Small Beauties by Elvira Woodruff Page B

until she noticed something special. She quietly opened her hem and slipped the small beauty in.

    Later that day, Darcy took one last walk with Granny down Derry Lane. “ ’Tis a big ocean that will soon be between us,” Granny whispered, a tear rolling down her wrinkled cheek. “And the years will come and go like so many waves upon the shore. I’m countin’ on you, my girl, you who notice so much. With all those small beauties you keep, here is one more.” She pressed the worn bead back into Darcy’s hand. “Help the others to remember, and not just the sadness, the hurt, and the hunger. Help them
to remember all the beauty they left behind.”

    “But I don’t want to go, Gran!” Darcy sobbed. “I want to stay here with you.”
    “Oh, my little one,” Granny sighed. “I know, I know.”
    Now there is no farewell sadder than the farewell of forever, and so it was with many tears that the O’Haras bid their beloved Ireland good-bye. They traveled by foot and by cart, by ferry and by boat. The seas were rough and people were crowded close belowdecks. Darcy covered her face with her scarf to keep the stink from her nose as the ship pitched to and fro on the choppy sea.

    After many long weeks of travel, the family finally crossed the wide ocean to America. Darcy found the island of Manhattan very different from the island she had known.

    Where’s the heather?
she wondered.
Where’s the bog?
    Instead of tiny cottages, Darcy saw tall buildings stretched to the sky. Instead of fields of rotting potatoes, she noticed shops and carts overflowing with fresh fruits and vegetables.
Instead of barefoot children dressed in rags, she saw girls and boys wearing hats, coats, and shoes! Everything was different. Everything was new. And best of all was the hope that the family could one day buy land of their own.

    But for all the newness, Darcy remembered the old. The first week in their new country found the O’Haras gathered together around a smoky little stove in a cramped city cellar. They were worn and weary, tired to the bone. And as they talked of their day and the days to come, Darcy silently began to loosen the stitches of her hem.

    “What have we here?” her father asked, looking up from his pipe.
    Darcy smiled as she pulled out her small beauties from home.
    First came a little round pebble covered in moss.

    Next came a magpie’s feather, black as night.

    There were dried blossoms of buttercups,

    dog violets,

    and heather too.

    “
Ach mucha.
Dear me.” Mother gasped at the sight of the old wooden bead from Granny’s rosary.

    A hush fell over the family then as they watched Darcy next pull a little chip of slate from her hem.

    And what is that one there?” her brothers whispered, leaning in close.
    “ ’Tis a bit of our hearthstone,” she told them, holding the chip in her palm.
    And suddenly the old familiar smell of a peat fire was in the air. They could hear Granny humming to the baby and the creak of her chair. They heard their own laughter as the piglets squealed. And soon the hushy whisper of Granddad’s voice filled their ears. “Long ago, on our fair Isle of Erin . . .”

    And so it was that Granny O’Hara’s prediction came to be true, for those small beauties that Darcy held in her hand called up the very memories her family held most dear. And Darcy Heart O’Hara went right on noticing.

Author’s Note: While Darcy and her family sprung from my imagination, the spark for their story came from my reading about a very real family who was forced to leave Ireland during the famine.
    They left County Cork in 1847, sailing first to Canada and then on to America. Sadly, the mother of this family died aboard ship, but her children survived and settled with their father in Michigan. One son, William, went on to marry and have a son of his own called Henry.
    This boy loved to tinker with the machines on the farm, and he grew up to become one of the forefathers of American industry.