Blackstrap Hawco (77 page)

The thought of her fingertips scares him. How she sees with her fingertips. He imagines them removed. What then? It reminds him of disaster. But she is there. Working through it all. All of these blind people moving around him. Getting on with what must be done.

When he finishes work, on his way out, he passes near Heather. Her face more and more familiar as he nears. Close enough to smell her perfume. Her head turns a little while he goes by. Like she's listening and knows his step. Her lips are pink and full. But they don't smile. They're serious. Almost frowning. The colour of her eyelids like powder. Her eyes staring. Fixed like an animal on display. She listens after him. Her face turning more. He looks back to see her watching. He tries holding his eyes on hers. But can't bring himself to keep it up. Even though there's no way she can see him. Her arms by her sides. Her face made even more stunning by the blindness. Always as though she's waiting for only one thing that's needed.

Out in the fresh air, he heads for the old woman's apartment. It's not that far away. About halfway between the factory and his rooming house. He has a bad feeling about not doing anything with Heather. Every time he moves close to her, he tries to say something. But the words won't come out, and he can't stand himself for not knowing what he wants from her.

Before he knows it, he is on the old woman's street. He has already
passed her apartment and has to turn back. He has been wondering why the old woman left Newfoundland. If she came to Toronto with her husband, she never mentioned. Why stay away like that? If she loves the place so much? He wonders about his mother and father. What they are doing now. He can get no sense of it from where he is living. No sense of what they might be doing in their house in Cutland Junction.

He is at the apartment door. He goes inside and looks at the buzzers for the five apartments. He remembers her number: 1A. The letters M-R-S. L-A-M-B-L-Y next to the button. He presses it with his ring finger. He has been thinking about the story all day. While standing at the control panel in the toilet paper factory. He has been trying to make sense of it. The image of the black sea. The blackness of it has sunk deep inside. To connect with a darkness already present.

The old woman's voice comes through the intercom: ‘Hello?'

‘It's me…From yesterday.'

The door buzzes and he goes in. Up over the one flight of stairs. He knocks on her door. The door opens a crack. And there is the old woman's face. ‘Yes?' she says.

‘Hi.'

‘What is it?'

‘I'm back from yesterday.'

‘Yesterday?' She squints a little.

‘I was here yesterday with your bags. Groceries.'

‘Who're you?' The old woman stares. Her lips wrinkling around the edges while she studies him. Then her eyes brighten and she begins to smile. ‘Ha. Just joking.' She opens the door wide. ‘You've come to hear the rest of it then.'

Blackstrap smiles and blushes a little at the old woman's playfulness. ‘Thanks.'

‘Come in.' She steps back for him to enter. Anxious. Her hands joined together. ‘It's good of you to come back. I thought I might have frightened you off.'

He wipes his boots in the mat, and they sit at the table. Again, the curtain has been drawn. The old woman does not open it. A small lamp is on in the living room. It gives off a cozy glow. ‘Oh,' she says, raising a
hand slightly. ‘I forgot.' She pushes herself up with a low groan and makes a pot of tea.

Blackstrap takes a moment to look for the cat. But there is no sign of it. He notices a few books stacked beside the table lamp.

A tray of raisin buns is on the counter. The old woman puts them on a plate and brings them over to set on the table. ‘I made raisin bread too. A loaf for you to take away.'

‘Thanks, missus.'

‘I'm cooking salt fish and potatoes later. Maybe some scrunchins, too. You'll have to stay.'

Blackstrap says nothing to this. Then nods. ‘Okay.'

‘Good…So, where were we?'

‘The men went out in boats and didn't come back,' Blackstrap says.

The old woman chuckles while she sits, her eyes on Blackstrap's face. ‘Right…The women would hug their sons and husbands goodbye…Was that where we were?'

‘Yes.'

‘Okay.' She straightens in her chair. Dabs at her lips with a fancy handkerchief. Looks at the lipstick stain. Then folds the handkerchief and tucks it away. Up the sleeve of her housedress. ‘So…Each day, another man would go out, then another…But nothing given in return.' She shrugs. ‘Except…'

‘What?' Blackstrap clears his throat, and eyes the raisin buns.

‘A few coppers. For every man lost, a few coppers would arrive at the household of the man lost. An envelope found on the doorstep with a strange stamp up in the corner.'

‘From who?'

Again, the old woman shrugs. ‘Soon, all the youngest men were gone, were lost. So, the middle-aged men were sent to see if they might find something in the black sea.'

Blackstrap shifts his eyes to the woman. His stomach grumbles and so he moves his attention back at the buns.

‘Have one?' says the old woman. Nudging the plate toward him with her bony fingers. ‘Don't be shy. Not around me. Take whatever you like. I don't mind.'

Blackstrap lifts a bun and bites into it.

‘You want some table butter?'

He shakes his head. ‘Why do the men keep going out, if the other ones don't come back?'

‘They cling to hope, of course. Hope is what keeps them going. Up in the morning, out the door, into the black sea. Hope…One day, they say, one of the men will finally return with news of why the sea has turned black. And let's not forget the envelope of money that finds its way to the family of the man who vanishes. The coins keep the poor children from starving to death. The men know this, so, in resignation, they come to make the sacrifice.'

Blackstrap takes another bite. Hungry for more words. He sips carefully from his cup of tea.

‘Eventually, the town has lost all its young men and its middle-aged men. There are only old men left and they can't go into the sea. The women give birth and when the boys grow into young men they go to the black sea. The mothers and sisters stand on the shore, staring out into the black void that the boats silently float through. The women won't even raise their hands to wave because waving had come to mean goodbye forever. Women lining the shoreline for miles and miles, stood there as still as anything with no expressions on their faces. It keeps happening like that, and there is never any news and there is no change. It becomes the way. The men are born to disappear in the black sea.'

‘There's never any change?'

‘No.'

‘Do the men die?'

‘Not really. They don't die completely.'

‘What's in the black sea?'

‘Nothing.'

‘So where are the men then? Where do they go?'

The old woman stares at Blackstrap, her eyes losing their youthful gleam. ‘They're right here.' She turns her head to gaze out the window. The curtains pulled. Not a stain of light entering from outside. Then the old woman looks back at Blackstrap. ‘You're one of them, aren't you?'

 

Chapter IX – 1984

Ghostbusters

(March, 1984, 30 years old)

One thing about the mainland, Blackstrap can go almost anywhere by bus. This is an idea he appreciates. Because there is no need to travel over water. No longer on an island. He buys a ticket from Toronto to Boston during his time off. One week. A belated present to himself for his thirtieth birthday. While on the bus, he thinks of Heather. Then he thinks of Agnes and Susan. But the way he feels for Heather is different. Protective. Agnes does not need protecting. She is off with another man. Maybe that was what happened to Susan, too. Maybe she met another man and went off with him. Although a part of Blackstrap believes that Susan was just something he imagined when recuperating in the hospital. Someone his mind invented as a distraction from the pain. But her memory as real as anything. Forever in his mind, a stretch of grace between two shifts on the Ranger. Or had there been two shifts at all? He thinks there might have only been one. The memory of Susan like a warning though. Why? He cannot keep his thoughts there too long because he fears the island entirely now. Not just the water but Newfoundland. When he thinks of his life there it dissolves into a series of broken actions. Meaningless and scary. He should have asked Heather to come along, if only for the company. To keep his mind occupied and the creeping fear at bay. He wonders if there is any point to blind people travelling. He could describe things for her. Would one place be any different from another? Sounds, he guesses. Smells. The air. How would he describe what he sees? He begins doing just that in his head. The stone front of a building. The grooves where the stones are joined. An old man's long face. The way his hat sits on his head. The balloon in a child's hand. A red balloon shaped not exactly round. Red. Round. What does that mean? Just a shape. A colour like a scream. Or
a fast car. A siren. Is that what it means? When he turns from the bus window, he still sees these things in his head.

The opposite of blind.

An image there without seeing.

Heather, his twin.

 

After checking into the hotel, he finds the phone book in a drawer. Opens it and looks through the lists of tiny names. He goes over the pages. Searching for an ‘H.' He knows the ‘H' and how to spell ‘Hawco.' The name torn from an envelope he keeps in his wallet. ‘H.' Two straight lines down and a line across the middle. It takes ten minutes and then fifteen. Comparing the shapes of letters. One after another. He is about to give up. Slam shut the book, when he finds the pattern. He counts the letters that form the name. Five. The sequence the same. That's right. Then he counts the names with his finger. There are seven Hawcos before the letters change. And he wonders if he might be related. But he does not call a single one. It is enough to know that they are there.

He goes down to the fish market. The one the guy at the hotel told him about. Haymarket on Blackstone Street and Quincy market nearby. He wanders around. Aware of the crowds. The colours and faces. The smell of fish and sea. The sight of the ocean. The pull of the sea under a blue sky. Blue water not black now. Not towering high. His body wants him in it. That water wants it. What it did not already claim from him. At the edge of land. The toes of his boots over the lip.

Out of place for months.

His dazed eyes drawn away from the mesmerizing water. He scans the faces behind the stalls. They are friendly, as far as he can tell. Going about their duties. Their jobs. But they talk with an accent bigger than the words they're saying. They are not Newfoundlanders. Newfoundlanders talk quickly, wanting to get it done with. Why did he choose Boston? Was it because of the old woman in the apartment? What she said about her sister moving to Boston. Many Newfoundlanders there. Why would anyone come here? To find a place where they could settle. Or settle for.

The different types of fish he does not recognize. Then he sees the
codfish, and accepts the people in the stalls who want to sell it to him. The smile on his face that the merchants see. It is taken as a sign to do business. He does not want fish. What would he do with it? A full codfish. But he wants to let them know that he recognizes it. Codfish a part of his life from the time he was a boy. The sea in the background. Making him sweat more than the heat of the sun. He wipes at his nose. The noise of the people increasing as the day moves along. The chatter. His eyes wanting him out of there. Not knowing why he came now. His head begins spinning at the idea of where he is. How far away. A dot on a map. He should be back in Toronto. A place he knows. He should have asked Heather to come with him. She would have made him stronger. He could have whispered in her ear. Explaining the action. A darkness seeps through him. A feeling removing him from any known place. If harm came to him here there would be no one to save him. No one he knows. No one for miles and miles. A hospital? How near is a hospital? And will he end up in one again? Tomorrow he will leave. The sooner, the better. He is hungry. He needs a beer. That might be part of the problem.

His hotel is across the street from an Irish pub. A sign on the sidewalk outside. Inside, there are different types of beer from Ireland on tap. All in a row. Names he has never heard of. The people around him ordering: A pint of Guinness. Kilkenny. Caffrey's. Murphy's. A pint in a big glass.

He stands at the bar. Watches the barmaid pouring a glass of beer from one of the spouts. She looks up from what she's doing. Smiles to show him she knows he's there and not to worry. ‘What's your pleasure, hon?'

Blackstrap thinks what to ask for. A stranger from away. He does not want to be seen as one. The barmaid with long black hair in a ponytail. The blackest hair he has ever seen. Skin as white as paper. He wonders about her accent while pointing at the tap she was using.

‘Guinness?'

Blackstrap nods. The barmaid's accent is a pleasure to listen to. Fresh and fun-loving. Nothing like the bent and broken version of it back home.

‘There's a fiddler playing later,' she says, checking down the bar
toward a small stage in the corner. Other men at the bar waiting to be served. ‘Kevin Roach, have ya heard of him?'

What lovely music to her voice. Dazzling to the ears. ‘No.'

‘No? There ya go,' says the barmaid, wiping her hands in the sides of her jeans and naming the price.

The black beer he drinks is bitter. It is filling, like a meal. A black smoothie. An invented memory? How is that possible? He does not want another. He watches what other people order. Points to a bottle of what looks like normal beer. His head swimming a little from the quick drink.

He pays the barmaid and raises the bottle. The new beer seems light. Nothing to it compared to the other. He has another swallow. Looks around. The place reminds him of leprechauns and foolish shenanigans. There are cardboard four-leaf clovers up on the walls. There is a pot with what looks like chocolate gold coins in it. The pot on a ledge over the bar. Is this what Ireland is meant to be like? There are big flags up on the walls. A golden harp on a green one. A bird with claws on a blue and white one. Wooden pillars in the place. Wooden tables and chairs with people drinking and talking. The faces almost like Newfoundlanders. It reminds him of Martha's down on Water Street. A real place? he wonders.

He checks toward the stage. A thin man stood there. Then bending down to lift a fiddle from its beat-up case. The fiddler is wearing a Montreal Expos baseball cap. A bushy beard and moustache, and big glasses. The fiddler leans into a microphone on a stand. He mumbles a few words that are flat and lost in the noise of conversation. This one looks like a Newfoundlander too. The fiddler taps his foot a few times, then jerks his arm into action. Heads turn at once. Faces smiling right away. Recognizing that sound, like it's theirs to claim.

The fiddler keeps up for five minutes steady. His arm a blur. Fingers shifting in a strobe of generations-old recollection. It's thrilling to watch. The smile growing on Blackstrap's lips. His boot toe tapping along without him even knowing. The genuine goodness of it. The people in the room clapping and cheering. Getting noisier. Hooting as the fiddler speeds up the tune. The bow tilting up and down in a dizzying see-saw. A few hairs broken and curled away. The smile growing bigger on
Blackstrap's face. Amazing to see a man play like that. His spirits lifting. He can't believe the quickness of that arm. The accuracy. The music jittering out of that wooden instrument.

When the fiddler's done, everyone applauds. Loud cheers and shrill whistles. People clapping with their hands held over their heads. The fiddler nods once. Pushes his glasses back up on his nose. The beak of his baseball cap down over his eyes. Then he starts in again. And the crowd gets even louder. More hands clap along. More feet stomp the floorboards. Orders for beer are shouted out. Blackstrap has another. The barmaid winks at him. All is going well with the beer and music in him. Everything in the entire world. Him and the fiddle music. And everyone else, too. All of them in it together forever.

In time, he feels the need for a bathroom, and finds the wooden arrow pointing downstairs. He takes the steps, his eyes on the walls going down. Black and white photographs hung there that stop him dead. They are of Irish girls in dirty old dresses. Children with smudged filthy faces. Boys with big freckles that look like they're saucy as dogs. But the one that shoots him through the heart, makes him put one hand against the wall, is a dark picture of a lone man kneeling on a grassy cliff. With the grey ocean behind him, the man is wind-blown, leaning on wooden sticks. There are children knelt around him. Listening. The man is wearing a black suit with an open-collared white shirt. It is not a new suit or shirt. The man has black hair and his features are severe. Carved by violent wind. Thrusting in from out at sea. The howling roar of it in everyone's ears. The push of it. He will not permit it to budge him. The children there for safety's sake. Rooted to the man's words.

The man looks the way Blackstrap feels at that exact moment. The man steady and enduring, despite the forces battering him. The similarity is so exact it nearly erases him.

Why is he in this bar? Why is he in Boston? Why in Toronto?

The land. The cliffs. The ocean, and that man knelt down. Twisted and shaped by it all. In worship and challenge.

Blackstrap wants to steal the photograph. Carry it away with him. He checks up the stairs and sees the fiddler coming down. The fiddler winks and tilts his head. Blackstrap does the same.

The fiddler moves by on his way to the washroom. Blackstrap studies the photograph a little more. Decides he might get it later. The stub of his finger touches the frame. It does not move. He sees why. Four bolts. One in each corner. Holding it to the wall. Then he goes to relieve himself.

The fiddler is pissing in the urinal.

Blackstrap steps into the cubicle. The door left open behind him. He pisses too, smiling at the noise in the water. Then he hears the bathroom door open and another man step in.

‘That was some fine fiddling,' says the man in an Irish accent.

‘Nut'n to it,' says the fiddler.

‘How long you been playing?'

‘Since I were t'ree.'

‘Where you come from?'

The fiddler laughs. ‘ 'Av a guess?'

‘Maritimes by the sounds of it.'

The fiddler laughs louder. ‘Close enuff, b'y. Newf'nland. Not da Maritimes dough.'

‘New-found-land. You're kidding. I've got an uncle from Chapel Arm. Bud Greene.'

‘N'ver 'eard of 'im,' says the fiddler.

Blackstrap grins in the cubicle. Done pissing, he fixes himself up and waits until the Irishman is gone. Then he steps out. Made nicely alive by the beers he's drunk.

The fiddler is leaning with his back against the sink. Arms folded. ‘Wha' part of da island you from?' asks the fiddler.

‘Bareneed.'

The fiddler grins, his lower jaw coming forward a bit. ‘I'm from Outer Cove, sure.'

They shake hands while Blackstrap gives the fiddler his name.

‘Kevin Roach,' says the fiddler. He glances at a man entering the washroom. Then regards Blackstrap again. ‘'Awcos eh. A good strong Newfie name if dere ever were one.'

Blackstrap nods. ‘Dat's right.'

They leave the washroom together.

‘She's in a fine mess now,' says the fiddler, going up the wide
stairs. A sad shake of his head. He glances back at Blackstrap. ‘Da Rock.'

Blackstrap says nothing. Takes another look at the photograph he admires so much.

‘Not fuh'kn much left of da island now.' Then the fiddler stops and adds with great seriousness: ‘Still God's country, dough. Ya can't destroy dat place. Tough as fuh'k'n nails. God's country.'

‘Finest kind,' Blackstrap agrees, following after the fiddler.

‘Dat's right, 'xactly.' The fiddler climbs the rest of the stairs and steps up to the bar. ‘Jeez, b'y, yer a sight fer sore eyes, wha'?' The fiddler slaps Blackstrap on the back. ‘Wha're drinking?' he asks. ‘Me old trout.'

 

Soon, Blackstrap and the fiddler are the only two people in the world. Talking at the bar like they were born in the same room. From the same womb. Separated at birth. One finishing the other's sentence. Talking about people they know or heard of. Cursing politicians and life-draining corporations.

‘Da 'Awcos,' says Kevin, winking and tilting his head. ‘A fine crew dey are.' A few moments of silence to watch Blackstrap's face. ‘Dere's a ton of stories 'bout dem. Da 'Awcos of Bareneed. Christ, b'y.' He lifts his pint glass. ‘To yer namesakes.' Tips it back. Swallows and swallows until the glass is empty.

They order plates of fish and chips. Eat them at the bar. Plenty of vinegar, salt and ketchup. The fries crispy and soft. Warm and golden. The batter too. And the fish flaky like it should be. More salt sprinkled on. Fries rubbed in ketchup and eaten with fingers. The grease licked off or wiped in scrunched-up paper napkins.