Neil McTaggart’s Crossing – Part 2: Arrival
by Joseph McTaggart
The ship groaned as it pushed into Halifax Harbour, cutting through a pale morning mist. Neil stood near the rail, coat buttoned high against the cold, his fingers wrapped around a small stone in his pocket. The stone was smooth and grey, polished by sea air and worry — a gift from his mother.
“When you feel lost,” she’d told him, “just hold this. It’ll remind you where you came from.”
He had barely let go of it the whole voyage.
Canada came into view slowly — not soft like Ayrshire’s hills, but wide and cold and sharp. Tall trees, wooden buildings, chimneys coughing smoke into the sky. The land looked tired, like it had been waiting too long.
A sailor nearby muttered, “We’re here.”
Neil didn’t answer. He was too busy trying to believe it.
The Dock
Chaos met them on land. Dockhands shouted. Horses pulled carts over wet stones. Boxes clattered. The air smelled of brine and coal smoke.
Neil kept his head down and followed the others. His boots were too loose and his coat too warm. Everything felt too loud.
Inside the immigration hall, the noise didn’t stop — it just changed. Babies cried. Men spoke in too many accents. A woman prayed quietly in the corner. Neil waited his turn, holding his case with one hand and the stone with the other.
A man in a long coat called him forward.
“Name?”
“Neil McTaggart.”
“Age?”
“Eighteen.”
“Can you read or write?”
“No, sir.”
“Who are you meeting?”
“My uncle. Robert Jefferey. Halton Hills, Ontario.”
The man scribbled on a paper Neil couldn’t read and handed it to him.
“Settlement train leaves in two days.”
Neil nodded and stepped aside, clutching the paper as if it might disappear.
The Holding House
The holding house smelled of boiled onions and damp wool. Neil found a mattress and kept his suitcase beside him. He ate bread and stew and slept with the stone under his pillow.
That night, he opened his mother’s letter again. He couldn’t read it — not properly — but he touched the loops of her handwriting and tried to hear her voice in the curves. It was enough to make his chest ache.
He remembered her standing at the harbour. She hadn’t cried. Just hugged him close and said, “You’ll know what’s right when it comes. Just listen to your heart.”
He hadn’t known what that meant then.
But maybe now he was starting to.
The City
On the second day, he was allowed to walk the harbour streets. Halifax was wooden and fast — men in tall hats, women carrying cloth bundles, boys with newspapers shouting headlines Neil couldn’t understand.
He bought a roll from a bakery, pointed and handed over coins. The woman said something he didn’t catch, but he smiled anyway.
He saw a church and stood outside for a while. It didn’t look like the kirk back home, but it had a door, and a bell, and people who walked in slowly. That gave him comfort.
But when the train whistle blew in the distance, Neil felt a pull inside him — like something bigger had just started.
Westward
The train rolled out of Halifax like a storm with wheels. Neil sat by the window and watched the sea vanish behind him. Forests appeared — darker and deeper than anything he’d ever seen. Snow clung to the trees like dust on old cloth.
Across from him sat a man with kind eyes and dark skin. His name, he said softly, was Yusuf. He spoke slowly, carefully, as if English had sharp corners.
At sunset, Yusuf opened a cloth bundle — bread, boiled eggs, and some kind of sticky cake — and offered Neil a piece.
Neil hesitated.
His father’s voice filled his head:
“You don’t take food from strangers, and certainly not from those outside the faith. That’s not our way.”
Neil stared at the bread.
Then his mother’s voice:
“Kindness doesn’t check names first. It just acts.”
He looked at Yusuf again. The man’s face was open — not demanding, just offering.
Neil reached out, took the bread, and nodded. “Thank you.”
Yusuf smiled and broke the egg in two. Neil gave him a bit of cheese in return.
They didn’t speak much more, but when Neil lay back that night with the train still rumbling under him, he felt something loosen in his chest. Something his mother would have been proud of.
The Land Unfolds
The train crossed rivers, flat lands, and towns with names Neil couldn’t read. He shared food with Yusuf and sometimes just sat in silence. The days blurred into each other.
He dreamed of his mother. Of her hands. Of the stone. Of Sunday afternoons with the fire low and the wind tapping at the window.
Every time he touched the stone, he remembered who he was — and who he might yet become.
Arrival
The train finally slowed at a tiny wooden platform. A man stood there, still and waiting, beside a wagon and horse.
Neil stepped off, suitcase in hand.
The man took one look and said, “Neil?”
Neil nodded. “Aye.”
The man had strong hands, weather-worn clothes, and a quiet way of standing. He didn’t smile, but his voice was gentle.
“I’m Robert Jefferey. Your mam’s brother.”
Neil’s chest tightened.
Then he looked closer — and there they were.
His mother’s eyes.
Not exactly the same, but close enough that his throat closed.
“You’ve her look, you know,” Robert said.
“So do you,” Neil whispered.
Robert picked up Neil’s suitcase like it weighed nothing and nodded toward the wagon.
“Come on. It’s a long ride. We’ll talk on the way.”
Neil climbed up beside him. The wind smelled of pine and woodsmoke. The wagon rocked into motion.
He touched the stone in his pocket and looked ahead.
A new life was waiting. And for the first time, it didn’t feel like running away.
It felt like arriving.
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