BY EDWARD VOELLER
This is a novel excerpt. Copyright rests with the author.
I DIN’T feel completely whole anymore. ’Twas like I was missing somethin’. Like when y’ feel y’ lost somethin’ or forgot somethin’ bu’ y’ don’t know what, an’ y’ feel yer pockets an’ nothin’ seems to be missing. Bu’ no, something’s gone, an’ y’ don’t know wha’ y’ lost or wha’ to look for or what’s missing. That’s the feeling I had. I’d lost something an’ I knew I wouldn’t never get it back. It was for weeks that I was like that.
It started when our ship, the Cadmus, pulled away from Dublin. Passengers lined the bulwark an’ watched our ship push off. They waved to farewell bidders an’ shouted names. Some had smiles, others wiped tears. Me parents an’ me gran’da, our arms at our sides, had no one to wave to, no names to call out. As our ship moved away from the wharf, the kin of passengers began to turn an’ walk away from the pier real slow.
The pier receded an’ ’twas almost empty of farewell bidders now, an’ on the wharf the dockers became smaller an’ horses on the dock lost their nickers to the slapping waves of the sea. Dozens of sloops, packet ships, barques, schooners, even a whaler or two were moored at that wharf, an’ they supported a forest of a hundred an’ more tall, skinny, naked masts. An’ that all became irrelevant.
Me homeland was dropping away, an’ that’s when me unwhole feeling began, an’ that feeling became stronger the farther the ship was a-sea. Éire grew distant. An’ I felt really lost. Lost an’ scared, and alone. Nothing bu’ choppy sea surrounded us now, an’ the farther we went, the stronger the undulating an’ lonely feeling. What’ll I be when we get to that Manhattan place? What’ll be left of me? That was me fear. Me gran’da stood next to me. He put his hand on me shoulder. I turned to him. I asked him if he felt like me.
“Aye,” he said. An’ that helped me feel a nick better.
“Bu’ I also feel some relief, Ronan,” Gran’da added. He looked up an’ away from me. “To be honest,” he said, “y’ won’t understand that now. Someday y’ will.”
Gran’da kept his hand on me shoulder. That’s how he gave me his assurance. His hand on me shoulder. That hand comforted me, an’ I din’t move his hand off, as I sometimes did when me da put his hand there. Sometimes Gran’da’s hand on me shoulder told me to reconsider. Sometimes it was to set me straight. Bu’ now it was to assure me that all would be all right an’ for me to feel safe. He understood how I felt. I did that once to him. Gran’da was ill in bed, an’ I put me hand on his shoulder. He smiled. He smiled wide an’ showed his missing tooth, an’ I think me hand on his shoulder did make him feel better.
Gran’da was me favourite. I loved ’im. Me gran’mam was dead, an’ I don’t remember her much. I cannot hear her voice when I listen for it. I only see an outline of her face in me mind. An oval shape, thick cheeks, that’s all. She must’ve been good if she was Gran’da’s wife, bu’ I can’t say for sure, an’ I din’t ask because I din’t want Gran’da to have to lie or explain something if he din’t want to talk about her. I’m sure Gran’da would not say she was anything bu’ good, an’ I know he misses her, bu’ she died a long time ago, an’ me gran’da does not talk anything about her anymore.
Gran’da was always true to me. I could ask him anything an’ he was always true. When he talked to neighbours or friends an’ even to Mam an’ Da, he was not always true. I heard him tell someone that we were going to live in a large house with maids in Manhattan. I knew it wasn’t true. Bu’ when he talked to me he was always true. I think that’s why I loved ‘im more than anyone. I believe we love people who are true. If a person cannot be true to y’, how can y’ love ’em? Mam an’ Da were not always true to me, bu’ I could forgive ’em. I usually knew wha’ was true by the way they spoke. I knew they wanted to be true to me. Well, mams an’ das can’t always be true.
Me mam an’ da were hardly around when we were in Éire. Always tired, they were. Came home from work tired. Got up in the morning tired. Bu’ I would not have any other mam or da. I thought they must be the best. I knew they wanted to be good. Just always they were too tired. So Gran’da was me favourite. That’s the way it was for me in Éire.
“Let’s turn this ol’ ship around,” Gran’da said. “An old man like me. I want to die in me homeland.”
At that moment, I loved Gran’da even more. He felt as I felt. For me, Éire was everything—me family, me friends, everything. I thought I was part of Éire. An’ I thought I wanted to die there too. Someday. Not any day soon.
“Bu’ it’s not possible,” Gran’da added. “No going back now,” he said.
We couldn’t turn the ship around. The ship was huge. Three tall masts! Many canvas sails flapping an’ slapping. One of them could cover our cottage back home. It would be our abode under a canvas tent. A sail could cover the soil that me parents tilled. Bu’ the ship was also small. It was crowded, an’ we knew no one. None of the people were like neighbours. Y’ couldn’t talk to them like neighbours back home. Some of them din’t even speak a language. Anyway, wha’ they said din’t sound like a language. Well, they din’t speak the language I knew. People crowded us, especially at meal time. An’ it got so noisy at meal time. Lots of complaints an’ children whining. That’s when the very large ship was very small.
***
Me an’ Gran’da found places to talk on the ship. We often sat beside one of the heavy wooden masts. I’d rub me hands on the wooden mast, then lick me hands, an’ they were salty. Gran’da laughed when I did that. Then I tried to get me arms around the mast. Impossible. We’d sit an’ lean our backs against the mast an I folded me arms like Gran’da did, an’ he told me stories in his deep voice an’ his calming smell. It was like he was a school teacher, kinda—though Gran’da had never been to school an’ neither had me parents, nor me. I could ask Gran’da anything. I could ask ‘im things that would embarrass me to ask me own da. I learned from him about a man an’ a woman. Stuff every 13-year old boy should know. Of course, I already knew everything from friends. Everything was told to me from boys I knew, bu’ Gran’da told me wha’ was true an’ wha’ was not.
“Did y’ fight other boys when y’ were young?”
“I did everything boys do,” he said.
“How about cry? Did y’ cry once?”
“I’m sure I did, bu’ I don’t remember. Hmm,” he said, trying to recall. He shook ’is head trying to remember.
“Do y’ remember getting scared once?”
“That happened too. Bu’ it’s a long, long story, Ronan. Some day I will tell y’. Bu’ when I was small, I was afraid I might lose me mam. Because I’d heard stories. An’ one day I got separated from me mam at a very busy market, an’ for a short time I was lost an’ I thought I was never going to find me mam. I was very young. I’ll never forget that feeling.”
“Y’ were afraid to lose yer mam.”
“That happened.”
“Sometimes I’m afraid of me mam an’ da dying an’ being alone,” I said.
“Don’t think about that,” Gran’da said.
Mostly he talked to me about Éire an’ stories about neighbours we knew an’ about why we were leaving home for Manhattan. About violence, about the price of provisions, about land an’ about everything. I understood some of wha’ he said about that—mostly that Éire was not good to everyone. Bu’ once he wept when he told me about Éire, an’ I din’t imagine what he was telling me.
Gran’da was funny too. Gran’da an’ I slept in the same bunk together below deck, an’ Mam an’ Da slept together, an’ always Gran’da bumped his head on the bunk above us. An’ that made him speak in Gaeilge, an’ I understood only some o’ that bu’ not the strange words he used. Then he would laugh, bu’ I din’t know wha’ was funny. “Why y’ laughin’, Gran’da’?” Bu’ he wouldn’t tell me.
***
When Gran’da died, I almost fell apart. I was more than unwhole now. I was in pieces. When it happened, I was waiting for him after the morning porridge at the heavy mast that I couldn’t get me arms around. The place where we often met. Gran’da said he’d meet me there after he sat for a few minutes below deck. I waited an’ waited at the mast until I saw four crew men carrying Gran’da limp. Two men each had a hand under a leg in back of a knee. Two more each had a hand under an arm near the shoulder. Gran’da’s head fell back without support. I was jolted. I was so deeply confused. Me world went upside down. I had terrible thoughts. It looked like me gran’da in those hands, bu’ I assured meself that no, it could not be; the limp man with his head dropping back wore a black knit cap pulled down over his face, an’ Gran’da had no black knit cap like that, an’ I prayed it could not be Gran’da because I could not see his face an’ I knew me gran’da din’t have a black knit cap, an’ then I saw Mam an’ Da coming after the crew with the limp man, an’ me mam was weeping, an’ I ran to them at the bulwark. They looked at me with little to say an’ din’t say the word dead, bu’ I knew the truth, an’ the four crew men put Gran’da over the bulwark an’ he splashed into the water without his heavy sweater, an’ I knew Gran’da would be cold. All at once I felt like I was gonna fall overboard, an’ I stepped back clear from the bulwark an’ put more space between me feet, an’ got back me balance on the undulating ship. I just could not watch to see if Gran’da floated.
I turned away from the sea an’ bent forward an’ held me stomach. It was the saddest time of me life. An’ there was no funeral. No priest. Me mam wept for her father with her arms around me da. I wanted to be with Gran’da so much to talk to him one last time. An’ I hated to think about never. I couldn’t bear to think of never again. Later I heard Mam an’ Da talk about Gran’da, an’ that it was going to be cheaper in America without him, an’ then they noticed me an’ they became quiet, bu’ I heard them.
Next day I looked for him on the ship an’ by the mast where we sat together, an’ I looked into the sea too. Gran’da was really gone. After that, being on the ship was no use to me.
Me da tried to comfort me. He slept with me in the bunk in place of Gran’da, an’ Da was a different smell. We ate porridge together for breakfast like I did with Gran’da, an’ he promised to meet me at the mast where I sat with Gran’da so often, an’ Da came there with the strongest coffee an’ hard tack wha’ he soaked in the coffee. We sat together, bu’ I din’t talk at all, an’ me da din’t say much. Not like Gran’da. Me gran’da always knew what to say. Wha’ to talk about. We did the same the next day, bu’ only for a while. Da had to work on the ship. That’s how he helped pay our way, an’ he went off to clean the kitchen, or help make food—food for the passengers an’ the better food for the ship’s crew.
***
Since Gran’da died, it was getting cold on the ship an’ windy, an’ rope coils an’ buckets moved across the deck. It was only early August, bu’ I learned that the North Atlantic sometimes got strong storms now. The clouds got almost black an’ winds blew more than they ever had till now. Passengers got afraid. Women wore scarves over their heads, tied under their chins, an’ shawls over their shoulders. I went below deck in those conditions, an’ coffee an’ soup went over the rims of cups an’ bowls, an’ passengers’ faces were pale. Ship’s crew said that the storm would pass an’ that it could be worse closer to America. The storm dropped a lot of water on the deck an’ the deck got slippery an’ people slipped on the deck an’ got injured. Da had to move the water off the deck. He moved the water with a deck brush an’ pushed the water through an opening in the bulwark. Bu’ a drunk immigrant man slipped an’ lost his balance at the bulwark an’ fell overboard.
Gran’da died in the middle of the Atlantic ocean. We reached Manhattan a week later, so I guess it was not really the middle of the ocean, bu’ it seemed like it because the remaining week of the voyage passed so slow without him. I thought it was cruel, so cruel that God took Gran’da from me. Why that cruelty, I don’t know. I din’t think God could be cruel. Now Gran’da was just lost an’ a-sea.
Without Gran’da, I had only Mam an’ Da in the whole world. What if they died? I thought about what would I do if I lost them. What if I lost them in America? Wha’ would I do? I knew a girl back home who din’t have real parents, an’ what would I do if I was an orphan like her? Me parents were good. I thought about me friends back home, an’ I thought I was lucky. I would never want their mams or das for parents. Even me best friend din’t have such good parents as mine. An’ me dog we left behind was the best dog in the world. I missed her so much too. I would have never traded me dog for any other dog. I wished to turn the boat around an’ return to Éire. Maybe I could stay on the ship when it docked in the harbour in Manhattan an’ hide an’ wait for it to turn around an’ go back to Eire. I began to think like that.
***
Everyone had enough of the Cadmus an’ the voyage. Children especially. Me, mostly because me gran’da died on the ship an’ now was lost a-sea, an’ there was no one to talk to. People stuck in family groups. No one made friendships. Not that I could see.
One evening after supper, on me most tired day, I was standing near the mast where I sat with Gran’da an’ I was looking out at the sea an’ a crew member put his hand on me shoulder. I looked up an’ glared at him because it was wha’ Gran’da did. Bu’ the man din’t smell like Gran’da, an’ his hand on me shoulder din’t pair well with his face, like the hand and the face weren’t from the same person. The man was good enough though. He smiled an’ he pointed to the far horizon slightly starboard over the prow an’ told me if I squinted I could see Manhattan, bu’ I was not listening. I was thinking about the man’s hand an’ how he put it on me shoulder like Gran’da did to comfort me. So I din’t squint at the horizon, an’ I stepped back from him so to remove his hand on me shoulder. I moved to the bulwark at the prow an’ watched the bow of the ship churn the sea. A new smell came up with that disruption of the Atlantic. Passengers began to gather around the prow for what they said was the best view of Manhattan, an’ I learned from listening that Manhattan was an island, an’ I looked for Mam an’ Da an’ told them that. They already knew that, they said.
Just tiny shapes of buildings of the same colour is what we soon began to see of Manhattan. Soon more an’ more sailing ships like ours were scattered outside the harbour. Then our ship came to a halt an’ Da had to help lower sails an’ wrap an’ store them on the spars properly with ropes. A small boat came up to our ship, an’ from the bulwark, I watched two men in uniforms climb a rope ladder an’ come aboard our ship, an’ the two men walked around looking for sick passengers below deck in steerage, an’ there were discussions with crew members, an’ then the visitors left on the small boat with two passengers an’ that small boat bounced over slapping an’ rolling waves in this world over here.
The anchor was down on our ship an’ we stayed still overnight. The ship just bobbing an’ rocking, an’ undulating, an’ just still in the harbour with the anchor down. Another ship was blocking the port or something I heard, an’ there was something about yellow fever in Manhattan, an’ that news went from person to person on the ship, an’ people seemed to stand farther apart from one another after that. At night, some cargo was lowered to flatboats an’ taken into the port. An’ the next morning I watched the crew of our ship set long oars into the sea an’ crew began pulling on the oars very hard an’ slowly an’ they moved the ship toward the wharf, an’ gradually rowed it into a slip at the Manhattan wharf on the East River.
Dockers moved quickly on the wharf, an’ the wagons on the wharf were large unlike I had never seen in Éire. An’ large horses with large hooves. Everything was large. The ships docked there were larger than the one we were on.
Da an’ Mam an’ I got our stuff together, which was one trunk an’ two bundles wrapped an’ tied in brown blankets. Other passengers had great trunks an’ some had multiple great trunks.
Then we passengers had to line up on the ship with our things, an’ some people were in the line who I had not even seen on the ship before. One was a woman with a baby. The baby was wailing in a blue blanket, an’ I learned the baby was born a-sea the day before. An’ I stood in line in front of me mam an’ da. Our ship was in the slip now an’ the wharf smelled like nothing I ever smelled before. Da put his hand on me shoulder, an’ I din’t remove it.
***
Edward Voeller has a background in journalism and university English teaching, including 15 years in Japan, Thailand (Peace Corps), and Oman in those two career fields. His fiction includes two YA novels. Recent stories appear in NUNUM.ca (Pushcart Prize nomination for The Periodicals Room), Oakwood Literary Journal, The Bookends Review (forthcoming), Good Age Minnesota (CNF). He has contributed to numerous other publications and media in the US and overseas, including McGraw-Hill, Macmillan, TC Public Television, and Time-Life Japan. He is currently compiling a collection of his published short stories.
