Legacy of Secrets (33 page)

The simplicity of the formula never failed to amaze him: you undercut your competitors and you offered folks the goods they wanted at the right price and they paid you their money. It could not fail and he watched with frustration as the dollars and cents flowed into old Corrigan’s pockets instead of his own, knowing there was nothing he could do about it.

A
T HIS NEW JOB,
Finn’s only problem was the head coachman, Skellern. He was big and loud, and when he drank he became truculent and argumentative. He walked around shouting orders and laying out with his fists when he considered they were not carried out fast enough, and he grumbled constantly about Finn. He did no work himself except for driving Mr. James to and from his office and madam to and from her various social events in the afternoon, and sometimes to their friends’ houses in the evenings. He always washed out his mouth with a strong-smelling cleanser first and sucked on peppermints to take away any trace of liquor on his breath, but Finn knew he was dangerous and he didn’t know what to do about it.

Finn took pride in his work. He liked the way the carriages gleamed after he had polished them and he always took special care with Mrs. James’s own little gig, and there was never a hint of mud on the wheelspokes when she left the house. It was such a joy to be back working
with horses again, he would almost have done the job for nothing. But when a month later Skellern found out it was on Finn’s advice that the frisky little Thoroughbred who had almost caused the accident was sold, his drunken anger boiled over.

He was a big, stocky man, built, as Padraig O’Keeffe would have said, “like a brick shithouse.” He grabbed Finn by the collar and swung him around. Thrusting his face next to Finn’s, he demanded, “And who’s the little paddy bastard has been sneaking behind my back to the boss, then?”

Finn eyed him uneasily. He knew Mr. James trusted Skellern and that he would listen if Skellern said Finn was not doing his job properly. Skellern had total power over him and Finn writhed in his grip, longing to punch the drunken bastard in the nose but knowing he could not.

“I don’t know what yer talking about, Mr. Skellern,” he stalled.

Skellern pushed him up against the stable wall, pinning him with one ham-fist. He thrust his face so close, Finn’s head reeled from the sour stench of liquor on his breath. “Ya blasted little mick,” he whispered, driving a vicious punch into Finn’s belly. “I’ll teach you to be after my job. You’ll be out of my stable yard as soon as I’ve had a word with the boss; don’t think you won’t.” And he heaved another rib-crushing punch at Finn.

Like a drowning man, Finn’s life swam before his eyes: he saw himself penniless and without a job again, and he gathered himself together and hauled off at Skellern’s vengeful face with a punch that seemed to come from his very boots. Skellern fell to the ground as though he had been poleaxed and Finn stared down at him. Then he turned his head and vomited violently into the corner.

The cook was Irish and had a soft spot for young Finn O’Keeffe. She watched from the steps, drawn like the other servants by the sound of raised voices. She went immediately to her mistress and reported what she had seen. “And I think it’s time somebody told you, ma’am, before
he kills you both, that Skellern’s an old drunk and not to be trusted with the carriages. We’ve none of us liked to say anything, but I’ll not see that good lad treated with violence, not even if it means my job too.”

Beatrice James stared at her cook with astonishment. Mrs. O’Dwyer had worked for her for three years. She usually kept to her place and that’s what she was expected to do, and so she understood immediately that what the woman was saying must be serious. She sent the butler and some other servants out to take care of Skellern and asked Mrs. O’Dwyer to tell Finn to wait in the kitchen until the master came home.

Skellern was carried into his quarters over the stable and a doctor sent for. Finn crouched on a stool staring into the kitchen fire while the cook plied him with cups of hot tea and unwanted slices of cake. His belly ached so bad he thought his guts were broken and his head swam and he felt faint, though he wasn’t sure whether it was from Skellern’s punch or his fear of what was to come.

The doctor came to inspect him and said if he vomited blood he should go immediately to the hospital. “If not, I daresay you’ll survive,” he said, impatient at having to deal with brawling Irish workmen. In his opinion if the worthless immigrants wanted to kill themselves by fighting, they should let them get on with it.

Finn hunched gloomily over a mug of tea, waiting for Mr. James to return and the ax to fall. When he was finally summoned to the study he had already accepted the fact that he was fired and that he would be lucky if he were not sent to jail for assaulting the coachman.

Mr. James was sitting behind a big desk and he stared severely at Finn over the tops of his horn-rimmed half-glasses. “You had better tell me the truth of this affair,” he cautioned.

“ ’Twas not Finn’s fault,” Mrs. O’Dwyer said, folding her arms belligerently over her plump, apron-clad bosom. “He’s a good lad and a good worker and old Skellern’s nothin’ but a drunk. I told the mistress before and I’m
tellin’ you now, sir. And I only wish I had spoken up earlier so that every time you went out I wouldn’t be worryin’ whether you’d be coming home on a stretcher.”

“Thank you for your concern, Mrs. O’Dwyer,” he replied drily. “And now I would like to hear what Finn has to say.”

“I knew I would lose me job for doing it, sir, but I just couldn’t help it,” Finn said miserably. “Skellern swore and cursed me. He was going to tell you lies about me not doing my job. He was angry I’d warned you about the little mare he’d bought being too dangerous for the mistress. He wanted me sacked for it and now he’s got what he wanted.” He shifted nervously from foot to foot, his cap clutched in his hands, a flush of shame on his cheeks and a look of bleak disillusionment in his eyes. “I just wanted to say my piece first, that’s only why I waited.”

Mr. James said severely, “I will not tolerate liquor in my house and certainly not with my servants. I have already fired Skellern and I am offering you his job, O’Keeffe, at the same salary. Twenty-five dollars a week and you will need to hire a new fellow to take over your old job as stableboy.” He waved them away. “You may go now, and just remember, there’ll be no more fighting.”

Mrs. O’Dwyer beamed, her rosy face filled with satisfaction. “ ’Tis an honorable fellow you are, sir,” she told her employer. And Finn’s spirits soared again as he thanked him. “I know just the lad, sir, to take over as stableboy,” he added, thinking of Rory.

Limping painfully back through Beacon Hill’s elegant gaslit streets to the North End, he imagined Rory’s excitement when he told him he had a job for him at twelve dollars a week with meals. “Sure and it was worth a punch or two,” he told himself with a triumphant grin as he went in search of Daniel to tell him the good news.

L
ILY FELT AS THOUGH
she were living in a dream. Nantucket was held fast in the grip of an icy winter and she shivered the months away by the fireside in the Sheridans’ parlor. She had no idea what she would do after the baby was born, because she had no money. She had never had to think for herself, and she had never needed to contemplate employment.

Abigail Sheridan told her about the Irish maidservants in Boston. “The rich Bostonian women like them,” she told Lily. “They say they make very good servants and the poor things work all hours God sends without so much as a word of complaint.”

But Lily was not going to be anybody’s servant. The very idea was ridiculous. She told herself there must be something else she could do, but when she thought about it she was astonished to find that she could not think of a single useful thing. She could not cook, sew, or clean. She could speak French and was well-read and could play the piano a little, but because of her silly pranks with the many governesses her education was missing great chunks. She was socially adept and well dressed enough, but none of those trivial assets mattered one jot when it came to applying for a position as a governess, or a children’s nursemaid, or even, she shuddered at the thought, as a cook.

Meanwhile, Alice Sheridan’s kindness wrapped her in a temporary cocoon of security and she shut away all
thoughts of the future. She lived one day at a time as dreary gray month passed into dreary gray month. The only real bright spot on her horizon was Ned. To his family’s amazement he suddenly took to coming home as often as he could.

“Of course, he’s coming to see Lily,” Abigail whispered to her mother, and they smiled conspiratorially, glancing at Lily listening wide-eyed to Ned’s tales of life on the road. Alice Sheridan thought what a fortuitous solution it would be if her son forgot his wild ideas of becoming an actor and came home and married Lily instead. Then the baby would have a father and Lily would be able to love it like a good mother instead of wishing it dead. And Ned would take over his father’s chandlery business the way Obediah had always wanted. She heaved a little sigh of satisfaction. It was such a perfect resolution.

March came and with it blustery blue skies and a faltering early spring sunshine, and for the first time Lily felt strong enough to venture outdoors. She walked through the town on Ned’s arm and he introduced her proudly to everyone from the owner of the Union Stores where they stopped to purchase sugar and flour, to old Bill Clark, the self-appointed town crier and newspaper vendor, and all the Sheridans’ neighbors and friends. Everyone knew about her and they wished her well, and Lily thought maybe Nantucket was not such a bad place after all.

They rode on the little train to Surfside and walked hand in hand along the beach and Lily told him about Ardnavarna. She talked despairingly about her father and how much she loved him, and how she was destroyed when he sent her away, though of course Ned thought it was because she had run off to marry her young captain.

He squeezed her hand sympathetically and said, “You have me to rely on now, Lily. I’ll always help you.” He glanced yearningly at her and she smiled, recognizing the look in his eyes. “You should think about becoming an actress,” he said. “People would stand in line just to see you onstage.”

She glanced at him in astonishment. She had heard all about actresses and she knew it was not a respectable profession. Especially not standing onstage to be stared at by beastly horrible men with only one thing on their mind. But each time Ned came back he mentioned it again, embellishing on his idea to the point they were stage partners, he as Romeo and Lily as Juliet. “We shall become a ‘theatrical legend,’” he announced triumphantly, already seeing them onstage accepting thunderous applause with magnificent bows. And when she pointed out that she could not act, he just smiled and said it didn’t matter.

He said, “With your looks an audience would be content just to watch you.” And Lily smiled gratefully at him. At least now she had one true friend and admirer.

With each month that passed Lily felt the baby growing inside her. It often kicked her awake at nights and she would groan out loud with despair. When Ned came to see her in May she complained of feeling tired. She refused to go out though the day was warm and sunny and it would have done her good.

“Don’t you understand,” she cried, when he tried to coax her. “I don’t want things that are
good
for me. I don’t want anything except not to have this baby.”

He knelt and took her hands in his. “Lily,” he said, “I haven’t spoken before because I thought you would just laugh at me and tell me I was a fool and that we don’t even know each other. But when you were lying in my bed, burning with fever and about to die, I vowed I wouldn’t let you. I promised to look after you. I fell in love with you that very first night, Lily, and I haven’t been able to get you out of my mind since.”

She tried to pull her hands away but he gripped them tighter. “Listen,” he said. “In the Orient, where they understand such things, they believe that when you save a person’s life you become responsible for that person’s soul. That means I am responsible for you, Lily, and I always will be. I know I’m still young and I’ve nothing to offer you except my love. But one day I shall be a great actor, and
I’m asking you to share my life. I promise to be a good father to your child and I promise to look after you.”

It was an easy way out and Lily was tempted. But if she married Ned she would be forced to keep the baby. And she knew she could never even look into the face of the child who had ruined her life.

“At least say ‘maybe,’” Ned pleaded, “and I shall return to the Players a happy man.”

“Maybe later; I’ll think about it,” she said.

He flung his arms around her and kissed her soundly. “Ah, how I love you, Lily Molyneux,” he said with a triumphant smile. “And don’t you ever forget it,” he added.

He danced across the floor holding an invisible partner in his arms and Lily laughed. “You see,” he cried happily from the door, “I’m the only one that can make you laugh!” As he disappeared into the hall she could hear him singing and then calling cheery good-byes to his family before dashing off to catch the paddle-wheeled ferry back to New Bedford.