August Gale (5 page)

But my father makes another decision. His voice is soft and low when he speaks. “What the hell. She is my half sister. I think I'm going to write her back.”

My father's e-mail is short and to the point. Just as Donnie tried to ease his hurt, he tries to relieve her guilt.

Hi Donnie:

I am extremely impressed with your sensitivity, consideration, and openness in regard to the situation concerning our father. I don't have any bad feelings regarding you, your sister, or your brothers (nor should I). With my father, however, even after all these years, there remain some ill feelings.

I have lived in Pelham, NH since 1960. Born in Staten Island, NY 1935. I am married to a wonderful woman (Patricia), and we are blessed with six lovely daughters. (I am downright spoiled.) We also have eight grandchildren who are the joy of our lives.

Ron

Three thousand miles away, Donnie waits for her half brother's reply. She prepares herself for the possibility that his response will not be positive. She tells herself:
He could say that he just doesn't want to know anything about us. Or he could simply not write back. If I don't hear from him, I'll put this all to rest
.

When Donnie receives my father's e-mail, she squeals with relief and joy. She quickly writes her half brother back: “I feel like this is Christmas.”

L
illian Walsh stood by the parlor window, her eyes focused on the bay below. From the mantel, a clock marked the time and its ticking seemed unnaturally loud, as if reminding Lillian of the hours that remained before Paddy and her sons set sail. She pressed closer to the panes of glass, her eyes following her husband as he walked along the dirt path toward the water and his wharf.

“Off to see how the crew is getting along, fitting out for the trip,” he had told her. In a few days, they would all be at sea: Paddy, Frankie, Jerome, and James. It was worrisome enough when Paddy and James were out together on a single schooner, but now they'd be on different boats, James captaining his own vessel for the first time. The thought of it made Lillian sigh. He's only twenty-three, Lillian wanted to plead, but she knew better than to try and change Paddy's mind. “James will be fine, Lil,” Paddy had reassured her.

“By Gad, he's ready to take the helm on his own. Did I not captain my own schooner at the age of twenty-three from Gloucester to Newfoundland?”

“Yes, ye did,” Lil nodded, silently thinking,
But the boat ye sailed back from the Boston States 'twas a fine vessel, and double the size of the fifty-foot schooner James will skipper
.

Since the codfish prices had begun falling, nothing made sense anymore Lillian thought. It was daft to risk your life for fish that were all but worthless. There was little else but the sea to earn your living from; still, Paddy's younger brother Philip had opened a small shop and operated his own fish-drying business. “Why can't you stay on the blessed land, Paddy, like your brother Philip?” she'd asked him that morning. Paddy shook his head and said nothing, his mind lost on concerns he could not share with his wife. Of Paddy's four brothers, he and Ernest were the only two left captaining schooners.
Stuck in the ways of their father and grandfather before them
, Lillian thought. And the two of them as competitive as the day was long. How Paddy hated to hear his younger brother caught more fish than he. Such news would put him in a fierce mood for days. Cursing and muttering like a fiend, he'd be.
Dear God, would ye be certain Paddy hauls more than his brother on this journey? We could do with a bit of peace around the home
.

Footsteps from across the hall drew Lillian from her thoughts. In the dining room, the family maid dusted the piano, gently whisking the black and white keys. Lillian turned to the woman, watching her as she moved about, methodically sliding her cloth along the harp, the glass case filled with china, and the imported dining room chairs. Lillian eyed these gifts that Paddy brought home from his fishing trips or freighting dried cod to Portugal and Spain. She knew she was fortunate to have these treasures. Few houses in Marystown had store-bought goods; most of the fishermen's wives made do with homemade chairs and tables, curtains tied up with a bit of string rather than the thick metal rods that Lillian's plush drapes hung from.

But the luxuries mattered little when Paddy was at sea. Fine furnishings were all but invisible to Lillian then. The only things that drew her attention were the windows and the water below. A few days into her husband's journey, Lillian would set herself by the glass panes, watching, waiting for his return. The longer he was gone, the more she sat, stricken with worry. It seemed she had spent the last twenty-five years of her life looking out one window or another, praying for Paddy's safe journey. Like the other fishermen's wives, she fretted from the moment her husband left until the moment his boat breezed back into the harbor. The relief of seeing his sails on the horizon never failed to make her shudder, the pent-up worry releasing itself like a fever.

Flushed with the warmth of the room, Lillian pushed the parlor window open. A summer breeze carried the smell of fish drying along the shore. For as far as Lillian could see, fish flakes lined the beach. Rows of split and washed cod were laid out on the wooden platforms, waiting to be sold or shipped overseas. On the beach sand, women washed their husbands' catches in cold saltwater tubs.
Their hands were surely numb and raw by now
, Lillian thought. A baby wailed from its makeshift cradle, a bucket set near its mother's side. The infant's cry stirred sympathy from Lillian.
Thanks be the Lord, she and her three daughters had never dipped their hands in a fish barrel
. Nor did they have to contend with menial household chores. With two maids, Lillian and her girls did little cooking, cleaning, or gardening.

She knew her well-to-do status irked some of the other fishermen's wives, who barely had a moment's rest to themselves. She could only imagine their conversations, the words they whispered behind her back. “Did ye see the foxtail fur on her coat? And the fine shoes on her feet? She walks around like the Queen of Marystown, she does.”

Lillian understood their jealousies. Most of the women worked from dawn to dusk, scrubbing the cod clean and laying it on the spruce boughs that topped the fish flakes. When they weren't hauling fish to and from the flakes, they were raking hay, planting, and tending gardens. Lord, they worked themselves to the bone, and it still wasn't enough to properly feed and clothe their children.

The silhouette of her daughter-in-law, Lucy, caught Lillian's eye as the young woman walked slowly along the footpath that hugged the bay. Lucy stopped suddenly, took a deep breath and rubbed her broad belly.
The baby was due any day now; there was no changing that fact
, Lillian thought.
What's done is done
. They had been lucky enough that Father McGettigan had married her son James and Lucy in the church. Lucy could barely hide her pregnancy beneath the white gown Lillian had stitched together herself.

Lillian eyed her daughter-in-law's long face; James was not yet at sea, and Lucy looked forlorn already.
Aye, there's plenty years of worry ahead, me girl
, Lillian thought. If she had a penny saved for every minute she spent staring at the sea waiting for Paddy to return, she'd be a rich woman indeed. Now, like most of the women in Marystown, Lucy would likely give birth while her husband was away. Surely, Paddy was only present for a few of the nine children she'd birthed. As Lucy slowly made her way toward the
Mary Bernice
, Lillian shook off a chill. She had heard Father McGettigan chastise women who had gotten pregnant before marriage: “You will have to atone for your sins!” McGettigan bellowed from the pulpit. “Dear Lord, forgive them,” Lillian whispered, praying for her son and his new wife. “Forgive them.”

The laughter of her two younger boys interrupted Lillian's thoughts.
What in the divil are they up to now?
From the window, she could see Frankie and Jerome wrestling in the meadow. The boys wore the new knickers she had made for their trip. Surely, they'd be tattered before they left town. She had stitched the boys a new set of clothes telling Paddy, “If ye will be going into port anywhere, I want the boys and yourself to wear your Sunday best.” Of course, there was another occasion for which the boys and Paddy might need their fine clothes on such a journey, but Lillian pushed those dark thoughts from her mind.

She allowed herself a smile as she watched Frankie and Jerome chase one another in the meadow.
The two of 'em never stopped moving. Thin as spirits they were. It was no use trying to fatten them up; they devoured enough biscuits and beef to feed a grown man. In a few day's time, they'd be eating schooner grub, and it was likely that poor little Frankie would not be swallowing much a'tall as the boat rocked on the swells
. Lillian had hoped he would beg off this trip, but the boy would not disappoint his father, nor did he want the taunts from the local lads, who learned of his seasickness on last summer's journey. “Sissy,” they had jeered. “Ye mustn't be Paddy's son after all. Poor little sick lass.”

The thought of her boy ill and without his mother's hand to wipe his brow made her own stomach twinge. She knew Jerome would look after his younger brother, but Jerome himself was just a boy of fourteen. “C'mon,” he cried to Frankie from the field outside, “let's go see Da. Race you!” Lillian followed their shirttails as they disappeared down the hill. It was just a short journey they were off to, Lillian told herself, a week away before the boys returned to their schooling. “Just a quick trip o'er Cape St. Mary's and Cape Race,” Paddy had told her. “Nothin' to worry about.”

At least it 'twas just a quick trip. Sure now, it could be worse with her boys dropping out of school to fish in the dories before they turned twelve
. Paddy himself and most of the men and boys in Marystown had done the same. “No sense in schooling,” the dorymen told their sons. “It's the sea where ye do yur learning. It's the sea that teaches and feeds us.”

It's also the sea that takes ye
, Lillian thought as she turned back to the window. Frankie and Jerome hollered from the wharf below, “Can we climb the rigging, Da?” Beyond the plum and lilac trees in the front garden, Lillian could see the masts of
Mary Bernice
and
Annie Anita
. The boats looked so small, Lillian thought. In these desperate times, she understood Paddy was lucky to have a vessel to sail, but they were a pitiful sight compared to the grand schooners he had owned in the past.
Mary Bernice
was a fifteen-ton boat and not much longer than fifty-five feet; on her deck, she'd carry two double dories, James, and his crew of four men. Paddy's vessel,
Annie Anita
, was forty tons and a seventy-five footer. She'd carry three dories, along with Paddy, his two young sons, and six men.

Lillian could not help but compare the schooners to the vessels Paddy had captained in the past:
Lillian, Swan, A. Davis
, and
Golden Glow
. Many of them were sixty-ton boats, capable of carrying six dories and fourteen men; they were schooners that could weather storms, rough seas, and trips to the Grand Banks, Greenland, Portugal, and Spain. How she loved the sight of Paddy returning in the
A. Davis
, his hand proudly on the helm and the wind at his back as he headed for his wharf, where he would drop the mainsail in a salute to his wife.

It just about tore him in two to lose that vessel, the last of his grand schooners. A few years past, the merchant's men had come with their legal papers while Paddy was in St. John's trying to settle his debt for the schooner. The creditors had knocked on her door and gruffly told her, “We're taking the
A. Davis
.” They were not long gone when the steamer carrying Paddy back home glided into the bay. From the bow of the ship, Paddy glimpsed the
A. Davis
with its sails stretched tight against the wind. His fists flailing in the air, Paddy shouted curses as his schooner breezed toward the sea. If he could have caught the men before they slipped away, he would have killed them. That much Lillian knew.

Now he was left with these two schooners, one of them named after their daughter Mary Bernice, who had died of pneumonia. Lillian understood Paddy's sentiment, wanting to honor the memory of their lost child.
Skippers often named boats after their kin; but sure now, 'twas it not poor luck in naming a schooner after a baby who lay in the cold ground? Could that not bring ill fortune upon those who sailed her?
Misfortune had also fallen upon the vessel's previous crew. Before Paddy bought shares in
Mary Bernice
, she was caught in the 1927 gale; one of her crew had been washed overboard and drowned.
She's already lost a man
, Lillian thought.
What if the
Mary Bernice
is cursed?

Paddy hushed his wife when she spoke of her misgivings. He had no use for premonitions, but Lillian looked for them in her dreams, in the sky, and in the noises after dark. In the small village of Marystown and its neighboring outports, Lillian was not alone in her beliefs. The superstitions and folklore had traveled across the Atlantic with the Irish immigrants who had made their homes in Newfoundland. The elder women knew the cures that could rid you of headaches and warts, infected sores, and boils. When the May snows fell, they collected and bottled the flakes to rub on tired and sore eyes; potions of kerosene and molasses were blended to soothe a ragged cough. From the graves of pious souls, they gathered pebbles to ease achy teeth; in the woods, they plucked juniper and dogberries for upset stomachs; and from the shores, they picked seashells and seaweed, the makings of a poultice for festering wounds.