If I Never Get Back

by Darryl Brock

  “Samuel, I cannot tell you more.”

  “But you haven’t told me anything.”

  “I’m not allowed to,” she said stubbornly.

  “Who gives permission? O’Donovan?”

  She said nothing.

  “Great.”

  “Samuel, don’t, please.”

  I let out the mainsheet to catch a languid puff of wind. We’d been in irons, hovering off the Covington shore to keep the current from carrying us miles downriver. My fantasy afternoon was failing on all levels. Having sailed often in my other life, I’d scouted the riverfront till I found a sloop advertised for rent in the East End, where boat builders were slowly giving way to the slums of Rat Row.

  It turned out to be more of a skiff and steered like a raft. A far cry from sleek fiberglass craft I had known. And the Ohio was hardly San Francisco Bay. We floated dully on yellow, silt-choked water beneath a hot, cloudless sky. Where were the tricky currents and tides, the exhilarating, unpredictable winds? No wonder pleasure boating on this stretch of the Ohio was limited to excursion steamers. The only good thing I’d seen all afternoon was giant side-wheelers, their whistles blasting and black smoke belching from their twin stacks, hoving into view around the bend above Cincinnati, already as doomed as dinosaurs with railway and telegraph networks enveloping the country.

  It had taken some effort to get Cait to go on this outing. Timmy was ill, and she hadn’t wanted to leave. I’d brought Johnny over to stay with him. He promptly entranced Timmy by doing handstands, conjuring coins from the air, and balancing a burning sheet of paper on his nose—tricks he’d perfected in the circus. Cait, though less impressed than Timmy, agreed to come. But she insisted on wearing layers of clothing and shading herself beneath a bonnet that enfolded her head like a tent. I was boating with the most beautiful woman I could imagine—and I couldn’t see her features.

  The sail filled slightly and I felt us pick up speed. “Did you talk to O’Donovan this morning?”

  “Why, no.” She sounded surprised. “He’s been gone for days. After he brought Timmy home he immediately joined General O’Neill in the South. He’ll be away for some weeks.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “For a certainty, why?”

  Was O’Donovan concealing his activities from her? I wondered. Or was she lying?

  “Cait, tell me about your secret society.”

  “It’s not secret,” she said. “Although the Church tries to say it is. That was true at first, in Ireland, but no longer.”

  “Then what is it?”

  “An army, Samuel.”

  “Whose army?”

  “Ireland’s army.”

  “You’re telling me that the army of a nation not yet in existence is operating inside this country?”

  “Ireland exists,” she argued. “It exists in subjugation, at the mercy of English tyranny. It exists to be plundered by landlords and to be exploited in the name of religion. It exists to be stripped of its people.” Her hand clenched into fists. “Oh, it exists!”

  “You’re a Fenian, then?”

  “Oh, Samuel, if I say yes, you’ll ask ten thousand questions. If I say no, you won’t believe me.” She sighed beneath her bonnet. “I am not at liberty to tell you.”

  The river lapped at the boat’s hull. In the distance a factory whistle shrilled and a bird’s cry answered starkly overhead.

  “Not at liberty,” I muttered, looking at this woman from a different era, seeing her old-fashioned clothes and button shoes. As we floated along a sunlit stretch of shoreline, clear images of my daughters came to me: laughing, calling “Daddy,” running to me in the sunlight of another century; I saw their faces, heard their voices.

  “Samuel . . . ?”

  I looked up. She was leaning forward, peering at me with troubled eyes.

  “Are you ill?”

  I shook my head. “Daydreaming.”

  “You were so far away, you frightened me.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Samuel, try to be patient. Please?”

  I managed a grin. “It’s not my strong suit.”

  “Remember,” she said, “there is a great deal I do not know about you.”

  “I guess that’s true.” My understatement of the century.

  As I steered back to the dock we exchanged wistful smiles that seemed to acknowledge the complexity of it all.

  I ransacked every paper I could find covering the past month. Sitting with stacks of them in the Mercantile Library, I learned that five hundred delegates from all over the United States had assembled at Fenian Headquarters in Manhattan. General O’Neill had been present and “the veil of secrecy” was drawn “with unusual care” over the session.

  A recent New York Times article asserted that the Fenians contemplated an immediate move on Canada and were also plotting to abduct Prince Arthur should he visit there or this country. I leaned back and rubbed my eyes. Unless the Times had fabricated the whole thing, the Fenian leaders were either insane or blowing smoke clouds. But why? Were they not yet ready, but hoping to build momentum? Were they covering up what they really hoped to pull?

  No less confused than when I’d started, I focused on the most immediate question in my mind: What exactly was in Cait’s basement?

  I was truly gorgeous in my best dark suit. My collar was starched and snowy, my beard and hair trimmed. I managed the block and a half from the Gibson to the photographer’s without wilting in the noonday heat. They were waiting for me, Timmy in short pants, Cait looking sensational in a green satin dress.

  “You’re beautiful, Miz O’Neill,” I said.

  “And you, Mr. Fowler,” she said, smiling and taking my arm, “are most noble to the eye.”

  I think she felt a bit guilty about our boating afternoon. When I’d said I wanted to have a portrait made of her and Timmy, she surprised me by insisting that I be included. In terms of our relationship, she was hard to read. Not only were her moods unpredictable when we were alone together—so far we hadn’t repeated our one transcendent kiss—but I couldn’t really tell if she saw me as gentleman friend, admirer, potential lover, or a brotherly sort of extension of Andy. Perhaps in her mind we were engaging in heavy courtship. I had no idea. I was trying hard to learn the rules as I played. And trying equally hard not to push things.

  “All is ready!” The photographer, a tall, nervous man named Daviscourt, his fingers stained brown from chemicals, led us to a backdrop painted with an idyllic woodland stream in front of which were imitation flowers, shrubbery, and a bark canoe. He posed me with Timmy inside the canoe and settled Cait on a stool between us—which made her look, I thought, as if she were sitting in the water. He handed her a parasol and me a rustic walking stick. Props at the ready, we waited. He ducked beneath his black cloth, emerged to inform us that light conditions were posing unusual problems, and eventually made half a dozen exposures of us gazing frozenly at each other or into his lens. Timmy had trouble staying still so long.

  “Uncommonly difficult,” Daviscourt grumbled. “The skylight seemed to give off unusual radiance, but not uniformly. I hope another sitting won’t be required,”

  We said we hoped the same.

  “Sam, can we toss the ball?” Timmy said at home. “My throwing’s stronger!”

  I pulled out my watch. “Sure, for a couple minutes, then I have to get to practice.”

  “Who do you play next?”

  “We leave for Portsmouth tomorrow.”

  Cait looked up. “When will you return, Samuel?”

  “Friday morning,” I lied, wondering if her interest were only casual. We were actually scheduled back Thursday evening. I had a bit of sleuthing in mind.

  She nodded gravely, her eyes holding mine for a moment.

  I felt like a shit.

  The pennant-holding Eckfords were coming to play us next week. A sure sellout. Deciding the occasion called for new products, I visited Bertha Bertram, a seamstress, in her millinery shop on Elm. Harry
employed her each year to make the club’s uniforms. She looked at my designs for silk rosettes and ribbon badges bearing red-stocking in-signias and said she could make them for six cents apiece. I agreed readily, thinking I could sell them for at least a dime, and ordered as many as she could have ready.

  Next I went to a print shop on Vine. Sheet music for “The Red Stocking Scottische,” which was “dedicated to the ladies of Cincinnati,” had recently been published. On its cover were the players’ likenesses, pirated poorly from the engraving in Leslie’s. I lent them my print of the original photograph and ordered five thousand small posters to be made along the same format: oval head shots of the starters, with Harry in the center. I figured I’d easily clear a dime on each. Champion would go nuts.

  The house lay dark and silent in the half-light. No wagon stood in front this time. I crept to the basement door and took a screwdriver from my pocket. The hinges were not rusted, and the screws came out easily. I lifted the door free. A ladder led to a dirt floor some eight feet below. I descended warily and lit the stub candle I’d brought. Eyes adjusting to the dimness, I saw long wooden crates stacked to the ceiling. Stenciled in block letters on the side of each was ELASTIC JOINT IRON ROOFING, Thewlis & Company, 130 West Second Street, Cincinnati. It seemed unlikely that O’Donovan had stockpiled roofing materials. With the screwdriver I pried the lid from one of the crates and removed a canvas tarp underneath. A dozen rifles lay packed inside, their long greased barrels gleaming like sharks. ENFIELD was stamped on their stocks. Replacing the lid carefully, I set about counting the crates. I was about half-finished at over a hundred when I thought I heard something. I snuffed the candle, edged up the ladder, and peeked over the top. Nothing stirred in the morning quiet. I refastened the door and moved quickly away.

  Two thousand new weapons, I calculated. Did Cait know about them? In my heart I didn’t think so. I was half-tempted to go back and show her. Watch her reaction. But what then? For now it seemed better to find out all I could about the plans of Mr. Fearghus O’Donovan.

  We took the Bostona southeast along the Ohio to Portsmouth, covering the hundred or so miles in six hours. The hometown Riverside team didn’t figure to be much competition; Cleveland had recently demolished them, 48-12.

  Everybody except Brainard and Sweasy seemed in good spirits. Allison gave Gould a hotfoot. George fashioned what he called a “Yankee contraption,” a sort of wire spider, and dangled it in our faces while we dozed. He even tried it on Brainard, who challenged him to fight. George—big, muscular, unintimidated—merely grinned.

  The mood shifted when Harry told us that Champion, not along on this trip, wanted all of us to sign a temperance pledge. There was an ominous silence. I sneaked a glance at Brainard, whose face showed nothing. I could understand Champion’s viewpoint: first Hurley and now Brainard had come close to disgracing the club.

  “Hell no!” said Waterman. “Is this a damn milk-and-water club? I’d go back to the Mutes first.”

  “If they’d take you,” George needled.

  “Poke it up your ass!” Waterman snapped.

  Harry looked somberly at Waterman during the exchange. I could roughly guess his thoughts: he couldn’t risk losing his star third baseman and splitting the team at this point. But I sensed that Waterman wouldn’t last forever with Harry. Nor Brainard.

  “The true problem here,” he said, interrupting a rambling commentary by Allison on the rights of individual freedom, “is that Mr. Champion would wish it announced that the nine had taken such a pledge.” Harry looked at us, his eyes deceptively gentle. “I see that it would embarrass some of you.”

  “That’s right,” said Waterman.

  “He wants to stifle rumors,” Harry went on. “Rumors of drunkenness and gambling—the worst threats to our business, gentlemen.”

  There was silence. Again I glanced at Brainard, who remained impassive, as if the topic were only of abstract interest.

  “Anticipating your reaction, I tried to convince him that a signed pledge is unnecessary. He finally agreed, but only with the understanding that further transgressions will bring drastic measures.”

  That night, when Andy and I talked about prevailing currents on the team, we drew a blank on Brainard. I suggested that maybe he’d cleaned up his act. Andy doubted it. I asked what was with Sweasy.

  “He’s meaner than ever,” Andy said. “Nearly mixed with Mac over some fool thing at our place. Called Allison a fool to his face. Those two are fixing to find new lodging. Sweaze is hardly even civil to me anymore.”

  “Any idea what’s eating him?”

  “No, but one of his worst spells was after he found you were sparking Cait. I thought he’d explode!”

  “What’s that to him?”

  “Don’t know exactly. I mean, he knows he wouldn’t stand a Chinaman’s chance with her himself. I guess he thinks your standing’s shot up with me ‘n’ Cait, while his own has dropped.”

  “What should I do about it, Andy?”

  “Nothin’ to do.”

  Brainard was sensational, striking out four—one for each hit he allowed—and whitewashing the unlucky Riversides in all nine innings. Although we had only one homer—a line shot by George in the ninth—our thirty-six hits were good for forty runs. The Riversides were actually pretty good fielders, but nobody could have held us that afternoon.

  Our record was now 37-0.

  All the way home on the train I pictured all those wooden cases with their deadly contents. Back in Cincinnati Thursday evening, I took a long soak in my room and got a shave in the barber shop. In the papers I read that Clara Barton, the famous war nurse, was sailing for Europe as things worsened between France and Prussia.

  I took my time over supper. Around ten, wearing dark clothes, I cautiously approached the boardinghouse. Streetlamps were fortunately sparse in this part of town. I edged along the wall outside the brightly lit parlor and heard voices arguing inside.

  “—won’t keep till next spring!” O’Donovan’s brittle, urgent tones.

  An older man’s voice responded, “We have no alternative but the St. Patrick’s Day Circular.”

  Wedging myself into thick shrubbery beside a window, I raised up by slow degrees until I could see inside with my right eye. O’Donovan’s buttocks were inches away. He faced a man with bags under his eyes who looked to be in his midforties and wore a green uniform resembling O’Donovan’s. He sat erect, pulling at his goatee, his gaze fixed on O’Donovan. I dropped down and listened.

  “But everything’s set,” O’Donovan said. “In Chicago, St. Louis, here, we’ve got stores for nearly twelve thousand. Add Troy and Buffalo, Nashville and Louisville—my God, man, we’re ready across the nation!”

  “Mind yourself, Captain!”

  “Sorry, sir.” O’Donovan sounded anything but apologetic. “It’s that I fear we’ll lose momentum if we don’t act soon. We have twenty thousand lads at the ready, two-thirds veterans. We have at least that many stands of arms, two million rounds of ammunition, thousands of breech loaders—”

  “You’ve briefed me exhaustively on our military stores,” the older man cut in. “Can you tell me the amount in our treasury at this moment?”

  “Well, not precisely, sir, but I would think—”

  “Less than seventeen hundred dollars, and bills are coming so fast—largely for those weapons dear to your heart—that it all will soon be gone. Then how are we to feed the fearsomely armed fighters we’ve launched on an invasion?”

  There was a pause.

  “Fearghus, I’m as sick as you of picnics and speeches and bond sales. I’ve traveled the country without respite. I’d like nothing so much as to fight tomorrow. Remember, it was I who pushed earlier operations when others wavered.”

  “I remember, sir,” said O’Donovan. “The courage of John O’Neill is beyond question.”

  Ah, Colm’s uncle, I thought, the big Fenian cheese.

  “We cannot fall short again,” said O’Neill. “E
ven another close thing like Ridgway, where we’d have won if reinforced, would finish us with Canada. We must pick our time and targets carefully, strike with coordinated effort, and smash our way to a sure and final victory.”

  His voice was rising to an oratorical pitch. I risked a glance. O’Neill was standing now, his booted feet widespread. He was as crazy as O’Donovan, I thought, and pulled back from the window.

  “And there’s the South,” O’Neill continued. “You know, Captain, that I’m involved in delicate negotiations with no fewer than eight Confederacy officers?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Since the defeat of their last hope, Seymour, and Grant’s ascendancy, they’re finally swinging to us. With Longstreet and others taking up our cause, lured by prospects of resettling in Canada, we’ll be immeasurably strengthened. To act prematurely now, when we are so close, would be fatal.” Another pause. “Caitlin, you’ve never been lovelier, there’s a bloom to you.”

  “Thank you, Uncle.” Cait’s voice sounded to the left of O’Donovan. She’d been sitting there all along. I burned with jealousy, wanting to crash through the window.

  “Isn’t she the picture of a colleen, Captain?” O’Neill’s voice was suffused with pride.

  Tell him to fuck off, Cait.

  Her light laughter mingled with O’Donovan’s mumble.

  “Isn’t she?” O’Neill insisted, and now there was no mistaking his role: matchmaker.

  “Aye, she is,” said O’Donovan, his voice tight.

  “Colm and his Caitlin were always quite the display,” O’Neill said expansively, a pronouncement that evoked heavy silence. “Well, Captain, there’s another matter we must discuss. Cait, if you don’t mind . . .”

  “Of course, Uncle.”

  Why does she call him that? I thought nastily. He wasn’t her uncle and she’d never really married his nephew.

  A chair scraped, footsteps, a door closed.

  “They’re not made finer than Cait on this earth,” said O’Neill.

  “Indeed,” O’Donovan said, and again his voice sounded constricted.

  “I understand some fellow has been paying her calls.”