By the time we went back into school, the blessed feeling had completely worn off. Sunk deep in misery, I didn’t hear Sister Frances until her pointer whacked across my desk and made me jump.
“Take the cotton out of your ears, Rose. Stand and read the story you wrote.”
I picked up my reader and flipped through the pages with sweaty hands. At least I had it memorized.
“Not from your reader. Listen!” Her hand tweaked my ear and I yelped with pain. “The story you wrote.”
I fumbled with my scribbler as she moved a few desks away. My one-and-a-half sentences looked lonely in the middle of the mostly empty page. I held the book up high so Sister Frances couldn’t see them. Part of my brain registered the classroom door opening and a rustle of cloth. Who had left the room? Or had come in?
My hands shook. Suddenly I knew what to do. I’d tell the story. It was right inside me.
“Ireland was starving. It was 1847 in the middle of the famine.” I moved my eyes from side to side to pretend I was reading. “My—My great-grandmother Rose—Rose,” I repeated, stumbling over the words. “She could not earn money for food for her four children and my great-grandpa Albert was dead.” Slowly I picked up the rhythm of my story and the words flowed more easily.
“One day the bailiff came to the cottage. ‘The English landlord says you will have to leave,’ he said.
“‘Where will I go?’ asked Rose.
“‘The poorhouse,’ said the bailiff. He didn’t care where Rose went, as long as she left.
“But Rose knew if you went into the poorhouse, you never came out again—alive. She went to the village priest, who gave her money to go to Canada. Rose made a small bundle of her belongings and gathered up her four children. With thousands of other evicted tenants, they walked many days to the seaside, Rose carrying the youngest child. My grandma, who was four years old, walked all the way.” I finished in a rush and sat down, relief weakening my legs. I had done it. I had read my story.
“Yes, well. Very good,” Sister Frances said grudgingly.
I smiled at her.
“Please turn in your scribbler so I can check your spelling.” Sister Frances held out her hand.
The smile slid from my face. Turn in my scribbler?
“Now, Rose.”
I couldn’t move from my seat.
A huge black cloud, Sister Frances sailed down the aisle toward me. Every head turned to watch as she passed, though no one made a sound. An angry Sister Frances was not to be crossed. She stopped in front of my desk. I tried to slip my notebook underneath my reader, but she snatched it away. The paper crackled as she flipped to the page where I’d written my one-and-ahalf sentences. Her nostrils flared.
“Stand up,” she yelled.
I scrambled to my feet.
“This is your story?” She jabbed the page with a stubby finger.
“Yes, Sister,” I whispered. “I had trouble writing it down. It was all in my head, though. It really was, so that’s almost like writing it.”
“Trouble writing it? You have used no punctuation, there are no spaces between your words—if you can call these scribbles that look like a chicken crossed your page words. No one could make sense of this—this . . .” She threw the book down on my desk and thrust her face into mine. “Do you know what you are? Do you know what you are?” Spittle flew from her mouth to my cheek, but I dared not wipe it off.
Terrified, I shook my head.
“You are a liar. A lazy liar and a wicked girl. You are a wicked girl,” Sister Frances repeated. “And do you know where wicked girls go?”
“Yes, Sister,” I mumbled. “They go down there.” I pointed to my feet.
“Yes. They go directly to Hell.”
To Hell? I thought she had meant the principal’s office on the floor beneath us.
I heard a soft gasp from the back of the classroom. I wanted to turn and see who was there, but Sister Frances hit the side of my head a stinging blow.
“Go to the principal and take your scribbler. You will give her a full explanation.”
The other students were completely silent, shocked to see right before them a girl headed to Hell. Ear ringing from the slap, I ran out of the room. I ventured one quick sideways glance to see Sister Therese at the back of the classroom, face distraught. It was she who had come in earlier.
As I closed the door, pent-up tears streamed down my face. I had disgraced myself. I had disgraced Mam and Da.
The principal’s office door was closed, so I stood beside it in the hall. School let out for the morning and still the door remained closed. The girls filed by, tossing curious glances my way, but no one spoke to me. Miserable and scared, I kept my eyes on the floor. I wished I could pray, but I found I couldn’t. Didn’t want to, in fact. Praying had got me into this mess in the first place. If I hadn’t asked for so many things for myself, God would never have needed to punish me. I had no one but myself to blame. But still . . . I felt let down.
“I’m disappointed in you, God.”
“I beg your pardon?” Sister Therese had come up behind me.
“Nothing, Sister,” I mumbled.
“Oh, Rose.” She sighed. “You are in a spot of trouble. Can I see your notebook?”
I handed it to her and hung my head in shame. I knew what she was seeing: black ink blots, half-formed words, holes in pages where I’d erased so many times the paper was worn away.
“Every time I use a pen, I break the nib or the ink spatters. I tried to use a pencil, but I erased too much,” I said. “I can’t write the words, though I know what I want to say . . .” My voice trailed off.
Sister Therese closed the scribbler. “I suspect the problem may be that you see things differently than we do, Rose,” she said. “I’ve had other students like that.”
The door to the principal’s office opened. Sister Maria Cecilia came out and directed a raised eyebrow my way. “Why are you here?”
My heart pounded.
“Sister Frances sent me,” I said.
“May I see you a moment before you speak with Rose?” Sister Therese asked.
The principal nodded, and Sister Therese carried my notebook into the office and closed the door behind her. A few minutes later she came out, notebook gone. “The principal will see you now,” she said. She laid a reassuring hand on my shoulder, then went down the hall.
I went into the principal’s office, sure she must hear the loud thumps of my heart. They deafened me. Sister Maria Cecilia sat behind the desk, my notebook open in front of her. She studied it for several moments, then leaned back and folded her hands out of sight inside the sleeves of her habit.
“Well?”
I stuttered and fell all over my words as I tried to explain. When I finished, she turned page after page of my unsightly work. Finally, she closed the notebook.
“Lying is a terrible habit to get into and, like most habits, difficult to break,” she said sternly.
I nodded. Father McManus would give me a stack of Hail Marys and Our Fathers for this one.
“I will send a note home to your mother and father. Sister Frances says you are lazy and inattentive, though Sister Therese does not share that opinion. She says you try hard but find it difficult to learn. She’s offered to give you extra help if you wish.” Sister Maria Cecilia opened a desk drawer and took out a piece of paper. “Either way, I’m very much afraid you will be kept back at the end of the year if your work does not show marked improvement between now and then.”
“I can’t be kept back again,” I protested. “I’ll be in my little sister’s class if I’m held back.”
“This type of thing won’t do, Rose.” She gestured toward my notebook. “You can’t write or spell or do proper arithmetic. We can’t possibly allow you to go on to the next grade when you’re obviously not ready. You can step into the hall and think about that while I write this letter to your parents.”
I did as she asked and waited outside the door. What woul
d the letter to Mam and Da say? I suddenly held my head up. That was it. I was never coming back to school. Never. And I wouldn’t take this letter home to Mam. In fact, I wouldn’t go back home at all. I’d—I’d go into service like Aunt Helen had suggested. My thoughts skidded off in every direction and my chest heaved as I tried to make plans.
Winnie pounced on me as soon as I left the school.
“Did you get a whipping, Rose?” she asked. Her eyes were like saucers. “Everyone said you’d get a whipping. They said you’d done something awful. A mortal sin, Catherine said.”
“I didn’t get a whipping, and how on earth would Catherine know what a mortal sin is? She’s not even Catholic,” I yelled at Winnie.
“What happened, then?”
“Winnie, leave me alone. Go home. You’re not to tell Mam or Da about any of this.”
“But where are you going?”
The boys were starting to arrive for their afternoon classes. I was afraid I’d see Ernest—or worse, Patrick. I had to leave, fast.
“I just want to be alone for a little bit,” I told Winnie impatiently. “Tell Mam I . . . had an errand. I’ll be home soon.”
Winnie took off down the hill at a run, wild with excitement. I knew she’d tell everyone she met that I had got a whipping, even though I hadn’t. That was just Winnie. I wouldn’t be able to show my face for a year. The older girls would never talk to me now, but it didn’t matter as I was never coming back. I walked rapidly in the opposite direction from our house. Tears started up again, though I told myself to stop. I didn’t cry pretty like Mary. I looked a frightful mess with red-rimmed eyes and a runny nose. But I couldn’t help myself. Right there in the middle of the road I sobbed. I didn’t know where to go. There was no place to escape me.
Chapter 8
You can’t stand in the middle of the street crying, I scolded myself. What if Great-grandmother Rose had stood in front of her cottage in Ireland and wept instead of getting on the ship for Canada? I knew what I had to do. I just had to find the gumption to do it. I closed my eyes a moment and tried to picture the way Mary and I had gone on the streetcar to the south side of Halifax. I could see in my mind the stores and houses we passed, the turns we made. It would take me longer to walk, but I felt confident I could find my way. Once there, I would hire myself out as a maid at one of the big houses. It would mean leaving Mam and Da, but I pushed that thought right out of my head.
I started on my way before my brain could tell me I was scared. Wind whipped up from the harbour, biting cold, but three days into December had seen little snow. I pulled my coat close and walked rapidly to keep warm. A small thrill ran through me. An adventure. I walked past shops and peered in the windows. I enjoyed the feel of the hard sidewalk beneath my boots rather than dirt. A sidewalk made me hold my back straighter, and, I thought, lent me an air of importance.
Then, all at once, my stomach growled and my legs ached and the skies opened to pour an icy rain on me. Thoughts of Mam setting out bread and preserves haunted me. She would pour hot tea from the brown everyday pot. Suddenly, I felt as if I’d been away for years.
A good part of the afternoon had passed when I stopped in front of a large, white-framed house. I looked up and down the deserted street. My neighbourhood bustled with life; women called to each other from their doorways as they shook out mats and mops, delivery wagons crowded the streets and children darted everywhere. The quiet here made me vaguely uneasy.
As I had walked from north to south, the houses had become larger and farther apart. It would be a pretty street in the summer when the trees were in full leaf, but right now it looked bare and unfriendly. I stepped up to the fence surrounding the house and peered over it. A porch stretched across the entire front. Mam would like that. She’d often told Da how nice it would be to have a porch out front rather than a step to sit on in the warm weather. Da had said he’d make her one when he had a spare moment. Mam had replied she wouldn’t hold her breath in that case. It was like I’d left them already.
Wet through, I shivered violently as I shifted from foot to foot, wondering how to approach the house. Did I go to the front door or the back? I had heard somewhere that maids didn’t go in front doors in big houses. In fact, we seldom used our front door at home, even though we had a small house. I craned my neck to see into the side yard. There was a door there. Would that do? I lost my gumption at that point and moved down the street. I stopped in front of each large house I came to, but I couldn’t force my feet to go up to any of them. What if the woman there asked me a question and I didn’t know the proper answer? What if they asked me to read something—like a shopping list? No one would hire a girl who couldn’t read a shopping list.
I arrived at the last house on the street, and stood in the shelter of the trunk of a large tree. I felt desperate now because I’d wasted so much time, so I took a step into the yard. A blur of snarling fur flew around the corner of the house. I turned and ran as fast as I could. I darted a quick glance over my shoulder to see if I’d outrun the dog, then crashed into someone, fell and rolled across the lawn. I propped myself up on hands and knees to see a young girl being helped to her feet by an older one. Paper, pencils and a school bag littered the lawn, flung from the force of our collision. I scrambled on all fours to gather up the now soaked scribblers, and shoved them back in the bag. I stood and held the book-bag out to the little girl.
“Sorry,” I muttered.
The older one snatched it out of my hand and glared at me. “You should be more careful. What are you doing here on our property?” she asked. She looked to be my age.
“I . . . I . . .”
“You don’t come from around here,” she said. “She’s not from around here,” she repeated to her younger sister. “That’s a poor girl’s coat.”
Surprised, I glanced down at my jacket, new to me this year, even if it had been Mary’s at one time. All in one piece and with no patches—I couldn’t see anything poor about it. The two girls were dressed in matching navy coats with red hats, though the younger girl’s tilted over one ear from her fall. They weren’t hand-medown coats. The older girl had gloves, the younger one, mittens. I envied her those mittens as my hands were numb from cold.
“Does your mother need a maid?” I asked. I cringed, fearing her answer. I hoped her mother did, but I hoped more that she didn’t.
“A maid?” The older girl laughed. “You don’t look like a maid to me. You’re covered in mud and you are far too skinny.”
She pushed past me and went up the sidewalk toward the house. The younger girl stared at me curiously.
“Did I hurt you?” I asked.
“No.” She smiled a bit. “Are you cold?”
I nodded.
“Do you want to come in for tea?”
The older girl ran back, grabbed her sister’s hand and gave it a vicious shake. “You don’t ask maids in for tea!” She turned to me. “You better go now or I’ll tell my mother.”
I knew her type. Another Catherine. “Bossy,” I whispered.
The younger girl grinned while the older one glowered at me. I quickly backed away and hurried down the street. I didn’t want to be a maid anymore.
The December afternoon darkened rapidly. Blackout regulations because of the war meant no street lights and house windows draped in heavy curtains. I stumbled, unable to see clearly. I had walked too far. My legs would never carry me back to our warm kitchen. I’d never see Mam or Da again.
Head lowered against the rain, I put one foot in front of the other. A motor car passed, its wheels throwing up a sheet of water. I jumped aside, then realized it didn’t matter. I couldn’t get any wetter. Horses’ hooves rang on the road beside me. Please, God. Let me get home safely. If You do, I’ll never ask for anything again.
“Rose?”
My heart stopped. God had answered me directly.
“Rose Dunlea? Is that you?” For some reason, God sounded like Duncan.
My befuddled brain soo
n told me it was Duncan. He pulled up on the horses’ reins and stopped the milk wagon.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
“Finishing my milk deliveries, but more importantly, what are you doing here? Does your mother know where you are?”
A sudden picture came to me of Mam wild with worry. Ashamed I hadn’t thought of that before, I shook my head. To my dismay, I began to cry.
Duncan jumped down from the wagon and lifted me up onto the seat. He whipped off his coat and wrapped it around me. “Let’s get you home before you get pneumonia.”
We rode in silence for a few minutes, Duncan shooting worried glances at me. “Well, your lips aren’t quite so blue now,” he said.
I did feel warmer wrapped in Duncan’s coat, though my teeth chattered non-stop.
“What are you doing so far from home, Rose?” he asked.
My voice shook and my nose dripped as the story poured out of me: the composition about Great-grandmother Rose, how I couldn’t read, Sister Frances, the letter for Mam and Da, becoming a maid, the girls in the navy coats. As I talked I watched his eyebrows lower until they formed an angry straight line above his eyes. He was mad at me. He thought I was dumb.
“D‒U‒M‒B,” I spelled out loud. Strangely, I knew I had got it right.
“Who’s dumb?” Duncan asked.
“I am.” Tears flowed. I’d had no idea there was so much water in me. I must have saved up an entire year’s worth just for today.
Duncan fished in his pocket and handed me his handkerchief. I mopped my eyes, balled it up and pushed it into my coat pocket.
“I didn’t know you delivered milk this far away,” I ventured after a while.
“It’s not far when you’re riding.” He smiled at me, and I felt a tiny bit better.
“We deliver all over Halifax. Our dairy’s well known,” he said, a hint of pride in his voice.
“Do you deliver to Horse’s house?”
“Who?”
“I mean Horace’s house. He lives here.”
Duncan’s face clouded over. “I might. Which one is his?”
Irish Chain Page 7
