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

of me die, da man to de left of me die, and more dan seventy udders, but not me. On de plantation, my friend die when he is bit by a snake I walk past just a few seconds before it bite him. And upabove dere, he continues, nodding to the top of the mast, dere are many times I t’ink, dis is de last storm I will see. But each time I live t’rough it. And den I begin to t’ink maybe God keep me alive for some reason. Maybe he have somet’ing he want me to do.
    He looks earnestly at Ethan and says, So why is it you do not die from de fever Etan? Perhaps God have somet’ing he want
you
to do.
    And then it’s quiet for a while except the noise of the city, and Ethan begins to consider what that might be.
    Sam, da man who teach me to read, Suah finally says. He is up in de top mast t’rough many more storms dan I ever see, an’ he make it ev’ry time. He fight against de great Napoleon when he is a young man, an’ still live. Den he slip on some water on deck when we dock in Liverpool a year ago. He hit his head on de metal rig … an’ dat’s all for him. He don’t wake up from it. An’ all anybody talk about is how strange a way it is for
such a man
to go. No glory, no storm, no battle—just some water an’ metal rig, an’ he is gone. Whatever it is God has keep you alive for Etan, it is best dat you do it while you can.
    IT’S MIDAFTERNOON WHEN A MAN walks partly up the gangway to the
Lord Sussex
and speaks to a member of the crew. Ethan watches him the whole time while Suah’s readin’, and it’s only when the man walks back down the gangway and toward them that he thinks he recognizes his Da. It’s been more than two years since he’s seen him, and the picture Ethan has of him in his mind has grown cloudier and more distant with time. As the man walks past the dock where they’re seated, Ethan gets the closest look yet, and though the last two years seem to have put five or ten years’ worth of gray into his hair and slouch into his shoulders, Ethan is almost certain it’s him.
    I think that’s me Da, he tells Suah, and Suah’s face lights up as if it’s his
own
father he’s seein’.
    Yes? We must stop him. Hello! Hello! Sir! Hello! Suah whistles loudly and Ethan’s Da turns around. Suah waves to him, and Ethan stands up along with Suah, as his Da walks tentatively toward them, seein’ only Suah at first. He stops about twenty feet away, but then he sees Ethan and his eyes broaden with a single glance.
    Ethan? he asks, but doesn’t wait for an answer before walkin’ quickly up to him with arms opened, embracing him and liftin’ him off his feet.
    Oh Son, yer here, yer here, he says, over and over.
    And past his Da’s shoulder Ethan sees Suah beaming with happiness. It’s a strange and proud moment all at once for Ethan. He doesn’t feel like the little boy who’d said goodbye to his Da two years before, but rather like a man who’d accomplished something just by surviving it all—The Hunger, the walk to Newry, the Coffin Ship. And the initial joy of having his father lift him up, for the first time in years, quickly gives way to the awkward discomfort of such an emotional display. What would Mr. Hanratty say about such a thing?
    Lookit da
soize
o’ ya, gettin’ t’be a man, his Da says as he places him back down on the dock.
    Ethan smiles at the recognition of his new stature, even extending his hand to his Da to shake as men do. And his Da takes his hand with a bit of a laugh and a nod of his head, adding only a slap on one shoulder to confirm that his youngest son is a boy no longer.
    He is a fine and
brave
young man, Suah adds with a smile, and Ethan’s Da turns back around to look at Suah again, this time less suspicious than before.
    This is Suah, Da, Ethan says, like one man introducing two of his lads to each other. Suah, this is me Da.
    And they shake hands and share a few compliments about Ethan, and then Da mentions about how he was expectin’ the ship to arrive at the