by Gary Collins
Maryann cleared the table, poured the dregs of the teapot onto the smouldering ashes in the stove, and with lamp in hand turned to mount the stairs before she noticed something different. Phil was standing at the foot of the stairs, waiting to walk up to bed with her. It was a rare thing. She liked it.
“Merry Christmas, Maryann,” he said in a soft voice.
“Oh! Merry Christmas to you, too, my love.” She added quietly, “Just a minute, Phil.”
Remembering she had not put the loaf of bread away, she stepped to the counter beside the kitchen window. She placed the half-eaten loaf inside a small wooden box with a door in its side. Stopping at the bottom of the stairs once again and holding the lamp higher, she looked around for her man, but the only shadow reaching long up the stairs was hers.
* * * * *
It was the evening of January 6, 1914, in Elliston, the last day of Christmas, or, as it was better known to everyone in Newfoundland, Old Christmas Day. It was the day of Epiphany on the church calendar. It was also the last night for the mummers—that ridiculously disguised group of citizens young and old who went door to door throughout the season. They were always welcomed inside to engage in revelry, music, and antics—but only if their faces were hidden—to entertain the households until their hosts correctly identified them, after which they would dance their way out the door. The snow melt from their heavy footwear, which could be anything from woollen mitts to snowshoes worn backwards, was hastily mopped up in readiness for the next troupe of mummers, who were already coming down the lane, rattling the pickets on the fence as they came. It was during this time of celebration and good cheer, with the dancing mummers buckling his kitchen floor, that Reuben Crewe hoped his wife, Mary, could enjoy herself on this last night of Christmas.
He had been withholding something from her for weeks and he didn’t like it at all. All through the days of Christmas and sleepless nights of Christmas, lying awake next to his woman, Reuben was torn with the decision he had made. Now, with the last mummers for the night gone from their kitchen, the strains of their accordion music fading away outside, and with the warmth of the season still upon them, it was time.
Mary returned from the porch where she had taken the mop after wiping the floor. Reuben had never once seen his wife go to bed leaving a dirty floor.
“’Twas a good Christmastime, Mary, my love,” Reuben began.
“Oh, ’twas all that, Reub b’y. It’s my favourite time of year, as you well know.”
“Mine too. Especially the mummers. Dirty buggers, though!”
“No need fer cursin’ now, Reub. ’Sides, a few flicks with the mop is a pittance to pay fer a night of enjoyment!”
“I’m going to the ice this spring, Mary maid.” Reuben blurted it out without softening the announcement.
“I know, Reuben,” came the soft reply.
Reuben turned with surprise, as much with Mary’s use of his full name as with her knowledge of his returning to the seal hunt. She only called him Reuben when he had done something she didn’t like—or when she had learned of sad news.
“’Ow could ’e know, Mary? I’ve kept it bottled up inside me like a festerin’ sore these many weeks an’ ’ave told no man!”
“Oh, Reuben, after all these years together, do you think you can keep sech a thing from me? Why, our Albert is a man now, as ye well know. Yet he can’t go out in punt or head in to cut a slide load of firewood wit’out you chargin’ him to mind the wind or the sharp axe. Still ’n all, I’ve never heard you speak a word to the boy about havin’ a care at the sealin’. So then I knew you was goin’ along wit’ Albert, jest to ’ave an eye on ’im. To be honest, Reub b’y, ’tis a great load off my mind knowing you’ll be alongside of ’im.”
And as simple as that, Reuben’s secret was out. Not only that, Mary was calling him Reub again. He felt a great weight lift off his own shoulders. Reuben hated keeping things from Mary. Feeling better than he had for a long time, he went upstairs to bed.
But Mary stayed for a time and puttered around her kitchen as housewives do. The stove pinged and creaked as the heat died. The kettle stopped its burbling when she removed it from the stovetop, and hissed gently when she placed it on the cooler hob. She walked on slippered feet across her neat kitchen and stood at the window facing the bay. The woman was mentally preparing herself for the time when she would stand at this same window night after night and stare into the nothingness of the black sea.
She turned with the oil lamp in her hand and walked away from the window. Reaching for the banister, her wedding ring clicked as her hand came in contact with the polished wood. Her gaze fell first upon the gold ring which shone with a soft lustre under the pale glow of the yellow lamplight, and then back to the featureless window. Sighing, she turned and stepped quickly up the thirteen steps to her room.
* * * * *
North by the wintry coast, the same silvery moonlight was witness to the plans of another, much younger couple. The night had deepened as it aged, but standing in the lun under the eaves of a scaly, red-painted stage in Doting Cove, in the warmth of each other’s arms, Cecil Mouland and Jessie Collins didn’t feel the cold. Earlier they had walked hand in hand, watching the moon rise up out of the sea as if pushed from below by an unseen force. There were no high hills for the winter light to wash over and no canyon walls where dark shadows could hide. There was just the wide-open sea, out of which the pale moon climbed to shed its mystic light on the black water, and the broad, flat landwash strewn with tuckamore just out of the light’s reach. The rote of the nearby sea, though persistent, was largely ignored by the two lovers.
They tore their mouths free from a hundred passionate kisses. Cecil clutched Jessie fiercely to his chest, his face buried against her neck. Her secret woman smell emanated, warm and intoxicating, from beneath her brown tresses. He sought her moist, red, sensuous mouth again, seeking, searching, exploring. Jessie tore her mouth away from the kisses that were clouding her senses and gasped for air.
“Oh my! Oh my! I—I—we, I cannot—we mustn’t—’tis not right.”
“Oh, Jessie! My darling! My love!” cried Cecil. “You are mine! You must be mine forever! Will you be my wife?”
And the young Jessie went back into his embrace and murmured, “Yes, I will! I will! Oh, I will, my love!” It was the best Christmas gift he would ever receive.
“I’ll be buildin’ you a home, Jessie, my love,” Cecil said after they had made their pledge. “I’ve been meanin’ to tell you, I’m going to the ice this spring! ’Tis been arranged fer me. ’Twill be guaranteed money!”
“Oh, you’re to be an ice hunter!” Jessie cried excitedly. Communities deep in Bonavista Bay always referred to seal hunters as ice hunters. “They stay at my father’s house in Hare Bay every year,” she continued.
“Well, I don’t know about ice hunters, Jessie, my love. Sealers, or swilers, we are called around ’ere. Though I know you crowd in the bay have a different name for everyt’ing,” Cecil said, laughing in his good-natured way. Secretly, though, he was pleased. Ice hunter was a proud title for a young man to wear.
The two lovers soon left and walked down the snowy road together in the light of the moon. Stealing a few more kisses at the open gate of Jessie’s home, the couple finally said good night. Jessie Collins went inside and closed the door behind her without a sound, and Cecil Mouland, the proud young ice hunter, bent his way home.
5
In St. John’s, the oldest European city in the Americas, the light of the last day of Christmas was also fading. Night was quickly filling the harbour, hiding the castle-like tower high above the north side of The Notch. It crept around old buildings in need of paint. Lights came on, some of them yellow and faint.
In dingy harbour taverns, beer was spilling over onto polished bar tops. Imported black rums were poured, blended harsh to burn a
man’s throat. In the drinking establishments of the old city on the sea edge, this last night of Christmas was just another excuse to drink. But over the bustling harbour, from atop one of the darkened hills, a church bell pealed out its belief and beckoned the faithful to witness the true celebration of the season.
The snow that had fallen on the city was no longer white. Coal soot from a thousand chimneys and the tread of a thousand more feet had left the cobblestoned streets a grimy muck. Spattered among the dirty snow were greenish splotches of manure dropped by horses pulling drays. Above the outer edge of the city, where The Notch met the Atlantic Ocean, the hills on both sides were splayed winter white.
Dozens of vessels were moored inside this narrow entrance and around the circumference of this best of harbours, and in several places where the slope of the rugged land allowed, small boats were hauled up for the season just out of reach of the sea. On one fence rail rested a discarded net with gaping, rotten holes, its cork floats tapping against the rail with the evening wind. Below the fence, the wooden claws of killicks—that ingenious Newfoundland invention that used rocks in lieu of steel grapnels—protruded out of the snow.
Ships were tied to the harbour wall and schooners with downed sails were hanked onto wharves and piers that poked like fingers into the greasy harbour waters. Hemp and bass and manila hawsers bigger than a man’s forearm were secured to worn bollards, creaking with the strain of holding the ships to the shore. From a few of the vessels came the smells of an evening meal cooking, the smells as foreign as the tongues of sailors who smoked while staring down over the bulwarks.
There were schooners, some of them tied to the docks and some of them hooked to collars off the land. All of them had furled sails and appeared to have been at rest for some time. Their decks were covered with trackless snow and their plimsoll lines had the same icy tidewater mark as did the cliffs.
Some of the steel ships in the harbour looked worn and rusty. Layers of ice coated their decks and rigging. One of them, with a deep-grey hull and a bright white superstructure, had built up a head of steam in preparation for leaving and was being pulled away from a northside dock by a stout little tug. Somewhere inside the vessel, a valve was released. The steam’s release sent a screeching sound around the harbour that no one noticed. The tug huffed a plume of smoke out of its lone stack as it wedged itself between the ship’s bow and the dock. Then, looking small and vulnerable beneath the huge liner, it pushed its charge into midstream. With the ship’s bow pointed seaward, the harbour tug burst away from the liner. Its whistle sounded and it plunged toward The Narrows. The liner made way and followed.
The seabound liner’s portholes were bright with light as she slipped out of the harbour, but only a glimmer of light showed from the black windows high up on her bridge. No captain would allow light on his bridge to hamper his visibility, especially not while making way through The Notch of St. John’s harbour. Smoke from the huge ship’s furnaces shot out of her stacks, only to fall lazily to her afterdeck and trail along in the vessel’s slipstream like a sooty curtain.
A deep, rumbling sound came from her vitals as well as a hiss of disturbed water as the ship went by the land. Still following the fussy little tug and taking the first of the Atlantic combers at the harbour mouth, the liner tipped her broad stern to the old city.
Secured to the many wooden docks and harbour aprons were several ships used extensively in the sealing industry. Only two of them were lit, showing a little activity. The others were silent save for the frequent wrenching and chafing at their tethers and the suck of the tide along their hulls. Coils of cordage and tangled lines smeared with snow lay on their decks as if huddling against the cold. Derricks, covered with snow, rested horizontally in their chocks. Huge windlasses in the bows were moulded in casts of snow. The big spring-lines and main bowsers that held the vessels to the docks were also covered with a layer of snow, except where they bagged down and dipped into the water between ship and wharf.
A sealing vessel moored some distance apart from the others looked ragged and dishevelled. She was in total darkness, with only the new snow on her deck to give her any semblance of cleanliness or light. She had a lone stack which rose above her bridge and reached halfway up her two masts. The forward mast was taller than the after mast, and from its top dangled a long piece of rigging that hung limply and stirred with the vessel’s movements. She had a small list to port as if she were leaking or carried an uneven weight somewhere inside her battered hull.
Two men appeared on the dock abaft of the black ship. They walked quickly toward a gangway that leaned down from the vessel’s listing port bulwark. The gangway, which was little more than two planks nailed together, was fastened to the bulwark, rising and falling and moving side to side with each motion of the ship. The men’s boots crunched on the snow as they approached the rickety walkway. One of them lugged a wooden tool box that swung by a handle from his left hand. Suddenly, he stumbled and fell backwards, the tool box spilling some of its contents onto the dock. The man bent to pick them up and cursed on the snow while the other man swore at him for falling. The tools clinked as he threw them back into the box.
They hesitated when they reached the gangway. It was covered with trackless snow. There were no rails or steps, and a single misstep would likely spill them into the icy harbour. After some discussion and more cursing, one of them scurried awkwardly up the makeshift gangway and stepped onto the deck of the ship. After a moment he found a rope and threw it down to the other. The man on the dock fastened the line to the tool box and waited as his companion pulled it up the walkway. After some coaxing from the man on board, the other finally made his way up. They walked like thieves toward a door and fumbled with its frozen lock. The door finally opened with a groan against its rusty hinges and the frost. Stepping inside, they lit a match, illuminating the windows.
After a while, the light went out again and the door creaked open as before. The two men appeared above the gangway and one of them went slipping, half running onto the dock. Inside the tool box was another large box, which the man aboard the ship lowered down. Finally, he stepped onto the gang-board, his arms spread out for balance. He tried creeping down. It didn’t work. He stumbled forward like a battered pugilist, stumbling and narrowly missing the empty air between plank and harbour, until he finally landed face down on the snowy dock. His partner roared with laughter. The two men grabbed the handle of the tool box, much heavier now, and walked quickly away with the chest between them. And the black box of modern wireless technology they had come for went with them.
The distant shriek of the steamer’s whistle and the answering farewell from the tug came through The Notch. And soon a throaty rumble came from the harbour entrance. A bright masthead light appeared and soon a green starboard and red port light. A white flush of water burst from her bows as the busy little tugboat came into view. The tug came roaring along the length of the sealing vessel the two men had just vacated. The tug’s engines were cut and she was heeled hard to starboard, her momentum swinging her under the broad stern of the quiet sealing ship. The tug slammed quickly and without ceremony against the dock, her rubbers chafing at the blow. Like a young athlete, a crewman jumped onto the dock from the shivering tugboat and dropped the sturdy bights of rope over the steel grumps fore and aft. A spring line was thrown and tied and the engine was shut down. The lights of the tug went out. The skipper jumped ashore and the two-man crew walked away to home.
The old sealing vessel pulled at her lines when the wash of the powerful tug rudely disturbed her sleep. The gang-board was plucked upwards with the indignity of the tug’s after waves, and when it came down it banged against the dock. While the ship twisted in the tug’s wake, for a moment her black windows picked up glimmers of light from the city. Then the dirty windows of the old SS Newfoundland fell dark with night again.
* * * * *
The ocean’s surface has u
ndergone a dramatic transformation under the curtain of Arctic night. With the terrible night winds, layers of snow have accumulated into countless humped, white shapes. At times during that long, lightless polar time, lifelike sounds where there was no life reverberated for miles along the expansive seascape: the rending and tearing of ice under pressure groaned and protested; it whined and screeched. There came rustling, crushing, pulverizing sounds, and sometimes a hissing and flushing, as if a troubled river flowed nearby.
The light returns gradually, reluctantly, revealing spectral scenes of white and grey. Now the deep, bitter night is penetrated by light. The blackest of skies grows dusky. Then comes the longest, most spectacular of gloamings. Deep smears of purple blend with pinks and shaded blues to dazzle the horizon.
This time of murky light, with all of its beautiful hues, soon passes. The sun scales out of the dark places and hangs in triumph, boldly ablaze, over a morphed landscape. And now, in the full light of day, where there had been a huge, grey, muted ocean, emerges a white plain without end.
It is incredible to look upon. It stretches so far as to shrink with the curvature of the ocean. Black points of land jut into its fringed borders. Huge, formidable-looking headlands with blunted and scarred waists stand like ramparts on the perimeters of this wasteland. There is no sign of life. Nor does it appear to be a place where life can exist. It is barren and beautiful.
Rising out of this white plain are several mountainous ice formations. Like the unbroken field of ice, the majestic icebergs were not here when the polar night had begun. Under the sun’s new light the ice floes gleam and glitter, basking in revelation after its time in the Arctic womb. Still, the ice is not finished with its amazing spectacle. Something even more incredible is happening. The immensity is moving. It is as if the entire northern world is in motion, propelled by a power beyond imagination. It is moving!