“This is dumb,” Patrick announced. He stared morosely around the crowded train.
“Then why did you bother to come?” I asked. “I could have gone myself. I don’t need you to help find Bertie.” I was, in fact, relieved to have Patrick beside me on the hard train seat, but I wasn’t about to tell him that.
I wiped steam fog from the train window with the back of a mitten and peered out at the snow-stippled fields that rushed past. I’d never been away from Halifax before and my stomach felt hollow with fear. I was determined, though. I had to find Bertie, and if I’d thought he was in Africa, well, I would have searched for him there.
“Nothing better to do,” Patrick mumbled around a jawbreaker. He fished in the bag for a second one and popped it into his mouth.
He was right. There was nothing better to do. There was no school; there were no sleds to race down snow-packed hills and few friends to race against. Seeing those that remained only reminded us of who was gone, so we didn’t go out much.
I leaned back against the seat and closed my eyes. The train car was overheated. It stank, too—an old smell of coal fumes from the endlessly burning stove at the end of the car, wet winter woollens, stale sandwiches and unwashed bodies.
“But it’s still dumb,” he said again. His lips were stained black from the candy and his cheeks bulged.
Patrick would never change. I wanted to snatch away the bag that he clutched tightly in his hand.
I’d bribed Patrick to secrecy with an offer to buy him candy with the lunch coins Aunt Ida had given me. I could have just told her why we were going to Truro, but I was afraid she’d stop me, so I said I was going to see Winnie. She’d been delighted. “I knew she’d come around given time,” she’d told Uncle James happily.
I’d cringed when I heard that. Not telling the whole truth felt as bad as a complete lie, confession or no confession. I would go see Winnie, as I had said. Hopefully, that would make it less a fib—though the thought of visiting Winnie made my stomach quiver. If it wasn’t for me, she wouldn’t be in the hospital.
After a long while, the train lurched, shuddered and stopped. “Are we in Truro?” I asked Patrick.
He leaned over me to glance out the window. “That’s what the sign says. Can’t you read it?” he said. He grinned widely, pleased with his own joke.
We filed off the train with the other passengers, then stood on the platform while people milled about us.
“Now what?” Patrick asked.
I looked around uncertainly. I think I’d had it in my mind that if I got to Truro, Bertie would be at the station waiting for me. “Why don’t we ask the ticket agent first?” I suggested. “We know the woman came to Truro.”
“There were other places she could have got off,” Patrick said.
“What do you mean?” I asked sharply.
“The train goes on to other towns. This isn’t the only stop.”
“Why didn’t you tell me that before?” I yelled at him.
“I just thought of it now,” he said. Behind us, the train chugged out, destined for those other places. Bertie could be anywhere.
“Well, we can start here.” I pushed open the heavy station door and crossed the room to where a man sat on a stool behind a high wooden counter.
“Where to?” he asked.
“Nowhere,” I replied.
He frowned at me over gold-coloured wire-framed glasses.
“I mean,” I explained, hurriedly. “I wondered if you know a woman who took the train yesterday to Halifax. She had a red-haired boy with her, about four years old.”
“Lots of women took the train yesterday and lots of four-year-old boys,” the man replied. “Now, move along. You’re holding up the line.”
I glanced behind me, but only saw Patrick. “No. You don’t understand. I think that boy is my brother. I’m from Halifax and he was lost in the explosion. I thought I saw him yesterday with a woman who got on the afternoon train for Truro.”
The man’s frown faded. He thought for a moment, then shook his head. “I can’t remember. I see so many people.”
“Thank you,” I told him.
“Good luck with your search. Terrible thing that happened there. Terrible.”
I went over to where Patrick was examining a large poster of a train going through mountains.
“Wouldn’t it be great to take the train all the way out west? Right through the Rocky Mountains,” he enthused.
“How can you think about that when Bertie is lost?” I demanded.
“I was just looking,” he said.
“Well, start looking for Bertie,” I said.
“Where?”
I mulled over the problem. “We’ll ask at the shops. Everyone goes to the shops.”
We left the station and walked toward downtown.
“It’s not that big a place,” Patrick said. “We should be able to find him if he’s here.” He stopped in front of a store window decorated with silver garland and holly. “They’re having Christmas,” he said. “Look at that coaster.” He leaned closer to the window. “I bet it could go down the hill faster than anyone else’s. I’ll ask Mama for that for Christmas.”
Startled, I stared at him. As I did, I saw his mouth turn down and his lips tremble as he became aware of what he’d said.
“I forgot is all,” he muttered. “It felt so normal here that I forgot.” He wiped a hand across his eyes and walked away.
I knew what he meant. At home the store windows were boarded up. Lamps and electric lights tried unsuccessfully to push back the resulting gloom. A few shops had sweets for the holidays and some carried toys, but the need for food and household goods was greater, and no one had money left over for anything else. Christmas might be in three days, but not for Richmond.
For hours, we wandered in and out of shops, Patrick on one side of the street, me on the other. No one knew where we could find Bertie.
“Trouble is, dearie,” the clerk at the last store I went into said, “we’ve had so many strangers in town since the explosion, it’s hard to keep track of anyone. People here to visit family in our hospital, children brought to stay with kin.” She placed a bag of flour in a box for a woman customer. “Even some of those American doctors and nurses are here.”
I thanked her and went outside to wait for Patrick. It was hopeless. I’d never find Bertie. Perhaps, like everyone else believed, he was with Mam in Heaven.
Patrick wandered out of a flower shop, quite pleased with himself. “Look,” he said. He held up two lollipops. “She gave me some candy.”
“Candy!” I shouted. My temper flared. “Did you even ask about Bertie?” I didn’t give him time to answer. “Candy and your stomach are all you ever give any mind to. You don’t even care that your mother and father are dead!”
Patrick’s face drained of colour. Abruptly, he drew back his arm and threw the lollipops as far away as he could. I felt stunned. I couldn’t believe I’d said such hurtful words. Words that I knew weren’t true.
Suddenly, the woman customer came flying out of the store. “Oh, I’m so glad I caught you, girl. I just remembered that Mrs. Halliday down on Prince Street took in some youngsters from Halifax. I remember seeing her with a little fellow with red hair. You just go down Prince Street until you get to Pleasant—that’s five blocks down. It’s the blue house on the corner.”
“Thank you.”
“I hope it’s your brother.” She smiled and went back into the store.
Patrick stalked away from me.
“Wait.” I ran to catch up to him. “Patrick, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. I just . . .” How to explain that I wanted to hurt him because I was hurting. It made no sense.
“At night I close my eyes and pretend I’m home,” he said. “Then I hear Aunt Ida or you or Mary, and I’m laying on a cot in the hall. I pretend I’m only visiting and I’ll be home soon, but that doesn’t work, either, because I know I won’t ever go back there again.”
I felt thoroughly ashamed. “I am so sorry. I shouldn’t have said such awful things to you. I don’t know why I did.”
Patrick grimaced. “Aunt Ida yelled at me this morning. I never heard her yell before. Nobody’s acting normal. Do you think they ever will?”
“I don’t know.”
We walked in silence for a few minutes. “Where are we going?” I asked.
“This is Prince Street,” Patrick said. “I saw a sign back there. The woman said five blocks. We’ve come four, so the house must be just up here.”
“Oh,” I said quietly. “Thanks.”
Patrick nodded, then pointed at a large, blue clapboard house that sat on the corner. “You think that’s it? That big house?”
“I guess so.”
My heart pounded as I knocked on the front door. I studied the garden, the brown weathered stocks that come summer would be covered with pink hollyhock blooms. I hadn’t realized until then how relieved my eyes were to see whole houses and buildings, and gardens.
I heard footsteps, then the door swung open.
“Yes?” a woman said.
“Mrs. Halliday?”
“Yes.”
“My name is Rose Dunlea, and I was told you had some children from the Halifax explosion staying here.”
“Yes, I do. Come in.”
Patrick snatched his cap from his head as we entered a large foyer. He gawked so much that I wanted to thump him for his ill manners.
“My little brother, Bertie—Albert Dunlea—is missing. He has red hair. A woman in a shop told me you had a boy here with red hair.”
“I do, but his name isn’t Albert. It’s Gordon.”
“Gordon? Are you sure?”
“That’s what he said his name was. Would you like to see him?”
“Yes, please.”
She led the way down a long hall. Patrick almost climbed up the back of my heels, he followed me so closely. I turned and glared at him.
“Sorry,” he muttered.
The hall opened into a sun-washed kitchen. The woman went to a screened door. Patrick and I crowded in beside her to see five children in the yard.
“He’s over there. At the bottom of the garden.” Mrs. Halliday pointed to a small boy near the back fence. She opened the door. “Gordon,” she called.
The boy turned around, but even before I saw his face I knew it wasn’t Bertie. This boy was too stocky.
“That’s not him,” I said. I fought tears that threatened to spill over. I had wanted it so badly to be Bertie.
“I’m very sorry.” The woman put a hand on my arm and pushed me into a chair. “Sit down. You children look all done in. Let me get you both a glass of milk and a sandwich.”
“We don’t want to be any trouble,” I said, but I sank into the chair. My legs couldn’t carry me any farther.
“Did you come from Halifax to look for your brother?” The woman bent and took a pitcher of milk and a slab of ham from an icebox. She had a calm, kind way about her that I immediately took to.
“We arrived on the train this morning,” Patrick said. “Rose thought she saw her brother yesterday in Halifax, and then getting on the Truro train with a woman. We told our aunt Ida that we were coming to visit Winnie, Rose’s sister. She’s at the hospital here.”
“I see.” Mrs. Halliday cut bread and placed thick slices of ham inside. She put the sandwiches on a plate and set them and glasses of milk on the table before me and Patrick. Patrick tucked right into his. I took a bite, chewed, but found I couldn’t swallow past the lump in my throat. I reached for the glass of milk. Mrs. Halliday sat down opposite us and picked up a sock she was darning. The needle flashed silver in and out of the wool, and I swear it could have been Mam sitting there.
“I wish Gordon was your brother,” she said. “No one’s come to claim him or two of the others. We’ve placed an advertisement in the Halifax paper to run tomorrow. Hopefully someone will see it and recognize the children. Some arrived here so little that they can’t tell where they came from or who their parents are. I’m afraid they’ll be separated forever.” She glanced up from her needle. “If you two youngsters are here looking for your brother, your parents must be hurt . . .” Or worse, her eyes finished: sympathetic green eyes, not as brilliant as Mam’s but with similar laugh lines spreading outward from the corners.
I took a second gulp of milk, hoping to wash down the stubborn lump of sandwich, but choked instead. Patrick thumped me hard on the back, nearly knocking me off the chair.
“Stop it,” I gasped. Tears spilled over my cheeks. I tried desperately to stop them, but that made them fall harder.
The woman set down her sewing, came around the table and put an arm around my shoulders. “Hush, hush, dear.”
“You don’t understand,” I cried. “I need to find Bertie. I have to.”
Mrs. Halliday’s arm tightened around me. I turned and clung to her, and the story spilled out of me. I couldn’t stop the flood of words. Mam buried in the cemetery. Da and Frederick dead. Winnie and Ernest hurt. Bertie lost. Sister Frances. School. The way I’d not talked to Da the morning of the explosion because I was mad at him. The fact that I was slow.
“So I prayed to God and asked Him to make it so I didn’t have to go to school and He answered with the explosion. I caused the explosion,” I sobbed. “So I thought if I could find Bertie, it might make it a bit better.”
Mrs. Halliday patted my back and handed me a handkerchief. I mopped my eyes.
Patrick’s chair screeched as he pushed it back from the table. His mouth gaped open. “You caused the explosion! I thought I’d caused the explosion!”