Ellis Island (18 page)

Charles’s face went from friendly and animated to blank. He stood up and walked toward the fire, his back to me. “I didn’t know you were married.”

I forced out a laugh. “I’m a good Catholic girl of over eigh-teen years of age, of course I’m married!” I hated the way my voice sounded, hard and shrill. “My husband is called John. Did I not say?” It felt wrong repeating “John” as if it was just a casual word in our conversation. John was my life. He was the reason I was here. “I love him, and he loves me. We’ve known each other since we were children.” Now I wanted Charles to turn round and listen to me. I wanted to talk properly about John and my life. I wanted to make John real, and bring him into the room with us.

Eventually Charles did turn round, but all he said was, “Then where is he?”

“What do you mean?” I was shocked by his cold expression.

“Well, he’s not here, is he? What kind of a man lets his wife travel to America without him?”

I cried, “My husband is a captain in the Irish Republican Army and he was badly injured. He has a medal! I came here of my own will to earn money for his treatment. He didn’t want me to come. He tried to stop me!”

“If you were mine I would never let you go,” he interrupted.

“But I’m not,” I said, “yours.”

In the moment’s silence that followed I could not help but wonder what it would be like if that were not true. What would happen if I were to give Charles permission to love me? Would he take this thin veil of loneliness off my shoulders and replace it with a warm blanket of affection, allow me to feel the comfort of being held in somebody’s arms again? John was not here, and love was love, from wherever it came. For an instant, I thought about reaching out and grabbing a moment, just one moment for myself. It had been so long. Except that I knew that one moment would stretch back into my past and wipe clean the canvas of my life. The days in the fields, picking hedgerow berries on the way home from school, starving myself for the love of John, our paupers’ wedding day, the hard knocks of poverty and war—even the loneliness I was experiencing now was part of the fabric of my love for John. One moment of weakness would reach back over the years and pull it all away, like it had never happened.

I smiled at Charles. A blank smile, devoid of seduction. I tested my foot on the floor and stood, shakily. “My foot feels much better now. The swelling has gone down. Thank you.”

“I’m sorry, Ellie—I shouldn’t have said . . . It’s just that—”

“I’m tired, Charles. I think I should go to bed.”

He insisted on bringing me downstairs to my room, off the kitchen. I let him carry me, although there was no real need. I held my face slightly too close to his shoulder and breathed in the smell of wood smoke and sweat from his shirt, resisting the desire to let go and sink into him. In the maid’s room, he laid me down on the hard, narrow bed, then turned his back quickly. At the door, he stopped and began, “If you ever need anything, Ellie . . .” but trailed off in the face of my silence.

I waited for the kitchen door to slam as he left the house, but it didn’t. A few minutes later I heard a chair scrape across the kitchen floor. I lay awake for a short while, but fell asleep secure in the comfort of knowing I was being watched over.

I was woken by the maid arriving, soon after eleven the following day. I could not remember the last time I had slept so late, certainly not since my arrival in America.

Chapter Thirty

I didn’t see Isobel for almost a week. She sent a car to bring me back to Manhattan alone. As the driver arrived, he handed me a note from her.

“What do you mean ill?” Mrs. Flannery asked as soon as I arrived back. “Is she in hospital— Did she take a fall?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “She just said she felt ill.”

“Well, was she vomiting? Did she have a temperature?”

“I think it is just a bad cold . . .”

“And if you are here, who’s looking after her?”

I hated all this lying. I invented wildly, “Her friends have lots of maids. And they have employed a nurse to look after her.”

Mrs. Flannery became genuinely concerned. “A nurse? Who are these people she’s staying with? Is it Dolores Wallander, or—”

It felt cruel, deceiving the anxious housekeeper. “Look,” I said rudely, “I
don’t know
. She just left the house in the car and told me to tell you she was sick and staying with friends. That’s all. I am Mrs. Adams’s maid,
not
her keeper . . .”

Mrs. Flannery was too astonished to admonish me.

I left and went up to my room. I lay down for a moment on the narrow bed and looked at the ballerinas on the wallpaper, dancing hopefully, torn off at the knees, their faded tutus disappearing into the cracked plaster of a servant’s bedroom wall. This was not what I had left Ireland for—to be an accessory to some unstable socialite. I wanted to live my own dream, not be picking up the crumbs of somebody else’s.

I took the note out of my coat pocket and read it again. “
Love, your friend, Isobel
.” She didn’t love me and she was
not
my friend. Sending Charles to me like that was an act of irresponsible madness. More than that, it was an insult both to my virtue and to Charles’s propriety—yet Isobel seemed to consider it as some sort of “gift” to us both, expecting me to lie for her as a favor in kind and cover her sins to Mrs. Flannery.

I decided to go and call on Sheila. It was Sunday, and with Isobel away there would be nothing much for me to do about the place. Sheila would doubtless think Isobel’s actions charming, but at least it would keep me from following my instincts and confessing all to Mrs. Flannery.

It was late in the afternoon and Sheila and Alex were together in the apartment. They had finished lunch and, in Sheila’s inimitable style, the kitchen was a complete mess, dishes piled up in the sink and a chicken carcass thrown to one side on the draining board. Alex didn’t seem to notice or mind, and the two of them were sitting on the settee working their way through a bottle of hooch, still wearing its paper-bag disguise.

“How was the weekend?” Sheila wanted to know.

“Busy. How is the typing course?” I was keen to deflect any questions about my weekend in front of Alex.

“Ghastly,” she said. “I’m going to give it up.”

Alex looked over at me and raised his eyebrows. She saw, and gave his arm a poke. “Stop,” she said, her eyes soft with the drink. “I hate it—it’s too hard. Why can’t I just stay home and cook and keep house for my darling?” and she pouted at him impossibly. Alex didn’t look happy. I wasn’t happy, either—except that I was more inclined to speak out.

“Well, firstly, Sheila,” I said. “You are a terrible housekeeper . . .”

“It’s true,” Alex said, smiling amusedly.

“Then Alex will get me a maid,” she said, pawing his arm. “Won’t you, darling?”

“. . . and secondly, you are a lazy, ungrateful, bone-idle strap! Alex is giving you the most wonderful opportunity to better yourself and you’re throwing it back in his face.”

“You’re such a bore, Ellie,” she said. Then she snuggled her face into her lover’s neck. “Alex doesn’t want me to be any better than I already am— It was
your
idea to do the course, Ellie.”

“Actually,” Alex said, “I’ve cleared a desk for you to start in a month, and I’ve already warned all the guys to keep their hands off my sassy new secretary!” Alex was joking, but I knew, from what Sheila had told me, that he was keen on the idea of her working at the firm and believed it would square things with his parents. It annoyed Sheila, both that she had to prove herself to his parents by working, and that Alex had thought my idea of a typing course to be a sensible one.

She pawed him again. “But it’s so
difficult
,
Alex—you’ve no idea—and I get so bored with all those other girls. Remember how much fun we had at school, Ellie? Why
hell
, it’s not like that
at all
.”

I felt that she was testing Alex by acting spoiled, and that annoyed me. She was lucky to have the man she loved on her doorstep—one who could give her everything she wanted.

“Hey, I’ve got an idea,” Alex said, standing up and moving across the room to get his cigarettes from the low fire mantel. He took one out of the pack, lit it, turned to me and said, “Why don’t you do the course with Sheila, Ellie? I’ll be happy to pay for it, same as I pay for her.” He winked. “That way you can keep an eye on her for me.”

I could not believe what he had just said. I was still standing and could have sworn I felt the ground shift under me.

“Don’t be stupid, Alex,” Sheila said. “What would Ellie want to do that for? Leaving her good safe job with Isobel . . .”

“Well then, I can go one better and offer her a job. We’ve got girls in the typing pool moving on all the time— How long is the course?”

I was speechless to either accept or decline his offer. I didn’t know where to put myself. “Eight weeks.” I pushed the words out. I knew everything about the course, having gone along with Sheila to help book her into it. The hours, the duration and the (impossible) cost of it were embedded in my mind.

“Well, I can’t guarantee you a job straightaway, but we have a dozen girls in our typing pool and there is always one or the other of them running off to get married. I can promise that as soon as one of the girls leaves, I’ll bring you in. And in the meantime, you can live here with Sheila and help her around the place. Deal?”

“Deal,” I said, keeping my voice as steady as I could. I wanted to scream with delight.

Alex threw his cigarette in the fire and politely took his leave. On his way out of the door, he touched my arm and said, “Thanks for looking out for my girl” as if he had not just altered the course of my life with one act of cavalier generosity.

On my way back to work, I stopped and sat on a bench at the edge of the park. The sun was shining and rain from a recent shower sparkled on the damp paving stones. The bench was sheltered from the rain by the canopy of trees. I needed to sit alone and think things out. I needed to take in the consequences and possibilities of my new life. No more Isobel, no more servitude. Could my life really be about to change so much for the better? In school, the nuns had told me I was clever enough to be a teacher. They would have been disappointed to see me living the life of a servant. Now all that was about to change. Less than one year after arriving here, a whole new life was about to open up.

A couple about the same age as me passed by, and for the first time since coming to New York I allowed myself to think how it would be if John joined me here. With Alex’s offer in place, suddenly it seemed a possibility. I indulged myself in a daydream. John and I, all dressed up and walking through Central Park. John was wearing a soft shirt and linen jacket over his tall, broad torso, and all the women looked after him as we passed. Together we named the birds and the trees and talked about how they reminded us of home. Near Fifth, we stopped at the fairground carousel and he bought me a ride. As I whirled around on the back of a gaudy gilded horse, a yellow chiffon scarf flying behind me, I saw him standing there waiting to wave to me as I passed and I knew that, even when he was out of my view, he was still there for me, within reach, waiting.

Chapter Thirty-One

Isobel was not happy at my resigning.

I told her the first morning after she got back when I was delivering her breakfast tray.

“I’m too nice, that’s my problem,” she said, circling her cigarette tip on the edge of her coffee saucer. “I show you girls my friendship, then you abuse it and leave me. I don’t know what you think you’re going to do that’s better than the life you have here, Ellie.”

“I’m going to become a qualified typist,” I said, “in a respectable, well-paid profession.”

Her eyes narrowed as she pointed her cigarette at me and said, “Let me tell you something, ‘Irish’—it takes a lot more to become a lady than the brief attention of a rich man. Charles Irvington may have a fancy for you, but you’re a fool to throw your life away for him.”

The foolish woman had accused me of being stupid and immoral—her own two obvious failures. My revenge was silence in reply.

“You’ll work a week’s notice. You are dismissed.”

They found a replacement for me within days. A dozen or more girls lined up along the staff stairs on the day Mrs. Flannery was interviewing. At the top of the line were the ones straight off the boat—their Sunday clothes made shabby with wear, the smell of carbolic soap disguising and yet announcing their poverty. One gaunt Irish girl caught my eye and said “
Dia ghuit
” to me in greeting. My stomach turned for the poor child. A native Irish speaker, she didn’t stand a chance. “
Dia is muire ghuit
,” I replied. Her little face tore back in a huge smile, revealing her terrible teeth. I felt bad for the hope I had given her. Isobel would surely pick one of the pretty, neat agency applicants who arrived later. I had forgotten how lucky I had been to have a job waiting for me when I arrived in America, and seeing these poor souls made me feel grateful to Sheila.

It was that bit of gratitude that got me through the next few months living with my friend.

It should have been the happiest of times, moving in with Sheila and us learning our new skill together, as we had at school. Even though I was a few weeks late starting the course, I soon caught up. But Sheila had changed. The novelty of her new life as a girl about town had faded and she had become desperately anxious to get married and move into the big house in Boston. Sheila was frightened. I could see that as clearly as the ever-brightening rouge on her cheeks and the brittleness of her newly permed hair. She was frightened that Alex’s parents would not approve of the marriage and that she would lose him. Frightened that she was not good enough, elegant enough, smart enough for this wonderful, rich man and that he would forsake her for some other girl. It was my belief that Alex was a man of integrity and would stand by Sheila against his family and all obstacles, if the need arose, although he was smart enough to guard against potential problems by biding his time. But Sheila had got herself wound up into a state of wanting, and I worried that her impatience was in danger of corroding their love.

Instead of confiding her worries in me, as her friend, Sheila kept the best of herself for Alex—remaining sweet and calm and untroubled in his company. She saved all her spitefulness for me. While the apartment had two small bedrooms, one of them was entirely given over to Sheila’s growing collection of clothes. So she requested that I sleep on a sofa in the living room, which I gladly did. However, after a few days she complained that my belongings were “making a mess” and that if Alex called by unexpectedly and saw this, he would think her a poor housekeeper. I suggested that I make room in the smaller bedroom, but she snapped at me and said, in effect, that her clothes were more important than my comfort. So, I had to arise early every morning and pack all of my personal belongings back in my case, and store the case in a closet in the hallway.

Sheila was tardy about timekeeping, dillydallying about in the mornings trying on this outfit and that, concerning herself about what powder and lipstick to wear and dawdling over her breakfast. So I became responsible for getting both of us to college on time. A routine developed where I started to lay out her things, ensuring that her outfit was chosen the night before, her makeup and toilet things to hand, and a light breakfast prepared so that I could get us both out the door on time. It was not long before I became as intimately acquainted with her things as I had been with Isobel’s.

In addition, Sheila showed neither the talent nor the inclination to cook. Soon I was preparing her meals for her with the same grudging disapproval as Mrs. Flannery. It infuriated me that she had started to treat me as her maid: “Ellie, would you be a darling and mend this hem for me?” “Oh, Ellie—you know how I hate rice pudding!” I was sure this was not what Alex had meant when he suggested that I “help her around the place.” But I could not say any of it out loud, for fear I would lose the roof over my head.

The more I bit my tongue, the worse she became. “Ellie, Alex is coming at seven—could you make sure the living room is perfectly clean, and please clear away the iron and sewing machine and all of your housekeeping things. I don’t want him walking into a servants’ quarters!” I felt like shouting at her that if breeding were to be the judge of us, I far outweighed her on that score. But I needed her as much as she needed Alex, and my old friend was so tightly strung that if I offended her, she might throw me out on the street and I would have nowhere to go. Fear and dishonesty poisoned our friendship as the threat of poverty hung over us both.

Money was as tight as ever. I took in some ironing and sewing to pay for my living expenses—small though they were, as my rent and the course was paid for, a fact of which Sheila reminded me daily. Also, I still had to send money home.

I wrote to John and told him of the course, and the splendid shiny typewriters, and of Alex’s offer of a well-paid professional position.

He wrote back:

When he begged like that, my heart no longer felt a tug for him or for home. Instead, it made me angry that John did not seem interested in news of how wonderful life was in America with all its modern devices, or impressed with the advancements I was making in my own life—advancements that, after all, I was making for the benefit of us both.

While the other girls, Sheila included, rushed out of the building at break time to various coffee shops and drugstores, I stayed behind in the pool and worked up my speeds. I graduated after the eight weeks with over one hundred words per minute and ninety-eight percent in our written test—the highest mark anyone had ever achieved. Sheila scraped through and Alex gave her a job straightaway, and asked me to wait a month while one of his typists worked out the notice before her wedding.

In the meantime, the principal of our college had recommended me for a lucrative short-term job typing up a law book for a professor at Columbia University. I was paid per typed page and calculated that, if I worked day and night, I could get the job done in a month and earn enough money to pay entirely for John’s operation.

Every day, I took the subway to Washington Heights where I sat in a cramped, airless room typing up a great pile of handwritten papers for a silent old man. Professor Liptka looked so old that I feared he might die before his enormous tome was published—an observation that speeded me up even more. He was not kindly, as one hopes older people will be, but had the air of a man who never liked talking much and took his great age as permission to dispense with it altogether. If I found a word unintelligible, I would underline it in red pen and pass it to the professor, who would fire me an impatient glance and rewrite it in capital letters in the margin. We were united insofar as he wanted his manuscript typed as quickly as possible and I wanted my money. I brought breakfast, lunch and dinner with me as sandwiches, and for three weeks I sat from eight in the morning until nine o’clock at night and typed.

I typed until my nails weakened and split, and the ends of my fingers went numb with hard skin. I typed until I thought I would go blind from the endless black print on white and my head would fall off from the tension in my neck. I worked at a desk on the far side of the tiny room and the professor sat by the door. Every time I needed to go to the toilet or stretch my legs, he had to move his chair out of my way and it was such an arduous process for us both that I waited until he left the room before doing either. As a result, my limbs were often so stiff from sitting in the one position all day that I was almost constantly suffering from pins and needles or cramp.

After three weeks I had typed one thousand pages at ten cents per page. I had the money for John’s operation in Dublin. In the meantime, I would continue to work and send money to the Hogans, until John had recovered and was well enough to work himself. Perhaps he could even work here in America. With my promised new job, I could save up the money for his fare.