The sight of a dreary English coastline had never in its existence looked so serene or so perfect as it did the day their ship made landfall in the hectic port of Liverpool, families and onlookers standing in awe to observe the steamer come whistling into the wharf.
Margaret observed the swing and pinwheel of seagulls, the cry of the fishwives, and within her a comfort grew. John felt it too, she could tell, for he breathed easier it seemed, and color returned to his cheeks. His eyes were set scanning the land for their nurse and baby, and when they finally disembarked, found Dixon with little to no trouble. Dixon cried and blubbered, calling to them and giving Margaret and hearty hug.
"Oh my dear, I heard about America, you poor dear! What were those savages thinking to expose you to such violence…and in your condition!" Dixon continued to cluck, but for the time Margaret was not concerned. She had not known how Dixon, her combatant for so many years, could look so sweet, or how her countenance would be restored with the appearance of her mother's maid, and now her nurse.
John asked to see the baby, and Dixon plucked him out of his pram, the little thing peering shyly up at the grown-ups around him, not sure what to make of his mother's delighted squeal, or his father's critical squint. Margaret took him, and cradled him in her arms, his face much altered from her last encounter. His cheeks had gone a ruddy red, his lips rose pink, and his eyes had settled into a blue-green like sea-foam. He was a beautiful child, Margaret mused, brushing coal-black curls from his eyes. He did not know what to make of this stranger, and soon whimpered and arched away from his mother towards Dixon, tears forming in his eyes. Margaret cooed to him, jogging him in her arms, but he would not be calmed. Exasperated, Margaret began to hand him back to Dixon, but John took him instead, shocking the now almost one year old into perplexed silence.
"Hello lad," he grinned, "how's a boy?" The baby looked as if he would cry again, but then found John's cravat and tugged on it, taking seemingly unreasonable pleasure in John's laugh and the attention his father brought him. In his eyes Margaret could see a love she had seen in her own father's eye, for her more than Fred, and wondered if her brother could feel that difference, as clearly as she now saw it, between John's adoration, and hers. Her brother had been her mother's joy, her last bastion of hope in a bleak world, and when he had gone to see, her fear was well documented. She, Margaret, wondered how she would react to her son leaving her, and shuddered to think. Maria's soul had been much stronger than she ever knew, and Margaret suddenly regretting viewing her as weak, or as someone lost, coddled and protected by her father.
"That's a good man," John said to Owen, refusing to take his eyes off the boy, "and almost a year old!"
As if to answer, Owen gurgled and spoke in that secret language privy only to babies, his eyes bright and his chubby hands reaching up for his father's stubbly face. John took one of his hands and kissed it, glancing at Margaret in awe.
"Thank God we are home." His eyes were darker than normal, and Margaret knew he was holding back tears. In seeing this, she cried too, and the little family moved away off the wharf and made their journey home.
On the way Dixon gabbed on, about Milton, about the great empty house, about Louis, who had sat at their door every night, whimpering and laying on his paws, his big dark eyes empty for their loss. Margaret in turn told her about America, mind only the pleasant bits, and Dixon sighed.
"If it was not so horrible I might go," she said dreamily, "but alas, I fancy civilization, and perish the thought that I should not be with you until I am dead."
"Dixon!" Margaret admonished, looking down at her baby, fast asleep in his carriage, then to her stomach, already swollen large with child. "Who will help me with these two?"
"Now, now, I'm not planning on dying yet," Dixon patted her arm reassuringly, to John's evident annoyance—for he turned his face to the window, his jaw set. He liked Dixon well enough, but too long or too much of her prattle wore him down in ways Margaret imagined he never told her. He tolerated the old woman, and was kind to her, but comments on mortality, or on the business of death bothered him somehow, and so he avoided its mention, for fear perhaps that if it became too commonplace, that the world would fall down about his ears, and someone else he loved would be committed to the shadows.
This was morbid thinking, however, and soon his thoughts were far away, to Milton, and to his work. He almost buzzed with the anticipation of it, and of the, dare he think it, romance of the cottony wilderness, and of the sound of industry. He knew what it cost his workers and he was sorry, but as his life was theirs, theirs belonged to him. He was once one of them, and they his stock. He was determined never to let his sons (for he was sure their second child would too be a son,) feel the heat of the machines or breathe the cotton that, unknown to Margaret, still clogged his lungs. True, he had gone to work at a draper's shop, but to make extra money, he, to his mother's ignorance, also took up dodging under the machines, collecting cotton, on days when he lied and told her he was with his mates. This allowed them to scrimp and save, salvaging their lives in spite of their father.
Fanny suspected such actions, but never told, and now, gazing at the exquisite form of his sleeping angel, he was sure he sure that what he had done his son would never do. It was not that he wished his children to be in anyway adverse to the struggle, or the potency of hard work, nor that they would develop an allergy to work, but he wanted them to learn from him, and to surpass him in their lives.
His proudest moment, he decided, would be when one of his children went to university. He would cry, and he would smile. As much as his mother decried its purpose, John had always been a closet academic, enjoying his time with the late Mr. Hale than he had enjoyed anything in his life until Margaret. She and he were a part of each other, and so his comfort and grace lived within her, and, he hoped, would be reincarnated within his children, no matter how many there would be. Lord, he thought, if Margaret would bear it, he would not mind having a house full of children, all smiles and quarrels and love. He feared his father's legacy, and worried of becoming like him, so he resolved to be as honest, and as straight-laced as he could, and show his sons the example which he had not seen. His boys would be great men; not merely good men, but the kind his mother would have been proud of. And he was sure that with a mother like theirs; that they would do all that and more, for they were of her as they were of him.
…..
Margaret, Louis by her side, went into labor shortly after her birthday, four months since arriving home. Again the house would be filled, and as she was led upstairs, Owen said his first word in his father's arms as he stood in the parlor.
"Mama."
AN: Hey all! I am so sorry for the delay, my computer crapped out and school started. Sigh. That summer was too short. Thanks to all who read and reviewed and to all my followers who I would not be continuing this saga without. I planned to write as soon as the last chapter was finished, but I had writers block and all the above, so again I am sorry. I hope you like the direction this is taking, for yes, I do have a plan! The juicy stuff is coming! R&R!...also, spelling errors, its late and this could stew no longer, so I apologize in advance!
Sue, thank you for sharing your story with me, I did indeed cry again. My story is not as tragic as yours, but it is, as you know, still a similar pain. It is possible to PM (private message) however, so if you would like to talk or send information, that is the way. I will say this on the public forum however. My loss was my brother, taken from us at 18 in a car accident that changed our lives almost 3 years ago, though you wouldn't know it by the pain we still feel. This was originally dedicated to him, but is to you now too. Peace and Love, your dogged author.