"So, what's there for us to do?" Hermione said.
"When the thing gained the surface," Charles said, "a section of it burst apart. I don't know, release of pressure or some such thing."
"Is this some sort of rare phenomenon or something?" Tom asked.
"Off the record, the Navy says this has been happening since the war ended. All over the Atlantic, apparently. Off the coast of France. Off the coast of England and such. U-boats popping up, and the Navy said that just last year one showed up in a Norwegian fjord. Some guy pissing off the rail of his trawler under a full moon got a once-in-a-lifetime surprise, eh?"
"Our U-boat, Charles, was sunk when?" Hermione asked. "Is that for the public?"
"Late 1944. It's sat at the bottom of the harbor since late 1944. Probably it filled with gases and buoyed up. But part of the hull blew open, and we're told there's all sorts of things been jettisoned."
"And that's where we come in," Tom said.
"There's items distributing themselves far and wide, some already washed up to Dartmouth, we're told," Charles said. "And that's why they called us, and that's what the triple overtime's about."
"Look, Charlie, say we volunteer," Hermione said. "Tell us straight out, are there bodies?"
"I wasn't told," Charles said.
"There has to be bodies inside the U-boat," Tom said.
"Doesn't mean they've got out into the water," Charles said.
Finally, all three of us said okay, finished our beers, took handfuls of crackers from the basket at our table for a little sustenance, seeing as we hadn't had supper, and followed our foreman to his car, parked not more than a block from Rigolo's. In twenty minutes we were out in the harbor again.
Good Lord, what a spectacle, Marlais. What a spectacle of history. In 1960, the City of Halifax purchased two new tugboats, equipped with all the latest gadgetry and sporting twice as many running lights as the old tugs. They still had truck tires secured all around just below the railing, to protect the tug from blows—that much hadn't changed. When Hermione, Tom and I motored out a ways, we saw that tugs were on either side of the U-boat and eight crewmen were standing on the thing itself, fixing hooks and ropes. By my quick calculation, there were no fewer than fifteen private boats out there, too, including a small cabin cruiser. Harbor police in a launch were warning them with a bullhorn to keep a safe distance. Cameras flashed, mostly from a boat owned and operated by the Mail. As we got closer, we could see, through binoculars, at the rail of the closest tugboat, two representatives from the coroner's office, with official identification badges hung around their necks. A uniformed RNC officer and a half-dozen sailors were on deck, too.
Closer yet, we could see patches of the U-boat's original black color, but in general the paint had gone to leprosy and rust. The entire hull was covered with barnacles, the conning tower as well. As we watched, one of the tug's crew crowbarred open the hatch. The hatch cover was now upright, and three men shone flashlights and gazed down into the hole. Their mouths were covered with what looked like surgical masks.
Faded but legible on the bow was U–99. The loud, incessant whine of an industrial saw started up as a man in protective gear and wearing goggles attempted to cut the fence. In a few minutes we saw a link break apart and a length of fence fall into the water. When the saw had started up, dozens of gulls scattered, flew off and back, then swirled overhead as if they'd been drawn by a carcass, the likes of which they'd never seen, in Halifax Harbor at least.
When the RCN officer waved us away, we veered off, and just as we got out of range of the tugboat lights and into dark water, we saw a decomposed body, or what shapeless stuff was left of a body, inside a German uniform, contorting and changing shape with the movement of the water. Tom cut the engine and we drifted.
Really, the only thing that looked at all solid was the belt buckle. I'd seen the buckle glint, and now I shined my flashlight on it and—whoosh!—in swooped a gull, which nabbed the buckle. The gull tried to rise with it but was pulled back down, and the bird refused to let go. It sort of half fluttered above and half sat on the uniform, lifting it a little, attempting to dislodge the buckle. Eventually the gull abandoned the effort and coursed back up into the black rainy sky.
The three of us had drifted close to the body, and when Tom poked it with his gaffing hook, Hermione said, "If you keep doing that, I'll vomit on your shoes."
Tom pulled in his gaff and said, "Guess what? I vote against attending to these remains. Let's leave them alone."
"Me, too," I said.
"It's unanimous, then," Hermione said.
"Too bad that German sailor in the water there didn't live to see our example just now," Tom said, "of Canada being a country where everyone gets a vote, eh?"
We looked over at the U-boat. All that macabre industry. Sparks spraying off the industrial saw. I felt we were out among some madness or other.
"We should've grabbed some sandwiches or something," I said.
"I didn't think of it, either," Tom said.
We spent another five hours out there—wallets, shoes, plates, not much else. One logbook. One album of family photographs. Many items of clothing. Hour after hour, peering through binoculars, we followed the progress of the salvage crew and then, near dawn, saw U–99 towed in to Purdy's Wharf. It had taken the entire night, but they'd done it.
"Let's head in, too," Tom said. "We've done enough."
Hermione pointed to the five burlap sacks we'd filled. "Not all that much loot," she said. "Except for triple overtime, it's been a pretty useless night. But we won't tell anyone that, now will we?"
"Next time Charles tells us one of these bastards pops up in our harbor," Tom said, "we should bargain. Immediate retirement at full salary, plus we each get a house in Cape Breton, plus medical for the rest of our lives. Or else the answer's no."
"Let's stick together on that," Hermione said.
"I've never been to Cape Breton," I said. "Is it nice?"
Close to shore, Tom barely maneuvered around a flotilla of sea ducks, peacefully sleeping. And the tugs and U-boat had just passed noisily by. At Purdy's Wharf we stood awhile under a tarpaulin roof set on poles and watched close-up as six RCN itemized and photographed the contents of the burlap sacks. They were very methodical about it.
"I figure it as seven hours' triple overtime," Tom said.
"Seven and a half," Hermione said. "I'm the one wore a wristwatch out there, remember?"
Charles drove up. We got into his car. Hermione was the first to get dropped off at home. When Charles pulled up at the curb, he said, "All of you look like this whole night's been one solid punch in the gut. Today's what?"
"Thursday," Hermione said.
"My decision is, everybody takes the rest of today and Friday off."
"Good Lord, Charlie," Hermione said, "marry me."
"Do I have to tell my wife?"
"That question shows remorse in advance," Hermione said. "Forget it."
"Today and Friday off and full pay accorded," Charles said. "Meantime, I'll arrange a substitute crew, no problem there. If you want, drop by the office, I'll cash out your triple overtime. Otherwise, we'll take care of it Monday morning, first thing."
"See ya, fellas," Hermione said. "I'm off to dreamland. After a whiskey. And not on the rocks, either." She got out of the car.
Bone tired, I slept on and off throughout the day and night and late into Friday morning. Hardly got out of bed at all except for tea, a bowl of oatmeal, bathroom and to listen to the radio. Friday evening I dropped by Ballade & Fugue, and the moment I stepped through the door, I heard the teeth-grating sound of a needle gouging a gramophone record. "Talbot, you dunce!" Randall said. "I told you, if you carry a big stack of records like that, you can't see where you're going."
"Sorry, Pop," Talbot said. He was sixteen now.
Randall laughed. "That's okay. I'm always so happy when you're putting in hours here with me. Besides, that gramophone wasn't long for the world, anyway.
"
"Pop, try calling it a record player, remember? It's not your old RCA Victor anymore." There was great affection between them.
"Hey, Wyatt," Talbot said. "You're here—it must be Friday, right?"
"Last week I came in both Tuesday and Friday," I said.
"Right, my dad told me that."
"Wyatt, have some coffee and let's listen to Bach's unaccompanied cello suites," Randall said. "They make some people lose the will to live, but they cheer me right up."
"Just what the doctor ordered," I said.
"Listen to this from the liner notes," Randall said. "'Played as Bach intended they be, Pablo Casals succeeds in not allowing a single note of compromised sadness. A profound accomplishment.' Know what? I didn't know you could compromise sadness."
"I guess a lesser cellist could," Talbot said.
While the Bach cello pieces played, customers drifted in and out, a few making purchases. Suzanne, Talbot's girlfriend, dropped by, and Talbot left with her, and by eight o'clock it was just Randall and me. I thought, I've been coming to Randall's store for well over twenty years, subtracting my time in Rockhead, and I often thought about his store even then. There were no other consequences to the evening, I suppose, except that I envied Randall for having such passion and dedication toward his chosen profession, record store owner and classical music expert. He asked me about the U-boat, and I described it as best I could. "Somebody should've blasted some Wagner through loudspeakers off those tugboats," Randall said. "You know, provide a nostalgic sendoff to Hitler's finest. May they rot in peace."
And then we settled into the comfortable banter we'd come to rely on. Randall on the threadbare sofa, me in the chair with the lumpy cushion and broken springs, listening to cello music. Just before he closed up shop, Randall said, "Wyatt, my friend, wonders never cease."
"Don't tell me Ballade and Fugue is making a profit so far this year."
"Not quite that wonderful," he said. "An hour before you got here, one of those RCN who put me in hospital came in and apologized, right in front of my son. You could've knocked me over with a feather. He had his wife with him, and their two daughters. His German wife he'd met in Germany. She bought a few recordings."
Saturday afternoon I walked down to the harbor. U-99 was elevated in dry dock, on reinforced scaffolding. There was also a grid of beams, specially made to compensate for any possible shift in the bulk of the submarine. Upward of thirty people had come with their cameras, posing with U-99 in the background or taking pictures of the boat on its own. Trucks had converged from a local television station and the Department of Health, and an RCN jeep and a few other official-looking vehicles were parked nearby. On deck three men stood near the open hatch. They were wearing black frogmen's suits and buckle-up galoshes and had surgical masks over their mouths, a strange combination. One by one they climbed down, hauling in the hose of an industrial vacuum—the truck it was attached to was close by. On the truck's doors it read MONTREAUX REFUSE CONTROL. The City of Halifax often worked with these guys, and I always found them very competent. A fire truck was parked near the stern, and a fireman in full gear was blasting the hull with a pressure hose. Pretty soon the industrial vacuum could be heard rumbling at high throttle.
Though a police cordon had been set up to keep onlookers at a distance, you could get close enough to see everything there was to see, except of course inside U-99, and who'd want to see that? I stood with a family of five—mother, father, two daughters and a son —and since each had their own camera, I figured they must be well-to-do. "At our hotel I read in the newspaper they're going to clean this U-boat right up," the son remarked with excitement. He looked to be twelve or thirteen. "Then they're going to move it to the Maritime Museum."
I lingered at U-99 long enough to realize I never wanted to see it again. The next time I'm in Harbor Methodist, I told myself, I'd fall on my knees and pray not to ever see it again. I knew where the Maritime Museum was. I'd have no difficulty keeping away.
I got a scone and coffee in an open-air café in the historic district and read the Mail, which had a two-page article about the salvage of U-99, but gave no details about what was found inside. The article did include an official statement from the RCN: "Records show that on December 19, 1944, at approximately 3:15 A.M., Axis attack submarine U-99 was severely damaged under a massive barrage of depth charges, and in all probability drifted or was mistakenly steered with crippled maneuverability into Halifax Harbor, where it was ensnared in antisubmarine fencing and finally sunk to the bottom. Records also indicate that U-99 was one of the last to have carried out attacks in Eastern Maritime Canadian waters."
The following Sunday I went to the ten-fifteen service at Harbor Methodist. I didn't feel particularly inspired, but there I was anyway, on my way to church. Maybe it's a simple equation: if you arrive uninspired, a sermon has a fighting chance to inspire you, but if you're already inspired, a sermon has to work wonders. Approaching the church, I'd seen on the bulletin board that the title of Reverend Lundrigan's sermon was A POSSIBLE ANODYNE. I'd never heard the word "anodyne" before (my thoughts went to Hans Mohring; had he known what it meant?), and when I walked in and sat, as usual, in the back pew, Lundrigan was already holding forth:
"Anodyne—it's not a word recently in good repute. But, my friends and neighbors, we all need an anodyne, and the definition, according to Webster's dictionary, will tell you why." He set a dictionary next to the Bible on the lectern, put on his reading glasses and continued. "One: a medicine that relieves or allays pain. Two: anything that relieves distress or pain; as in, the music was an anodyne to his grief. Three: soothing to the mind or feelings." He closed the dictionary but left it on the lectern. "And may I suggest that God can be an anodyne. Think of Job—think of others in biblical times who needed God at moments of great distress, facing challenges of immense proportions. But I don't wish to speak about that quite yet, my friends. For as you know, the sea has recently delivered us a disquieting messenger—a messenger in the form of a German submarine. We must look directly at this messenger and say, 'Evil One, we defeated you. We put you in chains and we defeated you. You have come back to try and torment us with bygone fears, but we reject you!' Here, today, on this holy Sunday in Harbor Methodist Church, Halifax, Nova Scotia, we call forth the memory of our best good deeds and how Canada defended its own. Let me now read from Scripture—"
My whole life, Marlais, I've had difficulty coming up with the right word to use in a given situation, but at least I know what the right word would have been once I hear it. After about two more minutes of Reverend Lundrigan's sermon, I left Harbor Methodist and walked home. I took out my Web ster's, purchased at J. P. MacPherson's pawnshop for a dollar, and studied the definition of "anodyne" again. When I'd bought my Webster's, J. P. had said, "This wasn't fished out of the harbor, but some of its pages are frayed, some might be missing. Don't worry, there's more than enough words left to improve the English of the average detritus gaffer like yourself." She meant it nicely.
And so, Marlais, my letter has caught up with the present moment—right now—7:35 A.M. on April 21. My next-door neighbors in the house formerly occupied by Reese Mac Isaac—Marshall and Caryn Phillips—have already left for work. They're both physicians. Through my kitchen window I can see their seventeen-year-old daughter, Elizabeth — Lizzy—sitting alone at their kitchen table having breakfast. She'll catch the school bus at 7:40 at the corner of Robie and Welsford. And like every morning for the past two months, she's playing Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Lizzy's got it at full volume on her record player—I read the news today, oh boy—and I'm going to open my kitchen window a little to hear it more clearly. I like the Beatles a lot, and wish Marshall and Caryn would've left earlier than usual for work so Lizzy could've played even more of Sgt. Pepper. When she heads off for school, I'll put on the Bach cello suites that I bought at Ballade & Fugue. For no good reason, I'm taking the day off work. Since in all these years I've never taken m
y yearly two-week vacation, I've got hundreds of days saved up.
In yesterday's post there was a letter from Cornelia. I have it here in front of me. I'm going to copy it out for you.
Wyatt,
I haven't mentioned this, because I didn't know how things might turn out. It's been in the works for some time now to try and find a new librarian. First Mrs. Oleander passed, and her successor, Miss Claire, married and went to live in London. Since then, we've had able volunteers, but a professional was badly needed. It was my brainstorm—I admit—to approach Marlais Hillyer for the position. After all, I knew her credentials, and she'd written that she was not having the best of luck with gainful employment in Denmark. Plus which, she has a house in the village. Of course, it's her house by rights.
So as of today, I'm freely privileged to inform you that Marlais is our new librarian! Even by the high standards set by Mrs. Oleander and Miss Claire, there's much confidence in this decision. I know because I heard this confidence expressed more than once in my bakery. Naturally, when Marlais requested that Chester and Delia Waterford, who were the most recent tenants in Donald and Constance and Tilda's house, find a new place to live, they understood right off, and now they live in Advocate. That went smoothly. Marlais arrives tomorrow.
I'm soon to be seventy-five. You'd look at me, though, and be fooled into thinking I wasn't a day over seventy. I suppose I'll have to bake my own birthday cake. I must confess, my fingers still feel youthful when I'm baking, seldom times else. And of course I'm pleased that my bakery continues and that I can still manage the stairs up to my room.
Wyatt, dear, I pray you're in good health and in as good spirits as can be expected. After you've read this letter, I'd think a visit from you was in order.
Don't forget: now and then, life can be improved upon.
Your old friend,
Cornelia Tell
And now I know where to send my stack of pages: Marlais Hillyer, Cove Road, Middle Economy, Nova Scotia, Canada. I'll post it this morning.
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