As Martin Butler’s five young children left the table, they each grabbed one more slice of bread and laughed while their father pretended to admonish them for their greed.
“Here, young man,” he said to a ragged boy standing on the street just outside their open door, “Take this last slice for yourself. You can’t be following my lot around with your mouth hanging open with the hunger and them stuffing their gobs.”
The young boy ran forward, a cheerful smile brightening up his grubby face. “Bless you Mr. Butler. Your wife makes the best bread in the whole of Cavan. I do smell it when I’m in me bed at night. Torments me it does but it’s better than the stink coming from the dung heaps in the yard.”
“Off with you now, before I change my mind about the bread,” said Martin.
“That young fella lives at the back of our house. You wouldn’t think to look at him he was working now, would you? Every farthing goes to his ma. She has three of her six young ones working and he’s the eldest, at nine. Every penny they earn has to feed them. Their da hands up enough for the rent and drinks the rest.”
“The same thing happens back in America,” said Thomas. “There are some unfortunates who settle in the cities and succumb to the demon drink. It dulls the anguish they feel at being trapped. So many arrive there full of hope, lured by the promise of a better life, and many of them do make a life for themselves. The ones who don’t, or are unable to, might as well have stayed at home.”
“You have a fine brood yourself, Martin, like steps of stairs they are. What age is your eldest lad?” asked Patrick.
“Ten and still in school,” Martin looked around his meagre possessions in the small parlour of his home. “And he’ll be staying there for another year, if I have my way. After that, I think we will all be taking the boat to America. I have two sisters there and they’ve been saving for our tickets. I fear that justice for the likes of us will be better fought on foreign soil, than here in Ireland.”
Martin had agreed to be interviewed by Thomas for his paper, on the condition that his name not be disclosed. Anonymously, he could vividly describe the sorry state of affairs for many who worked hard all week, yet never earned enough to free their families from poverty. For those who lived in the cities, the children they bore became more factory fodder, if they were ‘fortunate’ enough to gain employment, and the cycle went on. In rural areas there was less chance of finding regular employment, forcing both men and women to emigrate.
As they made their way towards the train station, having bade farewell to Martin and his family, Thomas took a mental note of the children following them. He could just as easily have been in the slums of Liverpool, London or New York, the scene was the same. His old trick of detaching himself from his surroundings quickly kicked in, before any trace of emotion could reach his heart. Thomas had learned how to do so, in order to carry out his work as a journalist. He knew those feelings never truly went away but stored themselves inside, waiting to be released. It was Lily who had saved him from drinking himself into an early grave.
Lily always joked at how Thomas had arrived like a knight in shining armour and rescued her from a life that she had made numerous unsuccessful attempts to escape from. She eventually planned the only sure way out and had accepted her fate with a calm heart. Thomas stopped her, as she was about to throw herself into the Hudson River.
Keeping pace with Thomas, Patrick vocally deplored the malnourished condition of some of the children, but his protests landed on deaf ears. To keep his feelings in check, Thomas tried to catch sight of any child wearing shoes or boots, but there were none to be found. Even fabric crudely wrapped around their feet would have been something. He himself had always loved to be barefoot as a child in Blackrock, with either grass or sand under his feet. In Sunderland it was a different story and he was thankful that his cousins passed on their boots to him when they outgrew them. Thomas doubted his younger sisters were happy whenever they in turn inherited his third or fourth hand boots. As they grew older, that happened less often and as soon as Catherine and himself began to bring in some extra money, their younger siblings rarely went barefoot.
Patrick was glad to be sitting on the train and heading home, although he knew that there would be no welcoming smile from Catherine awaiting him.
“Will you be fishing tonight, Patrick?” asked Thomas.
“As long as the weather behaves, I’ll be out. What do you think of your wee Jamie becoming a fisherman?”
“That was no surprise, it’s all he has ever wanted to do. He’s grateful to you for speeding things up. If you hadn’t promised him a place on your crew, Da would have waited much longer. Is it true that you can swim, Patrick?”
“Aye, it is. But I wonder if that’s more of a curse than a blessing.”
“I’m sure young Petey Halpin thinks it a blessing. He told me you’d taught him to swim, not long after you saved him from drowning. Would you do the same for our Jamie, Patrick?”
“I thought about it, but myself and your da don’t see eye to eye on too many things, Thomas. I have enough trouble keeping on the right side of my wife without bringing her father’s wrath upon my head, too.”
“If becoming involved in worker’s rights will come between you, then think carefully about what you commit to, Patrick. There are other ways to show support without having to attend meetings and rallies. Catherine’s fear for your safety is not unwarranted. I’ve seen too many peaceful protests turn into angry mobs. Can you take the chance of being arrested, or worse, with a young family to provide for?”
“How can you say that, when you have a wife and daughter yourself?” Patrick was defensive.
“Eliza is here in Ireland and I have a small life insurance policy that will go to both of them in the event of my death,” replied Thomas. “Besides, I’m considering a more permanent position, with another periodical, as an editor. Lily wants to put down roots and make a proper home for us, I’m ready now to do that. Please don’t speak of this to my family, Patrick. Ma will fear that I’m preparing to take Eliza away from her. When the time comes and she is old enough to make such a decision, I want her to have a home to come to, if she so wishes.”
“Have no fear, I won’t even speak of it to Catherine – she may be tempted to interfere. I’m not sure I know my own wife any more, Thomas.”
“Something is deeply disturbing her, Patrick. I know she is against your involvement with the First International, but I feel that Mary-Anne is causing her more anxiety than your activities. Perhaps she will confide in Lily before the end of our stay. Having the attention of a sympathetic ear may be enough to bring back the old Catherine.”
Both men were very quiet on the return journey, with Thomas making notes in his journal and Patrick deep in thought about his wife’s unhappiness.
The two mile walk home from Dundalk reminded Thomas of his childhood ventures into the town, in the days before his father owned a donkey.
“Would you ever consider coming to America, yourself?” he asked.
Patrick admitted that it had crossed his mind on numerous occasions, particularly since his return to Ireland.
“It’s your sister you should be putting that question to. If she asked me to go, I’d be packed and ready tomorrow. But Catherine is too much like her father. How is it that you had the courage to move so far from home and family, and leave your wee one behind like that?”
Thomas’s long silence caused Patrick to think he had offended him.
“I’m sorry. I should not have asked such a personal question, it was wrong of me.”
“No, no, Patrick. I haven’t taken offense. I was just thinking on what you said and how best to answer you. It wasn’t courageous of me at all. In order to be courageous you must be in fear, but I was never anxious about leaving, nor about what lay ahead. To be truthful, Patrick, I was numb inside. When you feel that way, it’s easy to make a decision that would have otherwise been formidable. Besides, I had an offer of employment and that made it easier to go.”
“What made you take an interest in writing? It’s a strange manner of work for a fisherman’s son.”
“Ah, Patrick, I was always one for words, even as a child. I remember the master in school telling me I could be a great poet, if I put my mind to it. But Ma always said the greater the poet, the emptier the stomach.”
“What did she mean by that?” asked Patrick.
“I think she meant that, too much time spent writing instead of labouring would mean less money in the pocket. If I was to depend on fishing for my livelihood I would have starved long ago, for I have never had the stomach for a boat. There is a newspaper cutting in the tin box where Da keeps all his letters and I used to ask him to read it to me when I was a child. It was written by a journalist called Alexander Somerville, about the terrible conditions in Ireland at the time of the great famine. I met him last year in Toronto, when I was sent there by my editor. He’s a big man with a strange temperament. I asked him if he remembered writing about Mary McGrother’s trip to Sunderland in 1847 and do you know what he said to me? He told me he couldn’t even remember what he had breakfasted on that morning. Then he laughed heartily and slapped me on the back, before walking away.”
“I never heard that story before, about your ma meeting someone like him,” said Patrick.
“His carriage knocked her off her feet on one of her visits to England and his wife insisted she join them for a meal. Somerville asked Ma if she would allow him to publish her story and he paid her well for it. I think that must have planted the seed in me, to become a writer one day.”
“I lost my mother at that time. That’s why we went to England. My father never spoke of the hardship. Not many do, even now, as if it was of their own making, something to be ashamed of,” said Patrick.
“That’s why I believe in the power of words. You should learn to read, Patrick. It would open up the world to you.”
“Aye, maybe you’re right about that. I’ll think on it, Thomas.”