Vengeance For The Dead - Chapter 4

Vengeance For The Dead

A Novel

By Paul McCann

Chapter 4

The Landlords Eviction  

As a young lad Kieran Murphy worked picking potatoes on his parents farm in rural Ireland . He was a happy go lucky fella who loved listening to the stories his daddy told him after dinner by the turf fire at night  . There was no television or radio back them in those days so his daddy’s stories were the only entertainment he ever knew apart from listening to his mother’s singing . She had a great voice and she had been handed down all the songs from her parents .

Life was hard but there was a lot of love in their little cottage . They sold the potatoes and turf at the local markets once a week that brought them enough money to oat the rent and a few little things for the kitchen cupboard .

It was a dark time when the potato famine came and when Hal Withers the landlord came to the house , he demanded Mr and Mrs Murphy to the pay rent that was a week in arrears. Mr and Mrs Murphy explained that they didn’t have the money but if they could be given some time to raise the money . The landlord , Withers refused their request and brought in a handful of men to evict them from the little cottage that had been their home for many years . The house was boarded up and the door sealed shut so with no home and no friends to help them Kieran and his parents went off to the roads like many others were forced to do .

Kieran watched his parents get weaker as the days went by . They were tired and  hungry  hunger and the only way he could help parents was by stealing some food from and couldn’t go in his attempt to try to help his parents he went into the large property there and broke into one of the big homes but in the process of trying to get some food from the kitchen he was knocked out and captured by the owner who contacted the police who took him away to prison and charged with breaking and would be going to make a court appearance  that week .

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Kieran was not alone in his crime as the overcrowded cell he was put into was full of people who had been caught stealing food to feed their families during the famine .

Kieran was very worried about his parents who were sleeping out on the roads and the first chance he got he tried to escape . Late in the afternoon another prisoner was brought into the cell and Kieran grabbed the policeman around the neck when he opened the door cell door . Another one of the police heard the commotion and immediately ran to see what was going on . With a loaded gun in his hand , he called out for Kieran to let the policeman go  and when Kieran refused, he was shot and killed by the police .

For Kieran there was no funeral or church service , he was buried along with countless of others into a large pit who had died of consumption on the roads . Among the dead were his parents .

As time passed the famine got worse and more people died .

In the large house of Hal Withers some strange things began to happen . All the flowers and plants in the grounds  mysteriously began to die as well as the lawn and some of the servants refused to return to work after they said they had heard a voice in the corridors telling them to leave and never to come back . Then holes began to appear around the grounds and huge rats now were seen inside  the house ,

In one of the rooms one of the servants had seen an old man and woman sitting in a chair peeling potatoes from a sack that lay on the floor . 

On the night Landlord Withers was awoke by the sound of babies crying he nervously went to investigate the room were the crying was coming from but where he went inside no one was there but as he left the room he was met by a family begging for more time to pay their rent .

Hae ran in fear and was met by the ghostly appearance of Kieran Murphy .

Screaming in fright he ran from the house and was never seen again until the day when the famine came to an end and some of the boarded-up cottages were being renovated to be put back on the market for renting once more .

In the Murphys old cottage the remains of Hal Withers were found on the ground and in his hand was the eviction notice he had given to Mr and Mrs Murphy a long time ago .

  End of chapter 4 

Link to chapter 5

https://www.abctales.com/story/mcscraic/vengeance-dead-chapter-5

Vengeance For The Dead

A Novel

By Paul McCann