Toward the Sea of Freedom Read Free Page A

seriously.
    Michael laughed and stuffed the last piece of scone into his mouth. Then he lay back and pulled Kathleen with him. He began to caress the tops of her breasts. He still had sticky jam on his fingers, and he held them up for her to lick clean when she complained.
    “No, Michael!” Kathleen fended him off as he moved to unbutton her dress. “We can’t.”
    “But Kathleen dearest, you’ll have to confess anyway. I know you: you will. Father O’Brien will be shocked no matter what. So why don’t we offer him a really good secret to keep?”
    Kathleen sat up reluctantly. “God forgives, not the priest. And God only forgives those who repent with sincerity. But this . . .”
    No matter what she did with Michael, she would never regret it.
    Michael stroked her hair and face, quickly getting her to stretch out on the beach again.
    “Kathleen, I want to make you my wife, you know. I want to give you my name—even if it’s not worth anything. Give me a little more time. Look, I’m saving—”
    “You’re saving?” Kathleen interrupted him, raising her voice. “How in heaven’s name can you save anything, Michael Drury? And don’t tell me it’s money from fiddling at the tavern.”
    Michael shrugged. “You don’t want to know, Mary Kathleen—at least, Mary won’t want to know. Kathleen may be curious, I suppose.” He had teased her about her name since she had taken it at confirmation. “But it’s nothing, nothing to be ashamed of.”
    “It’s whiskey, isn’t it?” Kathleen asked angrily. “And you really aren’t ashamed to be fermenting barley and wheat and Lord knows what all to make whiskey? While children go hungry?”
    Michael pulled her close. “I don’t make it, dearest,” he said. “If I tried my hand at it, it wouldn’t do anyone any good. But if I don’t sell it, someone else will. Old O’Rearke would be all too happy to do it himself. He’s got a donkey to bring the barrels to Wicklow. But they don’t trust him, the old drunk.”
    “Who are ‘they’?”
    Michael shrugged. “The mountain men. Dearest, it’s really better if you don’t know everything. But a few pence always fall to me. My mother gets most of it—our potatoes are all blighted, and without the whiskey money, my siblings would starve.”
    “Your mother takes sin money?” Kathleen marveled.
    Michael arched his eyebrows. “Rather than burying her children.”
    It slowly dawned on Kathleen why Mrs. Drury spent so much time in church.
    “But I get to keep a little for myself, Kathleen,” Michael continued eagerly. “And for you. For us. When I’ve got enough, we’ll run away. To America! Do you know what that means? The promised land. The sun shines all year there, and there’s work for everyone. We’ll get rich.”
    “And the ships that take people there are called ‘coffin ships’ because they turn into floating caskets long before they make it to New York. That’s what I’ve heard. I don’t want that, Michael.”
    Kathleen cuddled close to Michael. It was hard to think when she was in his arms. America scared her, and she did not want to leave Ireland. But she wanted nothing more than to be with Michael. She wanted to feel his hands and lips on her body. Kathleen wanted much more caressing than Father O’Brien could ever forgive, so much forbidden love that God Himself might punish her. There were worse things than fifty Hail Marys on a hard church pew.
    Kathleen sat up. She had given into temptation much too often already.
    “I need to get home,” she said quietly, hoping it did not sound regretful.
    Michael nodded and helped her smooth her dress and pluck the leaves from her hair. Then, in the shadows of the stone walls, he accompanied Kathleen to the village. The men in the fields must not see them. Neither could the thieves carrying their day’s prizes home, nor the women and children gleaning every little kernel—and certainly not Trevallion, who rode tirelessly across His