The Gravesavers

by Sheree Fitch

  “Save the Grave, Save the Grave.” Nana’s words kept flashing through my head like a blinking neon sign as I ran all the way to the house. I looked out to sea.

  I am positive I heard the screams of drowning people. Help!

  I saw my mother’s face before me. I heard her singing a Ladybugs song.

  I slammed the door shut behind me, leaned on it as if I could shut out everything. The phone rang and brought me back to earth with a thud.

  “Hey, Minn, how’s it going?” It was Corporal Ray.

  “Fine” is all I said.

  “And your grandmother?”

  “Same as always,” I snorted.

  “Are you getting on?”

  “Oh yeah, as long as we stay out of one another’s way.” I wanted him to feel good and guilty.

  “Minn, make an effort, all right?”

  “How’s Mum?”

  “Well, we’ve had a rough couple of days, but we did it.”

  “Did what?”

  “Cleaned out the baby’s—”

  “Oh. Yeah.”

  Then he told me that Mr. Forest had an angina attack and the ambulance had to come get him and he was fine but needed to take it easy. Also, Carolina dropped by, lonesome for me but pleased as punch she had a summer job babysitting the Fenton kids and a letter was in the mail.

  “Your mother wants to say hello to you,” he said. I pictured her by his side, waiting to get on.

  “She does?”

  There was a sound like he was covering the mouthpiece.

  “Okay, here she is.”

  “Minn?”

  “Mum!”

  “Is everything down there okay?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You sure?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Honey, I had this awful dream about you.”

  “I’m fine, Mum.”

  “Don’t go near the water, okay?” Her voice was urgent. I could almost see her talking through clenched teeth, her neck muscles tight. Seemed she pepped up a bit since I left.

  “Oookay,” I said.

  “Good. Well.”

  “Mum, I saw the most incredible sunrise this morning, you would have loved it—almost like watermelon.”

  “That’s nice, dear,” she said, back to that flattened-out voice I knew so well by now.

  “She’s tired, Minn.” It was Dad again.

  “I know, Dad, but when is she ever not going to be tired?”

  “Time is all she needs,” he said, “and rest. “I almost said if she got any more rest she’d turn into some dog that slept on the front porch with his tongue hanging out on hot summer days.

  “Will she really, Dad? Get better?”

  “Cross my heart,” he said. But he didn’t say hope to die stick a needle in my eye. This made me suspicious. Like he was hoping too but didn’t know anything for sure.

  “Bye, Dad.” I had to hang up fast before I told him the truth about how I was.

  That I was afraid and lonely and they both seemed to be worlds away from me.

  I went to my room and reached beneath my pillow. The skull was smooth, satiny even, like the binding on an old woollen blanket. There was still a tingle on my skin. A kind of feathery whispery feeling that started up the second I looked into the eyes of Beach Boy at the store. He barely even touched me and my heart had flipped. I shivered and stretched. I went out for another run.

  SHIPMATES

  On the second day at sea, the Atlantic docked in Queenstown, Ireland, to pick up more passengers. My father was thrilled to glimpse his “native shores” again—the first time since he’d left.

  “There’s the Emerald Isle. There’s your roots, boys. In that soil there.”

  “Sounds like we’re trees.” Thomas was still grumpy.

  “I’ve always felt the luck of the Irish in my veins, Dad,” I said, trying to buffer Tom’s snub. Things were still tense between them. Dad ruffled my hair. Thomas skulked away.

  After the Irish boarded, the ship crackled with laughter. There was singing and dancing and Irish whiskey flowing. A burly man named George supervised rearranging tables and chairs in the dining hall after supper. Musicians were everywhere: fiddlers and accordion players, Irish drums and ten-penny whistles.

  Thomas and I hung back at first, watching the older folks.

  “Want a sip?” A boy my age held out a bottle. “The name’s Ryan,” he said, even after I nodded no. Thomas took him up on his offer, though. He ducked behind a post so our folks wouldn’t see.

  “Where are your parents?” Thomas asked.

  “My mother’s dead and my father’s a drunk,” shouted Ryan over the din. “I worked and saved and if I hadn’t come up with the money I would have stowed away. But my uncle Danny, who lives in New York, sent me the rest of my fare.”

  I thought of Michael and his stowaway dreams. Thomas was thinking of his Rebecca, no doubt.

  Ryan’s accent was thick and at times he was impossible to make out. It didn’t matter much. He was like a gulp of fresh air. He had us laughing in no time and soon I was sipping the ale too.

  A few hours later I thought I was seeing things. A vision is what I’d call her. Yes, she was a dream. Everything was getting blurry on me by that time, of course. I rubbed my eyes. But no, there she was again. Thomas and Ryan were out on the floor dancing with two girls. I was standing alone. Or rather, trying to stand. And this beautiful vision—this young lady—came right over and smiled at me.

  “You … look a bit green,” she said.

  “Yes, miss,” is all I said.

  She was older than Thomas. And more beautiful the closer she came. She smelled like wet rose petals.

  “Would you like to get some fresh air?”

  “Yes, miss,” I said again.

  “Are you alone?” she asked.

  “Yes, miss.”

  “Well, let’s get you out on deck quickly, shall we?”

  “Yes, miss.”

  I vomited over the railing on the outside deck. She dabbed my mouth with a lace handkerchief. Then she put something underneath my nose that jolted me.

  “Smelling salts,” she said. “Can’t have you fainting on me!”

  Thomas and Ryan came out on the deck.

  “Do you know his name?” she asked them, as if I wasn’t there. I guess I really wasn’t either. I couldn’t find my tongue to speak.

  “John Hindley. I’m Thomas. I’m his brother.”

  “And I’m Ryan,” said Ryan. “And I’m not.”

  “I am Miss Maryanna Rayborn. And shame on you two. You should take better care of your brother!”

  They gawked at her.

  “Yes, miss,” they chimed in unison.

  And then they bowed. Bowed! I never knew Thomas to bow before.

  “But she had this way of looking at us,” Thomas told me later, “like we should almost kneel before her. Like she was royal almost, not snooty but you know—a lady. And she nodded—friendly enough—but turned her back on us and looked right at you and said,’Well, John Hindley, my name is Maryanna Rayborn in case you didn’t catch that, and I might have to be your guardian angel on board if you’re under the charge of these scallywags.’ And you said,’Yes, miss,’ and kissed her hand!”

  “I did not!”

  “Did too!”

  I never knew for sure if they were pulling my leg or not.

  Apparently, after Miss Rayborn said good night, they carried me to the cabin and helped me climb up into my bunk. I do remember them half laughing and bumping their heads as I fell asleep.

  I prayed for sleep before I was sick again.

  I dreamt of a woman with green eyes and a white dress made of feathers.

  GUIDED TOUR

  “The secret is to eat tiny bits all day instead of big meals all at once. And no spirits would help!” Mum scowled at all three of us.

  Dad winked at us. “Eyes at the back of her head.”

  “As if we didn’t know!” I said.

  “We ar
e in the bowels of the ship,” Dad explained, “in what is called the steerage section. This makes the seasickness worse, for sure.”

  “That explains the smell, then,” smirked Thomas. “And here I’ve been thinking it was your bowels stinking me out, John.”

  It was cramped, all right. Thomas and I shared a berth in the men’s quarters. There was just enough room for our beds, stacked one on top of the other. We argued over who slept on top and decided to take turns. Thomas let me get the upper bunk for the first half of the trip. Although I promised, I wasn’t ready to switch with him. I liked being as high up as I could be. All that ocean beneath me was unsettling.

  During the day Ryan kept us busy. One morning, he pestered the first mate, a gruff fellow by the name of Frith, until he finally paid us attention.

  “How many times you crossed this ocean?”

  Frith snorted, and then looked us over as if we were a bother.

  “Well, I started at about your age.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, times were different then. Young boys knew what it meant to put in an honest day’s work.”

  “I’m used to work,” Thomas piped up. “Worked at the cotton mill in Ashton until we sailed.”

  “I’m very busy right now,” Frith said. “But come with me. I want to show you young men something.”

  He led us through three narrow passageways, each one a level lower than the one before. We tunnelled lower and lower. I got this terrible closed-in feeling. Frith chattered on the whole time.

  “Imagine now, boys, this ship carries 11,016 pounds of flour, 4,560 pounds of beef, 256 pints of milk, seven gallons of whiskey. That’s for starters. Then there’s fresh water and butter, port wine and tea—288 pounds of tea. The English and Irish and their tea!”

  He gestured to the left and right, pointing things out. Our heads were spinning. Frith called the ship a “she,” as if it was a beautiful and powerful woman.

  I thought of Miss Maryanna Rayborn.

  At the end of each tunnel was a door, securely fastened with clips at the top.

  “These are airlocks, boys. Nothing can get through them when they’re bolted shut. Are you sure you want to go on?”

  I sure wasn’t.

  “Move on,” urged Thomas. But even Ryan’s wise-cracking manner had disappeared.

  “Mum would have a fit if she knew what we were doing,” I whispered to Thomas.

  “She doesn’t, though,” he hissed back, and the sound echoed all around us. Finally, we made it to the bottom of the ship and a final door.

  “Behold, young sirs, you’re now looking as close as you’ll ever get to the mouth of Hades itself,” said Frith, and he flung open the door.

  “Whooah!” Ryan blew the sound out between clenched teeth and whistled.

  “Crikey!”

  “Take a gander over there, John Hindley.”

  The clang of metal and spitting of steam from the boilers beat out a steady thudding rhythm. Below us, throngs of soot-faced, bare-chested men, sweat running in rivers down their backs, shovelled lumps of coal into the furnaces. Even covered with all that grime, they looked to me like ghosts. As the fires lit up, they lit up themselves. It wasn’t that much of a stretch to imagine that we were in the Devil’s Den.

  “She’s still a ship that’ll travel under wind and sail,” Frith was saying, “and for my money that’s how I’d sail her if I was the captain. Relying on the likes of these men to do their work is taking a chance. We found fourteen stowaways when we left Liverpool. Fourteen—that’s a record, for sure. Hardly a one of them is useful enough to work one honest shift.”

  The shouts of the men were lost in the din. One man with biceps hard as anvils barked up at us.

  “First Officer Frith, all respect to you, sir, but the boys ain’t allowed here.” He frowned and jerked his thumb.

  Frith waved, but let us stand there a few more moments. We were spellbound by the flickering shadows dancing on the rows of twisted pipes and tubing.

  Thomas’s eyes were as shiny as the flames themselves. He was breathing hard and grinning from ear to ear. I was breathing hard too but wishing like anything I was on dry land. Still, I pretended for his sake that the whole thing was a great adventure. It was like I had my real brother back again. He slapped my back in his old good-natured way as we headed up the stairwell.

  Once back on the upper deck, Frith gave us each a length of rope.

  “Now this ain’t to be going and hanging yourself with, boys. If you ever plan on being decent sailors, first off, you got to know your knots. Lives can be saved with rope and knots. I’ll show you some over the next few days, give you something to pass the time. We’ll start with the bowline knot. Simple and strong.”

  His hands moved so quickly it was hard to follow. This way, that way, criss-crossing. He laughed at our butter-fingered attempts and the looks on our faces when we ended up tangled. So he did it again, much slower this time, working the rope up through the loop of a number six and back in and over.

  “Practice makes perfect,” he said, and then he was off.

  My brother nudged Ryan. “Shall we go and find Emily and Sara?” They must be the two they’d been trying to impress the night before. Girls again!

  “Thought you left your heart back in England,” I teased.

  “Shut your mouth,” Thomas snapped.

  Ryan perked right up. “What’s this?”

  “Thomas is heartsick, don’t you know?” I had to duck and run to get out of his reach.

  I stood for a long time on deck, looking up into the rigging. The sails were down and the tangles of ropes made me dizzy. The mizzenmast, Frith had told us, was the third mast from the bow. Often a sailor proved his seaworthiness by climbing to the top of one of the masts.

  I knew I’d never be a sailor. I was as afraid of heights as I was of depths.

  “Something to behold, isn’t it, Master Hindley.” Her.

  “Yes, miss.”

  “Do you know any other words than those?”

  “Yes, miss.”

  Her laughter made me dizzier than the rigging I’d been looking up into.

  I laughed too.

  “That sure is a long ways up,” I said.

  “Could you climb it?” she asked.

  “That’s just what I was wondering.”

  “What was your conclusion?”

  “I thought not.”

  “Well, I’m a person who thinks you can do anything if you want to. Or have to.”

  “I don’t think I’d ever want to, miss, and unless I become a sailor I won’t have to.”

  “Please call me Maryanna. Miss makes me feel so old. Ma’am is worse! I’m not a married woman yet.”

  “Yet?”

  “That’s why I’m sailing. My fiancé is waiting for me on the other side. In New York. I can hardly wait!” She jumped up a little when she said New York.

  “Me too,” I said. “I mean, I’m going to New York, too! And my brother is going to send for his girl as soon as he can.” I brought up Thomas to make her know how well I understood love and passion.

  “And you? No broken heart you left behind?”

  I shook my head.

  “Well, then. We’ll just have to keep each other good company, won’t we?”

  She linked her arm in mine. I nodded like a fool.

  I think Miss Rayborn was lonely. I was just a young boy to her. She probably had no idea how she affected me.

  At that moment I needed another dose of those smelling salts.

  WHAT PARENTS DO

  “I don’t care if the king of England himself were sitting with us. When it’s time for a mother to speak, it has to be done.”

  Sure enough, Mum had found out where we’d been. Thomas couldn’t help spilling the beans to Dad. Dad was right proud and boasted to everyone. What was he thinking?

  Mum scowled. “Boys, over here, please, so the whole world won’t hear everything.”

  We obeyed.

&
nbsp; “Mr. Ryan O’Brien, that means you as well! Seeing as you’re their mate this trip and I wouldn’t mind having a handsome son like you anyhow, especially with that talent for making people laugh. But it goes with trouble, too.

  “Now. Don’t you go pulling any shenanigans like that again. Dig the earwax out and hear me good, because I mean it.” She twisted our ears as she spoke.

  “Ow.”

  “Woah!”

  “Mum!”

  But truth be told, we were all trying not to laugh. Mum could twist hard enough to make it sting, but mostly it was never more than a pinch. She was such a biddy thing, and now that we were all taller than her, she had to stand on her tiptoes to wag a finger in our face.

  “I can just imagine the language coming out of those men down there was not fit for any civilized gentleman.”

  “I’m not so civilized as all that, Mum,” Thomas mumbled. “Heard worse at the mill, you know, every single day.”

  “Well, good sir, man of the world, are you? So maybe there’s little hope for you, but your brother here is about to be an educated gentleman. He won’t be having any need for that sort of filth.”

  “Yes, Ma. Sorry, Mum.”

  It was true, my schooling was one of the main reasons Dad decided to leave Lancashire county and head off to New York.

  “A boy like you to whom reading comes so easily needs more schooling, not the mill.” He’d said this the first time I came home from school and recited some little poem for them after supper one evening. It was something I was asked to do regularly, for entertainment on winter nights. But it was my last year of public school. There was no money for more, not back home in England. In America, I could continue school for free.

  “Yes,” Dad said to me the night he told me of his plans. “You’ll get a better life than your old man’s, eh?” I knew what he meant, but the thing of it was, if I was to grow up to be a man like him, that would please me well enough.

  “To Paddy, the man with a ready laugh and a huge heart and the strongest arms in the mill,” said the fellows when they lifted pints to him on the night of their farewell party. And that described him, all right. Yes, indeed. Patrick Hindley was the kind of man any son would be proud to grow up to be.