Don't Die Under the Apple Tree

by Amy Patricia Meade

  In the thirty years since, Dewitt had come to be known for his dependability, strong work ethic, and easygoing nature, characteristics that would have earned any other shipyard worker promotions, raises, and the respect of supervisors and colleagues. Of course, in order to earn such things, those “other” shipyard workers would have had to be both male and white, and while Wilson Dewitt fit the former criterion, his dark brown skin stood in stark contrast to the latter.

  Like Jackson and the other Negroes who worked in the shipyards, Dewitt’s primary role was, and always had been, to assist the white employees, first as a maintenance worker then as a bucker. Despite his intelligence and aptitude for the shipbuilding trade, his employers would never train him to rivet or weld, and even if he had somehow managed to acquire those skills elsewhere, they wouldn’t have done him much good since, as a Negro man, he was not permitted to take the exam required for promotion.

  Moreover, despite his years of devotion and hard work, Dewitt could never earn as much as the other buckers in the yard, since whites and Negroes were paid according to two separate wage scales. Meaning that at the end of a hard week, a female welder with two weeks’ experience often took home a larger paycheck than he did.

  Rosie was acutely aware of the yard’s established pecking order. At the top of the social ladder stood white male workers, but even within this group there existed a certain hierarchy. Men of Anglo-Saxon, Scandinavian, and German descent, although comprising the minority of the workforce, formed the shipyard elite. The Irish and Italians occupied the second slot. Sharing a common faith, the two groups had formed an uneasy partnership with each other and, through sheer number, had climbed to a position of relative power within the dockside community. Beneath them, with each group occupying a different rung on the ladder, came the Slavs, Jews, Portuguese, Greeks, Hispanics, and other ethnic groups.

  Strangely, or at least it was strange to Rosie, these ethnic groups chose to stand alone rather than unify for the betterment of the whole. Never was there talk of a coalition. Each group was possessive of its spot within the hierarchy and determined to protect itself from those below.

  After the men came the women, who were grouped into one of two categories: white or Negro. White women, lumped together regardless of their ethnic or religious background, held a position lower than white males, yet slightly higher than Negro males. Negro women, however, possessed the lowliest status in the yard, below even that of Negro males.

  As Del Vecchio finished the remainder of the morning’s announcements, Rosie contemplated her new assignment. Dewitt, although seemingly courteous, was just one of four Negro men working at Pushey, and the only one to have made the transition from maintenance to riveting gang. Kolecky was a Czechoslovakian Jew who socialized with neither group and spoke to no one. Although some had attributed his silence to an inability to speak and understand English, Kolecky’s ability to take instruction from superiors belied that theory. Kilbride was a hard-drinking Irish Nationalist from County Wicklow who came to America shortly after the split of his homeland, in 1921, into northern and southern components. One of the fastest riveters in the yard, the boisterous Kilbride’s “80 Proof” lunch incited him to intersperse his afternoon riveting with rebel songs (“A Nation Once Again” was a popular favorite), limericks, and anti-establishment rhetoric. He was also notorious, at the end of the day, for leaving his tools on the platform rather than signing them back into the toolshed—a habit that had driven Finch to distraction.

  As the morning announcements wrapped up and employees began to filter into the yard, Rosie reflected upon her work assignment and immediately recognized why she had been placed with such a ragtag team. Although Del Vecchio might have agreed to put her back on the payroll and even paid public lip service to her return, she was at the very bottom of the Pushey pecking order. And for the riveting gang saddled with the presence of a potential murderer, Rosie’s assignment served to re-establish their low social standing.

  “You sure you know what you’re doing?” Delaney asked.

  “No,” she confessed. “But there’s not much I can do about that now.”

  “You can turn around and leave, that’s what you can do. But I know you won’t. Do me a favor, though. If anyone gives you a hard time, come and get me.”

  Rosie nodded.

  “Promise?” Delaney pressed.

  “Yes,” Rosie snapped.

  Shaking his head and muttering to himself, Michael Delaney disappeared through the holding area doors.

  “Brother or boyfriend?” Nelson ventured.

  “Neither.”

  “Hmph. Well, I’ll catch you during break. Till then, good luck.”

  “Thanks.” I need all the luck I can get, she thought as she exited the red brick building and made her way to Pier Number One. Approximately forty feet from her destination, she spotted Kolecky, short, somber, and bespectacled, setting up his forge. Rosie flashed a weak smile in the man’s direction. As expected, Kolecky returned the smile with a blank stare.

  Rosie chided herself. These people thought she was a murderer. If she went around smiling at them, they’d truly believe her to be deranged. With a grave expression on her face, she scaled the scaffold where Dewitt and Kilbride stood waiting.

  “Mornin’,” Dewitt quietly greeted.

  Kilbride, however, flashed a wild grin. “Clinton Kilbride at your service. This here is Wilson and that down there is Kolecky. I don’t abide by last names, only Christian ones—the world is dehumanizing enough—but I haven’t caught Kolecky’s yet. Mostly because he hasn’t pitched it. Now what should we be calling you?”

  “Rose. Rose Keefe.”

  “Rose. Just Rose?”

  “Well, most people call me Rosie.”

  “Rosie? That’s not very poetic for a fellow countrywoman.” Kilbride’s reddish blond brow furrowed. “You sure it isn’t Rosemary or Rosamund or—”

  “Rosaleen,” she replied, although she was unsure as to why. “Rose is short for Rosaleen.”

  “Ah, that’s better. That’s what I’ll be calling ya, then. Rosaleen.”

  Rosie felt her mouth pucker. The only person who called her Rosaleen was her mother.

  “Ah, don’t like being called that, do ya now? Sorry, luv, but I won’t change me mind. Rosaleen you are and Rosaleen you’ll stay. So welcome, Rosaleen, to the riveting gang of Drunkard, Darkie, and Mute. If you need me to point out who’s who, then ya aren’t as bright as you look. And now that we’re done with the introductions, let’s get to work and see if you can keep up.”

  “Keep up?”

  “Haven’t you heard? I’m the fastest riveter in the yard. I suppose since you’re here as punishment, they didn’t warn you.” Laughing maniacally, he swung over the other side of the scaffold.

  “He’ll have you running crazy in the morning,” Dewitt clarified. “He’ll slow down some after lunch, though. Always does.”

  Over the course of the next few hours, Rosie discovered that Dewitt’s description was quite accurate. With the cone in her left hand and a pair of tongs in her right, the morning found her dashing from the ship to the edge of the wooden boards, catching a handful of red-hot rivets, and then scrambling back to insert them into the predrilled holes. All the while, Kilbride’s voice could be heard urging her to hurry up.

  When the noon whistle finally blew, Rosie threw both cone and tongs onto the boards in relief.

  “Look, Wilson,” Kilbride teased as he swung over the side of the scaffold and caught a glimpse of Rosie bent over and rubbing her knees. “I think we broke her.”

  She met both Kilbride and the statement with an icy stare.

  “Uh-oh. Now I’ve done it. I’d best be careful leaving work tonight.”

  Determined to keep her cool and, in all honesty, too tired to fight, Rosie stood up and descended the scaffold to meet Nelson for their thirty-minute lunch break.

  Kilbride watched her in confusion. “Hmph. That’s not the reaction I expected. Not t
he reaction I expected from that one at all.”

  Chapter Nine

  While her sister shuttled back and forth across the narrow boards of scaffolding that lined Pushey Shipyard’s Pier Number One, a few blocks away Katherine Brigid Doyle Williams pushed her son’s baby carriage down the uneven cement sidewalk that led to Simonetti’s Butcher Shop.

  Wearing a robin’s-egg blue dress that played perfectly against her blue eyes and fair complexion, Katie wondered whether or not her plan would succeed. Would she enter the butcher shop to find a flock of women speaking, in hushed voices, about the “accident”? (Accidents. That’s what people tended to call murders or suicides while in polite company, wasn’t it?) Would they allow her to listen in on their conversation? Or would they snub her as an outsider?

  And what if there was no talk going on? What if the locals chose to treat Finch’s death with quiet respect? What would she say or do to start conversation? And moreover, what should she say or do in order to move that conversation toward the subject of Finch?

  As Katie neared the shop she felt her heart begin to race. Although pleasant and cheerful, she had never been particularly outgoing. Growing up, Rosie typically spoke on behalf of her younger sister, informing their mother that Katie wanted lemonade instead of milk, or complaining to Katie’s first-grade teacher about the boy who constantly pulled her sister’s hair.

  Then, after Rosie, came Jimmy. Tall, strong, and blue-eyed, but with the thick dark hair of the black Irish, James Dermot Williams was the life of every party. Always quick with a joke or a humorous anecdote, he could charm even the most difficult individuals and had a way of putting those around him at ease. All Katie needed to do was prompt Jimmy, and doors, as well as mouths, opened.

  As Katie tilted the carriage up and back in order to scale the store’s front step, she whispered a small prayer to her late husband. “Jimmy, if you’re watching, I could really use your gift of gab right now.”

  Just then, a woman emerged from the butcher shop. She was in her late forties to early fifties and—from the small felt hat with veil that rested atop her perfectly coiffed dark blond hair to the low-heeled leather pumps that covered her stocking feet—dressed from head to toe in black. Dabbing at her eyes with a lace-trimmed handkerchief, she hurriedly pushed past Katie, jostling Charlie’s carriage in the process.

  The bump sent the carriage rolling backward, off the step, awakening the sleeping child inside and prompting him to cry.

  “Sorry,” the woman in black said absently before taking off down the street.

  “Well ... I ... umm ... that’s okay,” a flustered Katie stammered.

  An olive-skinned man in a white butcher’s coat appeared in the doorway. “I’m sorry, miss,” he apologized with a faint trace of an Italian accent.

  “Oh, that’s all right, it’s not your fault.” She tipped the carriage up and back in another attempt to scale the step.

  “Still, I am very sorry.” He held the door open to allow her admittance. “She should not have done that. But Mrs. Finch, she’s been through a terrible shock.”

  “Mrs. Finch?” Such was Katie’s astonishment, that she let the carriage drop again, causing Charlie to cry louder. “The ... . the one in the paper?”

  “Sì. Let me ’elp.” He reached down and lifted the front of the carriage through the open doorway.

  Katie lifted up the handle end of the carriage and followed him inside. Although Simonetti’s shop occupied two storefronts, the L-shaped counters (one refrigerated, the other lined with scales and chopping blocks) and the assortment of hams, sausages, and smoked meats that hung from the rafters gave the space a “closed-in” feel.

  “Vincent,” the butcher shouted to an unseen employee. “Un biscotto per il bambino.”

  As Katie took Charlie out of the carriage and soothed him, a young man emerged from the back of the shop. He looked exactly like the butcher, only thirty years younger. In his left hand, he held a biscuit, which he gave to Charlie with a smile.

  The baby immediately clutched at it and happily put it into his mouth.

  “Ah, the teeth,” the butcher commented. “They’re coming in.”

  Katie thanked Vincent for the cookie and then returned to her mission. “Poor Mrs. Finch. I’m surprised she’s out and about so soon after what happened. It was day before yesterday when it happened ... wasn’t it?”

  “Sì, day before yesterday. She came to order sandwiches for after the funeral tomorrow. Oh! That reminds me. Vincent”—he turned to the boy—“cut a few links of that sausage Mrs. Finch likes, wrap it up, and deliver it to her with our, uh ...”

  “Condolences?” Katie suggested.

  “Sì, condolences.”

  “Aw, Pop,” Vincent complained in perfect American English. “Do I have to? I’m nineteen. I’m not a delivery boy anymore. Besides, I don’t even know where she lives.”

  The butcher smiled and held up one finger to Katie. “Uno momento, per favore. Um, one moment, please.” He then turned to his son and spoke to him quietly but sternly. “What do I pay you for if you don’t do what I tell you to do? You know exactly where she lives: 253 Van Brunt Street, the upstairs apartment. Now, bundle up those sausages and get running before I chase you with my meat tenderizer, eh?”

  With a heavy sigh, Vincent returned to the back of the shop.

  “Dio mio, I think maybe the army is just the thing for that boy. It may kill his mama, but it might straighten him out. Kids, eh?” he said to Katie, all the while smiling at Charlie. “He’s little now, but you’ll see. Sarà la morte di me! He’ll be the death of me! So, what can I get for you today?”

  “Well, a small roasting chicken, for starters.”

  “One small roasting chicken,” the butcher repeated as he made his way behind the counter. “I, uh, I don’t remember you coming in here before. Are you new to the neighborhood?”

  Katie felt her face flush, but she did her best to remain collected. “Yes ... yes, I am.”

  “Ah, you’re the one who rented the apartment from Mrs. Arthur.”

  Had the butcher been watching, he would have seen Katie lick her lips nervously. “Um, no. I’m—I’m staying with an aunt.” Realizing he might ask the name of her aunt, she added quickly, “My husband died when the Houston sank and she’s helping us get back on our feet.”

  As expected, the comment brought the conversation to a screeching halt.

  “Sono spiacente ... I’m sorry.” The butcher looked up from the chicken he was trussing. “I did not know ...”

  “No. It’s okay. You have no reason to apologize. But that’s why I was so interested in Mrs. Finch. What with us both losing our husbands and all.”

  The butcher held up a hand. “No, your husband was a hero, but Mr. Finch ... eh, it’s not good to speak ill of the dead.”

  Katie’s eyes grew wide. “Oh! Was he as bad as all that?”

  Simonetti—at least Katie assumed he was Simonetti—looked around the shop as if to ensure that no one else was listening in. “Okay, since it’s just you”—he invoked the sign of the cross—“I talk. Mr. Finch, he ... he wasn’t a nice man.”

  Katie pulled Charlie closer. He wasn’t nice? Was that all?Well, if—

  “He was il bruto ... a brute. Mrs. Finch, many a time she had the annerire l’occhio ... the black eye. And the other women? Così molto! When I heard that the shipyards were hiring women? Dio mio! That was the last thing Mrs. Finch needed.”

  Simonetti plopped the dressed, trussed, and wrapped chicken on the butcher’s scale. “’at’s four pounds. What else?”

  Katie was completely nonplussed. “What else? What do you mean? Oh! You mean meat. Umm ... ummm ... cube steak? About a pound?”

  “Good choice. That marbling? She’s beautiful.” Simonetti drew his fingers to his lips and kissed them.

  “You were saying that Finch—”

  Simonetti’s facial features rapidly changed and his accent thickened. “Ah, yes. Finch. He ’ad an eye for the ladies
, that one. Coming ’ome with long hairs on his jacket or stinking like the perfume. But when Mrs. Finch, she ask him about it, he yells at ’er and gives ’er the black eye.”

  Katie shivered as she recalled what had happened to her sister on that fateful morning. She had no trouble believing that Finch was the type of man who might bully and beat his wife, a fact that was disturbing enough in itself. What was even more upsetting was the idea that many of the hairs that traveled home with Finch each night, like Rosie’s, might have been removed by force. “Umm, how do you know all this? Not that I doubt what you’re saying, but people do gossip—”

  “It’s no gossip. I ’ear it straight from Marie Finch. We talk all the time. She’s my best customer and a very nice lady... .”

  So it was “Marie” now, was it?

  “Can you believe Finch ’ad the nerve to come ’ere and accusarmi di dormire con sua moglie. He accused me of carrying on with his wife. È ridicolo! I love my wife. And I’m a man of honor.”

  “Well, you’ve been quite the gentleman while I’ve been here,” Katie remarked. Inwardly, however, she wondered if Simonetti and Mrs. Finch didn’t share more than a simple customer relationship. From what Katie had seen of the woman, Mrs. Finch was attractive, slender, and approximately the same age as the butcher. For Simonetti’s part, he seemed to know a lot more about Mrs. Finch than just her favorite cuts of meat. He knew the details of her marital woes, her precise address (including the fact that her apartment was located upstairs), and her Christian name.

  The butcher dropped both his mallet and the steak. “Sono spiacente! Oh, Signora, I’m so sorry! You wanted to talk about Mrs. Finch, but I’m sure you didn’t mean to ’ear all this.”

  Simonetti was right. All things being equal, Katie didn’t want to know about the ugly things people did and, given a choice, she would have grabbed Charlie and run back to Greenpoint as quickly as possible, rather than get involved with murder, adultery, and abusive spouses. However, with her sister’s life on the line, she needed to hear all the dirty details. “No. No, that’s ... that’s okay. I need to know what’s going on ... since we’ll be staying here for a little while.”