Toward the Sea of Freedom by Sarah Lark Read Free Book Online

herself, though she feared they would taste bitter because of how she’d come by the ingredients.

    On the Monday after Michael’s disappearance, Kathleen continued her work in the manor as usual. Together with Gráinne, she lit the fireplaces, whose flames cast ghostly shadows on the walls.
    At least it was warm for the women—and Trevallion did not bother them. Moreover, Kathleen stole a few moments to look more carefully at the Wetherbys’ heavy velvet curtains and valuable furniture—she even dared to sit in one of the chairs, imagining an afternoon tea to which she had invited friends. If Michael was right, she, too, would one day have such lovely things, and a housemaid would light her fireplaces. In the New World, she would be free; she could earn money, become rich.
    Kathleen gave in to her dreams for a few heartbeats—or rather, to Michael’s dreams. She did not need a manor herself, or heavy chairs or velvet curtains. Kathleen would have been content with a cottage—a cozy little house, covered in ivy, with a cute garden where she could grow vegetables and trees. It should have a nice living room and a bedroom, a kitchen, and perhaps another room for the children. Not just one tiny room filled with smoke from the single fireplace as in her parents’ house.
    It suddenly dawned on Kathleen that she was dreaming of Ralph Trevallion’s house. The steward lived in just such a cottage a little removed from the village and manor.
    No! She chided herself for her thoughts. No house could ever make her marry someone as hard-hearted as Trevallion. Not to mention that she was carrying Michael’s child.
    As Kathleen stood up somewhat cumbersomely from the armchair to return to her work, she heard loud voices in the house.
    “Oh, my Lord, no! Oh, merciful Mary!” said Gráinne. The old cook and housekeeper was screaming and moaning as if her heart had been broken.
    Kathleen ran down the stairs and found Gráinne in the manor’s vestibule, sunk down on the lowest step, lamenting and cursing.
    “I can’t do anything about it, Gráinne,” Ron Flannigan was saying, his hand awkwardly on the old woman’s shoulder. “I just thought I’d tell you myself. Before Trevallion hits you with it. And before, before . . .”
    “Before the soldiers come? Before they—oh no, they wouldn’t! They’re not going to throw me out, are they? Tear down my house? Merciful God, Ron, I’ve eight other children.”
    Ron Flannigan shook his head barely noticeably. In his voice and entire comportment lay true regret. “I know it well, Gráinne. You’re a good woman, and they’re all good children. But you know the law.”
    “English law,” Gráinne spat. “Ron, I’ve served the Wetherbys. These many years, I’ve always been true, never stolen—well, no more than a few bites of bread. If only the lord and lady were here. If I could throw myself at the lady’s feet. She’d have mercy, to be sure.”
    “What’s going on here?” Kathleen asked. “What can be so awful, Gráinne, that—”
    A look at Ron Flannigan’s face silenced her. Any encouraging word was inappropriate just then.
    “They’ve arrested Billy Rafferty,” Ron explained. “They’re accusing him of stealing Trevallion’s grain.”
    “But it wasn’t him!” howled Gráinne. “Good Lord, you all know my Billy. A little braggart, but just like a rooster—all talk. He’d never come up with the idea of stealing the lord’s grain. Who’d he sell it to anyway?”
    “We don’t know,” Ron said seriously. “But they found money on him. More than three pounds; he can’t have made it anywhere else. Certainly not playing the tin whistle.”
    “Playing the tin whistle!” yelled Gráinne. “The fiddler, that no-good Drury boy. I’d bet he . . .”
    “Michael Drury has disappeared,” said Ron. “And yes, we can assume he had something to do with it. But your Billy was in Wicklow on Saturday, Gráinne, and came home drunk. And last night he got