Chain Locker

by Bob Chaulk

  “Otis, are you goin’ to send a message to St. John’s?”

  “I will when I know something. If they’re goin’ to send a rescue they need to know what to expect when they get here.”

  “Alf, you fellers still back there?” Simeon yelled behind into the darkness while balancing on a sloshing ice pan.

  “Yes,” the reply came faintly over the wind.

  “Hard sloggin’, ain’t it Simeon?”

  “That you, Lloyd?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Harder than I expected, and gettin’ worse, I believe.” said Simeon.

  “Reminds me of beatin’ into Twillingate in a sou’west gale.”

  “I suppose, except when you’re sailin’ you can at least hold the schooner against the headwind and not lose ground. This is more like canoein’ up a river.”

  “I wish we had bigger ice to walk on,” said Lloyd. “With all this splashing my boots are gettin’ icy.”

  “Can you see the light?” said Simeon.

  “Haven’t seen it for a while,” said Lloyd. “It must be out. I’m trusting to you; I don’t know where I’m goin’.”

  “I guess they put it as high as they could but it’s still pretty low,” said Simeon. “It comes and goes. There it is!”

  “So you think they know about the fire?”

  “Positive. They would have to be blind to miss it. I’m sure that light we’re seeing is meant for us. But I’m using the Gull Island light to keep us on course. As long as it’s over my left shoulder I know we’re okay. The Horse Islands’ light is a good double-check.”

  They walked for a while in silence, leaping from one pan to another and sometimes having to wait until the next one came near enough so they could jump to it.

  “That reminds me: you never did get to finish the story about the Queen of Swansea.”

  “I’m not sure I want to, after what happened to us.”

  “What became of the people aboard her?”

  “You sure you want to know?”

  “Sure, I—”

  “Watch out!” Simeon yelled as he grabbed his companion by the arm and pulled him back. “Don’t let your feet get between them clumpers. The way they’re grindin’ together you’d be lucky not to break your leg. You okay?”

  Recovering on all fours, Lloyd gasped, “Yeah, I’m all right. Thanks, Simeon. Just got a wet leg out of it.”

  “We need that wind to die down a bit,” said Simeon. “A westerly wind is usually a sailor’s friend, but it couldn’t be a worse one for us right now.”

  Simeon shouted encouragement to his men to keep them moving, hoping that the other watches were close behind. If he and his men could make it, then there was hope for everybody. He was feeling the strain of keeping their hopes alive.

  As if reading his thoughts, Lloyd reassured him. “You’re doin’ a great job, Simeon. I know you’ll get us there. So, back to the Queen of Swansea. What happened next?”

  Simeon yelled, “Where was we?”

  “She had just struck Gull Island…you said they all perished but there was more.”

  “That’s right. Now I remember. It was pretty bad; they ended up eatin’ one another.”

  “No!”

  “Not a word of a lie. The last note in one man’s diary said that they had cast lots and his sister had been chosen to die next, but that he would be taking her place.”

  “I got to tell you, Simeon, I got a hard time believin’ anybody could do that.”

  “Well, that’s what their notes said. Anyway, a few years later, they built the lighthouse that we’re seein’ now.”

  Simeon had known the details of the story since he was a boy, but the event was assuming a new poignancy. Looking back over his left shoulder he could see the cold ray cast by the Gull Island light making its circuits low on the horizon. Even if they made it to the Horse Islands, how could so many injured, exhausted, hungry men find succor in such a small village? The thin shaft of light went round and round, its impersonal, haunting beam reminding him that surviving a shipwreck, especially in winter, was just the beginning of the ordeal.

  “Did you hear about Henry Horwood?” Lloyd yelled.

  “Yes.”

  “He drove away on the ice.”

  “I know.”

  “How in hell did he manage to do something that stupid? I gave him more credit than that.”

  “One of those things, I guess. Bad luck,” said Simeon.

  “Yeah, well, a couple of fellers told me he was pretty nervous climbing down the side of the vessel. They said he looked so scared they didn’t think he was gonna go over at all. I don’t know how he’s gonna manage out there on his own if he got no more nerve that that. I don’t s’pose it matters now because we’ve probably seen the last of ’im, anyway.”

  Simeon stopped and turned around. “I’ll thank you not to talk like that anymore,” he said. “Henry’s my nephew and he’s a good hand on the ice. He’ll manage.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry, Simeon. I didn’t realize—”

  “I believe it’s startin’ to get daylight,” said Simeon, not wishing to continue the conversation. Looking past Lloyd to observe the brightening in the east, he saw a man waving and yelling from behind.

  “Simeon, Lorne fell between the balleycatters and got his leg hurt. He says he can’t go on.”

  “Is he all right otherwise? He got anything broken?”

  “No, but he’s soppin’ wet. George is goin’ to stay with him.”

  “Okay. We better keep movin’, Lloyd.”

  “Sure, Simeon.”

  A half hour later they could see the sun pouring onto the Horse Islands. “Good navigating, Simeon. I knew you’d get us there.”

  “We’re not there, yet,” said Simeon.

  “The worst is over, though,” said Lloyd. “There’s the islands, b’ys. Let’s keep movin’ now. Not too much farther,” he yelled back to the other men. “And look, Simeon, I can see some men comin’ our way. I wonder if they got a bit of dry clothes for poor Lorne.”

  They only had what they were wearing, but among the four, they managed to share enough to keep Lorne from freezing to death.

  At 9 a.m. Otis Bartlett cranked up his wireless set and sent off a message containing everything he knew to St. John’s.

  To Minister Marine and Fisheries

  Horse Islands, March 16—at 9 o’clock last night heard terrible explosion. Early this morning wreckage of burning steamer sighted about eight miles east of here. Also men travelling on ice towards island. No particulars at hand yet. Ice in bad condition. Heavy sea. Wind blowing off shore. First crowd men may reach Island; others have little chance. Making very slow progress. People only have sufficient supplies for selves. Also no medical assistance here; no chance getting to mainland.

  (Sgd.) OTIS BARTLETT

  Opr. Horse Island.

  The minister started a rescue effort, which included a message to Twillingate:

  to A. G. Ashbourne

  Twillingate.

  Do best possible get your auxiliary schooner off immediately to Horse Islands as steamer supposed to be Viking had explosion last night eight miles east of there. Many men injured on ice. We are sending steamer Foundation Franklin and Sagona from here this afternoon. H. B. C. Lake.

  Lloyd was wrong. The last mile took all morning. Copying the sparse pans was like jumping from horse to horse on a merry-go-round. Lloyd was the first one ashore, with a sturdy islander bearing him up on each side. All day long they straggled in, and by dark the group was too large to be afforded shelter; only the worst cases could be brought indoors and not all of them. As for food, there was hardly any. It was the long and hungry month of March, and the worried Horse Islanders’ supplies that had been put away in the fall were close to depleted. They were counting the days to spring and watching daily for a few seals to come their way.

  Looking out over the ice, Simeon could see groups of men strewn across the eight miles that had to be crossed from the wreck
site, and he cursed the westerly wind that was bound to be their undoing. Far beyond them Henry was probably blessing the same wind and wishing that it would continue, as he and Jackie drifted on their protracted journey towards what they hoped would be an oncoming rescue ship.

  All everybody could hope for was the quick arrival of a ship or two from St. John’s.

  chapter twenty-four

  The normal Monday morning tranquility was broken when Cyril Keough came into Tom Gould’s store to buy some potatoes and salt pork. News was going around about a sealing ship being lost somewhere at the Front. He said that was all anybody seemed to know so far.

  They were speculating about the details when Art Cahill came in. “Well, as I live and breathe, if it ain’t Surl Keough. Still survivin’ with that houseful of women? Found any husbands for them daughters o’ yours yet?”

  “The load is getting’ lighter, Art. Julia got married last Christmas, and Babs is engaged.”

  “That’s good news. What does that leave you with? Two to go?”

  “Two more, but I won’t be too pleased to see them all gone, I’m telling ya that; although it will mean fewer mouths to feed during these lean times. Just put this on my account, will you, Tom.”

  Tom nodded, making a mental note that he would soon have to tell Cyril that he was unable to extend him any more credit.

  “Is there any news about the sealing ship that blew up?” asked Art.

  “Blew up!” said Cyril, “I never heard that part. All I heard is that there was a ship lost.”

  “Apparently the boiler on one of the old wooden walls blew up last night, with the loss of all hands.”

  A half-hour later, as he unpacked onions in the back, Tom heard somebody talking to his clerk. “That’s not the way I heard it!” Tom strolled to the door. “No sir, it wasn’t the boiler. They were blasting the ship out of the ice and the damn fools sunk her.”

  “Do you know what vessel it was?” the gangly clerk asked as Tom perked his ears.

  “There’s lots of guesses but nobody seems to know for sure.”

  It was on the tongue of almost everybody that came into the store. A later version was that the galley stove had turned over in rough weather, catching the ship afire, and she had blown up when the fire reached the magazine. Tom was getting concerned that the rumours might find their way to his house. His wife would be in a fine state if she heard about it. He wondered if he should go home, or wait for more solid information.

  In the early afternoon more details began to emerge. Mike Murphy and his wife came in with the facts, which the radio had just reported. “She blew up last night up by the Horse Islands—”

  “Where’s the Horse Islands to?” somebody asked.

  “I believe they’re up off Conche, just about up to Saint Anthony.”

  “No they’re not!” his wife, a native of Hooping Harbour, corrected him as she picked over the potatoes. “You’re talkin’ about the Grey Islands, you foolish mortal. The Horse Islands is south, this side of White Bay, closer to Baie Verte.”

  “That’s right,” said Mike. “That’s what I meant to say. They said there was a lot of men hurt and a lot of men missing, and some of them probably even killed. They’re goin’ to send a schooner from Twillingate to pick up the survivors. She’s supposed to be on her way today.”

  Tom screwed up his courage and asked, “Did they say what ship it was?”

  “They says ’twas the Viking.”

  Oh, no! She knows for sure, he thought, because she got that radio blaring all day long. I should never have bought the bloomin’ thing.

  Without delay, Tom removed his apron and put on his boots and coat and headed home, leaving the clerk in charge. As he went out the door he could hear Mike say, “Sure, they shouldn’t be shaggin’ around up there this time of the year in them old ships. It’s bad enough in the summer…”

  All of Doris Gould’s anger had melted, to be replaced by a mother’s grieving for her lost son, for she was convinced she would not see him again this side of heaven. She shed tears of sadness for her loss and tears of guilt for having been so angry with him. Tom stayed with her the rest of the afternoon and held her while she sobbed, trying his best to comfort and encourage her while holding on to his hope. When the girls arrived home after school, they broke the news to them. Alice became uncharacteristically quiet, while her younger sister, Margie, bawled her eyes out. “Now we don’t know nothing for sure yet,” said Doris. “Let’s just hope and pray that the good Lord has preserved him.” It was a relief to get down to the routine of preparing for supper and helping the girls with their homework.

  Within a half-hour of Ashbourne’s replying to the Minister of Marine and Fisheries that they could not get the Bessie Marie out of the icebound harbour, Agnes Tizzard was rushing into her sister-in-law, Lucy’s, kitchen.

  “Luce, Luce, you ’aven’t heard the latest!” she yelled. “There’s after being a sealing ship blowed up out to the ice.”

  “Oh, my blessed Saviour!”

  “It’s the Viking. The same one that Simeon and Alf and Bert is onto.”

  Lucy slowly sat down. “What’s they all perished to death, I suppose?” “There’s no word, girl, but I heard there was some survived.”

  “Where did you hear this to, now?”

  “Janie Potter told me. Her husband, Calv Potter, works down to Ashbournes. The government is after them to send the Bessie Marie to the rescue, but there’s no getting her out of the harbour with all the ice hove in.”

  “There’s lots of ice around; that’s for sure. What about if the wind shifts? Won’t it all blow back out again?”

  “They thought it might, but Calv says even if it do, she’s still froze solid way up in the harbour. They could try to saw her out of the ice but it will still take at least a couple of days and the wind would have to blow out all the ice that’s after pilin’ up outside the harbor, too.”

  “Sounds like she won’t be goin’ nowhere soon. Who else do we know on the ship that blowed up besides Simeon and his b’ys?”

  “That young Henry Horwood from up to Cottle’s Island; he’s gone to the ice and I believe he went in the Viking with Simeon,” Agnes replied.

  “Oh yes, Henry Horwood, the one was seein’ the teacher. I heard they was gettin’ married.”

  “Well I heard she’s after gettin’ tangled up with the minister,” said Agnes.

  “That English one? He don’t strike me as bein’ interested in women,” said Lucy. “Did you see the physogue on him? He looks like he was baptized in vinegar, goin’ around with that white collar on and that black shirt with no buttons. It looks like he got it on with the hinder parts before.”

  “The way I heard it, she’s chasin’ after him,” Agnes replied, with arms folded and lips pursed in sound disapproval. It was certainly not the kind of thing she herself would ever do.

  “Henry: now is he related to Edgar Horwood from over Exploits?” Lucy asked.

  “He’s some relation; brother, I think.”

  “Now, there’s a man, that Edgar Horwood. I wouldn’t mind takin’ up with him.”

  “Hark o’ you now, takin’ up with Edgar Horwood! No mistake, I know! If Clar heard you talkin’ like that you’d be in some state o’ trouble.”

  “Hah! Sure Clar don’t pay no more heed to me than he do to that cat there,” Lucy said, pointing to the tabby sprawled behind the stove.

  “Unless he wants something,” Agnes ventured with a smirk.

  “Yes. And you just knows what he wants.”

  “Oh yes, I knows,” she replied with a knowing nod. “Anyway, I heard Edgar Horwood’s wife keeps him on a pretty short leash.”

  “How’s the teacher goin’ to feel about this now, I wonder?” Lucy pondered.

  “Never mind her. ’Tis Henry’s poor mother Darcas I thinks about, with her boy on the vessel, and not knowin’ if he’s alive nor dead. And Sade with her husband and two b’ys. Shockin’, shockin.”

  “Yes
, girl ’tis.” Then she added, “’Tis scandalous is what it is.”

  Lucy told Ivy Stuckless and Ivy told Emily’s mother, who was in the middle of making bread, with a cloth wrapped around her hair and flour up to her elbows. She sat down at the kitchen table with a look of great distress. “Dear Lord above, not more men dying out on the water. Sometimes life is too hard, Ivy. I long for the day when the Lord will come back and take us all outa this.”

  “Yis, maid,” said Ivy.

  “Henry’s aboard of that vessel, and Simeon and Alf and Bert, too, and God only knows who else. Then there’s them men from Exploits. I wonder what’s become of them.”

  “There’s no word yet about if anybody was lost. I suppose we’ll hear some more soon,” said Ivy. “Let’s pray that there’ll be some good news.”

  “Yes. Emily will be home from school in a few minutes. I don’t suppose she knows. I don’t expect she’ll take the news well.”

  chapter twenty-five

  “Are you ready to take a shift?” said Henry, squinting as he scanned the southern horizon for the elusive rescue ship.

  “My eyes are prickly,” Jackie replied. “Feels like I got sand in ’em.”

  “Well, you’ll have to take your turn. Mine are ready to give out.”

  Jackie muttered something.

  “Not feelin’ too workish, eh? C’mon. Shake a leg,” Henry ordered.

  Jackie slowly got to his feet and Henry sat down, with his back to the sun. He scraped up some snow and held it to his burning eyes. “No sign of the sun for three bloody weeks and now it beats down on us for the whole day, with not a cloud in sight. That ice is like a mirror. I always keep my sun goggles right next to my knife, but I grabbed the knife when I left the ship and managed to leave them behind.”

  “We need your soapy pig to come back and block the sun for a while,” said Jackie.

  “Yeah, we sure do.” If it’s sunny tomorrow we’re gonna be in trouble, he thought.