Redemption - Leon Uris [4]
Her oldest daughter, Mildred, was not what one would call a comely maiden, but pleasant from the inside and good and sturdy otherwise. It was most important that Mildred make a good match to serve as an example to her sisters. Edna’s vulture eye picked up on the first glances exchanged by Mildred and Liam Larkin. One time they were looking at each other across the stable. Edna walked between them and could feel their vibrations going back and forth.
She suggested to Bert that Liam’s contract be auctioned to another station, preferably one up on the North Island.
“He’s too damned valuable,” Bert responded. “And he still owes us more than two and a half years’ work. Talk to Mildred and explain her about things.”
“I’ve been explaining her about things since she was four years old, Bert. We simply can’t risk some illiterate paddy to destroy all our lives.”
“That paddy is a good investment, old girl. It’s your job to keep them out of the breeding pens.”
“Don’t be vulgar, Bert. Two and a half years?”
It was a bit much. The Hargroves decided to make Liam sign his name to a nonfornication oath. Although he could sign his name, he couldn’t read a word on the paper, even though Bert explained its meaning, precisely.
Edna Hargrove should have known that a mere sheet of paper was not going to stop certain powerful natural forces. She had her work cut out for her.
It was at the district fair during the wool-shearing contest that what was apparent, was apparent. Stripped to the waist, Liam Larkin represented the Hargrove Station. Odds against him were delicious. No newcomer held a prayer, even with the saints on his side. Twenty-to-one odds against Larkin put him close to the bottom of the heap. Of course, no one at Hargrove spoke about Conor’s newly designed shears.
Mildred could scarcely conceal her delight at the sight of Liam’s upper body. The shears did the rest. After due deliberation by the judges, Conor’s tilty, grindy-toothed instrument was declared legal in Liam’s hands and the squire and all the squire’s men went home with a hat full of silver.
In the beginning, when working out artful dodges from Edna, Liam could scarcely believe that a girl of English descent, schooled at a convent in Auckland, would consider him worthy. Liam didn’t know all that much about birds. What he knew he found out back in Ballyutogue tagging along with his brother Conor.
What was there to say about Conor? Conor could get a shag any time he whistled. On such occasions Conor always sought out Protestant girls so he wouldn’t have to get seriously involved afterward. A couple of times at fairs on the other side of Donegal or down in Derry, Liam had the opportunity to latch on to the extra girl, and he wasn’t too awkward, so long as Conor was nearby. He figured that he would be equal to the occasion, should it occur.
The occasion occurred at the celebration of the Queen’s birthday, no less, which also marked the first time Liam ever mouthed the “forbidden” words to “God Save the Queen” praying that certain ancestors were not beholding him from above.
No greater catastrophe could have befallen Edna Hargrove than Mildred’s pregnancy, which destroyed half a lifetime of delicate manipulation. Bert raged because something had been put over on him and there was a balance due on Liam’s obligations. When the Hargrove cloudburst was dry of rage, Liam and Mildred were presented with a monstrous ultimatum.
The pair would be broken up permanently. Liam’s labor indenture would be sold to a station elsewhere. Mildred would be slipped out of the country to Australia to a convent. Since abortion was unthinkable, the child would be put up for adoption in Australia.
The alternative was uglier. Bert Hargrove had legal recourse both on Liam’s debt and a number of “sexual” offenses that could put him in prison for years.
Liam and Mildred had backed themselves to the edge of a cliff and seemed to have no choice but