Little Drifters: Kathleen’s Story. Kathleen O’Shea

all the while my father rambling on and on about the mare, not even realising he’d nearly drowned. We laughed about it the next day but Claire was quiet. The horse bite had been the final straw for her. Now a change was coming – the family I’d known and loved all my life was about to break apart.

Chapter 5

       Needles and Haystacks

      Claire had had enough of our hard life, and though just 15 and 16, she and Bridget decided to strike out on their own. The Legion of Mary charity helped them get nursing apprenticeships in Dublin, and just a few weeks after the horse’s bite they both left. Daddy couldn’t believe it – he was terribly fond of them both, but especially Claire. We all cried when they had to go – we loved our older sisters so much, they had brought us up and cared for us for so long. I didn’t know it then but I wasn’t to see Claire again for another ten years. Now we were left alone and, when Mammy was gone, it fell to me and Tara to look after the little babies. We did our best but it wasn’t easy – we were just five and six ourselves. One time Lucy found a bottle of medicine and drank it all. She was limp and floppy by the time Mammy got back and rushed her to hospital but luckily she survived.

      One day, not long after Bridget and Claire left, a car pulled up by the wagons. Four people got out – a worker from the Legion of Mary whom we knew, a man that looked like a doctor and two others.

      From what we could make out, they were chatting to my mother about the ‘im-you-nice-ay-shun’ of the children.

      ‘We’ve been looking to do it for a long while now,’ they were telling Mammy. ‘But we kept missing you. Every time we came to find you you’d moved on.’

      We all listened curiously, not having a clue what they were going on about. Mammy went into the wagon and brought out Lucy. We saw the doctor open a large black case then a pull out a giant needle.

      He attached a little vial of liquid to the top, tapped the needle then sunk the whole thing into Lucy’s chubby little leg. Poor Lucy screamed her little heart out but the doctor just went on with his work, pulling out another vial now and asking Mammy to bring Libby.

      Just then the penny dropped and Brian, Tara, Colin and myself realised that we were next! Brian was out of the back window of the wagon like a shot of lightning and Tara, Colin and myself scrambled out quickly behind. We knew we had to get as far away as possible from that gigantic needle so we scattered all about the place. The folks from the Legion of Mary saw what we were doing then and shouted at my brothers: ‘Quick! Catch them!’

      Aidan and Liam set off in pursuit but, try as they might, they couldn’t catch us because they were laughing so much. We darted in and out of the campsite, Mammy shouting at us to come back, Liam and Aidan dodging and weaving about, trying to pin us down. Eventually I felt Aidan’s firm grip on my leg and I fell face down into the dirt.

      ‘No, Aidan! Don’t let them do that to me!’ I begged, bucking and kicking at my brother.

      I could hear Brian a way off, shouting and swearing his head off: ‘Let go of me, you feckin’ bastard!’

      Someone else had hold of Tara.

      ‘Mammy!’ she screeched, petrified. ‘Save us, Mammy!’

      But Mammy just looked on, unconcerned, now holding two bawling infants. Our brothers dragged us back to the doctor and I was trembling with terror as I saw the needle and felt it prick my leg. The pain seared up the side of my thigh and I cried out, terrified, until I felt my brother’s grip loosen and the doctor, having completed his task, moved on to the next one.

      The next day Tara, Colin, Brian and myself resolved to get as far away from camp as possible. We didn’t want any more nasty surprises.

      ‘Come on!’ Brian yelled when he spotted the hay barn we loved to play in. It was one of our favourite games – we liked to pile bales of hay one on top of the other so that eventually we had a hay tower all the way to the top of the barn. That day we’d just built our tower to the top and we were climbing down again – I was in front with Tara and Colin behind me. There was just a little ledge at each level so you had to go down carefully from one level to the next. But Colin was impatient and pushed me from behind before I could get down. I missed my footing and fell all the way from the top of the tower to the very bottom. On the way, my leg got caught between two bales and my body twisted round. I felt something snap then and a stinging sensation in my leg as I came to a stop at the bottom. The others followed quickly behind and jumped down to the ground before running out of the barn, hardly paying me any mind. I wanted to run after them but I was dazed from the fall and my leg was still stinging. I tried to ease myself off the ground but my leg refused to move. So instead I crawled out of the hay barn with my arms.

      I’d just got myself out into the yard of the farm when Tara came running back.

      ‘Come on, come on, Kathleen,’ she urged. ‘What’s wrong with you? Get up and walk.’

      ‘Tara, I can’t feel my leg,’ I told her. ‘I can’t even move it.’

      All I could feel was this dreadful stinging.

      Then she looked down and let out an awful scream. I followed the path of her gaze down my leg and got the fright of my life. All along my ankle I could see my white bones sticking out.

      ‘Oh my God!’ I screamed. ‘I’m dying! I’m dying!’

      Before that moment I had no idea I was seriously hurt, but now I went into shock. Tara did what she could – dragging me through the yard, out the gates and putting me onto the side of the road.

      Then she went and got my mother. Mammy came and she started screaming too and that alerted the farmer. Just then Daddy pulled up in a van with two other people I’d not seen before.

      ‘Look at the child’s leg!’ she shrieked at him. ‘Look at it! It’s destroyed. Look at them bones sticking out. Get out of the van and pick her up!’ Mammy’s screams were more terrifying than anything else – I couldn’t even cry because she was going so mad. But Daddy didn’t say a word. There she was, ripping her hair out, and he just drove off. So the famer put me in his car and drove me to the hospital, Mammy still ranting and raving.

      Everything seemed to happen in a blur. We got to the hospital but they told us they couldn’t fix up my leg because they didn’t deal with broken bones. Instead, they put Mammy and me in an ambulance and drove us to another hospital. Here, they cut off my sock and shoe and said to Mammy that they were sorry but they would have to amputate my leg because I’d been too long without blood circulating.

      Mammy turned on them fiercely: ‘There’s no way you’re taking that child’s leg! No way!’

      So the doctors went away and when they came back they told us we were very lucky because it just so happened that a surgeon from America was visiting and he was a bone specialist. And he was going to try and save my leg.

      ‘Mammy, am I going to die?’ I asked her as they prepared me for surgery. I really didn’t know what was happening but judging by my mother’s hysterical reactions I reckoned it must be pretty terrible.

      ‘No, baby,’ she said, though her eyes didn’t look so sure. ‘They just have to put you to sleep for a bit so they can fix your leg back on again.’

      ‘You will stay, Mammy?’ I begged her. ‘You will stay until I wake up?’

      ‘Of course, baby. I’ll stay with you.’

      I felt reassured at least that Mammy would be there when I woke up and she held my hands as they led me on a trolley into the theatre.

      The last thing I saw were the bright fluorescent lights overhead, racing past. Mammy’s worried eyes. And then I was gone.

      I came round in a dark ward, lit only by a few dim bedside lights. There were other beds all around me but everyone seemed asleep, except a couple of nurses going about their business in hushed tones.