May the Road Rise Up to Meet You: A Novel by Peter Troy Read Free Book Online

fourteenth beam, they were at the dark stern at the end of the bunks and next to eight makeshift latrines. Eight latrines meant eight big wooden buckets set on the floor about two feet above three planks, with the hole cut into each one of them for doin’ the necessary. They looked clean, but it was hard not to wonder what they’d be like when all these people were doin’ their necessary in there all day long. It was a sad place, and Ethan wanted to go back above deck, to leave the ship altogether and go find his Mam and Aunt Em to work with them in the mills until they could all go to America together. But then Mr. Quigley told him the sliver of space up on the top level of planking would be his, and as Ethan climbed up, the old man stood there with a content smile on his face like he’d done his manly duty. All he’d really done, Ethan thought, was surrender straight off and consign them to the darkest corner of the whole ship, and Ethan placed his satchel down along the front edge and buried his head on top of it. Within an hour they were on their way, and there’d be no turning back, no findin’ his Mam and Aunt Em or workin’ in the mills. Just a dark corner of space next to the latrines that was to be the greater part of his world for the duration of the voyage.
    It turned out life aboard the
Lord Sussex
was
all
about numbers, even if you weren’t purposely tryin’ to find them. For starters there was the number sixteen, as in sixteen ounces of food per passenger, per day. Might be some stale bread or uncooked rice or potatoes, or even a bit of fish, but whatever it was, it was always sixteen ounces and never a fraction more. And though they’d never weighed their food back home, it was easy to see that the ship’s ration was less than what they’d had in Aunt Em’s cottage, even durin’ The Hunger, even when it was four of them instead of three. On the third day, when they were fully out to sea, the bouncing ship turned Ethan’s stomach in knots. He walked to one of the latrines and didn’t even have time to close the door before his stomach started heaving and his mouth opened wide on instinct. But nothin’ came out. Behind him was the old man Donnegan from across the aisle. And Donnegan let out a bitter laugh and said to Ethan
sixteen ounces ain’t wort’ de effort of throwin’ back up
.
    Then there was the number six, as in six pints of water per person, per day, or six paired with two, to make six feet by two feet of bunk space for each person. Of course, one of the crewmen informed them right off that the water was
for drinkin’, washin’, and cookin’, not in that order, haha
, and that ration’d be cut unless they saw some rain on the trip. But the more rain they saw meant
the food stores’ll rot faster, so there ya go, haha
. As for the bunk space, it was more like six and twenty, as in six feet by twenty inches per person, because two hundred didn’t stand for the number of passengers aboard the
Lord Sussex
the way it was supposed to. Donnegan said the crewman counted out two hundred and fourteen rations of water each day for the passengers, which explained the tight fit in the bunks.
    Donnegan took to callin’ the
Lord Sussex
a Coffin Ship after what that same crewman told him was the common reference to these converted cargo vessels carrying desperate emigrants across the sea. The crewman said it was pretty common that such a ship sailing from Liverpool, Dublin, or Cork wouldn’t arrive
wit’ all its cargo intact
, and it took Ethan a minute to realize that
they
were the cargo.
    More important to Ethan than sixteen or six or two, or any other number set rigidly in place, was the number that was constantly movin’, constantly shrinking toward its ultimate, beautiful destination. It was the countdown of time until noon each day when sixty, as in sixty minutes above deck, became his favorite number. When noon arrived, Mrs. Quigley gathered their rations together to cook in one of