May the Road Rise Up to Meet You: A Novel (7 page)

Did more people die? he asks.

Suah shakes his head, but he’s not a good liar and Ethan presses him for the truth.

Some, is all he concedes.

Mrs. Quigley? Is she one o’ dem?

Suah shakes his head again, more convincingly it seems, and Ethan’s relieved. He resumes his position for another evening amidst the smelly fish barrels, and Suah promises that this will be the last night. It’s dawn the next day when a crewman opens the storage bin and is startled to see Ethan.

Get outta there ya little shit, he says. Doncha wanna see America?

Strugglin’ to stand up, he looks around and sees the passengers from above deck staring out across the water toward the brown mass on the horizon. It’s the first time in weeks that he’s seen anything in any direction except ocean. Less than an hour later the people from the lower levels begin to make their way to the main deck, with the crew saying that they’ll be docking that afternoon and they’ll
have to get the stink off ’em if you’re to be let into America, haha
. Ethan looks around for Mrs. Quigley, figuring she must’ve worried terribly about him. He wants to make sure that she knows he’s all right, that she hasn’t lost another one. But when he doesn’t see her with the people who are already above deck, he’s soon a fish swimming against the stream making his way past the crowd still climbin’ the stairs. She’s nowhere to be found.

She’s gone lad, Donnegan says from across the aisle. Sure she’ll be happy t’see her family once again.

And Ethan wants to explode at the old man with a fury of swears and fists to punish him for the way he cursed them all by calling this a Coffin Ship in the first place. But he can’t do that.

How many doyed? is all he manages to ask.

Dere’s been a few each day since you wandered off, Donnegan says, shakin’ his head. She went yesterday mahrnin’, den t’ree more last night make it noineteen b’my count.

The
Lord Sussex
eventually docks at a pier that looks as if it’s equipped for ships about half its size. The crewmen arrange the passengers into several rows across the length of the deck with the sickest or weakest-looking passengers all in the center, the strongest on the outside. It’s mostly the passengers who’d had the tiny cabins above deck standing on the outside, and Ethan stands in the second row between them and the sickly-looking people who are squeezed into the middle of the pack. Behind him two men are talking about the Captain and the First Mate, who disembarked just a few minutes before. They go on about bribes and quarantines and how they’re worried about whether they’ll be allowed in the country what with all the dead from the trip. Ethan can’t help but hear it, but his mind is clouded with sadness for Mrs. Quigley and now resentment toward Suah for keepin’ him above deck and not letting him do anything to save her. Then the Captain and First Mate walk out of the small building with another man, who wears a uniform and has a wooden slate in his hands with a large parchment against it.

Move them along, quickly and orderly, the Captain calls to his crew, and at once the mob begins to move. One hundred ninety-five of ’em, he says to the port official. Within the regulations, and all of ’em fine and healthy.

They pass the official who stands with arms folded as if assessing the passengers for fitness. But when Ethan walks by he notices that the official stares at a point halfway up the mainmast, not lookin’ at a single passenger as they set foot in their new country. The disembarkation is completed with great haste, as if covering a wrongdoing quickly before anyone notices. Members of the crew even help the frailest carry their possessions off the ship, and in a matter of minutes the pier goes from nearly empty to swarming with a hundred ninety-five people and all their worldly possessions. And as Ethan steps off the gangway and onto the dock, he is filled with more thoughts and emotions than he can keep track of all at once. He looks back at the ship to see if maybe Suah is there on deck or atop the mainmast, forgetting about his anger of just a few moments before and hoping his friend can give him some direction on where to go. But there is no sign of him, and he is pulled along with the crowd of people for a while until he walks out on an adjacent empty dock to figure out what to do next.

He’s become so accustomed to being on his own that he almost
forgets to look for his Da and brother Seanny, who Mam had written to before they left for Newry. But now, remembering, he can’t imagine finding them in all this mess of people. Boys not much older than Ethan swarm the docks, grabbing people’s bags and runnin’ off with them. When they’ve run far enough away so that the tired and hungry men stop chasing them, the thieves rifle through the bags and toss aside the books or clothes or trinkets that are of no value to them, pocketing little bits of jewelry and whatever money they find. Determined that they won’t do the same thing to him, Ethan takes out his books and the few clothes he has in his satchel, and spreads them out separately along the bit of pier that he occupies. When one of the boys approaches him and sees Ethan’s feeble possessions laid out before him, he curses at him and then turns toward another victim.

Within the first hour, most of those off the ship venture one way or another into the giant city before them, and the vultures leave right along with them. But there is still no sign of his Da or Seanny, just an endless stream of buildings as tall as anything he’s seen in his life. And he decides to wait for a while longer before venturing out into it in search of the place called Brooklyn, where his Da’s last letter said he and Seanny now live.

When the crewmen from the
Lord Sussex
begin to dump the few remaining pieces of rotted fish and salted pork into the harbor, Ethan almost instinctively jumps in to salvage what he can, but the seagulls quickly swarm in before he can act. And he can’t help but feel that New York, that all of America will be like this, swarms of people and young boys and seagulls even, waiting to grab whatever they can before anyone else has the chance. Life here, he thinks, will be faster than anything he’d known along the Lane back home.

Two even shifts now, the Captain calls out to his men from over on the deck of the
Lord Sussex
. You have three hours each shift, then back on the ship to clean the resta this filth! Get a bath, a meal, whatever you will, but if you’re past the time of your shift, don’t expect to be paid the resta your wages.

Some of the crewmen walk down the gangway, Suah among them, and Ethan’s happy to see his friend again. Amidst such spectacle, he forgets for a moment about how angry he was just a little while ago that Suah hadn’t told him about Mrs. Quigley and the fever. He waves
to him as soon as he’s off the gangway, and Suah smiles and walks over to the pier where Ethan is seated.

There you are Etan, he says, apparently unaware that Ethan would have any reason to be angry with him. I worry about you dis morning but I was up above and could not see you.

But quickly comforted by his friend’s presence, Ethan remembers to be mad again.

Mrs. Quigley doyed, he offers, as if confronting Suah with the truth. You said she was okay, an’ then when I went below today, I found out she doyed yesterday mahrnin’.

Suah just shakes his head and then says, Yes, I am sorry that she dies, Etan. When I see her last she is very sick and I think she will not make it. I am sorry for your loss.

It doesn’t seem like much of an explanation, and as Suah asks Ethan about his brother and Da, and explains that the passenger ships coming into New York land on the other side of the island, which is probably where they’ve gone to look for him, Ethan is listenin’ only halfway at best. They will come to find him soon, he assures him, but Ethan’s not ready to believe another one of Suah’s promises.

Well, dis is not a good place for a young boy just new to de country, Suah says, and sits down beside Ethan. I will wait wit’ you Etan, and if dey do not come today, I will hide you away back on de ship for de night and we will find dem before de ship leave in t’ree days. But first … he says, then leaves off as he stands back up and signals to Ethan to wait right there.

Suah walks to one of the shops not far from the pier, and Ethan has time to think about Mrs. Quigley and the rest of the nineteen who didn’t survive the trip, for the first time realizing that Suah might’ve actually saved his life. Now the guilt bears down upon him, and is worse when Suah returns with a large piece of cheese, a loaf of bread, and something that looks like a slab of cooked beef. Ethan can hardly eat any of it, choked up with shame the way he is, and as Suah talks about the city they see before them, all Ethan can think of is
how do you thank someone for savin’ yer life?
Finally an idea comes to him and he reaches inside his satchel, takes out
The Odyssey
, and offers it to Suah without saying anything.

We eat first, Suah says, den we can read some.

It’s
yours
, Ethan says. I wancha t’have it.

It takes a moment until Suah realizes what Ethan’s saying, then he shakes his head, as if he’ll have nothing of it.

You must have your favorite book wit’ you on your
own
journey, he says.

Ethan’s disappointed and relieved all at the same time, and he opens the satchel again as another idea strikes him, making perfect sense to him now. He could never give away Aislinn’s Shakespeare book, and it’d be difficult to lose Odysseus and Suah in the same day, but he sees how it’s all connected now, and why Aunt Em walked those extra miles the night before they arrived in Newry.

Paradise, Suah says, as Ethan hands the book to him. Etan, I cannot—

Please, Ethan interrupts. I wancha t’have it fer … fer savin’ me.

Suah hesitates, then takes hold of the book with both hands as if it’s a sacred scroll.

T’ank you, my friend, he says. I never have a book of my own before.

He smiles and Ethan does too, sayin’ a small thank-you to Aunt Em for what she’d done. They eat their food, and Ethan can feel his stomach fill up like it hasn’t in as long as he remembers. They read a little, but mostly look out at the city, watching the people passing. An hour goes by before Suah walks back to the shop for some more bread and cheese, and when he returns he tells Ethan about landing on this side of the island so that they could get into the city without being quarantined. He talks about the South Street Port where they usually land and how busy it is, but all that Ethan can think about then are the Quigleys and the rest of the nineteen who died on the way, and even Aislinn. It doesn’t matter where they landed, he still feels guilty for havin’ been allowed to make it even this far when too many others never got the chance. Suah nods his head as Ethan confides this to him, as if he knows the feeling himself.

Dere were t’ree hundred on de ship from Africa, Suah says, looking off into the distance as he speaks, almost the way Mr. Hanratty would. Da man to de right of me die, da man to de left of me die, and more dan seventy udders, but not me. On de plantation, my friend die when he is bit by a snake I walk past just a few seconds before it bite him. And up
above dere, he continues, nodding to the top of the mast, dere are many times I t’ink, dis is de last storm I will see. But each time I live t’rough it. And den I begin to t’ink maybe God keep me alive for some reason. Maybe he have somet’ing he want me to do.

He looks earnestly at Ethan and says, So why is it you do not die from de fever Etan? Perhaps God have somet’ing he want
you
to do.

And then it’s quiet for a while except the noise of the city, and Ethan begins to consider what that might be.

Sam, da man who teach me to read, Suah finally says. He is up in de top mast t’rough many more storms dan I ever see, an’ he make it ev’ry time. He fight against de great Napoleon when he is a young man, an’ still live. Den he slip on some water on deck when we dock in Liverpool a year ago. He hit his head on de metal rig … an’ dat’s all for him. He don’t wake up from it. An’ all anybody talk about is how strange a way it is for
such a man
to go. No glory, no storm, no battle—just some water an’ metal rig, an’ he is gone. Whatever it is God has keep you alive for Etan, it is best dat you do it while you can.

IT’S MIDAFTERNOON WHEN A MAN
walks partly up the gangway to the
Lord Sussex
and speaks to a member of the crew. Ethan watches him the whole time while Suah’s readin’, and it’s only when the man walks back down the gangway and toward them that he thinks he recognizes his Da. It’s been more than two years since he’s seen him, and the picture Ethan has of him in his mind has grown cloudier and more distant with time. As the man walks past the dock where they’re seated, Ethan gets the closest look yet, and though the last two years seem to have put five or ten years’ worth of gray into his hair and slouch into his shoulders, Ethan is almost certain it’s him.

I think that’s me Da, he tells Suah, and Suah’s face lights up as if it’s his
own
father he’s seein’.

Yes? We must stop him. Hello! Hello! Sir! Hello! Suah whistles loudly and Ethan’s Da turns around. Suah waves to him, and Ethan stands up along with Suah, as his Da walks tentatively toward them, seein’ only Suah at first. He stops about twenty feet away, but then he sees Ethan and his eyes broaden with a single glance.

Ethan? he asks, but doesn’t wait for an answer before walkin’ quickly up to him with arms opened, embracing him and liftin’ him off his feet.

Oh Son, yer here, yer here, he says, over and over.

And past his Da’s shoulder Ethan sees Suah beaming with happiness. It’s a strange and proud moment all at once for Ethan. He doesn’t feel like the little boy who’d said goodbye to his Da two years before, but rather like a man who’d accomplished something just by surviving it all—The Hunger, the walk to Newry, the Coffin Ship. And the initial joy of having his father lift him up, for the first time in years, quickly gives way to the awkward discomfort of such an emotional display. What would Mr. Hanratty say about such a thing?

Lookit da
soize
o’ ya, gettin’ t’be a man, his Da says as he places him back down on the dock.