City of Hope (21 page)

“Suffering?”

He nodded and kept smiling at his own joke.

“Plus, my family lost all of their money.”

“Really?” I said, and although I was immediately worried at sounding cheap, I stupidly added, “They lost everything?”

The Irvingtons had been so wealthy—beyond measure, it had seemed to me, and it seemed impossible that they now had nothing.

“Yes!” He laughed heartily. “Although my parents managed to hold on to their house upstate, oh and two cars—and my mother hid most of her jewelry—but my brother is living in ‘reduced circumstances,' working for somebody else as a shipping clerk. Not as lowly as me, mind you . . .”

“Not that he ever was.”

“No—he was always the smart one.”

“So when did you become ‘Chuck'?”

“When I joined the union. It was kind of a teasing nickname, given my lofty background.”

“I bet Daddy wasn't pleased.”

“No, indeed—‘Daddy' was most unimpressed—but then that was nothing new.”

None of this was any great surprise. Charles had eschewed his parents' money long before they lost it. When I had first met him, he had chosen to work at the docks as a laborer rather than take up his father's mantle as head of the company—working his way up through the office ranks, like his brother. His breeding, coupled with his affinity for the workingman and his politics, meant that Charles had always been adept at straddling both worlds: enjoying the benefits and security of his family wealth and the camaraderie and respect of the men he worked with. It seemed he was still doing that. He had wanted to marry an ordinary Irish girl, but shortly after I returned to John in Ireland, he had followed his family form and married a rich man's daughter. I had read about it in a society magazine.

We had not stayed in touch. Although it would have been neither appropriate nor possible for us to have corresponded after my return home, I had resented the distance that had suddenly come between us. It was me who had put it there, but nonetheless it had hurt me that he had married so quickly and so “well.” Part of me secretly wished he had kept the cottage on his brother's estate where he had promised we could live together in peace whether we married or not, then sat there pining for my return for the rest of his life. It was an irrational and unreasonable idea, but surely that is the nature of dreams. They do not exist in reality, and Charles did not exist for me after my return to Ireland—other than as a selfish desire for what might have been.

Although Charles had slipped into my thoughts since I came back to America, I had not allowed myself to indulge my curiosity by looking him up in the phone books, or the society magazines. The very moment that the vaguest notion of him came into my head, I felt only a guilty deception in the back draft of John's death. Now the culprit of my fantasies was standing in front of me in the flesh. Doubtless, as a younger woman, in the early years after my return to Ireland I had imagined this very scenario in my foolish fantasies: coming back to America and Charles finding me again, although not in this house and certainly not in this way. The truth was that whenever I was feeling disgruntled with my life, or angry with my husband, I was able to call Charles' face to mind as easily as one calls to mind the face of a film star. Yet earlier that very day I had found myself unable to call to mind the image of my own John. The inappropriate injustice of that fact unfurled inside me.

“Look at the two of us talking about money—God, Ellie, how
are
you? Are you still—you know?”

Married. That's what he meant.

“Anyway. You look great—tell me all about yourself. What are you doing here?”

This was neither the time nor the place for reminiscing. The mere idea of telling him about my life, of talking for one more second about what I was doing here or what had happened to bring me here, twisted my stomach. I did not want to say John's name, and I was angry with Charles for the invitation to do so, however vague.

I made myself remember why he was here.

“We'd better go in,” I said, “the men are waiting for us.”

“Ah, ‘the men,' ” he said, smiling that knowing, nonchalant smile, as if nothing mattered, as if no great time or distance had passed between us. Charles, for all he had once been, was a stranger to me now—as I surely was to him—even if he didn't know it yet.

I allowed him to follow me into the house, feeling his smile boring into my back. He was so delighted with himself, and it annoyed me that he clearly wasn't as shaken up by our chance meeting as I was.

My irritation didn't abate when he entered the room, and the quiet, serious atmosphere that I had left immediately lifted. It seemed to do so with his presence, although in reality half the wine was drunk already, despite the short time I had been gone. The men had started eating without us and, true to form, many of them had half-empty plates. Matt stood up as we entered, almost knocking his chair backward. He looked concerned, and it occurred to me that he suspected our tardiness was caused by me trying to negotiate with Charles outside.

I was tempted toward a Mother Superior sternness, to note their bad manners in starting their food and inviting them to say grace, but I knew I should never get away with such loftiness in front of Charles.

“I'm sorry, Ellie, we started without you—Chuck, won't you sit and eat?”

Matt was acting like the man of the house, as if he were in charge. Johnny and Cazper exchanged a smirk that suggested they had been gossiping about the handsome Chuck charming their uptight benefactor outside. How infuriating men were, with their impertinent attitudes! How ungrateful for all I had done for them! How insensitive to the delicacies of a woman's needs! There was Charles, his swagger impressing itself upon their stupidity. Men were good for nothing except for asserting their own self-importance and hurting you. John—I had loved him, I had given my life to him. He swore daily that he would never leave me alone, and then he died. Without warning, suddenly and callously disappearing out of my life, leaving me alone in the world. Leaving me loveless. I would never—could never—love another man again. Charles was talking to Mario, yet looking over at me with a knowing twinkle in his eye—the low-down rotter. He could go to hell—they could all go to hell, for all I cared.

“So, comrades.” Charles raised his glass. “To our beautiful hostess—Ellie, you are some cook, and this is some house.”

“Thanks to Matt's hard work,” the upstart Johnny butted in, before I had the chance to assert that opinion myself.

I wondered how the cheeky young fellow's head would look if I boiled it and put it alongside the lump of bacon on the table.

I stood up and said, “Excuse me while I go to the kitchen—I'll leave you gentlemen to talk.”

I need not have worried about offending them by leaving.

“You're certainly a skilled carpenter, Matt—the paneling in here is magnificent. Mahogany?” Charles asked.

Matt was bristling with pride. Charles shot me an amused glance. He was teasing me!

Let them flatter one another, these stupid men. I'd make provision for the wives and the children, and let the men look after themselves—and we'd see how far they got before they were rotting by the side of the road, without me to stand up for them!

I went out to the kitchen. Matt, the stupid blockhead, had not brought out the bread or taken the gravy from the stove—it was almost burned in the pan! I added water from the kettle and stirred it slowly back up to thickening point, then picked it up to siphon it into the gravy jug. Forgetting to use a cloth, I burned my hands.

“Damnation!”

I went over to the sink and turned the cold tap onto the red line that was rising across my palm, when an anger as hot as the burn came over me.
Here I was—the little woman—out in the kitchen preparing their meal, while the men—the useless, feckless ingrates—sat in my warm dining room. What in the name of God was I doing?

I left the bread and the gravy where they were and marched back in again—taking my seat at the head of the table. I was the woman in charge of this house. This was my party, and I was going to take my place at the table—not run around in the background like a servant. I remembered why I was doing this: to appease a group of overgrown schoolboys and have a welcoming party for a man I knew to be as arrogant a blaggard as ever walked the Earth.

“Matt,” I said, “would you please go out to the kitchen and bring in the bread and gravy—it is on the stove. Johnny? You might go and give him a hand. The apple pies are warming in the oven, and we'll need eleven bowls—you know where they are.”

Indeed they didn't, but let them look. They jumped up, recognizing my tone perhaps.

“Now,” I continued, “I'd like to welcome Mr. Irvington to our table,” and I raised my glass.

Charles flinched at my formal address. He leaned back in his chair in an attitude of false casualness and said, “Well, it's wonderful to see the men doing the bidding of a strong woman, Hogan. As it should be, of course.”

Oh God, he was showing off—humiliating me, teasing me in front of his new gang. So childish! Cazper suppressed a laugh.

“Mr. Irvington . . .”

“Please,” he said, “call me Chuck.”

I ignored him and continued.

“. . . it might have passed your notice, but it's the case around here that the women earn the money. We have started a very successful business to serve the needs of the residents of Yonkers. Some of the men enjoy handymen work at good rates, but the majority of our work is done by the women. Perhaps you think we ladies shouldn't be working, or perhaps you think we should unionize?”

“Perhaps you should.”

He kept his face cold and straight, but his jaw was tight. I could see I was rattling him. Politics was a serious subject for Charles—the only type of conversation that could really get at him.

“Ah, but there is no need. We women work together in happy harmony and, in any case, the business itself is owned by no one. There are no bosses, for we work as a cooperative, all of us doing our part and all of us earning equal share. Perhaps you are aware of the cooperative model of business—Mr. Irvington? No need for silly unions or politics, just level-headed common sense and equality, where we women are concerned.”

“Unions are no matter for mockery, and as a woman, Ellie, you should know more than to hold them in contempt. We are working for the rights of women such as yourselves.”

“Nobody has fought for me, or on my behalf!” I insisted, but he ignored me and continued with his rhetoric.

“As a national movement, the Workers' Union is increasing in strength all the time. If we stand firm against their oppression, we will win. After all,” he said, directly addressing me now, “why should the fate of many be left to the greed, or indeed the conscience, of a few? Why should the bankers and the businessmen be in charge—certainly they have proven themselves unworthy of our respect. No, the future success of America rides on the shoulders of the ordinary man and his willingness to work. Why should good, hardworking men like these be driven to take charity? They should be paid for their work.”

I looked across at Matt and he shrugged. Had Matt confided about our business to this “stranger”? I certainly hoped not! In any case I reacted as swiftly as if it had been a direct attack.

“So what does your socialite wife make of all this ‘union' business?”

Charles immediately reddened, and for a moment I feared I had gone too far. Then he put his glass down and lit a cigarette, saying, “We're divorced.”

He paused for a moment, then added coolly, “And what does your husband make of you moving over to the other side of the world—or has he come with you
this time
?”

I did not pause, but said quite suddenly, “He's dead.”

The men were rapt, looking from one to the other of us at each end of the table, like tennis spectators.

It was only after it was out that I realized what I had said. I felt a choking in my throat as if the words were trying to force themselves back down.

“Excuse me,” I said, and ran from the room.

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY
-
THREE

I went straight out to the kitchen. I was shaking and tried to calm myself by leaning on the dresser. The tin mugs hanging from hooks on the shelf started to wobble, so I pushed my hands harder onto the tiled work surface and breathed deeply, in and out, in and out, until they steadied.

In the hallway I heard Matt usher the men out the front door. I hoped Charles was with them.

I was too raw for company. I had exposed myself in front of them all—especially Charles. I did not want to continue playing out the drama that had begun with our meeting on the porch. The spiked flirtation, the competition for the men's affections—all had turned sour. In leaving the room as I had, I hoped I had drawn the curtain down on my revelation. He could start his work here and we would say nothing more about it.

I could not fathom why the incident had shaken me as much as it had, except that I had barely spoken of John since his death. Nobody had asked about my marital status, and I had not volunteered. My wedding band was still sitting on the mantelpiece above the range in Kilmoy, where I had placed it when making my last batch of bread the day before John died. The woman from Ireland with the gold band, and the woman without it who lived here in Yonkers, were one and the same and yet oceans apart. Admitting to the fact of John's death in front of all those men had felt like a confession. I was ashamed of never having mentioned him before, almost as if I had killed him myself. As if, in not remembering him, in not acknowledging his existence—in running away from his death in the way that I had—I had committed a kind of murder. Beyond the shame of that was the knowledge that I should have watched John more closely, loved him more thoroughly when he was alive. I might have,
could
have, kept him if I had cared enough, if I had not been so caught up with myself. There was no way of saying I loved John, no way of talking about our marriage, without acknowledging that he was dead, and that was too painful. Silence was my only route to peace and now I had broken it, and as good as told everybody my personal business. The only way to get the bit of stillness back was to keep myself busy. Too busy to think, too busy to speak. The kitchen was upside down, the women and children would be back in less than an hour. There was plenty for me to be getting on with. I picked up a pile of dishes from the table.