“Oh, the children, I mean, the children,” Dalton stammered. “Did you find their bodies?”
“We did, sir,” William answered. “We got Jessie’s three little ones that night and the women laid them out. But we didn’t get poor Irene for awhile. Her being missing was making Jemima’s grief all the more unbearable. We only got her body early yesterday morning. Her father, Joshua, found her washed up on the beach over there, just before you came in. He went searching every morning at dawn. He was determined to get her. Poor little thing, all beat up on the rocks like that and waterlogged. But the only thing missing was her left overshoe. She’s laid out up there now, though I think they got her covered, poor girl.”
Dalton stifled his retching. He said nothing. He tried to think of sharing a pot of tea with Cora in the breakfast room in their St. John’s home. He walked back and forth on deck as the men loaded the lifeboats with sugar, flour, and tea.
As they prepared to head into Point au Gaul again, he said, “William, you didn’t tell me about the third family made homeless.”
“Oh, it’s poor old John Walsh, Captain, sir,” William said. “He’s an old bachelor in ill health these days. All his gear and food is gone, too. He’s awfully upset. The women are trying to console him. Don’t know what he’ll do from now on…”
The young man’s voice faded away and Dalton’s sea green eyes fixed on a little house that stood with its back to the water. It’s a wonder the waves didn’t take that as a dare, he thought. He had spent his entire life on the water and had seen men swallowed by spume, crushed by sea ice, and numbed into statues by saltwater crystals. But never had he seen the Atlantic so cruel as the waves that had laced Point au Gaul that November night.
21
At Lamaline, Captain Dalton’s brow would finally have a chance to unfurrow a little. There, the members of the area committee sat down in the ship’s galley with the expedition personnel, all of whom were following the path taken by Nurse Cherry and the local men who escorted her. The members of the committee representing the strip of land from High Beach to Lord’s Cove introduced themselves quietly. They included C.C. Pittman, a Justice of the Peace and the committee’s chair, Father Sullivan, and Lewis Crews.
“You know about the tragedies that have visited Point au Gaul,” Pittman said slowly. “But no one has died here in Lamaline.”
“Thanks be to God,” Father Sullivan whispered.
Captain Dalton took a crumpled handkerchief from his jacket pocket and wiped the sweat off his forehead. He blinked rapidly.
“That’s not to say there isn’t a great deal of devastation,” Pittman continued. “Many stages have been damaged or swept away entirely. Dozens of trap skiffs are gone… it’s the same all along the coast, of course. And there’s even worse…”
“Yes,” said Father Sullivan, speaking with a firmer voice now. “Poor Mrs. Hipditch, Fred’s wife. She has no house anymore. It’s quite beyond repair, I can assure you of that. The family has six children—the two eldest boys have just started fishing with their father but Fred is away in Corner Brook working on the new mill there, I believe. Poor Mrs. Hipditch has lost their store, their Madeira fish, and some food as well. It’s a sad case.”
The priest lowered his grey head. Captain Dalton studied him.
“Jim Hooper, too,” Lewis Crews piped up. “Jim and Lucy, their house is all beaten up and their stage is, too. Jim is not even in good health.”
“Perhaps we can talk to some of these people and see what they think about their future,” Dr. Campbell suggested, taking a slim pen out of his breast pocket.
“Jim’s still over in St. Pierre,” Crews responded. “He hasn’t been able to get back yet.”
Campbell’s right eye widened.
“Oh, for goodness’ sake,” Fudge, the M.H.A., said. “People here go to St. Pierre for all sorts of reasons, not just to get a bottle of rum. Many of them even have family over there. There’s a long history of marriages between people here and the French.”
“There is no need for your rash reaction,” Campbell answered, turning to his government colleague. “I implied nothing sinister at all. I just wondered how Mr. Hooper could travel, given his ill health.”
There was a moment of silence before Dalton broke it.
“I’m governed by the weather, gentlemen,” he said. “We have to keep a close eye on it, this being late November. So I suggest we keep these meetings to the minimum time possible and do our business in as expedient a manner as possible. Our focus here has to be on assessing the need and getting supplies to the victims. We’ve got a fair bit of ground to cover yet.” Then he added with the slightest of tremors in his voice, “And I’m sure we want to do everything we can for these stricken people.”
Before the group dispersed, the South Coast Disaster Committee had commandeered all the stocks of coal available in Lamaline and Minister Lake had dispatched a ship from the town to North Sydney, Nova Scotia, Canada to get more coal for use in the villages of the southern Burin Peninsula. The committee also telegraphed an order of clothes to stores in the town of Fortune. A truck filled with dresses, coats, pants, and boots arrived in Lamaline that same afternoon. When the members of the local committee handed the new clothes out to families from High Beach to Lord’s Cove, frozen mouths broke into smiles for the first time since the great waves hit the shores that awful night. Little girls twirled on their toes, letting their new dresses blow full. Boys hitched up their new dungarees and nodded proudly. For the first time in days, the children of Allan’s Island and Point au Gaul began to feel like they wanted to put their coats on and go out to play.
But everything Captain Dalton feared about Taylor’s Bay turned out to be true. As the
“Very worrying,” said Dr. Mosdell. “All those people crowded into those few houses, and they’re small houses at that. It’s a health menace to be sure. If one gets a serious sickness, it’ll spread like wildfire.”
Suddenly heads began emerging from windows and from the sides of buildings; they put Dalton in mind of snails coming out of their shells. How different it is from sailing into a port and everyone comes out to the wharf to meet you, he thought. These poor people almost look afraid. Once outside, they went no farther than their windows and doors; they stood there, waiting.
On Mosdell’s orders, the medical staff left the ship and dispersed to the five remaining houses, doctor’s kits in hand.
When Nurse Rendell from the
“Nurse Cherry’s been here,” came a little voice from a corner of the room. “And she told us what to do!”
Deborah smiled. “She did. And we were lucky. We lost no food and I’ve been sparing it along. You’ll want to tend to some people, though. They’re homeless and have no prospects at all for the winter.”
Deborah motioned toward a row of children who sat on a sunken daybed. The nurse nodded and turned in their direction. The girls and boys lazily swung their legs back and forth, the biggest child scuffing her bare feet on the floor.
“We’ll get shoes for her,” Nurse Rendell offered, smiling brightly.
“Their mothers are in the parlour,” Deborah said, in a quieter voice. “They say they don’t want to stay in Taylor’s Bay. They want to go to Fortune where they’ve got friends and family. They think they’ll be safer there.”
Suddenly Nurse Rendell felt someone behind her. She turned abruptly and saw a small woman with great black eyes in a face the colour of the moon.
“I’ll not stay in this harbour another winter,” she said firmly. “I can’t stand the thought of it.”
