Newfoundland Stories (12 page)

The next five days saw him scavenging for food and scanning the ocean for the presence of a large black sail. He'd eaten the few vegetables he had found, and most of the berries had, by then, withered with the cold temperatures and fallen to the ground. His main source of food now was the small trout that populated the little stream that ran through the settlement. He found it very difficult to catch them with only his hands, and he ate them raw, especially savouring the roe he found inside them.

In those five days Peder's strength gradually returned to the point where he no longer felt exhausted and faint most of the time. The blisters on his feet had healed and hardened, and he could walk again without pain. Yet, notwithstanding these improvements, he had finally come to accept the reality that he was all alone – perhaps the only human being for hundreds of miles around – and that without the others and the cooperative effort that had enabled the settlement to survive in this harsh land, he would surely die. He could not survive a winter alone.

On the morning of the sixth day, he opened his eyes. During the night he had dreamed about his mother. Her smiling face had watched over him, and her gentle hands had caressed his cheeks as they had done when he was a small child. He awoke resolute and uplifted. The instinct of survival had been rekindled. Peder knew what he had to do.

He faced south and steeled himself for another journey. With only the piece of sail canvas, he set forth once again – to retrace the steps that had brought him here. With the snow season looming, he knew he had to make haste. Without hesitation, he took the first step on his second trek, an undertaking that would prove to be infinitely harder and longer than the first.

Fifteen days into his journey, eight days after passing the beach of the massacre again, his strength began to fail, and for every hour he walked, he rested and slept threefold. He was constantly cold, even with both the sail canvas and his deerskin covering his body. At night he thought that he would surely freeze to death, and awoke several mornings to find the ground dusted with light snow or covered with hoar frost. His only food now was small trout from the brooks and streams he passed along the way. The berries that had sustained him for so long had since dried up. He was slowly dying on his feet, and each step forward was extremely painful.

On the twentieth day, he stopped and knelt to drink from a small pool. The face that looked back at him from the clear water was not his own. The gaunt haggard look, the haunted eyes, the sunken cheeks, the tangle of long red hair, and the red stubble covering the face were those of a stranger. He looked at his hands and saw, for the first time, that they were mere talons. He rolled up his sleeves and saw that his arms were like sticks. He felt his legs, and they were just as skeletal.

Peder knew that he could go no farther that day. He would rest here and try again tomorrow – if he could. He crawled into the shelter of a nearby copse of stunted spruce, covered himself with the sail canvas, and within minutes was fast asleep.

When he awoke hours later it was dark, and small snowflakes were falling gently from the night sky. As exhausted as he was, the events that had ensued in the seven months following his capture were vivid in his mind. How far had he come? He had long since lost track of the days. He wondered where his mother was. Was she still alive somewhere? He thought of Ralf and the others, Kjell, Bjoern, Gunner. Lastly, he thought of Asbut, his adopted brother, the skraeling boy who had transcended fear and hatred to befriend him.

Then, as he was drifting back to sleep, he thought he smelled smoke. He wasn't certain, and waited. Again the hint of wood smoke passed his nostrils, faint but unmistakable this time. It meant people, undoubtedly skraelings. Maybe Asbut's own tribe.

When Peder awoke the next morning, snow lay heavy on the ground. Sleep had done little to restore his strength, and he lay stiff, cold and sore in his shelter, still utterly exhausted. For an hour he tried to move, but couldn't summon the strength to rise to his feet. The smell of smoke still lingered in the morning air, and he knew that if he could only rise he might be able to track it to its origin. Finally, by sheer power of will, he managed to get to his feet and take his first tentative step.

Three hours later he arrived at the encampment. They all stood motionless, even the children, watching him in silence as he staggered into the clearing. He stumbled toward Asbut's mamateek, willing himself to remain conscious and stay on his feet for a few more minutes. Asbut waited there, as still as the others.

Finally Peder faced Asbut, close enough to touch him. He leaned forward until he rested his forehead against Asbut's. “Brother,” he said.

He started to fall. Strong hands grabbed him, hands that were compassionate and caring – hands of forgiveness.

Then, before he lost consciousness, he whispered, “Peder is home. Peder is skraeling now.”

AUTHOR'S NOTE

In 1960, Norwegian explorer Helge Ingstad and his wife Anne Stine Ingstad, an archaeologist, discovered the remains of a small Viking settlement at L'Anse aux Meadows on the northernmost tip of Newfoundland's Northern Peninsula. It was named a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1978. Archaeologists have determined that the settlement dates from around 1000 AD. L'Anse aux Meadows has been authenticated as the only known Norse site in North America. This is the setting for the fictional story “The Skraeling.” Information in the story is based on Joseph R. Smallwood's
Encyclopedia of Newfoundland and Labrador
(St. John's: Newfoundland Book Publishers Limited, 1967, 1981) and
The Dictionary of Newfoundland English,
edited by G. M. Story, W. J. Kirwin, and J. D. A. Widdowson (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1982).

5
Skraeling is the ancient Norse term for the aboriginal people (Dorset) of Greenland with whom the Vikings would have undoubtedly come in contact. During their stay in Newfoundland, the Vikings applied this same term to the aboriginal people they found to be living there, most likely the Beothuk or their predecessors.

THE DRUNK

M
y Blessed Virgin, I just can't believe it. Wouldn't the likes of him make you sick to your stomach?” AgnesO'Brien's disgust was as evident in her face as it was in her words.

“Yes,” agreed her friend, Rita Shea. “What a state of a human being! “ And to think that there might be a poor wife and youngsters somewhere waiting for him to bring home a bit of food and God knows what else. What a shame!”

“Oh well,” added Agnes. “It should make us appreciate the ones we've got, I suppose, as bad as they are.”

The indignant women veered out into the street, giving the drunk a wide berth as they scurried past.

Three days earlier their words would have meant very little to him. He would have ignored them, if indeed, he heard them at all.

But today they stung, hurt more deeply than he could have imagined. For Roddie Murphy was sober – and he didn't like it. Three days of abstinence had left him with the shakes, and he was contemplating what he might do about them. Perhaps he would try to track down Gertie; she was sure to have a drop of what he needed.

It was all the fault of that Salvation Army lady. He didn't know who she was, had never even seen her before, but he had recognized the uniform she wore immediately. Slouched against the front of the building, minding his own business and feeling no pain, he had known nothing until she had him on his feet and had launched into her tirade. He couldn't remember much of what she said. It was mostly just a jumble now, but some small part of it had penetrated his foggy brain and triggered some long-lost sense of conscience. Perhaps it was the part where she had said, “The world's worse sinner, even a drunken sot like you, can be redeemed and gathered into the arms of our blessed Saviour if you repent and change your ways. And if you don't change your ways, my man, you're doomed to roast in hell with the very worst of them.”

Whatever it was, she had scared him. At one point he had thought she was going to strike him, she looked so angry. She could have gotten away with it, too, he knew, because his own puny body would have been no match for her brawny frame. She had left him trembling on the sidewalk, resolved that he would give what she said a try. Now he wasn't so sure. Sobriety certainly had its downside.

Still, he lingered there on the street, postponing his search for Gertie, deterred by an image of the Salvation Army lady that was still sharp in his mind. He was hungry and hoped that a few of the passersby might find enough compassion in their hearts to drop a copper or two into the cap he had laid out before him.

He stayed there for the rest of the day, until dark, and then left to wend his way to Victoria Park where he would nestle himself away in his favourite nook for the night. He knew that his hunger would not be assuaged that evening, for his cap was still as empty as when he had placed it on the ground hours earlier.

Snug in his bower, he slept fitfully for a short while until the hunger pangs gnawing at his stomach woke him. He was still “on the rats” and knew that to stay where he was would be to spend several sleepless hours in hunger and extreme discomfort. He decided to leave for the waterfront. Perhaps some late-arriving vessel might be a source of something to eat. It was now three o'clock in the morning.

He headed east on Water Street. Passing the railway station, he was tempted to go in and try to pass the night, but he had been kicked out so many times before that he knew it was useless to attempt it. He drank from the public fountain at the bottom of Alexander Street. Water Street was deserted, a far cry from the bustle and din of day. Very few sounds disturbed the stillness of the early morning hours. He paused in front of the Haberdashery, where, by the glow of the streetlight, he sized up the merchandise on display. He wondered what it would be like to have the money to go in and buy a suit or whatever else he wanted. He ambled on. Near Beck's Cove, he felt the need to relieve himself and ducked into an alleyway. A rat scurried beneath his feet. He kicked at it and sent it squealing into the darkness.

As he stood there, he noticed small shimmers of light dancing on the building on the west side of the alley. He thought he must be seeing things. Then he smelled smoke. Returning to the front of the buildings, he peered in through the windows, firstly the building to the west and then the other. Fire! He started to flee. If he was caught there, they might blame him for starting it.

Then he heard screaming from somewhere above him. By the sound of the voice, it was a woman. Her frantic screams told him that she must be trapped. Again he started to leave: it was none of his business. But he was stopped short by the same flicker of conscience the Salvation Army lady had aroused. He had to do something. But what?

He seized an ash can and hurled it at the window, shattering it into fragments. He stepped through, careful to avoid the flames and the jagged shards. His hands searched the wall for a light switch. Finding it quickly, he flipped it on but only a single light somewhere in the back of the room lit up. In the dim light and smoke, he spotted the door leading to the staircase, but when he opened it, a fiery downdraft knocked him backward. He fled outside.

Was there another way into the premises? He went behind the building, searching for a back door, but flames were already licking at the frame. Then he spotted a scaffold thirty feet above his head – and a long spindly ladder leading up to it. It was his only chance.

He started to climb, his legs trembling. Halfway up, his fear of heights forced him to stop. With a great effort of will, he pushed his fear aside and continued upward. With each rung he passed, the ladder bent and swayed. He prayed that it was fastened at the top. When he finally reached the scaffold, he stepped gingerly onto it. It gave beneath his feet and he feared it might break under his weight. He held his breath. Then, on hands and knees, he crept toward the only window in the rear of the building.

He called through the open window, “Is anyone there?”

No answer.

He called again, as loudly as he could. He shouted until he was certain he was in the wrong place or that the woman who had screamed had succumbed to the smoke and flames.

He was creeping back to the ladder when he heard a feeble “Help me, someone.” Turning, he saw the face of a terrified young woman at the open window.

“Take him. Please. Save him,” she pleaded. She passsed a small squirming bundle into his outstretched arms.

“You're coming too,” he shouted. “Just follow me.”

Holding the baby tightly under his left arm, he crept back to the ladder. She followed him. The scaffold groaned under their weight.

“Don't look down,” he instructed. “Just stay tight to me.”

They navigated their way to the ladder. He felt the weight of the infant. How would he get onto the ladder with the baby in his arms?

“Wait til I get started, and then get on yourself and climb down behind me. You can do it.”

He steeled himself for the transfer to the ladder. The baby squirmed under his arm and for a second or two he thought he was going to drop it. He recovered, and when his feet were firmly planted on the topmost rungs, he held on to calm himself for the descent. With the young woman gamely following, his probing feet found the rungs, one after another, until, eventually, he felt the firm earth. Depositing the baby on the ground, he reached up and helped the young woman down the last few rungs.