The Tea Rose Read online

  Paddy’s eyes widened. “Oh, Christ!” he spluttered. “Not the Ben Tillet?”

  “I suppose so.”

  “You mean all this time I’ve been standing here preaching to the choir? Sorry, mate.”

  Tillet laughed heartily. “Sorry? What for? The union’s my favorite topic. I like listening to you. You’ve got a lot to say and you say it well. I still didn’t get your name.”

  “Finnegan. Paddy Finnegan.”

  “Listen, Paddy,” Tillet said. “I’ve got to get this meeting underway, but what you said earlier was right; we are disorganized down here. We need leaders on the local level. Men who can inspire their mates, keep their spirits up when the going gets tough. What do you say?”

  “Who? Me?”

  “Aye.”

  “I… I don’t know. I’ve never led anybody anywhere. Wouldn’t know how.”

  “Yes, you would. You do,” Tillet said. He drained his glass and put it on the bar. “Earlier, when your mates were unsure, you asked them to think about it. Now I’m asking you. You’ll do that much, won’t you?”

  “Aye,” Paddy said, dumbfounded.

  “Good. I’ll see you afterward.” He moved off through the crowd.

  Well, I’ll be blowed, Paddy thought. He had to admit he was flattered and honored that Tillet would ask him to lead the men. But being flattered was one thing, and actually taking over was another. Could he do it? Did he even want to?

  “Brother dockers …” It was Tillet. He warmed up by telling everyone about the withheld plus money at Oliver’s, then moved on to the threatened wage cuts at the Cutler Street Tea Warehouse. With a full head of steam up, he chronicled the poverty and deprivation of the dock worker’s life, then lambasted the ones responsible. All talking had stopped. Men held their pints or put them down. The quiet-spoken, earnest man had turned into a firebrand.

  As Tillet railed against the enemy, Paddy’s mind worked its way back to his request. What would he do? He looked around at the faces of the men who worked the docks, faces like anvils, hardened by the constant hammering life had given them. Usually it was porter or stout that erased the cares from those faces. Pint after pint. Washing away the bellowing foreman, the sad-eyed wife, the underfed children, the constant, aching knowledge that no matter how hard you worked, you’d only ever be a docker and there’d never be enough – enough coal in the bin, enough meat on the table. But tonight something else had lit up these faces – hope. Tillet had made them see the possibility of winning.

  Paddy thought about his family. He had a chance to fight for them now on the front lines. For more money, but for something bigger, too. For change, for a voice. Dockers had never had that before. If he turned down Tillet’s request, how could he live with himself knowing he’d done less than his best for his children?

  A cheer burst from the men; they were applauding. Paddy looked at Tillet, thundering at his audience, on fire, and saw that fire reflected in the scores of faces watching him. There was no longer any doubt in his mind. When Tillet came for his answer, he knew what he would say.

  “Surrender now, Jack Duggan, for you see we’re t’ree to one, Surrender in the Queen’s high name for you’re a plundering son …”

  Fiona woke with a start to the sound of singing. It was coming from the back of the house. She opened her eyes. The room was dark. Charlie and Seamie were asleep; she could hear them breathing. It’s the middle of the night, she thought, her mind thick with sleep. Why’s Da singing in the bog?

  She sat up, groping blindly for the lamp and the box of Vestas next to it. Her fingers were clumsy and it took a few scrapes along the edge of the box before the match flared. The lamp’s flame cast only a feeble light over the small room that served as a parlor during the day and as sleeping quarters for herself, Charlie, and Seamie at night. She drew back the makeshift curtain – an old sheet draped over a piece of twine – that separated her from her brothers, and headed for the kitchen.

  “Jack drew two pistols from his belt and proudly waved them high …”

  She heard the jakes door bang back on its hinges, and then the grand finale.

  “I’ll fight but not surrender said the Wild Colonial Boy!”

  “Da!” she hissed, stepping out into the dark yard. “You’ll wake the whole house with your noise. Come inside!”

  “Right away, mavourneen!” Paddy bellowed.

  “Da! Shush!” Fiona stepped back into the kitchen, put the lamp on the table, and filled the kettle with water. Then she stoked the small pile of coals glowing under the hearth grate.

  Paddy came into the kitchen, smiling sheepishly. “Seems the booze got the better of me, Fee.”

  “I can see that. Come and sit down. I’ve put the kettle on. Would you like some toast as well? You should put something in your stomach.”

  “Aye, that would be grand.” Paddy sat down by the fireplace, stretched his legs out, and closed his eyes.

  Fiona took a loaf of bread from the cupboard, cut a thick slice and stuck it on a toasting fork. “ ’Ere, Da,” she said, nudging her dozing father. “Don’t let it catch fire.”

  The water boiled. She mashed the tea. Then she pulled a chair from the table to the hearth and father and daughter sat together in companionable silence, Fiona warming her feet on the iron fire surround, Paddy turning his toast over the coals.

  Fiona cast a sideways glance at her father and smiled. If her mam and Roddy hadn’t been asleep, she wouldn’t have shushed him. She loved to hear him sing. His voice was the sound of her earliest memories. It was he, not her mam, who’d sung her lullabies. He sang on his way home from work – you could hear him a street away – and from the pub. On evenings when he didn’t go out, when he stayed in to mend their boots, or carve a toy for Seamie, he sang in the kitchen. How many nights had she fallen asleep, snuggled down in her covers, listening to his voice rising and falling? Too many to count.

  “Well, lass,” Paddy said through a mouthful of toast. “Shall I tell you me news?”

  “What news?”

  “It’s not any regular old dock rat you’re taking tea with tonight.”

  “Oh, no? Who am I taking tea with, then?”

  “The new leader of the Wapping Tea Operatives and General Laborers’ Association.”

  Fiona’s eyes widened. “Da, you’re joking!”

  “Sure, I am not.”

  “When?”

  Paddy wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “This evening. Down the pub. I spent some time talking to Ben Tillet before the meeting. Bent his ear off, I did, but he must’ve liked what I had to say, because he asked me would I lead the local chapter.”

  Fiona’s eyes were shining. “That’s grand,” she said. “Me own da’s a guv’nor! I’m ever so proud!” She started to giggle. “Wait till you tell Mam, she’ll faint! Father Deegan says the unionists are a bunch of godless socialists. You’ve as good as got ’orns and a pointy tail now. She’ll ’ave to do double time with ’er rosary.”

  Paddy laughed. “Deegan would say that. William Burton just gave him a hundred quid to fix the church roof.”

  “What do you ’ave to do?”

  “Try to get as many men to join up as I can. Hold regular meetings and collect dues. And go to meetings with Tillet and the other leaders, too.” He paused to take a sip of tea, then said, “Maybe, I can even get me own lass to join a union.”

  “Oh, Da,” Fiona sighed. “Don’t start that again. You know it’s all I can do to save a bob or two for me shop. I’ve got nothing left for dues.”

  “You could just go to meetings to start. Wouldn’t have to give them anyt’ing –”

  “Da,” she cut in, determined to nip his unionizing in the bud before it turned into another argument. “I’m not going to be a factory girl forever. Remember when we were little – me and Charlie? ‘ ’Ave to ’ave a dream,’ you would tell us. ‘Day you stop dreaming you might as well take yourself down to the undertaker’s, for you’re as good as dead.’ Well, the union
is your dream and it means a lot to you. But ’aving a shop is my dream and it means the world to me. So, your way for you and my way for me … all right?”

  Paddy gave his daughter a long look, then covered her hand with his own. “All right, stubborn lass. Is there any more tea in the pot?”

  “Aye,” Fiona said, pouring her father another mugful, relieved the discussion would go no further. “Oh! We got a letter from Uncle Michael!” she said excitedly. “Auntie Molly’s expecting a baby! ’E says the shop’s doing well. Do you want to see it?”

  “I’ll read it in the morning, Fee. Can’t see straight enough to do it now.”

  “New York sounds grand,” Fiona said, thinking about her uncle in America and his wife and their tidy little shop. He’d sent a picture of them standing in front of it last year. M. FINNEGAN – GROCERIES, it said. The idea that her own uncle owned a shop inspired her. Maybe it ran in the blood. “Do you suppose I could write to ’im and ask ’im about shopkeeping?” she asked.

  “Sure you could. He’d be tickled. Probably write you a twenty-page letter back. Loves to go on, does Michael.”

  “I’ll save a few pennies for paper and a stamp …” Fiona said, yawning, her voice trailing off. A few minutes ago, the urgency of getting her father inside before he woke the whole street had made her feel wide awake. But now, sitting by the hearth, warmed inside and out, she felt tired again. If she didn’t go back to bed soon, she’d be exhausted when her mother rose to go to Mass and woke the rest of the household for work.

  Her mam went to Mass nearly every morning of the week and Seamie and Eileen went with her. Her da never did. Not even on Sundays when she and Charlie went. He made no secret of his dislike for the Church. He hadn’t even gone for their baptisms. Uncle Roddy had had to go. She wondered how her mother had got him to go for their wedding.

  “Da?” Fiona asked drowsily, twirling a strand of hair around her finger.

  “Mmm?” Paddy mumbled through a mouthful of toast.

  “Why is it you never go to church with us?”

  Paddy swallowed. He stared at the coals. “ ’Tis a hard question, that. I was going to say that I’ve never liked the idea of being told what to do, or how to do it, by a bunch of old men in long dresses, but there’s more to it than that. T’ings I’ve never told you, nor your brother.”

  Fiona regarded her father, feeling surprised and a little apprehensive.

  “You know that me and your Uncle Michael lived in Dublin when we were lads. And that we were brought up by me mother’s sister, me Auntie Evie, right?”

  She nodded. She knew that her father had lost his parents when he was small. His mother had died in childbirth and his father soon after. “Of what?” she’d once asked. “Grief,” he’d replied. He never said much about his parents. She always assumed he’d been too young to remember them.

  “Well,” he continued, “before me and Michael went to Dublin, we lived with our mam and da on a small farm in Skibbereen. On the coast of County Cork.”

  Fiona listened, her eyes wide and curious. She’d known her mother’s parents before they died, but knew nothing of her father’s side.

  “Me parents married in ’50,” he said, taking a sip of tea, “one year after the last bad potato blight. Me da wanted to marry sooner but couldn’t on account of the famine. It was so bad then … well, you’ve heard plenty of stories, Fiona, but a man could hardly find enough food to fill his own belly, never mind providing for a family. They both had a hard time of it, both lost family. Me da often said the t’ing that pulled him t’rough was the hope of marrying me mam.”

  Paddy set his mug down and leaned forward in his chair, his elbows on his knees. A faint, sad smile tugged at his mouth and crinkled the corners of his eyes. “He was wild about her, y’see. Adored her. They’d known each other since they were wee children. He was forever bringing her t’ings. Daft t’ings. Wild violets in the spring and the empty shells of blue robins’ eggs. Smooth rocks from the seashore and tiny birds’ nests. He had no money, me da. These t’ings cost not’ing to give, and yet to me mam, they was priceless. She saved everyt’ing he gave her.

  “They worked hard together, me mother and father. They both knew what hunger was and wanted to make damn sure it never troubled them again. I was their first. Then Michael came. I was four when he was born. When I was six, me mam was expecting again. She was poorly during much of it. I remember that even though I was only a lad.”

  As Paddy spoke about his childhood, his face began to change. Memories of the past faded his bittersweet smile; his eyes became dark and troubled and the shallow lines that barely creased his cheeks and forehead suddenly appeared deeper.

  “When her time came, me da went after the midwife. He left me to look after me mother and brother. Me mam was taken badly while he was gone. Twisting and gripping the sides of the bed. And trying so hard not to cry out. I was trying to help her, running outside and wetting Da’s handkerchiefs under the pump and pressing them to her forehead.”

  “When the midwife finally arrived, she took one look at me mother and told Da to fetch the priest. He didn’t want to leave her. Wouldn’t budge an inch till the woman screamed at him, ’Go on, man! Go, for God’s sake! She needs a priest!’ ”

  “He didn’t have to go far and it wasn’t long before he was back with Father McMahon. A tall, stiff stick of a man he was. Me and Michael were sitting at the kitchen table; the midwife had chased us out of the bedroom. Me father and the priest went in, but she chased me father out, too. He came into the kitchen and sat in front of the fire, never moved, just sat there staring into the flames.”

  Just like you, Da, Fiona thought, her heart aching for her father, at the way he sat, his broad shoulders slumped, his huge, strong hands clasped in front of him.

  “I was sitting closest to the bedroom and I could hear them. The midwife, Mrs. Reilly was her name, and the priest. She was telling him that me mam was bleeding too much, that she was weak, that it would have to be one or the other.”

  “ ‘Save the child,’ the priest said.”

  “ ‘But Father,’ I heard her say, ‘she’s got two others need looking after and a husband, surely you don’t – ’ ”

  “ ‘You heard me, Mrs. Reilly,’ ” he said. “ ‘The baby is not baptized. You imperil its immortal soul, and your own, by waiting.’ ”

  “Well, Mrs. Reilly got the baby out of her. God knows how. He hardly made a sound, poor t’ing. A few minutes later, I smelled candles burning and heard the priest reciting in Latin. Me da heard it, too. He ran into the bedroom. I followed and saw him push the priest aside and take me mother in his arms and cradle her like a child, crooning and whispering to her as she slipped away …” Paddy’s voice caught; he swallowed hard. “The baby was baptized Sean Joseph, after me da. The priest named him. An hour later, he was gone, too.

  “Me da stayed with me mother for a long time. It was twilight when he finally let her go. The priest had already gone to the neighbors’, the McGuires, to get some supper and to ask Mrs. McGuire to look after us. Mrs. Reilly was laying out the baby. Me da put on his work coat and told me to look after me brother. There was this terrible quiet about him. Maybe if he’d raged and wept and broke the furniture, he could’ve got out some of the grief that was twisting in him. But he couldn’t. I saw his eyes. They were dead. There was no light in them anymore, no hope.”

  Paddy paused, then said, “He told Mrs. Reilly he was going to see to the animals. He never came back. When it got dark, she went into the barn after him. The animals had been fed and watered, but he wasn’t there. She ran across the field and got Father McMahon and Mr. McGuire to go looking for him. They found him early the next morning. At the foot of a cliff where he and me mam used to walk before they were married. His back was broken and the sea was lapping at his head, all smashed open.”

  Paddy, his eyes dull, picked up his mug and took another sip.

  That tea must be cold by now, Fiona thought. I should top it up for
him. Get him some more toast. She did neither.

  “The priest sent to Dublin for me aunt and we went to stay with the McGuires until she came, two days later. The funeral for me mother and the baby was the same day she arrived. I remember it so clearly. I got t’rough the whole thing, the open coffin, the Mass, watching them lower me mother into the ground and me baby brother in a tiny wooden box next to her. I didn’t shed a tear in the churchyard. I t’ought,” he said, suddenly laughing, “I t’ought maybe they could see me, and I wanted to be brave and not cry so they’d be proud.

  “The next day, the priest held me father’s funeral, if you could call it that. I watched them bury him in a patch of nettles by the cliff where he’d jumped. And then, oh, Christ, lass, the tears started to come and I was standing there weeping, wondering why he wasn’t being put in the earth next to me mother where he belonged. With Sean Joseph. I didn’t understand. Nobody told me that the priest wouldn’t allow a suicide to be buried in the churchyard. All I could think of was me da out there all alone, with not’ing but the sound of the waves for company. So cold … so lonely … without me mam beside him …” Tears welled up in Paddy’s anguished eyes and coursed down his cheeks. He lowered his head and wept.

  “Oh, Da …” Fiona cried, choking back her own tears. She knelt beside him and rested her head on his shoulder. “Don’t cry, Da,” she whispered, “Don’t cry …”

  “That bloody priest had no right to do that, no right,” he said hoarsely. “Their life together was holy, holier than anyt’ing in that miserable bastard’s whole miserable church.”

  Fiona’s heart ached with sadness for that little boy, her father. She had never seen her da cry, not like this. His eyes had been watery during her mother’s long, difficult labors with Eileen and Seamie. And during the two miscarriages she’d had before Seamie. Now she knew why. And why he never went out to the pub while her mam was lying in as other fathers did.

  Paddy raised his head. Wiping his eyes with the back of his hand, he said, “I’m sorry, Fee. Must be the beer making me daft.”