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buttermilk and set it on the table by our window, the seaward door open, for it was balmy that September day.
    “The whole folk of Sligo Bay think that you are off to Dublin to see O’Connell at his brave meeting. I was wondering if I was going to be the very last to be told.” Her eyes were twinkling as she bantered me about my secret discussions with Brendan, Mr. O’Flaherty, even Woolly Rafferty with his game leg and rusty cart, and I grinned back at her foolishly.
    “Come here then, you big silly boy. Give your ma a hug and tell her when you leave. Go see a bit of the world. I went to work younger than you. I don’t worry about the travel. Be careful who ye travel with. And who you speak with, and what you say. The whole world is not Mullaghmore, or Sligo, or Dromahair. There are people of ill will.” Her eyes narrowed. Or did I imagine that? “God keep you safe then, Son, for I can’t surely keep you home forever, can I?”
    I laughed with delight. This had been easy indeed. “Drink up your buttermilk,” she added. “Come back after the brave speeches. Remember, Son, it’s to hear you are going, not to speak.”
    I left on the twenty-first day of September, well in time for the meeting. I had said goodbye to the others, many of whom marveled at my plan. Brigid had been gone for seven long months. By the time I returned, I was certain that she would be back amongus, her da tiring by then of his unaccustomed responsibility. If she had not returned by then, I decided to go again to Connemara.
    All Brendan said was, “Come back home when ’tis time, Padraig.”
    As I was about to round the corner on the road, carrying the small bag in which Ma had put her best cheese, bread, a couple of shirts, and such, I turned for a last look. She stood at the doorway looking grand, and her smile lit my world. I turned and set upon my road to Dublin, not knowing how long this journey would be.
    But this picture of my ma standing before our cottage, the sun in her red hair, I held in my heart forever after.
    •  •  •
    I T WOULD NOT be difficult to find my way to Dublin, for all I would have to do was to travel east, with a little southerly meandering.
    Unlike my good friend Brendan, I do not worry over much. If there be something to worry about, I worry when it arrives, and take care of it after. Even when trouble arrives, I try to whistle my way. My quick temper, Brendan never tires of telling me, encounters more conflicts than a reasonable man can hope to find. But he looks up at the sky and at his cape a dozen times, and worries about not taking it. Then he decides it will rain and returns after a few steps to debate at the threshold again. More often than not, it turns out to be a bright day with perhaps a whiff of mist. For these I would be teasing him, and he chuckling at me.
    If I had a fear, it was not for the money, for my mother did skillfully sew a goodly number of shillings into my coat within a hidden hem; with my shirt tucked into my britches, these were invisible. I could easily extract, when need be, a shilling at a time.No, my fear was of the clever people in Dublin who might find me a country dolt.
    I headed along the road toward Drumshanbo for the first night’s stay, leaving Lough Gill to my left, towards the south of Lough Allen. I was tempted to visit the tomb of the great Turlough O’Carolan. That blind harpist’s music, Mr. O’Flaherty used to say, could make the very wind stand still. I had heard that he was buried in the old Kilronan Abbey, but I did not want to stray at the very start of my journey.
    •  •  •
    T HAT FIRST NIGHT I stayed at a shepherd’s cottage outside Drumshanbo. When he heard my purpose, he would not take my small coin for the dry pallet and a few potatoes—though he had naught else. I slept well and headed out again next morning, pausing at the ruined abbeys near Boyle along the way. The Curlew Hills rose beyond.
    As I trudged east, county by county, I