The sun slipped behind the barn. Shadows cast across the yard, marking the interlude between day and night, when the light was dim and a lantern of little use. The only consolation was the slight breeze that offered a reprieve from the day’s unbearable heat. Ma looked down at the tunnel’s dark entrance, buttressed by a single plank at the crown and two flimsy supports. The shadow and the dull evening light made it impossible for her to see how expertly dug and painstakingly engineered it really was.
I stood up by the entrance to the tunnel, my fingers raw from scraping, my hands blistered from the handles of the pickaxe and the shovel. But looking around me, I figured Percy was right: I was the only one who could get to the end of the tunnel and still find room to manoeuvre. I threw back my aching shoulders and stared straight up at my mother. “I’m going in to get her, Ma.”
Ma drew in a breath. Silence set in as everyone stared at her. She glanced down at me again, then at the tunnel opening. When Mrs. MacIntyre edged beside her, Ma said, “Be careful, Pius James.”
I nodded up to my mother and disappeared into the darkness. Percy called out a final warning.
“Careful not to touch them planks. They’re in good, but you don’t want to chance it. The whole works could come right down on you.”
I heard my mother gasp. I could almost see her running another disaster through her mind, chanting out a frantic prayer to St. Joseph.
I inched along the black tunnel. My hands sank into the damp earth. Mud clung to my trousers. The air was heavy. Panic set in as everything seemed to close in around me. I focused on my breathing and counted my way along, trying to calm myself. The cotton cloth clung to my face, making it hard to breath. I tore it off and sucked in the smell of damp, still air and red clay. My first instinct was to back out of there, to get into the open and breathe in the fresh air. Instead, I pushed back the fear and urged myself forward. Then I heard Maggie’s muffled cries through the last layer of mud and rock and smelled the familiar smell of still water and wet stone. Uncle Jim called down to her.
“Where’d you go? I can’t see you.” Even at the worst of times, my uncle could be funny. In the fading light, the well shaft no doubt resembled a black hole.
I took a deep breath. You’ve got to do this, P.J. You can’t let her down. I hit up against the last layer of mud and rock that separated the tunnel from the old well. “I’m here.” I hoped she could hear me. But all I heard was Percy.
“Start at the top.” His voice was muffled by the length of the tunnel and the mud. “You want the dirt to fall on your side.”
In the dark, I felt around for the top stone, found it, and dug and brushed away dirt. I grasped around and tried to move it, but it was jammed in tight. I tried the stone next to it, but it, too, held fast. I tried a third stone. This one moved easily. The only problem was that it was leaning toward the well, and Maggie was on the other side.
“It’s P.J.,” I called out to her.
“I can hear you. I’m okay.”
“I need you to help. I can’t move these rocks from this side.”
“What should I do?”
“Can you move over this way?”
“Which way?” she asked. “I don’t know.” She sounded tired and scared.
“I just need you to help me one time. I just need you to pull on one of these rocks— pull it to your side. Do you think you can do it?”
“Uh…okay.”
I heard shuffling, then panicky breathing as she shifted on the narrow plank. “What do I do now?”
“Can you see this rock?” I shoved it with my hand. “Can you see it move?”
“It’s too dark….”
“Run your hand over the wall. I’ll push on it; see if you can find it.”
I pushed, then heard scraping and Maggie mumbling to herself.
“Is this it?” She pushed the rock back slightly.
“Good! You got it. If I push it in, do you think you can help get it out?”
“Uh-huh.”
Palm to the rock, I leaned on it. It came loose, then disappeared and splashed.
I heard a gasp, then her say, “Do you want to do another one?” She sounded braver now, more certain.
I put my hand through the hole and waved it around. “Where are you?”
She clasped it. “Right here!” Her hand felt frail and cold. But she held on tight.
“Hang on,” I said, surprised at my newfound confidence. I held onto her and talked to her. “You’re safe now—I’m getting you out.”
The hole in the wall gave me room to work. I put a hand in it, palm up, and grabbed a stone. It loosened and soon gave way. Maggie grabbed it from the other side and let it fall to the water. We worked in tandem, me grabbing the stones and working them loose, her feeling around for them and dropping them into the well. Uncle Jim placed a kerosene lantern at the mouth of the tunnel. Soon I could see the gap in the wall and Maggie on the other side. Her thin legs were goose-bumped and shivering, her teeth chattering behind a brave smile. In half an hour, we had created an opening two feet high. I figured one more foot would allow a safe escape. I pulled on the stones above it, but they wouldn’t budge. The ones below were supporting the plank.
“You got to move,” I said. “We got to get those stones out from under that plank.”
“Where to?”
“Maybe find the ones you were standing on before.”
“I can’t,” she whimpered. “I can’t see.” I got a feeling that she was so cold she could barely move.
Uncle Jim called down from the wellhead. “Now, Maggie, P.J.’s there to get you out. You gotta move now, just for a minute or two.”
“Where to?” she asked again. She sounded like she was giving up.
“Find a foothold somewheres,” Uncle Jim said. “You can do it.”
She gasped and whimpered and shifted on the plank, searching for a footing.
“Maggie, dear,” her mother called down. “Please—you’re almost there.”
Maggie moved again. She put a hand out to brace herself against the wall, put a bare foot out, and tested it. She found a single large stone and perched on it. I heard her in-and-out rasping, then a splash and a hushed cry.
“Maggie!” My heart raced as I threw a hand out into the dark and couldn’t find her.
“It’s okay.” A new resolve had replaced her fear. “I just knocked a stone in with my other foot.” She whispered to herself, urging herself along, scraping along the well wall, and then found another footing.
“I’m off,” she said. “You can move the plank.”
Earth trickled into the water as I pushed the board aside and rolled back stones. They landed on my side with a thud, then I secured the plank back in place.
I saw a knee, bruised and scraped, then another one as Maggie eased herself down and reached out a hand. I wrapped my fingers around it and held on like I never wanted to let her go.
The next day, I came downstairs to find everyone seated around the kitchen table over ham sandwiches and blueberry pie. I knew there had been a lot of food brought into the house the previous day. Still, ham sandwiches and blueberry pie seemed an odd choice for breakfast.
“Slept in, did you, Pius James?” Uncle Jim said. “Forget about chores?”
I looked up at the clock above the kitchen sink—both hands pointed at the twelve.
“Sorry. I’ll go right away.”
My uncle’s sunburned face broke into a smile. “You’ve earned your rest, young fella. The way I’m lookin’ at it, you’ve earned a little somethin’ else too.”
I pulled back a chair and stared at my uncle. “I didn’t…I don’t,” I said, too tired for words.
“I was thinkin’ ’bout a little reward. In fact, I never paid you boys for all that work you done while I was away. And now yesterday….”
“Al
l we did was help out,” Larry said. “Just like everybody else.”
“Larry’s right,” Ma said. “A reward would spoil it.”
“Well, okay,” Uncle Jim said. “But there’s two tickets to a certain ball game in Everett and likely another one where they came from. And I just scared up enough money to accompany both boys down on the train. But you’re absolutely right, Martha—a reward wouldn’t be fittin’.”
Ma’s face lit up as she looked over at my uncle. “I couldn’t say no to that.”
In July, we worked two solid weeks bringing in the first cut of hay. Uncle Jim sat up high on the seat of the big, clumsy mower and reined Big Ned up and down the field. Larry and I followed, picking up wheat stalks, tying them into stooks, and stacking them into little straw huts around the field. The wind blew chaff into our eyes, and it stuck to our hair. The days were long and the work was hard. The whole time, we prayed for sun, for high temperatures, and for the rain to hold off so the hay wouldn’t rot in the fields. We waited three days for the stooks to dry, loaded them onto the wagon, and stashed them in the loft for winter feed. Then Larry and I finally got a few days off.
I was on my way to Pat Jr.’s one morning with my bat slung over a shoulder, my baseball glove in hand, and the baseball Ma had bought to replace the one that had got lost when we moved. My head was full of Babe Ruth and Boston, when I noticed Uncle Jim dressed in his Eaton’s catalogue suit. He was backing Lu up to the shafts of the jaunting wagon.
“Where ya going?” I asked.
“Boughton Island. Takin’ Gen home.”
I had been marking the days off the calendar since early July. It was Saturday, August 4. There were five days to the big game; our train left in three. I wondered why Uncle Jim was taking a trip when we were going so soon. I looked straight at him. “Train leaves Tuesday.”
“That so.” Uncle Jim put a hand to Lu’s chest and checked to make sure she didn’t step on a shaft. “Take Lu’s halter, wouldja? I gotta get ’er lined up.” He gave her a firm but gentle shove. “Back, old girl.”
“Maybe she’s tired.” I put my bat, ball, and glove down and grabbed her halter. “Maybe she don’t want to go.”
“Ornery is all,” Uncle Jim said. “Hasn’t done a lick o’ work since June.” He strapped her into the harness and checked the buckles and straps. Then he circled the wagon, grabbed Lu’s feed bag from the storage box, and handed it to me. “Fill this up like a good fella—she’ll likely get hungry on the way.”
I took the feed bag and held onto the halter. “You going this morning?”
“What’s it look like?”
“The train leaves Tuesday.” It was obvious that he hadn’t heard the first time.
“I know when the train leaves.” He stopped and huffed at me. “I thought I told you to fill up that there bag.”
“You told me to steady Lu.”
“She’s steady! I’ll hold ’er, you get ’er feed. And be quick about it—I gotta get goin’.”
I raced to the barn, threw open the feed box, scooped oats into Lu’s bag, then returned to the wagon and held the feed bag out to my uncle.
“You know where that goes!”
My uncle seemed anxious and hurried. I knew this wasn’t time for talk. I also knew that the minute he saw Gen MacCormack, he’d fall under some kind of spell and maybe even forget all about our trip. Uncle Jim got light in the head when Gen was around. Didn’t notice a darn thing around him. If he was going to make it back from Boughton Island on time for us to catch that train, I needed to keep him on track. I stepped around the back of the wagon, opened the storage box, and deposited the feed bag.
“When’re you coming back?”
“Monday evenin’, likely.”
That’s cutting it close. By my calculation, he could get to Boughton Island by the late evening tide, drop Gen off, and return the next day. One likes a good margin in these situations. “Uh…you going to be on time?”
Uncle Jim circled the wagon again and checked the wheels, the shafts, and the straps that secured the storage box. Then he laughed and shook his head. “Don’t you worry: I’ll be back before you know it, and we’ll have us the best time ever.”
That evening, I went to bed, and in my sleep Uncle Jim’s trip ran through my head. I saw him, sitting tall in his seat, riveted on Gen. And her clutching his arm. The reins lay slack in his hands as Lu sauntered down the drive and took a right turn onto the road. I saw a ferry floating on rippling water, then its gangway lower to a cement launch. Beyond it lay a blank horizon where Boughton Island was supposed to be. Uncle Jim was taking Lu by the halter and directing her down the launch. When the ferry embarked, they were the only ones aboard. Then dark clouds moved in from the east and the wind picked up. But Gen and Uncle Jim stared off in the distance, oblivious. Black water swelled, then peaked, and splashed over the gunnels. It flooded the floorboards and rose up to Lu’s knees. Somehow, they docked. Then Uncle Jim urged Lu along a gravel road and out onto a narrow brick trail. As soon as Lu stepped onto those bricks, she sank into mud and water and disappeared.
Then the recurring dream I had had since Maggie’s ordeal in the well came back. I saw her frightened face, her standing in water, shivering. But this time there was no board holding her up—just the chill water below her. I was back in the tunnel, surrounded by darkness and damp, tepid air. There was red mud everywhere and my hands sank into it. Then the boards above me heaved and creaked and gave way. I heard a familiar scream. I saw a flash of Maggie’s frightened face as she slipped below the surface. The water rippled, then went eerily still, and I felt the weight of something pressing down on my shoulder, shaking me.
“Wake up, Pius James—you’re having a nightmare.” Ma pulled me off my pillow and wrapped her arms around me. “What was it? What did you see?”
“Water. Black and choppy.” I turned and looked at her. “It was everywhere.”
“What else did you see?” She spoke in a hushed tone, coaxing me. “People?…Someone you know? An animal, perhaps?” Ma really believed in dreams.
“Uncle Jim. Gen and Lu.” I thought hard. “Something falling into the water. I’m not sure.”
“What was the last thing you saw, Pius James?”
“Maggie.”
Ma sat up for a moment, then turned from me. Across the room, the thin, white curtains billowed in the early morning breeze. Dust danced through a stream of sunlight. “It’s just a nightmare,” Ma said. “Maggie’s fine.”
On the overnight train to Boston, Larry and I placed bets on who would spot Uncle George first. When we pulled into North Boston Station, I leaned out the window, scanned the waiting crowd, and spotted him towering over everybody.
“Uncle George!”
He stood with his back to our passenger car, looking hard in the wrong direction. I leaned out further, and called again.
“Get your head in here,” Uncle Jim said. “Wait ’til we’re stopped.”
The train screeched to a halt, and I pulled my bag off the rack above our seat and bolted down the aisle and out the door. Holding my bag in front of me, I squeezed through the crowd and found Uncle George. Uncle Jim and Larry were close behind.
“There you are, you rascal!” Uncle George threw his arms wide open and hugged me. Then he reached out a hand and grabbed Uncle Jim’s. “How was your trip?” And before anybody could answer, he slapped Larry on the shoulder and checked him over. “You’ve stretched out, haven’t you? They’re sure feeding you well up there.”
Uncle George led us through the station and out onto Front Street toward his big black Buick. We threw our bags into the trunk and climbed in—Uncle Jim in front, Larry and me in back.
“Your Aunt Mayme’s been looking forward to this for weeks.” He sounded as excited as I was. He checked for traffic, then eased the car out onto the street. “All she talks about is you fellas coming
down to watch the ball game. She still can’t believe Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig are coming to Everett.”
I had forgotten how crowded and noisy Boston was. Front Street was a stream of cars. Engines chugged and horns honked. The sidewalks were filled with people hurrying to get where they were going—they spilled across the intersections even before the traffic lights changed. Back home, Lu could pull Uncle Jim’s big old wagon for miles without stopping. But in Boston, we stopped and started all the way through the downtown.
There were buildings everywhere. They lined every block right up to the sidewalk, and they were huge. I hadn’t seen a single building on the whole of Prince Edward Island as big as the ones in Boston. And aside from the grassy boulevard in front of the train station, everything was cobblestones and cement. Northbridge Road seemed like a great wide-open space compared to Boston.
We soon crossed the Mystic River into Revere. When we passed by the Beacon Oil Refinery, I saw the black empty yard where the oil tank had blown up. I thought about Dad and wondered where he had been when it happened. Wondered if he had been trapped in the blaze. Father Flynn told us God took him right away and that he hadn’t felt any pain. But priests sometimes say things to make your feel better—Ma calls them little white lies. Seeing the burned-out refinery and driving through the old neighbourhood where the fire had been made me miss him more than ever.
When we turned off Alford Street and onto Broadway, someone ran across the road right in front of us. Uncle George slammed on the brakes and hollered out the window, “You trying to get killed?” But from the way my uncle raced through intersections even after the light had turned red, I wondered if he was the one trying to get killed. I had forgotten what a lunatic driver he was. Bumping along Northbridge Road with Uncle Jim and Lu might have been slow, but at least it felt safer than travelling with Uncle George. I was relieved when we finally drove down Hancock Street and saw Aunt Mayme waiting for us on the front steps of their house.
Somewhere I Belong Page 24