the fact is he will never leave me for the likes of you, and the sooner you understand that the better.” She was gripping the arms of her chair with such force that her knuckles were turning white.
“Yes, ma’am,” Rose said. She felt the blood rise to her face again, and she fought to control her anger at this casual insult.
“Good,” Mrs. Overton said. Rose suddenly felt sorry for her, because Mrs. Overton seemed humiliated by the whole conversation, and she was relieved when the lady ended the awkwardness by saying, “You may go.”
After that Rose was even more wary around Mr. Overton, and as the months went by she thought that perhaps her vigilance had paid off. He had been away on business quite a lot, and when he was in the house he seemed to be ignoring her.
Then one day it happened.
He came up behind her when she was in the kitchen scrubbing a large black pot that had been used to make soup, and she was so intent on her work that she was unaware of his presence until she felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned to see who had touched her and all of a sudden his lips were on her mouth and he was pressing her back against the sink.
He was a bull of a man and he pinned her with his body so that she could neither move nor cry out. One hand cupped her behind the head while the other roamed along her skirt. His stiff mustache brushed against her cheek like the wire bristles of a brush and his tongue tried to force its way into her mouth. She could hardly breathe; he was suffocating her with his brute force.
She reached around behind her and her fingers closed around the neck of an empty wine decanter in the cast iron sink. She realized she could bring it around swiftly and break it over his head, and she gathered herself for the blow.
Suddenly, there was a voice: “Why, Mr. Overton, I’m shocked! Is that young Rose you’re kissing?”
It was Kate.
Immediately Overton released his grip and backed away. He was breathing hard, trying to collect himself, and his face was flushed. He looked at Kate, who was standing at the door to the kitchen, and it was clear he would have liked to strangle her. However, with a great effort he mastered himself, and a smile flickered on his lips.
“My dear Kate, it seems you have caught me in the midst of a moment’s passion,” he said. “I find myself entranced by the beauty of our red-haired Rosie, and, well, I am only a man after all, subject to the sweet presence of such a lovely creature in my house. When a girl like Rosie smiles and winks at me, it is a powerful seduction. You would not understand, I am sure, but I pray you will not tell Mrs. Overton of my indiscretion.”
“I understand, Mr. Overton,” Kate said. “I will not trouble the mistress with this. Of course, I would be very surprised to ever see it happen again, sir.”
Overton burst out in a braying laugh. “That is a matter you’ll have to take up with our sweet Rosie here. When she gives me that come-hither look I confess I can’t quite control myself. Well, excuse me, I must be going.”
He turned and winked at Rose, and then he saw the wine decanter in her hand. All at once his face registered the fact that Rose had been ready to hit him with the heavy glass bottle. Anger flashed from his eyes, and then something else, something colder. Revenge.
For just a moment, he looked like he was ready to come over and slap the bottle out of Rose’s grip and then put his thick hands on her neck and throttle her. Then, just as quickly, he mastered himself. He turned on his heel and walked out, and when he did Rose dropped the bottle in the sink with a clatter and burst into tears.
Kate came over and held her close, stroking her hair and murmuring to her. “There, there,” she said. “Don’t worry about it, Rose dear.”
“But he’s lying,” Rose said, through her sobs. “I never did or said a thing to him to make him think that I would. . .”
“Don’t bother yourself about it,” Kate said. “He’s like that with all the girls. Blames everything on them, he does. He can’t be trusted. I’ll have to look after you more closely now. I should never have let you out of my sight in the first place. It’s all right, dear, don’t cry.”
I could have killed him, Kate thought. She looked down at the heavy glass bottle in the sink, the light reflecting off its many facets, and realized how quickly her future could have been changed. One blow from that decanter and Overton would have at the least received a serious cut to the head, and he’d have been bleeding like a stuck pig.
She’d have been dismissed from service, and probably sent back to Ireland, with no prospects of coming back, and no chance to make money for her family.
All her dreams could have ended in one instant.
She was shaking with terror, and it took a long time for Kate to calm her down. That night at dinner Mr. Overton ignored her completely, almost as if she were invisible. His daughters chattered away, telling their mother about the adventures they had earlier when Kate had taken them into the city to a museum, but there was a coldness around Mr. Overton, and he spent long minutes simply staring into his wine glass.
“I’d have killed the brute,” Mary said that night when they were back in their bedroom. “I’d have hit him with the bottle even after Kate came in. I’d have made sure he didn’t try that again with me.”
“And you’d have lost your job,” Rose said. “Did you not hear what Kate said about him? It’s always the girls who suffer when he does these things. The mistress as much as told me that if something happens it’ll be myself who gets the blame. I can’t afford to be sent back, Mary. My family is depending on me.”
“Ah, they’ll survive,” Mary said. “Haven’t they got along all this time? There have been Sullivans in County Cork for ages past, and they’ll be there for ages to come. They can’t be killed off, my girl.”
But Rose was not convinced. She fell asleep with a sense of unease, as if something bad was about to happen, and she had strange, restless dreams all night long.
The next morning, after the breakfast had been cleared away, and Mr. Overton had left for the day, Mrs. Overton called her in to the parlor.
“Sit down, Rose,” she said.
Rose took a seat on a sofa across from the lady. She was rarely invited to sit in the parlor, and her heart was pounding as she looked at the stony face across from her.
“Rose, my husband has told me that you tried to seduce him yesterday in the kitchen. I cannot have this type of immoral behavior in my home. I am dismissing you at once, and I suggest that you make plans to return to your homeland. I will not give you a reference for another job in service.”
This is the free sample version of a fictional series about Rose Sullivan, a girl from Skibbereen, Ireland, who comes to America in the late 1800s to work as a domestic servant, so she can send money back to her poverty stricken family in Ireland. During Rose’s long life the world changes in ways she hardly dreamed of as a girl in Ireland. This is a family saga, about Rose and the people who came before and after her in her family.
Book One of the series is here.
Book Two of the series is here.
John McDonnell believes in the power of imagination and language to transform life. He has done many types of writing, but fiction is closest to his heart. He writes in the horror, sci-fi, romance, humor and fantasy genres. He lives near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania with his wife and four children.
Read John McDonnell's Fiction Blog.
Did you like this book? Send me an email:
[email protected] Connect with me online:
Twitter
Google Plus
Facebook
Thank you for reading books on BookFrom.Net Share this book with friends