“Every soldier had a haversack to carry our things in,” he told his gathered family. “These went everywhere with us. But when a soldier—” He swallowed. “A haversack without an owner”—that seemed a softer way of speaking about death in battle—“was given to the quartermaster to be redistributed. I couldn’t let that happen to Grady’s after he—” This was every bit as difficult as he’d feared it would be. “I gave them mine, and I carried his sack and his canteen and his bedroll.”
For the first few weeks he’d used it, the bag had even smelled like Grady. That had been torture. “I carried it with me the rest of the war. And it has traveled with me all over Canada.”
All eyes were on the bundle, but no one moved.
“Nothing is more important to a soldier than his haversack and equipment. And these were his.” He pushed the words out. “This bag and its contents were with him from the moment he left home”—he met Maura’s teary gaze—“until the day he died.”
“If a haversack is so important to a soldier,” Mary’s son asked, “why did you give yours away?”
“Because I wanted something of Grady’s to carry with me, something of his to bring back home. This was all I had. Allhehad.”
“The tintypes were in this bag, then?” Ma asked.
Tintypes?He looked to Maura. “You kept them?”
“Both. Of course I did.”
He shook his head. “I really didn’t want you to keep mine.”
“Well, I wanted to keep it. ‘Something of you to carry with me.’”
Ma had slipped out and returned nearly too quickly to be noticed, holding something he recognized at a glance: the hinged leather frame held a glass-etched portrait of either Grady or himself.
“Which one is it?” he asked, afraid of the answer.
“Grady’s is at Maura’s house, of course,” Ma said.
His, then. That was the last thing he wanted to look at. He turned, instead, to his nieces and nephews. He motioned to the haversack. “It’s filled with a few things of your uncle Grady’s, things you’ve likely not seen before. You can dig through it.” To their parents, he said, “No weapons or dangerous things inside. I swear to it.”
The children needed no more encouragement. The grownups joined in the exploration soon thereafter. Noticeably absent from the perusal were Maura and Aidan, though they watched closely.
Maybe he should have brought these things to Grady’s wife and son first. Saints, he couldn’t seem to do anything right.
Lydia crawled from her perch on Eliza’s lap to his and curled into him as she often did and wrapped her arms around her doll.
Ma slipped closer. “Maura brought this to us when she moved here last year.” Patrick’s pulse pounded painfully in his head. “We’ve kept it here ever since, but now that you’re here . . .” She held out the tintype.
“I don’t want it, Ma.” He tried to keep his tone casual but knew he didn’t manage it. “I left it with Maura for a reason.”
“Do you not even want to see it?” She tried again to give it to him.
He couldn’t entirely stop himself from recoiling. “No.”
It was Ian who asked the next question. “Why not?”
Patrick had braced himself for interrogations but still wasn’t completely prepared for the question. “Those were the worst years of my life. I hated everything about that war. I don’t want to have to look at myself living my own nightmare, and that’s what I’d see in my face if I ever open that leather frame.”
Ian looked confused. “When did you start hating the war?”
“The first time I saw someone die,” he muttered, dropping his gaze to the younger ones still rummaging through the haversack. Thus far, they’d pulled out the tin coffee cup, the metal mess kit, Grady’s canteen and compass. “Though I never was eager for battle, even before we left home.”
Lydia’s tiny hand reached up and touched his cheek. “Sad.”
He smiled at her. “I’m happy you’re sitting with me,mo stóirín.”
She held up her doll for him, and he offered it a kiss on the head. She mimicked the gesture before returning to her quiet play.
Eliza leaned closer to him. “You aren’t a villain,” she whispered.
