“I’m just drunk, not feeble,” Lena grumbled as she staggered to her room off the kitchen.
“Mind to set the latch when you leave,” Hugh warned.
Loud, lusty snores wafted through the doorway. He had to admit it, she was one hell of a woman. Rubbing her back on a cold winter night wouldn’t have been all that bad. Lena would be all right. He fixed the latch and left the Powers’s house for the last time. He didn’t look back.
The day Callie James married Hugh MacDuff was damp and cold with an October wind that chilled the bones. Early that morning, Hugh had come for her at the rooming house in St. George. The mist had hung close to the ground, obscuring the pavement and the heavens alike. They had taken the ferry across to New York City, hiring a porter to take their belongings in his cart to the apartment on Fulton Street that Hugh had rented.
The best that could be said for the three squalid rooms was that they were mean-looking. Only the parlor had two windows that faced onto the street; the other two room were interior compartments without any windows at all. The stove in the kitchen was thick with grease and burnt-on food; a table and two chairs, one of them broken, stood in the middle of the spare room. There was only a dry sink; water would have to be brought from the pump two floors down, outside the back door. In the front parlor was a heavy horsehair sofa and one chair, both dirty and shabby, upholstered in what once must have been a dark cranberry red. Scarred tables of assorted sizes and shapes were grouped around the peeling walls, and there was one oil lamp. The bedroom was a narrow cell containing an iron bedstead with a gray, lumpy mattress and an odd hard-backed chair. A bedspread and a rag rug would help. Soap and elbow grease, combined with determination, would work wonders, but they couldn’t produce miracles.
“You’re deserving of so much more than this,” Hugh told her somberly, “but rents being what they are, this was the best I could do.”
Callie touched the sleeve of Hugh’s tweed jacket, her voice warmed by gratitude. “I’ll make it a home for you, Mr. Mac . . . Hugh. If it weren’t for you, I’d have much less than this.” Unwillingly her eyes went to the iron bedstead. Hugh shuffled from one foot to the other, cap held between nervous, fumbling fingers.
“I know you don’t think of me that way, lass, and I won’t be forcing myself on you. I’ll be sleeping out on the sofa until you tell me otherwise.”
Callie’s hands flew to her face to hide the sudden flush of color; her breath came in small, desperate gasps. “No, no, it’s all wrong! You’re a good man, you deserve a woman who’ll be a real wife to you,” she wept.
“Here, here, don’t be cryin’ like that, it breaks my heart, lass. I only want to be your friend and only ask that you be here when I come home in the evening. It’s more than a man like me has a right to expect, having a pretty young lass like yourself for my wife and having you share the bairn with me. Don’t cry, Callie, please don’t cry!” His voice rose in alarm; his experience with women was limited. He was a hard-bitten man, unused to expressing his feelings. He knew-there were times he came across as stiff and unbending, but it was only his way. He didn’t know much about being a husband, less about being a lover, but he did know that he loved Callie James and would wait for the day when she would come unbidden into his arms, the Good Lord willing. And if that day never came, he would be satisfied to have her share her life with him, share her child, and allow him to worship her from afar.
These very emotions, if he’d been able to express them, might have softened Callie’s heart, might have touched her sympathy and innate sense of fairness. But she was overwhelmed by her gratitude, and that blinded her to Hugh’s real desires. She was simply grateful that his demands on her were so few; that loving Rossiter as she did and knowing what it meant for a woman to give herself to a man, Hugh would not demand this of her.
Together they dashed through the wet mists to City Hall where they pronounced their vows before a court justice. Callie had to be asked to raise her voice, to repeat the vows twice before the justice nodded, smiling at this shy young girl who was marrying this fine Scotsman. Callie was nearly paralyzed by the import of what she was doing. She was marrying a man she didn’t love while her hands were clasped over her belly to hide the babe another man had put there. Her guilt made her feel helpless, her helplessness angered her, and her anger brought a wave of remorse. She tried to remember her gratitude to Hugh, but instead she felt only anger—at herself and at Rossiter. Granda used to say that no matter how hard the bed, if you made it, you must sleep in it. Callie gritted her teeth and swore to honor and obey.
Busy days followed for Callie as she scrubbed and cleaned the tiny apartment from top to bottom. She made an agreement with the landlord’s wife that if whitewash was provided she would paint the rooms. She let out the seams of her dresses, glad that she’d taken the uniforms Mrs. Powers had provided. The heavy black bombazine was warm on a winter’s day and disguised her burgeoning belly.
Each day Hugh would set out to find work, only to return each evening in defeat. He was always too late or too old or something. Work was hard to find, he would say, trying to keep the bitterness out of his tone. So many times he’d bitten back the words that because of the influx of Irish immigrants, labor was plentiful and cheap, making it difficult for an unskilled worker to find employment.
Almost guiltily Hugh told Callie he’d heard of a woman who wanted ironing done. He would pick up and deliver if Callie was willing. His young bride nodded enthusiastically. She would have scrubbed floors or returned to the button factory if it would help Hugh. She owed him so much—for the roof over her head and the food in her stomach. He had dug into his small savings to purchase a frypan and a decent cookpot, clean pillows and warm blankets for her bed. The stove was never without coal, warming them through the dark November days, and fresh cream and butter and slabs of bacon were in the box hanging outside the parlor windows. Each morning he brought a fresh pail of water from the . pump downstairs and had bought Callie a thick-lined cloak that was wide and flowing to cover her swollen body and keep out the wind.
One ironing job turned into two and then three. She spent long hours standing near the stove to heat her flatirons, perspiration dripping down her face. Her back ached and her legs throbbed, but she never complained. Dutifully she would hand over the payment to her husband, never keeping any for herself. He provided for her, she reasoned, he was her husband, and all she ever had to do was to ask for what she wanted. But Callie never asked.
Callie did her best as the weeks dragged into months. She cooked hot, substantial meals for Hugh, who was becoming more discouraged by the day with no permanent offers of work coming his way. He had taken to bringing home a bottle of whiskey, bought with her ironing money. He began coming home later and later, she noticed. Twice in one week she’d had to trudge across town, lugging a heavy basket, because he hadn’t come home to deliver it. When she had finally made her way back home, she had collapsed on the bed, her legs throbbing with cramps, her back near to breaking. She wished she believed in miracles. This was to be her life, the same as her mother’s. With one difference—Peggy loved Thomas.
Once the baby was born, things would be different, she promised herself. She wondered if her mother had ever had the same hope. Things would never be different unless Hugh found a steady job. Now that he was drinking more and more, she wasn’t sure of anything. All she knew was that she was a burden to him, and perhaps she was being unfair because she felt so helpless in these late stages of her pregnancy. Maybe Hugh was doing his best. It wasn’t his fault he couldn’t find steady work. Another ironing job would help, and perhaps they could put enough by to pay the midwife when she was needed. Tears of frustration and confusion trickled down her cheeks. She was so sick of feeling helpless, of not taking charge of her life. She was thinking of Beth more and more these days, and visions of Mary would intrude at the oddest moments. Then she would stand over her ironing board and cry for her mother and the little ones back home. Things must g
et better, she prayed. They must!
Callie was wrong. It was a snowy January, a month before the baby was due, when the landlord knocked on the apartment door, demanding not one but two months’ back rent.
“We just owe you for this month,” Callie said in a frightened voice.
“If that’s what your man’s been telling you, he lied. Get his snoot out of the bottle and pay up or out you go. You have to the end of the week.”
Hugh came home a bit after sundown, carrying a basket of ironing to be done. He wore a pleased expression as he told her he picked up two days’ wages doing yard work for the woman who asked to have the ironing back by morning. “That’s why I got the job, Callie. I hated to take it, and I know how tired you are. But it was the only edge I had over three others who came for the same job.”
“I’m not that tired that I can’t iron out a few things. But you look tired, Hugh. Sit here while I fix you some supper.” While she heated butter in the cast-iron frypan, she told him about the landlord’s ultimatum that morning. She tried to keep her tone light, as though she wasn’t worried, but Hugh’s shoulders slumped in defeat.
“With the two days’ wages and your ironing it still won’t be enough. There’s hardly any food left for the rest of the week, and then Lord knows what’ll happen.”
Callie’s heart went out to him, and she rushed to his side, putting her arms around his neck, pressing her cheek against his grizzled hair. “We’ll manage. We have so far. We could look for a cheaper place to live. Anything is all right with me. Don’t be blaming yourself. We’re both doing all we can. Oh, Hugh,” she cried in a sudden rush of emotion, “I don’t ever want you to be sorry you married me.”
“I could never be sorry,” Hugh said, gripping her arms in his hands, overwhelmed by this display of affection. How long he’d prayed, how many nights he’d slept out on the sofa listening for her slightest whisper! “It’s you I’m concerned about, Callie. I painted you such a bright picture of how I’d take care of you, and this is so bleak, it’d make a convict cry. I’m fifty-odd years old, Callie, and look every day of it. It’s young, strong backs they want when they hire, not defeated old men.”
“You’re not old! You’re not! And they don’t know how strong you are; I’ve seen you work, Hugh. I’ve watched you carry those heavy sacks of feed for the Powers’s horses and lift and move furniture as though they were sticks of matches. You’ll get your chance; I know you will!”
“Thank you for your vote of confidence, lass. You’re a dear one to say it. But you’re right about one thing—we do have to find cheaper lodgings. At least until things get better for us. I know I haven’t been much help with my snoot in the bottle, spending good money on whiskey. I won’t do it anymore, my solemn promise.”
Callie nodded, hiding the despair in her eyes. How often she’d heard her father, Thomas, say those same words to Peggy, make those same promises. How often she’d seen the spark of hope in her mother’s eyes. Some things never changed. Like mother, like daughter.
Chapter Nineteen
The next morning Hugh was up before dawn. Callie folded the last freshly ironed pillow slip and laid it on top of the basket. She ached so violently that she actually felt numb. Hugh led her to a chair and pulled her shoes off, gently massaging her feet and swollen legs. “You stay here. When I get back, I’ll pack everything that needs taking. When I went out last night, I found us a place; it’s not to our liking, but it’ll have to do. When I’ve finished work, I’ll hire a wagon for us and our things. Let’s have a smile now, and say you forgive this old man for making things so hard on you.”
Callie smiled weakly. “Everything will be fine, Hugh. You take that ironing back, and I’ll sleep for a while, I’ll help you pack. I’m all right, really I am.”
He waited for her to ask where he was taking her, but she didn’t. It was best she not know until the last. The Irish called it Shantytown, and it was a miserable place of hovels at the far end of a field uptown past Seventy-second Street. A crony from the tavern down the street told him there was a vacancy just near his sister-in-law’s place, and if he grabbed it before anyone else, it would be his. Hugh had followed the man’s instructions, taking the endlessly long walk uptown. The poverty of the slum he found made his heart turn over, but just as his friend had said, there was a vacant shack. It had been picked clean, not even the cast-iron stove remained, but it had a roof and walls and would keep out the wind if not the cold. And Callie would be among her own people.
Callie was an angel from heaven for not blaming him, Hugh told himself. His conscience pricked him all the way to the house where he delivered the ironing. He worked half the day, clearing out the woman’s basement and repairing the coal bin. With the money in his hand from an honest day’s labor he felt almost rich. The woman told him she would recommend him to her friends and that he should come by next week to see if she had any more work for him. Hugh was heartened. Callie couldn’t do any more ironing. He had wanted to cry earlier that morning when he massaged her swollen feet. He wasn’t doing right by her, and he knew it. All he had to do was stay away from that devil whiskey and things would look up. Once their baby was born, things would be better for sure.
Hugh found himself thinking of Callie’s child as his own. As he came to know Callie better, came to love her more, it was increasingly difficult for him to admit that she had been with another man. He refused to think about Rossiter, even to speak his name. Callie’s child would be his own, and one day, with heaven’s help, Callie would come to him as a real wife, inviting him to share her bed. She had so much love to give, she needed to be loved, and Hugh was determined to be the man to give it to her.
Callie didn’t like skipping out without paying the rent, but she knew there was no other way. There simply wasn’t the money, and by the end of the week they would have been thrown out on the street anyway, with the landlord more than likely confiscating all their worldly possessions. The wagon Hugh hired rolled through the streets, lurching and bouncing in and out of the ruts, shuddering over the cobbles. On the edge of the city the driver took them to what must have once been an open field. Now it was a rabbit warren of little hovels, their stove pipes sticking through the patchwork roofs like indignant little fingers pointing to the sky. Trash and litter abounded between the huts, and Callie knew that when it rained, Shantytown would become a sea of mud and refuse. The little one-room shacks reminded Callie of the skalpeens in Ireland, constructed entirely from bits of timber and thatch salvaged from tumbled cottages and pilfered from fences. She caught the sound of someone speaking Gaelic and then voices thick with brogue. Had she sounded like that when she’d first come to America?
Hugh, sitting beside her, broke into her thoughts. “Did you hear that, Callie? You’ll be among your own here. Irishmen, just like you.”
Callie scowled, dropping her head so Hugh wouldn’t see. Her own indeed. This wasn’t where she belonged, Irish or not. Not this shanty town, not these filthy little hovels overcrowded with people and children and disease. This was what she wanted herself and her family to escape!
“It isn’t much, Callie lass, but it’s just for a while, I promise you. Just until the baby comes and we get a little money put aside. You won’t be doing any ironing and standing on your feet either. I’ll make sure you’ve got food in your belly if I have to steal it. I know skipping out on the rent wasn’t right, nor helping ourselves to the poor furniture. But when we get on our feet, I’ll make it right.”
Callie turned on her seat beside the driver and looked over her shoulder. Under a tarpaulin she could just see the outline of the iron bedstead and the kitchen table and chairs. “When did you take down the bed, Hugh? I didn’t see you do it.”
“Aye, I know that, lass. I kept you busy washing out the pots down at the pump. I know you wouldn’t have liked it, but you’ll be glad I took them. The cottage is empty, lass, not a stick in it. Don’t you worry now.” He patted her hand. “I said I’ll make it right some day
, and I will.”
Callie believed him. Peggy always believed Thom.
It was nearly dark when Hugh took her to the hut, but it wasn’t too dark to see where the tarpaper roof and walls had been patched with odd boards and rusted tin. They’d had to walk the last bit of the way because the dirt lane did not go past their door; their hut was squeezed in between hundreds of others just like it.
When Hugh pushed open the door, Callie gasped in shock as a burly man wielding a cudgel made a threatening advance. Suddenly recognition dawned. “Oh, it’s you, MacDuff. Well, I did what you told me, and I beat off anybody who thought to take over the place.”
“Little wonder with that club you carry,” Hugh grumbled, digging into his pocket for a coin to pay the man. He noticed Callie’s questioning glance. “I have to pay the man, lass. Were it not for hiring him, somebody else would’ve grabbed the place and we’d have nowhere to go.”
Callie glanced around the interior, seeing the small, one-room area with the chimney flue coming down from the roof and ending impotently in midair. Someone had taken the stove. The floor was partially built of boards; the rest was just dirt. How could she live here? How could Hugh have brought her here? She’d known poverty in her life, God knew, but nothing like this. Her father would never expect Peggy to live in a place like this. She squinted at her unshaven husband. He said it would be all right; she had to believe that.
Hugh and the driver brought in their pitiful belongings. Hugh was right; she was glad that he’d taken the bed and table and chairs. There wasn’t room for much else besides a stove, which they didn’t have, but Hugh, resourceful as he was, constructed a crude hearth from a rubble of stones, and by leaving the door open a crack, the small fire’s smoke found its way up the flue. When they were alone, Hugh pointed to the double bed that stood at the far end of the room. “I’ll have to share it with you, lass.” He placed his hands on her shoulders expectantly, waiting for her to say something. Instead Callie just nodded, holding back the tears. Was her baby to be born here, in this hovel? Rossiter’s child, born here?
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