Separate Roads

by Judith Pella

  Mrs. Cavendish smiled and took her ease on a lovely oak and brocade settee near the front window. “I thought I would die. My folks thought so too. I still have times when the malaria hits me, and all I can do is take to my bed.”

  Caitlan nodded and went back to ensuring that the painting stood free of dirt. She felt a bit uneasy with her new arrangement, and Hazel Cavendish seemed to sense the same.

  “Come sit with me a moment, Caitlan. I’d like to talk to you.” Caitlan turned and bit her lip, causing Mrs. Cavendish to smile. “Come now, I won’t bite.”

  Caitlan slipped the dusting cloth back into her apron pocket, then took a seat on the edge of a chair opposite her employer.

  “I know this arrangement is strange and new to you,” Mrs. Cavendish began. “I hope your quarters are acceptable.”

  “Indeed they are, ma’am,” Caitlan replied.

  “I am rather surprised that you changed your mind about living here. Especially after so many months. Would you like to tell me about it?”

  Caitlan felt a sense of embarrassment creep over her. Her cheeks grew hot, and she knew she could never hope to explain her situation to Mrs. Cavendish. After all, what could she say? I’ve fallen in love with me brother-in-law, but he’s obviously disgusted by the attraction and wishes me gone from his sight? For by now that was what Caitlan had convinced herself had happened. She knew Brenton had a certain desire for her—as evidenced by his kiss—but it was painfully clear in her mind that his feelings were not such that he would ever consider marriage. He probably saw her as a simple Irish peasant, not at all a fitting wife for a Baltimore Baldwin.

  “Come now, child, I have a good ear for listening,” Hazel encouraged.

  “It seemed the right time to go,” Caitlan replied. “For more reasons than I can tell.” She tried hard to think of what else she could say. “Me brother-in-law is of a mind to take work with the railroad, and he may well be sendin’ his sister home to New York. I surely couldn’t have supported meself, what with the bank ownin’ the house and all.”

  Mrs. Cavendish nodded thoughtfully. “Well, I am happy for the extra help, but I don’t like seeing you so unhappy. I’m sure you miss your family. While they’re still here in Omaha, you be sure to see them on your days off, and maybe it won’t be so hard. Independence is a fine thing, but family is finer.”

  Caitlan nodded. Family was everything. This adage rang in her brain from morning to night. Her kin in Ireland had always taught her the importance of family loyalty. She thought again of Kiernan in California. Maybe that was where she belonged. After all, he was all that she could truly call family—at least on this side of the ocean.

  Caitlan looked nervously at the hardwood floor. The shine was brilliant, and why not? She’d put it there herself only the day before yesterday. At least she had a talent for cleaning and making things look new again. Mrs. Cavendish had given her high praise indeed for bringing the heavily trafficked floor back to a vibrant glow.

  “Happiness often seems so elusive,” Hazel said, interrupting Caitlan’s thoughts. “But God has a way of reaching inside, deep down in our hearts, to show us that we can have something far better than human emotions.”

  “I can’t be sayin’ that these are happy days for me,” Caitlan finally replied. She was uneasy with the talk of God and sought only to send Mrs. Cavendish down another path of thought. “But neither will I say they are bad ones.”

  “Merely different?” Mrs. Cavendish suggested. “A change of course?”

  Caitlan met her kind expression. “Aye. A change for sure.”

  “Your family seems quite nice. I met your sister-in-law at the bank several weeks ago. She’s quite capable.”

  “Aye, that she is. I wish I had half her confidence.”

  “And your brother-in-law has been commissioned by my husband to take our photograph on the Friday after next. He seems very nice also.”

  Caitlan bristled and looked away again. She’d not known of the plan for Brenton to photograph Mr. and Mrs. Cavendish. Would he come to the house? She pushed the matter away and replied, “Aye. He’s a good man.”

  Silence flooded the room for several moments, holding Caitlan captive in the closest scrutiny she’d known by this gentle-natured woman since first coming to work for her. She wanted to assure Mrs. Cavendish that her moodiness had nothing to do with her or the job she’d hired Caitlan to do. By her keeping silent, Mrs. Cavendish would merely pry to know the origin of Caitlan’s obvious discomfort. Why couldn’t the woman be like other employers and not care about her employee’s problems? Why couldn’t she simply let Caitlan do her job and leave her personal problems alone?

  But that wasn’t Hazel Cavendish’s nature. Every time Caitlan had come in so much as a minute late for work, Hazel had been standing by wanting reassurance that nothing was wrong. Caitlan supposed it was because her nature was so giving. She had spent a lifetime nurturing and caring for people regardless of their station in life or the color of their skin.

  “My dear, I know you are my housekeeper, and perhaps in the past, in other more formal settings, you were not allowed to be well acquainted with your employers. But here in Omaha, I can hardly see that such proprieties will work. I might live in this beautiful house with my husband, but my heart is no different than yours. It still suffers hurts and disappointment, and it’s still capable of loving.”

  Caitlan’s head snapped up at this. The idea that Mrs. Cavendish should use the word “love” so startled Caitlan that she nearly gasped out loud. Swallowing hard, she struggled to look completely controlled in her manner, but the older woman merely smiled.

  “Love is a glorious thing, my dear. You mustn’t fight against it, but rather embrace it. If the good Lord has two people in mind for a union, He will have His way. The longer we fight against what must be, the longer we suffer.”

  Caitlan shook her head and got to her feet. “I’m fearin’ me own problem isn’t one of wills but rather of station.”

  Hazel shook her head. “I’m not sure I understand.”

  Caitlan smiled. “Yar a good woman, Mrs. Cavendish. I appreciate yar letting me take a room here in yar home. Ya won’t be sorry. I’ll give ya me best work.”

  She then hurried from the room before the woman could reply. She knew full well it wasn’t what Mrs. Cavendish expected her to say, but Caitlan couldn’t very well go giving her the real explanation. Especially when the situation had so many complicated issues.

  Climbing up two flights of stairs, Caitlan took herself to her small attic room and closed the door. She longed only for a moment to compose herself before going back to the tasks at hand. She knew that Mrs. Cavendish was only seeking to be friendly, but Caitlan felt ill at ease with her lot in life. Americans were a funny sort. She had known the Vanderbilts in New York, as well as Brenton and Jordana, and the contrast had been severe. Brenton and Jordana had a lackadaisical attitude about life and stations, whereas the Vanderbilts were exactly the sort of folk she had been used to in Ireland. People who placed other people in neat, confined little boxes, on precise, exacting levels. They would never allow for camaraderie between the common workers and themselves. Slavery, as most saw it, might well be breathing its final breath in America, but it would hardly account at all for those of poorer class who were forced to sell their souls in nearly the same manner, all for enough money to keep food on the table and a fire in the hearth.

  She knew Brenton and Jordana came from great wealth. Knew, too, that they saw themselves as somewhat adventurous and ever so brave to have left the comfort and wealth of their parents for life on the road. But they didn’t know what true suffering was like. No matter where they went, help was as close as a telegram. They lived meagerly out of choice, but to Caitlan their sparse, frugal lifestyle was far better than anything she’d known in Ireland.

  She still shuddered at the memory of stories told by her older sisters. Stories of the first famines when the potatoes had all turned black. Stories of folks lying d
ead, their mouths green from eating the grass—their only food. Then there were her own memories of people being burned out of their homes because the landlord had found a better purpose for the property. Memories of landlords taking liberties with her as she struggled to work as a scullery maid. Threats to her and her family if she didn’t give in and do what was expected of her.

  She tried to push the thoughts from her mind, but they were so much a part of who she was that putting them from her was like expecting her to become someone else. She felt an aching in her throat, a sure sign that her emotions were getting the best of her. She’d done nothing but cry the first nights here at the Cavendish mansion, and she had no desire to waste any more time with tears.

  “I need to be strong,” she told herself aloud. “I will be strong.”

  But the words rang hollow as she sank to the small iron bed. On the nightstand beside the bed lay Jordana’s Bible. Her sister-in-law had apparently tucked it into Caitlan’s bags before allowing her to leave. Jordana and Brenton were the first and only true friends she’d ever had, and now they were in the little house on Marcy Street, while she was here, blocks away on Seventeenth Street.

  The Bible lay there as a firm reminder of one of the biggest obstacles between her and Brenton. Jordana had often told her of Brenton’s firm faith in God, of his desire to one day find a wife who felt just as strongly as he did about matters of faith.

  “I’d like to be believin’ they know the truth,” Caitlan whispered, reaching out to run her fingertips over the leather cover.

  There was so much pain associated with matters of religious indoctrination. People were cruel and mean-spirited, using religion and Scripture to serve their own purposes, rather than God’s. She’d grown up hearing whispers about her oldest brother, Red. People believed him to have committed murder, but within their own family they would never consider it as truth. Still, she knew the harshness of the older women, murmuring that God had put a curse upon the O’Connor family. And maybe that much was true, for they certainly seemed to have more than their share of bad luck.

  Jordana didn’t believe in luck, either bad or good, and she’d made as much clear to Caitlan. Smiling to herself, Caitlan could hear the younger woman reasoning with her now.

  “Luck is a part of superstition,” she would say. “Superstition is illogically based in a belief that one thing, completely unrelated to that thing, nevertheless has the power to influence or change that thing.”

  Caitlan could very nearly hear her speaking the words, and the thought warmed her lonely heart. Jordana would handle matters so concisely and logically that often Caitlan could find no easy way to protest what she said. But Jordana broke with this tradition when it came to religion. At least, that was how Caitlan saw it. Jordana said that having a relationship with God required faith. Caitlan saw faith as being illogical, but Jordana protested that faith was perfectly logical—for what other choice did they have?

  Caitlan felt she had many other choices. The first and foremost was to recognize that religion was just a system designed to keep folks either in line or at each other’s throats. It was as much a matter of culture and tradition for a particular group of folks as was the wearing of multiple layers of colored petticoats for Irish women. As far as Caitlan was concerned, it kept people separated and created an “us against them” mentality that destroyed and wounded everyone in its wake.

  But Jordana talked of God in a way that made Caitlan wish that what she said could be true. Jordana spoke of God as a friend and a comforter. Someone who was with her at all times, never leaving her to face the world alone. It always seemed clear that Jordana had something special in her relationship with God. Something quite impossible for Caitlan to grasp.

  Caitlan wished she could believe as Jordana did. She wanted to believe that God was more than a harsh and cruel judge. She wanted to believe that there really was something wonderful about yielding your life to Jesus.

  “If it is true,” she said, picking up the Bible, “I wish ya’d be showin’ me for meself. And not just in these words. I’ve had words aplenty thrown at me. All me life someone has been threatenin’ or condemin’, and always they use these words. I find no comfort here,” she said honestly.

  Startled at the tears that suddenly filled her eyes, Caitlan quickly dropped the Bible back on the nightstand. She had no time for such miseries, and if soul-searching caused her to feel so empty and lost, then why should she continue?

  Getting up, she dabbed her eyes with her apron and fought to regain control. She must go forward with her day and leave off with these wrenching thoughts of Jordana and Brenton. She couldn’t have any peace at all if she considered God’s and Jordana’s statement that He loved her with an everlasting love.

  “What kind of love allows a person such sufferin’?” she questioned aloud, knowing that there was no one there to give her an answer. It was the question that had followed her from Ireland. It was the question that haunted her wherever she went. If God were truly the loving and merciful Father that Jordana and Brenton believed Him to be, why did He allow such suffering?

  15

  Kiernan heard the final explosion fire off, then picked up his shovel and moved into the deep trough of Bloomer Cut. His mind traveled back to his time with Victoria and the sweet reunion they had shared. The time had passed much too quickly, and Kiernan had given strong consideration to petitioning Charlie Crocker to allow him to go back to Sacramento—permanently. There was always work to be done on the established line. He could work in the rail shop there, if nothing else. It wasn’t as much money, but they would manage somehow.

  He heard someone call out from behind him, but he was too lost in thought to hear the words. The men were probably complaining again. They’d set ten charges with fifteen minutes to spare before the lunch break. No doubt someone figured Kiernan should let them start lunch early.

  He glanced at the mess of rock, seeing where the blasts had eaten away at the horseshoe-shaped cut. Slowly but surely they were staking their claim to the land—but just as surely, the land was not giving in without a fight.

  “Kiernan!” a man called from the opening of the cut. “I only counted nine explosions.”

  For the first time, Kiernan realized he’d failed to count off the blasts. He tried to remember how many he’d heard, but of course, it was impossible. He looked down the cut to where the man stood.

  “Are ya sure it was just nine?” he questioned, then turned back to eye the mess of rock and debris at his feet. His gaze quickly traveled the areas where they had set the charges, and he had just turned to his right preparing to make a hasty retreat when the final charge, somehow delayed from the others, blasted out the rock wall in front of him. The noise was deafening—the impact debilitating.

  ——

  Victoria was enjoying the warmth of the spring days as much as anything else in her life. She loved being able to open the windows of her apartment and usher in the scented breezes. Life in Sacramento wasn’t the best she had known, but in many ways she had come to love California more than either Virginia or Maryland. With two weeks behind her since she’d returned from seeing Kiernan in Roseville, Victoria was already fighting her loneliness. She had worked with Li on several occasions, helping her with her English, even teaching her to recognize written letters and to read. Victoria seemed to have a flair for such things, remembering how easy it had been to teach Kiernan to read.

  Li had returned to Sacramento with her husband and son. Apparently, because of a general slowing of construction, the laundry business on the line was not enough to support the family. Victoria felt bad for their disappointment but for herself was thrilled to have this friend return. Hoping to find other work, perhaps as a maid, Li had asked Victoria for more English lessons. Before long Li, who had been so excited with her own progress, invited a couple of her neighbors to join in on the lessons. Victoria had known a great sense of pride and accomplishment when each woman could write her name by the end of t
he day. They thought it very strange that Americans should have only twenty-six letters in their alphabet, when Chinese had some three thousand characters in theirs. Victoria had teased the shy women, telling them that learning English should be a cinch, given the difference.

  But now, back at her apartment with the evening light fading, Victoria could only think of Kiernan. How happy they had been for their two days in Roseville. They’d acted like young lovers again. Holding hands and taking walks. Whispering secret thoughts and dreams. Kiernan was so hopeful for their future. He saw good things coming and had even suggested the possibility of bringing Victoria to Dutch Flat to live. She didn’t mind that idea at all. She loved Sacramento with its civilized stores and entertainments, but she knew Dutch Flat from their time spent there before coming to the city. She could manage well enough in that tiny town. Especially if it meant being with Kiernan.

  Going to light a fire in the stove, Victoria was startled when she heard knocking on her front door. It was nearly dark outside. Thoughts of Christopher Thorndike entered her mind. He had taken advantage of her loneliness once before. Perhaps this Sacramento entrepreneur had learned of Kiernan’s absence and had once again come to press his luck with her. She bit her lower lip and waited. Maybe the person would just go away.

  The knock came louder this time, and with it came a voice as well. “Mrs. O’Connor, are you in?”

  “Who is it?” she asked, knowing now that it wasn’t Thorndike.

  “Mr. Hopkins.”

  She opened the door to find one of Sacramento’s most prestigious citizens. Mark Hopkins and his wife had become acquaintances through the Central Pacific, where Hopkins was lauded as one of the original “Big Four.” But she’d also shared his company through social gatherings with Ted and Anna Judah.

  “Mr. Hopkins, this is a surprise.”

  “Not a pleasant one, I’m afraid,” the bearded man replied.

  Victoria stiffened. “What’s happened? Is it Kiernan?”