Lightkeeper's Wife

by Sarah Anne Johnson

  Mr. Thomas Edward Atkins

  of Dangerfield, Massachusetts

  Saturday, March 30, 1844

  St. Mary’s Church 2 pm

  Reception to follow at Wind Rush Estate

  Main Street, Barnstable

  Wedding! Barnstable! Absolutely not. Hannah struggled with the wick in the lantern. The lever that controlled its height wouldn’t budge. She wiggled it back and forth, and shook the lantern. How could she go to Barnstable when John had gone missing there? When she imagined seeing people from her past who still lived in the houses they grew up in and worked on their fathers’ fishing boats or married the women their mothers picked for them, she wanted to loosen her collar and gasp for air. She went to John’s desk and stood over the logbook, turned a few pages and ran her finger down his rows of entries. His careful marks made her feel as though he were in the room. For a moment she longed for the way her life was when he was in it. What would he think of her now?

  She imagined the wedding, the whispering behind her back amid the earnest condolences. Hannah, how are you getting along? She was getting along just fine because she was here in Dangerfield tending the lights and not in Barnstable where her dead husband had last been seen. And how could Tom not have warned her? He was so focused on his need for a wife that he forgot about her feelings. All it had taken was for her to turn him down, and he’d given in to Cassandra. No, she could not think of that now. She didn’t need to witness Tom getting married. She slid the invitation into the back of the logbook where she hoped to forget it.

  ***

  A fluttering rattle on the northeast corner of the house drove Hannah up and into her boots. She pulled her woolen shawl on tight over her nightgown as she strode toward the stone hollow of the lighthouse. Hand clasped on the cold iron rail, she ascended the spiraling stairs. She cleaned the magnifying lenses before she lit each lantern, then worked her way around the lights the way John had shown her. Once he’d taken care of the lights, he kept his vigil by the fire and waited out the storm. He only ventured down to the beach to look for survivors at the tail end of the storm. His risks were calculated. He protected himself to ensure that the lights remained a beacon that sailors could trust. That was the difference between them. Hannah couldn’t bear knowing that there could be men in the surf fighting for their lives. She had to get in the boat. She had to help.

  As Hannah rounded the corner into the kitchen, Billy was sitting by the fire with the poker, which she nudged into the charred and broken logs. Her desire for Hannah distracted her now from her daily chores, from watching out for her fingers when she pounded the hammer, from standing back from the ax as she swung into a wide piece of spruce. Her desire could ruin her. She could lose her position here, hurt herself, or succumb to drinking, and so she tried to disown it. This worked so long as she focused on building the lifesaving apparatus, installing the bell system that could alert her if Hannah needed help on the beach. It worked until Hannah came in from a storm, her eyes alive with excitement, her body bristling with energy. Until Hannah leaned forward in the candlelight, her high cheekbones and the planes of her face cast in shadow. It worked until right now, when Hannah entered the room with her hair down over her shoulders, her nightgown knotted at her thigh.

  “I didn’t mean to wake you,” Hannah said, reaching over Billy to light the candle. Her nightgown brushed against Billy, her skin so close to Billy’s shirt Billy nearly vibrated with fear.

  The slow patter of rain started all at once, and wind rushed beneath the door. They both tipped their heads to listen and gauge the storm by the force of rain against the house. “I wanted to remind you about those loose shingles by my bedroom.”

  “Soon as it clears, I’ll fix it.”

  “I know you’re busy with the lifesaving rig. That’s more important, of course.”

  If the lifesaving rig didn’t work, they’d be limited in their rescues. Part of Hannah understood that while she could take the risk and row into a storm, she couldn’t always save the sailors, and she wanted to save all of them. She felt desperate to get the rig up and working. She took a damp pair of trousers from the back of a chair and slid them on beneath her nightgown. Then she faced the fire and pulled her nightgown off over her head. Billy turned away while Hannah layered herself in woolens.

  She wanted to remind Hannah of the danger, but the wind was less than a gale and Hannah had been out in worse. There would be no stopping her. That’s why Billy had installed the bell as a signaling system. The old ship’s bell she’d discovered in the barn rang with a sound that carried on the wind for a distance. She’d nailed it to a post at the top of the stairs and ran a heavy rope through eye hooks from the bell down to the beach. Every half hour Hannah was to ring the bell twice for an all clear. If there was a wreck or she needed help, she was to ring the bell continuously and Billy would respond. She’d gotten Hannah to agree that she would not go out in the boat alone.

  “You’ll use the signals and wait?” Billy said.

  “Yes.” Hannah slid an arm into her jacket and glancing at the tide chart to see when there would be low tide, when a ship was more likely to run aground. As Hannah stepped into the weather, a suck of air pulled the door shut behind her.

  Billy kept her vigil by the window so that she would be sure to hear the bell. She busied herself splicing lines for the lifesaving rig, drawing pictures of how she imagined the rig would work once the mast was in the ground. She had a piece of paper with the time written for every half hour—8:00, 8:30, 9:00—so that she could mark each time Hannah rang the bell. The first half hour dragged and Billy sat by the window. The rain tapped the glass, and the glass fogged, and she waited. Hannah hadn’t dragged the boat into the water, had she? No, Billy reassured herself. She put her rope work aside and stood to stretch and stoke the fire. Standing in the heat of the fire, she rearranged the pictures on the mantel.

  The daguerreotype of John caught her attention. She’d seen it every day, but only now began to take it in. Hannah’s husband leaned slightly to the left toward his wife, his frock coat and collar trim and neat. His trousers hung loose and slightly too long, his boots shabby beneath the cuffs. He wore his hair slicked back and long sideburns that made the line of his jaw more pronounced. He held his left hand to his lapel in the traditional manner meant to appear stately. A dimple in his chin looked like a crooked scar, off center and tilted to one side. But most striking were his eyes, which seemed to call out with mournful acknowledgment, as if they had seen all the world had to offer and knew better than to trust it.

  The bell rang clear through the wind and rain, two steady clanging signals. Hannah was still on the beach. Everything was okay. Billy marked the half hour in her log and went back to her rope work.

  ***

  For hours Hannah patrolled, first walking north a half mile toward the post she’d planted to let her know if she’d gone far enough. Then south to the place where the dunes rolled back and the sand turned rusty orange. The storm tide ran north along the beach as fast as a person could walk. In the movement of her body she felt reassured. The ocean reminded her who she was. The overwhelming force of it put her right in her place. She pulled her collar up, tucked her scarf tight around her neck, and headed north again with wind in her face. She was nearly at the stairs when the wind rushed hard from the northeast. The staircase whined. The canvas tarp over the surfboat snapped in the wind.

  Silver light, like something exposed.

  The outline of a ship two hundred feet out. One great white sail caught in the flashing light. The hull a shadow leaning toward the safety of the lighthouse.

  Hannah yanked on the bell rope. Over and over, she rang the signal for a shipwreck. Would Billy hear her in the wind? The vessel was close enough to shore to use the lifesaving rig. She dug behind the stairs for the gear, pushing aside the toolbox and a sack of life jackets, until she had the ropes, life ring, and sand anchor
lined up on the beach. Again, she rang the bell. Where was Billy? She wasn’t going to take any risks this time. The schooner was over fifty feet long and tilted so that the decks rose like a hill, the lower rail almost underwater. A lifeboat from the sinking ship floated belly up in the waves, but there was no sign of anyone in the water. Only shades of sandy green where the bottom lay close to the surface.

  Hannah dragged the ropes onto a canvas tarp, which she took and tried to drag to the surfboat. She was sweating in her clothes in spite of the cold. The ropes were too heavy for one person to lift, but still she pulled the tarp against the wind.

  When Billy called out, Hannah felt buoyed by the sound. She wiped her sandy gloves on the back of her trousers. “Hurry the hell up!” she yelled through the clamor of wind and sea.

  Spars croaked and strained. Salt spray flew over the surfboat and sloshed in the bilge as Hannah maneuvered the surfboat alongside the schooner’s aft rail. The masts leaned over, ready to snap with the weight of water filling the sails. The ship’s crew had been caught with no time to take down the canvases. Men clung to the bulwark. The bow of the schooner lifted and sank the stern. The keel dug itself deeper into the sandy bottom, and the great strain shivered through the hull, a hollow moan, and then the rush of water into the lower cabin.

  “Who’s in command?” Hannah shouted through the wind, careful to maintain a safe distance between the surfboat and the wreck. A sailor with a gray walrus mustache waded through the flooded deck and looked at her, taken aback.

  “I’m the captain!” He wore his black collar up against the wind, his legs solid and braced against the sea.

  “I’ve got a rig to get your men to shore.”

  Hannah threw the heaving stick, which was a small block of wood attached to the free end of rope by a smaller length of twine. He caught the stick and hauled the rope aboard until he reached the paddle end upon which Billy had painted the instructions.

  Make the tail of the pulley fast to lower mast. If mast gone, then to best place you can find. See that rope in pulley runs free, and show signal to shore.

  “Hurry,” she said. The captain looked worried, but Hannah pointed at the coiled ropes. A breaker lifted the surfboat, and dropped, then lifted again so that the surfboat slammed into the schooner’s rail. With one of the oars, Hannah pushed away from the ship and rowed clear while the men scrambled back. The captain looked toward the lighthouse, standing in water up to his thighs, and waved a man down from the rail. He shoved the instructions into the man’s hands and pushed him toward the mast.

  “How many on board?”

  “Thirteen,” the captain said.

  “Give me eight. Seas are coming up. I can’t come back out, but we’ll get you ashore with the lifesaving rig.” Hannah rowed alongside the schooner. Before the captain had time to give any orders, one of the sailors leapt across into the surfboat in his panic, tipping the boat hard to one side with the force of his weight landing in the bow. He hit his head on the seat and groaned before righting himself, hands to his head and squinting against the pain.

  The rest of the crew followed orders, standing back from the rail until they were told to cross. Those instructed to stay behind held the surfboat alongside or watched the lifesaving lines to keep them clear.

  The next sailor dropped his legs into the boat, then let the rest of his weight down slowly and folded himself onto the seat beside the first. Their tattered jackets, wet boots, pants that stuck to their legs left them exposed to the cold. “For chrissake, hurry up,” Hannah said, helping the next man across while the surfboat rocked against the schooner.

  With the last man onboard, Hannah cast off. The weight of the men helped balance the boat in the waves. She put one of the sailors to work unloading the rope one coil at a time so that it drifted slack behind them, but not so slack that they lost sight of it underwater. “Just make sure the lines don’t get tangled. Don’t take your eyes off it,” Hannah said.

  “What the hell is this?” the tattooed man asked.

  “Shut your mouth.” The young sailor’s voice punctured the air like a spike. His pale skin and dark eyes had no look of hardness or weather about them. He wore his hair cut close, and when he worried his frayed jacket cuff, his hands moved tenderly as a whisper while all around was a chaos of wind and storm currents carrying the surfboat north. Hannah compensated for the north-running tide by rowing slightly south.

  She was focused on her rowing, pulling back and aiming for Billy. It’ll get your shipmates ashore. We just have to move fast.

  Near the beach, Hannah pulled the oars in and jumped into surf to her knees. She ordered the men to help haul the surfboat clear of the water. They moved sluggishly, weighed down by wet clothing, cold, and fatigue. If she could keep them moving, they’d warm up. “There’s a pile of wood and dry matches by the stairs,” she told them. “Get a fire going. Hurry up.”

  Billy had set the crossbar: two ten-foot boards bolted together and crossed near the top to form an “X”. She hauled the rope, heavy now as it stretched through the water, and hooked it to the sand anchor she’d constructed from two six-foot boards crossed and bolted at their centers. After she made sure the lines ran clear through the block and tackle, she hauled the free end to pull them taut, and the crossbar lifted and sustained the bridge of rope from shore to the stranded schooner.

  Hannah eyed the system of pulleys as Billy worked the rope to run the life ring toward the ship. She remembered how light she’d felt riding in the life seat above the ground and the solid feeling of the rig. But how would it feel to a man coming ashore over frothy seas with wind straining the rig and an unstable vessel? The canvas seat in the life ring had to hold the heavier weight of a man, the captain had to fasten the ropes properly, and the sailors had to be able to climb into the rig without fouling the lines or tearing the coarse stitches. It’s going to work. Don’t worry. It’ll work. Hannah forced her mind to focus on the rig reaching across the water.

  Once the life ring reached the wreck, Billy waited, attuned for the slightest vibration, but it was a man’s weight sagging the line that let her know it was time to haul the rig to shore. She stood back to get leverage and work the ropes. The tattooed sailor stood behind her to haul on the lines, his body leaning forward with Billy and pulling back with all of his strength. Faster and faster they pulled. The sailors gathered around, watching the ropes strain the pulleys. “Keep going,” Billy said, out of breath, her arms rubbery and burning. “He’s almost here.”

  The sailor approached the beach, arms draped over the ring. He was alert, watchful. “Hurry up, bring him in,” one of his shipmates said. The rig carried him as far as the crossbar and he dangled there like a child in a swing.

  Billy figured it had taken about twenty minutes to get the rig out to the ship and back ashore with the sailor. They had four more men to bring in, including the captain. That was over an hour to go, and the waves were getting huge. Hannah couldn’t go out in the skiff now, not in these seas. They had to rely on the rig. “Get him out,” Hannah said.

  “And make fast work of it,” Billy said. The crew swept into motion like a dark cloud, one indistinguishable from the next, with their wet clothes clinging to their bodies, their shoulders hunched and sticking together as if for warmth, but it was fear kept them close like that.

  Billy lowered the life ring, and the crew yelled orders back and forth to each other as they helped the sailor from the seat. The man was at least six feet tall once he struggled to his feet, with rosy skin and a helmet of black hair. Billy recognized him at once, and when Briggs caught his breath and walked up the beach, she kept her eyes on her work. As soon as Hannah cleared the lines, Billy sent the life ring out again. The wind gathered from the northeast, and the rig creaked where it ran through the pulleys. The life seat swayed on the lines. Billy felt the vessel shift and jostle the rig. The lines lurched and then settled down again, and the men
who were not tending the rescued sailor hovered around the rig.

  “Is it okay?” one of the men asked, his black eyes reflecting the fire. The wreck shifted as the tide went out, which placed more weight on the keel. At some point the hull would crack, the schooner would go down and take the rig with it. They had to get the men to shore fast. Billy watched the life seat until it reached the schooner. When she felt a man on the other end, the tattooed man joined her on the ropes.

  Hannah forced her way between them and stood behind Billy, then Briggs fell in line behind her. The four of them hove the weight in unison, bringing the rope in several feet at a time. The pulleys creaked and groaned with the weight of the sailor swaying the rig.

  “Keep going,” Hannah said. “Don’t stop.”

  But the weight on the line felt heavier than before. When the buoy came into view, three men were clinging for their lives, one seated in the buoy as intended, one draped across him, and another dragged through the water on a rope. On shore, they fell from the life ring and told how the hull had cracked and the schooner was taking on water as the sea poured into the bilge. “There’s only the captain,” one of the men said. “He ordered us all off the boat.”

  Billy worked in a frenzy to clear the lines and get the life ring to the captain. She waited to feel a weight on the line, but the rope snapped, and she fell backward into the sand. The crossbar tipped forward, and the pulleys whirred as the ship tilted hard toward the beach. The crew ran into the surf and pulled the lines hand over fist, yelling at each other to get out of the way, and pull harder, and hurry up, hoping to find the captain, but all that came in was a frayed end of rope.

  “Jesus Christ, do something,” one of the men yelled.

  Hannah ordered the young sailor to help her push the boat into the water. When he tried to climb aboard with her, she shoved him away.

  Billy ran into the water. She lunged to get hold of the surfboat, then grabbed Hannah by the elbow. Billy pulled Hannah out of the surfboat so hard they both fell back into the water. “It’s too rough,” Billy said, gasping. “You’re not going out.”