NEW potatoes were urgently needed and the potato merchant told Jim to get as many as possible dug on the first afternoon. No sooner had the squad come to the farmhouse than they were shown out to the fields where the green shaws, heavy with rain, lay in matted clusters across the drills. Every step taken relieved the green vegetable matter of an enormous amount of water, which splashed all over the workers as they stumbled along to their toil.

Work started. The men threw out the potatoes with short three-pronged graips; the women girt bags round their waists, went down on their knees and followed the diggers, picking up the potatoes which they threw out. Two basin-shaped wicker baskets without handles were supplied to each woman; one basket for the good potatoes and the other for “brock,” pig-food.

“It’s the devil’s job, as the man said,” old Maire a Glan remarked as she furrowed her way through the slushy earth. “What d’ye think of it, Judy Farrel?” But Judy, struggling with a potato stem, did not deign to answer.

Maire was a hard worker; and it was her boast that she never had had a day’s illness in her life. The story had got abroad that she never missed a stitch in a stocking while giving birth to twins, and the woman never contradicted the story. She gathered after Eamon Doherty’s “graip”; old Eamon with a head rising to a point almost and a very short temper.

Biddy Wor, the mother of seven children, “all gone now to all the seven ends of the world,” as she often pathetically remarked, gathered the potatoes that Murtagh Gallagher threw out. Biddy’s hair was as white as snow, except on her chin, where a dozen or more black hairs stood out as stiffly as if they were starched.

Owen Kelly, another of the diggers, was very miserly and was eternally complaining of a pain in the back. Micky’s Jim assured him that a wife was the best cure in the world for a sore back. But Owen, skinflint that he was, considered a wife very costly property and preferred to live without one. He dug for Judy Farrel, the stunted little creature with the cough. She was a very quiet little woman, Judy, had very little to say and, when speaking, spoke as if her mouth was full of something. When pulling the heavy baskets, weighted with the wet clay, she moaned constantly like a child in pain.

Two sisters worked in the squad, Dora and Bridget Doherty, cheery girls, who spoke a lot, laughed easily, and who were similar in appearance and very ugly. Dora worked with Connel Dinchy, son of Oiney Dinchy, an eel-stomached youth over six foot in height and barely measuring thirty-four inches round the chest. He was a quiet, inoffensive fellow, who laughed down in his throat, and every fortnight he sent all his wages home to his parents. Bridget Doherty gathered potatoes for one of the strange men. Both girls were blood relations of Murtagh Gallagher. The other strange man worked in conjunction with Gourock Ellen; Norah Ryan gathered for Willie the Duck; and Ellen’s companion, who was known as Annie—simply Annie—crawled in the clay after Thady Scanlon, a first cousin of Micky’s Jim. When the baskets were full, Dermod Flynn emptied the potatoes into large barrels supplied for the purpose.

The women worked hard, trying to keep themselves warm. Norah Ryan became weary very soon. The rain formed into a little pond in the hollow of her dress where it covered the calves of her legs. Seeing that the rest of the women were rising from time to time and shaking the water off their clothes, she followed their example, and when standing, a slight dizziness caused her to reel unsteadily and she almost overbalanced and fell. She went down on her knees hurriedly, as she did not want Micky’s Jim to see her tottering. If this was noticed he might think her unfit for the job. For the rest of the afternoon she crawled steadily, fearing to rise, and wondered how Gourock Ellen, who was giving voice to a loose and humorous song, could sing on such a day. What troubled Norah most were the sharp pebbles that came in contact with her knees as she dragged herself along. They seemed to pierce through rags and flesh at each movement, and at times she could hardly refrain from crying aloud on account of the pain. Before night, and when she knew that her knees were bleeding, she had become almost indifferent to bodily discomforts.

All the time she was filled with an insatiable longing for home. The farm looked out on the Clyde—the river was a grey blur seen through the driving rain, and a boat passing by attracted her attention.

“Is it an Irish boat?” she asked Willie the Duck, who was whistling softly to himself.

“Aye, sure,” answered Willie without raising his head.

“I wish that I was goin’ home in it,” she said plaintively.

“Ireland’s much better than this dirty country,” said Maire a Glan, speaking loud enough for the Scotchwoman Annie to hear her.

II

WHEN six o’clock came round Jim pulled out his watch, looked at it severely for a moment and shouted: “Down graips and run home to yer warm supper!”

“Home!” repeated Maire a Glan, rising awkwardly to her knees. “Mother of Jesus; it is a home! An old byre and no less, as the man said. Shame be on ye, Micky’s Jim!”

“We have no grub and no siller,” said Gourock Ellen, rising briskly and loosing the claycoated sack from around her waist. “I’m up to my thighs in clabber,” she added.

“We’ll not let ye starve as long as there’s a bit at all goin’,” said Micky’s Jim.

“We’d be pigs if we ate all ourselves when other people have nothin’,” remarked Maire a Glan.

When the squad went back to the farm a ploughman, a flat-footed, surly fellow with a hare-lip, showed them their quarters in the steading. “First I’ll show ye where ye’re to roost,” said the man, and led the way into an evil-smelling byre, the roof of which was covered with cobwebs, the floor with dung. A young fellow, with a cigarette in his mouth, was throwing the manure through a trap-door into a vault underneath. On both sides of the sink, which ran up the middle, was a row of stalls, each stall containing two iron stanchions to which chains used for tying cattle were fastened.

“No need to tie any of ye to the chains, is there?” asked the man with the hare-lip, laughing loudly. “When ye go to bed at night, close the trap-door,” he continued. “It will keep the smell of the midden away from you!”

“Aye, sure,” said Willie the Duck.

“Oh! ye’re here again, are ye?” asked the ploughman. “Have ye got the music murderer with ye? This way to see where yer eatin’ room is,” said the man, without waiting to hear Willie the Duck’s answer to his question.

The byre was built on the shoulder of a hillock; the midden was situated in a grotto hollowed underneath. Behind the dung-hill, in the grotto, the three-legged stove was standing, and already a fire which old Eamon Doherty had kindled was sparkling merrily.

“Watch yersel’!” shouted the ploughman to Dermod Flynn, who was crossing the dung-hill on the way towards the fire. “That young rascal above will throw down a graipful of dung on yer head if ye’re not careful.”

Maire a Glan filled the pot with clean white potatoes and placed them over the blaze. The ploughman sat down on an upended box and lit his pipe; Micky’s Jim took the squad back to the byre, which was now fairly clean, and proceeded to make bunks for the night. Four or five level boxes were placed on the floor of each stall, a pile of hay was scattered about on top, and over this was spread two or three bags sewn together in the form of a sheet; sacks filled with straw served as pillows, a single blanket was given to each person, and two of the party had to sleep in each stall.

“Who’s goin’ to sleep with me?” asked Micky’s Jim.

“I will,” said Murtagh Gallagher.

“Ye snore like a pig!”

“What about me?” asked Owen Kelly.

“Ye kick like a colt.”

“Will I do?” asked Willie the Duck.

“Ye do!” cried Micky’s Jim, “ye that was chased out of the graveyard with a squad of worms. None of ye will sleep with me; Dermod Flynn is the man I want. Help me to make the bed, Dermod Flynn,” he said to the youth who was standing beside him.

“It’s a fine place, this,” said Gourock Ellen as she spread a pile of hay over the boxes in the stalls. “A gey guid place!”

“D’ye know who slept in that stall last night?” asked Jim.

“A heifer like mysel’ maybe,” said Ellen. “And indeed it had a muckle better place than I had under the bridge.”

“The potatoes are nearly ready,” shouted Maire a Glan, sticking her wrinkled head round the corner of the door.

There was a hurried rush down to the midden. Boxes were upended to serve as seats, the maid-servant at the farm came out in brattie,[D] shorgun,[E] and brogues, and sold milk at a penny a pint to the diggers. All, with the exception of Annie, Ellen, and Owen Kelly, bought a pennyworth; Micky’s Jim bought a pennyworth for Ellen, Maire a Glan shared her milk with Annie, and Owen Kelly bought only a halfpennyworth, half of which he kept for his breakfast on the following morning.

The potatoes were not ready yet; the water bubbled and spluttered in the pot and shot out in little short spurts on every side. Ellen complained of her legs; they had been horribly gashed during the day and were now terribly sore. She lifted up her clothes as far as her thighs and rubbed a wet cloth over the wounds. Micky’s Jim tittered; Dermod Flynn blushed, turned away his head and looked at Norah Ryan. Ellen noticed this and, smiling sarcastically, began to hum:

As she finished the song, Ellen winked at Micky’s Jim and Jim winked back. Then she hit her thigh with her hand and shouted: “Not a bad leg that for an old one, is it?”

The potatoes were now emptied into a wicker basket, the water running through the bottom into the midden. The men and women sat round the basket, their little tins of milk in their hands, and proceeded to eat their supper. The potato was held in the left hand, and stripped of its jacket with the nail of the right thumb. Gourock Ellen used a knife when peeling, Willie the Duck ate potato, pelt and all.

While they were sitting an old, wrinkled, and crooked man came across the top of the dung-hill, sinking into it almost up to his knees and approached the fire. His clothes were held on by strings, he wore a pair of boots differing one from the other in size, shape, and colour. Indeed they were almost without shape, and the old man’s toes, pink, with black nails, showed through the uppers.

Gourock Ellen handed him three large potatoes from the basket.

“God bless ye, for it’s yerself that has the kindly heart, decent woman,” said the old fellow in a feeble voice, and he began to eat his potatoes hurriedly like a dog. Dermod handed him part of a tin of milk and blushed at the profuse thanks of the stranger.

“It’s a fine warm place that ye are inside of this night,” said the old fellow when he had finished his meal.

“It’s a rotten place,” said Dermod Flynn.

“It’s better nor lyin’ under a hedge,” answered the old man.

“Or under a bridge,” Gourock Ellen remarked, lifting her dress again; then, as if some modest thought had struck her, dropping it suddenly.

“Why do ye lie under a hedge?” Dermod asked, and the old man thereupon gave a rambling account of his misfortunes, which included a sore back and inability to labour along with sound men. He had come from Mayo years ago and had worked at many a hard job since then, both in England and Scotland. Now that he was a homeless old man nobody at all wanted him.

When the party went up to the byre he stretched out his old thin limbs by the fire and fell into the easy slumber of old age. Suddenly he awoke with a start to find the fire still burning brightly and a beautiful girl with long hair flung over her shoulders looking at him. It was Norah Ryan; the old man thought for a moment that he was looking at an angel.

“God be good to me!” he cried, crossing himself; “but who is yerself?” Then as recollection brought him a face seen at the fire, he exclaimed: “Arrah, sure it’s yerself that is the colleen I was after seein’ sittin’ here a minute ago. Now, isn’t it a good cheery fire?”

“Have ye any home to go to?” asked Norah.

“Never a home,” said the old man, resting one elbow in the ashes. “There is nothin’ but the rainy roads and the hardships for a man like me.”

“But could ye not get inside of some house for the night?”

“God look on yer wit!” said the old fellow, laughing feebly. “Ye’re just new over, I’ll warrant, and ye haven’t come to learn that they have forgotten all about kindness in this country. They do not want the man with no roof-tree over his head here. They’re all black and bitter Protestants.”

“So I heard say.”

“Ye’ll be one of the right sort, I’ll go bail.”

“I’m a Catholic.”

“Ah! that’s it! The Catholics are the best, and I’m one meself just as ye are, girsha. Have ye a penny to spare for one of yer own kind?”

“Are ye goin’ back to Ireland again?” asked Norah, drawing the weasel-skin purse from the pocket of her steaming dress.

“If only I had the price of the boat, I’d go in a minute,” said the man, fixing greedy eyes on the purse which Norah held in her hand. “But I’m very poor, and mind ye I’m one of yer own sort. Maybe ye have a sixpence to spare,” he said.

Norah possessed a two-shilling piece, all the money she had in the world, and she needed it badly herself. But the desire to help the old man overmastered her, and she handed him the florin. Followed by the garrulous thanks of her penniless countryman she hurried back to the byre, feeling in some curious way ashamed of her kindness.

III

A candle fixed on the top of a stanchion threw a dim light over the byre, and long black shadows danced on roof and wall. A strong, unhealthy odour pervaded the whole building; the tap at one end was running, and as the screw had been broken the water could not be turned off. Micky’s Jim sat in a cattle-trough sewing bags together with a packing needle; these were to be used as a quilt. Dermod Flynn, who was undressing, slipped beneath the blankets with his trousers still on as Norah Ryan came in, but Willie the Duck, stripped to the pelt, stood for a moment laughing stupidly, the guttering candle lighting up his narrow, hairy face and sunken chest.

Old Owen Kelly was already in bed.

“This place is a lot better than where we slept last year,” he called to Micky’s Jim.

“Where did ye sleep last year?” asked Dermod Flynn.

“In the pig-sty,” said Jim. “We were almost eaten alive by the blue lice.”

The women undressed in the shadow at the far end of the stalls, and from time to time Micky’s Jim peeped round the corner. When the women looked up he would shout out: “I see something,” and whistle lightly between the thumb and middle finger of his right hand. The Irishwomen undressed under the blankets, the two strange women, careless and indifferent to the jibes of Micky’s Jim, stripped off to their chemises in full view of the occupants of the byre. Annie and Gourock Ellen had quarrelled about something; they were not going to sleep together that night.

“Ye have to sleep with me, lass,” said Gourock Ellen to Norah.

“All right,” said the young girl quietly, seeing no reason why she should not sleep with a strange woman. As she spoke she went down on her knees to say her prayers.

“Say one prayer for me, just a short one,” said Ellen in a low tone.

“All right, decent woman,” answered the girl.

“I’ll put the light out now,” shouted Micky’s Jim after a short interval. “The women will not be ashamed to go on takin’ off their clothes now.”

The light went out, but Jim suddenly relit the candle, and the guttering blaze again flared weakly through the gloom. There was a hurried movement of naked flesh in the women’s quarters and a precipitate scampering under the blankets.

“That was a mortal sin, Micky’s Jim,” Norah Ryan said in a low voice, and in her tones there was a suspicion of tears.