Halton Cray (Shadows of the World Book 1) (26 page)

Thom turned his head away slightly. The corner of
his eye appeared bloodshot and glistening.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said, recalling how he’d vaguely
mentioned his father’s death before – and how I’d imagined it to have happened
maybe fifteen years ago.

‘It was another lifetime, Alex. Life goes on
whether you want it to or not. – But how are you feeling now? Do you need
anything?’

‘I don’t know how to answer, about how I’m
feeling. As for wanting anything, just the rest of your story for now.’

‘Very well. We struggled to survive in that
impoverished village. My mother was truly heartbroken. A few months on she
received a package. It bore the seal of my English grandmother, but contained
no note, just my father’s gold pocket watch. I suppose she sent something to
relieve her mind of guilt, or whatever she felt.

‘My uncle and grandfather ran our farm, while I
took what work I could get. Never a thing my father had educated me for. My
grandparents died within months of each other, owing to a lethal concoction of
old age, malnutrition and hopelessness. So I returned to help my uncle. In the
following years the Great Famine struck and suddenly the only food was the
grain we paid our rent with. To lose our house would have meant certain death on
the street. Some people, including my uncle, took to the city to find work.
Others made for England, but my mother would never agree to that. She’d
developed repugnance for that land.

‘Wildlife vanished around us where people were
desperate to feed themselves. There was even talk of our neighbours having
cooked their own dog. The world was falling apart. People committed petty
offences to get transportation, as you’d be fed and clothed if sent to America.
But I heard stories of those who were condemned to the ultimate penalty just
for stealing food. I couldn’t risk that. Bronagh fell ill while death and
disease surrounded us. My mother begged me to escape to America where food and
work was said to be plentiful, the latter well-paid, so I could send money back
to them.’

‘And–’ I interrupted him, my head spinning with
his story. ‘How old were you at this point?’

‘Thirty-one. You look surprised because you
thought I was younger.’

‘I never thought you could be over thirty. So you
are – well, not technically, but you’ve remained thirty-one?’

‘Not technically, but yes.’

I reminded myself to breathe.

‘So then you went to America?’

‘I did. We scraped money together for my single
passage, and I went just after parliament passed the Soup Kitchen Act in 1847. Leaving
them behind was the hardest thing– But even if we’d found the money, Bronagh
was too ill to make the journey. She would have died on-board that coffin ship,
which bore the sick and perishing across the Atlantic. These timber vessels
weren’t designed to carry passengers. Our sleeping quarters below decks were
just a run of boards down each side. We cramped on them to sleep. I spent the
time dreaming, as did the other passengers, about all the wonderful things we’d
heard about America. The idea was that you could do anything you wanted; acquire
some land quite easily and very cheaply.

‘The journey took almost two months. After one it
became roomier. Many died of cholera, or some other disease. Could I say I was
one of the lucky ones to have survived? I was filled with an awesome hope at
travelling across that magnificent ocean – I saw a rainbow on the other side,
Alex; only when we got there I discovered it was nothing but mist disguised by
the light.

‘We docked in Boston and I remember my disappointment
at finding the land of dreams to be one of nightmares! They shunned us there. Immigrants
had swamped the Bostonians already. The poor were fighting for work. My visions
of finding some well-paid labour were dashed. As for sending back money, I was
hardly able to feed myself.

‘My mother had given me my father’s pocket watch,
with its gold chain and personal seal. It was a beautiful timepiece and my
father would have given it to me himself. She made it clear that it was not for
food, not even if I was starving. “No place could be as barren as Ireland!” she’d
said, in her harsh but devoted way. “It’s to pay for your passage home, if it’s
hopeless and you need to return. I’ll forgive you.”

‘I gave my word. And I did go hungry rather than
sell it. It crossed my mind, of course, what little point there was in starving
to death with a gold watch in my pocket – which a grave robber would take from
my bones anyway! No matter what logical truths I told myself, I could not break
that promise to my mother.’

Thom sank in the armchair, his eyes glazing over.
He covered his mouth with his fist to keep back a rush of emotion. Before I
could consider comforting him, which I presently fought the urge to do, I would
let him finish telling me his account.

‘I survived on the streets. Sometimes cramped in
wooden huts with the overflow of unfortunate Irish. I took any work I could
get, and that was unskilled manual labour: cleaning yards, unloading ships. The
only good thing was that there I could earn up to a dollar a day, ten times
what they’d pay in Ireland. I started sending money home and received news that
Bronagh was recovering. In my mother’s letter, she wrote, “A Mrs Neale was
helping to care for her.” I feared it wasn’t true, and that she wrote this not
wanting to worry me, being so far away.’

‘How long did it take – I mean, for you to receive
letters?’

‘Roughly a fortnight, as they’d have gone by
steamship. A decade later and we’d have been able to send telegrams, which
would have taken minutes. C’est la vie!

‘I’d soon send more money, however. I took a job delivering
a cartload of crates and furniture to a house just off Beacon Street in Boston.
They called it a house, but no such thing existed in that part of town. It was
a mansion. Nothing like I was used to seeing. We were almost finished moving
crates in there when a man appeared from upstairs. I assumed he was the owner since
he was very well dressed. He was quite short and balding at the crown. I
remember how the fairness of his hair betrayed his ruddy complexion: it made
his scalp glow. There was a plumpness to him, a swollen look. He had an
arrogance about him and took no notice of us, except when passing me. At the
bottom of the staircase, he stopped and looked me over as a full-bellied cat
might observe a mouse.

‘After quizzing me on my history, I realised he
was only interested to know I’d travelled alone. I couldn’t figure out if
that’s why he separated me from the others, who were just as emaciated and
poor. He told me his name was Johan and he’d recently arrived from Europe,
before offering me employment as his coachman. I found his voice sinister and
his black eyes cold and terrifying. On telling him I didn’t know the city well
enough, he answered that he’d teach me himself. I told him I had work already
and found myself conjuring up more excuses. From his pocket he drew more money
than I’d ever seen, and offered it to me as an advance for a month’s trial.
Everything about him put me on edge. But what did I have to fear from the
little man I could knock down with one fist! How could I refuse the offer? To
my family it would be a small fortune.

‘Until now’ – Thom stared at me – ‘I lamented the
day I agreed to it. I stayed in a back room of that accursed freezing house!
After only one night there I began locking my door. Though I never saw or heard
him, I often felt his presence in the room with me. Far as I knew, no one else
resided there. I hardly ever slept for the strange noises I heard, but when I
did, nightmares constantly woke me. Often he’d have guests until all hours in
the downstairs rooms and these parties always sounded like they got out of
hand. I saw no sign of them the following day. When asking him once about his
guests, he denied all knowledge of them. He lounged back on a couch and played
with something between his fingers. I couldn’t be certain, but it appeared to
be a lock of fair hair.

‘“It’s not for you to question my habits, young
man,” he declared in his broken English. “You’d do better with me to remember
that. So if you should hear such noises in the night again, it was
unquestionably one of your nightmares.” – Only I knew I’d never mentioned them
to him.

‘He insisted on calling me young man, never using
my name. Every day he would spend hours wrenching the life out of a violin,
which he was convinced he could play well, before cursing inexplicitly that his
talent was lost.

‘I didn’t believe he ever had any musical gift
whatever. Why he was deluding himself was a mystery. I believe he wanted to
gain my trust, because he began telling me personal things. He confessed at one
point to having had a wife and two daughters, whom he claimed died in tragic
circumstances. The ghost of a smile crossing his face when admitting it, and
the elevation in his voice, suggested to me that the circumstances were to him
far from tragic. I saw him as their murderer. He once hinted that his eldest
daughter was an exceptional musician whom he envied and hated. But he never
disclosed to me how they died, despite many subtle questions. He then avoided
the subject altogether. I hoped to find out more by exploring the rooms of his
house. But most were locked, like some Bluebeard’s castle. One I discovered open
was a child’s nursery, overfilled with playthings. At the time I believed it
must have belonged to his youngest daughter. Later I realised these things were
trophies.’

Thom paused and his eyes fell.

‘Three days I was there before he ordered me to
drive him – it was the first time I saw him leave the house. Remembering my
predicament, he pointed in a direction and I merely navigated the carriage
through the streets. This happened regularly and we always ended up in poorer
communities. He would tell me to stop somewhere, randomly. I could only imagine
that he sat there within, watching the commoners go about their routine:
scrubbing clothes in washtubs outside, with a handful of children playing
nearby – before ordering me to drive on.

‘Sometimes the kids would run up to the carriage
to beg. He’d already given me instructions to pull away if this happened. There
was an occasion where I heard a child scream. Terrified I had run over her
foot, I turned to look. There I saw Johan leaning out the coach window with a
fistful of her hair, dragging the girl along the road. I halted, sprang up and
threatened him to let her go. He found it funny. But he did release her. He
yelled out to me that she tried to rob him. I didn’t believe him, but I wasn’t
sure what action I could take. I felt like an accomplice to a greater crime
unknown to me. I’m certain he recruited me to collect his guests. He was
working me up to it, I’m sure of that now. He mistook my good nature for
stupidity, and presumed I was weak and biddable. He would use my decency to
assure those people safety, as he couldn’t so easily gain a strangers trust. I
speculated how many other coachmen he’d had in training before me, whom had
failed him, or he’d failed them.

‘I was glad when it came to the end of that first
month. Equally as miserable when he persuaded me to stay another for more
money. Although I sent what I earned back to my mother, I’d heard nothing more
from her since she wrote that Bronagh was recovering. My worry increased for
them both, but I could only try to earn more. Two months elapsed and I couldn’t
agree to stay longer. I wanted to get away from him. I felt the walls of his
house closing in on me like a living grave. As politely as I could, I declined.
Anger is not the word for what I saw in his eyes, although he laughed immensely
in that moment. – It was a disturbing belly laugh that he cut from suddenly, as
if he’d realised the joke wasn’t funny. His face instantly became solemn and he
sighed, as if he’d bored himself.

‘“If it’s a matter of more money, young man?”

‘“It’s not the money–”

‘“Everybody has his price!” He hemmed, and then
flushed an unnatural colour, but repressed rage quickly. I couldn’t refuse
again. It would’ve antagonised him and sealed my fate. Moreover, he’d seen my
letters back to Ireland. He knew my family’s location – what he could do with
that I didn’t know. But it frightened me. I decided to get away stealthily and
return home.

‘Ordinarily it would torture me to be so sneaky on
someone who’d done me a good turn, but I understood his intentions by then. I
agreed to his face that I would stay. Only I would attempt to escape as soon as
chance presented itself. He anticipated this because he withheld my wages
saying he’d pay me at the end of the oncoming week. The bastard had me in a
hard place, but that wasn’t going to stop me – I still had my father’s watch. I
made up my mind to go that night, though it sickened me to even consider
parting with it.’

Thom fell silent, his face becoming still as any
photograph on the wall behind him.

‘You didn’t sell it?’ I asked, breaking his
deliberation.

‘Alex, when you’re starving, wretched and yet
still carry a morsel of hope, it is very difficult to see the dangers about
you. Now fed and rested, I heard Johan’s words and watched his eyes with a
rising sickness in my soul. He was dangerous beyond comprehension. I had a
narrow chance to get far away. I waited up, dressed and ready to leave. I was a
pipe smoker back then, and I smoked heavily that night. He was entertaining his
guests downstairs. It was growing very late and I feared falling asleep, and
missing my opportunity. So I stole down hoping they wouldn’t hear while
occupying the front rooms. The voices of women blared from inside as I snuck
past. Beneath this I caught the cacophonous sound of his violin, accompanied by
raw laughter and a girl’s humming. I heard Johan’s voice –

‘“What now shall we play?”           

‘No sooner was I contented I’d make it across the
threshold safely, than I heard a crash of furniture; the holler of a woman, and
a muffled scream! The piano keys rang out together, as if laden with something
heavy. A door flung open; a hand appeared, but instantly flew back. I heard a
thump, followed by unintelligible yelling. She sounded dazed – delirious. I
wanted to run but her hysterical voice – I still remember it now, ringing in my
ears. I ran to her aid.