The Famine Orphans, page 20
Luke chucked the horse’s reins and the carriage moved out onto the street.
Bridie straightened her back and sat upright in the carriage. “His name is Mr. Terrence O’Leary,” she began, “and he owns and runs the Emerald Isle Hotel and Tavern on George Street. He emigrated from Ireland twenty years ago, and not as a convict as you might be thinking, but to make his fortune.” She paused and looked towards Luke. “No offense to convicts, Luke,” she said, “yez are as good as anybody else.”
Luke made no reply.
“Mr. O’Leary is a well-off man and often comes to Mrs. Pitt’s parties. As a result, he knows two things about me—that I know all there’s to know about wines and that I can sing. Mrs. Pitt boasted to him about the wines I’d ordered for the picnic and he heard me singing in the empty dining room one night when I thought nobody was about.” She paused. “You recall that Mrs. Pitt doesn’t want me to be heard or seen by her guests. So, since Mr. O’Leary runs a hotel and a popular tavern, you can see why he’s interested in me. I can help him with ordering the stock and I can sing for me supper in the tavern.”
My stomach fell. “Oh, Bridie, you’re not leaving us, are you?” I cried.
Bridie laughed. “I said no questions, but I’ll answer that. I’ll only leave if I’m thrown out on me arse,” she said.
“Then what does he want?”
“He wants to marry me.”
I was too stunned to say anything. Even Luke turned around to stare at Bridie.
She laughed aloud. “What? You two don’t believe any man would be interested enough to marry me?’
I shook my head furiously. “No, that’s not true!”
“Come on, Kate, be honest. Everybody knows I’m no oil painting. But looks aren’t everything. Mr. O’Leary’s attracted to what I can do to help his business more than my looks.” She laughed again. “Anyway, he’s no prize either when it comes to looks!”
Something in Bridie’s protests didn’t ring true. I realized that she must have been hurt more than I ever thought by Mrs. Pitt’s attitude towards her. Even though the thought of her leaving Pitt House terrified me, I was genuinely happy for her. I reached over and took her arm.
“I wish you all the best, Bridie. You deserve it.”
She shook her arm free of my touch. “Will you whish’t, Kate. You think I’m going to jump at marriage in case it’s the only chance I’ll ever get? I’m not that daft. And besides, I’m not nineteen yet and so Major Pitt and herself would have to give me permission to marry and I can tell you now that Mrs. Pitt isn’t about to agree to it.” She smiled. “So you’re stuck with me for a while longer, whether you want me or not.”
I threw my arms around her. “Oh, Bridie,” I said, “of course I want you to stay. You’re the only one keeping me sane in this place.”
* * *
The year 1850 dawned hot and humid, accompanied by a foul smell that rose out of Sydney Harbor and clung to everything in its path, wrapping itself around blades of grass and leaves of trees, crawling over rocks, brushing the pavements and streets with its vile stench. Like a snake, it coiled through door crevices and window sashes, invading grand houses and tar-papered huts alike. People covered their faces with handkerchiefs as they rushed through the town, disgusted with the smell of their own clothing. At first, the town leaders were at a loss. Rumors circulated blaming the invasion on everything from spoiled cargos brought in by foreign ships to an unknown species of insect or animal, or a pox sent by God to punish Sydney’s sinners!
As it turned out, the people of Sydney were indeed the sinners at fault. The smell was finally traced to the pipes that had been installed to bring Sydney’s sewage down to the harbor, instead of burying it in pits as had been the custom. One outfall pipe had deposited raw sewage into the area of Fort Macquarie. Once the mystery was solved, the town fathers set about forming committees and summoning water specialists to find a solution. In the meantime, Sydney’s citizens continued to hold their noses.
At the time, I couldn’t help thinking the harbor smell was, for all of us—myself, the orphans, Luke, and the Pitts—an omen of bad things to come. Growing up in Ireland, I was well used to superstitions. The old people claimed almost everything was a sign—whether it was the “banshee” or fairy-woman crying out in the night predicting death, crows perched left to right on a tree branch predicting bad luck, or the sight of a white horse in the morning predicting good luck. I used to laugh at such stories, but their predictions came true often enough that I never discounted them altogether.
Early in the year, I began to sense that all was not as it should be around Pitt House. Two of the kitchen maids left and Mrs. Melrose’s mood grew more contrary as a result. Although orphan girls were still arriving from Ireland under the Earl Grey scheme, Major and Mrs. Pitt were dead set against hiring any of them as replacements, even though, like Bridie and me, they would be paid a lower rate than non-indentured staff. Then, the butler retired, though he was tight-lipped about his reasons. When the head housekeeper followed him out the door, I asked Bridie what she thought was going on.
“Herself has been in the worst of form,” she said as Luke drove us to Mass one Sunday, “finding fault with everyone and everything.”
I shook my head. “Yes, and she doesn’t seem to be entertaining as much lately. Am I right?”
Bridie nodded. “That’s true,” she said, frowning. “She’s cut down on the food and drink orders lately. As you know, she used to throw money around like there was no tomorrow, but now she’s counting every penny.” She hesitated as if deciding whether to say more. “And, last week,” she went on, lowering her voice so that Luke couldn’t hear her, “she sold that red velvet sofa in the salon. She cried when they came and took it away. It was a favorite of hers.”
“How’s the Major behaving?” I said.
“Aw, sure he’s going around with a face on him as long as your arm and growling at everybody in sight. His brother was here yesterday and I heard them shouting. Something about money and a bank.”
But the trouble was not just in the Pitt House. Mr. Martin from the Sydney Morning Herald had begun publishing more articles criticizing the Earl Grey scheme and the orphans now “pouring” into the colony. Apparently, my defense of myself and the other orphans had not softened his attitude towards us. The Herald was publishing not only its own stories, but reprinting accounts from other newspapers such as the South Australian Register in Adelaide, the Melbourne Morning Herald, and the Melbourne Argus. In all cases the accounts railed against the “Irish Orphans” using much the same language that I had heard from the men in the Pitt House the night of the picnic. They accused the Irish authorities of taking “professed public women and barefooted little country beggars” and putting them into the workhouses so they could qualify under the Earl Grey scheme and, as a result, rid themselves of undesirables. The Goulburn Herald expanded the argument by accusing England of “shifting from her shoulders the entire bulk of both her convict and pauper population and depositing them upon the shores of New South Wales.”
As I read those accounts, I was sickened to learn that anti-orphan sentiment was not confined to Sydney but was growing in Melbourne, Adelaide, Moreton Bay and elsewhere. The drumbeat against us was growing louder. Citizens became wary of hiring orphans, a wariness fueled by employers’ accusations of their insolence, idleness, and bad language. At the beginning of 1850, the Herald reported that there were now four hundred women in Hyde Park Barracks, some of whom had been there for over two months, and warned another two hundred were due to land from the Thomas Arbuthnot ship in February.
I knew I should be grateful that I arrived when I did. I could easily have been one of the girls now stranded without prospects at the barracks. But my anger overshadowed my gratitude. I was angry at everyone involved—the Irish workhouse guardians and the English government—who had promised us a better life; the Australian authorities who had welcomed the scheme, in the hope that we would civilize the hordes of single male convicts in the colony as well as ease the labor shortage, and who’d agreed to pay our way; the employers who believed the scathing rumors about us; and the newspaper editors and politicians and clerics who had whipped up this fervent hate. Most of all I was angry at the famine that had robbed me of my family and my future.
As the weeks went by, I felt a growing unsteadiness. Nothing seemed solid anymore. The ground under my feet felt as unsteady as when I was aboard the Sabine. I found myself longing to be back on the voyage, where the world was contained within the physical confines of the ship, where the daily routines were predictable, and where Nathaniel was close by to reassure me when fears overwhelmed me. Perhaps it was memories of Nathaniel that caused me to seek out Luke and the reliability of his stable presence. After all, the emotional undercurrents that laced every encounter with Nathaniel were not there with Luke. I felt free to be myself.
Our meetings at the grotto became more frequent. From the beginning I sensed that he, too, was having concerns about the state of things at Pitt House. Finally, one day, I asked him the question that I had been avoiding.
“Staff are leaving every week,” I began. “Will you be going soon? Did you get your land grant yet?”
He shook his head. “Not yet. The Major’s preoccupied with other things. I’ve reminded him a couple of times, but . . .”
“Oh,” I said, trying to hide my relief that he would be staying for a while longer. “You must be getting impatient.”
He sighed. “I am. I’ve a piece of land picked out near Bathurst on the other side of the Blue Mountains. As I told you, Major Pitt helped me with the grant application. He’s promised me he’ll follow up on it soon with the government land office. I can’t wait to get started. There’s crops need to be in the ground soon, and livestock to be bought, and a dwelling built. I want to call it ‘Tara’ after the ancient hill back in Ireland were the High Kings were crowned.”
I laughed. “Of course,” I said, “my da used to talk about it. He said that they stood on Lia Fáil, the Stone of Destiny, and if they were the rightful king the stone let out a mighty roar.”
But he wasn’t listening. Instead he was looking out towards the pond. “Major Pitt has assured me that because he is sponsoring my application it will be accepted without any bother. Of course if the drought gets worse, it might be as well to wait.”
I stood up. “I need to be getting back. Mrs. Melrose is watching me like a hawk.”
“What do you think of my plan?” he asked unexpectedly.
I was taken aback. “I’d need to think about it,” I began, reluctant to say that my only concern was keeping him here, “and besides, I can’t picture what it’s like out there in the Outback. Wouldn’t it be lonely?”
His eyes clouded. “My plan was to bring Maeve with me, but now . . .”
“How do you know she would have liked it?”
“Oh, I think she would have settled into it well enough. Maeve was not a pampered city girl. She grew up on a farm and loved being outdoors. In fact, you put me in mind of her.”
For the first time, I blushed in his presence. I looked away quickly, aware that he was staring at me. “I have to go,” I said.
I was out of breath by the time I reached the kitchen. Confused thoughts tumbled over one another. He had seemed as shocked as I was at his words, as if a truth had slipped out without his permission. I tried to calm down. So what if I reminded him of her? It meant nothing, but I had to admit that his words had made me want to run, just like my early encounters with Nathaniel. The difference was that I had been in love with Nathaniel. I was not in love with Mr. Luke Kinsella, nor, I was sure, was he in love with me. I had clearly read too much into what he said.
“You’ve lost the run of yourself altogether, Kate,” I scolded myself.
* * *
My eighteenth birthday came and went, as unremarked as the last. Under my indenture, Mrs. Pitt was to now start paying me eleven pounds a year, a one-pound increase. It was the one thing I was looking forward to, but when I asked Mrs. Melrose where the extra money was, she shrugged.
“I can’t tell you when you’ll see it, miss.”
“But it’s in the indenture contract, on my birthday I’m supposed to—”
“You should be grateful for what you’re getting, miss,” she said, cutting me off. “There’s better workers than you here waiting for a rise in their pay for months now.”
She had stalked away before I could ask any more questions.
When I saw Bridie the following Sunday, I asked her about it.
“I got me rise on me birthday in January,” she said, “but a few of the maids are complaining about Mrs. Pitt’s broken promises. You could go to the emigration authorities, but I don’t think you’d get far, knowing the attitudes of them oul’ buggers towards us!”
I sighed. Bridie was right of course.
Most of the orphans I saw at Mass said they had no problems with their employers about their wages. They were sorry for me, they said, but given the growing furor against the orphan immigration scheme, there wouldn’t be much I could do about it.
“I know you spoke up for us once, Kate, but what good did it do? And now, well, given the times that’s in it, I’d count my blessings that I have a job and not stuck waiting beyond in Hyde Park Barracks like a prisoner.”
I let the issue drop. Some nights in my room I would pull out an envelope from my travel box and count what money I had saved since arriving at Pitt House. I had to admit it didn’t amount to much—certainly not enough to pay my way back to Ireland, even in steerage, to find Christy and Paddy. Slowly and surely, my early dream of returning to Ireland to reunite with my brothers began to crumble.
The year lingered on. Temperatures dropped as summer turned into autumn, but the much longed-for rains were sparse. It was as if the whole world around me was holding its breath waiting for something to break the torpid spell. I was reminded of our days in the Doldrums when the Sabine sat unmoving on a lifeless ocean. Back then, every wisp of wind sent the crew running to open the sails, only to have hopes dashed when the wind dropped again.
Word came that the Earl Grey scheme was over. The pressure of opposition from the colony had been too much for England. The last ship, the Maria, had docked in Sydney in August. There would be no more. I wondered what would happen to the girls now languishing at Hyde Park.
I found myself clutching at even the smallest hint of normalcy as an omen of better things to come. What I didn’t realize was that it was the hints of normalcy that were covering up the upheaval that was about to burst upon us. The eruption came on an ordinary day in September 1850. The staff of Pitt House were going about their daily routines when we were all summoned to the main salon, where Major and Mrs. Pitt were waiting. I had a fleeting thought of how sad it was that Mrs. Pitt could no longer sit on her red velvet sofa. Instead she stood a few feet apart from her husband, her dark eyes blazing with anger. He stood erect and in full dress uniform. The gathered servants shuffled a little, then stilled. An air of expectation filled the room.
“We have called you here,” Major Pitt began, as if he was addressing a battalion of soldiers, “to tell you that some major changes are imminent.” His gaze was directed not at the people before him but on the front window, which framed the view of Sydney Harbor. “You must be prepared in due course—”
“Pitt House has been sold!” Mrs. Pitt’s voice was high-pitched as she glared at her husband. “There is no point in beating around the bush. The new owners have their own staff and will be moving in here in one month. Between now and then the Major and I will require the services of only a few of you who will be notified separately of our decision; the rest of you must make immediate plans to secure employment elsewhere. You must vacate this house within a fortnight. That is all!”
For a moment, no one spoke, then came the outbursts.
“What about the wages we’re owed?” one of the footmen called.
“We’ll need references!” cried a parlor maid. “We’ll not get jobs without them.”
“Are we supposed to keep working here in the meantime?”
Everyone began to speak at once, but Mrs. Pitt turned on her heel and strode towards the door, waving her arm in the air. “Speak to Major Pitt about those matters!” she called over her shoulder.
Everyone looked at the Major, who bowed his head. “I regret the inconvenience,” he began. “You may bring your concerns to my solicitors, Messrs. Waggoner and Clark, if you wish. My wife and I shall be leaving Pitt House forthwith and will not be available. That will be all.”
With that he brought his feet together and raised his arm. I had the ridiculous notion that he was about to salute. But he dropped his arm again and marched out of the room.
We watched them go. Some of the maids began to weep, other staff to grumble and shout, while others stood open-mouthed. I made my way through the crowd to where Bridie stood at the back of the room. My heart was beating fast but I had not yet taken in what had happened.
“Bad cess to them!” she said, her face red. “It’s not as if we didn’t see it coming,” she went on. “Sure we had plenty of signs over the last few months. But I can’t believe they’d put people out on the street with only a fortnight’s notice, and them behind on all their wages.”
“Will you be kept on for the month, Bridie?” I asked.
She nodded. “Aye, herself’s after notifying me this morning.”
“And what about afterwards?”
Bridie shrugged. “I’ll be making Mr. Terrence O’Leary a happy man, so I will.”
“You’re going to marry him?” I burst out in surprise.
“No! What did I tell you before? But I’ll be moving into the Emerald Isle Hotel and going to work for him!”
Luke came up beside us. “Well, that’s that, then,” he said.
I found my voice. “But why?” I said. “What happened?”
“The Major told me the bank he owned with his brother failed. He blames the brother for it. I almost feel sorry for him. This place was his pride and joy. Now he’ll have to walk away from these beautiful gardens and all the special trees and plants he shipped here from around the world! I suppose he wanted the land here to look like his native England.”
