Last Port of Call: The Queenstown Series

by Jean Grainger

  ‘I’m going home. As JohnJoe says, you have to die somewhere, and ’tisn’t like I’d have eternal life in America either. I want it to be at home, surrounded by my animals. I’ve thought about what you said, and I’m going to take your advice, move into town, start a little clinic. And Edward will just have to enjoy his oranges without me.’ She chuckled. ‘Now go, they’re closing the gangway.’

  The last stragglers were saying teary goodbyes, and the pursers were calling for the last remaining passengers to board the ship. Molly gripped her bag with one hand, slung her handbag over her shoulder with the other, seized the ticket and nodded at Eleanor, unable to speak.

  ‘Go…for God’s sake, before he comes back.’ Eleanor laughed.

  Molly showed her ticket and climbed the gangway, the last passenger aboard RMS Laconia. The dockers pulled the gangway onto quayside, and the embarkation door of the tender was sealed for sailing.

  Eleanor stood and watched as the ropes were cast and the boat bore the last of the passengers away from the quayside, out to the Laconia and a new life. She smiled to herself. Sure as she was that the sun set in the west over Benbulbin, she knew she would never go to America.

  She turned and walked back to the railing, and there they were, as she knew they would be, waiting patiently for her. ‘What shall we call you then?’ she asked, untying the pieces of twine as the dogs licked her hands delightedly. ‘Good idea, Poppy,’ she answered, as if the dog had spoken. ‘Patch and Poppy it is. I wonder what Bonnie will make of you two? She’s an old lady now, like me, so mind you two youngsters treat her with respect, do you hear me?’

  She set off in the direction of the station. Mr Quinn was there with his sign, just like yesterday, four new names written on it, collecting a new group of people, all destined to sleep at the Cliff House.

  ‘Ah, Mr Quinn.’ She walked up to him with a smile. ‘Would you pass a message to Mrs Delaney and Harp for me please?’

  ‘Certainly, Miss Kind, what is it?’ he asked with a smile, taking in the two dogs gazing adoringly at her.

  ‘Could you tell them that I went home?’

  ‘Home to Sligo?’ he asked, incredulous.

  ‘Yes, home to Sligo. A pair of very wise young people showed me the error of my ways and told me I have to die somewhere. It might as well be where I want.’ She grinned and hoisted her bag on her shoulder.

  He grinned. ‘The bright lights of Broadway not for you then?’

  She shook her head. ‘No indeed, and I had to come to the brink of Ireland to discover that.’

  Chapter 24

  Molly tried to get used to dry land, but it still felt like everything was moving. The voyage had been arduous. She was sick the entire time despite Danny’s information about the new anti-roll bars or whatever they were supposed to be. Her cabin shared a bathroom with the cabin next door, and whoever was in there had locked the door permanently from their side – they must have wedged a heavy suitcase against it or something – resulting in her having to find a bucket to throw up into.

  One girl in her cabin said she could no longer stand the stench of vomit, so she left to sleep in the dining area, forbidden apparently, but she had been free with her favours with the steward and was allowed to stay there. The fourth bunk was unoccupied, and the one opposite was taken by a girl from Dublin called Meg, who was joining her brother and sister in Pennsylvania. She assured Molly that she worked on a pig farm in Dublin so her sense of smell was long gone. She advised to remain lying down. Her sister had been very seasick also when she went over and had told Meg to lie down and stay that way until they docked. She kindly brought Molly water and dry bread, all she could stomach.

  Molly thought of Sean and Gwen on the same ship, the only people she knew, but they could do nothing for her, and besides, she couldn’t make conversation. In her more lucid moments, she tried to compose a letter to her parents, and another to poor Finbarr, but she couldn’t. Though she felt awful for slipping away as she had – lying and treachery were not in her nature – her heart sang at the thought of finally reaching the convent.

  Arrival at the port had been long and exhausting. They were checked into the arrivals hall, and there were endless tests, medical assessments, questions and forms. She was weak and her head was pounding, but Meg advised her to buck up or they might put her in quarantine, or worse, turn her back. The name on her ticket was Miss E Kind, but thankfully no further paperwork was required, so she just answered to that name.

  She drank a nip of brandy Meg had in her bag for medicinal purposes and ate a sweet bun and did feel marginally better. Thankfully she got through all the checks and found herself eventually in the terminal building. She had no American money but there was a change office, so she took the remaining money she had from the housekeeping jar at home and exchanged it for American dollars. It seemed a paltry sum, and she just hoped it was enough to get her to Somerville. She remembered Sister Brid saying it was not far from the city and that the sisters worked in the poorer areas of South Boston, where a lot of Irish immigrants had settled, so it couldn’t be too far. She could walk if she didn’t have enough money for the bus.

  A uniformed man who could have been a ticket inspector was standing on the kerbside, and she decided to approach him. She’d dressed in a clean dress and tried to brush her teeth in the large communal washroom near the dining room on board the ship, but she suspected she smelled as awful as she felt.

  ‘Excuse me, sir, could you tell me how to get to Somerville please?’ she asked.

  The answer was given so quickly and seemed to be made almost entirely of the ‘ah’ sound. She thought he said something like ‘streetcar’ and another word like ‘haavaah’, but she had no idea what that might be. His arm pointed to the right, so she walked in that direction.

  As she rounded a corner, a narrow-gauge railway snaked on the ground beneath her feet. She saw several small railway carriages and saw ‘Harvard’ written on the front of one. Was that the word the man was saying?

  ‘Excuse me?’ she asked a foreign-looking woman standing beside the railway car, a child in each hand. She had brown skin and was dressed in the most colourful robes Molly had ever seen. Each arm was adorned in gold bangles, and in the middle of her forehead was a red dot. The little children in her arms had huge brown eyes.

  ‘Yes?’ she answered, her English accented.

  ‘Is this the way to get to Somerville?’

  ‘Somerville?’ she repeated. Her brow furrowed. ‘Yes, Harvard, near, yes.’

  Hoping Somerville was near this Harvard place, whatever that might be, Molly stepped aboard. The driver, a dark-skinned man, then appeared and she thought she might get a chance to ask him, but he jumped into the seat and was moving before she had time to sit down. The streetcar left the port with a ‘ding, ding, ding’. People walking on the track jumped out of the way to safety. It was like nowhere she’d ever been.

  She settled her large frame into the small streetcar seat and gazed out the window. This was Boston. She could hardly believe it. She’d done it; she’d seized the day.

  Sean O’Sullivan stood tall and to attention as the inspection agent eyed him up and down. He had his eyelids pulled back by the dreaded buttonhook, the crude method of checking for trachoma Paddy warned about in his letters. Gwen was fifty feet away in the women’s queue, which the Americans called ‘a line’.

  The inspection only lasted seconds, and he was waved on to the next station. His hair was checked for lice; his teeth and ears were also examined. The inspection officers didn’t see him as a person; he was just another unit to be processed.

  He allowed his bag to go into the pile of luggage to be checked, but in his inside pocket he kept his money.

  He’d asked the purser on their first day at sea if the ship’s captain would marry him and Gwen but was told that it was a service for first-class passengers only. They’d resigned themselves to having to wait until they got to America, but one evening he and Gwen were walking the de
ck and overheard one of the officers tell another that a horse had made itself lame by kicking out the box. The animal was valuable, having been bred in Ireland, and was being transported to Kentucky for racing.

  Sean offered to help, explaining he knew a thing or two about horses, and was taken down to the stables in the bowels of the ship. There was a terrified stallion, eyes rolling. He’d kicked and reared up on anyone who tried to go near him. The rolling of the ship was distressing the poor animal. Sean urged the rest of the crew to stand back and risked entering the stable. The animal kicked and reared, but Sean remained calm and after two hours managed to soothe the animal enough that the vet could sedate him and treat his injury. Sean visited every few hours after that and was the only person the stallion would allow near the box.

  On the last day of the voyage, having visited the stallion after breakfast, he and Gwen were taking the air on the third-class deck, discussing what they might do once they landed, when a purser came to find him.

  ‘Mr O’Sullivan? The captain would like a word, sir,’ he said respectfully.

  Sean looked at Gwen nervously. Would Major Pearson have connections that could stop them in their tracks? He followed the man to the bridge, where the captain was enjoying a cup of tea, his navy uniform, with its gold braid and hat, looking resplendent. He was a slight man with a white beard and twinkling eyes.

  ‘Ah, Mr O’Sullivan, I believe?’ he boomed as Sean entered.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Sean replied, trying to gauge what was going on.

  ‘I owe you a debt, I believe. Mr Hodges, the veterinarian, tells me we would have surely lost that stallion had you not been able to use some kind of sorcery to calm the beast down in order that Hodges could look at the injuries the animal sustained.’

  Sean heaved a sigh of relief. ‘Well, he was never at sea before, sir. He was terrified,’ Sean said. ‘The horse I mean, not the vet,’ he added, feeling foolish.

  ‘Indeed.’ The captain chuckled. ‘Terrified and terrifying if the accounts of my officers are to be believed. But nonetheless you were able to save the day, so I just wanted to thank you. Now, I believe you are travelling with your fiancée? Would you both like to dine at my table tonight? As my guests? I’m quite sure the owner of the horse, who will be there, would be delighted to hear your theories on management of the animal in the future. He paid rather a lot of money for him, I believe, so will be anxious to get the best out of him.’

  ‘I… Well, yes, we’d love to, but I’m afraid we don’t have the right clothes, sir…’ Sean said.

  ‘Oh, don’t worry about that, my dear chap. We’ll sort you and your lady out in that regard easily enough. Do you two plan to marry in Boston?’ the captain asked, checking some dials on the bridge and murmuring an instruction to his first officer.

  ‘Well…’ Sean paused. ‘It was our hope to marry on the ship, but we were refused since we’re not first-class passengers…’

  ‘Oh! Well, my dear boy, if I can do the honours, I’d be more than happy to. Believe me, our equine friend was causing quite a headache and your intervention is worth at least that small favour. How about the pursers sort yourself and your fiancée out with something smart to wear and we’ll perform the ceremony before dinner?’

  Sean beamed. ‘Thank you, sir. That would be smashing.’

  ‘Jolly good.’ He turned back to his bridge.

  The next few hours were a whirl of activity. Sean was kitted out in evening attire and Gwen in a stunning scarlet dress. They even found a ladies’ maid to do her hair and make-up. She looked divine.

  The marriage was performed on the first-class deck as the sun set over the Atlantic. The glints of gold on the azure ocean created the most romantic backdrop, and once the first-class passengers heard of the magical horseman, many of them turned out to witness the wedding, clapping as Captain Ellingsworth proclaimed them man and wife. Sean kissed Gwen as the ship’s band played, and he felt his heart might burst with joy.

  There followed a lovely evening of fine food and music, and Sean and Gwen were surprised with the news that the Kentucky horse owner had paid for them to have a first-class cabin for their wedding night. They made love for hours and afterwards stayed awake all night talking about the amazing job offer for Sean at Dora Creek, a large racing yard on the outskirts of Lexington, Kentucky. Their future looked very bright indeed.

  Most of their fellow passengers were heading to South Boston, where so many people from Ireland had gone before. There was work there, and in what seemed to be a predominately Irish enclave of the vast country, the men and women they travelled with were hoping to find a welcome, a job and a home.

  He would write to Paddy once he was settled in Kentucky. Paddy and his brothers had a fine set-up in Rhode Island, and it would have been ideal had this better opportunity not arisen. Paddy had not married – he was a confirmed bachelor – and neither had two of his brothers. His third brother had married an American girl but she died in childbirth, so he sent the child home to Ireland to be raised by his sister and mother and he lived in a house with his brothers.

  Sean remembered that the Nestor household was rough and ready in Carlow, and that was under the care of his Aunt Maggie, Paddy’s mother, so he dreaded to think what sort of lodgings would have awaited him and Gwen in a place run by four Irish bachelors. He was glad to be spared that.

  He was determined to work day and night if he could. The job came with living quarters and everything. And when they’d told Mr Masterson, the owner of the stallion, that Gwen was a champion hunter, he was very interested. He said he’d surely find something for her to do too. He had a racing school for up-and-coming young people who showed promise, training flat and jump jockeys, and Gwen could perhaps teach there. They’d barely been able to contain their excitement that America had more opportunities for women. In the early hours of the morning, she fell asleep, her body curled around his.

  He watched her face in repose and wondered if he was dreaming. This amazing woman was always on his side, always positive, and now she was his wife. He could hardly believe it. He loved sleeping with her soft curves curled into him, he loved the smell of her hair, the peal of her infectious laugh, the touch of her hand. She was beautiful, and with her by his side, he could do anything.

  ‘Name?’ the clerk behind the counter barked as he approached the final booth.

  ‘Sean O’Sullivan,’ he said loudly and clearly.

  A series of stamps, and the bored-looking young man slid his papers under the glass at him. Five minutes later, ten booths down, Gwen came through. She grasped her stamped cards in her hand and ran to him. He scooped her up in his arms, swinging her around. They were in; they’d made it.

  Chapter 25

  JohnJoe must have checked the clock in the kitchen fifty times as they ate their breakfast.

  ‘He’ll be on the one o’clock train, JohnJoe,’ Harp said gently, spooning honey on her porridge.

  Danny had been in hospital for three weeks and was by all accounts well on the road to recovery. A letter from America awaited him on the hallstand, and Harp and JohnJoe had examined it closely. The writing was scrawly but not uneducated, and the name and address were written correctly.

  ‘We could steam it open?’ Harp suggested one day after it had sat there for almost a week. ‘We could use the kettle to melt the gum on the envelope and then reseal it?’

  ‘But it’s so wrong…’ JohnJoe said.

  But Harp knew he longed to know the contents. His entire future was contained therein. ‘Yes, technically it is, but if it was me, I would open it. You’re being shoved around like a pawn on a chessboard, JohnJoe, nobody telling you anything about what’s going to happen to you, and that’s not right, is it?’ she asked. She knew her mother would be horrified at them opening a letter addressed to someone else, but in this case she believed the ends justified the means.

  Since Danny’s injury, JohnJoe and she had become very close friends. They had cleared the stables out in just a few days
and had been astounded at the treasures they found. Boxes of books certainly, but lots of china, crystal, even some paintings that had been placed in timber boxes and survived the years reasonably well. Harp suggested her mother have them valued, and a man came from the auction house in Cork and estimated they were worth quite a bit. He explained that at various times in Irish history, houses such as theirs came under attack as symbols of British occupation of Ireland, so it was not uncommon for families such as the Devereauxes to hide treasures in obscure places.

  ‘Did Mr Devereaux know about these things, do you think?’ Harp asked her mother one evening as JohnJoe was whitewashing the stables. They were admiring a painting of a field the man told them was a Constable.

  ‘I don’t think so. He would surely have said it in the letter if he did.’

  ‘So what will we do? Should we give them to Ralph?’ Harp’s brow was furrowed.

  ‘Indeed we will not!’ Rose exclaimed. ‘This house and its contents were left to you, so we should keep them. Besides, the roof is leaking and the windows at the back badly need to be replaced, and there are so many other jobs need doing. I think we should sell them and use the money to repair the house.’

  Harp smiled. ‘ I suppose. Besides, we haven’t heard from Ralph since he got the letter from the solicitors informing him of the will, so we can safely assume he has no interest in us or the Cliff House, so –’

  ‘He wrote.’ Her mother’s words were quiet.

  ‘What? Who wrote?’

  ‘Ralph Devereaux. He wrote to say he was coming.’

  ‘When?’ Harp tried to quell the panic.

  ‘I don’t know. He didn’t say. Look, Harp, you know what Mr Smythe said – the will would be difficult to challenge, and with the affidavits confirming you as heir, it should all be fine…’

  Harp heard the uncertainty in her mother’s voice. She was terrified, as was Harp herself now.