by Jeffrey Ford
All I could picture was Ahab ranting at his crew, sick with the bard and biblical allusion. The tip of his whalebone leg was affixed in its peg hole and his body spun like a pinwheel on that still point of the turning world, bellowing orders, exhorting souls, scanning the horizon for a monster. Ahab, thou art shipwrecked in every way, I thought. And what kind of a name was Ahab? I remembered Ishmael telling me while he was writing the tome that Ahab’s mother was insane. She died before her son’s first year was achieved and her parting gift to him had been that moniker, the namesake of a king who buried children alive in the foundations of his temples.
There was a rapping upon the front door. Misha called out from the hallway that she would get it, and I opened my eyes, sat up straight, and turned away from the window. As I did, Misha led a girl into the parlor study. She was approximately fifteen years old with red hair and freckles, dressed as a boy in trousers, coat, and cap. Garrick called her his Mercury—messenger and head of the newsboys and -girls he employed to hawk the Gorgon’s Mirror on the street. The other children called her Mavis, and she lived secretly with her two younger brothers in the subbasement of a three-story warehouse. Orphans, they dwelt in the shadows for fear of being placed in a home for indigent children.
If the girl was anything, she was capable. At least once a week, she’d meet me somewhere at some ungodly hour in order to pick up a story that Garrick had to have a quarter hour earlier. She traveled anywhere in the city, knew the secret shortcuts through alleyways and old underground tunnels. I’d seen her deal with adults and the guttersnipes who were under her direction at the Mirror. She could be hard as the cobblestones and wouldn’t hesitate for an instant to use the switchblade she kept in her boot or the pistol stowed in her trouser pocket.
“Please, sit,” I said and held my hand out in the direction of the chair closest to me. She smiled, removed her cap. I reached back to my desk, retrieved the envelope with the story for Garrick, and handed it to her. I took a drag of the cigar. She held the envelope between her knees and rolled herself a cigarette.
“I found something out for you today,” she said, lighting a wooden match with her thumb. “This woman Garrick said you’re looking for, from Nantucket? I know where she is.”
“How’d you find her? We looked all day.”
“I just put the word out among the street kids and the answer finally wove its way back to me.”
“That’s quite a net,” I said.
“The woman lives with her aunt on Orange Street,” she said.
“We were all over Orange Street.”
“Right at the corner where Orange meets Elm, there’s a two-story house painted dark green. The second floor.”
I applauded and asked if she wanted a drink. She turned me down as Garrick had the printers working late and they were awaiting my piece.
No sooner was the girl gone on her errand than Ahab stepped out of the darkened hallway and into the glow of the parlor’s fireplace. He had taken the hint of the razor and gone were the thick sideburns and full beard. Ahab shaved was a stark sight, indeed. His bare chin and sunken cheeks gave him a more human aspect but one no less troubled. His face was furrowed with worry and wrinkles. His voluminous hair, graying at the sides, was now combed straight back. His peg leg made him stand somewhat stooped, and when he moved, he swayed slightly from side to side. His sailor clothes had been traded for another outfit he no doubt had in his bag—simple trousers, cut, of course, to accommodate the ivory leg; a long-sleeved black shirt without a collar.
He walked toward me and sat in the chair Mavis had occupied. He spoke as if he were a real person in the real world.
“Tomorrow?” he asked.
“The plan is to see your wife. A friend of mine, who visited while you were upstairs, tells me, with the greatest confidence, that the woman in question can be found at a certain address at the corner of Orange and Elm.”
I thought he’d be elated to hear it, but instead he appeared nervous.
“It’s been a long time, Harrow,” he said quietly.
“No doubt they’ll be delighted to see you. We’ll have a celebration on Garrick’s dime.”
He shook his head. “Remember, I left them to the whims of the world for the pitiful obsession of revenge. It was all I wanted.”
“Anyone can make amends,” I said.
“Many died due to my pursuit. Many suffered.”
I had no answer. Not another word was spoken between us that night. He kept an eye on the floor, and I kept one on the ceiling. In doing so, I finally fell asleep.
The morning found me still groggy, with a sharp pain where my neck met my back. It wasn’t the first time I’d slept in that chair. Ahab had obviously retreated up to the room that Misha had prepared for him.
Even if the captain feared the day’s encounter, I was thrilled to get to witness the reunion of Mr. and Mrs. Ahab after an eight-year separation. I could only imagine the number of Mirror pieces I’d squeeze out of it.
We ate breakfast and then went out into the cold rain. I’d asked Ahab if he wanted an umbrella, but he said he liked the feel of the weather on his face. I didn’t hesitate to immediately hail an omnibus to take us as far as it would go into the Five Points. Luckily, the bad weather would keep a lot of the riffraff off the street. Our journey was silent.
We went on foot the last few blocks. The mud was thick and the Points smelled like shit tea in a tin cup. Even using an umbrella, I was drenched by the time we got there, close to 10:00 a.m. The place was a hulking, ramshackle home, its upper floor listing slightly toward the street. We found a staircase on the side of the building that led to the second floor. I went first and Ahab stepped and stumped behind, shivering slightly and dripping with the mid-November rain. I rapped on the door at the top landing. We waited quite a while, and then I rapped again. Eventually an old woman answered.
“Madame,” I said, “we apologize for any inconvenience in calling upon you, but we had it from a reliable source that you have, living with you, a lady and a boy who came from the island of Nantucket.”
She wore glasses that magnified the width of her eyes.
“Who are ya?” she said.
“I’m a writer for the Gorgon’s Mirror, but this”—I stepped aside for her to get a better look at Ahab—“I believe is that woman’s husband.” The captain stepped forward.
“You’re Ahab?” she said and leaned toward him as if preparing to pounce.
“Maisie?” he said.
She nodded as she stared at him for a long while amid the sound of the downpour and finally said, “I believe you.”
I divined that this Maisie must be Ahab’s wife’s aunt.
“Iris? Gabriel?” he asked with the tone of a beggar.
“I’ll take you to her,” she said and backed into her apartment. The door shut. I looked at Ahab, he looked at me, and we waited.
Finally, she emerged, dressed in a coat, a scarf over her head and an umbrella on her arm. She said, “Follow me,” and her words were steam. Maisie was slow, but we fell in behind her, Ahab and then me bringing up the rear. It took us forever to descend the stairs to the street. We walked south for two blocks until stopping by a gated entrance in a brick wall. The hinges of the rusted bars groaned as Maisie pushed them open. We stepped into a large rectangular courtyard enclosed on all sides by a brick wall. Inside that hidden enclosure were grass and trees shedding orange leaves. And gravestones.
Ahab immediately recognized where we were and what was about to be revealed. I was slow to it and watched as he dropped to his knees and then forward into the wet grass. The old woman didn’t slow but continued at her honey-drip pace to a headstone beneath a towering white oak. I dropped my umbrella and my writing satchel in order to help the captain up. I put his arm over my shoulder, and with great effort—he was a bit larger than I—steered him to the headstone where Maisie stood.
He regained control and was able to stand on his own. Yes, there was sobbing. Even my eyes redde
ned, and I traffic in the cynical. As for the old lady, not a blink, a wink, a wince. She was stone-faced throughout the ordeal. Finally, he stopped sniveling and asked, “How?”
“Smallpox.”
“The boy?” asked the captain.
“Iris left a message with me for you, should you ever return. She said she loved you and that you should rescue your son from his situation.”
Maisie knelt on the muddy path next to the gravestone and rested her right hand upon its mossy top. All her stoic façade crumbled, and she wept with a sadness that stripped away life’s illusions. The captain leaned over and put his hand on her shoulder.
5
We followed Maisie back to her apartment. As we traipsed solemnly along the hallway into her kitchen, I could feel the house sway beneath our weight. There were wounds to the walls where the plaster had come away and the wind snaked in through a ribwork of lathing strips. Ahab and I took seats at a table and she moved about, gathering a dusty half bottle of something and three mugs. I imagined the two chairs in which Ahab and I now sat had not too long past been occupied by his wife and child. The place was small, the furniture was threadbare, and its threat of tumbling into the street was ever imminent, but, in the Five Points, with only three people in the apartment, the accommodations were luxurious.
She poured. I waited for my companions to drink, but no one did. Finally, I lifted the mug and dashed it off. It was neither rum nor gin. The smell was rank, the taste so horrid it literally stopped my heart for a moment. Maisie looked at me as I put the mug slowly back on the table. “How’dya like that? I made it myself in the bathtub.”
“The dark color made me think it rum,” I choked out.
“It’s pretty rum. Another?” she asked, peering at me with those big eyes under glass.
“I’m well done,” I said, yet she poured anyway. The smell of it in the mug made me swoon.
“The boy?” said Ahab.
She took a sip of her own poison and her body jerked suddenly, only once, and she said, “He’s a good boy, Gabriel. But they had no money and she wasn’t well before she caught the smallpox. He went out to work and worked hard at many jobs, but when she died last year, he left the apartment and didn’t return. He joined one of the gangs or something. He lives on the street, steals, and who knows what else.”
“How old is he?” I asked.
“Sixteen years.” Ahab wanted to answer but Maisie did.
“Where can I find him?” asked the captain.
The old woman shook her head and took another quaff.
“When was the last time you saw him?” I asked.
“Maybe two months ago.”
“He strayed as boys do when they have no pilot.”
That said, we sat in silence and listened to the rain on the roof; the drip of it into a pail in the corner.
The old woman got up and went into the other room out of sight. I heard her call, “I have a picture of the boy and his mother, not but a year and a half old.” The sound of rummaging followed her words. She eventually reappeared with something in her hands. “Gabriel paid with his wages to have it made,” she said. Ahab winced and looked away as she set the portrait, five inches by seven, on the table in front of him. The woman in the daguerreotype was beautiful as her husband had said, black hair draped across her throat and then over her right shoulder. Her eyes were large and piercing. The boy was well on the way to becoming a man. He was handsome; obviously taking after his mother. He had her eyes.
The captain took his hands from his face and forced himself to look. His hands hovered above the picture. Suddenly, he found his strength and snatched the image up by the frame to press it against the side of his face. Maisie turned to me and said, “Too bad he didn’t care that much about her when she was alive.” I was going to speak up in the captain’s defense but realized she was right. The entire scene was pathetic, and I’d had enough. I abruptly stood, thanked Maisie, and said to Ahab, “Come, it’s time to find your boy.” I put the picture in my bag and we left. The old woman called after that if she were to see Gabriel, she’d let us know.
The rain had stopped when we reached the street. Damp, overcast, and the wind was high, papers and leaves blowing past us as we walked. Ahab was silent.
“Now what?” I said to him.
He stopped and turned to me, “We hunt the boy with the same fierce devotion as I hunted the white whale.”
“Man the harpoons?” I asked.
“For the deserving,” he said.
I made a mental note to remember that exchange as it would make good copy. As the skies cleared, the streets began to fill. We made our way slowly toward the park at Mulberry Bend, showing the daguerreotype to individuals willing to be accosted for a moment. Not a soul knew the boy nor had seen him.
We sat on a bench in the park, taking a break, when, from across the field, there came a thin, bald man with a scar that snaked from the corner of his left eye to under his ear. His coat was too large, his boots were full of holes, and a cutlass was secured in his belt.
“Ahoy, Captain Ahab,” he called as he shuffled toward us.
The fellow approached, his tattered coat flapping. The captain stood to greet him. They exchanged a sort of secret handshake, each grabbing the other’s forearm well above the wrist. The fellow’s name was Usual, which struck me as rather unusual. Usual Peters. I could tell by his accent that he hailed from the upper reaches of the Northeast, where they speak like cranky church people. Aye!
I tried to remain an outsider to their conversation. Though I turned slightly away, I kept an ear open. Peters was, as he put it, “landlocked.” He’d gotten into the drink and it kept him ashore for two years. When he decided to go back to sea, no one would hire him.
“A harpooneer can’t have shaky hands,” said Ahab, who, if I remembered correctly from Ishmael’s manuscript, had once plied that trade.
“Don’t I know it, Captain,” said Usual and nodded. “One of the shipowners who used to give me steady work told me, ‘I can’t hire ya. You look like nine-tenths of the life’s been sucked out of you. You’d spook the others and the whales wouldn’t come near the ship.’”
“Cursed, like me,” said Ahab.
I thought to show the man the portrait of Iris and Gabriel. Taking it out of my bag, I handed it to the captain, interrupting their conversation. The captain inquired if Usual had seen the lad. The sailor took his time eyeing the daguerreotype, but when he spoke he nodded.
“Seen him down at Peck Slip.”
That was all I had to hear. I got to my feet and tapped Ahab’s shoulder. “The hunt is on,” I said.
Ahab didn’t follow immediately. He leaned in close and grabbed Usual’s forearm in that peculiar handshake again as the old lush whispered into the captain’s ear.
Usual called back as he moved away, “A strong wind for ya.”
“Calm seas,” said Ahab.
My intention was to hail a carriage for South Street as soon as we left the park, but when we reached the cobblestones, the captain grabbed my arm to slow me down. He leaned over my shoulder and said, “The harpooneer says we’re to go to the slip after midnight. There’s a clipper, laden with special cargo, which, every few nights, is unloaded and sent back out to sea by daybreak.”
“And what is the fellow doing on the wharf at night?”
“For a few nights he kept watch for the ship’s owner.”
“Kept watch against what, whom?”
“He didn’t say.”
Ahab wasn’t very good at waiting. We sat in my parlor office after dinner, killing time till the clock struck twelve. I, of course, was drilling the captain for anything that might make a suitable article for the series. He stared intently at the picture of his wife and child, and all his answers were grumblings. It was like talking to a beast.
“For instance, what’s the story behind that wicked white scar that runs down the side of your face and neck?” I asked, probing for the light of a tale. “I’ll b
et there’s something fascinating at its origin. It’s not from a blade as Usual’s wound was.”
“It runs all the way to the center of the world,” he mumbled. “I never speak of it.”
Finally, I said, “Ahab, come now, help me get your story out into the street. There’s a chance your son might read it. The Mirror gets around, you know.”
He winced, took the pipe out of his mouth, and said, “Very well. Here’s something else. On the voyage home, I was stranded in the town of Sydney in Australia. I made the acquaintance of the harbormaster who got me in touch with some of the shipowners and captains. They arranged a living situation for me for three months until the next ship that would leave for Boston. I stayed with a woman on the outskirts of town. It was only me and her in the house. Her husband had within the last year gone down with a ship under the direction of a Captain Crevcoure, a fellow known to the international fishery as inept. My benefactors informed me that she was aware I’d lost my entire ship and crew and would not speak to me. Still, she would allow me to live under her roof.
“I knew her as Lisle. A pale, frightened woman. Sometimes I’d come in from a morning walk through the countryside and find her hiding, twisted up in the drapes. Every night she cooked fish, clear as glass and the consistency of jelly. We sat together and ate in utter silence. When she thought I was sleeping, she’d slip into my room. I kept one lid cracked the merest slit. She stood over me and watched me breathe. Some nights I was convinced that she would cut my throat. And then she vanished. Days went by and I didn’t see her. I informed them in town that she was missing. They acted like they had no idea what I meant. Some laughed it off as a joke and others just shook their heads. By the time I boarded ship and left Sydney, I realized that they’d sent me to live with a ghost. I saw her again in the mist and spray off the Isle of Treachery as we rounded the Cape of Good Hope.”