Blackstrap Hawco (76 page)

From what?

He looks over his shoulder. Leans toward the aisle to stare down the rows of seats. A rowdy bunch of Newfoundlanders toward the back. Drunk already. Cracking jokes and singing. Lewd remarks made to the stewardess. Words with double meanings. A bunch of raw laughter.

A flash goes off.

Someone taking a picture.

Black beyond the oval window.

A face watching another face.

 

Yonge Street. Both sides with tall and low buildings. The longest street in the world, Blackstrap has heard. It runs off as far as the eye can see. A steady flow of cars rolling north and south. Expensive and new. And the occasional limousine, creeping by for the show of it.

It had been no problem finding a job. With his experience on the Halifax docks. A job handling the cutting machine at a toilet paper factory run by blind people. Even with his fingers. One thumb gone. Both hands still functional. Spreading wider to do the job. The missing fingers a bonus. When the woman who did the hiring saw them. He had started out driving forklift. Like his old job. Gloves with the empty fingers. An obstacle course if there ever was one. With those blind people edging around. Some tapping with their canes. Others secretly
feeling with their hands. Then he had been offered the cutting job. When someone lost a hand. At least he still had most of his attached.

On his time off, Blackstrap wanders the sidewalks. Anyone who meets his eyes. He tilts his head and winks. Solidly. In acceptance and in defence of himself. A hardness willing to give way. Trying to make himself feel more substantial. They do not respond. Like they know nothing of the greeting. Like they do not see him at all or are afraid of him. He has started on Bloor and worked east. Past Bay Street. Toward Yonge. Then south. With the waterfront in mind. He does not like spending time with the other Newfoundlanders. The ones who have moved up to Toronto and hang around a bar called the Newfie Club. They often act foolish and drink too much. As though it's their birth right to drink themselves into bleary states. Or beyond. Into unconsciousness. A joke. Complaining about a hangover the next day. They like to do nothing more than start fights and chase easy women. The uglier the better. Big-titted and slack-arsed. None of it ever raunchy enough to suit them.

He avoids those sorts of Newfoundlanders. Prefers wandering around by himself. Seeing things that surprise him. He likes to stumble upon the red and yellow shop signs in Chinatown on Spadina. He grows fond of the little people speaking in a choppy language he can't understand. All those little Chinese. Japanese. Whatever they are. Absolute strangers to him.

He likes to stroll down Bay and watch the businessmen in their sharp suits. Neatly cut hair. They move in and out of glass doors. Talking to one another with that look. Like nothing else in the world matters. Even their words in a hurry. Not even watching where they are going. Crossing streets as if by instinct. They keep talking and talking. No one runs them over. Cars screech to a halt for them. They don't even bother to look at what might have happened. A driver slapping a dashboard inside.

Blackstrap has a bad feeling about Yonge Street. The steady movement of the cars unsettles his stomach. Some kind of fake western town he's seen in a cowboy movie. All the low store fronts. The street deserted on Sunday. Newspapers and litter swirling around in vacant doorways. Bars closing too early in the night. What to do when the bars close. Just
a big feeling of loneliness. And the heat. Christ! It is like living inside an oven. The steel and concrete and the air so thick and hot.

He swipes a drop of sweat from his nose. The nub of his finger dangling. He licks the drop away. Continues walking. His feet sweating in his socks. In his boots. He should buy a pair of sneakers. But worries about his feet in something so flimsy.

There's a bar up in the Eaton Centre. Maybe open now, if not soon. A picture of a horse's head on its sign. He's been there before. Plans to stop there for a beer or two. Then come back out into the sun. A day that's a little more comfortable. Everything more acceptable then. Alive with a new splash of interest. He dreads returning to his room on Brock Street. There's a liquor store close by. Attracts all the crazies. No shortage of them. A dime a dozen. So many crazies in one place. One or two of them live in the same house with him. He can only sleep there. And most times he's forced to take a bottle home to get any rest at all.

He passes a big grey hotel across from a parking lot. And knows he is almost at the Eaton Centre. A group of black kids leaning against the parking lot railing. They watch him in silence as he approaches. One moves away from the others. Walks straight for him. The black kid flashes what looks like a black plastic gun. Held under his jacket.

‘Money for the subway, man.'

Blackstrap ignores the teenager. Keeps walking. He hears a long curse behind him. Spoken in a violent way. Words he's never heard before strung together. Learning to ignore what's headed for him. Like all the others.

Up ahead, a pretty girl in a skirt and blouse. A purse in her hand. Even at a distance, Blackstrap can see through the blouse. See her bra and the curves of her breasts. Maybe a hooker. Maybe not. He can't tell for certain. Maybe just done up to be sexy. Not really selling herself for money. But conjuring up desire. His breath shrinking in his lungs. He watches her face. The even whiteness of her skin. Like Agnes. Her skin. But this woman done up too perfect. Her lips outlined by pale red lipstick. Her eyes covered by large sunglasses that give her face sleekness and mystery. With his hands tucked in his jeans pockets, he turns to watch her pass. The length of her glistening sun-warmed blonde hair down along her back. Her high heels twisting into the concrete. While
she passes the group of teenagers. They make noises and call after her. Without a glance back, she raises her hand, gives them the finger.

Turning, he sees a man in a wheelchair gliding along the sidewalk. Blackstrap stops to watch the man. The wheelchair has reminded him of Ruth. Of a stroller. Of babies. He smiles and winks when the man catches his eye.

‘How ya doing?' Blackstrap says in passing.

‘Alright,' says the man. His arms working the wheels. Shoulders put into it. ‘Thanks for asking, man.'

When the wheelchair passes, Blackstrap turns to look at the man. People clearing a path for him on the sidewalk. Human contact. He feels good about himself. The way things should be. Say hello and get a hello in return. That man not so special. His mind filling up with Ruth. He had tried to teach her how to count. One, two, three. Over and over. Until she banged her arm down. One, two three. And she had laughed with her head hanging back. And he had cried with laughter. Because she was so beautiful. There was nothing he liked better than hugging that thin body. Those big eyes watching him. Knowing everything there was to know about him.

Up ahead, the sign for a bar. A man in a white shirt and black pants outside. Setting up tables on the concrete fronting.

‘Open yet?' Blackstrap asks. Stood by the man's side. A touch too anxious now from the long walk to this point.

‘No,' says the man blankly. His voice soft. His movements careful. Like a cat's. ‘Not till noon.'

Blackstrap watches the man move off. Going about his duties. The man is dainty. A word Blackstrap's mother might use. Like a small spoon and fork his mother owned. Dainty. The man brings something to mind.

‘Where you from?' the man asks half-heartedly. But smiling. Briefly looking Blackstrap up and down. Knowing by the way Blackstrap has spoken that he's from away. ‘Ireland?'

‘Newfoundland,' Blackstrap says.

‘Oh.' The man smiles more. Nods. A special secret. He lays an ashtray on one of the tables. ‘Makes sense. A Newf.'

The man reminds him of Junior.

Blackstrap wonders whether he should be offended. The tone that implies all is explained by that word: Newf. He licks sweat from above his lips. While the man sets chairs upright.

‘Another fifteen minutes or so,' the waiter says evenly. He gives Blackstrap another smile that thinks itself cute.

‘Alright,' says Blackstrap, suspecting that the man is a quiff.

Then the waiter pauses to lean with one arm on the table. He takes a good look at Blackstrap. ‘I guess the bars never close in Newfoundland. That's what I heard.'

Blackstrap shrugs. The way the man is standing there. He looks like a woman. His face. He is a pretty man. Definitely a quiff.

‘I hear they're open until three or four in the morning in St. John's.' The man folds his arms and nods. Almost like an accusation. ‘True?'

‘I'm not from St. John's,' Blackstrap says, shyly now. He wants a beer or to leave.

‘Oh, but you must have
been
to St. John's.'

‘Yes.'

‘Where are you from then?' The man sets one hand to his hip. Like he's challenging Blackstrap. ‘Hm?'

Blackstrap thinks of his parents' home in Cutland Junction. Then travels back further, saying, ‘Bareneed.'

‘Bareneed!' The man's mouth drops open. He shakes his head in amazement. Touches his hair with one straight finger. ‘What a great name.'

Blackstrap glances in through the glass. A television is on in there behind the bar. A news broadcast. There is a map of Canada behind the newsman. The east end of the map ending with Nova Scotia. Newfoundland nowhere to be seen.

‘Newfs are really great people. My sister has a friend from there, from Stephenville or something like that. Everyone knows one, I guess. That's what I've found. Either they're related to one, know one, or have one for a pet.'

Blackstrap offers a careful nod. Still not knowing if the man is being genuine or not. If he is being friendly or disguising his meanness. So many lilts in the tones people use in Toronto. People always complaining about something or someone else. What they do and to who.

‘Only a few more minutes now.' The man tilts his head up. Winks. ‘I'll let you know right away. Bet you could use a beer. It's soooo hot out.' He blows breath up toward his forehead.

‘Thanks.' Blackstrap watches the man move in through the glass door. He thinks of sitting at one of the silver tables. But wonders if it's allowed before opening time. He looks across the street. To another street running perpendicular with Yonge. Trees strangely separated from each other. Growing up from concrete. So many people in the streets. Believing only in themselves. To be so separate from everyone else. He watches them walk by. Not a word to him. They stare straight ahead. Or chat amongst themselves. Not one set of eyes meeting his.

 

Chapter VIII –1983

The Hitler Diaries

(September, 1983, 29 years old)

Blackstrap lays the old woman's packages on the kitchen table. The apartment is not large. There are paintings on the walls of the ocean with cliffs. A large hooked mat on one wall. An Eskimo on a sled. Huskies pulling it across frozen water. The shoreline in the far distance. The curtain is drawn across the window. On the back of the couch there is a cat. Lying there without raising its head.

‘What part of Newfoundland are you from?' the old woman asks.

‘Bareneed,' he says.

‘Bareneed,' she says. Thinking about something while she takes off her long coat. ‘What happens there? Fishing?'

‘Used to.'

‘Used to.' The old woman fits her coat on a hanger and puts it in the small closet by the door. ‘Yes, there's a lot of “used to” in Newfoundland.'

‘Everyone moved.'

‘You're not in Bareneed now?' She gives her head a little shake. ‘Your people.'

‘No, Cutland Junction.'

‘I left in 1950.' She casts her eyes around the kitchen nook. Until they settle on a four-shelf unit built into the corner. ‘I was forty-one. I never went back, but I have photographs.'

She goes over to the shelves. Takes out an old album and sits at the table. She lifts a pair of glasses from a case. Puts them low on her nose.

‘These were taken when I was a girl.' She opens the brown cover of the album. ‘Sit down, go ahead.' The sheets inside are made of black matte. Silver corners hold the black and white pictures in place. A few of the corners have come unglued.

Blackstrap stands there not expecting to stay. He thought he was just helping. An old woman carrying so many bags. Now, there are photographs involved. And an apartment he does not know. A space he feels he wants out of.

‘Please, have a seat.' The old woman's eyes go to the other chair. She smiles and nods, watches him with soft, friendly eyes. ‘I won't keep you too long. I promise.'

Blackstrap sits and listens while the old woman begins to tell a story. Who is in the first photograph. What that woman means to her. Where it was taken. What sort of special day it was. What happened to the woman and her people. The next photograph. Verna and Bill. Where they were from. What they did for a living. One was her uncle. He worked in a mine in Buchans. Died of lung cancer. A horrible death, that disease. His wife remarried. Back in a time when that was frowned upon. She went to Boston on a trip and stayed there. Running away. Never to return. ‘I don't know what became of her.' Another is of the old woman's mother and father. Stood together in some grass. The photograph is tinted brown and looks ancient. The woman in an apron. Black hair coiled and pinned up on her head. A hard face. The man with a cap on. His eyes in the shadow of the brim. They are stood as if they don't know what to do. Captured this way. Perfectly still when so used to moving. Out of place. They look almost ashamed to be in the picture. To be thought of in that way. And another is of her brother and seven
sisters. One sister went away. Most of them stayed. Her brother was a fisherman. John. A sister, Betty, worked on the American base in Argentia. Another sister, Alice, was a teacher. The nuns just told her to teach. That was it. No university required back then.

All dead now.

She was the youngest. Her fingers on the pictures. That look on her face with her mind lingering in a memory.

One of herself as a baby.

Done with the last page, she shuts the photo album and remains quiet. Her hands on the front cover. Her eyes watching there.

‘It's enough to hold in the head,' she says, moving her eyes to look at him. Happy enough to share what she's just said. A smile from her to prove it. But a smile not all the way happy, part of it sad too.

He does not know what to say. ‘Nice pictures.'

This woman with a desperately wrinkled face. ‘Yes.' She smiles again. ‘They are. It's all I have of them.'

‘My brother took pictures.'

‘Oh. Would I know his name?'

‘Junior.'

‘Junior?'

‘Junior Hawco.'

‘He was named after your father?'

Blackstrap nods. ‘Jacob.'

‘Does he still take pictures?'

‘No.'

‘Oh.'

‘He died in a mine. Bell Isle. Iron ore.' It is the first time he has admitted it. Spoken those words aloud. Why to the old woman? The stranger. He notices the woman's eyes going softer. He moves his thoughts away. Shifts in his chair. Too much to think of now. He watches the table and considers leaving. That is the urge that strikes him. To be occupied with something. Work. He wonders what he might do with his upcoming days off. He would rather work than have free time. There is a woman named Heather at the factory. Blind. He has no way of knowing what to say to her. Where would he take her if he asked? To a movie. Dancing. But her gentle smile. It
confuses him how much he cares for her, with no way for her to ever see him.

He raises his eyes. The old woman is still watching him.

He looks down at her hands on the photo album. ‘You never went back?' he asks.

‘I won't go back to face what's been done. All I hear about is when there's news of some sort of find. Churchill Falls. They took the hydro power and gave back nothing. Quebec gets all that money now, selling power to the States. I listened when they found the iron ore. Gone soon, I told myself. And it was so. Bell Isle flooded with Canadians and Americans. Then shut down back in the 60s. Pulp and paper. Cut down the trees and ship them out. Now, the offshore oil. Do you know anything about that?'

He shakes his head.

For some reason, she looks at his hands. ‘Oil will kill everything in the water. That big disaster there. The
Ocean Ranger
. You must have heard of that.'

Blackstrap shrugs.

‘Everything in the water. Dead soon enough.'

Blackstrap thinks of his father. How he would like this old woman. How she sounds just like him. They would have a noisy conversation. Over tea. Voices rising hotly and, eventually, laughter.

‘I won't go back to see what's done. What it's like.'

‘The same,' he says right away. Then he thinks about it. ‘No difference.' It is a mystery why he tries to make it sound good for the old woman. Like he is meant to defend the place.

‘Yes, you see a difference.' She reaches and presses her hand against his. ‘You do. It might look the same, but you wait and see. I see Newfoundlanders here. Come across them every now and then. I have a small circle of friends from back home. The men leaving because there's nothing left. New found land. New taken land. That's what they should call the place. Newtakenland.'

The old woman stares off, watches toward the curtain. Then she stands and goes over to pull open the drapes. Light floods in, so that Blackstrap squints to see. Gradually, a view of the old woman watching out the window. Old houses across the street. Low brick shop fronts.
With old signs over their doors and in their windows. Places where you can eat all sorts of cheap food. He never heard of any of it before. Can't pronounce the names he hears. Smells coming out to meet him. Dark-skinned people. He wonders how anyone fits in here all bunched together. The buildings and houses stuck right next to each other. No space between them. No land to own. No place to set a stretch of garden.

‘Have you ever heard the story of the black sea?' The old woman turns and steps toward the kitchen nook. The cat raises its head where it's lying on the back of the couch. It looks like a stray he used to see hanging around his house back in the Junction. The cat stares right at him. Same colour. Same orange, black and white markings. Stares and then lowers its head. The old woman fills the kettle from the tap in the sink and carries it to the stove. She switches on the burner and sets the kettle down. Then she returns to the table to sit. One hand on the photo album. ‘Have you?'

Blackstrap shakes his head.

‘It's an old Newfoundland story.' She smiles in a surprised way. Straightens a little in her chair. ‘You've never heard of it? I don't believe you.'

‘No.' He hadn't. Heather in the eyes of this old woman. That's what he had been thinking about. Why with this woman so old? Those eyes not blind. But the same somehow. Too pale. Seeing too much, the same as nothing.

The old woman waits with her eyes on Blackstrap. Then down on the photo album.

Soon, the kettle boils and she rises to prepare tea. She carries the pot to the table. Then two cups and saucers. She pours him a cup of tea. ‘One day the sea turned black and stayed that way.' Blackstrap's cup filled near the rim. She levels the teapot, moves it toward her cup and pours. ‘On the sea, there was no longer movement, but stillness. Blackness. No longer liquid but a void that somehow kept a boat afloat.' Done pouring, she sets the teapot down. Spoons a cube of sugar into her cup. Pours in a little tinned milk. Her spoon makes a tinkling sound while she stirs. ‘Help yourself…' Her hands tremble when she raises the cup to her lips. ‘So…' Her eyes fixed on him in a way that makes him feel strange. Makes him aware of the fact that he's in an apartment with
this woman he does not even know. A woman who had been struggling with her packages. He had offered to help. And here he is. A woman from Newfoundland. He does not even know her name. And she has not asked his.

‘The men would go out onto the black sea and cast their nets to fish. They'd do this every morning, as they had done before for centuries. The nets wouldn't make a sound when they hit the black water. There was only dead silence.'

Blackstrap sips his tea. He realizes he has slurped it. The next sip he keeps quiet. The tea going down, warming him. He feels his stomach grumble. It is near suppertime. He carefully belches behind his shut lips. His mind emptied now. Only the story from the old woman.

‘When the men pulled their nets in, it were as though they were dragging them through nothing. And when the nets came up on the boats, there it was: nothing. Just the holes. They'd return to shore and question each other about their catches, but every boat was empty. Not even a bit of seaweed. Eventually, they decided that someone had to go into the black sea. Someone had to see what was down there that was causing all the fish to stay away from their nets.'

Blackstrap watches the woman's wrinkled face. Her pale blue eyes bright and alive. Almost scary. Like they don't belong in the face at all. With each word of the story, Blackstrap grows more comfortable with her, the familiarity of her voice.

‘So, the next day, one of the younger men, a man who was known for his strength and his industrious ingenuity, went out in his boat with his two brothers and father. They sailed out early in the morning, as they always did, to reach the fishing grounds before daybreak.' She pauses to look at Blackstrap's hands. ‘Do you want a tea biscuit?'

‘That's okay.'

‘With raisins. You like raisins, I can tell.' She stands and goes over to the kitchen nook. Takes some tea biscuits from the counter. Lays them on a plate. She brings the plate and the butter dish over. Sets it in front of Blackstrap. ‘I can't stand tea biscuits without enough raisins. Raisin bread either. The bread has to be heavy. Dense. And the raisins have to be measured exactly.'

Blackstrap takes a tea biscuit.

‘Have some butter. Go on. I'd like to see you eat it. That's the boy.'

Blackstrap cuts the tea biscuit in two. Plenty of raisins. He uses the knife to blob on the butter. Then he takes a bite.

‘Good?'

‘Mm, yes, missus.'

‘Not too much baking soda. Some people put too much in it and it burns the mouth. You know what I mean? I can't stand that.'

He nods. He knows exactly. But he did not know it was baking soda that did it.

‘So…the men travelled under a black sky and on the black sea. Soon, it was only their boat and them that could be seen floating in blackness. The strong son said he would swim down and see what was the matter. They waited in the boat for daybreak, but the sky remained black. Everything remained black. Finally, the strong son said he would wait no more and stood and dove over the side of the boat. There was not a sound on his disappearance. He just vanished. And, of course, he never returned.'

‘What happened?' A piece of tea biscuit falls from his mouth. He brushes it under the edge of his plate.

The old woman sips from her tea. Watches him with those young eyes in an old face. ‘More men went out to try the same thing. By now, the women knew that the men would not be coming back when they went out on the black sea. There were tears when the men left. Women hugged their sons and husbands to their breasts for they knew that they were gone, lost to them, that the men would be taken.'

Blackstrap sits patiently and waits. He takes a bite. Chews. Swallows. Then he says: ‘What happened?'

‘That's all for now. If you come and see me again, I'll tell you the rest.'

‘What?'

‘I've got you now, haven't I?' the old woman says. A bit of the devil in her voice. She slowly stands and carries away her empty tea cup. Rinses it in the sink and gently lays it to rest in the rack. ‘Thank you for your help. I'll need a little rest now. Storytelling always takes the good right out of me.'

Blackstrap stands and checks the old woman. He does not know what to say.

‘I'll see you tomorrow then?' she says, still at the sink. Her back to him. She turns her head to give him a wink. ‘There's another story I'll tell you, too. It's about a shrieking woman who gave birth after thirteen months. You ever hear that one? An Irishwoman.'

Blackstrap shakes his head.

‘Ohh, it's a good one.'

 

The next day during work, Blackstrap is distracted. Lost in recollection. He almost misses the clearance call twice. Blind people wander near him. He doesn't see them. But they curve out of his way. Like they can sense his heat. He snaps out of it in time to keep them from the railing. Thirty feet from where he works, Heather at the control panel for the packager. All of the buttons in Braille. She must have them memorized by now. Everything in her fingertips. How sensitive they must be.