A Pocket Full of Shells Read Online Free Page A

speaking. 
         "She will be a bit emotional over the next few weeks and that's only natural, so take everything she says with a pinch of salt. If she has a sharp tongue, ignore it. She's a grand girl with a good heart and will be back to her old self in no time. Well, I'm off to my own bed – Pat should have it nice and warm by now."
    Annie stood up and patted James on the back. 
         "I'm glad you came to stay, it's brought a new lease of life to both of us. If you and Mary decide to join your family in England we would miss you terribly, but you have to do what's best for your child now."
    James stood and hugged his aunt. 
         "The thought of going there never entered my head. No matter how bad things get here, this is where I want my family to be reared. I know Mary feels the same way. So we will have no more talk of that. You go on up, Pat will be missing you. I can look after the fire." 
    Annie smiled at her nephew's words and took one last look at the sleeping baby before climbing the stairs.
         After tending the fire, James lay on the other bed in the parlour, looking over at Mary, sleeping peacefully. It was hard to imagine she was the same young woman he had seen wreathing in agony earlier that evening. Sleep did not come to him easily that night. He tossed and turned, drifting in and out of a strange dream about a young girl in prison and Mary at the barred window. She had pushed her arms through the gaps, holding onto the child, both of them sobbing their hearts out. James woke up, his body damp with sweat, and looked over at his young family. 
         "I'm sorry, love, did the baby wake you with her crying?" Mary whispered as she stroked her daughter's head of dark brown hair. "She is so hungry, this is the third time she has suckled since she was born."
    James asked if he could lie in beside them. Mary made room for him and he held them both in his arms. 
         "She is so beautiful, just like her mother,” he said, then added mischievously, “She sounds like you, too.”
         Slapping him on the leg Mary said, "And that's what she'll get if she is as saucy as you." 
    She placed the sleeping baby in his arms.
         "Are we still agreed on calling her Catherine, after my mother?" asked Mary.
    James felt a warm glow as he held his daughter for the first time; a feeling that would make him agree to anything asked of him.
         "Of course," said James, “That's the tradition isn't it? The first boy after the man's father and the first girl after the woman's mother. It's nice that one of my sisters is also called Catherine, in fact, there's lots of Catherine McGrothers in our family. It's a good solid name, one she will be proud to bear when she's older."
     

     
     
    CHAPTER 5
         James could see four boats spread out in the bay, their vessel being last to sail. On board with him was his uncle Pat, along with the owner of the boat and his son. The fishermen called out greetings to each other as they passed. It was midnight. A pale ribbon of moonlight lay over the quiet sea and the air was very still.
         "A calm before the storm I would say Tom," remarked Pat. "We will have to head back to shore at the first sign of a breeze."
         Tom Matthews looked at his fifteen year old son, Joseph, the only one left of five. Three of his boys had gone to America six months before and one had died of the fever. His wife and two young daughters depended on them catching enough fish tonight to eat for the next week – if they were lucky. The weather being so bad the previous three days, nobody had risked bringing a boat out to sea. As soon as the wind calmed, the fishermen set out, thankful for the opportunity to replenish their depleted food supply. Under normal circumstances none of them would have chanced going out with a storm expected, but times were hard and food scarce.
         Mary's eyes were fixed on the boat carrying James away from the shore. In