Chapter One: Fiorella's Promise—Aspen Bluff, Manitoba, 1897  

Mary:

When I first saw her, though she was across a field and barely a speck on the horizon, sure I knew she was one of my kind. As she made her way toward me, a rush of warm wind moved across the tips of the wild grasses. It was so quick; on another day, I might’ve missed it altogether. But that day, I noticed everything. As I held my young lad’s hand, she glided across the field, and when she was a stone’s throw away, she shouted, “You come for Fiorella?”

I smiled but didn’t answer straight away. My mind was buzzing with the many warnings the townspeople had filled my ears with since my move to Aspen Bluff. I’d no sooner stepped on Canadian soil when I felt the air droning with gossip. The women pulled me aside in the general store to tell me Fiorella had been under suspicion of murder, warning me to stay away from “the Italian witch”. But this smiling woman was no more a witch than I was a leprechaun. I’d told my husband that the Italian woman's well had run dry. This was a lie, but everyone—even a woman scorned by all—needed water, and no one could argue otherwise. Dowsing was also the one thing that allowed me an afternoon to myself, or almost to myself as I'd brought along my youngest.

“I’ve come to see you, indeed,” I said.
Fiorella swept us into her house―if you could call it a house as it was more of a shack―

where a simple table sat in the middle of the room with two rickety chairs on either end that looked as if they could barely hold the weight of a turnip apiece. There was a counter for chopping vegetables, shelves from floor to ceiling to hold foodstuffs, and a woven rug to soften the steps of the few who graced her tiny home.

My lad and I settled into her bockety chairs while Fiorella busied herself in the kitchen. A clothesline was stretched alongside the length of the woebegone house with dried herbs, flowers, and branches with berries dangling from it. While Fiorella reached up to snip off a bit of this and that, we quietly took in our surroundings. Within our reach, a jar of pink clover, devil's paintbrush, and goldenrod brightened up the faded blue tablecloth. Yellow pollen from the field flowers had drifted down, and with the mid-afternoon sun finding its way through the windowpane, for a second, I thought fool's gold had been sprinkled onto her tabletop. Fiorella’s calico cat was curled up by the stove on a stuffed chair, keeping the home free of mice, although the creature didn’t seem to put a dent in the numbers of spiders spinning webs underneath the table. Holy cards of the Blessed Virgin were tacked in every corner and alcove. 'Twas the picture of sweetness and, in an instant, I was glad we’d made our way up to the bluffs to discover Fiorella’s tumbledown farm, her wild fields, and her cozy four walls.

Fiorella shooed the cat to the floor and, pushing the chair up close to the table, she sat with us. As she spoke in broken English, I could hardly keep myself from floating up to the roof. It was all in her eyes―chocolate brown with crow’s feet from too many tears of sadness or laughter, and dark pupils that reflected an ocean of might back to me. No matter what others thought of her, that day, she found a friend in me. Fiorella told me that I was carrying a baby, but that wasn't news to me. She offered her help when the time came. If only she knew that time hardly existed for me anymore. Sure, the seasons marked time, as well as the ten lunar months I'd be with child. I wanted to explain to her how, in my three children, I saw the stamp of time as clear as the moon on a winter's night. I felt as if I'd left variation behind, though, somehow left it in my childhood where change was a fact of everyday life.

To be sure, life is not perfect for anyone. I married a man who has a great love of the bottle. James turns to whiskey for comfort as he can't find his way to soothing his wounds. And yes, he has wounds. As do I. As do I. The difference is, I am willing to put my hand to the plow, no matter the odds. And I take comfort wherever I can find it: a pipe under the stars, singing songs my mammy taught me, or slipping away to visit my Italian friend. Though Fiorella has the aging face of a crone, I now know she’s not much more than a decade older than me—a burdensome decade of hardship, no doubt—a widow with her children grown and moved away. On first meeting, it didn’t matter a pinch to me how weathered her face was, or how broken her English happened to be. I was as happy as a clam at high water.

“These are for you,” I said, handing Fiorella three blue-tinged mother-of-pearl buttons that I'd slipped into my coat pocket before leaving home. She smiled. The buttons sang out ting, ting, ting as they found their way to the bottom of her teacup.

“You have long time, I think,” she said.

“Since I was a girl. They were my mother's so.”

 As a young lass, I'd stolen a pair of scissors from an old man's shaving kit to get at the buttons. He'd already passed over so it wasn't quite stealing, but neither could you say I borrowed the scissors as you can't borrow what can't be returned. I began snipping buttons from coats and sweaters—mother-of-pearl, black glass, metal, leather, wood, and bone—even as my family lay sick and dying on the ship from Ireland. I kept one button for every person I lost, but from my mother, I kept all five, as I couldn't part with a single mother-of-pearl. Even though it was as dark as coal in the bowels of the ship, I held up one of her buttons, turning it this way and that until it caught a bit of light from somewhere, God only knows where. To my delight, it gleamed purple and blue and silvery white.

'Twas a coffin ship that carried us over to the new land. All ten siblings, as well as Mammy and Da and grandparents alike, made their graves of the salt water seas, overcome with typhus. I suppose taking their buttons was my way of fastening their souls to mine. With so many people dying from the fever, the boat was surely haunted. Once a poor soul died, if you wanted a button, you had to work fast. My mother’s were the easiest. The round little buttons on her dress just popped off, hanging on by a thread. Her buttons were loose from my brother Frankie tugging on them trying to get milk. But if Frankie did get any milk, 'twas sour from all the tears she’d cried. Too many tears spoil the mother’s milk. Everyone knows that. Now Da, he was a different story—dark steel buttons they were. Must’ve been sewn on with thread from the devil because there was no getting them off, not even with my stolen scissors. I had to use a blade from my father’s shaving kit.

They promised us an hour of fresh air each day, but when the disease began to spread, we

were to breathe the salt water air only when the priest blessed the body, just before it was tossed into the sea. I was worried that if the priest himself died, there’d be no holy water. And then the dead would be forever chained to the bottom of the sea, imprisoned in a watery purgatory.

      The journey lasted nearly four weeks, and to survive a single day was a miracle. The air below was so foul, it’s little wonder the rats didn’t throw themselves overboard. I remember well the stench of it, and how we were half-starved. The dried biscuit bread could only be endured by dipping it in tea―tea that was steeped two, three, and four times, bitter and dark as rust. Once on the journey, I had the glory of tasting cheese. An old woman with black lace wrapped around her head called me over with a wave of her hand, pitying me as I'd only just lost my mother that morning. From her pocket she pulled out a small bit of linen, unwrapped it, all the while darting her eyes here and there to make sure not a soul was watching. Before I could ask her what it was, she popped it into my mouth, a sweet and creamy delight such as I've never tasted before or since. 

Once we arrived, the ship docked at the East River pier in New York. Most of the crew and a handful of cabin passengers passed through American customs as easy as turning apples into sauce, but the rest of us waited on the ship another two days. The authorities were hemming and hawing about delivering us to customs at Ellis Island, afraid of the diseases we might carry. Before we disembarked, we were instructed to leave all of our possessions behind. Most of us had nothing but the clothes on our backs, but I did have my buttons, which I hid inside a square of cotton and fastened with a pin to my petticoat.

Finally, we were brought out into daylight. With women and children in one line, and men in the other, they filed us down a wooden plank and onto dry land. Children clung to whoever they could find, as some were orphaned. I was lucky to have a relation to claim me, my great auntie Helen. She was as crusty as week-old toast, but she was family. After being trapped in the bowels of the boat for weeks, I felt as if I'd stepped into a world of sparkling light. My legs felt wobbly, as if they might crumble beneath me. Holding onto Auntie Helen's firm hand, we were herded onto a barge and hauled over to Ellis Island as if we were nothing more than a pile of logs making our way to a lumber mill.

I felt a sudden urge to turn my face back to the sea, to where my family lived under the dark ocean. I pictured their sweaters and socks unraveling, with all of those coloured yarns twisting and turning, knotting up. Then I saw the yarn weaving them all together; first Mammy and Da, then Caleb, then Emma and Molly, after that Jacob, and the twins Georgina and George, and on and on, Grannie and Granddad too, all of them woven together as if they were fish caught in a grand net. At least they're together. I’m all on me own. No matter if I lived to 101, the yarns in my sweater would never knot up with theirs. Yes, I had their buttons, but buttons were only useful when they fastened one thing to another. Who was I fastened to? No one. Nothing. Auntie Helen, I suppose.

“Mary Quilligan,” my aunt said, tugging at my arm, “don't be looking back at the sea! Have you never heard of Lot's wife? Turned to a pillar of salt, she was. Do you want that to happen to you?”

“Lot was a mean sort of man,” I said, “to let his wife turn to salt and not turn his head an inch to wave goodbye.”

“Then he'd be salt as well. Better to have one pillar than two.”

Though we were crammed shoulder to shoulder on the flatboat, my aunt took a notion to put a comb through my hair. “You've the look of a stray cat. One glance at you and they'll be after shipping us back to Ireland.”

“I can't help it, Auntie. I'm all in flitters.”

“Flitters or no, stand up straight. And not another word out of you!” When she wanted to,

my Aunt Helen could bite the head off a nail.

I craned my neck to see above everyone’s heads, and there I saw a round building with flags reaching up into the clouds. I felt suddenly glad I'd taken Auntie Helen's advice and turned away from the sea. Maybe once we reached this castle, as it had to be a castle of sorts, maybe we’d be greeted by the Queen of America. Maybe she'd be seated at the head of a table and serve us cakes and tea from a shiny silver pot. Did this new land have a queen? It was on the tip of my tongue to ask, when I stopped myself. Ireland cursed the crown of England, so I knew better than to mention such a thing to Auntie Helen.

As we drew closer, I began to imagine what I’d say or do, once I met the Queen of America. Surely, she’d take one look at me and turn away in disgust. I hadn't bathed since I'd left Ireland, and smelled like a pissy old cat, to be sure. And worse, if the queen discovered my buttons, she'd look down at me, her eyes sharp as razors, and say, “You, child, are a thief and a dirty thing. You are not welcome here.” 

Once inside “Castle Garden’’—as the sign said above the entrance—I could see there was no chance of tea from a silver pot. Though it was grand, there was no place to rest our legs, let alone have tea. I looked up in amazement at the dozens of pillars reaching up to the ceiling, like long tree trunks with umbrella leaves and flowers spreading outward at the top. At the centre of the hall, a circle of light poured in from above, almost as if the Holy Spirit was shining down on the poor souls below. We lined up along with hundreds of others, all of us bedraggled and worn, waiting our turn to speak to the customs man.

“Well now, young lady,” the customs officer said, “are you glad to be off that big boat?”

“I am. But I'm not to look back to the sea, that's what me auntie says.”

“Shoosh now,” said Auntie Helen.

“And why is that?” the man asked.

“We'll be turned into―” My aunt gripped my fingers, sending a shot of pain around my knuckles.  

The man removed his spectacles and stared into Auntie Helen’s sea green eyes. “Where's the girl's mother?” he asked.

“Must we speak in front of the poor girl?”

“Mammy died from the fever on the boat,” I piped up. “And Da too. Seven sisters as well.

And four brothers. They're all under the salty seas.”

“Is this true?” the officer asked my aunt.

“As true as the sky above.”

“Are you the next of kin?”

“I am.”

“You intend to provide for this girl?”

“Indeed, I do.”

“Papers!” the man commanded. As Auntie Helen produced the papers, her lips were pinched tighter than fiddle strings. “And the girl's?” the man asked.

“She hasn't any.”

“And why is that?”

“The family moved about and never had a parish to call their own.”

“You realize we could send you back to Ireland, both you and the child.”

“We paid our fare. Hardly made it out alive. You might as well clap us inside a jail cell as send us back.”

“Who's to say what kind of family she comes from? We don't welcome illiterates.”

“Look at her! A mere slip of a thing. Surely to God you wouldn't be so cruel as to send an orphan back over the waters.”

“We'll do what's best for the United States of America. I'll remind you, you're foreigners.”

My Auntie Helen was having the effect of a burr on the man’s neck. I decided to try my luck at charming him. “Mister, is it too late?” I asked.

“Too late for what, young lady?” he asked.

“For the circus. Me granddad told me all about the circus in America.”

“Mary, must you put words to every twitch of a thought?” my aunt chided.

“And what did your granddad tell you?” the customs man asked, ignoring my aunt.

“That the night sky fills up with lights, like a thousand fireflies of every colour. And there's dancing bears.” I knew I was asking for a severe scolding from Auntie Helen, but once my lips came unbuttoned, I couldn't help what flew out of my mouth. “He told me America's got so many bears, once you piled them up on top of each other, they’d reach the moon. We haven't any bears in Ireland. Only old bones in caves, and sometimes the bones rattle and shake like ghosts―”

“For goodness sake, girl. Listen to your runaway tongue.” My aunt squinted her one good eye at me, like a taunt arrow. Her other eye tended to wander off to the side.

My so-called nonsense was having an effect on the man. His scowl had given way to a grand smile, after all. “What did you say your name was?” the man asked.

“Mary.”

“Well, Mary, it's too late for the circus this year. But if you take a trip up to Canada, you might find a bear in the wild.” I wanted to ask him more about this Canada, but I knew I'd asked enough questions if I wanted to escape Auntie Helen’s wrath. One glance at her cross face was enough to finally put the plug in. 

The man turned to my aunt and said, “All passengers will be in quarantine for seven to ten days.”

“Dear Mother of God. Why so long?”

“We can’t take a chance with you Irish infecting the rest of the country. You're lucky I'm not sending you back. Next.”

“But sir—”

“Next!” the customs man cried again.

As we turned away, my aunt said under her breath, “Who stitched him together?”    

With my eyes wide as seashells, we were shuffled into an empty room where four women in white uniforms gave us orders to strip down naked. My aunt insisted on covering my eyes, but I peeked between my fingers. Never before had I seen so many women, from girls to old crones, naked as the day they were born. We were told to make a pile of our clothes in the centre of the room. They took our clothes for burning. But before I added my shabby slip and dress to the pile, I stole the tiny bundle of buttons into my hand as if it were the Pope's own diamond ring.

The women in charge then marched us into another room where strange fixtures on the walls spurted out fountains of water, like indoor waterfalls. We scrubbed ourselves with soap that burned my skin. By now, Aunt Helen had little hope of shielding my eyes from the naked shapes all around me. “Naked as Eve, every last one of us,” I heard her mumble. Once we dried off, they handed us horrid smocks, more like potato sacks than dresses. To my dismay, there wasn’t a single pocket to hide my bundle of buttons.

After waiting for hours, I was seen by a doctor and a nurse who checked my teeth and throat, and listened to my breath with a strange contraption. It didn’t take long for the doctor to discover my treasure, and when he did, he pried the bundle from my stubborn fingers. He untied the knot to see what I'd smuggled into the country, then handed it over to the nurse saying, “For disposal.” Naturally, I took to weeping. The nurse winked, as if to say that we had a secret, the two of us. Later, she slipped me the bundle, bringing her finger up to her mouth as if to say, Don't say a word about it. From that day onward, I kept the buttons in safekeeping, not parting with a single keepsake—until the day I gave Fiorella three buttons from my mother's own dress. 

Looking back, I wonder now what possessed me to give Fiorella buttons in the first place. You couldn’t make a meal out of buttons. And what exactly did I expect Fiorella to do for me? Certainly, she knew a great many things: how to relieve the kind of toothache that can drive a person mad, how to procure or prevent a miscarriage, how to turn around a lackluster life. But even so, what drove me to her door? I hardly knew myself.