Bridie's Fire by Kirsty Murray Read Free Book Online Page B

along the line. The thin, dark man they’d talked with when they first arrived had closed his eyes, and Bridie knew he wouldn’t get his wish to die inside the walls of the workhouse.
    Bridie had caught a glimpse of the inside of the building. It looked like a big stone prison with dark figures moving about in the rank stillness. Something about it reminded her of the death village. The terrible wails of the crowd seemed to echo inside her head. Bridie drew her knees up against her chest, shut her eyes and covered her ears with her hands, not wanting to hear their cries. Suddenly, she felt Brandon’s small hand reaching for hers. She grasped it, and turned to look at her brother with gratitude, as if he’d brought her back from the brink of hell.
    â€˜We’re not waiting here,’ she said. ‘We’re not ready to die.’ She stood up, pulled him to his feet and dragged him to the end of the street.
    Mrs MacMahon glanced up and raised a hand to beckon them back, but Bridie moved away quickly, weaving through the crowd and out into a wide street.
    â€˜Where are we going?’ asked Brandon, frowning. ‘Mrs MacMahon says they might have room for us tomorrow if we’ll be patient. She says Mam would want us to wait and that she promised she’d come after us.’
    â€˜If she promised you that, boyo, then she promised a lie. Mam won’t be coming after us and that place is a death-house, not a workhouse. This wasn’t what our mam meant for us.’
    Brandon flinched. Bridie felt a wave of grief and guilt break against her as the weight of her words made him hunch over in pain. How could he have not understood what leaving Mam had meant? He said nothing more, and his silence hurt her more than any accusation. Suddenly, it struck her how much more like Paddy he looked, each day, closer to becoming an angel. He folded his thin arms around himself and his face fell into the shadow of a swathe of red hair. She wanted to take him in her arms and comfort him, to hold him close and whisper lovingly, but the idea of it made her feel as if she’d unravel around him. She reached out and grabbed his wrist, dragging him onwards through the crowded streets. Bridie wasn’t sure where she was going, but she knew she had to get as far away from that death-house as she could, and movement fuelled her will to live.
    Suddenly, they found themselves down by the docks, where the masts of great ships stood black against the blue morning sky. People lined the quays. Soldiers stood guard, their bayoneted guns ready to fight off the crowds as great sacks of meal and grain were loaded on board ships bound for England. Everywhere she looked, there were soldiers standing guard over the food supplies.
    Further along the quay, a boat was casting off. As it moved away from the dock, the passengers lined up along the deck reached out their hands and called to those they were leaving behind. There was a tumult of weeping, grieving families, crying out for their departing relatives. An old woman fell to her knees beside Bridie and Brandon, keening as if death was all around them, crying out for her children who were sailing to America, knowing that would be the last she’d see of them.
    Brandon stood staring up at the masts.
    â€˜Are we going to get on a ship, to take us to America?’ he asked, and for the first time his voice had a spur of hope in it. ‘We could go to Aunt Mairead. We could find Uncle Liam. I want to go there, Bridie. I want to go to America.’
    Bridie wanted to box his ears, even if he did look like an angel. ‘Those ships, you know what they call them? They call them coffin ships. You want to go and be buried in America?’ she said scornfully. She grabbed him by his scrawny wrist and dragged him away from the quay.
    â€˜Where are we going?’ asked Brandon.
    â€˜We’re going to find shelter,’ she said, taking the road out of