The Streel Read online

  said nothing and that felt right. We had not yet come to the time to say the words that might one day pass between us. I leaned against his chest and heard the comfort of his great heart beating there.

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  There was no fire and there was no whiskey and there were no ci-

  gars being smoked. There was no sense of camaraderie or joy. In

  fact, a somber feeling hung in the room. This was a business transaction.

  So it was on St. Patrick’s Day, we went again to the Grand Central Hotel where we had once met before to discuss sel ing the Green Isle claim, but this time it was only Padraic and I, and we were talking to Mr. Hunt, Charlie’s father, and Professor Underwood.

  Before he left after Billy’s accident, the professor had given us the gold bar made from the ore sample, and the money from that had tided Paddy

  and me over well until the meeting. Paddy had also gone out to the claim and continued to pull gold from the ground. I feared that Seamus had

  been right all along and that we would have more money if we held on to

  the claim and worked it ourselves, but I was sick to death of it, and so was Paddy.

  In preparation for this meeting, I had ordered my first dress from the

  French woman— a lovely dark blue, it had a full skirt with flounces all

  down the back. I had cut Paddy’s hair, shaved his face, and dressed him

  like a gentleman. He looked quiet and dignified; his dark, thick hair swept back from his face.

  I held his arm as we entered the room. Mr. Hunt rose and bowed. The

  professor stood also and nodded his head. We all sat and Mr. Hunt pulled out some papers.

  He looked over the papers through his small glasses and then lifted his

  head. There was to be no small talk. “We are ready to offer you two, as the remaining owners of the claim, thirty thousand dol ars for the claim and all the rights that go with it,” Mr. Hunt said in his solemn voice.

  This was twice again as much as we had originally hoped to gain from

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  the sale of the claim. But that was in another lifetime. The claim had gone up in price.

  Mr. Hunt was addressing himself to Paddy and turned his head quickly

  when I began to speak.

  “That is not an untoward offer, Mr. Hunt, and if it had been made sev-

  eral months ago, we might have accepted it. But claims are going for more money now, and much has passed between us and your family. Therefore,

  I feel I must ask for fifty thousand dol ars.”

  Possibly I had an unfair advantage. I had worked in his household for

  almost a year. I had watched the amounts of money that were spent on

  keeping the family in style. I knew what this man could afford and I knew what we needed.

  He blanched. “Fifty thousand dol ars. Why, that’s unheard of.”

  I continued. “What is unheard of is the manner in which your son

  went about guaranteeing the sale of the claim to your company.”

  “My son, what do you know?” Mr. Hunt spit out at me.

  I could tell he was holding himself back.

  “My son has little freedom these days. The leg turned gangrenous on

  the train ride home. We were barely able to save his life. He lost the leg; he has lost his health and nearly lost his mind.”

  Neither Paddy nor I answered anything to this statement.

  There was silence in the room for a few moments and then Mr. Hunt

  cleared his throat. “I can offer you forty.”

  Somehow I stayed firm. “Fifty.”

  He bowed his head and repeated after me, “Fifty.”

  The numbers were written in to the papers, and we all signed them.

  I looked on as Paddy took the pen and paper and signed his name to it,

  Padraic Hennessy. He had been working on his signature for some weeks now. He was beginning to be able to read, and it delighted him to read the headlines in the paper aloud to me.

  Mr. Hunt told us the money would be made available to us from what-

  ever bank we would choose. We explained that we wanted it waiting for

  us in Cheyenne and that we would pick it up there in the weeks to come.

  After the papers were in order, we all stood.

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  Mr. Hunt would not look at me. He did not offer me his hand. I held

  my head up high and took Paddy’s arm, making ready to leave the room.

  Finally, Mr. Hunt raised his head and said, “My son has not forgotten

  you.”

  “But I will forget him.”

  I felt the pressure of Paddy’s hand on my arm. We walked out into the

  clear sunlight of the Black Hil s in spring.

  Author’s Note

  I am of Irish descent. A year after my mother’s death I decided to find

  out where in Ireland my ancestors came from and why they emi-

  grated to the United States. I was able to ascertain that my father’s family, the Logues, were from Donegal and my mother’s, the Kirwins, from

  Galway. In my research I was even able to find which ships two of my

  great- great- grandparents came over on in 1849.

  While I can’t say exactly why the Logues and the Kirwins left their

  homeland, after reading many stories of the potato famine, I’m quite sure they were pushed out by English landowners and forced by poverty to follow the promise of a better life in America. When I think of what they did, leaving all they knew behind— their family, their friends, their language—

  and arriving on a new continent, then making their way halfway across

  this unknown land, I’m astounded. I feel like the equivalent for me would be to take a spaceship to Mars and try to settle there.

  Some years ago I wrote a book about my grandmother, Halfway

  Home: A Granddaughter’s Biography, which told how she grew up in the far western part of Minnesota near the South Dakota border. A sense of not

  tel ing the whole story of such Irish immigrants never left me. I wanted to write more about what the Irish diaspora found when they came to this

  new land, so I set out to create a new character from my family history. My great- grandfather married a Reardon, and Brigid is an important saint in the Irish Catholic hierarchy— thus the name for my main character, Brigid Reardon, in The Streel. My brother, James Kirwin Logue, was called Jamie, but often we used the Gaelic form of his name, Seamus. Jamie died when

  he was only sixteen, and it was nice to honor him as Brigid’s dearly loved brother.

  I’m lucky to live with a wonderful writer, Pete Hautman. For a time

  Pete was somewhat addicted to poker, and the closest legal place to play it was Deadwood, South Dakota. We took several trips there, and while

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  he lost and won money, I wandered around the town and soaked up the

  history from its early mining days. As a flatlander, I was fascinated by the Black Hil s, a small mountain range, and Deadwood, an old mining town

  set in a deep valley. I was amazed to learn from reading menus from the

  1870s that oysters had been shipped to its fancy restaurants from the West Coast. In its heyday the town was a wild and exciting place where almost anything could happen. When Brigid Reardon sprang to life, demanding

  her story be written, I knew where she would end up in this first tale.

  My research for The Streel included studying maps, newspaper clippings and photographs, and other books written about this place and time.

  The James J. Hill House served as the model for the Hunt house in St. Paul.

  In Deadwood I read old diaries from women living in this frontier town; I imagined hearing their voices as they wrote about their daily lives. I even found an
old book of Irish Gaelic prayers and translated many of them,

  with the blessing of an Irish priest from the University of Notre Dame.

  So here are my thanks. First to Pete, for giving me all the space and

  support I needed to dive headlong into this book. To my two sisters,

  Robin and Dodie, for reading anything I hand them. For the Minnesota

  Historical Society Press, especially Ann Regan, Deborah Miller, and Jean Brookins, who in the early 1990s gave me a grant to write the history of my grandmother. And to all my ancestors, for the courage to come to this foreign land and make their way.

  My gratitude also goes to all the librarians and researchers who helped

  me, finding just the right book that would give me the nugget of information I needed.

  I am most thankful for the new home I’ve found at the University of

  Minnesota Press and quite grateful to work with Erik Anderson and the

  rest of the crew.

  Go raibh maith agaibh.

  Mary Logue is the author of thirteen mystery novels, including the Claire Watkins mystery series, and five volumes of poetry, several nonfiction

  books, and many young adult, middle grade, and children’s books. She

  has received a Minnesota Book Award, a Wisconsin Outstanding Achieve-

  ment award, and several Minnesota State Arts Board awards. Her picture

  book Sleep Like a Tiger won a Charlotte Zolotow honor, a Caldecott honor, and a Best Picture Book award in Japan. Her writing has been published in the New York Times, the Star Tribune, and the Village Voice, and she has taught writing at the University of Minnesota and Hamline University. She lives with writer Pete Hautman in Golden Valley, Minnesota, and Stockholm, Wisconsin.

  Document Outline

  COVER

  Half-title Page

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Epigraph

  The Crossing 1. Galway, Ireland, May 1877

  The Hunt Mansion 2. St. Paul, Minnesota, November 22, 1878

  3. Thanksgiving Day, 1878

  4.

  5. December 15, 1878

  Deadwood 6. Deadwood, Dakota Territory, December 24, 1878

  7. Christmas Day

  8.

  9.

  10.

  11.

  12.

  13.

  14.

  15.

  16.

  17.

  18. December 29, 1878

  19. New Year’s Eve, 1878

  20.

  21.

  22. January 3, 1879

  23.

  24.

  25.

  26.

  27.

  28.

  29.

  30.

  31.

  32.

  Author’s Note

  Author Biography