After hours of waiting, she heard: “Mary O’Connell?”
As a doctor began to look over Mary, her heart raced.
“You are nervous,” he said. “Just take a deep breath…”
Mary inhaled, shut her eyes, and said a prayer.
“Next,” the doctor said, pointing toward another man sitting at a desk, who then checked Mary’s identity against the ship’s manifest.
“Welcome to the United States,” he said.
Mary didn’t move. Tears came.
“Welcome to the United States,” he repeated.
“What do I do now?” Mary asked.
“Anything you want,” he said, smiling. “This is the land of opportunity.”
“Mary,” the girl heard a woman call. “Mary, this way!”
The older woman who had calmed Mary on the ship was motioning for her.
“My family is headed to a boardinghouse in New York City,” she said. “You can come with us where you will be safe.”
When they arrived, Mary was immediately overwhelmed by New York: It was loud and crowded. People moved at a pace Mary had never experienced.
The family set up a cot at the boardinghouse and Mary slept in a room with eight others. Between the snoring and the noise of the city, Mary was unable to sleep, so she arose and went to the living room of the boardinghouse where she sat in front of a fire.
Mary began to cry, as she thought of home, of her mother, of that sewing machine in front of the fireplace. And—just like the man at Ellis Island had promised—opportunity came to Mary.
“I heard you crying,” the older woman from the ship said to Mary.
“I miss my family,” she said.
“Do you have any skills?” the woman asked.
“I can sew,” Mary replied.
“Then you will find work,” she said. “Now, let’s get some rest.”
Mary rose at dawn and began blindly meandering from tailor shop to seamstress shop in New York, inquiring if they had any jobs available.
“We don’t hire immigrants,” they replied.
“How old are you?” others asked. “You’re just a child.”
By late afternoon, Mary was exhausted and hungry. She felt as if the pace and hubris of New York were eating her alive. As she stood outside a dressmakers shop, rejected again, a well-dressed woman emerged from a carriage carrying a sack. Mary watched as the woman entered the shop and began gesturing excitedly to the owner behind the counter, her giant, feathered hat and long, ruffled skirt moving in concert with her motions. She pulled beautiful white fabric that looked like clouds from the sack.
Mary walked to the shop door and cracked it slightly.
“We cannot do that,” the man with the moustache said. “I’m sorry.”
“Please,” the woman asked.
The man continued to shake his head.
The woman exited and whisked by Mary, a look of disappointment etched on her pretty face.
“Madam?” Mary asked.
“I have no money for beggars,” the woman said, brushing off Mary.
“I can make that dress for you!” Mary stated proudly.
“You can?”
The woman stopped before Mary, considering her, as her carriage driver opened the carriage door. “My baby will be baptized next Sunday, and I need a dress for myself that is as sacred as the occasion. The man said his shop didn’t make communion dresses, and he knew no one that could.”
“I can!” Mary said, lifting her head.
“You can?” the woman asked warily.
“Yes!” Mary said. “Except I have no tools or space. And the gentleman in this shop said he was not hiring.”
“Wait here,” the woman said. “I’ve been a client of his for a long time. We’ll see about that.”
The woman again entered the shop and began pointing back at Mary, whose heart had risen to her throat.
Finally, the owner gestured at Mary to enter.
“You will do fine in America,” the carriage driver said to Mary, smiling.
Mary entered the man’s shop.
“This is your only chance,” he said, his moustache twitching. “I am Mr. Edwards.”
The woman nodded at the man, and then handed Mary her material and a dress pattern.
“You have until dusk,” he said, pointing toward a back room. “You will pay this lady back if you ruin her material, understand?”
Tears formed in Mary’s eyes. “Thank you, madam. Thank you. And thank you, Mr. Edwards.”
Mary nodded at the woman as she smiled and exited, and then pulled a curtain, revealing a back room where an army of women sat at treadle sewing machines—row after row—making men’s suits, women’s gowns, and little girls’ dresses.
It resembled a ballet to Mary, as women moved in sewing syncopation and rapt rhythm with one another, feet flying, hands dancing, bobbins bobbing, and colorful thread spinning, which looked like fire exploding from their feverish work.
Mary scanned the room, and a woman with a tight grey bun nodded toward an ancient Singer sewing machine on a big treadle stand in the very back of the workspace. She pointed a thick hand with muscled fingers at the machine, a bracelet around her wrist jangling as if a hundred wind chimes had been rattled.