A Slip of a Girl Read online

  The following images are reproduced courtesy of the National Library of Ireland: L_CAB_04918, this page; L_ROY_08496, this page; L_IMP_1507, this page; CLON618, this page; CLON1646, this page; L_CAB_09217, this page; CLON2156, this page; L_ROY_01767, this page; L_ROY_02921, this page; M56/43, this page; L_ROY_09179, this page; EPH E124, this page; L_ROY_05267, this page; L_ROY_05256, this page; L_ROY_01772, this page; L_IMP_1506, this page; L_ROY_11600, this page.

  The photographs on the following pages are reproduced courtesy of Historical Picture Archives: this page; this page; this page.

  The books refered to on this page are the Lonford writer Maria Edgeworth’s

  Castle Rackvent and Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels.

  Copyright © 2019 by Patricia Reilly Giff

  All Rights Reserved

  HOLIDAY HOUSE is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

  www.holidayhouse.com

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Giff, Patricia Reilly, author.

  Title: A slip of a girl / by Patricia Reilly Giff.

  Description: First edition. | New York : Holiday House, [2019] | Summary: “Set during the Irish Land Wars (1879–1882) this novel in verse follows Anna Mallon through a series of tragedies as her mother dies, older siblings immigrate to America, and she and her father and sister with special needs are about to be evicted from their farm”—Provided by publisher. Identifiers: LCCN 2018040274 | ISBN 9780823439553 (hardcover) Subjects: LCSH: Ireland—History—1837–1901—Juvenile fiction. CYAC: Novels in verse. | Ireland—History—1837–1901—Fiction. Family life—Ireland—Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.5.G54 Sl 2019 | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018040274

  Ebook ISBN 9780823443086

  v5.4

  a

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Home

  Sounds

  The Hill

  A Word

  Liam

  Spring

  Leaving

  Mam

  Hens

  Last Day

  Saying Goodbye

  The Well

  St. Mary’s

  The Rent

  Another Promise

  Reading

  The Schoolmaster

  Hungry July

  Shapes

  Rain

  Awake

  The Stranger

  The Letter

  The Little People

  Fall

  The River

  Liam’s House

  Counting

  The Big House

  Waiting…

  The Agent

  The Barracks

  Away

  Escape

  The Shed

  The Farmer

  Food

  The Road

  Traveling

  Another Shed

  How Far?

  The Well

  The River

  Lough Ree

  The Loom

  A Brown Cow

  Days

  Spring

  Wool

  Resting

  Weaving

  Martin

  Nuala

  Working

  A New Day

  The Big House

  The Kitchen

  My Book

  The Lough

  What I’ll Do

  The Trip

  Going Home

  Almost There

  The Beginning

  The War

  The Priest

  Morning

  The Second Day

  The Third Day

  After

  The Fourth Day

  The Field

  Mae

  My Loom

  Years

  Glossary

  Author’s Note

  Acknowledgments

  For my Longford great-grandmothers:

  Elizabeth McClellan Reilly

  of Clonbroney,

  who survived the Hunger,

  and

  Anna Rogers Mollaghan,

  and for her father, Thomas

  of Drumlish,

  who lived through the Land War,

  with deepest admiration,

  and for

  their grandson,

  William Reilly,

  my dad,

  with love

  Home

  Sounds

  IN the back field,

  I’m bent double, hidden,

  pulling up chickweed

  for our tea.

  Since the Ryans were tossed out,

  this field belongs to the English earl,

  and his sheep,

  who huddle near the stone wall.

  Nearby, screams begin.

  They come from a mud house

  that shelters a family of girls:

  Bridey, Mair, Kate,

  and Mag,

  I forgot the new baby’s name,

  Cassie?

  I stand tiptoed,

  trying to see.

  The crash comes

  over their screams.

  The bashing in!

  Dust rises up:

  the house of five girls

  and a mam is gone.

  They’re forced out on the road,

  maybe to starve.

  I clutch my fist to my chest.

  I’m afraid for the five girls

  and the mam.

  I’m afraid for us,

  Mam and Da,

  Willie and John,

  Jane and Nuala,

  and even more afraid

  for me, Anna.

  But didn’t Da say

  we’re all right?

  A house that has been destroyed by a battering ram during an eviction in County Clare

  (This image is reproduced courtesy of the National Library of Ireland L_CAB_04918.)

  The Hill

  AFTER supper that night,

  I climb my hill.

  It’s steep and rocky,

  but my bare feet know the way.

  I sing one of Da’s old songs.

  I won’t think about those poor things

  on the road.

  From behind the hedgerow,

  my brother Will says,

  “She has a mouth on her,

  that Anna.”

  And John: “With a voice like a frog.”

  I make a frog sound,

  laughing,

  and go on.

  I carry an old potato,

  green with mold.

  If one of the little people

  comes up from the earth,

  I’ll throw it to him,

  and dash awa
y while he eats.

  From here, I can see the world,

  my world anyway:

  the bogs that cover the earth

  like blankets,

  and the snipes that fly high.

  There’s the top of Liam’s roof,

  the thatch tan with weeds.

  Beyond that, the schoolhouse.

  I close my eyes.

  I’ve never been inside.

  I’m needed at home.

  The corn mill rises up below,

  its great wheel creaking

  as it grinds the grain.

  The English earl’s house spreads out

  like a castle.

  He’s a man to be feared.

  He could put us out to starve,

  if he wished.

  A sudden wind loosens a stone.

  It rolls and moves another.

  Something is underneath.

  I catch my breath.

  A book!

  I’ve never seen one before,

  except in church.

  One cover is missing.

  The other is the color

  of a January field.

  It has a picture of a horse,

  its mane flying.

  I clutch the book to myself,

  wondering at those silky pages.

  Imagine knowing what the writing says!

  I fly down the hill,

  to tell my best friend, Liam.

  I pass my house

  and circle around the Donnellys’.

  The oldest, Mae, raises her hand

  to wave.

  She looks tired.

  She has more to do than any of us,

  with her da gone,

  and five children in

  steps and stairs

  behind her.

  Liam meets me

  at the crumbling stone wall.

  I don’t say a word,

  but hold the book in front of me.

  “Oh, Anna,” he says.

  He reaches out,

  almost touching it,

  and then my hand.

  “If only I could read,” I say.

  He nods.

  A Word

  THAT night while everyone sleeps,

  I sit on the rush chair

  at the hearth.

  The room is cozy.

  The banked glow of peat

  gives enough light

  to see my treasure,

  the book!

  I stare at the cover,

  and picture the horse

  pawing the ground,

  as I climb on his back.

  We soar across the field

  and jump over the wall.

  I lean closer to the firelight.

  The circles and lines

  under the picture must say

  Horse!

  A joy like listening

  to Da’s stories,

  or swinging along the boreen

  with Liam,

  fills my chest

  and spills into my throat.

  I go to Mam’s bed.

  She never sleeps.

  How thin she looks!

  Her eyes are sunken,

  her cheeks flushed.

  Please, let her just be tired.

  I put my hand on her shoulder.

  “I can read a word.”

  She touches my cheek.

  “Alannah, my Anna,”

  she whispers.

  Liam

  WE sit on the stone wall,

  our heads close,

  and search through the book

  to see Horse.

  It’s printed on almost

  every page.

  We know dozens of words,

  all Horse.

  But still…

  “Anna?” Liam begins.

  I glance at his blue-gray eyes,

  the color of a windy sky.

  “We haven’t paid the rent,”

  he says.

  “Not this quarter,

  not the last two.”

  “This year may be different,”

  I say desperately.

  grasping his arm.

  “It’s almost time to plant.”

  “If the weather holds,

  we’ll have vegetables

  to sell,

  and lumper potatoes to fill us

  next winter.”

  “It’s too late,” Liam says,

  his hand on mine.

  “We’ll be out on the road,

  Mam and me.”

  I can’t see the earl’s house

  from here.

  Still I look toward it.

  Rage rises up in my throat.

  I swallow,

  try to speak over it.

  “Our land,” is all I can manage.

  “Someday,” Liam says,

  touching the curl of my hair.

  Spring

  MARCH is here,

  time to plant.

  With knives in our hands,

  we cut the eyes

  from seed potatoes.

  We’ll tuck them in the earth,

  where they’ll send up green shoots

  and purple blossoms.

  Then underneath,

  lumpers!

  My sister Jane is old enough

  to help.

  But her mind is far away,

  on a ship to America.

  She slices her finger

  as well as the potato.

  Ah, Jane.

  Mam and I rub her arms,

  while Willie pats her head,

  and John finds a cobweb

  to stop the bleeding.

  Da croons, “Don’t cry, astore.”

  We set the cuts in the field.

  Mam bends,

  trying to catch her breath,

  her fine hair blowing in the breeze.

  She pats the soil

  the way she pats us.

  “Our mother, the earth,”

  she says.

  Nuala grabs my skirt,

  wanting a bit of potato,

  not to plant, but to eat.

  Her smiling face looks

  almost like Mam’s.

  I gather her up,

  twirl her around.

  “Someday,” I say.

  If only the days are clear,

  and the lumpers can grow.

  “Listen, sky,” I yell,

  my fist raised.

  “Hold back the rain

  for us,

  and for Liam and his mam.”

  Leaving

  AFTER the potatoes, the oats,

  and the summer cabbage

  begin to grow,

  Will and John go down the road,

  arms slung around each other’s

  shoulders.

  They’ve worked hard in town,

  mucking out the hotel barn,

  washing windows,

  and sweeping the street.

  They have enough coins now,

  just,

  to pay for passage.

  Their ship will sail from Cork,

  to Brooklyn, America.

  Da stands in the field,

  one hand raised in blessing.

  Mam’s face is set

  so they won’t see her tears.

  I look hard after my brothers.

  I’ll never see them again.

  “Take me,” Jane cries,

  until the road turns


  and they’re gone forever:

  Willie who carried me on his shoulder

  when I was Nuala’s age,

  and John so tough

  he could walk through nettles,

  but was soft for Jane.

  I pick up a clod of damp earth

  and hold it tight in my fist.

  America is not for me.

  That faraway place is for my brothers,

  and maybe for Jane.

  But I belong to this country.

  If only it belonged to me.

  Mam

  IT’S early, still dark.

  Mam is at the hearth.

  I go to help with the cooking.

  She stands, stirring,

  one hand

  against the stones,

  balancing herself.

  The wooden spoon falls

  to the floor,

  spattering hot soup.

  She sinks down for it,

  her hand sliding,

  and kneels there.

  I stare at her.

  She’s bone thin,

  her hair was red

  like mine

  but streaked white now.

  Are we going to lose her?

  She turns.

  I can’t hide my fear.

  “I’m all right, child.”

  She raises her shoulder

  a bit.

  I go toward her,

  stumbling.

  “I can’t do without you,”

  I say fiercely.

  I bury my head

  in her chest.

  All right, I tell myself.

  She’s all right.

  Hens