The Pilgrim

by Paul Almond

  On the way back, we dropped Gene at Old Fort Island, from which he would be taken by a fisherman into the settlement of St. Paul’s River and rejoin his wife and baby. His one hope, as he had told me, was to get a church built there, but we both feared that might be several years off. A brave man, a wonderful companion, but how on earth had he been able to leave his family for so long?

  So indeed, two long weeks after I had rescued that willowy, bedraggled Lorna, Owen and I sailed into the stagehead at Mutton Bay, my headquarters for the winter, where presumably she had ended up. As we unloaded the boat, I confess I was delighted not to have to get on board again — at least, not until next spring’s breakup.

  I set off across the snow-covered village toward Aunt Minnie’s, with Owen helping carry my belongings. My mind had often been focussed on the well-being of Lorna Maclean and I wondered if she would still be here, or had she caught a last sail back to Nova Scotia?

  As I trudged along, I couldn’t help but wonder why those first inhabitants here, some half-century ago, had chosen such barren promontories for their year-round home. So little to recommend it — by no means an accommodating environment, it seemed to me. Attractive, oh no doubt, with its looping inlets dividing the village. Unified now with a dusting of autumn snow, it still seemed so very inhospitable: square, boxy houses with red or tarred roofs perched unnaturally on the uneven granite shore. Their positioning arose from no careful selection of building sites but rather, from having been seemingly scattered haphazardly like toys across the brittle landscape by a careless child. The whole community comprised not more than a couple of dozen families, making fifty or sixty parishioners in all. Most of the houses sat only a few feet back from the water on granite arms that looped around, each family getting thereby an individual wharf or stagehead, and at its back a stage for preparing and storing fish.

  We reached the top of a slight rise and started over toward the house of Aunt Minnie on a footbridge across an inlet. As we were walking rapidly, I glanced again at the square white house and stopped short. Walking behind, Owen almost bumped into me. There, in the light wind, stood a tall figure in a dark skirt, but what was she doing? Splitting wood? A man’s job! I shook my head and glanced at Owen, who grinned. “Seems like they put ’er to work!”

  We hurried on, not talking, and then as I drew closer, I was to get my second shock of the day.

  She tossed a couple of split logs aside and turned. When she saw me coming, she stood as if struck, and then dropped her axe and ran lightly down the slope and straight into my arms, clutching me with all her might, shaking slightly. I confess I was taken aback. She buried her face in my shoulder, and then I could feel her sobbing. I allowed my arms to go around her, although I felt embarrassed. Then a wave of empathy washed over me and I began to hold her as tightly as she held me. Owen, seeing this meeting, hurried by and went to drop my bag at the door of the house, after which he turned and, with a broad grin, waved and set off to his relatives where he would spend the night.

  Slowly, she disentangled herself and then, shaking her head, turned to wipe her eyes and went back to her chopping.

  I followed. “Well,” I felt somewhat at a loss for words, “I see they’ve got you working, Lorna!”

  She nodded, managing a brief smile. Then she gestured to the door and got another log of birch, while I went inside to make myself known to Aunt Minnie.

  I greeted her, certainly more formally than that emotional meeting outside, and I asked her how Lorna had been doing.

  “Took ’er about a week, I’d say.” Aunt Minnie helped me off with my coat and then went over to the stove to prepare the obligatory cup of tea. “And then, one morning by the time I’d made myself breakfast, I looked around, and the house was spic and span. Lorna had gotten up early and was cleaning like the best of them.” She smiled, and I reacted with surprise. “All that day it went on, till I made ’er stop and sit while I gave ’er a bowl of soup. She seemed so anxious to please, and so happy to be ’ere.”

  “Has she spoken to you?”

  Aunt Minnie shook her head. “Not a word since she arrived, poor dear. I ’spect she’s been through so much on that awful schooner. We just ’ave to give ’er time.”

  I nodded. I knew she would come out of it, but when? Well, I too would give her time.

  So that was the story. As we talked, I recounted my journey to Aunt Minnie, telling her of our narrow escapes, how we had nearly lost the boat and our lives, and how other storms kept plaguing us so that we found ourselves seriously at risk twice more.

  “But you are sure you don’t mind Lorna staying here for the time being?” I asked Aunt Minnie.

  “Mind? My dear, I couldn’t do without ’er. Do you know, whenever I was short of water, she’d go and bring me buckets down from the pond.”

  So at least my mind was put to rest in this regard. I would now have no worries about her and could continue pursuing my duties as priest. Gene had warned me I’d have to begin teaching school while we were held captive by the slob ice. Once enough snow fell and the land froze up solid, I could begin using the dogs and komatiks, and get off ministering to other villages. But not for at least another month or more.

  The next morning I awakened early as was my habit, but I found myself enormously tired. I went downstairs to a good breakfast which both Aunt Minnie and Lorna had prepared. Apparently the latter had gotten up early to make a fire before the rest of us, a chore she had adopted and a welcome one at that. I was introduced to brewis (pronounced brews) which is hardtack and salt fish, both soaked overnight, and brewed up to be served with scrunchions (small cubes of fat pork, fried to a golden brown). These make it palatable, to my taste, although it all sounds dreadful. Much admired along the coast here, it was a traditional Sunday breakfast. I soon got used to it, and began to look forward to it before church.

  After chatting with Aunt Minnie and swapping the latest news, I retired to my room to read over the lessons for this Sunday, for I had my sermon to prepare. But before I had even finished the Gospel, I found myself falling asleep, and indeed did not wake until I heard someone knock at my door.

  I sat up, astonished. Already noon! The door opened and in came Lorna with a tray. She stood looking down at me, motionless; was she taking me in for the first time? At the same time, I looked at her: she had already lost that gaunt look and was beginning to get colour in her cheeks. Her once stringy hair was now a lustrous black, beautifully combed and tied into a bun. In fact, I found her more striking and much younger than I had first imagined. Her size had given her a maturity that her age did not support. But no doubt, a quiet dignity permeated her youthful presence. Her black eyes stared, apparently unaware of my returning look, and then she collected herself and set the tray down on the table beside my bed. She lifted a hand as though to touch me, thought better of it, and left the room, glancing back at me with a wondering look as she closed the door.

  I suppose she and Aunt Minnie had realized how tired I was and had decided to keep me quiet. Very welcome. So I had my fish soup, which tasted fine, and some homemade bread with molasses, finishing with a dish of bakeapple preserve. Then I lay back once more to read over Sunday’s lessons and, believe it or not, fell asleep again.

  Another knock awakened me about midafternoon and Lorna came in, gesturing downstairs. I nodded and sat up, and she retired quickly. I put on my boots and went downstairs to find my two churchwardens: Thomas Buffett, nice and young with a moustache, the people’s warden, at whose wedding I later officiated, and his companion, Thomas Bobbitt, heavy-set, patriarchal, bearded, the warden here for eleven years. We proceeded to discuss the arrangements for the Sunday services, and they offered to bring me the next day over to Tabacher, another community, more densely populated, only five miles away.

  Perhaps because I had slept so much during the day, my night was uneasy. I tossed and turned, and then had nightmares invaded by wolves. They were about to ravage me when I woke up, and then I distinctly heard what
seemed to be long howls echoing over the granite outcropping. Other howls answered, after which a chorus of barks rang out. I went to the window, and looked across the snow-covered land upon which a harsh full moon was flinging its ominous glare. All was still, no light in any window... no four-footed demons that could I see. I shivered and crept back across my cold, wood floor to snuggle under the blankets and try to get back to sleep.

  The next day I found myself striding with Thomas Bobbitt over hilly and quite wooded country on our way to Tabacher. “Funny, you know, I thought I heard wolves in the night, but then this morning, I realized it might just have been huskies.”

  “Could be a bit of wolf in them dogs,” my warden said. “We’ve been bringing ’em back from the islands the last while, getting their pens ready to hold ’em good.”

  “I have to admit I’ve never driven a dog team. On the Gaspé where I came from, we use horses, of course, and in the old days, oxen.”

  “No horses here, dogs only. They’re fast and steady, if you train ’em good.”

  I wondered if I’d ever get them “trained good.”

  “Have you any idea why your ancestors came to settle on Mutton Bay for their permanent home?”

  “Smart fellas, them folk were,” Thomas said. “Plenty o’ flat rock to dry the cod, and plenty of waterfront for ’em to land it. Best place around,” was Thomas’s considered opinion. “Now over there in Tabacher where we’re goin’, it’s got the biggest seal fishery on the coast. Old Sammy Robertson got it off the Labrador Company, maybe seventy-five year ago, when ’e first come. Now ’is grandson Sammy John runs it.”

  I’d heard about the seal fishing and was pleased we’d be seeing the foundry. Gene had warned me not to forget that, every year round about now, we had a Sunday service devoted to prayers and supplications for the seal harvest.

  We entered Tabacher on foot by the inlet known as Red Bay, by Pointe de Gros Mecantina, full of English Catholics ministered by a priest, Father Poudrier. I determined to meet him as soon as I could. A bit further on, we crossed an isthmus and walked past another inlet to Tabacher Cove where my warden introduced me to a bewhiskered and dignified Sammy John Robertson. It seemed the Robertsons pretty well owned Tabacher: certainly they were related to everyone. We walked past his house and found him supervising a couple of men who were repairing platforms a dozen feet above the flat rock shelf.

  “Just fixing our seal scaffolds,” Sammy John told me, after we’d been introduced. A heavy-set man with an honest look in his eyes and, like all the men here, a rock hard body, though not tall. “We put the seal carcasses up there once they’re sculped to keep ’em frozen till spring, when we render down the fat. Keeps ’em safe from dogs and other animals. Pelts, we hold ’em in sheds till spring.”

  “Any wolves?”

  “Way inland where we go hunting. None out here.”

  “And what are the chances of a good seal hunt this fall?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “You never know, you never know.” The village’s livelihood depended upon it flourishing, and some years it didn’t.

  “You sell the pelts?”

  “Yep, there’s a fella comes round to buy ’em in the spring. The meat feeds the dogs. We eat it too, specially the flippers — ever had one?”

  I shook my head. “And that’s all you live off?”

  He nodded. “Cod too, o’ course. But you’ll see it all when we start in a couple of weeks. Then we’ll be able to get going on our komatiks.”

  “The dogs like seal meat?”

  “Best thing for them, along with cornmeal, and sometimes we get a whale.”

  I was anxious to see this seal hunting, for we did none on the Gaspé.

  “You gonna teach our children?” he asked.

  On the way over we had discussed the matter. More children lived here than in Mutton Bay, and although the Tabacher folk often made the trek over for their church service, I knew it was too much to ask the children to do.

  “Might be able to.” I turned to Thomas. “Could I teach maybe mornings in Mutton Bay and afternoons in Tabacher?”

  “None of ’em other clergy folk ever took that much on, Mr. John,” said Thomas Bobbitt. “But if you likes, you could start. When it gets too much, we can leave it to one school till ya start your rounds on the komatik.”

  On the way back, Thomas broached the subject again. “I been asking around for someone to start helping you, going on a few test trips with the dogs. Pretty hard to find someone though. There’s a team Mr. Gene used last year, and they might do. But I don’t know how we’d feed ’em, and get someone to drive you.”

  “Food for the dogs, it’s a problem?”

  “You see, pretty much everyone who works on the seals gets their share of meat. So I’m not quite sure ’ow we should arrange that this year. I been talking to Thomas here, asking ’im what we should do.”

  “Why wouldn’t I work on the seals along with everyone else?”

  “You, Mr. John? Clergy don’t do that kind o’ work around ’ere.”

  “Well, I was brought up on a farm, I do like dogs, and I would prefer mine to be well fed, and so if that’s what it takes...”

  “Dogs, Mr. John.” Thomas stopped walking and looked at me. “You gotta be careful. They’re not pets ’ere. They’re workin’ animals. You go soft on ’em and they’ll run all over you. Only two year ago, one old fella was killed by ’is dogs. He must’ve given ’em some fresh rabbit, or fresh meat, and the smell of blood drove ’em crazy. When ’e went into the pen, they tore ’im to pieces.”

  I reacted with horror. “You don’t mean that’s actually true?”

  “It’s the truth all right. And five years afore that, one of the children over in Whale Head just missed being kilt by dogs what escaped their pen. So ya see, no laughing matter.”

  I realized I had more on my plate than I had bargained for. “What about my working along with the men in the seal hunting?”

  “Hard work,” was all Thomas said.

  “Well, let me give it a try.”

  He nodded, and we spoke of it no more.

  We were walking back quite quickly, which impressed me. “You always walk this fast?” I asked.

  “It’s bath night. I got four kids. We all gonna take our baths afore supper. So I can’t be late.”

  Bath night! I certainly had forgotten. Time for me to get good and clean, at last.

  Another surprise awaited me when I arrived. When I opened the front door, Lorna rushed forward and indicated I should go straight upstairs and not look into the main room, where I saw something was hidden behind a makeshift curtain, a blanket strung between chairs. Frowning but curious, I went up and heard Aunt Minnie’s voice call after me, “Bath night.”

  “Don’t I know it,” I called back. Saturday, everything got scrubbed, I discovered: floors (on hands and knees) chairs, tables, everything. And at the end of that, we scrubbed ourselves.

  “Come down in ten minutes. We’ll have a surprise.” She sounded tickled pink.

  I got out of my heavy clothes and put on a pair of sealskin slippers I had received as a present on one of my visitations. Ten minutes later, her voice called, “We’re ready!”

  Wearing only underwear with my long coat as covering, I went down, feeling the heat at once; the stove had been well fired. Lorna stood beside Aunt Minnie, and they both looked well pleased.

  When I peeked behind the blanket strung between the chairs, I saw a large puncheon tub, a wooden vat really, used for fish. This one had been well scrubbed and was watertight. Large enough to get into, as well. “Wherever did you find that?”

  “Only bath like this in Mutton Bay, that’s fer sure,” Aunt Minnie said proudly. “Seems your friend ’ere seen the like in Halifax and she went out and found one on some stage. She ’ad to work for three days cleaning their place in return for it. It’s all ’er doing.”

  I looked at Lorna. She hid her face behind her hand, so obviously pleased with herself, b
ut at the same time shy.

  And what was more to the point, the water in it — a considerable amount — was steaming hot.

  “She ’ad to make three more trips to the pond to get enough water fer ya. I must say none o’ my other clergymen been treated so good! You’re a lucky fella, Mr. John, to ’ave rescued such a prize. I reckon there’s nothin’ Lorna can’t do.”

  “Oh thank you,” I said. “I just wish you’d be able, soon, to talk to me...”

  A hurt look flitted across her face. Then she took Minnie by the hand and they hurried out. On the chair hung a fresh towel above a big bar of homemade soap.

  Once they had left, I wasted no time stepping into the tub and tried curling down to get under the lovely warm water. No doubt, I hadn’t felt so royally treated since I left home. Yes, my confrontation with that captain was bringing rewards I never expected.

  I sat soaping myself, completely relaxed and dreaming of my service tomorrow. I’d start with simple morning prayer — that would be best. And who knows, I might even start having two services, one here in our little mission house, and one over in Tabacher at the one-room mission. I felt quite prepared for the future, because cleanliness, as my mother often said, is next to godliness. How lucky to have this bath. Yes, I reflected, Lorna is indeed a prize!

  Chapter Six

  The seal fishing had been going on for two weeks when on Saturday I arranged for Lorna to wake me before dawn. The winter was definitely upon us, though without enough snow for long-distance travel. I had settled in pretty well, teaching school now for four weeks and taking on my share of daily chores, including daily trudges up the hill with my still-mute Lorna to get water from Vincent’s brook behind the village; a big enough supply had not been laid in for Aunt Minnie during the summer. Lorna was getting healthier every day, and once when I tripped and spilt my buckets, she broke into the most delightful peals of laughter.