Blackstrap Hawco (86 page)

The reason Patsy is working is because she's pregnant. More money needed for the baby. She told Blackstrap when he came home, but she hasn't said much to him since. The pregnancy his fault again. Blackstrap knows Patsy wants her own house. Her own car. She doesn't want a sick husband. She holds his injuries against him. Blackstrap wonders why things have changed. Why Patsy is no longer nice. Why she doesn't do as he says. Why she scoffs at him whenever he speaks.

‘Your hair's funny,' Junior says, pointing at Blackstrap's head. The hair on the top of his head has grown back enough to have all of it buzzed down the same length. He goes to Jocelyn's to have it done. She asks him what number he wants. He has no idea so she shows him pictures. He asks Junior which one is best and Junior picks one. Jocelyn names the number and clips one of the comb attachments to the buzzer.

He watches himself in the mirror. The top of his head hurts when the buzzer goes over it. A woman working on his head with something electrical. His reflection in the mirror. The dent in his cheek. He grips the armrests of the chair. ‘Sorry,' says Jocelyn. The scar on his head throbs. He has lost weight, his eyes in a face not his. He wonders why he did not die. His hair falls to the floor. He had taken the bottle of pills and Agnes had called. The pills had put him to sleep while she spoke. He had died or he had lived. He kept hearing her. She told him he already had a crushed lower vertebra, one from before besides the new one. An older injury. He suspects it was from when he rolled the car six years ago with Patsy in the passenger seat.

Done with the haircut, he pays Jocelyn and gives Junior the change. Junior looks at it in his palm. He pokes at it. He grins and jumps up and down. Excited, he bobs his head.

Blackstrap stares for a long while at the boy. He has no memory of ever being that small.

Jocelyn gives Junior a red sucker.

The boy grabs it.

‘Ha,' says Junior, leaning forward.

‘Say thank you,' says Blackstrap blankly, his mother in his head.

‘Thanks yooooo.' Junior runs for the door and side-kicks it, almost falls over. Then shoves it open. ‘Cowabunga!'

Out in the car, Blackstrap makes sure Junior is buckled in. His hand trembling while he checks the belt. Even after it clicks, he tugs on it with his hand as hard as he can. His arm a mess of unsteadiness.

‘Ninja,' shouts Junior. ‘Ninja, ninja…' thrusting forward against the restraint.

 

‘You goin' out?' Patsy asks.

Blackstrap nods and pulls on his boots. A job just to lace them up.

‘Where?'

‘Dun know.'

‘Yeah right. How long?'

He doesn't answer. Dizzy when he stands up. He wants to shut his eyes but worries of the consequence.

‘I'm goin' out, too, with Rayna.'

‘Sure.'

She watches him while he turns without looking at her again, without seeing her eyes. Junior is upstairs playing. The boy a trouble to him. Why? He doesn't feel good. He feels burnt and wasted. Always in pain makes him not want for anything. He'll take a drive. He can drive now. A little further than before. He can make it as far as Bareneed and back. He will go and see the ocean, ride on the water in the
Floating Nut
. The water his again, with no fear of it. He thinks it might be the medication.

He drives at a crawl through Cutland Junction, passing the houses with people in them who he knows of. He crosses the highway and takes Shearstown Line down to Bareneed. The once-rocky road paved now. He passes the graveyard. His eyes staying away from there. He parks down as far as he can go. Then takes his time walking to the wharf. A few men are there who he's not familiar with. They're on boats with polished hardwood inside. The sound of them talking reminds him of hearing voices through a speaker. One of them on the deck in shorts says hello to him. He nods and watches out over the blue water. There is talk of a yacht basin being built here. More houses being bought up by
people with boats. Not for fishing. Pleasure crafts. His boat, the twenty-footer he bought from Doug Bishop, is tied up at the wharf. The one from the insurance money for his crushed testicle. He hasn't been out on the water since the truck accident and the boat might be gone soon. The lawsuits against him taking everything. He can't stand to worry about it, so he doesn't.

He stops on the wharf, smelling the sea air. He can't get his mind off Agnes and the face of the little girl in the car window. His mind makes him think the girl belongs to him and Agnes. Why this screwed-up thought? Confused by sadness. Worn down by whatever is playing with his mind. A million little things he doesn't even know are there.

He wants to go back to Corner Brook, to the hospital where he'll be safe. He'll take the boat if he can't drive. Patsy pregnant. Another baby. When was that? The time of conception. When and where? He wants to remember. But can't. The sound of Agnes' voice. The way his mind is he feels he is dying.

He steps down from the wharf. Not on land anymore.

 

Casting off, Blackstrap heads for Port de Grave, the long finger of land extended east, across from Bareneed. His intention is to travel north. Up over the top of the island. Then his head tells him different. North would be too long a voyage. All the way up and around the Northern Peninsula, then down. He should head south first. That would be better. He recalls the map of Newfoundland. The old map up there in front of the classroom. The map pulled down on material like a blind. He's seen it countless times since then, but that's the one he remembers. Something he should already know. Its shape is gone. He thinks on it and sweats from the idea of not knowing. The island a jumble of broken-up bits. He swings the boat around. Full out. Seven knots. By his calculations, it'll take him a little more than a day to get there. A change of clothes already on the boat. Toothbrush. Deodorant. No food though. He's not hungry. He's in pain. He must have dropped ten pounds since the accident. He forgot his pills. The idea of the pills being far away makes him unsteady.

In despair, he heads the boat toward Brigus. Then out toward Bell Isle, past the towering cliffs that shape the island, like a fortress. With
Junior there somewhere in a hollow shaft of the earth. Far beneath the sea. He remembers to switch on his radio. The squawk of transmissions. Small boat chatter and warnings that trouble him even more. Down around the Avalon Peninsula, he passes St. John's harbour in four hours. The sight of ships in through the narrows where the cliffs rise from the water. Buildings and houses just barely lit up in the cup of the harbour. It reminds him of flying home from Toronto at night.

Darkness soon.

He heads out farther from shore.

No pills with the night closing in. When the pain will be worse. He licks sweat from above his lips. Shifting the pressure from leg to leg. But pressure never relieved, only rising up his spine into his head. Impossible to sit down. Agnes will have pills.

 

St. Shotts. Branch. St. Lawrence. The clusters of lights far off, on land. The water black and glistening. And then the slant of sunlight shows houses nearer the shore than expected. Wharfs and fishing boats, the closer ones with people waving to him in the otherwise perfect stillness.

No time for sleeping. The pain tightens and tires him out. His stomach grumbles and burns. He belches liquid. Battery acid in his throat. When he was in the hospital, they said something about an ulcer. Medication he never took for it. Lay off the fat, Agnes said. Lay off the beer. A glass of milk with the pills. Watch your diet. Sure. He could agree with her, but do nothing.

Grand Bank. Burgeo. He knows the names of places. He has been through these waters before, but not in years. Not ever, really. He thinks on it. He knows the cut of the land. He knows the places. But has he been here? Not that he recalls. Not on a boat. Only that map up in front of the classroom.

Tracing the contours, now near the place of shipwrecks where Francis Hawco lived. With the new sunlight over his shoulder, he coasts closer to shore. Eases back the throttle and carefully studies the cove. What he expects to see is the graveyard of ships' masts. The shack on the shore where Francis Hawco is stood, watching, waiting for him to strike rock. To sink.

The pain easing up at the thought of a capsule broken open. Through
the wheelhouse window, he watches down into the water. The underwater hull of a ship in movement. The reflection of his own passing.

 

Port aux Basques. Stephenville. He refuels for the fifth time. Corner Brook by dusk. He falls asleep on his feet. How long is he gone? He has no idea, but wakes to the lop of water, his hand on the wheel. Land within sight. The sea with wind in it. Not so restive as before. Entering the Gulf of St. Lawrence. He sails frighteningly near a huge ship. The CN ferry on its way to North Sydney in Nova Scotia. He turns up the radio to listen for traffic. He checks his maps. Twenty kilometers away from the inlet. Then another forty kilometers inland.

Five more hours and he'll be there.

When the sky begins to darken, he looks for the shadow of the Long Range Mountains. A continuation of the Appalachian belt. Stretching up from Georgia in the US. Only interrupted by the Atlantic Ocean. A mass of faded blackness where he finds the inlet from the open waters of the Gulf.

The beauty of this place brings Agnes fully to mind. Why did she settle here? Because of the land. Not just for the job in the hospital. That wouldn't be like her. Not from here, but the land reminds him of her. Those mountains and the lush green. The inlet that he floats down. Maybe her family had people from here. He didn't know enough about how far back she went.

The smoke from the pulp and paper mill is barely seen, like a distant fire's signal. Life. The bow of a freighter up ahead. In time, its immense hull passes near him. The few men by the railings pay him only the slightest attention.

As light moves completely from the sky, he approaches land.

The reality of civilization when it was only him on the water for such a long stretch. Him alone with his thoughts only. And then upon this. Houses and buildings where hundreds of people would be moving around. They would be driving cars or shopping. Eating at tables. They would be on schedules, knowing little of the land occupied. The way he sees it, gliding in from miles away, up to the wharf. He shuts off the engine. Tossing out a rope, he steps up, pain slicing into his back, and slowly ties the boat, his feet on something solid, built with wood and
nails, attached to land. An ancient structure. The pain makes him feel like he's out of breath. A few men gathered in shadows on the wharf. Hands in pockets or leaning back on a rail. Wordlessly, they watch him pass. He notices them less than the sour smell from the mill.

The hospital is on a hill to his left. The stacked floors of lights. A boxy complex of buildings. Off the wharf, he hurries across the lot and up over a bank. Then on a road. Asphalt. Knowing the way. Not a big place at all, but big enough to be called a city. Walking, he finds his legs wobbly. The speed he travels is unnatural, too fast. He might trip or bang into something, his body too light.

He comes upon the parking lot like a puzzle solved. He wonders if Agnes is working. The inside of the hospital makes him too aware when he steps up to the information booth. Off of the sea and into this place, he will need to speak.

The woman behind the glass looks up at him. ‘Can I help you?'

‘Agnes Bishop,' he says right away. Agnes might be married for all he knows. But her ring finger had been bare. Were doctors allowed to wear rings? Jewellery. He thinks of this only now, his stomach knotting. Back in the hospital. Did he even leave? Travel by water an entirely different world. He checks his clothes. He might be standing there in a hospital gown. Time throbbing in reverse and forward through every inch of him. He glances toward the dark glass doors. Night outside that has brought him in here.

‘Dr. Bishop?'

‘Yes.'

The woman makes a call. She watches him like he's a patient who's escaped.

Blackstrap straightens. He does not listen. He looks down at his boots. Then at his pants. He's wearing jeans. His shirt is dark blue. Then he looks around the waiting area. A few people there, watching him with lazy wonder. Or watching the floor. A man leaned forward in his chair, rubbing his hands over each other. He turns back to face the woman.

‘She's not in tonight.'

‘Where then?'

Something small changes in the woman. She barely shows it while
she studies his face. Not such a regular thing now. But her answer is just that: ‘I don't know, sir.'

‘Okay, thanks,' Blackstrap says, already striding toward the door, limping now for some reason. It must be his back. He goes through the door, re-enters the night, and makes his way along the streets. A telephone book is what he needs. He wanders down a street and takes a turn. The people driving by in cars make him feel unusual. Wheels rolling over earth. He will not go back into the hospital. He feels that he has shamed himself in some way. There are houses everywhere with telephones on tables or hung on walls. How far from his boat now? How far from Bareneed? Turning corners, he comes upon a street with old shops in a row, then he finds a Holiday Inn on a narrow road. A smaller version of the ones he's seen on the mainland. In the lull of the lobby, he recognizes the fact that he must be quiet. The young woman behind the desk takes a quick look at him. A bit of a smile. But she's busy with other things behind the counter. He scans the lobby to see the telephones with books beneath them. Turning the thin pages, he struggles to find Agnes' name. ‘B' for ‘Bishop.' The sequence. The order of letters. Something he memorized. He works hard at it. Then takes a break to look back at the young woman. Because he has been making noises. His stomach growls. He licks his lips and keeps watching her until she goes back to business. Again, he checks the letters. Muttering with his finger against the page. His eyes not the best in the lobby light. He checks toward the young woman, but she's gone. It takes a second to notice her next to him, off slightly to the side.