Unbound (61 page)

"Long I travel. I explore, see new placez. I see Izaiah's light but I come too close." Now he looked out the window. "My land, I need to go back. Harvest. Time for harvest. To help famlee."

"What is your land like?" asked Reverend Foster. "Your Evanonway. I've not heard of it before."

"Treez. Much smaller, not so big as here." Mr. Island's eyes drifted upward as if the room were surrounded by the tall spruces and pines indigenous to much of Maine. "I live by the sea too."

"'Course you do," Isaiah said. "You live on an island."

Mr. Island smiled at his friend. "Yez. Island. It is not so different."

"What continent is your island near?" Reverend Foster asked.

Mr. Island glanced first at Isaiah, then at Dr. Hutchinson, in puzzlement. "Cont-continent?"

"Yes. Like Africa, for instance, or Europe."

The folds above his forehead deepened. "This I do not know."

Dr. Hutchinson placed a hand on Mr. Island's shoulder. "He has much of our language yet to grasp, Reverend."

When it appeared little else was forthcoming, whether due to the insurmountable language barriers or bashfulness on Mr. Island's behalf, the ladies removed to the sitting room across the hall. Many of the women pulled out needlework and conversed about childcare and matters of domestic economy.

Lydia suffered the evening silently, for her crippled hand prevented her from even the simplest of needlework. I caught her often peering across the hall, where the French doors enclosed the men in the formal parlor but did not hinder their thunderous laughter. No doubt she wondered about our mysterious Mr. Island and the faraway port he had sailed from. Evanonway. Though he was ugly beyond words, she had formed a bond with him, and I wondered if it would blossom into something more. Tilda Fernald noticed Lydia's glances too and smiled.

For my part, I closed out the inane chatter of the women. Mr. Grindle and I had not been given children, and my mind cried out to discuss something other than croup and pox. I, too, looked at the closed French doors. But to actually cross the hall and open the doors and join the men would have been considered promiscuous at the very least.

* * * * *

October can be beneficent with the sun warming the day and frost coating the ground by night. Or, the weather can be surly with heavy leaden clouds hanging low over the ocean. No matter what the climate, I observed Mr. Island strolling, or rather his shuffling equivalent, along the shoreline on a daily basis. Ensconced on Schooner Head at the base of the lighthouse, he would look out to sea. For hours.

On one such excursion, Lydia joined him. The wind swirled leaves around them as they walked, and from their intense expressions, I knew they attempted to communicate with one another. They did not watch the ocean for long that day, for Lydia grew chill. Mr. Island put his topcoat around her shoulders and escorted her to her parents' home.

Later in the week, I chanced to meet Lydia along the Shore Road as I walked to the village on errands. "Lydia, dear," I said, "what is it that Mr. Island watches for when he stands beneath the lighthouse?"

Lines creased Lydia's brow. "I believe he wants to go home and he thinks about that. He is trying to think of a way to retrieve his ship."

"Why, it must be shattered to pieces by now!"

"I don't know," Lydia said. "He believes his ship to be whole."

"Well, it's too treacherous to go anywhere near Heddybemps. He must resign himself to that and perhaps find passage on some other ship."

"For some reason, he doesn't find other ships to be good enough."

Over the days that followed, I espied Lydia accompanying Mr. Island to Schooner Head. It appeared they were beginning to understand one another much better now, their conversation and gestures animated. Lydia's laughter, a sound unheard since she returned from the mill, carried on the wind to my dooryard.

Isaiah Fernald often sat carving on a stick outside the lighthouse and barely grumbled when Mr. Island and Lydia passed by. His sunny nature had grown irritable at best now that the light kept itself. The egg-sized lamp Mr. Island had installed in the light tower didn't smoke the Fresnel lens or brass housings as kerosene once had, and so there wasn't even polishing to occupy the lighthouse keeper.

We fear that Isaiah's idleness may lead to his consumption of demon rum as it is the way with men of the sea. I pity Tilda, whose shy smiles have turned to anxious frowns.

Mr. Island surprised my husband and me by stopping at the house one afternoon. I led him to the piazza where Mr. Grindle sat reading in the warmth of Indian summer. As I turned to step back into the house to leave them, Mr. Island stopped me.

"Pleeze. Stay, Meezus Grindle. Stay."

I hesitated on the step and my husband raised a brow. "Wouldn't you like some tea?" I asked, uncertain as to why I was being detained. After all, it sounded like he wanted man-talk. To talk business with my husband.

"No, pleeze. I just talk. Talk ships."

"Well, surely you don't need me."

"Stay. Where I come from, mates are . . ." He paused, searching for the appropriate word. "Partnerz."

My husband was incredulous but did not protest for fear of offending our guest. I settled onto the rocker, frankly relieved to be off my feet. All the mad preserving of fruits and vegetables, the beating of carpets and cleaning in preparation for winter, had sapped the energy from me, even with the help of our housekeeper.

"What is it I can do for you?" Mr. Grindle asked. "Are you interested in investing in the new ship I'm building in Searsport?"

"Ah, no. I need
my
ship." Mr. Island jabbed a finger at his chest. "I need your help, George Grindle. I need my ship."

Mr. Grindle smoothed his mustache. "Joseph, I'd help if I could, but your ship is broken on the bottom of the bay. It's foolish to even think about salvaging it."

Mr. Island's wrinkled brow furrowed deeper. "Not foolish. Not broken. I know this. I know how to . . . salvage, but, uh, I have no monee."

"Money? You want me to finance the salvaging of your ship? I wish to help, Joseph, you know that, but not only is it a dangerous endeavor, it's an expensive one. Can't we find you passage on some other ship?"

"No, no, no. No good. Only
my
ship take me home."

I could tell my husband wanted to help, but he is, after all, a businessman, and Mr. Island's request was not a good investment.

"Obviously Mr. Island is in desperate need," I said, before I knew I was saying it. "It seems we must help him in some way. Remember Paul:
And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity
."

My husband glared at me, but Mr. Island beamed. "Yez, I provide George with macheenze that make his ships better. Faster than wind. Faster than steam. He gives me monee."

That gave my husband pause. Speed in shipping was everything, and he harbored a not-so-secret desire to relive the days of the swift clippers of the '50s; he often cited the record of the
Flying Dragon,
which sailed from Maine to San Francisco in only ninety-seven days. Our hardy down-easters proved competitive but lacked the glamour of the days of the Gold Rush, when speed and grace, not necessarily cargo, were the mariner's dream.

"You have machines that will improve my ships?" he asked.

Mr. Island nodded. "You give me monee. I make macheenze."

Once Mr. Grindle realized he would receive some compensation for his assistance, his benevolence toward Mr. Island could not be mistaken.

When the interview concluded, I showed Mr. Island to the front door. He paused on the threshold, only to turn around and look up at me with those queer black eyes of his.

"I am most grateful," he said. "You convinzed George."

"I did no such thing. You offered him a form of recompense that he found impossible to ignore. These engines you proposed will make his ships difficult to surpass. Sailing around Cape Horn as speedily as possible is more important than you may know."

"Perhapz." He rubbed a wrinkled cheek with his three fingers. "But you helped all the same. It is important that I return home. Your ships, they will not cross the ocean I must cross. The ocean I must cross to my island."

He bore his sadness well but now and then it resurfaced. I have never been far from home, certainly not across the wide ocean, and now I was sure, after witnessing Mr. Island's melancholy, that I never wanted to travel afar. I will remain content with the curios and stories brought back from foreign lands by my brother and the various shipmasters in my husband's employ.

"I do have one request," I told Mr. Island after a moment of thought. "A favor you may return if you like."

His sadness vanished at once in his eagerness to please.

"When you travel the lyceum circuit at the end of the month, I ask that you remember to mention women's rights and universal suffrage!"

Mr. Island laughed. "I will, I will!"

"One more thing," I said. "You must promise not to hurt Lydia. She's quite taken with you and if you were to leave . . ."

His laughter died abruptly, and the sadness returned to his eyes. "I am . . . taken by her too."

* * * * *

The rest of the month brought frenzied activity to Schooner Harbor. Mr. Island spent much of his time at the shipyard drafting plans for my husband's ships and working with machinists as they built engines to his specifications. The rest of his time he spent at the sail loft, where he manufactured special filaments that were woven into sailcloth. My understanding was that the sails would collect the energy of the sun, in turn rendering power to the engines.

Even when the sun hid behind the clouds, Mr. Island assured us enough energy would be stored to keep the engines running, and if not, the sails would catch the wind as always and continue to impel the ship forward. Mr. Grindle was well pleased. His ships would not be likely to falter in a dead calm, and he'd outpace any competitor to port.

One day he brought home a sample of the new sailcloth and the filaments made it gleam with pearlescent beauty. I could only imagine how splendid a fully rigged ship would look with sails bent and the sun full upon it.

Meanwhile, Mr. Island left the lightkeeper's house to reside with Dr. Hutchinson. Isaiah Fernald had grown surly, and we suspected the rum. Mrs. Fernald and the girls hurried through town on their errands, their expressions wan and bereft of joy. There was talk of the government relieving Isaiah of duty. After all, the light kept itself. In fact, rumor had it that all lightkeepers would be replaced by a replica of the device that kept Schooner Head Light aglow.

Mr. Island spent long hours poring over plans and drawings in anticipation of removing his ship from the ocean floor. I chanced to see him one evening through an undraped window, bent over his desk, examining the pages of a logbook in the glow of a candle. No one was privy to these plans but Lydia.

November blustered in, cold and rainy. Lydia waved a handkerchief in farewell as Dr. Hutchinson drove off with Mr. Island to the train station to begin their lyceum tour. Beneath the hood of Lydia's cloak I saw tears. It could have been rain but I think not.

Lydia spent evenings with me, huddled by the warmth of the stove in the kitchen, writing letters to Mr. Island. That is, I wrote the letters for she was not capable with her maimed hand. The content consisted of, as one may guess, sentiments of youth, the sentiments of love. I recall a few I wrote Mr. Grindle during our courtship.

She narrated, blushing girlishly as she did so, and I inked the papers wondering throughout it all how such an odd looking fellow, with all his deformities, could capture the heart of this sweet young woman.

"Lydia," I said, "what will you do if he is able to leave for his own land?"

"I don't believe he'll be able to do it," she said with complete assurance. "All of the men say it's impossible for him to recover his own ship. Even your Mr. Grindle."

I laid my pen down on the table and looked her squarely in the eyes. "It appears that Mr. Island is capable of a good many things. If he should succeed in retrieving his ship, what then?"

"I will go with him."

I shook my head at her confidence, then remembered love can drive one to do a great many things. "My dear, he comes from a very foreign place. It will not be easy."

"I shall manage quite well," she said and would speak no more of it.

Mr. Island wrote Lydia in return, and she shared portions of his letters with me, whether out of her own excitement and desire to share them, or out of a feeling of obligation toward me for writing him letters on her behalf, I do not know, though I suspect the former.

She showed me his fine renderings of Faneuil Hall and Boston's waterfront. He could not write in English, but his drawing skill was excellent. The letters, crafted by Dr. Hutchinson's ornate hand, spoke of the wonders of Boston and New York, and of the society there.

In a side note to me, he said he spoke on behalf of women's rights just as he'd promised. He called on Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton in New Jersey, the most radical leader of the struggle, but she was not home. How thrilled I was that he tried.

The Boston paper my husband subscribed to, however, told a different story of Mr. Island's exploits, stories of which I did not have the heart to relate to Lydia. One evening, as the bitter November wind lashed rain against our windows, Mr. Grindle and I sat in the parlor, he with his paper, me with wool and needles. I was knitting a pair of mittens for my little niece.

The house groaned with the wind, and the fire spat and hissed like an angry cat as rain seeped down the chimney. Over the cacophony, I heard my husband grumble at the paper.

"What is it?" I asked him.

He snapped the paper in his hands. "Our Mr. Island has made friends with every industrialist in Boston."

"This is good."

"Humph. Just so long as he doesn't sell any secrets of my ship engines." Mr. Grindle stroked his mustache. "It says here that though Joseph was well received by society people, he faced much heckling and ridicule while speaking. Apparently it is generally believed he is suffering from delusions borne of reading Jules Verne, that he is malformed not only physically but he is quite mad as well." He looked up at me. "Was he reading Jules Verne?"