1863 Saratoga Summer Page 23

  “In the saloons, I saw the serious divisions occurring in the rioter’s ranks. When I originally talked to me friends about the draft, they envisioned a one-day anti-draft demonstration.”

  The results of yesterday’s display forced Bowes to abandon any thoughts of rebellion against the authorities. In fact, at this point, if he didn’t need to get Sinead, the laddie and her new husband out of the city, he would have joined the authorities as young Egan prepared to do. He took the hoof pick from the tack box, bent to clean the hooves.

  Soon, he thought, volunteers would line up at the fire and police stations, wanting to defend their neighborhoods against the worst of the rioter and arsonists. In frustration, he grabbed the brush again and, with added vigor, assaulted the tail already hanging straight.

  He sensed the die-hard rebels would pursue black people. They would brandish poles and clubs to do far more damage than they already done.

  The very idea upset Bowes so, he started brushing off the horses’ legs with swift, sure strokes, talking to them again in a friendly way. “The bad ones, the avengers, will hunt those poor people down where they work, attack their homes and stores until some greater power comes and forces them to suffocate their rage.”

  As the dangerous times facing everyone worked to the forefront of his mind, Bowes thoughts drifted to his daughter and her dilemma. Her experience in both Dublin and New York had hardened her, but beneath the veneer was a fine young Irish lass. What she never realized, probably his fault, she was truly a country girl, with the gentle, proud ways of her mother. He was sure of it.

  Those thoughts made him so uncomfortable his pacing began anew. It was with great relief that he saw his family exiting the Dewitt mansion, through the back door. He straightened to meet them.

  Connor, with Robbie’s legs wrapped around his waist, held the lad tight with one arm and juggled the cloth bundles in his other arm. He sped from the Dewitts’ mansion and down the back garden path, leaving the wrought iron gate wide open.

  Sinead followed, carrying bundles clutched to her chest. Barely able to see over what she carried, she darted across the alleyway on swift, silent feet.

  No words were spoken as Sinead leaped into the back of the open carriage, dropping her baggage on the floor. Connor shoved Robbie into her arms then bound onto the driver’s seat next to Bowes and sat back.

  When Bowes saw everyone was safely secured, he clucked to the horses, flipped the reins across their back and urged them to trot off at an unusually fast pace. Supreme anxiousness compelled him to move those he loved out of the city environs as quickly as he could. To Saratoga and a different life.

  Down the alley they went, far faster than they should have, until they came to the end, facing another of the huge buildings bordering Fifth Avenue. A block of loud screams and call reverberated in the distance, and the occupants of the carriage could already smell the smoke hovering over the city.

  The carriage scooted left onto the main part of the avenue. Fire bells rang and clanked behind them. Piercing blasts of whistles split the air, along with the rumbling shrieks of bedeviled people.

  Connor stood in the carriage and glanced over his shoulder. “Some sort of collision, between the rabble and the authorities, must be happening several blocks further down the avenue.”

  Connor’s thoughts and worries over Egan’s welfare escalated. He knew his brother’s thinking processes often moved too quickly, sometimes with dire consequences. “Och, Jaysus, I pray Egan’s bright nature and smart mouth help him make his way safely through the devastation prevailing in this place.”

  He sat back abruptly, his hands grasping his knees, his head bowed. Sinead touched his arm with a soft pat or two, her nose wrinkled from the smell of ash. Robbie scooted over in the seat to sit closer. Seemingly unaware of their attempts at comfort, Connor settled into bad memories.

  It was shortly more than a month since Egan and he left their home in Ireland. On a balmy, serene Saturday morning in July, they had arrived in America at a New York City port. The wharves bustled with activity and noise, giving an indication of what life might offer here. Around noon that day, Connor had watched his wife faint at the sight of him, the very wife who had patted his knee only moments ago.

  He shifted in his seat slightly to stare at her in an oblique manner. She sat as still as a statue, staring down at her hands folded and resting on her lap. Her hair, uncapped and clean now after her bath last night, rained delicate, soft copper curls around her face. Her light blue eyes, so unlike the sparkling sapphire jewels his mother sometimes wore, were huge with fright and roving over every inch of ground they passed. Yet, her back remained straight despite her fear, and she smiled willingly at the lad who, thankfully, did not quite realize the seriousness of their situation.

  Ashes descended over the carriage, and Connor batted them away. He lifted Robbie onto his lap, hoping to protect the lad from debris, but his thoughts were concentrated on his wife.

  Och, she is brave, for sure, but cold natured, he thought. Lovely to look at but difficult to deal with if she didn’t get her own way. Well, that has to change. He shook his head and almost groaned aloud. How had his father talked him into such a baleful slice of life?

  Bright streaks flamed across the sky to meet the sun, adding more heat to the day and further memories of the upsetting arrival in New York. Saturday evening, while waiting for Sinead’s da, flashed before him. Egan and he had gotten into a brawl with Irishmen over something he didn’t even understand. He did now.

  The outcome of that battle was a jail cell, locked up by others formerly from Ireland. It was an embarrassment to him. He’d never been in such a place before.

  The shouts of marauders on the street got louder. Bowes spurred the horses to a faster pace. Connor was unable to relieve the black memories, not even when Robbie climbed off his lap and crawled over to Sinead, who never once looked in Connor’s direction but stared straight ahead as if navigating the way.

  An especially loud shout from one perpetrator of misery brought the stinking, infested jail to mind. Sunday, when Egan and he were let out, they were put into the hands of those who could control of their lives but who seemed to dislike the thought. Bruised and battered in body and spirit, his brother and he were made to feel like refugees from a penal colony, Egan going in one direction, Connor in another. That evening, the only good thing in Connor’s fleeting memory was the ability to bathe, to be clean.

  The sound of racing feet and people tossing things into the streets assailed those in the carriage. The horses briefly shied but quickly righted themselves and they continued to tear up the avenue.

  After hearing about the disturbances in the city on Monday, the family raced through several serious altercations, only to become completely involved in a flaming riot at an orphanage. They had gotten more bruised, burned and exhausted. Only the joy on the wee lad’s face, when he saw them, made the day brighter for Connor, who was still concerned about what might come.

  Police whistles sounded several block away. The whirr of sirens rent the air. Flames rose in the sky to streak the day with red tinges. Smoke and ash fell everywhere around them, carried softly on what little wind there was. Sparks hit the grays’ rumps. The horses bolted forward.

  Bowes clutched the rein with all the force he could muster. “Slow down, ye idjits.” He touched their hind ends with a short whip. “Whoa. Pay attention, now. Whoa,” he called in an elongated voice meant to reassure and soothe.

  It was only Tuesday, the fourth day after Connor’s arrival in America. He had lost sight of his favorite brother, each fleeing for his life in a different direction. Connor had an added group to tend. In this whole world, all he wanted was to return to Ireland, his family and his horses.

  ~*~

  They had gone no more than ten miles when a vague indirect light spread from the far horizon they had recently vacated and blocked out the rays of the sun. Tongues of fire from downtown areas streaked through the sky. They lapped
at the sun with claw-like fingers.

  Gray smoke spread uptown, a surprise for such a cloudless, windless day. Soon the sky behind the carriage was dark with hot cinders and more ash, which floated over them from the south and east. The smell was cloying.

  Connor spotted a mean-looking group of about seven unruly men gathering in the road up ahead of them. They carried large chunks of wooden cudgels and stood in a straggly line as if daring the carriage to pass by them.

  A blood lust glittered in the eyes of several. A slight hint of madness contorted another’s broad, sweat-greased face. They crouched, as if ready to charge the carriage like bulls in a blind rage.

  Their crooked, deceptive grins and grimaces struck fear in Connor’s heart. He looked around the area, hoping to find another possible avenue of escape but none appeared. They were blocked in.

  A spray of blinding orange and blue sparks roared and shot into the sky, matched only by growls and snarls from the gang barring the roadway. Heat rose from the vanished sun, making tempers short and fears magnified. The men screeched with gleeful fury, their eyes fixed on the flames, loving the sinuous undulations of it. One man, with a dangerous sneer, turned and refocused his gaze on those in the carriage.

  Bowes stood, his hands clutching the reins, a whip in his free hand. “Hey there, Clancy, me friend,” he shouted to one of the men. “Haven’t seen ye in far too many days. Come on over. I would be having a word with ye.”

  The brute of a man called Clancy took a step forward. His crooked smile became a sneer then disappeared before he took another two steps toward the carriage. “Whatcha’ doing here Brennan?” he asked. “Ye’re not a fool. Ye must be knowing ‘tis not a good time to be roaming the streets.”

  The shuffling crowd in back of Clancy bellowed with coarse laughter and spit bolts of coarse derisive remarks in the direction of the carriage. They quickly closed in behind the man who was obviously their leader.

  Connor’s hot-blooded Irish temper rose in unreasoned anger at the folks who seemed to want to stop him from protecting his new family. These were the very same people who caused horrendous devastation around town on Monday. Although he understood he should not rile them further, he needed to get past them to some sort of safety.

  Without turning around, he tipped his head to one side and slung words at Sinead, from the corner of his mouth. “Take the boy in your arms. Do not let him wriggle or speak. Make him pretend he’s ill.”

  He leaped over the door of the carriage, knowing full well, he was taking a terrible chance by approaching the group of ruffians on foot. They had heavy cudgels with which to fell him, but he barely stopped his forward movement, except to pat Bowes’ knee and give orders. “If I can make my way through and move them from one side or the other, take the carriage by them with as much speed as you can.”

  Connor knew the danger, but rage churned relentlessly through him. The smile plastered on his face ached with animosity but he did not falter in his steady movements forward

  Sinead called out, “Connor, come back here.” When he ignored her, she poked her da on the arm. “Make him come back. They’ll kill him if they’ve a mind to. We can’t let that happen.”

  “Daughter, do what the man asked of ye. Take Robbie in yer arms and rock him back and forth as if he were sick or diseased somehow.”

  Sinead burst into ragged and uncontrollable sobbing. She swayed in her seat until she had control of herself and could reach out. With tears dripping down her face, she pleaded, “Robbie, lad, come to mama, darlin’. Rest your wee head on my lap. Remember when you were sick with the terrible coughs. Your new da needs you to be acting like you’re terribly sick. Can you do that for mama, love? For your new da?”

  With wide-open, terror-stricken eyes, Robbie flung himself down onto Sinead’s lap and clutched at her skirt. He groaned and shrieked as if in pain, all the while never taking his eyes from her face. Tears trickled from his eyes in sympathy and fear. They rolled down his face to his chin, mixed with the ash floating in the air and mottled his face.

  “Clancy, me daughter’s having hysterics behind me here, wanting to get our laddie to a new doctor before it’s too late. We need to be moving on, if for no other reason than to save the wee youngster. With yer permission, for sure,” Bowes shouted, using a smile and deferential movement of his head to indicate a way through the crowd.

  Clancy strode forward belligerently. “Who in hell is this brute coming at me?” With a show of bravery, Clancy straightened, sneered then stepped to one side. He bent and clasped a large stump in his hands. He looked up at Connor with shifty eyes. “Well, who are ye?”

  “I’m the wee lad’s da. Me son is sick,” Connor answered, not taking his eyes from Clancy’s. “Ye need only to look at him, suffering in his mama’s lap.”

  “If ye’re the lad’s da, how come I don’t know ye?” one of the men in the crowd screamed out. He followed his question with a high-pitched laugh, sounding like a hyena.

  “I’ve just returned from the old sod. Me own da was sick and needed tending,” Connor lied, without a blink. He was ready to fight if need be, hoping he needed no weapons other than his bare hands.

  “What’s wrong with the laddie?” Clancy asked.

  “We’re not sure, but we’re thinking it might be the small pox or diphtheria. We’re trying to get him out of the city before he infects more folks.” Connor moved forward and put his hand out in supplication. “Now, I’m figuring Irishmen, like yerselves, will do for one another and a wee Irish laddie.”

  “Och, Jaysus. Stay away from me man,” Clancy said, holding his arm straight out toward Connor. “You’re likely carrying the disease yerself…” The man backed up until he stumbled into the men in back of him. “Move, ye stupid bastards.”

  The others bumped and pushed each other back. Their fearsome animosity collapsed under the fright of possible illness. They stood silently in Clancy’s shadow, grumbling complaining, considering their options.

  They were an incongruous blend of opposing forces, shaking their heads and waving their fists at each other now. Sides were chosen and alliances made there on the street.

  Clancy made the final decision. “Man, get back up into yer carriage,” Clancy instructed, his dark, destructive need for vengeance momentarily diffused. “We’ll be making a wide path for ye.”

  He and his men moved to the sides of the roadway. He nodded to Bowes. “Go on through, man. And don’t be coming back here until the lad and the rest of ye are free of disease.”

  “Aye, man. And I’m thanking ye, Clancy.” Bowes moved the carriage forward at a slow pace. He stopped only long enough for Connor to mount the driver’s bench. Then, in the midst of a flurry of ash rising from the road, he pushed the horses into a fast canter. Dust and dirt permeated the air, going higher than before. It flew above the men on the road like cinders from the fires of the day before.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Traveling north through the upper reaches of New York City was a frightening experience for the members enclosed in Bowes’ carriage. Minor battles with gangs of rowdy people, going in all directions, some fleeing the city, others seeking revenge on the blacks and rich, ensued every few blocks.

  Shouts traveled through the air. Connor saw the gang running toward their roadway. He grabbed the reins from Bowes and made the horses gallop past. “Move on grays,” he called. “Good boys…”

  No sooner had they gotten passed one gang, another surfaced from a side street. They all brandished large sticks, waving them in the air. They threw paving blocks at the carriage, several reaching their goal.

  “On grays.” Bowes clucked as loud as he could, hoping the animals could hear him. Again, the horses raced forward.

  The carriage was assailed every few miles, until they were totally outside the city’s environs. Fortunately Bowes and Connor were able to jolly people out of doing damage to the carriage or those that rode in it.

  Once totally clear of the city, relief overcame them. The
horses, sweating profusely, slowed their pace to a walk. Bowes wheezed and coughed the effects of the ash into his hand. Connor groaned and leaned back in the seat. Robbie hiccupped and cried softly.

  Sinead murmured soothing words to him. “’Tis alright, now, darlin’. Everything’s fine. It will be just grand, our little vacation.”

  Robbie shook all over and put his head in Sinead’s lap. The people traveling together through the anguish of riots did little talking to each other.

  During the first day on the route upstate, Robbie, deep in some secret, child’s place, refused to look at anything outside of the carriage.

  No matter how Sinead cajoled him. “Robbie, look. ‘Tis a blue bird,” or tried to interest him in some unusual natural wonder, he merely clung to her skirts, fearful and weepy.

  “Robbie. Look at the river flowing past.”

  “The white sails on that cutter are blowing hard against the wind. See, Robbie.”

  Finally, at a loss as to how to console him and take away his fears, she let him keep his head in her lap or huddle in a corner of the carriage. She continued to murmur to him and tried to rid him of his angst with soft Irish lullabies.

  Connor, sitting on the driver’s seat with Bowes, was entranced by the sound of her songs. They made him nostalgic for home and seemed to heal a space left by the death of his beloved mother, a space he was not aware he had. He felt soothed and renewed by the singing.

  The further they got from the city, the more the tension produced by the riots left them, in slow measures. Connor got out of the carriage and stretched his legs. In a bit of energy, Connor swung Robbie up onto broad shoulders and ran with him alongside the moving vehicle.

  The boy gasped and hung on to Connor’s forehead. Only then did childish fears leave the boy. With his short legs wrapped around the front of Connor, feet tucked under armpits, and his hand fully entrenched in Connor’s hair, Robbie began laughing, grinning at Bowes and looking around at the glorious scenery.