The Girl Who Came Home(41)

As Captain Smith conducted the service and led them in prayer from the ship’s own prayer book, Kathleen’s thoughts turned to those in Ireland. She was well aware that many of the mothers and fathers left behind felt that it was her influence which had encouraged their sons and daughters to make this journey. They were partly correct and she made no apology for the fact.

Aside from coming back to spend Christmas with family and friends and to collect her niece, her time back in Ireland that winter had given Kathleen Murphy the perfect opportunity to spread her message about a better life overseas. She’d already told her niece that they would travel to America together in the spring and as the months since her return passed by, her influence and conviction was having an impact on a number of families. Serious discussions were taking place behind closed doors, finances were being considered, and letters to relatives already overseas were being written, expressing intentions to travel. By the time the last of the snow had melted from the thatched roofs of their homes, many in Ballysheen were seriously considering the prospect of a passage to America.

Kathleen was no fool and was well aware that among some of the parishioners she was not a popular woman, having somehow offended them with her ‘American ways’ and her insistence that there was a better life waiting for them and their children in the New World. She knew that they considered her to have airs and graces above her station and that with all her talk of a better life she was in some way insulting their own. But this didn’t trouble her too much; she knew that the people who had made this journey, who stood next to her now in this extravagant room, would never look back; would always be grateful that they’d listened to her advice and had the courage to leave the familiar and try the new.

As she sang the unfamiliar hymns of the Captain’s choosing she glanced around the congregation. In front of her she saw people she already recognised as fellow passengers from steerage, people she’d shared a conversation or a game of cards with over the last few days. There were all manner of people; others from towns and counties in Ireland, families from Finland and Russia and young men and women from all over England and America. The social aspect to this journey had surprised her. She would normally keep very much to her own company on a transatlantic crossing, but there seemed to be a different atmosphere about this ship entirely and she was almost enjoying the evenings after dinner when they would congregate in the general room.

To her left stood Maggie, now almost as tall as herself and developing into a fine woman. It was hard to believe that she was just a nine year old girl when Kathleen had first arrived back in Ballysheen with her cases and her fashionable skirts. With the girl’s mother and father dead from the scarlet fever, Kathleen had taken it upon herself to raise Maggie and her two siblings. Despite her rather stern nature, woman and child had formed a close bond over the years, Maggie responding well to the conviction, determination and direction her aunt had brought to her and her grieving siblings’ lives and Kathleen enjoying the sense of purpose the four young girls gave to hers, although she would never have admitted that to anyone, hardly daring to admit it to herself.

Looking down the row to her left and her right, she saw the familiar faces of the other Ballysheen men and women. They were indeed a large group, all travelling together, and she was certain that every one of them felt comforted and reassured to have so many familiar faces around them. She considered them now, knowing the personal motivations of each for making this journey; each of them with their own reason for leaving Ireland, each of them with a relative in America eagerly awaiting their arrival and each of them with a relative in Ireland mourning their departure.

Next to Maggie stood Maura and Jack Brennan, hoping to start a new life with the funds from the sale of Jack’s family smallholding. With his father dead since January and inheriting the family land, Maura had suggested he sell. It was with the money raised from the sale of that land that Jack Brennan had enough funds to pay for passage to America for himself, his wife and his sister and still have enough left over to invest in a business in Chicago. Jack’s devoted sister Eileen stood with them. The family had agreed that she would travel with her brother and sister-in-law and would settle with them in America.

Then there was Ellen Joyce, a proud, confident woman who had returned to Ballysheen from Chicago to visit her sick mother and to announce her engagement. Kathleen also suspected she had relished the opportunity to show off her diamond solitaire engagement ring and her new gold watch, a gift from the man she was to marry in a few months’ time. She’d spent her last few days in Ballysheen packing a trousseau of wedding gifts she’d received and other items she’d purchased for her bottom drawer. Her sister was to stay at home to care for their mother. Ellen was travelling with the Brennans who knew her and her family well, their homes being just across the field from each other.