When I got downstairs in the morning Robert had gone, leaving a note in an envelope which read, 'Dara, please try to forgive me, Robert.'
I frowned and stamped my foot. How could he, I asked myself, deny his own natural feelings because of his religious beliefs and then take on so because they had got the better of him. I had been prepared to give him a whole night of love and kisses and send him on his way a happy and contented man. Instead it had all turned sour because of his damned religious beliefs.
Tearing his note into small pieces, I threw them into the street. I was doubly annoyed because, for the first time since John Bruce, I had wanted to give myself to a man freely, with affection, respect and a warm heart, and once again I had been pushed off.
The long days spent on the barge taking me through the Erie Canal to Buffalo were dull and boring, apart from the beautiful countryside which was like none that I had ever seen before. After boarding another boat I arrived at Cleveland, a town at the mouth of the Ohio River. My relatives had a farm about twenty miles south of Cleveland. A few enquiries in town led me to a carrier who was willing to take me to within a mile of Peel Farm.
They had named the farm after the town in the Isle of Man where they had emigrated from some eighteen years before. Since they had left the island a year or so before I was born, the only knowledge I had of them was gained from reading letters that they had written to other relatives. The Quirks were not close relations, Mrs. Quirk being my dead father's cousin, but being Manx, like themselves, I was sure that they would give me a warm welcome. As I had departed within a few days of making up my mind to emigrate, I had not written to inform them of my intentions as I knew I would arrive at the farm before a letter could reach them.
The farmhouse was like two log cabins adjoining each other to form a letter L, giving the impression that originally there had only been one log cabin and the second had been built at a later date when more house rooms had been required. There was a porch door on which I knocked repeatedly without getting any answer, so I wandered around to the back where there was a door held open by a small wood log. It was the door to the main room of the house. A spotlessly clean combined kitchen and living room.
A lovely appetizing smell of baking bread emanated from the room and the first thing I saw was half a dozen newly baked loaves on a very large wooden table. On the other side of the table a blonde haired woman, nearly six feet in height and stout with it, was kneading dough. She looked up for just a brief moment as I entered then stooped over her dough again. As I stood with my leather luggage bag, not knowing what I should do or say next, she asked without looking up from her work with the dough, And who might you be?'
'I'm Dara Tully from Baldwin Valley in the Isle of Man,' I answered.
This news was greeted with silence as she continued to knead the dough.
'I suppose you are Mrs. Quirk, my father's cousin.'
She quickly filled six baking tins with the dough and put them in the oven, then turned her full attention on me. 'So you are Sam Tully's daughter. How is he keeping these days?' she asked.
'My father is dead,' I replied.
She gave this information some thought for a moment then said, 'I always thought he wouldn't last very long. Too fond of the drink, that one,' and then, 'What are you doing here in America?'
Perplexed at receiving such a cold reception, I was a little nervous at that question. I tried a smile to see if that would soften her, but her face remained expressionless.
'Well,' I said hesitantly, 'I was hoping you could find me work on the farm or in the house.'
She began to roll out some pastry. 'You don't look strong enough for farm work,' she snapped. 'In any case, my husband and son don't need any help on the farm. We cannot afford it, and I don't need any help in the house. You might find some work in Cleveland. I don't know what we are going to do with you.' 'I can milk cows. I used to work in Mr. Bruce's dairy,' I said hopefully. 'We haven't got any milch cows, only hogs and they don't need a dairy maid.' Her remarks struck her as being very funny and she guffawed herself into a fit of coughing. She paused in her coughing and shouted as she pointed a finger at me, 'You, milking hogs, that's a good one; I would like to see that!' She was obviously enjoying mocking me.
She was still bent over coughing when two blonde giants entered the kitchen. Although my body is slim without an ounce of fat on it, I am of good height and taller than most women, and yet I felt like a dwarf beside these men. With massive shoulders about a yard wide and legs like tree trunks, they seemed to fill the kitchen with their presence. I presumed they were Mr. Quirk and his son and stood waiting for an introduction, but none was forthcoming.
Mrs. Quirk got her coughing under control and pointing a finger at me and looking at her husband said, 'This is Sam Tully's daughter, from the Isle of Man. She has come to help us milk our hogs.'
The absurdity of her introduction set her off again. She neighed like a horse and whooped with laughter. The men just stood there looking at me and then at Mrs. Quirk and back again to me, not understanding the joke but with big oafish grins spread across their faces.
In an effort to bring this ridiculous situation to an end, I extended a hand to Mr. Quirk saying, 'I am pleased to meet you. I hope you are keeping well.' 'Tolerable, I thank ye,' he replied, politely.
My slender hand disappeared from view when he enclosed it in his huge paw. Going to the son I said, 'My name is Dara. What's yours?'
His face was still occupied with a stupid grin and he stared down at me with pale blue eyes for a moment. 'I'm Billy,' he grunted.
In the meantime, Mrs. Quirk, recovered from her laughter, was setting the table with cold meat, a pan of boiled potatoes and a great mound of cabbage. When four large china plates were placed on the table it became apparent that I was expected to join them at their evening meal. Riling three of the plates with meat, potatoes and cabbage, she took the fourth and placed less than half the quantity of the provisions of the other plates on it and handed it to me.
Nevertheless, it was ample for my appetite but her deliberate inhospitality didn't escape my attention and I made up my mind that first thing on the morrow I would be on my way back to Cleveland and out of reach of her insulting uncouth manners.
Our meal was eaten in silence. When we were finished, I asked Mrs. Quirk if I could help with the washing up. Receiving no reply I declared a need for fresh air and said that if it was alright with them I would take a look around the farm. On hearing this, Billy lifted his huge body off the bench and said, 'I'll show you round.'
His mother immediately interjected, 'Now don't you be long, our Billy. You've got to get to bed early. You've a hard day's work to do tomorrow.'
She obviously didn't trust me with her precious son. She needn't have worried; the hulking great brute was of no attraction to me. I would rather have been left to my own devices but he stood in the doorway waiting for me to come out, determined to accompany me on my walk.
'This way,' he said as soon as I emerged through the doorway and strode off to a barn only a short distance from the house. Coming up alongside him, as he stood in the open doorway, I was about to make some excuse and wander off when his hand came around my back and pushed me with tremendous force into the barn. Stumbling and trying to keep my balance, I fell on top of a heap of hay. For a man of his size he was surprisingly quick in action. He had turned me over onto my back and was on top of me, squashing all the breath out of me before I had time to rise. Pulling my skirt up over my face and forcing my knees apart, he knelt between my legs. I was in darkness and trying to bring my skirt down from over my head when I cried out in pain as he roughly forced two fingers, coarsened with farm work, up my giny.
He was digging away inside with his fingers as if trying to find something at the top of my giny when the barn door was flung open and I heard his mother shout, 'Billy, where are you?'
By this time I had got my skirt off my face and saw her stride over to us. She clouted Billy hard around the head and told him to get back to the house.
'As for you, you trollop, keep your filthy hands off my Billy. He is already spoken for by a decent girl on the next farm to ours.'
I pulled my skirt down over my knees as she made a move to leave and was about to rise to my feet when she turned. 'Out you go first thing tomorrow morning, and make no mistake about it.'
Flabbergasted at the ferocity in her voice, I lay there for a moment or two before getting onto my feet.
I walked about for a while and then reluctantly returned to the house as there was nothing else to do under the circumstances. She glared at me as I entered, muscles tightened with aggressive hostility, husband and son
