Brooklyn (10 page)

"You don't look well," Miss Fortini said when she approached.

Eilis could feel her eyes filling with tears.

"Why don't you go downstairs and have a glass of water and I'll be down in a second?" Miss Fortini said. Her voice sounded kind but she did not smile.

Eilis nodded. It struck her that she had not yet been paid; she was still living on the money Rose had given her. If they sacked her, she did not know if they would pay her. If they did not, within a short time she would have no money at all. It would be hard, she thought, to find another job, but even if she did she would have to be paid at the end of the first week, otherwise she would not be able to pay the rent to Mrs. Kehoe.

Downstairs, she went into the bathroom and washed her face. She stared at herself in the mirror for a moment and then stood tidying her hair. Then in the staff room she waited for Miss Fortini.

"Now you'll have to tell me what's wrong," she said as she came into the room and closed the door behind her. "Because I can see that there's something wrong and soon some of the customers will begin to notice and then we'll all be in trouble."

Eilis shook her head. "I don't know what's wrong."

"Is it your time of the month?" Miss Fortini asked.

Eilis shook her head again.

"Eilis"-she pronounced the name strangely, with too much emphasis on the second syllable-"why are you upset?" She stood in front of her and waited. "Would you like me to call Miss Bartocci?" she asked.

"No."

"Then what?"

"I don't know what it is."

"Are you sad?"

"Yes."

"All the time?"

"Yes."

"Do you wish you were with your family at home?"

"Yes."

"Do you have family here?"

"No."

"No one?"

"No one."

"When did the sadness begin? You were happy last week."

"I got some letters."

"Bad news?"

"No, no, nothing."

"Just the letters? Have you been out of Ireland before?"

"No."

"Away from your father and mother?"

"My father is dead."

"Your mother?"

"I've never been away from her before."

Miss Fortini looked at her but did not smile.

"I'll need to talk to Miss Bartocci and the priest you came with."

"Please don't."

"They won't cause a problem. But you cannot work here if you're sad. And of course you're sad if you're not with your mother for the first time in your life. But the sadness won't last so we'll do what we can for you."

Miss Fortini told her to sit down and filled her another glass of water and left the room. It was clear to Eilis as she waited there that she was not going to be sacked. As a result, she was almost proud of how she had managed Miss Fortini, letting her ask all the questions and answering as little as she could, but enough not to seem surly or ungrateful. She felt almost strong as she contemplated what had just happened and she resolved that no matter who came into the room now, even if it were Mr. Bartocci himself, she would be able to elicit their sympathy. It was not as though there was nothing wrong; whatever darkness she felt had not lifted. But she could not tell them that she dreaded their shop and their customers, and that she hated Mrs. Kehoe's house, and there was nothing any of them could do for her. Yet she would have to keep her job. And she believed she had achieved that much and it gave her a feeling of satisfaction that appeared to melt into her sadness, or float on its surface, distracting her, as least for now, from the worst parts of it.

After a while Miss Fortini arrived with a sandwich that she had brought from a diner near the store. She said that she had spoken to Miss Bartocci and assured her that it was a simple problem, that it had never happened before and might never happen again. But Miss Bartocci had then spoken to her father, who was a special friend of Father Flood, and he had telephoned the priest and left a message with his housekeeper.

"Mr. Bartocci says you are to stay down here until he hears from Father Flood and he told me to get you this sandwich. You are one lucky girl. He is sometimes nice the first time like this. But I wouldn't cross him twice. No one crosses Mr. Bartocci twice."

"I didn't cross him," Eilis said quietly.

"Oh, you did, dear. Turning up in that state to work and having that look on your face. Oh, you crossed Mr. Bartocci and it's something that he'll never forget."

As the day went on, some of the other sales girls from the floor came down to see Eilis, studying her with curiosity, some asking if she was all right, others pretending to search for something in their lockers. As she sat there, she realized that, unless she wanted to lose her job, she would have to make a decision to lift herself out of whatever it was that was affecting her.

Miss Fortini did not reappear, but at around four Father Flood opened the door.

"I hear there's trouble," he said.

She tried to smile.

"It's all my fault," he said. "They said you were doing great here and Mrs. Kehoe says you're the nicest girl she's ever had staying and so I thought you don't want me coming around checking up on you."

"I was all right until I got the letters from home," Eilis said.

"Do you know what's wrong with you?" Father Flood asked.

"What do you mean?"

"There's a name for it."

"For what?" She thought that he was going to mention some private female complaint.

"You're homesick, that's all. Everybody gets it. But it passes. In some it passes more quickly than in others. There's nothing harder than it. And the rule is to have someone to talk to and to keep busy."

"I am busy."

"Eilis, I hope you don't mind if I try and enrol you in a night class. Do you remember we mentioned bookkeeping and accountancy? It would be two or three nights a week, but it would keep you busy and you could get a very good qualification."

"Is it not too late to enrol for this year? Some of the girls said that you have to apply in the spring."

"It's a funny place, Brooklyn," Father Flood said. "As long as the guy in charge is not Norwegian-and in a college that's unlikely-then I can pull strings most places. The Jews are the best, they always love doing something for you. Say a prayer it's a Jewish fellow who believes in the power of the collar. We'll try the best college first, and that's Brooklyn College. I love breaking all the rules. So I'll go down there now and Franco says you are to go home, but be here on time in the morning with a big smile. And I'll drop by Ma Kehoe's later."

Eilis almost laughed out loud when he said "Ma Kehoe." His accent was, for the first time, pure Enniscorthy. She understood that Franco was Mr. Bartocci, and she was interested in the familiar way in which Father Flood had described him. As soon as he left, she found her coat and slipped quietly out of the shop. She was sure that Miss Fortini had seen her pass, but she did not turn as she made her way quickly along Fulton Street and then home towards Mrs. Kehoe's.

As she let herself into the hall with her own key, she found Mrs. Kehoe waiting for her.

"You go into the sitting room there now," Mrs. Kehoe said. "I'm going to make tea for the two of us."

The sitting room, which gave on to the front of the house, was surprisingly beautiful, with old rugs and heavy, comfortable-looking furniture and some dark pictures in gold frames. Double doors opened into a bedroom, and, since one of the doors was open, Eilis could see that the bedroom was decorated in the same heavy, rich style. She looked at the old round dining table and supposed that that was where the game of poker was played on Sunday nights. Her mother, she thought, would love this room. She saw an old gramophone and a wireless in another corner and noticed that the tassels on the tablecloth and the curtains seemed to match. She began to take note of all the details, thinking, for the first time in days, how she could include an account of them in a letter to her mother and Rose. She would write it as soon as she got to her room after supper, she thought, and she would put nothing in about how she had spent the last two days. She would try to put those two days behind her. No matter what she dreamed about, no matter how bad she felt, she had no choice, she knew, but to put it all swiftly out of her mind. She would have to get on with her work if it was during the day and go back to sleep if it was during the night. It would be like covering a table with a tablecloth, or closing curtains on a window; and maybe the need would lessen as time went on, as Jack had hinted it would, as Father Flood had suggested. In any case, that was what she would have to do. As soon as Mrs. Kehoe appeared with tea things on a tray, Eilis clenched her fist when she felt that she was ready to begin.

After the evening meal Father Flood came and Eilis was summoned once more into Mrs. Kehoe's private quarters. Father Flood was smiling and went towards the fireplace as soon as Eilis appeared as if to warm his hands, even though there was no fire lit. He rubbed his hands together and turned towards her.

"Now I'll leave the two of you in peace," Mrs. Kehoe said. "If you need me, I'm in the kitchen."

"The power of the Holy Roman and Apostolic Church is not to be underestimated," Father Flood said. "The first thing I found was a nice devout Italian secretary who told me what courses are full and what courses are really full, and most important told me what not to ask for. I told her the whole story. I had her in tears."

"I'm glad you think it's funny," Eilis said.

"Oh, cheer up. I got you into the night class in bookkeeping and preliminary accountancy. I told them how brilliant you were. You're the first Irish girl. It's full of Jews and Russians and those Norwegians I told you about and they'd like to have even more Italians, but they're too busy making money. The Jewish fellow who runs the place looked like he never saw a priest in his life before. He stood to attention when he saw me like it was the army. Brooklyn College, only the best. I paid your tuition for the first semester. It's Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, seven to ten, and Thursday, seven to nine. If you do it for two years and pass all their tests, there's no office in New York won't want you."

"Will I have time?" she asked.

"Of course you will. And start next Monday. I'll get you the books. I have a list here. And you can spend your spare time studying them."

His good humour seemed strange to her; it seemed he was putting on a show. She tried to smile.

"Are you sure this is okay?"

"It's done."

"Did Rose ask you to do this? Is that why you are doing it?"

"I'm doing it for the Lord," he said.

"Tell me really why you are doing it."

He looked at her carefully and left silence for a moment. She returned his gaze calmly, making clear that she wanted a reply.

"I was amazed that someone like you would not have a good job in Ireland. When your sister mentioned that you had no work in Ireland, then I said I would help you to come here. That's all. And we need Irish girls in Brooklyn."

"Would any Irish girl do?" Eilis asked.

"Don't be sour. You asked me why I was doing it."

"I'm very grateful to you," Eilis said. She had used a tone that she had heard her mother use, which was very dry and formal. She knew that Father Flood could not tell whether she meant what she said or not.

"You'll make a great accountant," he said. "But a bookkeeper first. And no more tears? Is that a deal?"

"No more tears," she said quietly.

When she came back from work the following evening he had left a pile of books for her as well as ledgers and copy books and a set of pens. He had also arranged with Mrs. Kehoe that she could take a packed meal with her the first three days of each week at no extra charge.

"Now, it will be just ham or a slice of tongue and some salad and brown bread. You'll have to get tea somewhere along the way," Mrs. Kehoe said. "And I told Father Flood that since I would already be getting my reward in heaven, I have that nicely arranged, thank you, he owes me a favour that I would like repaid on this earth. And before too long. You know it's about time someone spoke up to him."

"He's very nice," Eilis said.

"He's nice to those he's nice to," Mrs. Kehoe said. "But I hate a priest rubbing his hands together and smiling. You see that a lot with the Italian priests and I don't like it. I wish he was more dignified. That's all I have to say about him."

Some of the books were simple; one or two appeared so basic that she wondered if they could be used in a college at all, but the first chapter that she read in the book on commercial law was all new to her and she could not see how it might apply to bookkeeping. She found it difficult, with many references to judgments of the courts. She hoped that this would not be an important part of the course.

Slowly, she became used to the timetable at Brooklyn College, the three-hour sessions with ten-minute breaks, the strange way in which everything was explained from first principles, including the simple matter of writing down in an ordinary ledger all money going into the bank and all money going out and the date and the name of the person making the deposit or making the withdrawal or writing the cheque. This was easy, as were the types of accounts you could have in a bank and the different sorts of interest rates. But when it came to drawing up annual accounts, the system was different from the system she had learned, with many more factors added in, and many more complex features, including city, state and federal taxes.

She wished she could tell the difference between Jews and Italians. Some of the Jews wore skullcaps and many more of them appeared to wear glasses than did the Italians. But most of the students were dark-skinned with brown eyes and most were diligent and serious-looking young men. There were very few women in her class and no one Irish at all, no one even English. They all seemed to know each other and they moved in groups but they were polite to her, careful to make space for her and make her feel at ease without anyone offering to see her home. No one asked her any questions about herself, or sat beside her more than once. The classes were much larger than the classes she had attended at home and she wondered if this was why the instructors went so slowly.