Colleen Rose rustles in the bassinet at the sound of her mother’s voice. In the dark Ligeia freezes with a big smile on her face and puts her hand over her mouth. Darby begins to smile, but although he believes himself smiling, he actually is not. He doesn’t remember how.
Everything Ligeia does fills him with something he had never known. The way she smiles as if everything is an inside joke between them, her accent in the language she has picked up so quickly and the way she mothers him. Joy. Love. It was as if he’d been starved until she fed him. All those lonely, cold years in the shadows. And before that, homeless under a rotted pier like a water rat.
Am I really going to die? Die, and lose all of this?
“Darby,” she whispers from the other side of the bed and puts his face in her soft hands. “Darby, what do eh-think about all the time?”
He didn’t hear that. As she spoke, he had made his decision final, If I decide something based on a dream, I would be seen as psychopathic. No, I cannot do that.
“Darby?”
But is it worth the risk of losing Ligeia and Colleen Rose?
“Darby?”
“Yes?”
“What you eh-think about?”
“How much I love ya,” He reaches for her hand and brings the ring to his lips. “Ligeia, will ya marry me?”
“Yes,” she answers quickly, “Do you worry? Worry about us?”
His eyes move to the right in thought, “After the—” he stops himself from saying after the fight between Dinny and Bill, and instead he says. “After next week, we will go to City Hall in Manhattan. People get married there everyday. We should—”
“Oh Darby, my lover.”
“We will get married after next week. I’ll make all the arrangements.”
I am not psychopathic. And I do not believe in messages from dreams. I will take all the risks that are needed to make my own way for us.
Ligeia grabs Darby by the shoulders, “What about a dress?”
“I’ll get money for that,” Darby sits up.
But how, he has no idea.
Chirping sounds come from Colleen Rose in the bassinet across the cramped room and Ligeia smiles. Darby then presses a finger to his lips to shush her. Across the street at the Socony factory a shift whistle sounds off as the bed gives a rusty squeak when Darby inches toward her. He takes her hand and kisses her mouth, “I love ya so much, Ligeia. We’re gonna get outta this hole. We’ll get married. We’ll get a new room, an’ we’ll be safe. I made a commitment to ya, an’ it means the world to me.”
Her mouth opens as he slowly pulls down the strap over the shoulder of her nightgown to spill her engorged breast. A slight gasp comes to her lips when he puts her soft brown nipple into his mouth. A shot of milk shoots down Darby’s throat so sweet that it stirs his passion to a stiffened point. In response she reaches down and runs the palm of her hand along his shaft and warms it in her gentle grip. With his mouth he takes her other nipple as she watches with downturned eyes and an open-mouthed exhale.
Darby pushes her onto her back and swings his legs over and between hers, but before he can direct himself inside her, she says, “Remember you promise, Darby. I want go out to ristorante. I have a new eh-friend to sit with the baby. You take me?”
“I promise. An’ we’ll look in the windows at dresses. Then we’ll get married.”
A few minutes later and the room is an orchestra of rusty shrieks and the angry cries from Colleen Rose. A moan issues from Ligeia. And Darby’s neck cranes toward the low, angled ceiling.
Forever Over Dawn
Mam had been to a tailor. Yesterday she had hung a new dark blue suit on the outside of my bedroom door. How does she know my size?
Now that she is aware of the bank account, she spends money on the things that matter most to her. And this day I would do what she requests, against my instincts.
I cannot speak of love to her, or any other. My love has been tied up like a prisoner since Emma McGowan died. And bound by the guilt of my uncle Joseph’s murder. No, I cannot open up to the kindness and humility that I once naively showed everyone. Now I can only show it by going against my own inclinations, and doing what my mother requests of me.
I run my bandaged hand down the arm of the new coat. The fabric is beautifully woven and the hand-written tag describes it as Bannockburn tweed. Inside there is a matching waistcoat and a paper collar that is scalloped round the ends where they meet to allow view of a striped tie of oranges, yellows and hints of green. A matching muffler hangs elegantly out of the pocket. Brown patent colt-skin boots with pointy tips and a conservative hat lined with chinchilla to top it off.
A new man needs new togs to get the feel, I smile. I take a deep breath to allow my new life to settle into my thoughts. The fistfights, the honor codes, the fear of death at every corner, the old beat up laborer’s suits and the Hanan boots; all in the past now.
Even the camaraderie, a voice inside reminds. My mouth squiggles at that thought. Dinny had not taken my abandonment of post well. He smiled and wished me happy birthday. But the words that ring in my head the most are, ya can never escape.
Dinny Meehan has done terrible things, but to come after those who quit the gang would make him evil. Some say he is evil, in fact. But he is not. I know he isn’t.
When I slip on the coat I notice an envelope inside the pocket without a return address. Scrawled across the front it says plainly, “For Liam only.”
I open it quickly. Inside, a piece of paper is folded multiple times over so that the words cannot be read from outside. When finally it’s open, it simply reads, “Patrolman Culkin works with Wolcott & Barry. It is Culkin who is behind the disappearance of Detective William Brosnan. You were right.”
At the bottom of the letter it’s signed, “H.”
H? Who is that? This is the second time I’ve heard about a letter with—
“Liam?”
“I’m here, Mam.”
She emerges again from her room quietly tying her robe, again, “How do ye like it?”
“It’s fine, well-made.”
“I got it for—”
“I know what it’s for.”
She turns her head and lowers an eye, “Ye’re havin’ second t’oughts.”
No, they are trying to suck me back into the racket. “It’s fine, stop worryin’,” I pull down the rest of the suit.
“Liam?”
“What?” I answer in front of the door to my room.
“Just remember that—”
“Mam, I don’t need you wiping the milk from mouth with your robe strings every time you worry, understand?”
She does an about-face at that and gently closes the door to her room.
I should go to Captain Sullivan with this letter, I think. But the more I ponder that, the more I realize how bad of an idea it truly is. I can’t go to the Poplar Street Station because they know who I am. It would be better to go public with this information. But I have to go to someone who does not know who I am or my associations.
That’s when it comes to me. I look at the new suit and smile. After I do this, I’m done. No more gangs, ever. This last gesture I do for my old friends, and maybe, just maybe it will go a long way in helping me feel better about abandoning them.
An hour later and I am at the Western Telegram and Telegraph Company next to the Eagle Warehouses. Two hours after that and I have an appointment.
“You the guy with the telegram to the Daily?” A man with a boater’s hat and sharp eyes with a badly rolled cigarette hanging out of his mouth approaches.
“I am,” says I.
“What’s your hot tip, kid?”
“Are you a reporter?”
He hears the lilt in my voice and nods, “That’s why I’m here, right? What are you all dressed to the nines for? A funeral or a court date?”
I look down at the new suit, “I. . . I work for a law office. I’m an apprentice.”
“Apprentice to a lawyer?” He turns
his mouth at me in doubt. “An Irishman lawyer? That’s a scary thought.”
“Really I’m just an errand boy to start, but maybe one day—”
“Uhright,” he flicks his collapsing cigarette impatiently. “What do you have?”
“Well, something that is terribly illegal that everyone should know about—”
“Spare me the set up, what is it?”
“It’s about Detective William Brosnan, you know—”
“The disappeared detective, yeah I know about him. What do you know?”
“His own son-in-law killed him under the direction of the president of the Waterfront Assembly, Jonathan G. Wolcott. It was Daniel Culkin did it.”
A junk dealer atop an old wooden coach sends a ripple through the reins attached to a pair of barrel-bodied percherons. He gives me a stern look then clicks from the side of his mouth and the horses pull him through the street.
“Where did you hear that, kid?”
“I told you, I work at a law office.”
He pushes his hat to the back of his head and dabs at his brow with a kerchief.
Aftershave, I smell aftershave on him, I think to myself. Very strong. Like he bathed in it.
“So you’re giving up the goods on your boss. Not so smart are you?”
“This is bigger than even he can handle.”
“What’s his name?”
“That doesn’t matter.”
“What’s your name?”
I slowly shake my head at him.
“So you want me to write a cop conspiracy, yeah?”
“I want you to look into it, that’s all.”
“What evidence do you have for me?”
“Culkin and Barry and Wisniewski were together when that building burnt down under strange circumstances on Hoyt Street. Wisniewski is a known, um, consultant of Wolcott’s who recently partnered with Barry,” My stomach begins seizing up on me before I can even begin to tell the lie. “A witness came to the law office. Someone who was in the bar when it caught fire. He overheard them talking about Brosnan.”
“That right?” He stares, then gives a look of frustration.
Shame washes over me in a wave of tingles. I shouldn’t have come forth like this. I’m in over my head again.
A patrolman and the president of a business conspiring to murder a detective is a weighty accusation, but the thought crosses my mind that it may be too big to be true. That although dark lies can be spread about the working class on the waterfront in newspapers without accountability, such irresponsible reporting about members of major power structures would be repressed before ever seeing the light of day.
I should’ve realized this earlier, what’s wrong with me?
He continues, “You expect me to look into something without any evidence pointing to your claim other than three guys among many who were in the same place before a fire? That’s not what I would call a hot tip.”
I think of the envelope in my coat pocket, but that would mean nothing to the reporter, “I. . . It makes a lot of sense to at least put it out there and make them answer to it. The public should be aware.”
“I tell you what,” he says. “I’ll look into it simply because it’d make a big story. A big splash, right? But I need more evidence. Anything. How about a quote from this witness? Or this lawyer you work for, he isn’t willing to go on the record?”
“No.”
“Did the witness pay your boss a retainer?”
“Retainer,” I simply repeat, unsure exactly what that means.
A look of doubt comes across the reporter’s face. But instead of confronting me, he just smiles, “I’ll look into it, that’s all I can say. No promises. Who else have you told?”
“Eh, no one."
“Send me a telegram when you come up with something new,” he turns away and steps down into the cobbles, then sidesteps a pile of horse manure.
“I will,” says I. “Hey, what’s your name?”
He looks back with a new cigarette in his mouth as a train rumbles by overhead on the Fulton line, “Pakenham.”
Pakenham? I know that name.
~~~
The small screen door is pulled back with a crack. An echo falls through St. Ann’s Roman Catholic Church and we assume the aspects of penitent and priest.
Through the lattice window Father Larkin’s darkened face assumes the austerity of his position with a low whistling pant through his nostrils. His lipless and collapsed mouth is pinched by years of spiritual certitude and his brow is a bushy furrow of graying, unkempt hairs. I clasp my sweaty palms together and lower my forehead onto my thumbs in the heavily lacquered confessional box. Already my knees ache and I stumble with the opening words, but it all comes back to me quickly enough.
I touch my forehead, chest, left shoulder, right shoulder, “In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Bless me Father for I have sinned. My last Confession was. . . I think four years ago.”
“In Paul 5:16 it’s said, ‘Confess yer sins, one to another.’ Do ye understand that I’m only here to help? Ye do not confess on me today, ye confess to god. Only god can absolve yer sins. I am but his instrument.”
“Yes Father.”
“God understands that ye may be neglectful at times to confess. Sometimes we do not know the full weight sins bear on our daily lives, and sometimes we sin unknowingly, but four years is a long time.”
“Yes Father.”
“Release yer sins,” he sits back impatiently and dabs at his forehead again. “Tell me how ye’ve sinned.”
“I have sinned, eh. . . I lied to my mother.”
His nose whistles through the lattice window, “We will speak o’ repentance when ye’ve finished, what other sins have ye committed?”
Is hating your haughty Dublin accent a sin? I wonder. “I have eh. . . I have beaten men with my fists.”
“Is the fightin’ necessary?”
“To do my job correctly, it is. I mean was, yes.”
“But it is in self defense?”
“It was to defend my honor and authority as a leader of men. I had taken over as a, eh. . . manager of a territory and if men didn’t respect my word, many bad things could have happened.”
“We usually turn to our work superiors, or the law if our authority is challenged. Why would it be necessary to fight a man? Does yer superior tell ye this is necessary?”
I don’t want to be here. I don’t want to answer your stupid questions. This is all for you, Mam.
“He does. . . Did.”
“This is not self-defense an’ ye’ve sinned,” his tone has scorn in it. “Let me ask ye this, my son. An’ it is my devout hope that ye answer it in truth. . . Have ye ever killt a man?”
I have, but the words catch in my throat. Uncle Joseph would not listen to reason. He was a drunkard and a fool who stumbled into Dinny’s way. He wanted to recruit our men into the longshoreman’s union. I had to convince him to join us or step aside, but he became angry. I had to convince him to help me get Mam and my sisters out of Ireland, but he said family is a burden. I begged him with all of the persuasion I possessed and even offered to leave the gang and join the ILA, but he waved me off. I ran out of time. I failed.
“Son, did ye hear my question?”
I look up through the lattice window. I can only see the silhouette of the priest’s face now. Behind him is a light. I think it’s a candle over his shoulder that wavers here and there, but mostly stands upright. The outline of his shadowed head moves closer, “Son? This is a question o’ mortal sin,” his face almost presses onto the lattice in his annoyance.
I ran out of time. Petey and Matty and Timmy had stormed into McAlpine’s Saloon through pistol smoke, wielding blades and throwing punches. Men began to fall and the only thing uncle Joseph had to say in his anger was that my mother and father were dead. Even my sisters, ‘Dead, all of’em!’ he screamed. I was only fifteen years old and I had but one job to complete: Bring my mother and sisters to
New York. Yet no one would help me. My own blood, uncle Joseph scoffed at the notion. Only Dinny Meehan would help.
“Son, do ye hear me?”
It was Dinny Meehan who sent me to Mr. Lynch from the County Claremen’s Evicted Tenant’s Protective and Industrial Association in Greenwich Village. With the help of Mr. Lynch I was able to sneak letters to the farm in Tulla during the war. And it was Dinny Meehan who gave me work. I was able to make more money as a runner and a dockloader than most immigrants in New York, and when the war was over, I bought my mother and sisters tickets for passage. Only Dinny Meehan stood with me in my time of need and to complete the job my father had tasked me with. Uncle Joseph deserved to die. He deserved it, yet still I am filled with the shame. It is wrong, what I done. And yet still it was right. The church says when a child dies unbaptized it goes to limbo, yet I feel I am there already, hovering, fixed over a constant position of change. Forever at dawn, forced to choose.
Father Larkin bangs a fist against the confessional box, “William Garrity, are ye listenin’ to even a single word that comes from me, are ye?”
“Yes Father.”
Through the lattice window Father Larkin’s face is flushed, his eyes ablaze of anger as the light over his shoulder shimmers, “I remember the first time ye came to Mass here at St. Ann’s. Ye were a good child then, innocent. But Dinny Meehan’s men came in and dragged ye out like sheep to slaughter. I warned them not to hurt ye. But Dinny Meehan fashions himself as some savior and provider for the poor. But the poor already have god, they do. I am breakin’ the oaths o’ my office here, I know. But it can’t be helped. Dark times call for dark decisions, an’ I’ve made mine here an’ now. Listen to me closely. Detective William Brosnan, a man who served Irishtown since the day he came off the boat has. . . I remember him so well because he came into his police work in this parish the same year I had become a priest at St. Ann’s just months before the Great Blizzard o’ 1888.”
Divide the Dawn- Fight Page 49
