Somewhere I Belong (10 page)

I dipped my nib into the ink and dotted it onto the blotter. I wrote the topic across the top of the page. I wrote the date, my name, and my address on the top right-hand corner and the premier's name and address on the left. I shaped my letters as carefully as I could. I did this all with my right hand, trying not to go too slowly. Then I thought about the stories Ma had told us about the Island from when she was a girl. There was the one of when she went to Boston to find a job; the one before she met Dad.

March 25, 1937

Martha Jane Kavanaugh

The Lanigan's House

Northbridge Road

Creed's Creek

Prince Edward Island

Mr. Premier MacMillan

Government House

Charlottetown

Prince Edward Island

Dear Mr. Premier MacMillan:

I have just returned home from Everett, Massachusetts, and I am writing to you because I need a job. I am good with numbers and I have work experience as a bookkeeper. Here is my story:

I finished grade 9 at Northbridge Road School in 1914. Grade 9 was the highest grade in our school. To finish grade 12 you had to go to Charlottetown and pay room and board. I couldn't go because my parents didn't have the money. Even if they did, they would have sent the boys because that's what farm families do.

When I finished school, I helped my parents on their farm. It was hard work and I didn't get paid. I looked after the laying hens, the chickens, and the turkeys. During planting and harvest, I helped with the milking. I got up at sunrise and worked until dark every day.

When the war started, my mother and I volunteered with the Women's Institute on Saturdays. We put packages together for the soldiers that were going overseas. Things got rationed during the war, things like flour and sugar and gasoline. At breakfast, I got a single sugar cube and I had to decide if I wanted it for my tea or for my oatmeal. Oatmeal doesn't taste too good without sugar, but neither does tea. I missed the flour because I loved to bake and you can only bake so much if you don't have very much flour. Sometimes we traded eggs or butter for more flour so we could bake our bread. Nobody missed the gasoline because we didn't own a tractor anyhow. And the only automobile on our road belonged to Father Mullally. But when you add rationed sugar and flour to all of that hard work, you can imagine that it wasn't much fun.

One day, I got a letter from a cousin in Boston. She said there were lots of jobs there because of the war, even for women. My cousin told me the Gillette Safety Razor Company was expanding their factory in South Boston. They made safety razors and blades for the soldiers. She said Gillette had lots of jobs, but not enough men to fill them, so they had to hire women. She said they taught you stuff and they paid the women almost as much as the men. I wanted to get away from all of that farm work and the rationing. Besides, I had never been to Boston and I really wanted to go.

I took the train and stayed with my cousin, Mary Ellen Lanigan. When I went to the Gillette factory, they hired me right away. As you can imagine, working in a razor blade factory can be dangerous—razor blades being sharp and all. I stayed for a few months, then I saw an advertisement in the Boston Globe about a job at a company called Cabot. They made carbon black for the printing business and they were looking for someone to keep the books. I was good at math, so I thought I would give it a try. It sounded way better than working in a razor blade factory.

I worked there for two years and really liked it. Then I met a man named Joseph P. Kavanaugh. He worked for the Crandall Dry Dock Company, in Cambridge, building and repairing marine railway slips. He wore a diving suit and a brass helmet with an air hose attached to it because he worked underwater. Before the war, he travelled all over the world for his work with his brother, George. When the war started, he worked for the Navy, repairing ships that were going overseas. When we got married, I had to give up my job. When our children came along, Joe got a job at an oil refining plant. We thought it would be safer than working under water. But a month ago…

I was well into Ma's letter and getting to the point where I was
going to ask the premier for a job, when a dark shadow fell over my desk. I looked up and saw Old Dunphy staring down at me. I never even heard him coming.

He put the end of his pointer on top of my desk and nudged it against my left hand. “What's this?”

My pen had somehow migrated there. Black ink pooled at its nib.

“You said we were to write with a pen, sir.” My hand shook. A single drop of ink splattered over my letter.

“Look at you,” Old Dunphy barked. “You're making a mess. And what hand are you supposed to be holding that pen in, anyhow?” His voice rose now; his calm demeanour slipped away as his face darkened and
he gritted his teeth. He stepped back, and said, “What have I been
telling you over and over again? Do you not listen?”

I looked down at the pen that rested comfortably between the index finger and thumb of my left hand. A second drop of ink pooled at the nib, so I tapped it onto my blotter.

“I forgot.”

Old Dunphy shook his head. “You forgot?!” He stepped back and
took a breath. “Something tells me I could talk to you 'til I was blue in the face and you wouldn't learn. Whatever am I going to do with you?”

My heart pounded. My throat went dry. Beside me, Maggie shifted uncomfortably in her seat and put her pen down.

Old Dunphy glanced around as if suddenly aware that the room had gone silent. Everybody was staring in our direction. He took another breath, returned the tip of his pointer to the floor, reached down, and grabbed my pen. “Look at the mess you've made. You'll be writing with a pencil from now on.” He picked up my letter and ripped it in half. Then he pointed toward the platform. “Up you go. We'd better fix this now, before it's too late.”

I followed him, thinking there'd be another session in the dummy
desk, as Old Dunphy mounted the stairs. He was calmer now. The
colour in his face seemed to settle as his pursed lips relaxed into an easy smile. He pointed to a spot at the centre of the platform, and said, “Stand right there, where we can all see you.”

He put his pointer down, opened a drawer, and pulled out a long strip of heavy leather. He stepped toward me, holding the strap firmly in a hand. He raised it up once and let it fall onto an open palm. “You know why you're here, don't you, Mr. Kavanaugh?”

I stared at my boots and nodded my head.

“Tell us, then.” He was looking more at the classroom than he was at me.

“I wrote with my left hand, sir,” I said, still staring at my boots.

“Lift that empty head of yours up when you answer me, boy,” Old Dunphy said.

I did.

“Now, I want you to explain to me why we don't write with our left hand.” He grinned across the room.

“I can't, sir.”

“And why is that?”

“I don't know.”

“Come now, Peter James, don't be coy.”

So we were back to
Peter James.
The man turns into a lunatic and my name is
Peter James.
“Pius James, sir,” I said.

“Pius James, then.” His face reddened again, embarrassed this time. His eyes narrowed into mean slits. “Tell us, Mr. Kavanaugh.”

I looked up at him, confused, and couldn't find an answer.

“We will wait, then,
Pius James
.” He practically spit out my name. Smiling. Evidently pleased with himself for finally getting it right. But even Patrick Daley would have gotten it faster. “Maybe it will come to you…eventually.”

I stared down at the floor and thought hard. Back home no one had ever said anything to me about being left-handed. It wasn't a big deal. I stared across the classroom and sent a silent plea to where Larry sat, white-faced, biting his lower lip. Then I looked up at Old Dunphy.

“Hold out your hand, boy.” He raised the strap. “Perhaps my little friend here will jog your memory.”

I stared at him in disbelief, and stepped away. “But why, sir? I didn't do anything wrong.”

“Hold it out.” He lunged forward and grabbed my left hand. The strap landed with a crack, stinging the tender flesh of my palm.

“What is it, then? Tell me.” He was a deep purple now. His spittle sprayed across my face.

“I don't know, sir, honest.”

He let my hand go.

I stepped back and hugged it to my chest.

He was almost shaking now, both hands gripping the pointer. “You're consorting with the devil, that's what you're doing.”

My mouth fell open. I backed away and stood by the dummy desk, wondering what to do. I went to church; I said my prayers. I received the Holy Eucharist every Sunday, a blessing at Mass, and another one
during the week when Father Flynn and, now, Father Mullaly came
to visit. Then there was the rosary, which I said every evening on my knees in the parlour while first my dad, then Ma led the way through the mysteries. I never ever had anything to do with the devil.

Old Dunphy lunged toward me, his face raw with anger.

I let out a shriek. One that Larry told me, later, made the hair stand up on the back of his neck. Whatever effect it had on Old Dunphy, it seemed to work, because as quickly as he had stepped toward me, he backed away.

“Go on over to the desk,” he hissed. Shaking his head, he returned to his own desk and replaced the strap. He picked up a piece of foolscap, found a pencil, and crept across the platform. He seemed conscious that the whole room was still watching him and moved as noiselessly as his shoes and brace would allow. He put the foolscap and the pencil on the desktop in front of me. “Here now.” He placed a shaking hand on my shoulder. “Here's a clean sheet of paper and a brand new pencil. Why don't you give it another go. And you'll be wanting to write with your right hand. You can trust me on that one. It's for your own good.”

It didn't take Uncle Jim long to figure out something was wrong. It could have been the way Larry, Pat Jr., and Thomas escorted me across the schoolyard. Or maybe it was the look of desolation on my face as I exited through the gate. He was waiting in his box sleigh while Big Ned and Lu stood quietly in their traces, blinking back the newly falling snow.

“What happened to you?” He looked straight at me. And before I could answer, he asked again. “Pius James, what's goin' on?”

My hand still stung from the strapping. But worse was how everything my teacher had done to me seemed to collect in my chest. It sat
heavily, making it hard to breath. It clogged up my nose and made
me gasp for air. “Nothing.” I raised a mittened hand and caught a tear.

“Musta bin somethin',” Uncle Jim said. “You look none too happy.” He waited a moment. “We ain't goin' nowhere 'til somebody tells me.”

“Mr. Dunphy,” I snivelled. “He…I….” My hands flew up and covered my face.

“Larry?” Uncle Jim asked.

“P.J. was writing with his left hand and Mr. Dunphy caught him,”
Helen offered.

“What the devil!” Uncle Jim exclaimed. “What difference does it
make what hand he writes with?” He drew a breath. “What'd he do?”

“He took him up to the front of the classroom and bawled him out,” Larry said. “Then he gave him the strap.”

“
And
,” Thomas interjected, “he tore up his work and made him do it
all over again
.”

“He made him sit in the dummy desk again too,” Pat Jr. said.

I could almost hear Uncle Jim's teeth grind. “You fellas watch them horses. Charlie Dunphy and I are gonna have us a little chat.” He jumped down from the sleigh, and stormed through the gate and across the yard.

Later that evening, when we were supposed to be asleep, Granny, Ma,
Aunt Gert, and Uncle Jim sat in the parlour and rehashed the day's
events. Somehow the women had heard part of the story, and now they wanted to hear the rest, especially Ma. I crept out of bed and leaned out my doorway as their conversation drifted through the grate in the floor of the upstairs hallway.

“So, what was his excuse, Jim?” Ma asked. “Why did he strap Pius James?”

“The same nonsense all over again—Pius James bein' left-handed. Charlie tryin' to teach 'im how to write proper,” Uncle Jim said. “He made a big deal over it; goin' over that stupid superstition. Sayin' he was tryin' to save the boy's soul. I'm afraid I didn't get the whole story—his side of it, anyhow. I was so mad I coulda tore his head off.”

“But Pius James's penmanship is good,” Ma said. “It's always been good. I suppose Charlie Dunphy thinks my son's spiritual well-being is part of his duty in the classroom.”

“You know what I think?” Uncle Jim said. “I think it doesn't have
anythin' to do with what hand Pius James writes with. I think Charlie's lookin' for an excuse to pick on 'im because it makes 'im feel big.”