Blackstrap Hawco (70 page)

 

Chapter VII – 1981

Charles and Diana

(January, 1981, 27 years old)

They fly out in a big orange helicopter from St. John's airport. Twenty men on board in survival suits and ear protectors. Their boots set down beside them. Blackstrap is hoping for a good view. An occasional ship. A sailboat. A tanker. A trawler. But there is only grey. Fog or clouds for two hours. There had been a stir of excitement about flying out. But the edge is gone off his hangover, so he sleeps most of the way. Just like the other men. No chance of talking with the noise: in-nin-nin-nin-nin. The constant high-pitch whining of the turbo blades. His head muffled from the ear protectors. Noise kept at a distance. But hearing himself too clearly when he breathes through his nostrils or clears his throat.

Somewhere between sleep and waking, he feels the chopper begin its descent. Out of the fog with the water in sight. A vast field of greyish-blue with a tiny speck in the far distance. The men in the other seats begin to move around. Sit up straight. Coughing and stretching their neck muscles. Watch through the side windows. With the rig that far away, it seems the chopper would be too big. A dangerous trick to put something so huge down on that speck. But as the chopper nears, the rig looms larger and becomes a possibility.

The mass of steel with its derrick poked up. Looking like no ship at all. More like something ancient and new, a man-made monster. The offshore drilling platform, the
Ocean Ranger
.

The sea is fairly calm today. Only whitecaps and grey skies. But he has heard stories of the weather. And has been there himself. Not on that rig. But on the water in January. Out for a lark just to see what the water was like. A foolish boy lost in an open boat. A memory best kept behind a screen of white. What the water can do to anything afloat. The worst sort of vicious winter storms gather in January and February. The months of shipwrecks. The
Carlysle
. The
Yarmouth Town
. The
Parry Sound
. All gone. Never the months to travel on water if avoidable. Time to be at home, in the warmth, with the angry sea out there on its own.

Take it or leave it. A job on the rigs or another trip to the mainland. And there was no going away if he could avoid it. He had signed up at the hiring office out on Bowering Road in St. John's. One hundred dollars a day. A Texan in a cowboy hat who must have been six foot five. Pacing the office and talking. Asking about experience on the sea with his big Texan drawl. Checking a paper to let you know if he made you a roustabout or a roughneck. Better to be a roughneck, said a young fellow next to him. The young fellow had introduced himself as Billy Cullen. There was a form to fill out. One that Billy filled out for Blackstrap. Lending a hand when he saw Blackstrap not doing it. ‘You remind me of me brudder,' Billy said. ‘He won't fill nut'n out either. You never saw someone so stunned.'

The chopper approaches the landing pad. Centres itself in the white circle. Tilts and drifts from a push of wind. Holds there, straining, before it levels off again. Sinks down steadily until touching.

A ship like any other ship.

The chopper door opens and the men climb out. Blackstrap's feet on the steel. He wants to get his boots back on. Pull the survival suit off. A nuisance the way it fits.

Off in the corner, he notices a man in a silver space suit. Holding what looks like a thick hose or a cannon aimed at the chopper. There's a window in the front of his silver hood.

Blackstrap waits while the rotor blades wind down.

Another man is there in a hard hat. Shouting above the helicopter. A voice with a drawl: ‘So, you're the new crew. Git on down and git your overalls and git on up to the drill floor. No time for pause with money burning away. Oh, yeah, I forgot to say “welcome.”' A smile meant to be something other than a smile.

They head toward a set of stairs and go down. The blun-blun-blun of engines in the steel walls and floor. To Blackstrap's right, an office with a guy sitting in a chair. A big bubble centred inside a glass on the wall. To the left, another room with a wall of radios. A guy with a telephone receiver in his hand. Another door with a red cross on it. Then into a room where other men are waiting. The off-duty crew ready to fly back home. Blackstrap wonders why they're there. What they're waiting for with the chopper up on the pad ready to lift off.

‘Git them suits off,' says the man with the drawl. He's come up behind them. The new arrivals remove the survival suits and the other men put them on. A few exchange stories while they do it. Two suits left over because there are only eighteen men going back. The steward shows up and takes them out into the corridor. Blackstrap glancing back over his shoulder to see the old crew climbing the stairs up to deck. Then the new crew clangs down another set of metal stairs. Crew quarters. A notice posted behind plexiglas. Four brass screws holding it to the bulkhead outside his door. He sees it in passing. Doesn't check it out, thinks maybe he should, but doesn't want to look like a know-nothing.

Right away they change into their overalls. Put on their hard hats. They introduce themselves. Billy Cullen, Fred Rumsey, Johnny Cole and him. All in one room. A bunk each. One stacked on another and a small table between.

‘Let's go,' says the drawl out in the corridor. ‘Almost noon. Let's go now, ladies. Come on down.'

‘Who's that?' Blackstrap asks Fred Rumsey. Because Fred has been on the rig before.

‘Senior tool pusher, Willy Cuntz. Last name's sumt'n like dat. From Mississippi.' Fred frowns. ‘Worst sort 'a prick.' The others follow after him. ‘T'ree t'ings,' says Fred, holding up three fingers. But there are only two because one of them is gone. Nothing but a stub. Billy Cullen is close by, trying to get closer, listen carefully. Wanting to hear anything
that might be important. Curious eyes and always licking his lips. ‘Number one…Now, lis'en. Number one, never get between anyt'ing that can or will move. Number two, never turn yer back on a piece of drill pipe. And number t'ree, always watch out fer the person yer working widt. Got it?'

Billy Cullen nods while walking.

Johnny Cole doesn't pay attention. Not a care in the world. Only interested in the rig. The walls. The rooms. Grinning like it's the finest thing he's ever seen. A fancy hotel in a big city.

Blackstrap keeps looking straight ahead. Up the stairs.

The men join the others on the drill floor. Right away they get to work putting drill pipe together. Thirty-foot lengths screwed into each other. Three of them making one long length that's stored vertically off to the side in the derrick. Blackstrap watches Fred fit them down into the hole. Machine clamps grabbing hold of each length and screwing it together tight. Just to be certain. The solid mechanics of it impressive.

‘Ten t'ousand feet down,' shouts Fred. ‘Two miles.' A good-humoured tilt of his head. He looks toward the driller in the drill shack. The driller's hands on levers. Calling out: ‘Watch yourself, boys.' All the while, the foghorn is going. Hnwwww-hnwwwwhnwwwwwwwwwwww. Dot-dot-dash. The letter ‘U' for danger, Blackstrap knows. Why a warning signal? Maybe just to alert other vessels that they're sitting where they are.

Putting lengths of pipe together for twelve hours. Near the end of the shift, with the fluorescent lights on above them, giving the space a fake daylight glow, a piece of chain lets go. It whips toward bushy-haired Billy Cullen. Blackstrap yanks the young fellow down just in time. The chain rattling and snaking off before losing its energy and settling against steel. The wildness gone from it. Someone put a sloppy knot in the chain. One of the new guys. Fred Rumsey shakes his head at what might have been. A constant string of things that might've happened. And then things that do.

Starving at midnight. Steak and fries from the cafeteria hot line and some apple pie from the dessert table. Blackstrap sits on one of the benches. A photograph of the
Ocean Ranger
hung at the end of each long
table. The one he's watching shows the drill rig in a calm cove somewhere. He stands and tries reading the words beneath it. Until Billy Cullen comes up and reads them aloud, ‘
Ocean Ranger
in Port Alberni, British Columbia.' Blackstrap sits back down. Checks over his shoulder. Billy Cullen looking at another photograph. The
Ocean Ranger
under tow. Being pulled by a ship on the smooth, blue water.

‘I heard why dere were only eighteen men in the crew goin' out,' says Fred.

Billy Cullen, not wanting to miss anything, returns to the table.

Blackstrap chews some steak and bread with butter. Watches Fred.

Johnny Cole watches, smiling while he eats.

‘Duanne Foley and his brudder got put off on a supply boat.'

‘Why's dat?' asks Johnny Cole with a laugh. A guy who laughs at most things. Skinny and tall. Wavy, coal-black hair and a long face. A mouthful of big twisted-up teeth.

‘Dis new senior tool pusher. Cuntz. Fired 'em. He were brought in ta get t'ings going. You and you, Pat Hopkins told me, dat's what Cuntz said, You and you, yer not working hard 'nough. I'm running you off this rig.' Fred does a good impersonation of Cuntz. Good enough to get a few chuckles.

Blackstrap cuts another piece of steak. It's pink in the centre, the way he likes.

‘What'd Duanne do?' asks Johnny, drinking milk. The question like he wants the punchline to a joke.

‘Nut'n right away. Dis new pusher figures he'll play tough guy 'n show us. So, Duanne were sittin on his bunk when Pat Hopkins came in and Duanne were just out of prison. Duanne's from Torbay. Got a job to please his parole officer. So, he's shaking his head saying “It's ain't right. Not fair, buddy.” Den he gets up and leaves the cabin. Just like dat. Had enough of it. Pat follows after him to Cuntz's cabin. Duanne gets in there, hauls Cuntz outta bed 'n beats da shit out of 'im.'

Blackstrap swallows the lump of bread in his mouth. Puts a piece of steak in there. The rig is swaying slightly. Just barely enough to feel.

Fred goes quiet and Blackstrap looks over his shoulder. To where
Fred's eyes are looking. Cuntz there, walking through the cafeteria, checking the men.

‘Tell ya da rest later, b'ys,' says Fred.

 

A shower and bed. Dreams of nothing except a blackness with forms that almost take shape. When Blackstrap wakes, there's a storm blowing. Strange energy in the air. Electric. The hum of the locomotive engines vibrating through everything. Fluorescent lights burning his eyes with brightness. When he passes the radio room, he sees a few men in there, waiting to use the phone.

He eats breakfast then watches Billy Cullen and Johnny Cole playing ping-pong. Johnny whacks the ball and Billy ducks and covers his head. Johnny laughs. Blackstrap catches the ball where he's sitting. Tosses it back. There's a video on the television about a flying machine. The
Gossamer Albatross
. A strange-looking contraption with big wings. And a guy inside a glass box pedalling. It manages to cross the English Channel and win a prize. Powered by pedals that drive a two-bladed propeller. It takes 2 hours and 49 minutes. The voice on the screen says. ‘Achieving a top speed of 18 mph and an average altitude of 1.5 meters.'

Madman, thinks Blackstrap. Fucking madman. But wonders about the mechanics of how it might be done.

The screen is suddenly switched off. Cuntz up there for the safety meeting. The men gather, sitting around while Cuntz talks on and on. A routine he's gone through a hundred times before. Nothing but words for the sake of saying them.

At the end, the men ask questions that Cuntz has no time for. Fred Rumsey has a few concerns. Broken locks. Breakdown of equipment. They've been calling the rig the Ocean Danger for months. Soon after it arrived from drilling off Ireland a year or so ago. ‘Eight fingers gone in two weeks, b'y,' says Fred.

Cuntz seems outraged. Furious by the steaming redness in his face. ‘Don't you call me “boy” or I'll run you off this rig.' His voice getting louder, shriller toward the end. His finger pointing. Jabbing at the air. ‘You just do your job. Do your job. Everyone. And keep your fingers on your own hands.'

Blackstrap wonders: Whose hands could they be on except our own?

The men are concerned about the storm and high winds. The rig shifting more than usual. Never felt so unstable before, one man comments, barely loud enough for Cuntz to hear.

‘This rig cannot sink,' shouts Cuntz. ‘It was built by the Japanese.'

 

Twenty-one days on. Twenty-one days off. He is surprised that he has survived and made it back to land. The unsteady helicopter ride to shore. Watching the rig turn into a fleck in the mist and fog. Battered by high seas. Solid as a rock out there in the middle of the Atlantic. Then the chopper up into grey turbulence. The gut and nerves not wanting any part of it. Out that far on the sea with the fear of death so near. Fishermen do not sail to sea in winter for a reason. Those words in his head, again and again. Fishermen do not…

But the money. Pockets stuffed with two thousand dollars in danger pay, he rents an apartment in St. John's. An old house on Military Road, divided up into units. Across the street, there's a church where he sometimes goes to pray. The Newfoundland Hotel is only fifty feet away. Signal Hill behind the hotel, up high on a steep incline that forms one of the cliffs framing the harbour narrows. An intersection divides the church from the hotel. Around the corner is Gower Street with row houses painted all different colours. The streets parallel to Gower run gradually lower toward the harbour. Duckworth Street. Then Water Street. Then Harbour Drive skirting where the big boats are tied up. It takes him little time to familiarize himself with the geography that is considered downtown. He walks wherever he goes, investigating the bars and clubs, and favours a bar down on Water Street called Martha's where all sorts of people drink: businessmen, workers and young people. He likes the mix of it, how they all get along.