Читать книгу Northern Neighbours: Stories of the Labrador People - Wilfred T. Grenfell - Страница 6

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It was Saturday night in the early fall when in our hospital schooner we anchored among Adlavik Islands. A number of vessels were there “making” the fish, which they had caught farther north. Many of them had called to pick up their freighters, or poorer folk, who had to come down to the Labrador fishery for a living, and yet had been too poor to get credit to purchase a schooner of their own. They had therefore taken passage on some already crowded craft, in return paying twenty-five cents to the master for every quintal or hundredweight of fish they should catch during the summer.

Among these, lying close beside us at anchor, was a small vessel, labeled on the bow the Firefly, though if ever in her early days she had possessed any claim to display the fascination of her namesake, there was nothing about her to betray it now. As I walked on the deck of our well-appointed little ship, I could not help feeling a real sorrow for any man who had to wrest a living from the North Atlantic in a craft so terribly ill-fitted for the purpose.

Her hull was obviously the rude design of some unskilled fisherman, and was innocent of any pretension to paint. It was probably the devoted work of the skipper, the father of a family of boys, who no doubt had helped him in that one great step towards an independent living—the ownership of a schooner. Curves and fine lines are difficult to obtain, and, compared with our graceful hull, this poor little craft looked merely a bunch of boards. Our planks and timbers were of stout oak and were all copper-fastened. Our humble neighbor’s were of the local soft wood, no doubt from the Bay in which he lived, and were held together with galvanized iron nails, at the very best. Her masts and spars of local spruce compared poorly indeed with ours of staunch Norwegian pitch pine. Her running gear was obviously old, and even her halyards were spliced in many places. Our stout canvas sails made the Firefly’s old patched rags of canvas look insufficient indeed to face the October gales she was sure to encounter before she once more reached her harbor far away to the southward. Her small deck space, crowded as usual with barrels and casks and fishing boats, suggested that if by any chance a sea came over it, it would go hard with the ship and all aboard her. But there was something even more distressing about her; she was evidently “clean” betwixt decks—that is, she had “missed the fish,” and the poor skipper was going home to face a winter in which little or nothing could be earned, yet without money to purchase a winter’s food, and still less to devote to the many needs of his plucky little craft. If she was ill-fitted this year, what would she be next?

Churches as we conceive them are “beyond the reach” of the summer fleets “down north,” but perched in many a barren island harbor on the Labrador is some substitute that serves—some fish store regularly prepared each week-end for its Sunday, or even some special house solely devoted to “any kind of religious service.” Ashore was a little building devoted to “meetin’s,” which had been the labor of love of one or two poor fishermen “who loved the Lord.” It was built of chopped upright sticks, the chinks between had once been stogged with moss, and the rough hand-sawn boards that formed the roof had once been made water-tight with rinds of birch-bark. The floor had always been the native heath—that is, pebbles—and the seats were narrow, unedged, chopped boards, seriously rickety for want of good nails. Death had claimed one of the builders; the other had gone to the “States.”

That Sunday was a really raw Labrador fall morning, cold, sunless, and dispiriting. None of the craft sailed, and no work was done, as is our wont in Labrador, yet it did not look as if we could expect much of a gathering to “heartily rejoice in our salvation,” for nearly every craft was “light-fished,” the season was almost gone, and “t’ merchants” had fixed a low price for fish. But the skipper of the Firefly upset all our calculations. For not only was he up betimes “getting a crowd,” but his own exuberant joy showing out through his face—yes, and his very clothing—was so contagious that the service went with a will. Indeed, this mere fisherman, ignorant and unlearned like his Galilean forebears, radiated that ultra material thing, “the Spirit which quickens,” bringing into our midst that asset without which orthodoxies, ornate rituals, and ceremonies are not only dead, but destructive.

This man made the best of everything. He moved the topply seats so that they were steadied by the outside walls, and arranged the congregation on the weather side of the building, so that their broad backs might serve to block the drafts out from the chinks. He apologized for remaining defects by saying that the holes above “will do to let ’em hear the singing in the harbor.” Afterwards, as we walked down to our boats, I spoke to him of his poor luck with the fish.

“I shall have enough for the winter, thank God,” he told me. He meant dry flour enough not to starve.

The whole fleet got under way at daylight, for all were anxious to get south. Soon after midday, we reached a harbor where we wished to see the settlers. The barometer had fallen a good deal during the day, and there was a lowering look about the sky and an ominous feeling in the air. So we put out two large anchors with a good wide spread, and buoyed them as well. The harbor was none too good if the sea came in from the eastward, and a sullen ground swell hinted of something behind the present light air. By sundown the little air had fallen to a flat calm, but the swell had increased, and the barometer was still lower. We knew we were in for a storm, so we gave sixty fathoms on each chain, and got out our big kedge on the rocks with a hundred fathoms of good stout hawser to it. It was almost dark, when we saw in the offing a small schooner being painfully towed into the harbor by some men in a rowboat. The calm outside had left her helpless. Inky blackness shut everything out long before she rounded the heads, but to our great relief we at last heard her a little way ahead let go first her port and then her starboard anchor. Evidently her skipper, whoever he might be, was aware of what was threatening; we were glad to have a companion, anyhow.

Soon after midnight it began to rain, and then, with scarcely any warning, the wind struck us. Everything loose was instantly blown away, but as there was yet little sea and we always kept an anchor watch so late in the year, we did not stir from our bunks and soon, as far as I was concerned, I was fast asleep again. It was hardly daylight when I was awakened by men talking eagerly in the cabin. The motion of our ship told me at once that the sea had risen considerably, though we rode easily to our anchors. The rain was pelting in torrents, or the flying spray falling on deck, one could not tell which.

“What’s the matter, Joe?” I shouted to our mate, whose voice I could distinguish. “Anything gone wrong?”

At the sound he put his head in at my cabin door. His oilskins were shining with water, and his hair was dripping also.

“The schooner ahead of us is drifting, Doctor. It’s the one came in after us last night.”

“Drifting! How’s the wind?”

“Right into the harbor, sir. There is nothing but a watery grave for their crowd if she goes ashore. The breakers are halfway up the cliffs.”

It didn’t take long to get into sea-boots and oilskins, and join the rest of the crew, who were on deck before me, watching the schooner.

“She’s only riding to one anchor, Joe, isn’t she?” I knew he could see in the dark like a cat.

“Sure enough, sir. She must have parted her other cable in the night. She looks a poor little craft. I expect her holding gear is none too good.”

We were sheltering under the weather cloth in the after-rigging. It was still scarcely dawn, and the murky sky, over which endless clouds were scudding, looked cold and disheartening. The roar of the breakers against the cliffs behind us seemed to have a hungry sound, as if they were greedily anticipating the death knell of the poor souls on the slowly drifting schooner.

“There are women aboard, aren’t there, Joe?”

“Yes, sure,” he said, “and children, too. ’Tis a small freighter, bound home.”

As we spoke we could see the deck getting more crowded, evidently with people coming up from the cabin.

“There’s thirty or forty of them if there’s a man, Doctor!” the mate shouted above the storm. “I guess they’re going to try the boats if it comes to the worst. They might as well go down in the vessel. They’d never put to windward in this wind.”

Meanwhile the schooner was getting nearer to us, though as the wind was blowing then she would pass at least fifty yards to the south’ard of us. It grew a little lighter as we watched. The schooner was riding to the full scope of her chain, and seemed, like some live thing, to be making a desperate effort to save herself and the human souls she was responsible for. As the larger swells came along she would plunge almost bow under, and then rise and shake herself of her enemy before he struck her again. Casks and barrels and heterogeneous lumber of every sort had all been thrown overboard to free the decks, and were even now being pounded to atoms on the rocks astern. It seemed only a matter of time before all on the devoted little schooner would share the same fate.

“Joe, that’s the little schooner that lay near us last night?” I asked at last. “I’m sure that’s her stern.”

“It’s the Firefly, as I live, Doctor. If the wind canted ever so little, we might pass them a line,” he said, hoarsely. “We can only fail, at worst. I’ll be glad to make one in the boat to try.”

“You’ll do nothing with the lifeboat, Joe. She’s much too heavy. It must be the jolly-boat, and she’s poor for a night like this.”

There was no time to be lost. Volunteers were plentiful for the four places in the boat. Who ever knew a deep-sea fisherman to hang back when life was to be saved?

The boat was manned as much as possible under the shelter of our own hull and a long fine line coiled in the stern, to which we attached the end of our stout double-twisted wire hawser. A second line attached to the boat was to act as a life-line in case anything went wrong.

“God give you strength, boys,” was all we could say as they stood to their oars, ready to make a dash to windward.

The crazy wind seemed to howl down with extra violence as the men bent to the oars, and a fierce sea, rising up, hurled the bow oars out of the rowlocks, and drove the boat some precious yards astern. The tail of it, topping over the boat’s rail, set the cox to bailing for all he was worth. Again the bow oars were shipped, and those herculean backs, toughened by years of contest with nature in her angry moods, were straining every sinew to hold their own. Now they would gain a little, now lose it again. Again an oar would be unshipped, and again the boat half filled with water. They were edging away to the south’ard, but making no headway. It soon became obvious that they couldn’t get to windward. At best they could only hold their own, and if their strength failed, or an oar broke, it became a question if we should be able to get them back. If only the wind would cant a little, there was still a chance, but to expect that seemed absurd.

We soon perceived that the men on the Firefly had seen the boat, and had at once taken in the situation. A small waterbreaker was immediately emptied, lashed to the end of their log line, and flung over the side. The schooner was now nearly abeam of us, and riding not more than four hundred yards from the rocks under her stern that spelled death to every soul aboard her if she touched. Everything would be decided in a few seconds now. Even our lads couldn’t stand the strain much longer. I think that, could we have read them, some of their thoughts were in little homes ashore just then. I know that I was thinking of wives and children—

But just then a wonderful thing happened. The empty cask was coming appreciably nearer to the boat. Were they making way? No, not an inch. They were still astern of our counter, which they had left, it seemed, ages ago. Surely it isn’t a change of wind! Our wind-vane on the masthead hadn’t budged an inch. No, it was just a flaw of wind on the water—a flaw, but oddly enough just in the nick of time! Almost unable to speak for excitement, we saw that our boys in the boat had noticed it. What would we have given at that moment to have been able to lend a hand in the boat! It must be now or never. They saw this also, and with one supreme effort our noble lads had seized the moment, and bent every ounce of strength to the oars.

If cheering could have been heard in the howling wind, we could have cheered ourselves speechless as we saw the bow man drop his oar, lean over, and heave the cask into the boat. In less than half a minute the line was detached, fastened to the line coiled in the stern, and the Firefly’s men were hauling it in, while our boat still had her work cut out to make the ship once more. The wire hawser, carefully paid out, was soon through the Firefly’s hawsepipe and fast around the mainmast itself. In less than a quarter of an hour she was riding behind our ship. True, her keel was only a few feet from the rocks as she rose and fell on the mountainous swell, but the line was trustworthy, and we ourselves were anchored “sure and deep.”

And so, when the storm was over, and our friends of the Firefly came on board, I don’t know which of us was the most grateful, the saved or the saviours. It was only a pot of tea, without sugar, and salt tub butter which graced our humble table! It was only a crowd of men in coarse clothing, with sea-boots and blue guernseys in place of broadcloth and patent leathers, but I know that all our hearts, as we gathered around to thank the Giver of all good gifts, were full of a joy not to be purchased with dollars.