Whiskey Island (13 page)

“You’ve already done too much,” Lena protested.

“Without the ease of a stove, the men have cooked very little. I have extra crockery, some spoons, a knife or two….” Katie made it clear that the things would magically appear in Lena’s kitchen tomorrow whether she approved or not.

“You’re a dear friend.” Lena reached for Katie’s work-roughened hand and squeezed it hard.

“You’ll need friends. Life isn’t easy here, but we live in one another’s shadow. We take care of our own if we can.”

“And I’ll always help you any way I’m able.”

“Then we’ve struck a good bargain, you and I.” Katie took one more look around the room, shaking her head as she did. “Clean enough, that’s all we can say for this.”

“No, one more thing.” Lena smiled. “We can say it’s mine. My very own kitchen.”

Katie’s expression softened. “We’ll get you ready for your husband now.” She turned, and Lena followed her through the sitting room and across the hall. Katie opened the door into the small room that Lena and Terence would share, and lit a lamp she found. The room was somewhat smaller than the sitting room, with pegs along the wall for clothing and, surprisingly, a fine, tall chest near the door for storage. Another sawbuck table, more finely crafted than the one in the kitchen, sat beside it, complete with the lamp and a chamber set of basin, pitcher and cup.

The rest of the space was taken up by a bed hardly large enough for two. It was made up with heavy, utilitarian quilts that seemed to be crafted from odds and ends of men’s clothing.

Katie lifted one edge of the top quilt. “It doesn’t look like much, I know, but it’s wool and warm as a peat fire. I made this myself, from goods the ragman sold me. Nothing was left in the house by the time Terry arrived, you see. What little Darrin had gathered together was taken by other poor men.”

Lena trailed her hand along the table. “Do you know how he died? No one’s told me.”

“It’s better not to think of it.”

“Please, Katie?”

Katie sighed. “There was an accident. He was deep in the hold of a ship. A load of ore spilled on top of him. They say he must have died quickly, but it was two days before they shoveled enough ore to find his body.”

Lena shuddered. “Seamus and…Terence?”

“They’re careful. They’ll be careful always.”

“Their jobs are terrible.” It wasn’t a question.

“Shoveling ore’s the devil’s own job. The dust is so thick that they do nothing but cough it from their lungs for hours after. And the dust grinds into their skin and hair until it seems they were born red all over.” Katie managed a smile. “Not as red as your hair, of course.”

“These are the only jobs?”

“Good enough for now, and better than they find in the deepest part of winter, when the ships can’t get through. A man’s work is hard, but it puts food on his family’s table.” Katie straightened. “Come, dear. Terry will be here soon, and I’ve got to get back to Seamus and the children. Shall I help you undress?”

Suddenly shy, Lena shook her head. “You’ve been too kind. I’ll manage alone.”

Katie smiled. “Then that’s what we’ll do.” She paused. “Is there anything—”

“I’ll be fine. You’ve done far too much. Thank you for everything, Katie.”

“You’ll remember what I said? It’s not the big mansion that makes the happy home. It’s love between man and wife and the things that happen here.” Katie patted the bed one last time, then she turned and swept out of the room with the same energy she’d swept in.

Lena heard the front door close behind her. She fell to the bed and squeezed her hands together in her lap. The house suddenly seemed extraordinarily silent, as if no one else were alive in the world. She couldn’t remember when she last had been alone. Not often in Ireland, since she’d tended her father until his death and, afterward, her mother, who had nearly died from sorrow. Lena hadn’t been alone on the crowded ship that had brought her here. In her brief hours on deck she had searched for a place where she could have a bit of solitude, but there had been little to be found.

Now she longed for her new husband’s voice and step, even though she didn’t know what she would do when he arrived.

She rose, realizing that he would surely be home soon. She was still dressed, and if he arrived before she had slipped out of her clothes and washed, she might have to do both in front of him.

That realization sped her movements. In a matter of minutes she had taken off her skirt and petticoats, her corset and waist. She didn’t take off her chemise, which would double as a nightdress. Stockings and shoes came off last, and she nearly flew to the pitcher, pleased to discover there was water to wash with.

She found her small trunk beside the bed, where Terence must have put it earlier in the day. She took out her hairbrush, worn but beloved, and removed the pins from her hair until it spilled down her back. Almost savagely, she pulled the brush through it, debating whether she should braid it for the night. The front door opened, and the debate was no longer productive.

Terence was home.

Home.

“Lena?”

“I’m here.” She expected him to march right into the room and perform whatever act husbands performed. Instead his footsteps died away.

She was curious now. Had she done the wrong thing? Should she have waited, fully dressed, in the sitting room? Would he think that she was shameless, waiting for him in bed?

She heard footsteps again, growing louder, then dying away once more. She was glad that the boarder, Rowan, had chosen to spend the night elsewhere. It seemed odd enough to share her new home with one man.

When Terence still didn’t appear, her curiosity overcame her embarrassment. “Terry, what is it you’re doing?”

“Why not come and see?”

She looked down at her chemise, patched and worn to mere threads. She owned nothing that had belonged only to her. Her clothes had come from aunts and cousins. The corset had come from her own mother, who had been far heavier than Lena when last she’d worn it.

She couldn’t meet him this way, yet her curiosity had reached a peak now, and she couldn’t ignore him, either. She slid to the floor and lifted the top cover from the bed, wrapping it around her shoulders like a cloak. It was even heavier than it had looked, and it shortened her steps as it trailed behind her.

She opened the door and peered into the hall. When she didn’t see him, she crossed it and stood in the sitting room doorway. “Terry?”

He appeared in the doorway that led from the kitchen, his golden hair glinting in the lamplight, a chair held stiffly in front of him. As she watched he made his way to the fireplace and set the chair in front of it.

Only then did she see what a fine chair it was. “Oh, Terry!” She clasped her hands together.

“It’s yours, Lena. Do you like it?”

She forgot that she was wearing almost nothing, that she was wrapped in the oddest coverlet she’d ever seen. She forgot that they were so poor that, between them, there wasn’t enough luck for one person. She started across the floor, trailing the quilt like an ermine robe. “Oh, it’s…it’s beautiful!”

“It’s what they call a Boston rocker. I wanted you to have it on our wedding day. Now you can sit by the fire on winter evenings, and when we have children, you can rock them here, where it’s warm.”

She trailed her hand over the polished wood. The rocker had curved arms and a spindle back. The wood was stenciled with lovely, fading designs. “You bought this for me?”

“A widow with no children sold it to me. She said I had more need of it than she.”

Tears filled Lena’s eyes. “You darling man.”

She was in his arms then, as naturally as the sun rose and the larks wheeled over a summer meadow. He enclosed her in them as if he always had, as if they had been long married. “I have so little…to give you.” He choked on the words.

“You have everything! You have yourself.”

“Lena…” He tipped her chin and placed his mouth against hers. As she lifted her arms to his shoulders and kissed him back, the cover fell from her shoulders.

His body was hard and long against hers, harder as he pulled her closer. She had kissed him before, when her mother’s back was turned on the road to her family cottage. She had liked kissing him then; she loved it now.

She loved him.

“Lena, sit with me.” He lowered himself into the chair, pulling her to his lap in one fluid motion. He kissed her again, before she could protest. He crossed his arms behind her and held her to him, and one kiss became another. His hand found her breast, and it was so warm against her chemise that she could feel his flesh pulsing. His lips traced a path to her shoulder, and she felt the chemise sinking lower. She thought she should say something, but words had disappeared. There were no sounds except the sweet, sucking pressure of his lips against her skin.

She closed her eyes, and sight disappeared, too. It was just as well, since her head was beginning to spin. His hand was fully against her breast now, no threadbare cotton between his skin and hers. He found her lips again and turned her so that he was leaning above her.

“My dear girl…”

She thought, as she never had before, that clothes were not a good thing, but simply a barrier. As her chemise slipped to her waist, she sighed blissfully. And when he lifted her in his arms as easily as if she were a bit of duck down, she slipped her arms around his neck and kissed him again.

In their room, he closed the door behind him and laid her on the bed. She watched him undress hurriedly, a warm bubble of expectation shielding her from fear. When he joined her, she slipped her arms around his neck again and pressed her naked body against his.

She supposed that what she felt at that moment was wrong. She had been told so often enough, told to guard against feelings such as these, learned the names for them and the punishment. But the only words she could recall were Katie’s, and the only feelings seemed straight from heaven.

“We’ll have a good life,” Terence said before he made her his at last.

“Oh, yes,” she agreed. And in the next moments, she was absolutely certain of her words. “Oh…yes.”

January 17, 1881

W
e come into this world as part of a family. Some of us come as precious gifts, others as trials to be borne. We spend our days struggling for freedom or hiding safely in the arms of those who nurtured us as children. Sometimes we swing between one and the other as regularly, as gracefully, as the pendulum of a clock.

Family is the greatest test of a man, the price he pays for entrance into this world and the debt he owes when he leaves it. Of all the sorrows I have known, and all the joys, none equals the instant of awakening in a familiar bed, the sounds of those who know me most intimately awakening, too.

From the journal of Father Patrick McSweeney—St. Brigid’s Church, Cleveland, Ohio.

9

Whiskey Island Saloon
February 2000

F
or days after the celebration at the saloon, Casey saw Jon Kovats everywhere and nowhere. He was waiting in line at a Tower City ATM, but when she marched over to confront him, she found herself lecturing a startled stranger. He was grinding coffee beans at the Giant Eagle grocery store, but when she tapped him on the shoulder, the man who turned to face her had a pug nose and receding hairline.

She could have called him. After all, she knew where Jon worked, even if his private telephone number was unlisted. She could have dropped by the district attorney’s office to ask him to lunch, something that had always seemed perfectly natural with other men. But she was hurt that Jon had disappeared again. They had been friends, good friends.

Jon had played a unique role in her adolescence. They had talked about everything, disagreeing on much of it, mercilessly shredding each other’s logic and conclusions, but when the arguments ended for the day, the friendship had always been deeper.

“You know, Casey,” Megan shouted from the saloon kitchen, “it’s a Friday. Our busiest day. In about half an hour that room’s going to be filled with patrons. Big men, most of them, who get annoyed when they’re hungry. Do you want to be the one who tells them why the tables aren’t ready?”

Casey snapped back to attention. She had been staring off into space, and Megan was right. There was a lot to do.

“Sorry,” she shouted back.

“When you get finished, we could use some help in here.”

Megan ran the kitchen with the assistance of two helpers, but today one of them was sick. Casey started wiping tables in earnest, until Peggy came over and pried the rag out of her hands. “Go on back to the kitchen. I can do this.”

“Can you get the bar, too?”

“You bet.”

Casey smiled her thanks. Peggy looked particularly pretty this morning, in the saloon’s traditional white polo shirt and green kerchief. Casey had fully expected her sister to head back to school by now, but Peggy seemed in no hurry to return. In fact, early that morning she’d offered to fill in today and all next week for their day server, who’d grabbed the unexpected opportunity to visit family out of town. Peggy was even more welcome, since her presence in the apartment eased the strain of caring for Ashley, but Casey was beginning to worry about her.

“You doing okay?” Casey asked. “I know you came home to be with Megan and me for a while, and maybe to run a little interference. But if you came home to rest before the semester gets into full swing, you must be disappointed.”

“I needed a break, not rest.”

Casey cocked her head in question.

Peggy raised her voice so it was audible over the soft rock music wafting from the kitchen radio. “You know how it is. College is great for thinking about some things, but not so great for thinking about life.”

“A saloon’s not exactly a think tank.”

“You’d be surprised. Sometimes the only way you can figure out where you’re going is to figure out where you’ve been.”

The smile that accompanied her words lit up her face. Casey might have been alarmed, but clearly, if something was bothering her little sister, it was something she could manage. She was quieter than usual, perhaps, but not, in Casey’s opinion, depressed.