The Women of Saturn Read online

I want to answer that half of the school’s population—students as well as teachers—could be labelled “school phobics,” but I turn to the principal. “Mr. Champagne, you had agreed on this special project in June.”

  “Yes, Cathy, you’re right, but we didn’t have all the documentation on this student then, and it was clear we’d accept her on a trial basis. Frank has done thorough research on her file and there are just too many irregularities,” he concludes.

  Frank continues, “Not only has Angie been admitted without proper assessment, but she comes from a French school board, without the proper Quebec eligibility certificate.”

  The new language laws in Quebec make Angie ineligible for English-language schooling, since neither of her parents had attended school in the province. Some Italian parents in the suburb of Saint-Leonard had challenged the law earlier by setting up clandestine English classes in church basements. In June, Mr. Champagne had told me he wasn’t bothered by Angie’s ineligibility for English schooling, since the “illegal” students had been pardoned. If necessary, he would request a special exemption for a special needs student. I remind him of this promise.

  “Unfortunately things have changed since then. We’re in tough contract negotiations with the government,” Mr. Champagne says.

  Frank adds, “I’ll have you know that, yesterday, Angie vandalized the teachers’ bathroom across from your classroom. That’s the last straw.”

  “Are you sure about the vandalism?” I remember that I had opened the bathroom door for Angie, but other students had used those facilities throughout the day.

  “We’re sure. Go and check for yourself,” Frank says.

  The principal sums up: “Since the school has not been officially informed of the latest happening, and no names are given in the news, we will proceed as if nothing has happened. Angie will be sent back to her own school board.”

  I try to argue, “I don’t understand why we can’t give her another chance, especially given the circumstances.”

  “Cathy,” Mr. Champagne says forcefully. “The circumstances and timing make it even more pressing to act. Her parents are rumoured to be involved in organized crime. Have you not read the papers? Cafés are being torched, people are getting killed. The sooner we take action, the better.”

  “But … those are only rumours…”

  Frank cuts me off. “The family hasn’t seen fit to contact us yet. Obviously, they want to keep the whole thing quiet. The longer we wait, the harder it will be to get rid of her, especially if Social Services gets involved. Let’s hope they haven’t heard about the beating yet.”

  I don’t know what else to say. Frank seems pleased with the new developments, as if he has been proven right.

  Mr. Champagne continues, “I’m sending the parents a report that Angie should be sent to a special program at St. Justine’s Hospital,” he says. Then adds: “Cathy, this is not a formal reprimand, but it would be appreciated if you’d try to set a more professional example for students and arrive a few minutes before them. And do try to stick to the rules about the teachers’ bathroom.”

  As I leave the office, one of my shoulder pads comes loose, and seems ready to slide down my back.

  Frank walks besides me. “Angie’s school was just an excuse for her mother to leave her husband.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Cathy, you’re so naïve. Imagine, after twenty years of marriage, she decides to leave him, now that he’s getting old. She must have found a younger sweetheart. Can you blame him for the whack on the head?”

  I walk away. Life without Angie in my class will be a lot easier, so why am I so upset about losing her?

  Since she’s been in my class, I can’t help thinking of her mother and our ocean crossing. Lucia was a married woman, yet she was hardly older than her daughter is now. The defining moments of that trip all had to do with Lucia; the rest is a hazy memory.

  I walk into the teachers’ bathroom to fix the errant shoulder pad, and to check on the vandalism Angie is accused of having committed. I break into a broad smile when I see ANGIE WAS HERE written in bright red marker, the large scrawl unmistakably the girl’s handwriting.

  I go straight to class and call the Social Services Agency.

  PART II

  THE VOYAGE, 1957

  4. DAYS ONE AND TWO

  ON THE FIRST DAY OF the trip we travelled from Calabria to Naples by train. That day blurred into Day Two because we had travelled by night and arrived in the early morning hours on the day of the boat departure. It was after midnight when my mother’s brother, Zio Pietro, came into our train compartment and pulled the suitcases down from the racks above our heads. He yelled, “We’re in Naples!” as if he were warning us as much as waking us up.

  “Naples is full of scugnizzi,” Zio said. “Don’t trust anyone to touch the suitcases.”

  Zio shooed off the porters that circled around us like flies, but then he negotiated with an older man, who took the heaviest suitcases and walked us to the nearest hotel. I felt as if I was sleepwalking, but had to keep up with their brisk pace.

  The hotel, which was only a few metres from the train station, looked dark and dirty. Three women with bright red lipstick were huddled together at the entrance, trying to keep warm. They were arguing, their hands and cigarette smoke moving nervously up and down to the rhythm of their loud voices.

  “We’re in good company,” said Zio.

  Mother and Lucia looked at each other in disbelief. “What are they doing out in the cold at this time of night?” Mother whispered.

  “We all have to make a living,” the porter said, as Zio paid him.

  “We’re only here for a few hours,” Zio said apologetically.

  I slept soundly, sharing a room and a bed with Mother and Lucia, while Zio and my brother, Luigi, slept in the room next to us. At the first hint of daylight, we dragged ourselves out of bed and took turns using the smelly bathroom in the corridor. From a rusty nail on the wall hung strips of cut-up newspaper that were to be used as toilet paper. We pulled on a chain to flush the toilet, but it didn’t work. Mother splashed some cold water, which trickled from the faucet of a stained sink, over my face, but stopped short of using a towel to wipe it dry.

  “Don’t touch it,” she said fiercely. We lugged our own suitcases back to the station, hungry and shivering with cold.

  Groggy, I still peered out the bus window, wanting to see Naples. But the city, too, was still half-asleep, as were the street sweepers who moved lethargically, pushing garbage from one side of the curb to another. The shops were closed, but the street vendors were setting up their stands. Some were ready for business, sitting next to small lit-up furnaces, bundled in heavy coats and shawls, offering cigarettes, magazines, small toys. They called out loudly to passers-by in the Neapolitan dialect. They sounded as if they were singing. The bus sped directly to the port and parked in the shadow of an immense ship.

  I had seen pictures of the Saturnia, and of its twin, the Vulcania, on a poster tacked up on Zio’s wall in Mulirena. He processed all the paperwork for people who emigrated, and handled their travel reservations with the shipping company, Italian Line. The two ships took turns sailing between Naples and Halifax. Third class, in winter, was the cheapest way to travel. The poster showed the whole fleet of ships, including the brand new Cristoforo Colombo and its sister ship, the Andrea Doria, two luxurious liners that did the Naples-to-New-York route. During the summer before our departure, the Andrea Doria sank. Zio went into mourning for a few days, as if a family member had died.

  On the poster, the Saturnia, photographed from a distance and surrounded by an expanse of ocean, looked like a boat made of folded paper. It was long and slim, its hull painted black, the railings and outside upper decks white. As we approached it, so close to the pier, we could hardly see the water behind it. We faced an enormous black wall with tiny por
tholes that looked like small, mysterious eyes. I had to close my own eyes in fear of the massive shape before me. Mother made the sign of the cross.

  “There are as many people in that boat as there are people in all of Mulirena,” Zio said.

  The departure was scheduled for later. Once the luggage was checked in, we went to get something to eat nearby. We passed by a cart selling oranges, and I nudged my mother to get me one. Zio went up to the cart, and with hands in his pockets, asked the price.

  “Cento lire,” answered the woman.

  Mother hit her brother’s arm from his pocket. “Are you crazy?” she said. “Paying a hundred lire for an orange? What is it made of? Gold?”

  “Ebbé,” replied Zio. “We can all share it.”

  “Pay a hundred lire for a slice of orange that won’t even reach our throats?” Mother snorted and then yanked me away.

  Zio wanted to show us the Galleria and some of the other sights in the area. He walked us briskly past a castle, the Castel Nuovo, and the Royal Palace. Both imposing buildings had been residences to the French and then Spanish rulers of Southern Italy. Don Carlo’s ancestors, the founders of our home town, Mulirena, must have lived here once, I thought. We then stopped at a bar across from the palace and had caffe e latte, and a sfogliatella.

  “These are a specialty here in Napoli,” Zio said.

  I had never eaten one. When I bit into the flaky, crusty pastry filled with sweet custard and candied fruit, I forgot all about the orange.

  Zio had spent time in the navy and loved talking about ships. He took us on a tour of the pier, pointing out to Luigi the different types of sea vessels with foreign names and flags. We followed them, I holding Mother’s hand, and Lucia, walking behind, uninterested and mute. Then before we headed back, Zio stopped at a stand, and before Mother had a chance to protest, he bought Luigi a harmonica.

  A procession of people was already boarding the Saturnia, dragging bulging cardboard suitcases and parcels held together with string. There were only a few couples travelling together. Mostly, it was either men alone or women with children. Zio had special permission to come aboard and help us settle into our cabins. As we set foot onto the gangplank, the sound of hard metal underneath our feet made us walk cautiously down narrow steel stairs, clutching the railings. The ship resonated with the sound of footsteps, of luggage thumping against metal stairs, of children crying, mothers shouting, and cabin doors opening and shutting in the hidden corridors below us. Luigi ran excitedly in front of us, rattling his metal harmonica against the railings.

  “Slow down. Isn’t there enough noise on this ship that you have to make more of your own?” Mother yelled. “I’m already getting a headache.” The further we climbed down into the ship, the narrower and more congested the corridors and stairs became. Luigi finally found our cabin with our suitcases already inside it.

  I was surprised to find a thin, older woman with a brown furrowed face and grey hair knotted into a bun, sitting with two toddlers on the lower berth of a bunk bed against a dark corner of the cabin. There were two other bunk beds besides the one occupied by the woman. She introduced herself as Giuseppina, from Frosinone. The children were her two granddaughters. The woman’s daughter had left the girls behind when she emigrated two years earlier so she could work unencumbered and make enough money to send for them. Now there was a third child on the way. Giuseppina would go live with her in a place called Windsor and babysit all the children. Luigi was allowed to stay in the same cabin as us. Zio went to check that Margherita, a woman from Amato, who was travelling to Winnipeg with her child, was also settled into her cabin, not far from ours.

  A steward dressed in a white jacket arrived. He was a tall man of about thirty, broad shouldered and husky, with dark straight hair brilliantined in place behind his ears. He turned on a switch near the door and a faint light came on. “There’s electricity on this ship,” he said with a smile. “I’m Armando, your steward. I am from Rome.” He kept smiling as he checked everyone over from head to toe. In his white uniform and white gloves, he looked like he might be the ship’s captain. He marked off our names on a list and then examined the tags on each suitcase on the floor. He placed the bags next to the beds.

  Pointing to Mother and Giuseppina, he said, “The two signore should sleep on the lower beds. The two children can sleep with Grandma or on the top berth. If they fall, they won’t make as much noise. The boy can climb up too.” Then he bowed to Lucia. “The bella signorina will decide whether to sleep on the top or on the bottom, as she pleases.” I wasn’t given any choice, or any attention.

  Giuseppina, who in a few short minutes had not only told us all about herself and her daughter, but had inquired about all of us, answered sternly. “There are three signore in the room. The bella signorina has a husband waiting for her in Halifax.”

  Armando answered quickly, his eyes on Lucia. “Ammazza! They married you off before giving you first communion?” Lucia, for the first time in recent memory, chanced a small smile.

  Zio had just come back and shot back at him: “What kind of questions are these? Show some respect, or I’ll report you.”

  “Report me for what? You people are so hotheaded. It was only a question,” he said, then explained how to get to the dining room and lounge for lunch, and left.

  “He was just trying to be friendly. He didn’t mean anything by it,” Lucia said, sounding annoyed.

  Zio quickly retorted: “Ma, what business is it of his when you got married?”

  “Don’t trust these chiaccheroni from Rome,” Giuseppina added.

  Zio, satisfied that everything was in order, said he’d have to leave. We all followed him up to the ship’s deck, while Giuseppina and the girls stayed in the cabin. Zio hugged all of us and left quickly before we had a chance to cry. “I’ll stay on the pier until the ship departs,” he said, walking away. Then, before descending the gangplank, he turned and added. “Luigi, I beg you, eh. Take care of your mother and your sister.”

  From the deck, we watched the group of people assembled below, looking up at us, waving their handkerchiefs and blowing kisses. They formed an island of raised arms, surrounded by a swarm of people in motion, pushing baggage-loaded carts in all directions, like ants around an anthill. The whistles of ships, and the screeches of white seagulls hovering over us, deafened our ears. We spotted Zio, waving his handkerchief with the others.

  The Saturnia finally blew its foghorn and started moving away slowly, as if still held back by heavy weights. The waving became frenzied for a while, and then calmed down, until only a few diehard kept it up. We looked until we could no longer distinguish the white handkerchiefs from the flapping wings of the restless seagulls following the ship or scavenging for food around the pier.

  After accompanying Mother and Lucia back to the cabin, Luigi and I followed Armando’s directions and explored the ship. In the dining room, we admired the chandeliers and the rows of tables, all dressed in starched white tablecloths, and topped by hundreds of shiny glasses and dinnerware.

  “If this is third class,” Luigi said, “imagine the luxury in first class!” We sank into the sofas in the large lounge, the first and only hint of softness in that huge palace of steel. The beds had felt hard, and the cabin had been dim even with the light on. I decided that this is where I’d come to read.

  Back on deck, we watched the waves get higher as the boat moved deeper into the sea, until Castel Nuovo and the Gulf of Naples receded completely from our vision.

  We spotted a fish jumping over the waves; Luigi was sure it was a swordfish. “This is nothing,” he added. “Wait till we see sharks and whales!”

  We lost track of time, and when we went down to our cabin, the others were waiting for us to go up for lunch. Mother was upset that we had stayed away so long. It was nearly two o’clock when we sat at a table and were served pasta and thin cutlets by a waiter from Naples, w
ho kept offering us seconds.

  “What service!” Giuseppina said.

  After lunch, I wanted to stay in the lounge with the prayer book I had brought with me, but Mother said we should all go back for a rest, and we returned to the cabin. Lucia had chosen the lower berth next to the wall on the opposite side of Giuseppina, but I didn’t mind climbing the small ladder to the top. It was more private and I could see all the others, except Lucia below me. I arranged my purse, my book, and my notebook against the wall. My mother and brother took the beds in the centre of the room, in between us and Giuseppina.

  I knew most of the prayers in my prayer book by heart, and they didn’t mean anything anymore—just words we had repeated so many times before. I asked Luigi if he wanted to look at the thick novel, I Promessi Sposi, which we would have studied in high school had we stayed in Italy. He was practicing on his harmonica, cupping it in his hand to muffle the sound.

  “I’m trying to compose a tune. I’m not spending my time here reading a book. Anyway, I know the story already.”

  Everyone knew the story of Lucia and Renzo, betrothed to each other but prevented from marrying by a powerful man. I started reading; the print was so small, I could hardly see it in the dim light of the cabin.“Quel ramo del lago di Como che volge a mezzogiorno tra due catene non interrotte di monti, tutto a seni e a golfi, a seconda dello sporgere e del rientrare….” The first sentence seemed never to end, and I fell asleep before finishing it.

  5. DAY THREE

  WE DIDN’T GO TO DINNER that first evening on the ship. I fell asleep after the heavy, late lunch and slept right through the night. When Armando woke us all up the following morning, I was confused as to what day it was.

  “Buon giorno, signore e signorine,” he said cheerfully. “You slept very well. But don’t think of spending all of your time in bed. My advice to you is to stay up as much as you can, even when the weather gets rough.”