The weeks he had
been forced to sit
around worrying and waiting for the trial to come to their
respective
conclusions had been hard, and Dalton had kept himself
occupied by drawing
sketches and planning out colour schemes for their new home.
Now that he was the
absolute owner
of the Randall Shipping Company, there was nothing to stand in
his way. It was
not the way he had ever hoped to
come into the company and such vast power, but he could not
regret what he had
done. He no longer considered Frederick Randall his father,
but a meglomanic
who simply had to be brought to justice.
Now that it was all
over, he would
grieve for a time, but at last he was free of the malevolent
influence that had
tried to destroy everything he had ever held most dear.
Finally, he could set
about making all of Emer’s dreams come true, and living
happily ever with her
and his son, just as soon as he found her.
That night, at a
small victory
celebration at the orphanage, Dalton announced, “Now that all
three trials are
over, I'm going to Ireland to find Emer and bring her home. I
have her
acquittal papers now. Once she's released, we’ll be back as
soon as possible. I
can only pray you will have found William by then.”
“What if she’s
already left for
Australia?” Myrtle asked worriedly.
“In that case, I
shall just have to
follow her there. Joe, I know it's asking a lot, but can you
go out west and
try to find my mother and William? Emer must be frantic with worry,
and I know I could
never forgive myself
if I didn’t try to see the poor woman my father has locked
away like a nun in a
convent for nearly forty years just because of his own sick
fantasies.”
“I’ll do my best to
find the child,
but don’t hold out much hope, Dalton,” Joe warned. “We’ve posted
rewards everywhere. If he were still alive, don’t you think
someone would have
come forward by now?"
Dalton's mouth set
in a grim line.
Joe continued,
“Much as it pains me
to say it, you have to be prepared for the worst, Dalton. Children
die all
the time. You're a
doctor, you know that.
"Emer will be
devastated if
William is gone forever.
Don’t
count of her being willing to come back with you just like
that, not after all
she’s been through. You’ve
had a
very rocky road to together, and perhaps all the hardship
she’s endured will
only drag you two further apart, instead of bringing you
closer together.”
“I’m going to bring
Emer home,
Joe," Dalton said firmly, "and I will just have to convince
her
somehow that we love each and other and belong to together, no
matter what's
happened. I’ll
be miserable
without little William, you know that, but my life has no
meaning without Emer
by my side.”
“I know that,
Dalton. I hope you
find her. Go on,
now, get your
things together, and we’ll all see you off at the docks
tomorrow morning.”
Dalton went to his
small room in the
cabin he was staying at, and packed his bags in preparation
for his
departure. But
he very nearly
didn’t go when, early the following morning, he got an
oddly-penned letter
saying that Emer had jumped overboard in Cork harbour, just as
Joe came in to
see if he needed any help with his bags.
Joe read the note
with his sorrowful
brown eyes. “What
would have been
the chances of her surviving in her condition? You know yourself she
was badly
crippled.”
“A lot can happen
to a paralysis
victim in a only few weeks.
Emer
may be able to walk by now.
At any rate, she was always an excellent swimmer. She’s
alive, I know
it, and she needs me. She
can’t be
dead. We’re
linked somehow, just
like me and William. I
would know
it if they were dead.”
Joe sighed, and
crossed himself
devoutly. “Please God, I hope you’re right. Listen, Dalton, there’s
something I need
to tell you before
you leave.”
Dalton looked up
from the scruffy
letter, and said, “It sounds serious.”
“It is. Myrtle and I have decided to get
married,” Joe announced
suddenly.
Dalton beamed, and
shook him by the
hand heartily. “My dear fellow, what marvellous news!”
“I thought I'd
better tell you now,
and apologise for not being able to wait until you and Emer
can be at our
wedding. You
see, Myrtle wants to
come with me to look for William out west. This seems the only
respectable way
she can do that. It
also gives us
a good excuse to avoid the huge ceremony her father would like
her to
have. We want to
leave as soon as
possible, and under the circumstances, with Emer and William
both missing, I
think there's little cause for a huge celebration,” Joe
explained.
“You shouldn’t feel
like that,
Joe. After all
you’ve done for
Emer, she would be the first to say she wanted you to be happy
on your special
day, and not worry about her."
"Thanl
you for saying so, but all the same…"
"She’s a survivor,
Joe,"
Dalton said, patting him on the shoulder, before looking
around the cabin one
last time to make sure he had everything. "You should know
what Emer is
capable of better than any of us. You were her shipmate for
long enough. She’ll
be fine. We’ll both be with you in spirit if not in person on
your special
day.
"Myrtle is a fine
girl, the
salt of the earth, for all the wealth in the Chandler family.
I only hope
you’ll both be as happy as Emer and I were together on the
Pegasus
,” Dalton said
sincerely.
“Thanks, Dalton, I
knew you would
understand. I
think you know there
will always be a special place for Emer in my heart, but she
loves you body and
soul. I shall
just have to settle
for being her brother. Myrtle and I balance each other, and
with her by my
side, I feel I can accomplish anything.
I promise you, Dalton, if I can
find William, I
will."
"I know. Thank you.
You've been
a great friend to both of us. I'm so glad she stopped Captain
Jenkins from
throwing you overboard for being a stowaway," Dalton said,
shaking his hand.
Joe laughed
ruefully at the
recollection. "My God, that seems a lifetime ago."
"For both of us,
old son."
He sighed.
“We’ll also go look
in on Brona and
Michael while we're out there, and see if there is anything we
can do for
them. Then we’ll
go up to see your
mother on the way back, and ask her if she would be willing to
come to Quebec
to see you.”
“You’ve got my
letter, explaining
everything to her?” Dalton asked quickly.
“I do, right here
in my pocket.” Joe
patted his jacket.
“Give them all my
love then, and
tell them not to worry too much about me or Emer. I’ll contact you
as soon as I know
anything.”
Joe took some of
Dalton’s bags to
the carriage, while Dalton carried the rest himself, including a
couple of Emer's in the hope
of finding her
soon.
When they pulled up
at their
destination, all of Dalton’s friends were lined up on the pier
to wish him
well.
Thus, on the first
of September,
Dalton embarked on the newly refitted
Pegasus
, with Captain
Jenkins and his wife
and Charlie on board as his guests, all ready to join in the
search for Emer.
“Good luck, Dalton! Give our love to
Emer!” Joe, Myrtle,
Adrian, and all the others called as the ropes were untied and
the ship finally
moved away from the dock.
So Dalton set out
on his voyage,
hoping that somehow he could get inside Emer’s head, and figure out
what she
would have done,
and where she would have gone once she jumped ship at Cork.
The oddly-penned
letter had taken
several weeks to reach him from Ireland, and she could be
anywhere by now. He
was concerned that the authorities
might have already found her, and transported her to
Australia, but even that
possibility seemed better than the thought of Emer starving in
the south of
Ireland, one of the most deprived areas of the country since
the Famine had
struck.
Dalton also
realised fully that if
starvation didn’t kill Emer, fever or exposure to the elements
might.
Once he was alone
that night in his
cabin, the strain of the past two months began to take their
toll. Dalton
fell into a black
depression, and tormented himself by reading over and over
again all the
letters which Reeves had given him, which Emer had written to
him while he had
been away in Ireland. He read them til he almost memorized
them, and wept
bitter tears of longing and frustration at every word.
She had loved him
so. How could his
father have ever thought otherwise, and made her suffer as he
had. It was
unthinkable, monstrous even, for him to have read those
letters and yet still
treated her as he had.
Dalton also grieved
for his father,
and even for Madeleine. It never should have come to this. He
had been weak and
foolish, and by not standing up to them, had allowed them to
roam free causing
untold harm with impunity.
They had paid the
ultimate price in
the end, but it was Emer who had suffered so cruelly, and the
thought of what
she might be enduring now without her son was almost more than
he could bear to
think about.
As the
Pegasus
sailed day after
day through the
rough cold waters of the Atlantic, Dalton had ample time to
look back over the
past eighteen months of his life, and agonise over the foolish
mistakes he had
made. Some days
Dalton could do
nothing but wonder if he would ever see Emer or their son
again.
But then he would
recall Emer’s
bright smiling face, with her vibrant aqua eyes and lilting
laugh. Then he
would turn to his volume of
poetry, and relive the first evening they had spent together
as lovers with
such clarity that it was as though it had happened only
yesterday.
“I
will
get her back. We can be happy
like that again, nay,
happier
, once we are
married,” he whispered
as he read ‘To Althea’ by Richard Lovelace from the volume
they had treasured
together on their trip over from Ireland when they had fallen
so deeply in love:
“When
Love with unconfined wings
Hovers within my
gates,
And my divine
Althea brings
To whisper at my
grates:
When I lie tangled
in her hair
And fettered to her
eye,
The Gods that
wanton in the air
Know no such
liberty.
When
flowing cups run swiftly round
With no allaying
Thames,
Our careless heads
with roses
crowned,
Our hearts with
loyal flames,
When thirsty grief
in wine we steep,
When healths and
draughts go free—
Fishes that tipple
in the deep
Know no such
liberty.
When,
like committed linnets, I
With shriller
throat shall sing
The sweetness,
mercy, majesty
And glories of my
King,
When I shall voice
aloud how good
He is, how great
should be,
Enlarged winds that
curl the flood,
Know no such
liberty
Stone
walls do not a prison make
Nor iron bars a
cage,
Minds innocent and
quiet take
That for an
hermitage
If I have freedom
in my love
And in my soul am
Free,
Angels alone that
soar above,
Enjoy such liberty.
Dalton was also grief stricken over
the state of his
affairs with his father and the loss of his mother. To think
that he had
trusted, and centred his whole life around a man who had turned
out to be so
evil and self-serving.
Dalton been
completely taken in by
Frederick, and could never even begin to calculate the damage
that his
misplaced trust had caused.
If his
mother was anything like the warm and loving Emer, his father
had consigned her
to a living hell.
And yet, as
terrible as her fate,
and that of Emer and William and him were, it could have been
far worse. Dozens
of men and women had died because of Frederick Randall’s
rigidity of thought
and inability to show compassion. Dalton felt terribly guilty that
he was almost