| Chapter Ten - Promises Made I wish that we had spent more time admiring Music, that we had gone up riding in the hills for longer, that I had some how persuaded Joe to stay on with us, or that we had ridden over to the Kelly’s together and that we had all gone dancing or drinking or somewhere. So many things that could have happened….things.that would have made it all different. Joe he left me to go back to the Kelly farm and that copper Fitzpatrick was waiting, not for Joe, he had no grievance with Joe, he was there to arrest Dan from what I heard. The Kelly’s, well they as you could be imagining, they was having none of that and there were words and then a scuffle, and that was to change everything. You can read anywhere what one or the other said or might have said, so many opinions of what happened and who did what and I never really did get the truth of it all. Afterwards there were too many other things to be speaking about, to be doing, what really happened did not ever matter. The police they was never listening to the truth, they was only believing the lies of one of their own. For what was done was done and nothing would ever be the same again, not for the Kelly’s, not for Joe, not for any of us that loved any or all of them. Ned and Dan they went up into the Wombat Ranges. Firstly just to be getting out of the way of trouble, never thinking that they would soon be raising money for the trial of their Ma, working at distilling whiskey and panning for gold they would be. For Ellen and her baby daughter had been arrested along with Bill Williamson and Bill Skillion and there needed to be money to pay for the defense. There was a whole bunch of fella’s up there, Joe he was there along with the likes of Tom and Jack Lloyd, Aaron, Steve Hart one of Dan’s mates, Wild Wright and others from the Greta mob, Liam he came and went bringing supplies and news, them all trying to be figuring out what they should be doing to make things right. I could hardly bear to think of Mrs Kelly locked up with a new baby, those coppers they would have treated their dogs better than what she got. We did what we thought might make some difference wrote letters to the authorities, to the politicians, to the bishop to anyone that might have had some sort of conscience, we rode with food, and we watched and we waited. Every word that any copper said was reported back to the lads. Anything that might mean something we was doing and all the while feeling so angry and helpless and bitter that this could happen. Where was the justice and the right in the world, and I found meself asking where was God, not for the first time but it seemed like if he was watching over us then he was not doing so good a job. We was the meek and the poor and the downtrodden and there seemed to be no end to the suffering that was meted out. Not four weeks after Ned and Dan took to hiding out in the hills Liam arrived unexpectedly. Late in the night and he was nervous, all fidgeting and anxious and I was instantly afraid that something had happened, that he had more bad news. But instead he asked me to go out walking with him, out in the night under the stars. So I pulled on me boots and we stumbled around a bit until our eyes got used to the night and then we wandered down by the creek, him with his arm wrapped around me waist, walking quietly until we got to the clearing not far from the swimming hole then he stopped. Turning me to look at him. Telling me that he did not want to be so far apart, that he wanted to be always close to me and that it felt like this was where we had always been heading from the moment that he had seen me. Would I be his wife, live with him on the land that he was going to buy further up the Woolshed. Would I marry him, so that he could love me forever. I said Yes, Yes I shouted Yes and he grabbed me up and kissed me breathless and we made love right there under the night stars with the gum trees looking over us. * I didn’t want to be waiting, I just wanted to be with Liam so we did not worry about dresses or guests or any of the other things that Meg was fussing about with, she did have her own back of course asking me the same question that I had been asking of her. That did make me laugh, the gleam in her eye was full of mischief but she was happy for me, happy for us. I suppose looking back we did everything wrong but me Ma was so ill that she was not able to be getting out of her bed, and even though she may not have known what was going on I wanted her there. Liam he had a sister who was married to an Italian fellow, his brother was a priest. I am not sure how Liam convinced him, but he did and that priest he came down to the Woolshed and married us. Meg she stood with me and Joe he came down out of the hills and he stood with Liam, he also stood for me Da, giving me away. So serious as he did it, giving me a kiss before he handed me over to the man who would be me husband. Whispering that me Da would have been proud of me. Then a smile and he shook Liam’s hand telling him to be taking care of me. Solemn words spoken and I could barely get them out, I had to look at me toes as I said me vows, scared that I would cry and that he would think that I was not wanting to do this. I had heard them words many times before. But this time they meant something different. For they was my words and they was Liam’s and we were making promises for life. I can’t explain the feeling that came over me but it was both happy and sad and so very powerful, like our love was something more than anything ever before and that we would survive anything because of it. A touch of fear in the midst of it all, not fear for marrying but fear of losing what I now had. But a look into Liam’s eyes and it was gone. Only room for love, for him. We did not really have a honeymoon, no trip to Melbourne to see the sights for us, just the one night in the Commerical Hotel in Beechworth, one night of no sleep and lots of love and talking. A different face this time from Jane as we came down the stair the next morning, well wishing and I like to think just a touch of envy, but maybe that was just me being so made up that Liam had married me, no one else, but me. Liam he wanted me to meet his family so we rode out side by side, not much more than a few clothes and some canvas to sleep on or under depending on how the weather was to be. It took us some days to make the journey up to Liam’s home, we did not be hurrying. If I think back now we played. Stopping and swimming naked in creeks that he knew of, visiting people that was important to him, people that he wanted me to be meeting. “hello Mrs M this is me wife Maireagh….” And he would smile at me as he said it, drawing me forward to meet these men and women that he knew and they would smile and talk and shake his hand and I would know one more part of his life. His family they had a good sized farm between Nyora and Jerilderie, a tidy and clean place with healthy stock, they seemed to be doing well for themselves and his Mam and Da they were welcoming, happy I think that another son had made good and married his lass. In the Jerilderie courthouse Liam and I was married all over again, I think that was what made it all official but I was not caring. For me we was wed the first time those words were spoken in that house that me Da had built, me Ma watching me, perhaps understanding what was going on. Least I hoped that she was. Liam’s family well they was overwhelming, so many of them, sisters and brothers and most of them was married with children, children and dogs, they seemed to be most fond of the both and they was running everywhere. And they just welcomed me like I was already one of them. A week of dancing and celebrating, of talking with his sister Annie who’s was on her own at the time her husband working on the railroad down Benalla way, gone for weeks on end leaving her at home with twins. It was her husband that had the priest brother and she had some stories to be telling about her Italian in laws. They sounded like people that enjoyed life, and not so different from us she said. The same fights with the authorities, anyone that was not being English or was being Catholic well we had to be working much harder than them lot. She rode back down to the Woolshed with us, the three of us managing her babes between us, she taking the chance to be going to visit her husband, sleeping rough in a tent with him she did but it did not seem to worry her none. She was just happy to be with Benedetto, though we called him Ben, Annie being the only one to be called him his proper name. He was a big fine looking man with shining dark eyes and a big laugh and they would come by the house and be having supper with us when they could get the time. Liam he came to live at our house, Meg she said that it was just plain good sense rather than going and paying some fella rent somewhere, that we should stay there until we had the money to be buying our own place. The words until Ma passed unspoken but there always. Neither of us really ready to be deciding or choosing to move her from her home. It is a dreadful thing to be waiting for some one to die, but we was waiting, not wanting her to be going but knowing that she had in all but one way already gone. But those days together, us the newly weds as they would be calling us when we went to mass, those days were happy times. The beginning of our life together. Dreams and plans made as we lay close under the covers, everything we wanted if we just wanted it badly enough, at least that was what Liam said and I believed him. I loved him, a love so big that sometimes it scared me, always fearful if he was a fraction late, my life intertwined with his in a way I could not explain. |