The Callahans: The Complete Series

by Gordon Ryan

  “Katie, you gave Tommy the responsibility for his brother.”

  “Tom, stop it. He’s only twelve years old. He’s just a boy. And besides, how could you expect a twelve-year-old to control a seven-year-old?”

  “But he was supposed to do a man’s job, Katie. I was doing a man’s job at twelve. He failed. It’s as simple as that. And his brother is dead. Gone. Never to return.”

  The tears had returned to Katrina’s eyes as she saw the anger beginning to form in Tom’s.

  “As God is my witness, Thomas, he is not to blame for this tragedy. You must understand that.”

  “What I understand, Katie, is that I sent my family to Europe intact, and that you gave instructions to Tommy to watch his brother. He didn’t do that, and now Benjamin is dead. That was a cowardly act, no matter how old he is. That’s what I understand,” Tom said, standing again, and picking up the telephone.

  Katrina rose to come and stand by his side, trying to convince him of the error of his position. As she started to speak again, Tom raised his hand, the palm facing toward Katrina.

  “Yes. Room Service, please—Room Service? Breakfast for four in the Constitutional Suite, as soon as possible.”

  He hung up the phone, and Katrina could see that her husband had taken on the intransigence she had so often observed in his decision-making process. Tom walked to the bedroom, toward the lavatory, while Katrina stood by the telephone table, tears blurring her vision. She heard a sound behind her and turned to look. For an instant, she locked eyes with Tommy, who stood behind the slightly ajar bedroom door, tears running down his cheeks. Then the young lad silently closed the door.

  The Callahans

  The Complete Series

  Book Three

  Reunion

  Copyright 2011 Gordon Ryan

  Chapter 1

  Salt Lake City, Utah

  February, 1916

  On Tuesday morning, the second week in February 1916, Tom began a solitary drive from Salt Lake City to Price, Utah, a mining town located high in the southern end of the Wasatch Mountains. Hoping that snow would not block the mountain pass at Soldier’s Summit, he drove down the valley, through the small towns of Murray, Sandy, and Draper, toward Utah Valley and Daniel’s Canyon. The newly graveled road was fairly smooth, and Tom was enjoying the sense of speed provided by the steady thirty-five miles an hour he was able to achieve in his new 1915 Pierce Arrow touring car. The day was clear and mild, and it would have been a pleasant drive except for his concern over continuing labor troubles at the Winter Quarters Mine, located near the coal mining town of Helper. Strikes had plagued the Utah mining industry for nearly ten years, and if the prognosis from the majority of mine owners was to be believed, it was only going to get worse.

  It was ironic that many of the mine owners were first- or second-generation Americans themselves, yet to a man, they resented and mistrusted the immigrants who made up the work force and who had banded together to demand concessions from management.

  Tom’s bank’s investment holdings in coal had increased sharply two years earlier, following Tom and Robert’s correct analysis of the potential to be gained from the outbreak of war in Europe. Steel, the lifeblood of any modern war, was badly needed. Steel mills required coal, and so, UTB had moved thirty-five percent of its investment capital into steel mills and coal mines.

  As a result of several timely business opportunities, Robert Thurston’s astute management, and Tom’s instincts and increasing knowledge of the business, Utah Trust Bank had, in the nearly twenty years since its founding in 1897, increased its assets from approximately five million dollars to roughly two hundred million dollars. Tom held sixty-five percent of the stock, which included the one-third interest he had long-since repurchased from Gary Simonsen, the man in San Francisco who had bought Tom’s Alaskan gold claims and become his initial partner in UTB.

  As President of UTB, Robert Thurston had exercised share options to acquire an eight percent ownership over the preceding eighteen years. Tom had privately donated five percent of UTB stock to Holy Cross Hospital. He had also set aside ten percent in Katrina’s personal account under her direct control, and had established four percent custodial accounts for each of his children, to be held in trust until their emancipation at age twenty-one. All in all, Tom had long since personally passed the hundred million dollar net worth mark, and each of his children had trusts worth several million dollars apiece, although only Katrina, and Robert as executor, knew of the arrangement. Tom and Katrina had agreed to keep their children’s personal wealth a secret from them until they had shown they could handle the money properly.

  UTB and the Callahan family had come a long way since Tom’s runaway journey up the mighty Yukon River in the summer of ’96, and his trip back down that same river in ’97, bearing crates of Alaskan gold dust.

  The war in Europe had created a situation where fortunes could be won or lost, practically overnight—a situation, Tom understood, that made it imperative to make sound and timely economic decisions. With more at stake, effective management was more critical now than it had been in the early days of the bank’s existence. America had gotten her nose bloodied on a couple of international issues, and it was becoming more and more apparent that some U.S. involvement in the European war would be required. Coal would become all the more important. If the flow to the steel mills were to be interrupted, Tom could foresee military intervention to ensure the mines kept operating. That meant government involvement and a variety of inspectors sticking their noses into operations. The meeting of the major shareholders of Winter Quarters Mine, held the day before in Park City, was called to forestall any such government action and resulted in Tom being asked to travel to Price to sort things out.

  Tom pulled his new sedan off the main road and drove into Provo. Katrina had tried very hard to get Teresa to attend the church college there, but she had insisted instead on entering the University of Utah, just up the hill from their home on South Temple. It was hard for Tom to imagine Teresa in college. Barely sixteen, she had overshadowed both her brothers in academics and extracurricular activities, finishing high school at fifteen.

  Thinking about the difference between Tess and Tommy, Tom shook his head. Tommy was just as bright as his twin sister, but he seldom applied himself, except in planning mischief. Getting by on his native intelligence and doing just enough at critical times, Tommy had also finished high school at fifteen. But his was not an unblemished record. Sprinkled with some outstanding marks, it was also tarnished by notations of more than a few visits to the principal’s office. Tommy applied himself all right, but not always in the right direction.

  Tom and Tommy had never spoken directly about Benjamin’s death, but a barrier had been erected between father and son. Tommy’s ability in sports, academics, and even troublemaking, demonstrated that he was a leader, yet from the time the family returned from the fateful trip to Norway, the young lad had never really regained his father’s approval. As a friend and business partner to Tom, as well as a member of the stake presidency following his release as their bishop, Robert Thurston had tried to talk to Tom, but to no avail. Katrina was acutely aware of Tom’s resentment of Tommy and had also tried to talk to him about it, but to no greater effect than Robert. It was as if Tom had built a wall between himself and his youngest son.

  Tommy’s single attempt to cross the breach had actually brought more agony to him. Thinking, perhaps, that he could align himself with his father, when he was thirteen, Tommy had approached Father Scanlan, asking for permission to join the Catholic church. The kindly old archbishop, then nearly seventy years old, understood young Tommy’s desire and counseled the lad to confer with his father. But Tom had taken umbrage when the boy summoned the courage to speak directly with his father about the matter, further widening the gulf between them.

  “Your mother and the Callahan children are LDS,” Tom had said, “and that is how it is going to be.” End of discussion. Tommy’s ref
usal to attend the newly founded LDS seminary program associated with area high schools had only served to widen the chasm between father and son.

  PJ was a different story. He had it all, Tom knew, but somehow he’d not found a reason to put any of it to good use. All his teachers said he had a good mind, attention span, and conceptual ability, but unlike Tommy, for whom the wayward side presented a challenge, PJ had found no such challenge worthy of his attention, good or bad. While Tom and PJ shared a good relationship, and indeed PJ and Tommy frequently enjoyed each other’s company, it was Tess and Tommy who formed the bond so common to twins. As they moved into their teens, their frequent horseback riding excursions up in the canyons provided Tommy his only outlet for his frustration. He was never able to confide in Katrina his longing for his father’s acceptance, and so Tess became his sole confidant.

  But Katrina knew. Ever since that awful moment in the hotel in New York, when she had met Tommy’s eyes, she had known. And she was certain that Tommy’s decision to attend George Washington University in Washington, D.C., where he could be near his Uncle Anders, was partly motivated by his desire to strike out on his own and prove something to his father. Katrina’s brother, Anders, had often proven more of a father to Tommy than Tom, and Katrina had thanked Anders more than once for his sensitivity to her son’s needs. Aunt Sarah, with two miscarriages and an empty household, was more than happy to have Tommy close by and to have her nephew and his friends stop by on weekends to visit Tommy’s uncle, Congressman Anders Hansen.

  With regard to family loyalty, the three Callahan children were as similar as the three leaves in the clover the parish priest in Ireland used to explain the Holy Trinity. But as the years progressed, it became apparent to Tom and Katrina that their children were as different as possible in their outlook toward life.

  And then, notwithstanding Tom and Katrina’s long-standing accommodation, there was the issue of the LDS church. For nearly twenty years, Tom had stuck to his bargain with Katrina. He often thought of how close he had come, back in 1900, to joining the Mormon church, immediately after Katrina’s close call at the birth of the twins. Through the intervening years, the children had been fully exposed to the daily and weekly activities the church provided to retain the interest of its youth. PJ, nearly eighteen, was committed, or professed to be so, although his activity level had decreased as he got older. At sixteen, Tommy, following his abortive attempt to join the Catholic church, wanted nothing further to do with any religion. Tess had been her mother’s constant companion through the years at church meetings and socials. Secretly, Tom hoped that attending the University of Utah might broaden Tess’s horizons and that she would come to see the world a bit more realistically. He had, in fact, wanted to talk to her about attending Stanford or UCLA, but Katrina had quickly vetoed the idea.

  Even though the Callahans lived just a short distance from the University of Utah, Teresa had chosen to live at her sorority house. The first weekend she had come home with a few new friends from the university, Tom thought he saw the first hint of change, but he had not been pleased with certain intolerant attitudes he saw displayed. When he stopped by the parlor, where the latest grammies were playing, he said, “So, how are the college girls today?” Teresa had responded stiffly, “Father, we prefer to be called university women, if you please.” “Well, pardon me,” Tom had laughed, and departed. Later, when he returned, he encountered the cluster of girls sitting in the yard, under the sycamore trees. Two of the girls were smoking, which Tom asked Teresa about that evening, after her friends had departed.

  “Kind of flaunting custom, isn’t it, Tess, for young girls to be smoking in public?” he asked.

  “It’s 1916, Father. It’s considered chic.”

  “And you?” he asked.

  “I obey the Word of Wisdom, Father, but I don’t condemn those who don’t.”

  “And who was the girl you were all talking about? I hope she isn’t aware of your friends’ opinion of her.”

  “Good grief, Dad. Patty Johnson’s grandfather was a polygamist, and her father was excommunicated for continuing to practice polygamy long after it was outlawed. She tried to get into the sorority. Can you imagine? I’d just die if my friends thought I’d come from a polygamist family. I don’t know how Patty had the nerve to try to join.”

  “You sound like a bit of a snob, Tess. It’s a whole new world you’re entering. I hope you can discern its rights and wrongs and understand that people have different lives and we have to try to understand,” he added, and no more had been said about the episode.

  It wasn’t that he thought her strong belief in Mormonism, so much like her mother’s, was wrong. In fact Tom had often thought that if his had been a Catholic family, Tess would have been the one to go the way of Sister Mary and join the convent. Not that she didn’t like boys. Valhalla had seen a constant stream of would-be suitors during her high school years. Tommy and PJ had taken great delight in heckling the long line of love-sick swains who longed after their pretty and popular sister.

  Sister Mary had seen the divine spark in the girl and had encouraged her to nurture it, whatever religious leaning she practiced. How the thought amused Tom. Katrina had learned long ago that Sister Mary, a Catholic nursing Sister of the highest traditions, nevertheless always took the opportunity from those brief teaching moments to expound to the Callahan children a broader concept of love and Christianity than the specific definitions taught by either Catholic or Mormon. And in the process, Katrina and young Teresa had come to love Sister Mary, much as Tom had learned to do, years earlier.

  For over twenty years, ever since he first met her in the lobby of Holy Cross Hospital, Sister Mary Theophane had been for Tom the personification of Christlike love. Whomever, wherever, and whenever, she had never thought to ask from whence a man’s religious beliefs derived. “We are all God’s children,” had been the basic philosophy of her life, and no one Tom had ever known had practiced that belief as decisively as Sister Mary.

  As Tom drove south through Provo, his thoughts segueing from one subject to another, his memories of Sister Mary and concern over her current health brought an ache to his chest. She had never fully recovered after Cuba. Father Scanlan, until his own death the previous year, had required her to take on an assistant director and actually threatened her with a forced retirement if she didn’t allow her assistant to assume much of the work load. Now, at seventy-seven years of age, Sister Mary was well advanced in years, and her body was simply worn out. Tom knew her time was not far off. For him, the pain of losing Sister Mary Theophane would exceed even the loss of his mother, gone also these past seven years.

  Tom pulled into a gas station on the south end of Provo and watched as the young man pumped the gas up into the clear glass cylinder on top of the pump stand, measuring the gallons before draining the fuel back into the car. Three times he did that while Tom wiped some of the dirt from the windshield.

  “It’s a real snapper, Mister,” the young man said, using his rag to polish the chrome headlamp housing.

  “No, actually it’s a Pierce Arrow, son,” Tom replied.

  The kid looked at Tom like he’d stepped out of a history book and just shook his head. “Whatever you say, Pops. That’ll be $1.40,” he said, holding out his hand.

  “Right,” Tom replied. He knew he’d said something wrong, but what it was eluded him. How was one to keep up, anyway? Katrina’s understanding of the slang used by the younger set was amazing to him. As the kids had grown and times had changed, she had practically learned two or three additional foreign languages as far as Tom was concerned. Tom shrugged his shoulders. Impressing university men, or university women, with his bilingual skills didn’t come easily to an old man of nearly forty-one.

  Pulling out of Provo, Tom began the drive into the mountains toward Helper. Even the Pierce Arrow labored to climb the graveled road and steep grades cut through the mountain passes to the east-southeast of Spanish Fork. About three hours, Tom fi
gured. He’d check into his usual room at the hotel, get cleaned up, and meet with mine management for dinner. What excuses would they have this time, Tom wondered? The constant tug-of-war between foremen, managers, and general miners went back as far in Tom’s mind as he could remember. Even his father had told him that he was lucky he was working in the family store in Tipperary, because if he’d had to go down in the coal mines in Ireland, he’d be no better off than any other “Paddy.” He’d escaped that life and was grateful to have done so.

  Tom’s new automobile climbed smoothly as the scenery changed above the snow line. Running away from Ireland as a youth, Tom had never given thought to how his parents viewed life. Maybe they expected acceptance of responsibility from their kids—as he did now, from his. But all three of his children seemed set on individual paths.

  And now PJ was having a look at the old Irish sod—a trip Tom thought might help the young man to sort out his life and perhaps give him some direction. Convincing Katrina to let the lad go had been hard at first, but once she saw the merit of allowing him to meet his aunts and uncles in Ireland, she relented. Only the danger of the war remained a concern, and, so far, the European conflict had not yet threatened Ireland, although many Irish were serving in His Majesties forces. PJ had been gone only three weeks when the first telegram arrived to say he was safe and rooming with Tom’s youngest brother, Seamus, in Dublin.

  Seamus, who had only been three when Tom left Ireland in 1895, was just six years PJ’s senior. Tom really didn’t even know his youngest brother, although the entire American branch of the Callahan’s had gone to Ireland for a visit in 1905. The trip could certainly do PJ no harm, and Tom, who was beginning to wonder which of his children would eventually take an interest in UTB and seek to come into the firm, thought maybe seeing Ireland would give PJ a different perspective. His kids didn’t seem to grow up quite as fast as he had, Tom thought, but times were indeed different.