battered body.

“He was next to me, Mam. Right next to me. He had just moved there, just stepped into the spot,” Paddy had whispered to me his first night at home. He’d said nothing more since then.

And now, at the wake, Paddy was greeting the young soldiers in uniform, and the older men, their fathers and uncles. “The Brigade’s a family,” one man said to me as he followed Paddy to the kitchen to join Jamesy and the others.

Máire and I sat with the women, keeping watch—close enough to touch the coffin.

I wish we had a keener like Widow Clooney from home to put words on this awful sadness.

“My first born,” Máire said to each person as more and more people entered.

Michael Gibson from the boatyard took Máire’s hand. “A great worker, he was. He had a true feel for the bones of a boat. A good son. He would have liked to sail the world. But he said the ocean had taken his father and he couldn’t worry his mother by going to sea. Killed on dry land.”

“A good son,” Máire repeated. “A very good son.”

No sign of Patrick Kelly since he’d arrived two days ago, though Mr. McGillicuddy had simply appeared with the coffin and said Patrick Kelly had paid for it.

“Here’s Uncle Patrick, Mam,” Jamesy said. “And look who he’s brought with him—Alderman Comiskey and Mr. Onahan. Here, in our house—shows how important Johnny Og was.”

I went to tell Máire. Lizzie McKenna and Molly Flanigan, sitting next to her, looked over.

“Well,” Lizzie said, “first time those two have been at Bridgeport, I’d say, and dressed so lovely.”

“A real tribute to your Johnny Og, Máire,” Molly said.

“Of course, Patrick Kelly’s still in his buckskins. He should have a uniform,” Lizzie said.

“He’s his beard trimmed and his hair cut,” Molly said.

“I believe he’s a scout,” I said.

Lizzie looked at me.

Máire stood up and we walked over to receive the men. Patrick presented them to Máire and then went out to the kitchen.

John Comiskey was a Chicago alderman from Holy Family parish. He also acted as the Brigade’s fund-raiser and treasurer. William Onahan was the publisher of the
Western Tablet
, the man who started the Catholic Library and Literary Association—well-spoken, a friend of the bishop’s. Men of great dignity and achievement, and they’re younger than I am, I thought. Early thirties, I’d say. John Comiskey was a tall, well-built fellow with a prominent nose. William Onahan only reached Comiskey’s shoulders, a tidy fellow with thinning hair, gold spectacles. John Comiskey took Máire’s hand.

“I’m sorry for your trouble, Mrs. Leahy. A brave lad, taken from us too soon.”

“No more Leahys,” she’d said to me last night. “My Johnny was kind and easygoing, brave in a boat, and his son Johnny Og like him—no more Leahys, for all that Daniel and Gracie carry the name.”

But now as John Comiskey patted her shoulder he remarked on the many Leahy families in Chicago.

“Really?” Máire focused on him. “Are any from Galway?”

“They could be,” he said.

“I must meet them,” Máire said.

“A great clan, the Leahys,” William Onahan said.

A little boy stood behind John Comiskey.

“And who’s this wee fellow?” Máire asked.

“My son Charlie,” Alderman Comiskey said. “He’s only two, and shy. My wife’s visiting another bereaved mother from the Brigade, so he’s with me.”

“Only a minute since my Johnny Og was that size,” Máire said.

“Charlie.” She knelt down to him. “Hello, Charlie.”

He smiled at her.

“Honora, where’s Bridget or Gracie?” Máire said. “They should take Charlie up to your place—play with him.”

I took Charlie by the hand. I couldn’t see Bridget or Gracie, but I found Michael out on the landing, tossing a ball up and catching it.

“Michael, this is Charlie,” I said.

“Hi,” he said, still tossing the ball.

Little Charlie was watching him. “Ball,” he said. “Ball.”

“It’s a base ball,” Michael told him.

“Base ball,” Charlie Comiskey said.

I went back to John Comiskey.

“Could my Michael take Charlie outside to play?” I asked.

“I’d appreciate that,” John Comiskey said.

“Stay close to the house,” I said to Michael.

My youngest, and he’s taller than many of the men here. Only a minute, Máire had said, before they’re grown and gone. Young Michael is always agreeable, as Johnny Og had been. No complaints from Johnny Og. He needed no petting or cajoling. As a boy, he’d taken care of his younger brothers. Solid. He would have been a wonderful father.

Máire had rejoined the women. She sat straight, contained. No tears. She thanked the Bridgeport neighbors as they said to her, “Sorry for your troubles. A good lad. A fine boy.”

Now Patrick Kelly brought Paddy and the men out from the kitchen. They stood in front of the coffin, an honor guard formed of the Irish Brigade in uniform jackets and work trousers, the older men wearing Sunday shirts and pants, and John Comiskey and William Onahan dressed in their gentlemen’s suits. How many? Thirty, forty, more, massed around Johnny Og’s pine coffin, shoulders squared, heads high. Patrick Kelly, somehow military in spite of his buckskins, placed a scrap of green cloth on the top of Johnny Og’s plain box.

“This fragment comes from the flag of the Irish Brigade,” Patrick said, “which was cut in pieces before the surrender. The enemy did not capture our flag. The banner of the Irish Brigade was not taken. Corporal Johnny Og Leahy joins a tradition of courage stretching back to Fontenoy and beyond. He will be spoken of down through the centuries. An Irish hero. In his name, let us defend our new land, then free our native land. Faugh-a-Ballagh!”

“Faugh-a-Ballagh!” the men shouted. “Hoo-rah!”

I saw the look on Jamesy’s and Daniel’s faces as they joined in, “Hoo-rah!”

Patrick lifted Grellan’s crozier and held it over the coffin, blessing Johnny Og and all of them. Jamesy took his whistle from his pocket. The high, clear notes of “A Nation Once Again” sounded. The men sang the anthem, and the women joined them.

I looked over at Máire. She was nodding her head.

Now Father Kelly spoke. “Corporal Johnny Og Leahy is in heaven, reunited with his Heavenly Father and his earthly father. I believe, as do many of you, that Ireland’s our heaven and we will see it again when we die. Johnny Og Leahy, who gave his life for the honor of the old land, for the defense of the new, is there now. Remember what the cock crows: Slán Mhic Máire. Now, Johnny Og, son of Máire, you too are safe. Safe at home.”

I had to go outside. I took my shawl off the hook, wrapped it around me, and slipped out.

I walked down toward the edge of the canal. Indian summer, I’d learned to call this bit of time before the winter grabbed Chicago by the throat.

War. Such a short word to cover so much. All those boys inside were shouting to “get into the war, avenge Johnny Og.” They hadn’t seen his body when Patrick unwrapped the buffalo robe.

At least we could bury Johnny Og. Annie McCafferty didn’t know where her son’s body was. Neither did Kitty Gorman or Mary Malone. Paddy had told me dead soldiers were piled into trenches and their bodies covered over with dirt. “Like in Ireland,” he’d said, “during the Great Starvation.”

We’d saved our children at such cost. To lose them now? What sense?

“Honora.” Patrick came up behind me.

I stopped, looked up at Patrick. “I do thank you, Patrick. Paddy told me how you helped him.”

Patrick shrugged. “I wish I’d been able to get there sooner,” he said. “I was fighting at Wilson Creek in Missouri with Tom Sweeny. Sweeny’s quite a man, Honora. He lost his right arm in the Mexican War. He rides into battle with the reins of his horse in his teeth so he can hold his saber. All Irishmen are showing such courage—the Sixty-ninth at Bull Run, the Brigade at Lexington, and many more.”

“I keep thinking that Johnny Og was wounded on September twentieth, only one day before the surrender. One day, Patrick. Why didn’t Mulligan surrender sooner?”

“James Mulligan expected the relief at any moment. General Frémont might have hurried a bit if he’d known one million dollars confiscated from the Bank of Lexington was buried under Mulligan’s tent.”