1863 Saratoga Summer Page 10

  “Ye think and care too much of the Dewitts and what they might be thinking. But, I guess in this case, ye have reason to.”

  Sinead hadn’t realized she was so tense. She smiled, sensing her da’s unspoken acknowledgement of the truth, and leaned back in the carriage.

  The thoroughfares were less clogged today, although groups of men were standing around on the street corners as if discussing something important. Many of them spoke in loud, angry voices. Their gestures were animated. Some even shouted. One raised his fist like a cry for justice.

  Sinead wondered what was going on but wasted little time worrying about it. She had her own job to do. She chuckled to herself. Lots of angry men hung about the city streets of late—men without jobs, men against some political force or another, men in disagreement with something or someone—and now she was going to the Tombs to gain the release of just such a one.

  Time was getting short. The carriage was nearing the Tombs, lower Manhattan’s main jail on Centre Street. She knew she should compose herself and start thinking of the actions she needed to take, when her da’s voice broke into her thoughts.

  “Sinead. Listen to me. Put the damned old clothes on. I want ye to appear to be a hard-working Irish washerwoman. I’m sure ye can still speak in the Gaelic if ye have to and punch up yer native brogue.”

  Sinead stared at her da’s back. “Of course I can. The Dewitts don’t like it if I do it in front of Robbie.”

  Hearing his name, Robbie looked at Sinead. He pointed at ships berthed at one of the piers they were passing. “Mama Jane, look. See the ships, the big ones. Over there. How are they tied up? Can we go see them?” he asked in one stream of hurried words. But he was quickly distracted. “Oooohhhh, look at that man up on the top of the big one. Is that a clipper? What kind?”

  Robbie wriggled around in the seat in order to see well. His knees pushed on the leather seat of the carriage then he climbed up onto his feet, leaning on Sinead, pointing and gesturing in every direction. She hung on to him in fear he’d fall and get stepped on by the horses. He put his arms around her neck and squeezed.

  Although she couldn’t really see what he was pointing at, she thought to mollify him. “Aye, darling. That’s a sailor. He’s working on the ship, probably repairing the sails or tying something up high.”

  Bowes nodded and said, “The clothes, Sinead. We’re almost there. Put them on, lass.”

  “Robbie, get off that seat and sit. Turn around in the seat, so Mama doesn’t have to worry about you falling out and bumping your head.” She pulled him down and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek.

  Being the good child he was, Robbie swung around in the seat, leaped into the air for one breathless second of disobedience and sat back down, grinning. He couldn’t pull his gaze from the ships. He twisted around everyway possible to get a better view and kept up a running dialogue about them.

  Sinead sighed, content for a brief moment. While Robbie was busy with the sights around him, she held onto him, with one hand on his legs to steady him. With her other hand, she slipped the frayed, gray skirt over her head and over the clothes she’d been wearing.

  “Da, stop the carriage so I can stand. I need to fix the skirt.”

  Bowes did as asked. When the carriage slowed, Sinead teetered but stood to smooth the overskirt skirt down over the Sunday one she already had on. She smiled grimly. All this clothing made her look fat.

  Bowes took off again. The carriage bumped over broken cobblestones, and Sinead was forcefully thrown down onto the seat again. The jarring impact ripped a seam in the skirt, making the waistline, still open, too big. Sinead took a large pin from her reticule, gathered the skirt in a bunch and pinned the waistline closed.

  She noticed another big rip across the bottom of the hem. Thinking it wouldn’t matter if she looked poor, she eased herself back in the seat and pulled a limp and tattered shirt out of her handbag.

  “Look at the birds, Mama.” Robbie pointed then suddenly noticing her activity, asked. “Whatcha’ doing?”

  Over the screeching calls of gulls near the waterfront, Sinead tried to explain. “Mama Jane has to stop someplace before we go to church. It’s a dusty, dirty place, so Mama is putting on old clothes. I don’t want to go into the church looking dirty and ill-kempt.”

  “What’s ill-kempt?” Robbie asked, his face intense with concentration.

  “I guess ‘tis just another way to say dirty. Maybe ‘messy’ would be a better explanation for you.” Loving his interest, his curiosity, she smiled down at the young lad who so filled her heart.

  “Can I go with you?”

  “Nae, darling. This is something Mama has to do by herself. You’ll stay with Grandda Bee.”

  Robbie stood in the carriage. Sinead clutched him as if he were going to fall. “Don’t, Mama. I want to talk to Grandda Bee.” He poked Bowes in the back with a forefinger. “Hey, Grandda. Are you going to take care of me while Mama Jane goes into the dirty place? Can we get out and walk? Can I pet your horses? Can I…”

  “Aye, laddie. We’ll think of things to do, until yer new da comes out. Then ye’ll be wanting to pay all yer attention to him,” Bowes answered before Sinead could say anything more about horses.

  “I’m going to see my new da, now?” Robbie turned to Sinead with eyes wide. He shook his head up and down in pleasure. His smile was as broad as could be. “Really? A new da?”

  “Aye. I’m going to get your new da,” Sinead said, slipping the shirt over her head and letting it fall where it may. “See, now I’ll stay clean.”

  She didn’t bother to tuck it into the skirt. It completely covered her own clothes and made her look much heavier. But if her thoughts were correct, it was the way her da wanted her to look.

  “Why is my new da in a dirty place?” Robbie frowned.

  At a loss how to answer, Sinead looked at her da.

  “He’s been helping men repair some things wrong with the place. It takes a big man to do lifting,” Bowes supplied.

  Sinead’s nerves got the best of her. Her heart beat faster than usual. Her tongue felt like it was sticking to the roof of her mouth. “Da, what am I going to say when I get in there?”

  “Be yerself, lass, with just a bit more of Ireland in yer speech.” Bowes’ lips curved into a grin. “Be a bit more like yer old da.” His laughter filled the carriage. Robbie laughed with him, just for the joy of laughing. “That’s me wee lad!”

  “This is not the time for foolishness, da. I have to know what to do.”

  “Show them yer papers. Crush them up a bit now, will ye? Ye want to make it look like ye’ve been married for a while and they’ve been stuffed in a drawer somewhere.” Bowes snapped his fingers. “I’ve got it. Pretend yer husband is a wee bit of a drunk, sometimes going a smidgen overboard. Specially when he gets with his brother.”

  “Do ye think the police will be believing me?” The sound of the lilt in her ear surprised her. “Aye, da, this might be fun after all.” A corner of her mouth turned up in a grin. She straightened her shoulders and set her expression into a grimace.

  “And daughter, don’t be forgetting to give that drunken husband of yers, and his weak-kneed brother, a sound lashing with the back of yer fierce tongue.” Bowes chuckled and wiggled his finger at her. “Be sure to do it in front of the police. They’ll think it’s hilarious and send you and the two men on your way with a lot less trouble.”

  A grin crossed Sinead’s face again but disappeared quickly. “I have never been a shrew. Ye’re teasing me, for sure, old man.”

  “Ye only need a wee bit o’ practice.” Bowes held up his hand to stay her words. “But I want ye to act the shrew until the men are set free, in our carriage, and we’re off. Then ye can apologize if ye’re wanting.” He paused. “Ye may not be wanting to just yet, ‘til ye see the lie of the land.” He nodded toward the building. “Now, go.”

  The possible seriousness of the situation struck Sinead. Her body recoiled in distaste. What if the De
witts found out about this little excursion to the city’s jail? She shouldn’t have brought Robbie with her. “Da, I can’t be doing this. I just can’t. I don’t have it in me.”

  “You sound funny.” Robbie giggled. “What can’t you do, Mama Jane?”

  Bowes laughter floated to the back of the carriage as he turned a corner onto Centre Street. “Och, Robbie, Mama Jane can do most everything she sets her mind to. She’s the smartest woman I’ve ever known.”

  “I know. Me, too,” Robbie said, shaking his head up and down. He looked at Sinead with love shining from his eyes.

  Sinead chuckled despite the tremors she was experiencing. In her own way, she enjoyed the way the two males she loved best teased with her. As much as she complained about her da’s schemes, most often she found herself caught up in them. Even now, when her heart beat with a fast rhythm.

  And, playing a part might be fun at that, she thought. “Alright, you two fellows. Mama Jane can do everything. Right now, she’s going to get yer new da for ye, laddie.”

  “You still talk funny.” Again, Robbie giggled but grew interested in another sight. He pointed to a brick building. “What’s that place?”

  “A hotel,” Bowes answered before Sinead tried to explain. “’Tis a lovely, very expensive hotel.” He turned back to Sinead. “Which reminds me, daughter. Did ye bring some money with ye? In case palms need to be greased.”

  “Aye. This old washerwoman brought enough to bribe an army.” Smiling, she held up a battered old reticule.

  “Are you going to the army, Mama Jane?”

  “Nae, darling. ‘Tis just an expression I use sometimes.”

  The puzzled look on Robbie’s face made Sinead chuckle. She understood she was working herself up to put on an act, one to make her da proud.

  She put on the broadest Irish accent she could. “Besides, Da, that handsome lad of an Irishman, him who now called himself me husband needs to be brought down a peg or two.”

  She tucked her shirt tighter into the skirt and stared straight ahead. She brought her chin up and stuck her nose in the air. “Aye, the fool needs to be learning he’s not going to be controlling me life. If anything, ‘tis more the other way around.”

  The carriage stopped across the street from the Tombs. Several men in uniforms lolled on the steps leading to the big double doors at the top. They seemed to be deep in conversation.

  Robbie poked her with a finger and whispered, “Are those men the army?”

  Her heart beating far too fast, Sinead stumbled over her answer, not sure how to respond. “Um, nae, I mean, aye. They’re members of the army.” At least, if she agreed with his assumption, the Dewitts wouldn’t find out about the jail.

  Bowes turned around. “That’s me lassie. Ye’re getting into it now. I can feel it, and ‘tis a lovely thing to see. Do yer job proper-like and ye’ll be having those lads out here in seconds.”

  In disgust, Sinead shook her head, nodded toward Robbie and narrowed her eyes. Her irrepressible da grinned at her. “Right. Well, I’m as ready as I’ll ever be. Wish me luck…”

  “Luck to ye lassie,” Bowes said with a solemn tone.

  “And take off yer fancy hat. Mess up yer hair some,” he continued, folding the reins in his lap. “Better yet, let some of it hang loose in strings. Put some dirt on yer face as ye go through the doors.”

  Now that the carriage was completely stopped, Sinead stood. The sides of her neck ached from the rigidity with which she held herself. She tossed her hat down on the carriage floor and looked around her. Thinking she would start playing the part now, she kicked at the carriage door. “Aren’t ye going to opening this door for me, ye sod of a carriage driver?”

  Bowes shouted back, “Ye think I’ll get down from me perch and open the door for the likes of you?” He sat up straight in his seat and crossed his arms over his chest, beginning to play along with her. “Not for heaven’s sake or all the tea from England would I be doing that. I’m probably lucky if I get paid a cent for this wee trip,” he groused in a loud voice.

  “Grandda Bee, don’t holler at my mama,” Robbie shouted, tears welling in his eyes.

  “Och, hush, Rob. Yer grandda’s not hollering,” she bent and whispered in his ear. “He’s just playing…you know, for fun.”

  She lifted her son into her arms for a second then squeezed and tickled him until he giggled again. “Stay with Grandda, son. He’ll keep ye safe from worry…”

  “Och, Robbie lad, I’m not really hollering. Yer mama and I are just playing a game.” Bowes whispered, too. “If ye want to play with us, when she gets across the road, scream at her to get yer da, quick-like, and stamp yer feet in the carriage. She’ll think that’s funny. Just don’t scare the horses.”

  Sinead smiled at them both, stepped from the carriage and crossed the street under the watchful eyes of the policemen standing in front of the building. She stared straight ahead, ignoring their looks.

  “Mama, you better bring my da or I’m going to be mad at you,” Robbie screamed across the street, his little hands cupped around his mouth.

  Sinead turned, grinned and shook her fist at her da but answered Robbie with a sweet tone. “Aye, I’ll be doing that for ye, laddie, mine. Don’t ye be worrying yer wee head.”

  ~*~

  Gingerly, Sinead moved onto the sidewalk and stared at the unpleasant-looking building in front of her before putting a foot on the steps. Tingles vibrated up her spine. She drew in a deep breath and, grasping the wobbly iron railing connected to the stairs, she started up.

  Several members of the local precinct, dressed in the navy blue uniforms, their shiny badges worn high on the front pockets of their shirts, stood by the sides of the doors, smoking. The men stared at her. One, dour and mule faced man, made a comment to another, behind his hand, as she reached the last step before the double doors. The three guffawed then snickered.

  Sinead spun around. “Something ye gentlemen find so funny, ye have to be laughing at me?” she asked.

  “Something ye gentlemen find funny,” a young man, his mouth curved in sardonic amusement, mimicked. “Aye. Coming here to be getting yer man out of jail, are ye?”

  She went back down a couple of steps to face him. She conjured up a picture of an absolute, angry gesture of the most hateful Irish women she’d known and imitated their facial expressions. With her chin jutted out, she sputtered, “Now, why were ye whispering thing about me? ‘Tis not necessary to be making such fun of me speech or me dress,” Sinead snapped, practicing the rhythm of the brogue, letting it sit well on her tongue.

  Her tone was quiet but her temper edged toward high. Her face was flushed. She hated being the object of ridicule, much less from the very men who were supposed to help in her current endeavor.

  “Sorry missus, but we were wondering what a fair, young lady like yerself was doing down here at this precinct. ‘Tis the Tombs, ye know,” said an older, more respectful man who was taller and imposing.

  “Aye, here ye are, to a place for hardened criminals, missus,” said the first, the heaviest of the three, who spoke while keeping a cigar stuck between his teeth.

  “A neighbor said me very own husband was brought here. To this ugly place. I cannot figure out why, unless it was the demon rum what caused him to lose his senses,” she said, letting her speech slur and her body tremble, as if she felt upset, lost and bewildered.

  “Lately, since the Conscription draft came to the City, the only men brought to this jail have been the ‘down and outers’ from the saloons down by the piers. Lots of workers from the piers. Or from the slums. Most of them men who waste their time and stir up the folks around the ships,” said the man who whispered in the first place.

  The man with the cigar laughed. “We bring ‘em in every Saturday night, steady as clockwork, and drunker than fools.”

  “Yeah. And women like you, lady, do not come to pick them up too often. Ye seem a finer sort than the ones who usually have their men sitting here, waiting for re
lease,” the older man added.

  Sinead took his remarks to heart. Aye, she thought. Women, who were refined, socially educated to some sort of upper society, did not visit jails, much less the one in this district. She knew she would have to change her tactics once she got inside, be more downtrodden, dissolute.

  She dropped her reticule on the step in front of her, bent and retrieved it along with a great deal of dirt. With a small gesture of pushing back the hair that had fallen into her face, she rubbed some of the dirt along her cheek and down her neck. “I’ll be going in now,” she politely replied.

  “Lass, go to the man at the desk inside. He’ll get yer husband for ye,” the heavy policemen said before turning back to his cigar smoking.

  The older man added a bit of advice. “Speak nicely to the fellow. He’s a mite quick to take offense. It’s been bad today and only looks to get worse. Oh, and if ye have any papers to prove a man inside be yers, take them out as ye go through the doors.”

  “Thank ye. The information will help me,” Sinead responded, clutching her handbag and squeezing it to crush the papers inside. “‘Tis the first time I’ve been here,” she added as an afterthought.

  The man continued, “And I hope, for yer sake, it’s the last. ‘Tis not a nice place to visit. The row of holding cells in there are dreadful.” He moved to the doors. “Here, now, Missus, let me hang on to these door for ye.”

  Sinead patted the man’s arm. “Thank ye so much. Ye’ve been a help, ye have.” When he nodded, she went inside.

  The interior was dingy and saved from utter darkness by thin strips of gaslight. The narrow hallway resembled the nighttime streets at the corner of Five Points, one of the city’s worst slums, a place her da no longer frequented or allowed her to go to. Dominated by the Irish, Five Points was filled with rotten wooden houses and tall tenements crammed with poor families. Violent brawls and pitched battles broke out with frightening regularity between rival gangs who lived there.