Blackstrap Hawco (92 page)

 

(May)

A few welfare houses are left in the lower section of Bareneed they call the Gut. The townie yuppies can't drive the poor people out. Government houses that the yuppies can't buy, no matter how hard they try. Blackstrap still has a boat tied up there. The
Floating Nut
. Its real name:
Bareneed's Pride II
. There are other local people from the region
who've taken to gathering there, standing on the wharf and griping about the state of the fishery. More men there now that their livelihoods have been taken away. Too much time on their hands.

‘Dose bloody foreigners,' says Walt Drover.

Blackstrap smokes a cigarette, pinched between his remaining fingers, and stares out to the water.

‘If any of us had a spine,' says Donny Cole, ‘we'd be out dere blasting dem foreign vessels outta da water.' Donny is Johnny's younger brother. Johnny who died on the Ranger.

Blackstrap takes another draw from his cigarette, paying extra special attention to Donny's words. Still staring out to sea. The back of Bell Isle and a far-off horizon that tells him nothing.

‘We're eeder being robbed from 'r tol' wha' ta do.' Words that might have been from Blackstrap's father's mouth.

‘Right,' he says loudly, dropping his cigarette and crushing it out with the heel of his boot.

The faces of the men and oldtimers all look at him because of the way he's said it.

‘Right, wha'?' asks Walt Drover.

‘We'll go dere,' says Blackstrap.

‘Where?' asks Donny Cole.

‘Two-hundred-mile limit.'

Walt Drover busts out with a laugh, half amused, half disbelief. ‘Naw. What?'

‘Are ye at wit's end, b'y?' says Tommy Bishop.

‘We'll need some guns,' says Blackstrap.

The humour wilts from the oldtimers' faces. But Donny Cole smiles, just like his brother, the exact same grin. Andrew Fowler looks interested too. But like he still thinks it might be some sort of joke.

‘Guns?'

‘Big ones,' says Blackstrap, watching Walt Drover. ‘You were a gunsmith.'

‘Were,' says Walt Drover. ‘'N I never made no big guns.'

‘Navy guns,' says Blackstrap.

‘From where?' laughs Donny Cole, liking the idea even more now, interested as anything. Stepping closer to Blackstrap. Ready to go.

Blackstrap thinks for a while, wondering if there are any navy vessels rusting away anywhere. He remembers Halifax. The naval base. The guns would have to be removed. How to make off with navy guns? They could sail from Bareneed and surprise the Canadian Navy, pull up alongside and climb aboard. A bunch of Newfoundlanders making off with navy guns. Impossible. What they'll have to do is hijack a navy boat. That's what they'll do.

‘Navy boats in Halifax,' says Blackstrap, looking around at the men gathered there.

Donny Cole nodding. He slams his fist in his palm. ‘Fuh'k'n right, buddy.' He nods again, confirming the deal. ‘When?'

‘Halifax,' says Walt Drover, seeming confused.

The men and oldtimers check Blackstrap's face. Then give attention to Donny. Men of action. Then they glance at each other, their mouths silent. A few with jaws hung open in disbelief.

But soon a glint of humour returns. Tommy Bishop laughs outright. Blackstrap just looks at him, until the whole lot of them go serious. And soon a prickle of excitement passes from one to the other.

‘Da navy should be da ones out there,' Blackstrap says. ‘Protecting us. If we had a Newfoundland navy, we'd be out dere chasing off dem bastards.'

‘Like dey done in Iceland,' says Paddy Murphy, nodding.

‘Ya t'inks we can just storm da Canadian Navy!' asks Walt.

‘Dey won't be expecting it,' says Paddy, sniffing. ‘Who dey ever fight? Not a friggin' clue, the lot of 'em. We could take 'em.'

There is little agreement, but the idea has been laid down. And each man holds it in his head as he travels back home that night to smile or fret over.

 

Blackstrap thinks it through while Shearstown Line stretches off in front of him. The more he thinks, the more he believes it's possible. He has been inside the naval compound. The security is nothing he couldn't handle. Boats passing along the water all the time. Who would ever know? Who would ever expect it? Hijack a Canadian naval boat. Wouldn't that be something.

He starts figuring out cost. Where would they get the money? How
many boats to Halifax? How many men to take a destroyer? A lot of fuel required. He thinks of talking it over with Karen. But she wouldn't want him getting involved, not with the new house and all. She wouldn't want to be left alone. Any hint of bad news always puts her on edge. She'll just go to the bedroom and shut the door, lie there watching the ceiling, hiding from it.

There's a chance they might go to prison, be made an example of for trying to steal Canadian property. Federal property. Send them to a federal prison. One right here in Cutland Junction, so there's not so far to go.

Off Shearstown Line and into Cutland Junction, past Agnes' old house. He could talk to Agnes about it. He could call her and see what she thinks. An excuse to hear her voice again. She would laugh at the idea, but not in a mean way, like it was just something else he was going to do, something expected of him. What about Patsy? She'd call it a bunch of foolishness. Tell him he was nuts, then warn him, threaten him.

His mind reverses. Guns is what they need. A plan not so complicated. How to board those vessels once they reach the 200-mile limit? That'll be a problem. He thinks of where he might get big guns that will do damage. Huge guns. His mind imagining the sort required. And soon it comes to him. He drives right in front of it. There in the Cutland Junction Museum run by that little townie woman, Mrs. Foote, the one who tries saving all the old houses, and goes around picking up litter on her walks. He sees what he is after. Something of no use to anyone in this day and age.

 

Blackstrap stands outside his father's house. The extension to the living room that had been added on twenty years ago is being torn off. Some of the studs still there. The clapboard stripped and piled on the ground. This seems peculiar. If anything, the house needs more space. To make room for the furniture Jacob and Blackstrap have been collecting. It's like Jacob has it backwards. He needs more space, so he got rid of space.

In the kitchen, Blackstrap watches his father at the table. How to stop a man from tearing down the house? His father is interested in Blackstrap, wanting something from him.

‘Where's yer mudder?' Jacob asks, his jeans and plaid shirt covered in
dust and wood chips. His face grey and unshaven beneath a turned-around baseball cap.

‘Out.'

Jacob stares. Then he looks down at the plate on the table. Deep-fried chicken wings and fries from Ernie Green's. ‘Where's Sunday dinner?'

‘It's not Sunday. It's Friday.'

‘Dis,' he says, pointing his shaky finger at the chicken wings and fries. ‘Dis ain't fish.' He suspiciously tips the plate up and checks the bottom, like he's looking for something hidden. Higher and higher until the food spills off. ‘Dat bastard, Smallwood, were defeated. Moores booted his arse fer 'im after Smallwood broke me good leg over da head of Fidel Castro.'

Twenty years ago.

Blackstrap looks out the kitchen window. Two strips of land where the vegetable garden used to be. The grass lush and green there. His mother checking the sprouts. He wonders about Karen in the new house next door. When he left, she was repainting. Soft, pale colours: pinks and blues and greens. She paints the walls every few months. A new shade of some colour she's picked out.

‘I were wrong 'bout you,' says Jacob.

Blackstrap shifts his gaze to his father.

His father shaking his head in disappointment. ‘Yer mudder said you were different. She t'ought you'd turn out different. But yer jus' like Blackstrap, yer brudder. Just like 'im fer da world.' Pouring ketchup over the mess on the table.

The telephone rings. Blackstrap goes over to where it's hung on the wall and picks it up.

‘Hello?'

‘Blacky?' Patsy's voice.

He hangs up.

‘Who were dat?' asks Jacob, a mash of food in the hole of his mouth. ‘Were it da niggers?'

Blackstrap squints a questioning look at his father. The first time he has ever heard that word out of his father's mouth.

From the living room, the sound of a TV preacher.

Blackstrap turns and strides into the smaller living room with the new
wall up. He grabs the TV cord and yanks the prongs from the socket. Then hoists the TV and carries it to the kitchen. It's heavy, hard to be lifted by one man.

Jacob watches him carrying the load. ‘Where ye go'n widt Mudder?'

Laying down the console, Blackstrap opens the porch door. The outside door is there ahead of him. He comes back in for the TV, turns sideways to edge it out. Down the drive and heaved into the back of the pickup, the TV clunks in there. Wood against metal. He gets behind the wheel and drives away, his mind on Bareneed. Passing through the junction, he has to take a detour. The road blocked off for the Soiree dance later that night. Through old narrow roads and lanes he seldom takes, like going through a strange land that was always near. He leaves the community and crosses the highway. Heads down the long stretch of Shearstown Line until reaching Bareneed. Bumping over the rougher patches until he's near the water next to the Gut. He parks on the tall grass and drops the hatch on the pickup. Climbing up, he slides the TV toward the end of the hatch, then gets down again, picks up the console and flings it over the jagged edge. Losing his footing, he stumbles and tilts sideways. One hand going for the ground. He drops to his knees.

The TV tumbles and smashes. Sound not so clear with the white wash down there. The pieces of wood already afloat. He looks back at the land, toward the houses, to see two small shadows shifting. A boy and girl coming toward him. He rises from his knees and the children vanish. His eyes searching the open spaces.

When he gets back to the house, Jacob is not in the kitchen. He is in the living room, seated in his chair, watching toward the corner, nodding. ‘Dere were adventures ta be had,' he says to the space where the TV stood. ‘Dat journal were nut'n. I'll write me own one day 'n dey'd make it inta da finest kind o' movie.' He grins and laughs, slaps his knee and points toward nothing. ‘Dat's right, course I would. Ya knows it. I'd even play meself if dey took it inta dere 'eads ta ask.'

 

It took two nights. The men bolted sheets of steel reinforcement to the insides of their boats. Blackstrap did the welding where needed. The boats were anchored offshore, behind the headland, to hide the flame of the torch. The steel supplied from Donny Cole's metal shop. They had
figured out the pounds per square inch of impact. Then they had determined the thickness of the steel. Without reinforcement, all the boats would be sunk when the time came to make their noise.

Now, the five boats idle in Bareneed harbour. A warm, peaceful night. A clear, deep-blue sky with stars. Only lights showing from within the wheelhouses. Three twenty-foot skiffs and two forty-foot boats. On their decks, large objects covered with grey tarpaulins. Roped down.

Blackstrap thinks ahead to what he'll be doing out on the ocean. Far out to the 200-mile limit. Not close to shore like the trips he's taken recently. No land in sight. Paddy has said he wants to come along, but Blackstrap can't have him in the boat. He can't manage the distraction. Paddy either drunk or wanting a drink. Plus Paddy's scared of water, which won't help the situation at all. So Blackstrap knows Paddy was just asking to tag along for Blackstrap's sake. He had to come up with an excuse for Paddy to stay on land. Blackstrap's scared enough himself of water. He didn't need Paddy adding to that. It'd be a mess. He told Paddy that he could be their media spokesman. That makes Blackstrap smile more.

The wharf has a single man standing on it. Paddy with his arms loosely folded, watching the boats gear up. He shifts from one foot to the other, tapping the toe of his boot. Behind Paddy, another man comes up with the strap of a black case over his shoulder. Paddy turns when he hears the sound. The man is a townie from St. John's who bought a house in Bareneed last year. Paddy knows him from when he and Blackstrap delivered a load of wood. Blackstrap brought the man felled wood, trees that'd been sitting on the forest floor for a while. Seasoned wood, good and dry, so the man wouldn't be burning green wood, trying to light a fire for hours, the wood charring instead of burning. The man didn't know any better. And Blackstrap said nothing of it. If the man bought wood from anywhere else next year, he'd find out all about it on his own. The same man had been hanging around when they were loading the boats last night. A bit of an accent when he talks, but it's not a Newfoundland accent. Probably Irish, by the sounds of it.

Through the side window, Blackstrap sees the man raise his arm, moving his fingers in a way that means for Blackstrap to come nearer.
Paddy looks the man up and down, but Blackstrap ignores him. He checks his watch and goes out on deck to clear the line. No time for chit-chat. The man bends on the wharf to do it for him, brushing Paddy aside.

This pisses Paddy off because Paddy has been waiting.

‘Where you heading?' the man calls.

‘Las Vegas,' Blackstrap plainly states.

The man laughs while holding the line. ‘I know what you've got there on board,' he says.

‘Toss that line here,' demands Blackstrap, raising his hand.

‘You're going to the two-hundred-mile limit. I heard rumours.'

Paddy stands behind the crouched man. He swings back his boot, pretending he's going to kick the man in the arse. His face is tight with the silence of a grumbling curse.