Sylvanus Now

by Donna Morrissey

  Clamping shut his mouth, he opened the door to his mother and slipped outside, carrying the empty water buckets.

  SYLVANUS WAS TO LEARN lots about reasoning that fall as the fishing season drew to a close, pitting him more and more into the company of his ailing wife. Truth was, he no longer felt himself the creator of his own path, but more the lowly subject of another. Undoubtedly, since the first moment he saw her, he’d been tripping over terrain where laws unknown to him determined reason. But never had he felt so lost as during those first months, watching her sickness grow along with her belly, hollowing her cheeks and rendering those luminescent eyes to mere bruises upon her shrinking face.

  Ordinarily, fighting his way through brush, struggling through knee-deep snow, couldn’t hold him as did standing in his boat and rolling on the wide, opened seas, listening to the ocean’s murmurings as she lapped around his boat like a coddling old mother. But after his boats were hauled up, and jiggers and puncheons stored, and close to a hundred pounds of fish soaking in brine for the winter’s eating, he eagerly sought the shelter of the woods, anything being preferable to her growing sullenness and the silence engulfing them both. Thankfully he still carried the newness of providing for his own house, and it was that—setting out his snare line, tracking caribou, and cutting firewood, along with his daily logging for the sawmills—that helped set his course through those darkening fall days, preparing for this, his second winter in his own house. For sure, it would be a lean winter indeed, if not for his prowess, he consoled himself one morning, smacking a surprised bull moose between the eyes with a bullet. After gutting, skinning, and quartering it, he cut a few meals off the carcass for himself and his mother before hanging the rest of it to freeze in the woodshed, then set off for home, feeling more calm than he had in months. And in the days to come, filling his Addie’s pots and roasters with the grainy brown meat of the boo birds and turrs (which she loved), and all those other saltwater ducks that flew low over the ocean and that he brought home by the boatload, and the plump white breasts of the partridge and grouse he shot in the back woods, and the eels he caught in the brook and pickled by the dozens, he started feeling again a sense of worth. Cripes, times he even felt himself lord of his manor again.

  With great affection, then, as the winds came and the snow started piling up outside, he would stand beside Adelaide, calming her as she watched in fright the windows drifting over. He’d go outside then, trampling the snow so’s she could see the blue of the sky and the grey of the ocean, assuring her that all was fine; just a bit of snow, was all, and she could go visit Eva, her mother, or anybody else she cared to anytime she wanted.

  “On that?” she once asked, staring at the wind-frenzied waters in the neck, crashing sheets of spray sometimes thirty, forty feet high against the cliffs. “Suppose somebody got sick, real sick, and needed the doctor?”

  “Woods road, silly,” he replied. “The lakes are all froze; easy to cross over. Wouldn’t take more than an hour on horse sled. Or Alex’s dog team—faster than a horse. And parts of the bay will be catching over soon enough. She’ll freeze straight up to Ragged Rock—a nice sled ride.”

  “I’m always scared walking on ice.”

  “She freezes too thick to be dangerous. By the middle of December, it’ll take a half hour to chop down through to the water. Addy, you getting nervous? Perhaps you’d like to stay with your mother this last month.”

  She turned from the window. “Nope. Nobody else leaves their house to have a baby, and I won’t either,” she replied, resuming her reign, leaving him fumbling behind as she shuffled through the days, her sickness never abating, her belly growing bigger and bigger, and her groans increasing as her hair grew limper and thinner, filling her hairbrush and coating her pillow in the mornings. It frightened him, it did, this ballooning weight upon her tiny frame, hunching her shoulders and crippling her lower back, sometimes making her hobble about the house, her hand rubbing her neck and spine. Yet other times she drifted ghost-like, the blue of her eyes lost in a shadow that foreclosed light as she wafted through it. Even her kitchen dulled, despite her attempts to keep up her daily polishing. But when finally she grew into her last weeks, and her horrible nausea appeared to be increasing, she became truly despondent, withdrawing to her bed.

  “It’s the smells. Everything bloody smells,” she cried as he came home from the woods one evening, chilled from a wind-driven rain that had lashed him all day, and cuddled up next to her on the bed. “And you, too, Sylvanus, your hair’s sticky with myrrh. You never bathed, did you? Oh, don’t argue with me,” she cried weakly as he protested his hair was still damp from a soaking. “It’s curdling my stomach, the stink of it. Go wash it agin—and soap it good this time.”

  “And I would if there was warm water,” he muttered, springing upright and heading back to the kitchen.

  “Kettle’s on the stove—not much I can do if it won’t boil,” she called after him.

  “You might fill it with water, Addie. It’d boil soon enough, then.”

  “Oh, don’t argue with me, Syllie, I can hardly lift a thimble, let alone a dipper full of water. Why don’t you wear a cap to keep the myrrh off your hair—the stink of it.”

  “I wears a cap every day, and myrrh don’t stink.”

  “Bloody hell, it don’t stink—worse than gurry.”

  “Perhaps you’d rather I sleep in the stage,” he said childishly, and checking that she wasn’t looking, he quickly ran his hand through his thatch, sniffing his fingers.

  “If you’re foolish enough,” she said. “Else take yourself off to Jake’s—for sure he’s hovering over his pit and drinking by now.”

  “Oh, you likes me smelling of smoke, do you? Perhaps I will, then.”

  “Matters not if I likes it. That’s what you smells like all time these days anyway, a smoked mackerel. Must be some fun, hogging around a fire all night, smoking and drinking.”

  “I don’t smoke,” he snapped.

  “Same difference if the fire’s smoking you. Ooh, go away from me, Syllie. How’d you like to be lying here sick as a dog and somebody arguing with you?”

  His eyes widened in disbelief. “It’s not me who’s arguing,” he yelled. Seizing his cap out of the boot box, he swung out the door into squalling winds.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  THE BACK WALL

  “BEST TO NOT GO near them when they’re like that,” said Manny.

  “Best not to go near them no time,” said Jake over the rain pelting the canvas canopy above their heads. “Foolish as hens, women are; cluck, cluck, clucking, and half the time not knowing what they’re clucking over.”

  “Ye-es, my son. Don’t suppose it got something to do with the rooster crowing in their faces, do it?” asked Manny with a wink at Sylvanus. “Jeezes, Syllie, get your face off the ground. Cripes, if that’s what you looks like around the house, no wonder she’s kicking you out the door.”

  Sylvanus tried for a grin. “Who owns that new long-liner tied up by the plant?” he asked distractedly.

  “Fellow from Hampden,” said Manny. “That’s three liners now, coming out of Hampden. Lot of new people getting into the fishing,” he added with a shake of his head.

  “Well, you knows, old man, the way the government’s praising the fishery these days,” said Jake. “Cripes, everybody that left years ago is now coming back for work in the plants and on the boats. Some good now, trying to make the outporters better off when there’s more people moving back by the droves, taking the jobs. Too many people, too many people getting licences and buying boats. She’s won’t last, buddy, watch and see, she’s not going to last. I say, if we’re going to get that trap, we better get at it,” he ended, nodding at Manny. “The way the berths are going, soon won’t be room on the water for another net.”

  Manny nodded tiredly. “Yes, b’ye, might as well. We’re buying a third trap,” he said to Sylvanus.

  “A third!? Christ, how you going to keep up with hauling all the
m nets?”

  “We’re getting rid of the flakes,” said Manny. “Sell straight to the plant in Ragged Rock. Easier, my son, it’s easier,” he quickly added as Sylvanus shrank back, looking like a youngster being abandoned on shore. “That’s what everybody is doing, giving up the flakes for the plants. Foolery, anyway, drying fish when the weather is always flying in your face. And besides, more money in selling green fish. Salt fish is going to the wayside.”

  “Before you starts,” said Jake, holding up his hand to block the protest already registering on Sylvanus’s face, “we’re asking you to come with us— Give me a chance to bloody finish!” he said loudly. “It’s no good you out there jigging all by yourself. Mother’s always on edge, and you might want to start thinking about her getting on in years. She won’t always be able to run to your flakes, covering up the fish when a sudden rain takes on, and for sure you’ll never get that one you married out on the flakes, not from what the women says—”

  Sylvanus near choked. “What the hell you talking about, Mother turning my fish? I pays your boys to do that.”

  “The boys!” snorted Jake. “Up the woods all the time, building camps, that’s all the boys are good for. Most times it’s Mother running to your flakes.”

  “By jeezes, it’s time somebody told me that, then,” roared Sylvanus, rising. “Them little bastards! I been paying them, and Mother doing the work?!”

  Manny waved him back down. “Just hold on,” he said impatiently. “Melita and Elsie been helping her—and no, they’re not going to say nothing to you about it, not with Mother threatening them.”

  “Oh, jeezes, don’t tell me no more,” cried Sylvanus.

  “No more to tell,” said Manny. “Forget about that now. There’s no problem with turning your fish; the women’s fine with it. It’s the future we’re talking about. Things are changing with the fishery, and we got to change too if we wants to stay at it and do either bit of good. The youngsters are all growing up, and by jeezes, their wants are starting to outgrow them. Other fishermen are doing good without their flakes and selling to the plants—from what they says. And anyway”—he paused, patting his younger brother on the knee—“that’s what we got figured, and going off the head talking about it won’t do no good. So perhaps you can think about it for a while before you makes up your mind.”

  “Already did,” cut in Sylvanus

  “Yup, like Father,” said Jake. “By jeezes, you’re his spit.”

  Manny shook his head irritably. “Just never mind all the arguing,” he said. “Nothing wrong with flakes and curing fish if that’s what a man wants to do. But,” and he lowered his eyes onto Sylvanus, “I’m getting out of it. And you’re welcome to come with us if you wants. And that’s all I’m saying.” He raised his mug of brew. “Come on, raise your jeezling mug,” he bawled out as Sylvanus took on a sullen look. “Brother, if them eyebrows keeps growing in, we’ll have to tie them up in ponytails so’s you can see where you’re going.”

  “Like the pothead whales, that’s what he’ll be like,” said Jake, showing a rare moment of humour, “all the time running aground.” He halted, a dawning look widening his eyes. “By cripes, you don’t suppose that’s why they throws themselves aground like that every year, do you?” he asked Manny. “They got eyelashes stuck in their eyes and can’t see where they’re going no more?”

  “Nay, suicide, my son—their women drives them to it,” Manny ended with a groan. “Because I tell you, buddy, women could drive a sunken boat to shore, women could.” Raising his mug, he washed back his words with a good dollop of brew.

  Jake stared at him keenly. “Hey, you cast out, too?” He broke into guffaws as Manny gave a mock shiver. “Aah, go tell her you loves her, b’ye, that’s all you got to do, go tell her you loves her!”

  “Shut your mouth,” said Manny. “Women is good in all ways—except when they’re looking my way. And that’s when I scuttles out the door like the dog. But I don’t be hanging my head over it all night, either,” he charged, leering at Sylvanus who was staring glumly into his brew. “What’s you pouting about now—the flakes or your wife? Bend over, my son, I kicks your arse. Go dig a hole, Jake, we buries him. Where’s that shovel? Go on home, b’ye, if that’s what you’re going to do all night, sit there and mope. And if it’s the wife you’re pouting about, you haven’t got a worry. Like the pup, she’ll be, cuddling all over you when you gets home. Yeah, that’s right,” he said as Sylvanus looked at him disbelievingly, “that’s what all women are like after a fight—nice and cuddly. What odds she just scratched out your eyes like the coyote, right, Jake? That’s the trick, right, Jake, telling her you loves her?”

  Jake threw a mangy look at his house. “And never mind they throws your supper to the dogs.”

  “Nay, don’t mind that stuff. Only because she likes dogs, she feeds them your supper, and that’s why you cuddles up to her like a pup, because she likes dogs. Guaranteed, my son. You listening, Syllie? Better be, my son, you wants to tame that woman of yours. You sees how Elsie is tamed, so you knows what you got to do now.”

  “Yes, b’ye,” said Syllie.

  “Yes, b’ye,” said Manny. “The Nows keeps their women happy because that’s what keeps us happy—when our women’s happy, right, Jake?” Manny broke into a hard laugh as Jake snarled back something undecipherable. “Look at him, look at him,” he roared to Sylvanus, “too goddamn joyful to talk. Yes, my son, yes, we knows your joy, we sees your joy all over your face, right, Syllie? All over his face. Come on now, let’s sing ’er up,” and grabbing Sylvanus’s hand, he held it to his heart, bellowing in a deep base, “We got the joy, joy, joy singing deep in our hearts.”

  “Jeezes, you’ll have her yodelling through the window, you keeps it up,” shouted Jake. “Shut your mouth, shut your bloody mouth. Jeezes! Screech owls, the both of ye,” he carried on as Sylvanus, along with Manny, buckled into laughter.

  The flakes were forgotten as the evening wore on, and the brew kept flowing, and Manny kept up a steady tirade of nonsensical things. And with the fire warming his bones, and his face broadening from laughing, Sylvanus soon forgot his fight with Addie. Was late, real late when he found himself leaning closer to the fire, all the time nodding and grinning; even when nothing was being said, he was nodding and grinning. Time to go home, he thought, and stood up. His legs wobbled like rubber beneath him, and he wondered how long he’d been drunk.

  “Now, enter like the lamb,” cautioned Manny as he set his sights onto the corner of the house and started staggering toward it. “Remember that—like the lamb.”

  “Thought it was the pup.”

  “Noo—yeah—noo, that’s later you cuddles like the pup. First, you got to get through the door, and that’s how you does it—enter like the lamb. Gets them right off if you bleats like the lamb.”

  “That right, Jake? Bleat like a lamb?” asked Sylvanus, kicking his eldest brother’s foot as he stumbled past him. “Can you show me, Jake? Can you bleat? Just show me how you bleats,” he begged, and yowled as a boot in the arse from Manny sent him stumbling into the winds blasting through the neck.

  Nice fellows, he thought of his brothers, weaving his way through the dark, nice fellows. “Bejesus, I’m not riding your back this night, hussy,” he muttered as the wind delivered a slather of spit from the sea against his face, “bejesus I’m not,” and he hurried his step toward home, yellow patches of light from the houses on his left divining his path, and his outstretched hands seeking an invisible railing against the seawater broiling a greyish white out of the abyss to his right.

  His mother’s house drew near, and he saw her face in the window, watching out for him. “Been doing it since you was three. Don’t ask me to stop now,” she’d shushed him once, after his wedding night, when he’d complained about her still doing so. And she hadn’t stopped, either, still treating him like the youngster, he thought, and he stood grinning, waving at her as he passed by, trying to keep a straight line so’s she wouldn
’t think him drunk and worry. The night turned blacker past her lamp-lit window. He staggered, trying to keep to the path and figure out the outline of his house through the darkness before him. His ears picked up the brook over the roar of the falls and the pounding of the sea, and he headed toward it. A window, he thought, weaving off the path and stumbling to find his way back, we needs a window on that damn back wall, that’s what we needs. What harm to have a little window to light the way home sometimes, especially if we’re to have youngsters, he thought solemnly. Yes, they’d have to have a window. He would tell her once he got inside—a window, we needs a window, Addie, a window to light the way home. That’s what he would tell her, then; but not in the rambunctious manner of the ram—“Addie, we needs a window!”—but real quiet like, “Addie, we needs a window on the back wall, just a small one so’s when we haves a youngster, it won’t go drowning itself in the brook, trying to get home— Heeyy!!” And he let out a cry as his feet slipped from beneath him at the same instant his mother opened her door, letting out the lamplight and showing him, too late, the brook broiling up to greet him.

  “Christ!” he cried out as the icy water flooded his boots. Then, scrambling back up the little incline with the water squishing through his toes, he stood shivering, waving his mother back inside.

  “Syllie! Did you fall in?” she called from her doorway.

  “Naw! Get back inside.”

  “Syllie!”

  “I’m here, I’m here on the other side!” he roared, waving wildly. “Go on in. Go on!”

  “Did you fall in?”

  “No, cripes, Mother, get your head inside. Go on.” And as her door closed, he grunted, balancing himself awkwardly on one foot while pulling off the boot of the other and emptying it.